Wednesday, July 08, 2015

the haunting


There was no doubt in my mind that this body, my body, belonged to a woman. My hips are softer yet still punctuated by sharp bones. My hair has begun thinning and regressing into the hair of my childhood, smooth, slightly wavy;  stark white strands peeking through the varying shades of brown. My age surfacing in random pink spiderwebs along my legs; the lines under my eyes deepening. This urge. This urge is real. 

I had begun to silently inventory his features. His straight teeth, the way his back sloped, the lighter irises, the darker pupils. The way he used his hands so often in conversation. His habits. His music collection. His book collection. All of the details that we so often gloss over had now become magnified the longer I sat in his apartment and looked over what he called his. There was so much right, there was so much wrong. Spread all over the table. Microcosms. My legs crossed on the sofa. Cold. 

I had, rather recklessly, become attached to the idea that the only way of achieving a true semblance of human balance was through the violent clash of complete and total opposites. Perhaps this was the work of my parents doing. Perhaps this was because I had unwittingly subscribed to this belief through inherent narcissism. But it was there, fermenting deep in my psyche regardless. Could this be it? A union of light and dark, black and white, right and wrong that nestled itself deep into a beautiful gray? Strange to find myself planning for such a storm. 

My history tells me that I am naive and far too gullible for long term relationships. Too immature for craving and expecting unconditional love and worship. My body tells me that I am too impatient to abstain. My mind knows that I run the risk of losing it with this one, that learning to trust someone again can only end one way. And would it be worth it? To trust him is to trust myself. 

All this time I have been growing, expanding, compressing, realizing, fighting. To become. Who I am, who I will be, who I need to be. 

Could he possibly ever know? 


New York. 
After dinner, I sit across from       and think of him. My palm tucked under my thigh and the wine beginning to settle in, jazz playing in the background. Gin and tonics perched precariously on the small round table. In the morning when I walk down Christopher, I find him again in a coffee shop. I see him in the museum. I want to kiss him in a cab. I want to hold his hand on a train. I carry souvenirs with his name only to place them back in place. I crave him beside me and for the first time that I am here, in this city, I want to be home

Is this what it feels like? Is that what this feels like?
I hope so.

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