This Unexplainable Urge For A Life I've Never Had, Will Never Have. For A Life So Far From Mine, It Doesn't

“It is so much safer not to feel, not to let the world touch me.”

— Sylvia Plath

i want to go home now. go home and cook something warm. eat it under the familiar lights. curl up in my bed and read all day, all night. listen to my mother's voice as she sings far away, but close enough.

home is not the same now. but it also never felt the way i remember it now.

my best friend from ages ago texted me today. said it was great to think of me. now we're both 20. how did childhood pass so quickly? once, we laughed together and cried together. once, life was simply passing chits in class and holding hands during recess. now, there is too much to feel. talking to you, most of it is good. i hope we keep remembering each other. i hope we keep reminding each other. i hope, when life turns bitter, our memories can be that one last, sweet thing to hold onto.

what do i do with all this untouched grief. it grows stale in my mouth.

what do i do with all this unpromised love. no one told me how to hold it without bruising.

day 7

10:40 p. m.

it's october now. don't you remember the poems? don't you remember the quotes? you can't be sad in october. it's for happiness and sunshine and smiles. but here's the longing, the missing. a thousand miles made of pain.

maybe one day the world won't hurt so much. maybe one day these words won't be a way to make sense out of all this. maybe one day.

i hope i stay for that day.

day 9

9:43 p. m.

i know it feels like your pain is out there in the world for all to see but it's not. it's so deep inside your heart even you can't feel it. and even if it wasn't... even if it was out there for all to see... what would be so terrible about that?

it's been a while since you left

well, two months, five days, seven hours and thirty-five minutes to be exact

it takes one minute for your heart to stop beating in the absence of oxygen

another six for all you cells to degenerate

after that, even your brain gives up on you

and you die

i don't know what my brain is waiting for

'you suffocate me', your note said

'i'm suffocating here', i wanted to tell you

but you never stayed long enough

now i don't know how to tell you this

but for the past six months, you've been my only reason to smile

and this might seem like poetry to you

but i'm not feeling beautiful

if you look into that gratitude jar

you'll find it full of your name

so i'm sorry if my love suffocated you

but please come back

i need to breath now

home really is the strangest of all places. you only ever seem to have one as a child. older, and you wish to run away. the first place you wish to run away from, no matter how much you proclaim to love it. it is only when you do leave, when you need a home thr most, that it ceases to be home anymore. it is only when you yearn for it more than anything you have ever yearned for, that you cannot recognize it anymore. you wish for home, but home doesn't feel like home anymore. you wish for your mother's arms, but she is not the mother you grew up with. or maybe she is and you simply do not recognize her anymore. when you go back, you run away again. and again, and again, and again. running away and away and away. towards home. wherever it may be.

day 16

10:40 p. m.

songs from a time forgotten. my poems in a language you'll never understand. our fingers never touch. there was a promise once. of a day meant to be spent together. a promise to never let go. maybe you gave it to someone else. maybe you always knew i was going to break it.

(and yes, i do remember another promise. to myself. to never spend any more of my words on you. i try. but maybe that's how i keep all my promises)