Still

For hours I sit in front of the screen. It stares at me in return, mocking my empty attempts at speaking to it. Stories fall by the wayside, they blow out the window and scatter on the scorching street below. My bright summer nail polish chips in scorn. She writes from across the water to question everything; I question it back, and the emptiness bounces between us. There's a suntan line where your fingers used to rest; it means nothing. He had such piercing blue eyes, but I cannot hear the story in his kiss so perhaps there isn't one. My hearing isn't the best, but my blood is an excellent judge of character.

The mouse returns. He skitters across my bedroom floor without shame. I've been sitting here with my feet on the desk for hours, you can't blame him for thinking the world is his oyster. I set another trap.

But I'm less sure now it'll catch anything.

Roach

It's an early evening at the bar; you haven't been there since the time you all piled into the back of a cab simply to ride three blocks through the Rainbow march, but this kind of bar never changes. She already knows the bartender, he refills your glasses on the sly every time he passes and you just giggle in return. Complain about how the stranger droned on about himself but then proceed to do the same yourself, an inevitable game of passing it forward. You vow to do better, as the New York night steams around you. There's a dance party in Washington Square Park, you love the city to no end.

The summer is still wild in its prime, steaming streets and Instagrammable adventures. In a small corner in the East Village, my tan fades and forgets itself. 

The story that grows in its wake will be worth it in the end. 

It Better Last

New York drowns in its temperatures. I know I mention the weather too much but it's so hard not to. Walk these same paths as always. The waitress is new but the drinks taste the same: everything is different, somehow. I long for the storm. Surely it'll come soon. The plants on my window sill are screaming for a change.

I found the story again today, I feared it was long gone and my cavorting around the Old World had erased it from my heart, but it had not. I know who I am only through words, and it turns out to be the only thing that matters. An alarm clock lies in wait, but it cannot touch me. I looked around me. And it turned out I was free.

Advisory

The heat remains. It licks the island like a bumbling puppy unaware of its size and drenches the streets in a heavy, warm, wet blanket. I try to acclimate but end up standing in the grocery store's freezer for much longer than is environmentally conscious.

Another singer of our tormented youth dies, hangs himself in his beautiful home and leaves everyone else back at the beginning of the grieving process. You spent so many years teaching yourself it was no longer an option, only to be proven wrong by those you've leaned on. You wonder what you're supposed to learn now. Your music streaming service is quick to suggest the appropriate playlist, but you turn off the sounds, close the door. Open the word processor and focus.

The only thing that will get you out alive is keeping your shoulder to the wheel. It's not a pretty life, but it is your only one. If the darkness wants to catch me, it'll have to run like hell to keep up.

To Tell Them To

4 a.m. and New York City lies quiet. The street corner is dark, a dark I haven't seen in weeks. I sit in the window, unable to sleep, and my head keeps whispering Home, home, home. I forget I have ever been anywhere else, that I have ever wanted to.

Later, on the subway, seeing again people of every skin, of every way, I realized my center of gravity had sunk into the ground, my breaths slowed. Like I had been untethered, like I had been drifting off into space for a while but had returned to dock now. Home, home home. A heat wave rolls across the avenues, it makes pearls of sweat roll down my neck, but it can't touch me. Nothing can.

On these steaming, dirty, noisy, impossible streets, I am invincible.

Behind

Wake early, the slightest tinge of hangover across my brow. Pack the last of the things strewn across an apartment that isn't yours, run out of money on your public transit card, everything says it's time to go and you arrive early for the airport shuttle, early for check in, early at the gate. The flight is late and you upend yourself in an airport lounge, playing games on your phone to avoid hearing the voices within speak. It is time for them now. It is time for all the drifting mayhem to wrap itself neatly along your spine and make you whoever it is you are going to be. Playtime ended when you passed security, and now there is only the rest of your life left. You wonder what it's like to not spend every moment considering every thing, to not always be questions, or not always be exploding in emotion.

But you are not sure you'd like to find out.

Blank Page

The last days race past. There is no keeping up. She dons a white veil and a silly smile; the park is all sunshine and peak summer. We prance around with secrets and surprises, and the night ends no later than could be expected from a group of middle aged women with children who'll wake them in the morning. I say I have to pack. Stockholm is still light when we get into the taxi. I don't quite know what I'll be without it.

My body prepares for flight, for the other. My tongue rearranges itself in my mouth, I feel the muscles around my spine tense and perk up. Now is the time to put these jagged pieces together. What did you learn? Who will you be?

Same, same.

But different.

Pollenchock och Stjärnfall

Another train races across the heartland. The evening sun sits high in the sky. It casts long shadows across fields on fire. The last few days swim through my head like a sweet dream, my chest expands in gratitude; it overwhelms me but I want it to. At the end of the day, today, when the train was waiting and it was time to go, I ran back down the side of the cliff -- warm, smooth cliffs, eons of reliable -- and jumped back in the water for one last dive. I dipped my head and let all the sounds fall away, opened my mouth to let salt water stream through my gills. I arrived at the train station with white eye brows and brown shoulders, the smell of the sea in my hair. They asked me if I'd ever come back but I'm not sure the answer matters.

I am here now. Something will come of that, alone.

Since You

The monster came back today, reared its ugly gnashing teeth and tore through my insides. I sat in an armchair in her living room (you know the one, from IKEA that I always liked, I'd make you stop and sit in it with me on the show room floor) and tried to keep from tears while my hands shook uncontrollably. There were no drugs, no drinks, no magical potions to soothe the burning tide, but we packed our bags. The tram came up behind us and we ran to catch it. When we slowed for the last stop, I smiled.

A hundred times I've walked that path, a thousand. It curves around a cliff, bores into a bit of grass and then you're at the top, with nothing but open sea and sail boats and sunshine in your lungs. I ran down to the water's edge, let my shoulder rest against sun-warmed, smooth rock. We took our clothes off instantly, she said the water was cold but I knew it would be perfect. Two steps and you're in.

The ocean is salty, real salt water between my teeth, I feel my skin crackle and my eyebrows turn white. Seaweed between my toes. Dive under the surf and everything is quiet, everything is clear. The body adjusts to the cool temperatures; it comes alive. I laughed and told her nothing had made me this happy in a long time and it wasn't untrue. The monster curls its tail and retreats to the last dark corner in the back of my spine. Not gone. But not stronger than the pull of the tide in my flesh.

Another Little Piece

The weather comes and goes; there's a constant addition and removal of clothing, you cannot count on anything and that's reassuring. I zig-zag across the country to people who have known me longer than I've known myself: some of them understand my dizzy madness, for some it is too alien, and intimidating. It unnerves them to see me wrangle the mold. My bags are full of keys; I sit in an empty living room crying, in an apartment twice the size of my own, and know now beyond a doubt what I must do.

I walked past your house this morning and didn't feel a thing. I've been doing that a lot lately -- feeling nothing. It comes as a bit of a relief.

There's a fine line between being untethered and being free. But life is short, and dire, and impossibly beautiful.

I can't stay on the ground, if there's a chance that I could fly.

of Sun

The sun doesn't set, the nights don't get dark. I lose track of time in the permanent twilight that is for sleeping, all I want is to be out in it. Do you remember how we'd spend entire summers in that space? Perhaps we were drugged by youth but I still think the magic is out there. There's a bed waiting for you in every home; they build their houses, drive their cars, return to the safe ground from which they came but they make room for you in it.

But I never wanted the safe space.
All I ever wanted was magic.

Around Me

The rain comes and goes; it is never entirely absent, never entirely out of view. Bodies, skin tones, hair colors and cuts of cloth you recognize from forever envelope you. Are you one and the same?

The bus cuts through downtown on a quiet Monday night and all is quiet (it's always quiet), the rain doesn't bother anyone but me. I went to check on you and you are well; I'm glad. There's an ease in your step I'm grateful to see. I like to think there's one in mine, too, but I can't be sure.

It's so hard to know who you are when the world around you would rather say what it wishes you could be.