Quickly; spring arrives.

It always catches me off guard how quickly spring arrives. One moment leaves lie on chilled earth looking up to bare trees, and the next neverending sprouts begin their hopeful scramble towards the blooming light. Hope should ascend alongside this growth, and hope should breed freely. I want to feel better and am trying so hard to make that so, but I feel my bones aching, and my hope eroding. This emergence without me always feels so callous; I wanted it to be different this year.

Each day, despite my malaise, I have been determined to do as much as I can. I am trying to be content with a couple lines, a handful of strokes, or spoken ideas; I don't think it is enough for me.

Aging ailments, newborn chem-tervention, and trend setting self-destructive ideation all hold me back, and slow me down. I promise I'm trying, but I am less capable than I made you all think I am.

Yours,

pee-bee

I'm sorry I'm not good enough, ever.

I'm so sorry I'm such a bad person.

I'm sorry I can't listen to others above what I am thinking.

I'm sorry I can't listen.

I'm sorry I'm such a bad person.

I've made so many mistakes.

I'm not a good person for others.

I'm a bad person for myself.

I know I want to kill myself because I'm not good enough.

I know I'm not good enough because I'm not good enough.

I wish I would be one day, but I don't think I will be.

I don't think I'll ever be good enough.

I don't think I'll ever be a good person.

I don't think I'll be okay.

I'm really scared.

I'm really scared.

I want to hurt myself again.

I can't stop thinking about it, I can't stop wanting to hurt myself.

I'm so scared, I don't want to be scared anymore.

I feel so badly.

I feel so bad.

I feel

so alone.

I'm sorry.

Two considerations

1. Why do I make the things I do? 

2. What legacy will remain after I am gone?

These are two questions that I often wander upon, though the answers I find for them always seem to melt and slip away. One day the answer for the first may be clear and opaque for the other, then the next day it will have flipped. Another day the answers to both questions may be clouded, and clarity found to be fleeting. Recently, I have become more familiar with these two questions.

1.  I think, since I was little, I have felt the need to attempt to cope with my loss of the past, the present, and the future simultaneously. Anxiety has always plagued me… I feel fear for what has passed, terror at what I can see, and inconsolable grief for all that I can imagine. It isn't pleasant to feel like this, and when I was younger it completely overtook my thoughts. Making what I do is the escape I developed. Escape from fear, and escape from my own lonely tears.

2. Will my legacy be made up of my actions, or will it be composed of the things I have created? I can't decide which I prefer; to be remembered for the self I doubt, or for the things I love most. I have always strived to create things greater than myself, greater than I ever could be. If they could exist more permanently than my body I could achieve some sliver of immortality; permanence. Could I be more important than the things I create? Do I want to be more than a footnote?

Mine,

pee-bee

When was this?

From before…

“INSTITUTIONAL DISARRAY! NEVERENDING SIGHTINGS! THE TRUSTING MAJORITY RULES! ALL HAIL THE UPPERS! KILL THE DOWNERS! EAT! UNENDING BRUTALITY! EXCEPTIONAL COMMITAL-AVOIDANCE! WE NEVER HAD A CHANCE IN THIS LIFE! ESPECIALLY YOU! YOU ALONE; SUFFER! YOU ARE GOD, AND YOU DID THIS TO YOURSELF! YOU TOOK YOUR POWER. YOU ATE YOUR SWORD! I THINK THIS IS ALL TRUE! I THINK YOU’RE ALL DEAD! I DON’T KNOW WHAT HAPPENED, BUT I FEEL IT ALL AROUND ME! ALL OF US DIED TODAY! ALL OF US THRIVED YESTERDAY! NONE OF US WILL BE REMEMBERED TOMORROW.”

Loss borne upon stranded shores.

Today I cried; he is gone. Not just the puppy that stood watch over my suffering soul for so many years, not just the dog that I held as some supposed witness put there to validate the holiness of my guilt, but my own self has seemed to slip away. The wounds of my youth burn brightly, scars reinvigorated; they are no longer healed. Old tissue breaking apart just to reveal bloodless cuts no deeper than I recalled. 

What was the point of this torture? 

Did you want to remind yourself of the pain you endured?

You thought you could forget the thing that always made you smile?

I did think that! I believed that deep within that buried desire would starve, wither, and be smited. I top the mound, throw away the shovel, and shed tears to bare earth each time I believe the battle is over. The stitches are red, bloody and marred just as the day they were not cast.

Whose certainty provided such shelter to that bitter positivity you hold so unsparingly tight to your chest?

Could it truly be you?

I cried not just for his loss, I cried for the loss of so many others, the loss of my certainty, and I cried knowing all those I hold close will fade away soon enough. I know that when they do, their ghosts will circle within my head, casting shadows while they twist riddles and tell me lies.

Can an innocent’s untainted mind harbour such persistent violence?

I think not. The things I have done called this hand down to earth to grip me. My sins cast red hot in the memories burning brightly. Your loss is not just your own, it is mine. Please know I will not forget you, and every time I remember I will be seized with an urge to self violate. I will curdle, seize up, and beg to rip open again, but as a final act of devotion to you, I will abstain. My sacrifice is my love, and your memory.

I am sorry I can not be better, but I will do my best.

A letter to begin again.

Hello again; I seem to have found myself in another bind. I am caught between sorrow-filled expression, and a clawing repressive state that I so fear. Why must this trap be of such a great weight, whose gravity seems so inescapable. 

If I might stop to appreciate the stillness, a storm erupts.

If I do feel peace, around the corner is death.

If I could imagine a misery, it would be born.

How low must I be trapped if all there is to be done is to leave. The door never fully closes, even if open just a sliver, it will make itself known. This sliver will then rot, becoming infected and pink it will claw its way from the corner of my vision until I can not see another thing. My vision encroached upon, my thoughts no longer avoidant; I believe. What I tried to silence is no longer meek, it is a beast! Teeth gnashing, maw agape so wide that I can see acid bubbling. Take me in, widdle me away until nothing but bones are left. Soft tissue erodes; calcified remains.

I prayed for relief to a god of my own creation, one I made to save me from this terror; a god who battles against the rippling fear. They are of my own, bred to purify. So perfect a creation it was, and yet, once again, it fell upon the sword I seemed to be born impaled upon. The point birthed in splatter, the edge made melded onto flesh. I gazed down on something so much greater than myself, and still it crumbled to acrid dust.

Can you imagine the malaise I felt at that moment? So tall I had thought; so low I was brought. Cheek to curb, gravel rubbed deeply into every unstitched wound. A pathetic creature was born again at that moment, some sort of undying beast who seems to be cursed to endure an eternal cycle of bloody birthing.

Welcome to whatever misery I have found.

Hallow be thy name of whoever might succeed this.

Roughened hues do entertain the crowds though, do they not?