best kept secret

(moved this from my tumblr)

Nobody really knows about the secret kind of cry i have.
It’s not the gentle kind I can hide with a stone face as tears stream down my cheeks like rain on a warm window.
It’s not the kind of cry that satisfies my heart when I’m met with indescribable beauty. 
It’s not a cry i let loose when i’m sad, or hurt, or even angry. 
I never cry for any of those. 
It’s not the kind i can laugh about and convince the world is irrelevant.

It’s the kind that’s been held up inside of me for a while that i refuse to look at, like a monster that ceases to exist if i close my eyes. 
It’s the kind of cry i cry when i’ve lost something beautiful forever. It’s what happens when i mourn the past.
It’s the cry for things that cannot and will not ever change, and something precious is lost because of them.
It’s the kind that will go unacknowledged for months, because apathy has kept it in check deep down in a well which i never dare to peek down into.

Recently, i’ve visited that well a few times, peering into it and contemplating who i am and was and should be.

I didn’t know it at the time, but every stolen visit to the thoughts that make me care would diminish my wall of numbness, brick by brick.

Tonight, when i was all alone, and the world was quiet enough for me to grow restless, i visited the well again. And this time i wasn’t alone. He was there. As if He’d been waiting for a while for a meeting i had promised Him I’d go to, but I had never shown up.

And in that moment, i remembered everything.

The walls of the apathetic well erupted and my secret cry was let free.

It’s the kind of cry that rushes into me like air filling an empty space. It seizes me in its grips and makes me crumble.
It’s the kind of cry that shakes me so violently that i run my fingers through my hair and grasp the roots just to have something to steady my head. 
It’s the kind of cry that makes me press my fists into my eyes and steals my breath away until i’m helplessly gasping for air.
It’s the cry i try to stifle by pressing my face deep into my pillow, holding my breath to still the sobs. 
It’s the kind of cry so deep and overwhelming that i can’t move from where i’ve fallen to the ground and huddled there.

It’s the kind of cry ushered in when i realize the fact i’ve broken beautiful things and they can’t be fixed, and it’s all my fault. again.
It’s the kind of cry that is wrenched unwillingly from a heart desperately trying to close its eyes to the truth it sees. 
It’s the kind of cry ripped out of my chest when i’m confronted with all the words i remember and can’t seem to let go of.
It’s the kind of cry i don’t want anyone to ever see. 
Because it’s the kind of cry that only comes out when i finally admit how absolutely broken and completely cracked i am.

It’s the kind of cry that i’ll only release in the dark. Or the shower. Where no one can see me or help me or comfort me. Because that would be more than i deserve. And a reprobate such as i should suffer more than a few tears for what i’ve done.

It’s the cry of a convicted criminal forced to look upon the damage he’s done; the faces of those he maimed and wounded. 
It’s the cry of a guilty sinner condemned to look at his failures over and over again before his eyes.
It’s the cry of a soul finally realizing the chasm between itself and grace, and the insurmountable grief and torment at the impossible distance.

It’s the cry of regret. of weakness. of helplessness. 
It’s the cry i cry when i can wrap myself in my blanket and pretend i’m five, with my stuffed animals to be my friends. 
It’s the cry i cry when i realize just how much i’ve hurt; how much of the wrecked landscape around me was actually my own doing. 
And it’s the cry that grips my heart and unravels me thread by thread when i’m hit by the realization: i’ve forgotten how to love.

Downward Spiral

To be honest, there’s a lot on my mind. And frankly, I don’t know where to put it.

So here’s to you, choice blog of two, for being there when I almost decided to start caring about things again.

I didn’t choose to slip. No one does. You get so used to being invincible, being untouchable. Like that glowing turtle shell you hit on Mario Kart and suddenly the other annoying shells bounce off you harmlessly like raindrops. You build this idea in your head about who you are – about what you’re capable of handling. You think nothing can bring you down, nothing can shake you. Other people can be shaken, maybe. The weaklings. But surely you are on a different playing field entirely.

That’s what I used to think. But falling isn’t always a straight shot down to rock bottom. Sometimes it’s a slow, gentle slip that builds up speed if you don’t open your eyes soon enough to see what’s coming. Sometimes a single, pivotal event creates more forks in the road than you can possibly ever hope to account for. Variables you didn’t dream of suddenly come into play, and you learn to move before you can rest long enough to think about what’s happening. And you begin to learn you’re not so set-in-stone as you thought you were when you started your journey ages ago.

You see, things have become kind of foggy. Everything got a little out of hand, a little fuzzy around the lines, a little grey between the pools of black and white. There was room for exception, if I didn’t think about it. Things could be separated and quantified: my identity no longer permeated every thought, every action I committed, every observation I took away from the world. I could leave the things I had labeled truth in one hidden box close to the ground and walk away from it, as long as I knew where I had left it last. It was always in the background, always relevant, just never outwardly seen or opened.

With my convictions out of the way, I found there was all this room… Room for experience, trial and error, curiosity. And then slowly that tiny voice in my head that used to send warning impulses began to get softer and softer. My conscience was becoming duller, less able to slice through my sins. Half of me became unnerved at my own lack of care. The other half didn’t care because it was too busy being apathetic. The world could burn to the ground, with me in it, and I could smile and say I was satisfied. Which, to the other half of me, was alarming.

I remember what it feels like to have no worries, no secrets to tip-toe around, no shadows in the corners of your mind to fill the cavern void of thought when you’re trying to get some sleep. They’re only shadows for now. These daunting regrets and hints of downfall accumulating in the basement where late night thoughts reside. They’ve paired up with a series of questions I can’t look in the face, waiting to be confronted and stored into a new set of filing cabinets.

I know what I have to do. I always have. But it’s the act of surrender that is the hardest act one can ever commit to. To have everything stripped away- who you think you are, say you are, feel like you should be… irrelevant. And to trust someone else to know who your true self is. To trust your making in the ability of another.

Technically whoever made you should be able to form your identity as well, but where does that leave me? Dangling by a thread of hope and trusting that someone will find me valuable enough to save me from the consequences of sin, patiently waiting to eat me alive.

I feel like I’ve done too much. This time, I put myself in a pit too deep to climb out of. No one can get me out except myself, and at this point... I don’t even know who I am.

And then all of a sudden everything has stopped. Everything that kept me full. Every little bite I took. Every person I filled a spot of myself with. They’ve all frozen away from me, and I can only gape at the spots they used to fill in bewilderment and wonder if this feeling is how most people feel all the time.

There’s a silence, a stillness. But not one of peace or relaxation. It’s not a sigh of relief. It’s a pent-up breath held tight in the lips of a world that spins too fast for depth. The depth I tell myself I can live without, the depth I’ve convinced myself I don’t need.

I had come to realize my root issue was always satisfaction. I used to be sold out on resting in my savior. Nothing could tear me away. Not life, death, or anything in between. And then I slipped into that fuzzy grey. And suddenly the gravity of the situation shifted under me and I was floating. It really wasn’t important to be grounded anymore. I could float around as easy as others walk and be completely satisfied with the way things were. Until this standstill.

Before, I remember looking around and seeing everyone bundled up and having a home, and feeling as if my home was the stars and the seas and the earth, because that was where you were. Now, stained and guilty, I can’t bear to turn my face to the sky and hope to feel welcome. Not like this.

I just keep digging… and it’s not that it’s too deep to climb out of… now I’d rather stay at the level where I’ve sunk because it would be too hard to get out – too much effort put into vertical movement.

I keep trying to figure out a reason why – to trace the root issue back to something that makes sense psychologically. Or maybe just to shift the blame onto someone else. I don’t know what I’m looking for. Or do I. I do know. I do know all the issues deep down inside. I just hate saying them.

I’m still bitter. About so many things. Things I thought I was over, things I thought weren’t an issue. It’s not so much value anymore as it is spite. It’s being dissatisfied. It’s looking at what I was given and deeming it unfit, deeming it less than what I’m worth, deeming it somehow a reason for me to do the things I do. I’m looking for justification for these sins I’m staining myself with. But I’m not finding any. And yet my fingers continue to grasp at the straw in front of them and prod through the thin strips of emptiness for some kind of reasonable excuse for my ever-growing selfishness.

There’s no logical reason for turning away from all the things I used to have. And I hate myself for it. I hate myself for being an idiot, for slipping away, for becoming numb, but I can’t bring myself to fix things and start living like I know I should.

I know I’m hurting myself. I know I’m going to end up in a place I won’t be able to talk my way out of. I’ll end up helpless, and wounded, and full of regret. But I haven’t reached that stage yet. I can keep fighting, I can keep striking out and being this creature I’ve become. I find a strange satisfaction in these claws and teeth I hide behind.

I stopped caring. I don’t care about anyone I left behind. Anyone who made me what I am. I can forget about it all. I can blot it out and walk away. Haha. A tattoo might have reminded me of whose I was… good thing I didn’t get one, or conviction might have guilt-tripped my heart.

I don’t care about where this puts me. I don’t care about where I’ll end up. I’m not there yet, and until that day comes, I’m going to keep on carrying on. I don’t care about the past. I don’t care about the words I’ve said or who I thought I was. How satisfied I used to be.

I’m not convinced satisfaction is what I’m chasing. But I’ll admit to a strange restlessness that eats me up inside. When I’m alone. When I stop to breathe. There’s an unexplainable stirring in me that urges me to move, to thrive, to keep myself occupied so I can’t stop for a moment.

It’s a hunger for feeling. Because I’ve discovered all this rejection of truth has put me in a state of apathy in which I feel nothing, and any emotion from this point on gives me a strange high. I’ve heard all these promises – these ideas and notions that the world would have me believe, about what it has to offer me and how it can make me feel.

So here I stand.

Back to the past, arms open to the future. Stone hard as a rock. Wanting to feel the elation I’ve heard of, wanting to be able to be my own without giving up the things I crave, wanting to find a way to be independent and pursue my own ideas of freedom.

Chasing after cars that I know I’ll never catch.

Because nothing’s good enough. Nothing satisfies my craving for MORE that is consuming me. If this is high, there must be a higher. Each new step up the staircase makes me crave a step more, but the stairway stops and I know I’ll find myself tumbling down toward reality sooner or later. But I can’t stop.

I know I’m going to get hit. Maybe that’s why I do it. Hoping sooner or later I’ll crash, careening into something strong and hard and firm that won’t change. But I’m still freefalling through the list of things I have to try until I feel again, and nothing has stopped me yet.

I feel like the whole world could blow up right now. All the people, all the children crawling along towards their futures, all the landmarks and pinnacles of human accomplishment crumbling to the ground, all the time-tinted lands aging under my feet… it could all blow. Gone. Disappear. And I would sit in the middle of a dark, empty world, without a tear, sitting and staring ahead of me without a flicker of response to the fact that something was wrong.

I don’t even know how it came about… it’s not a moment in time that I can pinpoint. As mentioned before, it’s a gradual slope… you don’t realize you’re falling until you see the ground you’re rushing towards but by then you’ve accepted it.

So this is it. This is where I am. Climbing slow the stairway to my own destruction. Knowingly. I can’t stop. I’m far too curious and resentful for that. Perhaps I have decided that freedom to destroy myself is better than submitting to someone else’s idea of how my life should be. I can’t say anymore. A part of me is scared. A part of me regrets it. But I can’t give it up. And I can’t say I’m sorry. Because I’m still sincere in what I do. It makes me tremble, but I still can’t feel the tears I know would bring me back to my knees.

I feel like I’m too far gone for that. I know in my head I’m not… but the feeling doesn’t seem any less real. One part of me begs to crumble, the other part can’t let go of what it knows it will have to surrender.

I suppose the only thing left to do is to just keep running. Conflicted, again.

Everyone runs… the difference is there are those who run towards the hope of promises, and those who run from the shadows of broken ones. Or at least, that’s what I used to think. Now I’m starting to wonder if there is indeed a third kind of runner. The ones who run for the sake of running, because sometimes falling is the closest they will ever come to being able to fly. 

rainy day

i wished to walk with you today
Beneath the sky-breathed tones of grey.
But words were silenced by the day.
Resigned to sigh, i slipped away.

Heartless

A lifeless wind blew past my face

To still the somber scene.

Spell-bound, I’d found the phantom beast

That only you had seen.

It held ensnared inside its claws

A pulsing, bleeding heart.

I saw it start to hungrily

Tear all the flesh apart.

Behind its legs were useless chains

That looked well-made and new.

An open padlock gave me pause -

The key was kept with you.

Would you unleash such foul a beast,

One you had always feared -

The brute you claimed you only wanted

Dead or disappeared?

You had the power in yourself

To keep it still, at bay.

But now, set free, it roams around

Till all is rank decay.

As silent as the gust of wind

That crept along my face,

Cautiously, I took a step

To leave the wretched place.

The beast stopped still, and turned until

Its eyes accosted mine.

It licked its teeth; I felt a vein

Of ice run down my spine.

It dropped the heart, which fell apart

In shambles at its feet.

A hunger burned within its gaze-

The lust for bloody meat.

My sight went dark, and time unmarked

Flew on as it grew near.

I felt its breath upon my cheek,

A cloud of trembling fear.

I feel its claws and iron jaws

Sink in; it thus begins,

This self-deserved and undeterred

Result of all my sins.

The razors of its sharpened teeth

Sliced open all the spots

Where I had stowed my tender self

In tight, defensive knots.

My heart is ripped out from its cage;

I weakly realize why

This monster made you so afraid

You claimed to wish to die.

My hollow chest, a void at best,

Is taken by the cold.

It feeds, harbinger of regret that’s

Stale from growing old.

My mind crawls back to all the times

I saw it chained, asleep.

You had the keys, my trust, your word -

The things you couldn’t keep.

Another truth, a thought aloof

That stirred, aroused by pain -

This justice served was well deserved

Though I no profit gain.

My blood ran patterns down my face,

And choking on the smell,

I sealed my secret with my death.

I had a key as well.

The Past

I tried to listen, once or twice,

To music in my head.

The hidden tunes I yearned to free

I found entombed and dead.

I tried to speak my thoughts aloud

When time could hold its breath.

A long-lost promise stole my words,

And they succumbed to death.

I tried to hold my trembling hands

Since they were full of space.

The voids unused to being bare

Held shadows in their place.

I tried to search the rusting skies

For whispered lights of day.

Ashamed clouds rained down memories

That made me turn away.

I tried to keep myself contained,

To shield the fragile hearts.

Chagrined I find my bloody claws

Clutch all the splintered parts.

I’ve found a choice - a gaping grave

Entreats me, in the mud.

So shall I chase the phantom hearts,

Already stained in blood?

Or shall I take the shovel here,

Despite my half-closed eyes,

To bury deep the rusting past

And hope it swiftly dies?