I didn’t think I had so much condensed pain. It had been solidified, kept tight in a box somewhere. But then the heart warmed and the contents melted and now I feel the little bits of thawed liquid rise to the surface, the piercing shards of newly melted ice striking me.
I want the pain to go away so I can hold it at a distance. Regard it. Put it back. I’ll collect it later, I say. But there is no later. Only now.
I know why I stayed with you. Because the alternative was loneliness. This kind - the aching in your bones, the starving desperation, asking "when will I be whole again?" And so I wait. Willing that someday I’ll lay myself to rest. Someday I’ll wake and there you’ll be, a warm reminder that life doesn’t have to be an empty cage, spent solitary, sequestered, silent, alone.
So now I lament. Speak the virtues of asserting oneself, not knowing how long I myself will last. When will the hope run dry? When will life take its bitter course? I run up the hill, only to find that beyond is nothing but the same barren terrain laid open, as if to say, "there is nothing but me left".
PhD candidate in Race, Podcasting and Social Media. Associate lecturer in sociology. Irritating know-it-all.
