4.17.2020 - the step down

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the urge to write is sudden, strong, immediate. i am laying on my side, curled inward around the pain, when the words begin to thrash wildly in the back of my mind. i don't know how to harness it or contain it, so i attempt to do both.

"i - hello. hi there. it's been awhile."

 i don't know how to welcome back the rising tide of emotions, but i do know how to start a draft. eyes welling up, fingers flying: how can you have a masterpiece when you've never built its foundation? note to self: stop giving up because you never started, then feeling disappointed with the results.   

 the unraveling feels like catharsis.

the tap, tap, tap of words under frantic fingertips feels like oxygen after holding my breath. i don't know how to write about five month admissions or the slow burn of fear. i couldn't tell you about the tiny germs creeping through my veins; the ones they're not sure they know what to do with this time, they are so sorry. 

instead, i dive into going missing. i focus on the kind of grief that leads one to mourn potential when it was never dead in the first place. a first draft, then the second. tapping letters into words, words into thoughts. the chaos gives birth to something nostalgic and smoldering, and i'm back under the santa monica pier. 

 i know that the machines keeping time with my body tell me otherwise, but it's been a long time since i've felt so alive. 

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