I just want it to end.

The hopelessness, the fear,
the constant critic in my head:
I've lived with them all for too long.

All I've ever known is this war, this endless battle.
There's nothing wrong with wanting it to end.
To wish that it didn't is cruel.

But why can't the best solution be the simplest?
Why do I have to keep fighting?

At times it's deafening,
and I'm so exhausted.

Why can't I just lay down in no man's land
and let this battle fall silent around me?

Why can't that be the end?

Because... I'll never know what's possible.

Dear gender queer kid,
I know this is difficult.
I know that you're struggling.
I know that you're perpetually discusted by the shape of your body, the mismatch... The... distortion,
Dear queer kid, I know it isn't right.
I know it isn't fair.
The fact that you have to live with being ridiculed and invalidated for living your truth.
I know you're confused, clumsily attempting to tick all the right boxes for a society seemingly hellbent on making you pick one... Or the other.
Are you a sister or a brother?
Will you be a father or a mother?
Going whole days dehydrated because you don't want to be in the wrong bathroom.
And yes- it's okay not to use the disabled toilet.
Your gender is not a disability.
It should not be treated as a liability.
Your gender is FREAKING BEAUTIFUL!!!
So dear queer kids-
Have hope, have pride!
You are bold and bright, you don't need to hide
...who YOU are!
This letter is to Ash and Kai,
Jay and Ty,
To Sam and Rebel,
To Atlas and Rowan.
All the they's and them's
The zi's zir's and zim's
The fluids, and neo pronoun users... Stay strong.
And know that I am with you.
Every grueling step of the way.
All the ones who spend every day
Enduring abuse from ignorant strangers, who wouldn't think twice about actually trying to understand, accept, or even just know you.
All the "*****" the "benders" and "trannys".
The "perverts" the "toasters" (yes that is actually a thing.)
And "*****".
All the "drag shows" and "freaks"-
Turn every cutting word into another stitch on your flag! Not your skin, Or your soul.
And remember -
It will get better!
You'll move out!
Meet people who love you, just for being YOU.
They'll use the right pronouns and name.
So fly your flag high, and never forget or underestimate OUR power.
Strength in numbers, and your **** well not alone!
We WILL be loud and fight tirelessly against those who try to strip us of our rights to simply exist.
We are proud!
WE ARE US!
and we're not ever going to be anything else.
So here's to the days yet to come.
Here's to them.
Here's to us!
And here's to pride.

Signed with love,
Scotty. ***

You know the Five Stages Of Grief?

It's like that.

Stage one, Bargaining.
I told him I'd do anything, absolutely anything to keep him in my life.
I pleaded, I begged. I was ready to drop anything and everything for him.
Just for him.
All for him.

Always.

for.

him.

He was worth my entire life.
At the drop of a hat.

Or a noose.

Then came the Grief. I was... Incomparably sad.
My life fell apart, I felt nothing but pain.
Felt like my guts were being torn out, and spilled at his feet.

Choking on tar

my mind was never quiet.
It was all my fault, If I'd been better I'd still be his.
It hurt.
So much.
  So
       So
            Much.

Then Anger.
It was his loss, I was SICK AND ******* TIRED OF BEING ******* OVER BY HIM! I deserved BETTER than that ******* and whatever PITIFUL MEANINGLESS FLING our two years HAD BEEN.
I'd burn every precious **** thing he'd given me.
He'd filled my life with bits of him... Art, poetry, clothes. Built me palaces of paragraphs.
I'd tear it all out of me as if it was a tumour.
A desise.
Discusted by the thought I'd ever affiliated myself with his filth.. Inch by toxic inch I'd tear him away. Dig in my nails and press hard Hard HARD with the point of my razor.

Then I crashed.
The fourth stage, Depression kicked in.

Nothing had meaning,

my anger had evaporated, without it I was the shell of the person I used to be.
Empty
Cold.
Dull.
His City lay,
all burned out,
no longer aflame,
my highway overpasses crumbling and scarred with decay.

My dark glassy eyes now dry, no more rain soaked asphalt.

No more laughter or dancing.

No more cheap laminate countertops.
and he was gone.

And he was gone.
And
     He
            Was      
                        G O N E.

Like watercolour dripping off a canvas.

Nothing i could do. I had no purpose anymore.
My life was cold and grey without him lighting it up, painting cave walls with his love.
My perfect, perfect boy.
He'd gone forever.
I slept and slept and slept. To try and stave off the emptiness. The hollowness he'd left inside of me.
To pass the seconds ticking by without him. It didn't hurt, I was just... in my heart there was emptiness. Grey and blank and hard as cold concrete. All the bright chalk mandalas washed away.
Now the last step.
Acceptance.
Acceptance.
Acceptance.
I'm working on it.
I can live without him. He's not my one and only perfect thing. I wasn't blinded by love. I was idealistic. Hopeful and nieve, praying and begging to anything that could mean hope, that he wouldn't leave.
Now I realise You are, Tom. Toby and and Emma are.
Pippa and Frankie and Willow and Jack and Chris.
Molly and Emily and... Me.

Every beautiful person in my life.

I know none of you would leave me.

Not like he did.

The song. Our song.


Honeybee

It feels like acceptance to me too.
I know it's dumb, it's just a song, but it came on shuffle last night and I think it triggered this.
I'm far from okay,
but I'm closer than I've been before. ****, I've got trust issues, I feel like I can't ever let anyone that close again.

I'm terrified of vulnerability.
But that's what you're here for.
You guys are gonna help me out the other side.



Thank you so much for that.



"Hello Goodbye, Twas nice to know you
How I find myself without you
That I'll never know
I let myself go
Hello Goodbye, I'm rather crazy
And I never thought I was crazy
But what do I know?
Now you have to go"

You set me free.










I
Forgive
You.


Even if you hate me.
Even if it should be the other way round, and you can't. Won't.
I loved us.
And I'm sorry.
🖤

Is it our eye
or

is the blue sky
much

bluer
through cheap

motel glass we
always

paint
the most beautiful pictures

of the things we never get
to have

and that I believe
is just another example

of how truly
beautiful

the mind really
is

Whit Howland © 2020

The breakup was
the best thing that
ever happened to me.
I lost everything except
my dignity.
I escaped with my soul.
She tried to buy it with
Sushi and Thai food,
but it's not for sale.
I would rather
freeze and be free,
than die warm in her cage.
No amount of love can
fix that abysmal madness;
that car crash confusion.
Daisies withered when she
walked by.
Her heart was rotten, like
an STD, like a
fish hook to the eye.

When he smiles,
Instead of butterflies,
I'm flooded with nostalgic memories of times spent together laughing like hyenas.
And roasting each other as if we were marshmallows on a stick hovering over a campfire.
Memories of talking over the phone for hours,
Where he does not whisper sweet nothings to me, instead we speak about the moon,
the stars, everthing and question why everything is the way it is.
This is why when I seek comfort I go to him.
Because I get more than this,
He gives me insight,
A different perspective
Or a reason to self-reflect.

He is not my pillar of strength.
He is the healthiest relationship I've had with a boy for years.  
He is Ray.
Like the ray of sunshine flowers need to grow.
He does not know this yet
but he is definitely the platonic love of my life.