I've been listening to La Luna by Belinda Carlisle on repeat for days now. I guess there's nothing particularly odd about daydreaming to intimate love songs. But I feel as though the fantasies I imagine in my head aren't quite the ones the song intended to convey.

Sea salt hair, the sand kissed skin – I can see that.
The cobblestone pathways of small Mediterranean back alleys. Lover's fingers intertwine as they lead each other to the quiet seclusion where is it just them and the moonlight. - It's all clear in my mind.

I think the immersion falls flat when my fantasy involves two lovers who looked like the overgrown emos you see on your tiktok front page. Bright coloured hair, **** cuts, mullets, piercings, the My Chemical Romance t-shirt, cuffed jeans and scuffed up converse. A sense of ****** and binary ambiguity, I do not know who they are. But they're all I can think about.

Yeah, the immersion is definitely broken.
And I, am definitely gay.
G-A-Y. The word almost feels like a jumpscare every time it comes to the forefront of my mind.
So I keep repeating it over and over to try desensitise myself but it never works. The thought fills me with dread, an overwhelming sense of shame and fear. And yet, I still keep listening to that song.
I prefer to call myself Queer for a better term of use.
Queer with a Q that feels like a tender kiss when the word leaves your lips.

Whether I wanted it or not over the past year the walls of heteronormativity began to gradually shatter and I felt as though I was shattering along with it. To see the world through Queer-tinted lenses. It's a beautiful yet overwhelming experience.

To be free? Should feel liberating, but I just feel lost and exposed. A part of myself wishes I'd have had this realisation at 14, 15, 16 even. Anything but 24. I feel a sense of grief for all the life I have wasted, every date I've sat through with straight men who truly believed they were Guts from Berserk, yet their words dripped with the blatant misogyny they were trying so desperately to keep inside.

'Crazy ex girlfriend' I've been her, I've heard of her over 100 times. And yet all of these men are still hung up over her? I find it fascinating that they cant see it's inside themselves they need to look. I guess I still hold a sense of resentment for all the years I spent mothering men who wanted nothing but my body, when my body would recoil at the sight of theirs.

It's not that I'm not attracted to men. I am. In fact my preference is for masculinity, but the difference between masculinity and  the standard straight man is stark.
The standard straight man takes: takes your body, takes your worth, your sanity, your words.
You are perceived but never seen.

There is a softness, a sense of humility within the Queer heart. A silent, unspoken acceptance for whoever you are. Some scream it loudly, for others it's just the small smiles exchanged between each other when you know you both feel comfortable in each others presence. Because you are seen and you are safe.

Safe. A word I am yearning for.
I've not felt it in years now.
Love, A word I am yearning for.
I've not felt it in years now either.

La Luna, whoever you may be. I'm excited to meet you one day.

She was a Messiah, with boys bowed at her knees.
But when their mouths a-gaped, she'd close them quickly, begging them not to speak.
She'd keep them close to fill a void. But no matter how many, it could never be solved.
So she took, and she took, never letting them touch.
Until now,
Where we have nothing.

And now I am no Messiah, more like the off grid Wise-Women.
Hidden within the thickets, on the edge of the forest.
Some still travel, and they do find me. But it's not the same as before.
They come to me for ailments of the mind and heart.
To listen to their woes of a past they can't leave behind.
When I out-stretch caring arms, they take a step back. Begging me not to come closer.

They take and they take, never letting me touch.
Because inside, they have nothing.

What a cruel turn of fate for the girl who fought her way through years of the past to be in the present once again.
Some may call it karma for my younger self's mistakes.
Now destined to starve the heart that was once filled till day-break.
So I sit awake at night full of other's worries in my mind.
Because if I cannot be desired, at least I can be useful.

I guess the young girl never learned how to simply exist.
Without the presence of transactional love, she may as well be extinct.
This is no way to live.
You will never feel whole if there is still a quiet, constant longing to fix or be fixed by someone else's soul.

So I sit in the stillness of my isolated garden.
With nothing more than the damp, mossed floor and early dawn chorus.
I may be on my own, but I am never lonely.
I am one with the world around me.
I am the Wise-Women.

I will never be the same again.
But truly who ever was I?
The foundation never formed,
All there ever was – is mourning.
Died then revived.
Died and revived once again.
Continuously digging myself up from the grave.
A wraith amongst the dead,
I cannot rest because I have never truly lived.

Necromancy upon my soul,
A constant yearning to finally be whole.
A body covered in dirt and scars.
Yet I am determined to make it beautiful.
A heart full of spite, yet bursting with love.
An incautious desire to one day be enough.
I refuse to rest until I experience what real, safe human touch feels like.

Place a hand upon my sulphuric body.
I was once so afraid but now I am begging.
Please take it away, please tell me I am not *****.
I suppressed it all but now I'm overflowing.
I care not who you are, please just love me.
Lay me down amongst the green.
Put all your limbs on top of me.
Make imprints upon this rotten flesh,
until I can finally feel clean.

A body barren and hollow,
A body that only knows shame.
My bones are coated in it,
Words spewing it,
Tears pouring with it.
All I am is shame.

She used to smile so innocently when she was young.
With a laugh like a howling winds great bellow.
She would fantasise about her first love, I let her down.
Now I am screaming, snarling, spitting.
Resenting a world that I was foolish to trust.

Drive a stake through my heart,
I ask of you to wish me peaceful rest.
Hopefully this time I will not rise again.

Banished.

The last 5 years feel like a numb, confusing blur.
Like I laid myself to sleep for a while.
Like I needed to be dead to the world.

Then one day I suddenly awoke to a longing in my chest.
A feeling I couldn't fight.
A quickening of my breath.

The outside world shone through the cracks and my legs guided me straight outside.
Fresh socks on the grass of spring's early morning dew.
As it soaked through to my feet, I felt alive again.

But who am I now?
And who the hell do I want to be?
What just happened?
And what am I doing here?

I keep blinking to wake up but I'm finally awake.
It feels like I've forgotten everything, I'm trying to remember who I am again.

I've been playing Eurotruck Simulator for 2 days straight.

Mindless driving through virtual country roads.
I've jack-knifed my truck and need to pay the service toll.
Have to deliver this big bag of seed to Hamburg but I'm stuck in the middle of the road.
The traffics piling up and everyone's honking their horns.
This is way too much pressure.

“Don't Worry Baby” By the Beach Boy's plays softly in the background.
But in fact I'm very much worried.
Whether in my online trucking game or the real world it just never seizes.

All I asked for is a day where I'm not incapacitated by my own thoughts.
They're useless, nonsensical pesters that make everything go wrong.

Stupid worry gremlins with bells on their ankles.
The harder you try to ignore them, the louder they love to play.
Until your mind is an orchestra of gremlins beating their feet into your brain.  
It's impossible to get anything done when they're dancing away.

What matters is I'm still trying my best.
I'm leaving the house again, changing my old routines.
I even went out past 7pm.
What a real rebel I'm becoming.

Breaking old boundaries takes time but false 'safety' doesn't serve me anymore.
I sat in the pub last week and finally felt 24.
Maybe I'm a little behind compared to everyone else.
But I managed to save my jack-knifed truck and ship the seed to Hamburg, everyone has their own strengths..
Jack of all trades.
Master of none.
But in Eurotruck Simulator I'm No1.

Lucifer was my first lover,
Now I have a twisted fantasy seeping darkness into my head.

I can no longer grow brain cells but I can now grow horns.
Splitting out ot my skull like thorns from a branch.
There's dried blood dripping down the crown of forehead again.

Dancing with the devil is child's play.
He's wrapped a chain around my neck.
Belts upon my arms, ties around my legs.
I'm fully undressed and unholy.

Light the circular fire while I become my purest form.
Lay me on dirt while the embers silhouette around me.
I'm burning like amber, illuminating the nights sky.
This is a ritual, I can take it. I'm not human, I'm reborn.

Mephistopheles' forked tongue spits gasoline over pale skin.
Imp's are beating on drums as the ceremony begins.
Sacrifice me, I am the chosen one.
Beat me until I believe.
Face down in damp soil I'm a mural against the green.
The mausoleum next to me will guide my spirit where it needs to be.

Lily-livered eyes cremate excervasion into my flesh.
Taloned hands drag my body to the crypt.

Bathe me in others as unfortunate as me,
Then dress me in Ivy so those in the underworld can see:  
I'm the "Purest Form Of Innocence."
The one who was once "Me" has finally become "We."

The Archfiend tells me to kneel and I obey his every command.
Falexn eyes control me to undress myself once again.
" Filia Diaboli" He calls me as he places his hands on my head.

I feel my body ascend through the dirt I used to lay.
And when I open my fawn eyes, I'm in the real world once again.

Sometimes I think I'm not from this world.
I can't understand how to connect with humans.
All my wires are tangled, frayed and broken.
My brain is forever fizzling,
I'm short circuited and twisted up.

I have a constant headache from just processing how to live.
But all i ever see are cryptic codes and error alerts.
It's exhausting feeling like you're made of metal.

I have this hard, steel shell and I'm incased in it.
I don't know where it came from.
I feel like a scientist's test subject.
What happened to me in those test labs framed who I am today.

I talk as though I'm automated.
Stuttering and zoning out like I haven't been charged for weeks.
I'm begging you to hook me up to your mains support,
make me feel real.

I'm introverted and alienate though my insides feel forever exposed.
Every 'emotion' I feels like fresh scar tissue,
it hurts so much to feel.
My cognitive heart can't take it,
I'm malfunctioning at any given moment.

Would you please be my new scientist, I know it's a lot to ask.
In fact I'm terrified of scientists, so let's scrap that.
Would you please be my alchemist, I know it's a lot to ask.
Could you conjure up a potion to turn me from alien, to faery.

I'd rather live in a fantasy world than these extraterrestrial plains.
I'm sick of floating within a barren atmosphere,
take me to enchanted wooded lands.

Use the glitter in your eyes to cast a spell,
fill the sky with stars and comets,
I just want to smile without an aching jaw.

I think you can help me.