That’s It

I just want to feel it and that’s it. But I am compelled to write. There are some things too pure to put into words, but I long to try for the sake of expressing at least a hint of it to those who grace me with such purity. I guess I could express it differently, maybe it would make more sense if I skipped past language in pursuit of something more natural, like a gesture or a look. Infinity exists through an intentional look; you can summon a deluge of emotion through a tactful manipulation of the eyes. Somehow there are countless ways to stare, and in all of them reveal an invisible current connected to the soul. They say the eyes are the windows to the soul, but that’s not even close. The window is too much of a tactile boundary—the eyes are the closest thing we get to the soul, they are the portal, the guiding light, the salvation.

Gentle breezes pave space between the finest, thinnest ornamental grasses, grazing their feather-like figures with only the softest embrace. Both from nature and of it, I am not with you but of you, not with you but of you. The currents are within and around us; it’s the chills that stipple across the skin, I imagine if they could they would take on a greyish blue hue, or the stronger ones—almost like a pinched nerve—would be the deepest midnight blue. Lips just grazing lips, the dancing around a kiss, the wisteria of dreams, or peonies, which appear as though suspended in a state of unfolding, giving away not too much but just enough to be delicate and contained, wispy and cocooned, both from nature and of it forever.

If only I could be so attuned to my own nature, whatever that would even look like. There were recent times in which I felt light-years away from any kind of nature. I couldn’t tell if I was closing in on myself like a dying star, or if I was making way to burst completely, from the core throughout, sweeping away everything in my path—a supernova! Not long ago I feared I would destroy everything I had. That I would drag everyone down, of course myself included, although the devotion to self-annihilation is inherently rooted in a neglect of oneself; I was doing everything I could to forget me, to forget the feeling of being trapped in my skin, my mind, feeling somehow disconnected and hypersensitive to my life, my surroundings, paralyzed by indecision of what I was going to make of this thing called my life, and God knows how much I longed to destroy that concept. I didn’t want to die, but I didn’t care if I slowly did, and I really just wanted to stop caring about proving anything to anyone, especially myself.

Now I have been feeling suspiciously free. It’s funny, you never really know when a certain freak show is going to end, and out of nowhere the current slows down, the liquid nightmare fades out, you float around gracefully as the white wash dances with you and around you. The set is over, the rushing roar has died down and you are humming along to the mellow rhythm of a forgiving sea. I learned to respect nature long before I respected any person. I had a couple close calls in my youth, trapped alone in those sets that seem like they may never end, towering over me and as I dove underneath I had to let them carry me as they wished, to push me down for so long I almost didn’t know if I could keep holding my breath. But as always I was met with the bite of light’s embrace, the misty air allowing me a brief pause to gather my strength only to command me back down again. There is no greater guide than this, why would I respect anything more? To what do I owe more?

—

I can’t stand repetition. I remember smoking weed when I was 19, it was the end of summer, an hour before I had to catch a flight back to where I had been attending college. I remember that familiar feeling of the high coming on—the warm haze creeping up to coat the black cave of my eyelids, and beginning to wind down not in tranquility, but more like an old clock. There was a trash truck right outside my window. I heard it beeping and for some reason the culmination of having to leave home again and everyone I loved and having no say in any of it, just having to be an adult, came over me and that beeping would not stop. Long after I left for the airport, long after I boarded the plane and even after arriving and walking with my roommate along Telegraph Avenue I kept hearing that faint beeping in the corner of my mind. I drank some wine later that night and still the fixation lingered, eventually subsiding with sleep. I don’t do well with sounds; I hear various ringings, frequencies, currents, pulses, all kinds of shit throughout my days. I waver through phases of surrender and pathetic, futile protest. But I hate repetition the most, I always will.

When I rediscover a surrender to everything, I feel like a scattering of a thousand pearls across the darkest gray marbled surface of the midnight sea. I feel like the subtly flickering shimmer of moonlight that is felt more than it is seen, and although peace is nothing but a trite euphemism to me, I could say it’s the closest I get to it. The goal was never peace—it’s simply surrender, as that is and will forever be my only sense of freedom. Distractions, delusions, daydreams…I dance around all of them, linger on a couple for a while, wear out my welcome and start over again. I don’t know if there’s a rhyme or reason to any of it, and to some that could be a valid concern, but concerns like those are for anyone but me.