I wrote something…I haven’t written in years. I’ve been told that it’s important THAT you write again, not WHAT you write…in order to get back in there…just remember you said it, was/is my response to that person.
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we were young when we found us. we always will remain, there. tangled in amongst those cars and lofts and tombs and cabins and elevators and woods and long, lonely roads. I can’t think of any of us, even now, even just me, without those places as additional characters, as whole entities unto themselves. us, laying in a square, heads in laps, music in the middle, loud.
my soul lay bare. bare. thumping in time.
a wasteland in the pauses.
summertime. it rolled on and on.
oh, but the pauses…
I still have the scar we gave each other that night. faces smeared and stained. florescent lights beating down. the glares, the shock we caused. thinking they were only alarmed at our usual appearance. her and I giggling our way into the bathroom, discovering what had caused such a stir. “oh, that? It’s just love. this is what love looks like when it’s on the outside.”
my soul lay bare.
they held onto my arms on the nights we went flying on the roof down the old Natchez. I held onto theirs on the nights in the barn, in the fort, in the park, sneaking in and out of our rooms. somewhere, I still haven’t let go. but here? here, I had to.
my soul lay bare.
my blood turned bad that year. an ocean of silver pulled against it. we fell off, one by one, torn towards other things. only to be drawn back by habit and the strength of our own arms – a mangled mesh of limbs, indistinguishable now.
my soul lay bare.
three of us wrote it all constantly. like we could stop time with our words. I had notebooks and notebooks filled with nothing that could stop anything. near dawn, after they had crept back out of my window, I’d get on my knees and beg for more time. but prayers are just more words. he shared his with me one night. blank-faced and silent, in the stairwell, he let a single tear fall. beautiful. hopeful, I glanced down at my watch, time marched on. oblivious. tears were no match for time either.
my soul lay bare.
some twelve years on, I have to squint to remember the best stuff. only one of the three ever remained constant. I adore him for that. most of the old places have changed. were torn down, have different names, were sold, are rotting in junk yards. nothing has ever felt the same. everything feels unspooled at my feet.
my soul lies bare.
