Types Of People: Film Genres

today, on the anniversary of my final suicide attempt, I went out and witnessed the Black Lives Matter movement, felt the rush of humanity coming together, the inexplicable feeling of togetherness and justice. I squeezed my boyfriends hand and bought chocolate milk, sat by the river with him and breathed in the air. exhaled. inhaled. there’s so much sweetness in the air.

and isn’t that just what we’re here for. to witness and experience all this sweetness. to feel all the pain. to grow from all of it. to cut short that inherited trauma. isn’t that what makes us flesh and bone and cartilage.

my story was not that of a superhero who overcame all the pain and abuse and sadness. I’m lucky enough to have the most amazing people around me. lucky enough to kiss and laugh and run and eat foods that make my heart happy. I won’t make a fairytale out of my story but god, I’m so glad I’m still here. so glad I didn’t leave.

you move & the wind moves with you, something honey, something bruised— in the way you chew on your bottom lip. nervous habit; delayed reaction. how in summer the world feels like a mirage of itself. hands that chain themselves to anything that refuses to let go: a leech, or brown muck. your teeth (grazing) the inside of my elbow. something damn frustrating about the way you give yourself up (to anything that’s foolish enough to take you) i.e the sea, the coast, where your shoulders meet, the leylines of your veins. & picture me humbly, please. picture me in evenings & earthly tones, only. & do not hold your breath when i go, slip. out the back door—silhouetted feline; precipitous, or better yet. picture (you), standing barefoot in the tall grass, picture the curve of your neck in malnourished light, & a puncture wound, in the now negative (space) you found me in: a flower bed emptied; the sun bleached out. — oh all i ever wanted / was a life in your shape // mitski

lavender kisses, sunshine eyes and tight hugs. heaven takes the shape of a boy with blonde hair, long legs and clumsy words. he’s got a smile as soft as his heart. smells like cinnamon and sugar. he’s so sweet in and out and i can’t think about him and not smile, can’t write about him without blushing. his name next to mine still makes my heart skip a beat.

“They’re all angels.”

— Keanu Reeves when asked what type of girls he likes x

we roll around on the carpet floor, hugging each other tightly, pulling each other ever closer. we try to stay quiet, but whispers of “I missed you so much” spoken in the language of pleasure escape. we giggle at the intimacy of it all, two lovers ready to throw themselves off the brink of everything to stay in this dream.

the way your body melts into mine, like you belong here, like we were made for this moment. we hug and laugh and kiss and say “goodbye, lover, I’ll see you later!” and never worry. we help each other with our work and plan for a future full of sunflowers and paintings and dinner by the fireplace. we’re still arguing if we should get a dog or a cat, though. that playful love.

how my words slip from my loose gloved jaw whenever ur around. how I lie on your chest and hear ur heartbeat quicken like you still get shy when I come close. how you stumbled into my life and made a beautiful mess of my mind.

wouldn’t trade you for the world, my summertime boy, wouldn’t give you away for anything. and when we roll around the carpet floor, breathless and wistful and entangled, I’m reminded why loving you is so easy.

it’s getting colder and I miss watching the condensation of your breath form and disappear in the air. the iciness of your blue eyes, the chill in your stare. winter boy, you said you never loved me. winter boy, I have so many questions: was it all real? why can’t you look me in the eye any more? how did you forget me that easily? 

winter boy, how did our love get so cold?

Ocean Vuong, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous: A Novel | The Shape of Water, dir. Guillero del Toro | F.K.A. Twigs, ‘Water Me’ | Alejandra Pizarnik, ‘To a Poem About Water, By Silvina Ocampo’ | Camille Mariet, Sharing a bubble bath on a rainy day | Ilya Kaminsky, ‘When the Child Sleeps, Sonya Undresses’

You sure it wasn’t just a shitty relationship? He asks.

I answer the boy’s question with well-practiced silence. 

Give into the chokehold of this quiet dehumanizing moment I had grown so used to by now.

Whisper to my body: you know what to do. 

Succumb to the numbness, lose yourself to him all over again.

I remember seeing my abuser across the train platform

the way my silence met his. 

the fear twisting itself between my ribs as he grinned at me,

asked if I missed him

I watched the anger flash across his face as my silence met his rage.

I got on the next train and physically collapsed, 

had a panic attack that lasted an hour.

Didn’t speak for the rest of the day.

You seem like the type that would happen anyway.

I smile politely and listen to him as he went on about how sexy he thought my vulnerability was.

My trauma a commodity, a mere accessory to him.

I am the saint in the stained glass window now.

I wonder if I’m the type when he kept his hands where they were even when I asked him to stop. 

The way he mistook my shrinking for permission.

My fingertips were so thin then, 

Pale, peeling skin and a wrecking ball in the empty space in my chest.

I wonder if I’m the type when a man I don’t know follows me home,

The way I tried to swallow the problem, to drop my throat into a whisper. 

To survive by blending, by not being the victim, 

Maybe I had always asked for it. 

Maybe this just happened to girls like me.

here darling. summer isn’t so bright this year so come lean on my shoulder and baptise your sorrows in the valleys of my body. I know you’re crumbling under the weight of it all so lean on me until you’re strong enough to walk again. some flowers don’t have sturdy stems, and that’s okay. doesn’t make them any less beautiful, right? let my arms be your peace until the world outside stops sounding so much like violence, the chaos and busyness of it all. come, my love. mind over matter. you’ll start feeling like yourself again, I promise. love is being the hook, line and sinker. love is being the fish and the fisherman. love is knowing that sometimes it isn’t 50/50, that sometimes I must give more than I take. but love is also knowing you’d do the same for me any day of the week.