DUM SPIRO, SPERO.

An attempt to make sense of rather intense emotions through mediocre, mostly unedited writing. 

[stellaproject]

hypnos.

It had been so long that I nearly forgot how easily sleep came to him; within minutes he had drifted off. I didn't mind. I was glad to know that he was resting and I knew that he would sleep soundly until morning.

With practiced grace, I slid off the bed as quiet as possible. As soon as I could feel the rough carpet under my feet, I stood up and reached my arms as high as I could while standing on my toes to stretch my back. I could feel my hips pop and the tension release along my spine. It helped to brush off the sluggishness as I padded carefully to the bathroom.

To avoid waking him, I closed the bathroom door before I turned on the light. It kicked the fan on as well and I was glad for the ambient noise filling the silence. I turned the shower on, the faucet sputtering to life as the water spilled out, stalled, then rushed out as if over a waterfall. Steam rose from stream as the water heated up. It was already fogging the mirror.

I tied back my hair in a bun, careful to gather every strand before securing it to the top of my head with a claw clip. I stood back as I continued to look at my reflection in the mirror. My body hasn't changed much in the last few months. I slimmed down only slightly, my skin was still very pale,  and I had the remnants of a breakout as my body got used to its new steady supply of hormones. I felt beautiful. The way he looked at me made every blemish and scar and imperfection seem to disappear. I thought he was the most beautiful creature alive. For the first time, I wondered if he felt the same about me.

I jumped behind the shower curtain and into the tub to start rinsing off. It was a short shower, some soap in the necessary places, the careful flick of a razor across others. I kept my hair dry and out of the way. Washing it wasn't necessary as I already done so that morning. Soon enough, I turned off the water and dried off my body before wrapping the towel around myself like a dress.

Efficiently, I brushed my teeth and quickly washed my face with the cleansing stick. The baby blue packaging of the cleanser and the moisturizer I followed up with made me smile. I felt light and airy even as I applied some body lotion to soften my skin after the drying effect of the salty air. Clean and dry, I let my hair down from the bun and shook it out to re-establish the part on the side.

I wandered back into the bedroom as quietly as I could manage after turning out the bathroom light. I peeled back the covers and sat on the edge of the bed just watching him rest. His chest rose and fell with a deep, steady rhythm, closed eyes fluttering as he dreamed. I leaned in and placed a feather-light kiss on his cheek. My heart. My king. I could only smile as I climbed under the blankets next to him.

He made a soft noise, shifting and adjusting himself to accommodate the intrusion as he continued to sleep. In the bleariness of unconsciousness he stirred and moved closer to me just as I did him. He slung an arm around me to hold me against his warm body. We both settled and fell asleep quickly after that. It was the best sleep both of us had gotten in a while.

[stellaproject]

lock your sins in eden.

Is this what I am?

I wondered how many times my heart had conjured up that thought. Years ago, I paid a boy called Arien with the effigy of an old man to tell me the history of my soul. He was certain I had lived many lives and wove stories of men and women who offered their bodies as temples in the worship of consciousness. A soldier breathing in the mist. A dancer balanced on the edges of knives. A ranger seeking silence in the trees. I wondered how far back I went, if I went back at all. Reincarnation meant nothing to me besides a spark of fleeting curiosity, But there were times when that spark lit a flame, however brief it burned.

I reached my hand out and touched John's shoulder, feeling his hot skin under my cold finger tips. I witnessed the faint rise and fall of his chest with a soft smile. He slept so soundly. I wondered how old his soul was; were we the same? I didn't think so.

I flattened my hand against his chest so I could feel him against my open palm. His heart beat steady, slow and strong under my touch. Lieutenant. I thought without any expression. Is there any difference between a soldier and an officer? No, I thought. Mars owns them both.

I moved my hand away and shifted onto my back so I wouldn't wake him. The ceiling was blank and white and it's textured finish dated the building by decades. Who would have thought a popcorn ceiling would be testament to the age of this island prison? Who was the true prisoner here? In a moment of savagery, I declared it to be the men wearing tan boots.

Closing my eyes relieved the anger mounting in my throat. John's breathing helped and what his ambient noise could not quell, the sharp smell of salt did. Warmongers, politicians, citizens, taxpayers. This place didn't exist to them. A prison on a tropical island. What better way to forget your mistakes than by banishing them to paradise?

[stellaproject]

morning // sleep in on a saturday.

I dream of you every night and when I wake you from those dreams I pretend it's you I'm holding on to and not the pillow. A weighted blanket becomes your arm wrapped around my side the same way the aftershave I dabbed on the sheets becomes your lingering smell. I can pretend you've simply gotten up earlier than me and you'll be in the shower when I brush my teeth. That rustling downstairs isn't the cat, it's you fumbling around to make coffee for me in my unnavigable kitchen. There are those early mornings where those lies become truths if even for a moment-- the moment I put the phone down after the good morning text. My heart's still racing from the alarm I set to match yours but I'm too tired to do anything but dream in half sleep of when we'd wake up together. I hated those mornings I'd need to wake early to drive 2 hours to class, now I'd pay my entire tuition just so I could have a kiss and a mumbled hey rabbit in my ear before I graduate. You'll be home for graduation, won't you? Halloween? Christmas? Will you kiss me on my birthday and hold me close on Thanksgiving? Sleep in on a Saturday. For now, I'll put more aftershave on my pillow case and pretend it's not a deployment but a late shift and you'll be here in the morning.

[stellaproject]

smile now.

I haven't said I miss you in five days.

I think it, though. I think it all the time.

I think about it when I take that tiny white pill in the morning,

When I look at the label on the bottle.

Generic, sterile. The word doesn't even look like a word.

It looks like some Greek glyph, not modern medicine.

Happiness in a bottle, I'd wished.

A wish it was.

It hurts. My head hurts.

My eyes my hips and my stomach.

All the things you said you liked about me.

Is this punishment? Why does it still feel like punishment?

What if it doesn't work

If the headaches don't go away

I'd keep taking it even if it hurt

If it meant you'd have faith in me

If it meant you'd believe in me.

Am I crazy?

Can I pretend to be fine?

You said you're frustrated and it's not me

But it is me.

It must be me.

But it's not me.

I want to help, I just want to see you smile

Hear you smile.

Don't forget, I can't see you.

I want to beg you to open up.

Will you?

Can you?

There's nothing to open.

It's you.

You need aloneness.

It's me.

I'm broken. Am I?

I don't know, my head hurts too much.

Just stop, why can't you stop?

Why can't I be better

I want to be. I'm trying. I am.

Happy pills.

Happy feels like poison.

I miss you.

I said it. Back to zero.

Smile, now.

Everyone's watching.

[stellaproject]

We saw ghosts in the forest that day. A man forgotten to all but the toads and the spirit of human disregard made manifest as tin cans tossed in an artificial meadow. I did not lay flowers on the graves of these apparitions; I instead planted seeds of hope watered by mortuary prayers to a man who's name only I remember. He showed me his humility, holding my soul steady as it trembled.

[stellaproject]

I woke up with my head on his chest in a room full of green. I whispered I love you before I could see and hear, my senses hidden beneath the smell of coffee and hope. He kissed me in the shade of dying tree and I watched him drive away with a smile on my lips.

[stellaproject]

I met him for the first time on a Tuesday morning in August. We followed the river through bouts of warm summer rain until the foggy twilight. We sat on rocks and spoke of our lives as if they were fairytales. I thought for a moment that they were as every time the clouds shut out the light, his bright eyes replaced the sun.

[stellaproject]

I'd like to tell you the story of the man in the woods.

[stellaproject]

compartments.

I was going to stay at your place tonight. It was raining, the lights of the city filling the clouds with unnatural brightness. Seeing the city never ceases to amaze me. It's beautiful. The openness of those narrow streets and that dense yellow smog. I feel like I can be anyone when I see it on the horizon of the road.

As I sat in my car after leaving the mall, I stared at the clocked and let out a deep sigh. I'm worried about you. I can't help but be. I started reading horoscopes because they take the control out of my own hands and put it into some abstractness that means nothing. It said that I'd be looking for attention today in a selfish way and it's better to not do anything. I didn't go to your place. It would only break me down more at a time when both you and those meaningless stars are telling me I need to be strong. I drove two hours home in the fog and I didn't cry like I wanted to. I got a large coffee and drank it black. All of it. I focused on the road and the bitterness and for the first time in my life I did not think. I just drove.

I followed the rain all the way home.

[stellaproject]

11.05.2018.

I love my words. Everything has a name. Description. Designation. A title. A label. The strange and obscure words are my favorite. Sonder. Chrysalism. Adronitis. But my language is limited. What isn't named I look for in foreign tongues; Words native to lands in the Faraway. Anecdoche. Schadenfreude. Altschmerz. German is good for them. So is Greek. There was one you told me. I can't remember it though. It meant: “Knowing that love will blossom”. What a pretty phrase. What a precious feeling. You have such a way with the words I love so much. If only I knew how to tell you how beautiful you are. My darling words, My lovely English and its cousins and its distant lovers, Alll go silent when I try to speak to you. There is only one way to tell you. One way that works. My lips. They speak in the silence of kisses Where a million words are said.

[stellaproject]

patria.

Dig for dirt under snow. Solid ground fantasy of surreal white crystals, falling, a navy sky ribbed with gray Touch the cold mud as the ice melts hot hands smear it, pale skin baptized iron, salt, rock earth. Home.

[stellaproject]

ecstasy and existentialism.

Heavy breaths muffled by hungry kisses. Desperate fingers sliding off sweaty skin, soft skin, nails digging into arched backs and tangled too-short hair. Lips on hot skin, shivering, shuttering I need you, I love you I want you I want your hands on my body, feeling my waist, my breasts, touching my skin, touching my soul You feel so perfect You’re perfect Fuck fuck me, take me, be me Whisper my name between groans of pleasure, your’s a breathless and trembling sigh between yes and please and faster: “David.” I want to taste you let me taste you, smell you, feel you. Kiss me. Bite my lip, hands on your cheeks. Clear thoughts smearing cognizance with Primality? It’s assurance. Only you could make me feel ecstasy and existentialism, humanity, as you trace the lines of my hips.

[stellaproject]

I can imagine him singing on small, smokey bar stages... 

[stellaproject]

I'm terrified of time. Every day, every minute, every second, each passing moment erodes my memory bit by bit. I obsess over you. I know one day you will be gone from my mind entirely. But, if I dwell long enough and remember hard enough, the thought of you will be the last memory I hold on to when everything else has slipped away.

[stellaproject]

The leather of your belt felt cold under the skin of my arm as I rested it over your stomach. The fact that you had a belt on at all was a surprise to me, especially considering you were wearing jeans. But I suppose that first dates were an occasion to dress well, even if we were only going to Chipotle. I could feel your muscles tremble, so slight and so fast that it seemed as if you were vibrating as you rested your head in my lap. It only stopped when I ran my fingers through your hair, the color of which burned as bright as the smoldering cigarette butt on the asphalt outside.

[stellaproject]

I pressed the phone closer to my ear when I heard your voice on the other end of the line. We’d been talking for hours by then, from when the birds stopped chirping in the darkness to when they resumed again in the misty blue light. We were both laughing, the kind of lackadaisical stupidity that comes with staying awake all night. Perhaps it was the sleeplessness or the alcohol that you’d been sipping, but you seemed free. Your tone was more expressive than I’d ever heard. Instead of being drenched in painful, burning whiskey, it seemed to be as bubbly as a mimosa at brunch. I couldn’t stop smiling and I knew you couldn’t either- I could hear it in your words. My voice entwined with sincerity, I said I would make you love me but it sounded like a joke because of my exhaustion. You responded almost immediately in a strange, high voice: “I’m halfway there.” 

[stellaproject]

pressure.

The pitch of his voice rose as his emotions boiled over. He never yelled, but he seemed to be all but shouting now as I egged him on with angry comments and petty provocations. It wasn't my intention to upset him; I was never good at controlling my own emotionality and I couldn't stop the progression from simple curiosities to demanding interrogations. Part of me wanted it, this fiery response. All of me wanted answers.

Why? It wasn't as if he owed me any answers nor did answers really exist for half of the questions that I had. But that didn't quell the drive. It only served to feed the anxiety that motivated and controlled me in this moment, turning a paper cut in to a gaping wound. I wanted it to end. I could feel the irritation and disgust dripping from his voice like puce-colored sludge. But I could not stop. I'd given up on trying to.

“Why is it so fucking hard to just tell me how you feel?” I demanded. I was far from yelling, but I had never before heard myself so shrill and loud. It made my head pound to the rapid beating of my heart and I could nigh on hear the blood raging through me. I felt lightheaded, dizzy, stupid, the same feeling as if I hadn’t eaten in days. But I still didn't stop.

“I can't just come up with these words on the spot!” He said back, roughness in his tone and his voice as he growled in annoyance. I must have asked him this six or seven times now and every response was the same from him. I shouted that he was a poet, accusing him of being a wordsmith. I spat the word as if writing was a criminal act so horrid people would balk at the mere implication of it. He was seething. “Stephanie!” He groaned.

“Fucking show it, then! I don't care!”