little red refuses to be eaten

I did something tenacious and brave and self-affirming today, but I feel shaky now and depleted and impossibly tired. In fact I feel exactly as I imagine I would feel if I had slapped a bristling wolf on the nose and told it loudly to go home.

fine

I'd never been in that alley before; I didn't know where it would let out. Had to turn left instead of right because I came out farther down the street than I thought I would, and then I ran those last two blocks home. I clattered down the stairs to my basement room, curled up as small as I could, fell asleep clenched and gasping. Woke up late, and my roommates had already gone for the day. Dragged myself upstairs to shower, the hottest shower I could stand. Washed my hair twice. Scrubbed my fingers, my palms, under my nails. Sat limp on the floor of the tub and let the water beat down. I listened to it gurgle, loud, watched it swirl in the drain. It could have been an hour, two hours, a hundred. When I came to again I bundled my clothes up in a towel and threw them in the laundry. Hottest setting, lots of detergent. Waited, tense, on the end of my bed for the beep of the washing machine, then the dryer. Hot, hot, kill the germs. Kill the germs. Hot.

When my clothes were clean I put them in a plastic bag, along with the towel that had touched them, and I took the bag out to the dumpster and threw them away. My favorite sweatshirt too, and my earrings, and my shoes -- everything I had been wearing the day before. And the blanket I had slept on top of that night. Garbage now. Gone.

And then I was calm. I was calm because I was in control again. There was no evidence, none. It must have been a dream. It was all a terrible dream I had, and I would soon forget it.

My mum dropped by later.

"How are you?" she said.
"Fine," I said. "I'm fine."

breakable

I feel vulnerable in the spring. Sensitive. Exposed. The flowers start showing up and they're gentle, thank goodness; I need them to be gentle. The sky is bright, and blue, and full of empty promises.

It's been 5 years and 2 weeks. And I still feel vulnerable in the spring.

raw

My consciousness streams like comets, like meteors. Streams like rivers running madly, racing to the sea. It could be like this all the time; this free flow of thoughts. This sea of ideas. But I am surrounded by sluices and dams, all meticulously handmade... I'm terrified of drowning, you see.

A seamless transition.

That's what we all hope for, isn't it. But does it ever really happen? Is it even possible? I don't know. I think it might be a thing we made up.

I feel like every change I've ever made has been wrenching, like ripping off a band aid--only not done and over then, quickly, like they say it will be, but awful and messy and the sting doesn't fade, it just gets overwritten eventually, maybe, by a new kind of sting that isn't any better, just different.

It is so abrupt, this wide world. Blatant. Blatantly kind; blatantly cruel. Lacking in subtleties.

Oh, subtlety.

How I long for quiet details, rather than this vast, raw experience I've had. Raw like meat. Raw like bones exposed. Raw like animals in the winter in the wild, cold, ravening, merciless. Harsh.

Weeks, months, years. My baby is dead, dead! And it guts me still, in the same beautiful, haunting way it always has and always will, except that my breaths get bigger, now, instead of smaller, and I am so excruciatingly alive I can hardly stand it. I want to cry and sing. Laugh and scream. Shake my fist at the falling sky. Dance. Dance. Dance.

I am alive.

Last night I dreamed I was pregnant, heavily so, and happy. Near the end of the dream, I thought my water broke, but I wasn't sure, because I'd never felt it before. It made me sad, in the dream. I didn't know what to do next, and I was so sad. I felt like less than the other mothers, the ones who had done this before. I felt that I should know.

I was still sad, when I woke up, still unsure.

There is indescribable pain radiating outward from behind my right shoulder blade, as if there were a massive hook through and through my flesh. (It's happened before, right there, though I couldn't tell you why.) I've been almost totally incapacitated for two whole days. Disheartening. I try to breathe into it, but it's deep deep down and it's boiling lava hot and it hurts-hurts-hurts-hurts-hurts, and I'd rather just lie as still as I can, and pretend it's not there.

Story of my life.

Oh god, it hurts. All of it hurts.

But I am fierce, and clever, and strong, and no one has completely gotten the best of me yet.