she/her; nyc

apparently i wear my heart on my sleeve 💌

[thatwasthenightthingschanged]

folklore (2020) + favorite lyrics (insp.)

[overandunderthewaves]

in another life, i could love you

I think back to the generations before us. When distance couldn’t be bridged by texts and social media. It could test a relationship. You filled it with calls. Before that postcards and letters. Couples had to work for it back then, but they did. Wrote down every tender word and feeling, sprayed perfume on thin pages, hoping the other would be reminded of their scent. Hoping they wouldn’t give up on you before the next time they caught a glimpse of your face.

Somehow, in this day and age I feel further away from you than ever. Of course, it’s not fair to compare us to the stuff of lovers in an earlier century, but my brain drifts there anyway. Sometimes I think it would be simpler to love back then. When life spans were shorter and feelings were stronger. When it was more acceptable to look at someone and feel it in your bones, that you just know. I want to believe in love at first sight, I do, but I didn’t know the first time I looked at you.

In fact, it took a few times. A few pokes and prods before I looked up one day and saw you, really saw you, sitting right there in front of me. Hair tucked behind your ears as you scribbled furiously in our history class, and I thought, oh no. And it wasn’t love then, either. It was more like hope. Hope that in the future, it could be.

I don’t know if I can even call this love. A more fitting word would be infatuation. To others, maybe obsession, if they’re being particularly harsh. But my feelings don’t quite fit in a box like that. Where is the proof of love? All I know is I spent months hiding from you, being afraid to look you in the eye, and now in separation, I would give anything to be face to face. What a terrible dichotomy. To be so afraid that someone will see you that you never give them the chance. Then when it’s finally too late, to realize that maybe that was all you ever wanted.

I don’t love you. Love isn’t selfish. It isn’t late nights where I curse your existence. It isn’t praying that you want me when I know that you can’t. It isn’t not knowing what’s on your mind, but turning it over in my head every single day until the very question drives me insane.

So what is love, then? Whatever it is, it’s not this.

[overandunderthewaves]

may 9th, 9:19 pm

there are three bottles of alcohol hidden in my room. a bottle of whiskey, for when i miss you during the day. a bottle of vodka, for when i miss you at night. and a bottle of wine to celebrate the next time i see your face. needless to say, the wine has reminded untouched for quite some time. these days you seem more like a dream than a reality. the only proof i have that we were ever really real are the texts we exchanged that i can’t tear my mind away from. i wrote you a love letter. now, you have a tangible reminder of my feelings and i’m stuck with half-formed drunk memories that are slowly fading away. somehow, it is just like me to be in this position-my heart set on a girl i can’t have. others can bend over backward, but i only see you, even when you don’t want me to. so i’m pouring a concoction of lemonade and vodka, hoping to drown out the background noise of my brain- the track thay repeats over and over, i miss you, i miss you, i miss you. please call me so i can be reminded that this wasn’t all in my head. i type a text, then give up, frustrated to not find the right words. i know you don’t want to hear from me anyway- my pleas for attention go unanswered. and each day, though the distance between us isn’t growing, i feel further away than ever. feelings of guilt threaten to swallow me whole. it’s been a month now, and i’ve replenished the vodka and whiskey so much the twins at the liquor store recognize my face. i wonder if they can see the heartbreak splashed all over it. still, i long for the day i can break out that bottle of cheap white wine. i’ll pour it in a glass over ice and toast to us. toast to you.

[vodkakilledtheteen]

“You were the first person to ever love me. And I think that’s why I’m all messed up in the head now. These days I can’t think about anything else. I can just think about you and I sitting on a rooftop in the middle of the night, and drinking cheap beer from the gas station down the road. We rambled about life. The good things. The bad things. A mixture of the good and bad. Our words sometimes felt like fire but we knew exactly what to say to prevent it from burning our mind. Or maybe that was just the case for me. Who knows. I think I might be going crazy. But who should I blame? you for walking away at 8pm the other night, or me for thinking you were like the stars that always come out at night? You were the first person to ever love me, and right now it feels like you’re not going to be the first person who loves me and leaves. Thanks to you, I’ve ditched my heart. I threw it out into the ocean the other day. Hoping it’ll drown and maybe then you’ll come running to save me.”

— Alexa Evangelista, the book I’ll never finish writing

[skinhorses]

tender quotes:

1.  “The number of hours we have together is actually not so large. Please linger near the door uncomfortably instead of just leaving. Please forget your scarf in my life and come back later for it.” (mikko harvey, from “for m,”)

2.  “I still feel like the world is a piece of bread, I’m holding out half to you.” (eileen myles)

3. “Wherever you are it’s okay. You can come back from it. Whatever happened to you down there, whatever the world looks like now, that’s not how it always looks. That’s not how it’s always going to look. There’s more. There’s always more.” (patrick ness, from “more than this”)

4.  “I was making dinner and I got a message. Go look outside, she said, go look at the sunset. My apartment is small, with four rooms and two windows that don’t see much light so I had no idea. I pulled my coat on and hurried out. I was running to this sunset, suddenly the only thing that mattered. I hurried past the taller buildings to the park and the sky was leaking shades of pink and purple. It was beautiful and fleeting, there one minute and gone the next. I would’ve missed it; I almost kissed it. And so I started thinking, how great it would be to get a nudge, a tap on your shoulder, a moment or two before your life changes. Stop what you’re doing and look around, you’ll want to remember this later. In a minute, you’re going to fall in love.” (kelsey danielle, from “unexpected sunset”)

5.  “Today is a day like any other: twenty-four hours, a little sunshine, a little rain. Listen, says ambition, nervously shifting her weight from one boot to another―why don’t you get going? For there I am, in the mossy shadows, under the trees. And to tell the truth I don’t want to let go of the wrists of idleness, I don’t want to sell my life for money, I don’t even want to come in out of the rain.” (mary oliver, from “black oaks”)

[vodkakilledtheteen]

“I’m tired of the mixed signals. To be honest it’s been driving me to hell and back. There are days you look at me like I’m the one, but sometimes your eyes go blank and my thoughts swallow my emotions until everything is blurry. I want the mixed signals to stop. Do you like me or do you just see me as someone who’s just there to mess around? I want to give you a taste of my heart, but I’m scared that you’ll think it’s way too bitter, and you just prefer something sweeter than me. Maybe it’s me. Maybe I’m the one causing all of these mixed signals.”

— —Alexa Evangelista, random #4

[sunsetico-deactivated20250705]

“each love poem i have come to assemble has a dash of exaggeration in it. truth be told, i have never loved so greatly, so freely, so desperately. i find myself holding back forever, holding back every single fibre and nerve and butterfly in my body. but i am tired of holding back. i want to fall head-to-toe, madly in love. i want to feel what it is to be able to throw my love away and know with absolute certainty this love will come back to me because you’ll give your equally free and honest love, to me.”

— i find myself holding back forever.

[moonlitpoems]

i always set high expectations for myself and i think i pass it onto others as well. maybe some form of expectation is normal, but feeling let down by a situation that i created in my mind is a different form of depression. i knew it would only hurt me, but i let the thoughts become what i want my reality to be and expect others to know. there isn’t fairness in this. i create these painful situations. and i’m the only one who gets hurt.

j.e.b. (( the birthday blues ))

[wlw-affirmations]

I would give anything to be quarantined with you. 

[overandunderthewaves]

you are nervous and i am drunk when you call me at 1am two weeks after i swore i’d never talk to you again. i suppose it’s my fault for getting us here but my heart leaps when i hear your nervous breaths hitching over the phone, the pauses between your words. i have rendered you speechless, unable to communicate. you stutter over your words like a 5th grader on the first day of school, scared yet so full of hope. and each one melts my heart. i am glad you can’t spell the rosé on my breath when your voice finally forms coherent sentences over the phone. another pause, you’re not good at this but neither am i. i know this is hard for you, and as hard as it is for me, i can’t help but laugh internally about the sheer impossibility of it all. of a person receiving my love, receiving my feelings and having it stick with them. i miss talking to you, you say. i feel like i am floating. two weeks ago, i sent you a letter pouring out my own affections. you’ve rejected me before, and you rejected me after, but you call me now desperate and yearning. i don’t know what to believe, but i hear the quiver in your voice. the my-heart-could-break-at-any-moment quiver and i know you’re pouring your heart out, oh God, just as much as i was that day i sent my letter to you in the mail. i guess i have to accept that this is what your feelings look like. i want to touch you but you are miles away. you end the call too soon, and i wonder what to do now, where to go now. aimlessly, i try to quiet my mind and rest. when i sleep, i know i’ll dream of you.

[ink-and-oceans]

“I look at myself in the mirror with a few broken pieces of my heart in hand wondering what collage of a fake face I will make with them today. Excited? Or do I simply pretend to be happy? Do I even have the strength to pull off a smile anymore?”

— tara love / the breakdown as i sit on the bathroom counter

[overandunderthewaves]

i wake up at noon and fight every nerve in my body to try to put my restless mind back to sleep. these days, i find it’s easier to not be awake. i push the clock, eleven, twelve, one, see how long i can stay in bed before i give up at last and rise with everyone else. walking through life it feels like a dream. streets empty for the first time in ages, restaurants still open, but bare of all tables and chairs. the people about wander aimlessly, not really any place to go, not really anything to do. everything is unavoidable, but i will avoid it, throw my phone into a hole and try to pause everything around me, it’s not so difficult. yesterday i swallowed a fistful of meds with a combination of sprite and vodka. i would feel worse about it, but after a week of not taking them, if i can wash it down with something that makes the pill less bitter to swallow, it’s a win in my book. this empty life makes me feel just as hollow inside. these days, every bone in my body itches to do something reckless, something to disrupt the monotony and complacency of where i am now. raspberry vodka plagues my days, strawberry melatonin my nights. i live between episodes of the same old shows, searching for something to make me feel the way i used to. it never does. can’t recapture the feeling of childhood, would never want to replicate the feeling of my teenage years, and nothing seems to inspire hope for my adulthood. my past, present, and future bleed together as time looses meaning to endless days. wake up. count down the minutes until i can fall back asleep. dream of all the things i never allow myself in the day. repeat. things are bearable until they aren’t. my life is a story i wish i could stop writing. just focus on your breathing. inhale gratitude. exhale tension. inhale hope. exhale fear. inhale. exhale. please just breathe.

some thoughts on the quarantine

[inkskinned]

despite everything, i’m still writing poetry about you. always waiting for you to text me. always telling everybody listening: that’s over and done and behind me and i’m doing wonderfully. but while wine drunk i’m scrolling and re-scrolling your feed. block you just to unblock you to see if you miss me. last night i dreamed about you, all beautiful and smiling, and you showed up with a wilting plant and said: admit it, you missed me. i hate knowing i don’t even need an apology. you could just walk back into my life and own me. it was always like that with you: something about you just buried in me. a dying fish saying they still love the lure. i turn around and find myself coming to you like bees come to clover.

despite all my growth and denial i know. if you rolled in, i’d roll over. 

[i-wrotethisforme]

Sometimes people can’t love you and it has nothing to do with you

[overandunderthewaves]

Falling for you

is like skiing

You once told me that

you hated everything about it.

And I agreed, partly because I was in a bad place

but partly because you were right.

It’s a glorified sport for the rich and white

Like our history teacher who bears

The hunter green of the Dartmouth ski team

As his only personality trait.

You wake up early

Drag your feet into leaden boots heavier than the burdens you bear every day

Listen to the clink of them against the snow like nails on a chalkboard

You wait

(aaaaaand you wait)

For lift tickets and queues

Finally, you reach the top of the mountain

The briefest moment of peace.

It is cold, you are always cold

Sometimes it feels like you’ll never be warm again.

But when I go down that slope I feel invincible

Weaving in and out of trees

Bouncing over moguls that shake my entire being

Spraying my companions with snow at the bottom of the hill

When the slope comes to an end, the falling is over

I’ve hit the ground.

But God, I love the falling.

You once asked me if it was even worth it.

Skiing, you meant

If the only part you enjoyed was the racing of your heart down the mountain.

It is, I said. It is worth it.

And I’d do it all over again.

In fact, I do

Because every time I get to the bottom of the hill,

There are more queues

There are rude strangers, dirty looks

There is still the cold, unshakable in my bones

But I drag myself back up that mountain

Still entranced by the way the light hits the snow

A glimmer of hope rising in my throat so real I can taste it

So hot for a second I forget the ice around me

When I finally reach the top

And find myself tumbling down again.

[overandunderthewaves]

i am terrified that i am no good at love. that maybe all my years of pouring love into the wrong people has left my own well dry. that i cannot see good in the eyes of people who hold me that way, only crave the people who don’t desire me the same. and maybe i’m right. maybe my heart left with the last girl i loved who told me that she never meant to hurt me, it just sort of happened. maybe it was gone long beforehand, packed bags for boston with the girl before her. maybe it sailed across the sea to get away, but couldn’t seem to escape my messages. these days i go to dates empty handed, wanting to offer my heart, my whole heart, but grasping at air when asked to hand it over. it’s on the tip of my tongue, but not quite there, the words to accept the love i know others so desperately want to give me. i am learning how to give love to others while still leaving some for myself in return. maybe one day i’ll get all those pieces of myself, my heart back. until then, on dates, i give a promise. an i owe you. one day, when i have enough to give, i will.

-on giving and receiving love

[compljcated]

“it’s summer again and my hair has reached my waist i’ve stopped pretending that i don’t miss you and i’ve stopped trying to convince myself that you miss me too did you know my father started drinking again? did you know that my parents are fighting again? did you know i couldn’t get up this morning? i’ve tried to ignore your side of the bed but it’s not warm anymore i can’t remember what your voice sounded like and i’ve forgotten what it’s like to hold your hand you know, most nights i look at the sky and try to remind myself that we’re under the same moon but then again, most nights i go back inside and cry myself to sleep i’m trying to remind myself that time will help me forget you that a bottle of vodka and some diet coke will turn me into my father that people leave and they don’t come back and you can’t do anything to fix it because it can’t be fixed i’m trying to act like being your friend doesn’t hurt like it doesn’t tear me to pieces like i don’t wish i could call you baby and fall asleep to the sound of your voice”

— you set a fire in my heart five months ago and i’ve been trying to put it out