a letter in the mail,
a three, four, five, or even six digit number meant for you to repay, sooner or later. but we both know the answer lies later than sooner
2.
in bed during broad daylight wearing his clothes,
missing, missing, missing
an empty space in your heart, vespers of fingerprints across your body
crying into your pillow til your eyes turn red and angry, bloodshot
defeat, the smell everywhere, damp.
where do loved ones go when they still exist, just not in relation to you?
3.
unfixable,
irreversible loss.

and finally, 4.
the screen.
tendrils of hair bunched into angry clumps in the palm of your hand,
blood dripping from eye to mouth,
a bored lumberjack with a garish mask flanked by black branches, auburn leaves
all of these things and a doll at the end of the dark corridor are nothing to worry about.

i can hear it when i'm walking down the street even if it's silent.
gazes fall over me like watchful crows, i try my best not to boomerang their stares. fearful, always fearful.
once an anecdote to share over a cup of coffee or a raised hand to gain participation points in women and gender studies classes,
sometimes (hopefully) taken seriously but above all if i was with the right person, a palpable tale.
i can hear their voices flood my mind even when they're not talking,
all backwards baseball hats and oversized shirts, pants that sag too low, purposely belted in the wrong place, or if not them then a construction worker sneering twirling his screwdriver in hand, an uneducated high schooler stepping off public transit, sometimes even a brazen-mouthed father holding a young child's hand.
i hear the unwanted coo that eclipses that of the humble new york pigeon or harmless night owl,
i had once thought "sonorous" to be a beautiful word but now i just associate it negatively,
for i hear it, the stream of "hey mami"s,"god bless you", "hey ****", "hey gorgeous how you doin?"
effortlessly tangible like the condensation on a glass of water.
i hear it when they don't speak, it comes naturally to me.
every man i pass by, i give him a voice. i say the words for him in my mind before he even gets the chance to speak or look at me. i've rehearsed it so many times because i've grown to expect it.
constantly fearful and hyperaware.
it's getting to the point where i can't even remember not being like this.
i hate myself for it because, and i repeat words in my head "honey, it's your fault for what you're wearing." who's on your side really? who's on your side when it's 100 degrees on a summer's day and you don't want to wear pants because you don't want to feel the burn on your legs?
"it shouldn't bother you so much."
"just listen to music."
"boys will be boys."
again and again and again
who really understands?

thankful for fall not only because of the pumpkin spice lattes and the countdown til the giant christmas tree is set up in the city, but partly because it'll give me a reason to dress frumpy, unflattering, shapeless.
hopefully it'll help me appear unknown.
that's all i can really hope for.
for now.

i can't pinprick the moment when something in me snapped and instead of being fully confident and carefree i decided i needed more.
more reassurance
more security
more.

these days i find my hands reaching out to grasp things i can't carry, and even though i hear the same three words over and over and repeat them back like an old favorite song, i still shiver out of nowhere.
perhaps it's a combination of the passing time being spent on things i can't control, be it work and routine conversation with throngs of people i'd rather not see
all of which underscore the fact that i can't touch you because you always seem too far away.
my childish habits have been chasing after me, these days i find myself skulking all the way home after work because i'd rather not entertain, i'd  rather hide under the warmth of the covers and immerse myself in fresh or tattered pages. live a different story other than my own for a bit.
tired of the fear but unable to change it.
complacent with the quietude and stillness.
missing the past and you in this silly way.

you asked for a sip from my straw but i just let you have the whole drink because i wasn't going to finish it anyway. respelt every word as "give" even though the meaning no longer applied to the situation. til whatever felt like an obligation morphed into a little something resembling friendship. harmony. camaraderie. i'm a sucker for those types of things. we could paint our nails and don heart-shaped sunglasses in the summer time together. lay in the grass and i'll remind you to stop biting your nails if you remind me to be better at saving my money. i have really great memory so i'll never forget--and sorry in advance if this haunts you--but i'm always willing to forgive if it means it'll bring me a happy memory to write about.
it's way easier to open up than it is for me to close.

i saw an elderly man today at war with gravity. i watched him tumble on the time-made incline of the pavement. he laid there with his cane in one hand and a crumpled ball of tissue in the other and wiped at his bleeding nose. we didn't know him but we stopped being bystanders and rushed over to help him up. nameless characters peeled off the backdrop like paper dolls in a children's activity book and everyone's faces were fraught with worry for the poor guy. he couldn't speak english so our barrage of questions likely confused his bedraggled and weary state even more. eventually a woman who spoke his tongue came to his aid and we later walked in the same direction and saw her tugging onto his arm, leading him where he needed to be. he still looked as detached from the scene as he did earlier.

i wonder if i'll be like that when i'm, let's say, 72. i don't want to be helpless but i'm scared that's all it comes down to. sometimes i feel burdened by the thought of time constantly passing, by the stolid fact that the progression of time will always be continuous. a never doesn't exist, and some things have to be inevitable.

i can say i wish that time would just stop even briefly but even then i'd just be wasting time.

what does it take to chisel time?
what does it take to structure a fully lived life?

in words that come after "i'd never thought i'd"

in the instrumentals that give me time to digest the lyrics that remind me of you

in my smile as i'm coming up the stairs for the 67th time at work that day

in the color of the sky that i look up to distractedly thinking of you when we're apart

in the 2 am creeping up on me as i try to write something that even remotely captures how fleeting the moments we have together are

in another contented sigh

thank you.

girls like me are built small
some might say fragile, even
but our hands are tough and strong
always clutching broad swords and shields
our lips: ruby red, from lipstick and/or taking the occasional wrong turn once in a while
our hips: like vases for flowers you sometimes forget to water when you're too busy (somewhere along the line i became more of a wildflower than a wallflower though)
our noses: so cute and buttonlike and perfect for those little lost and found kisses
our mouths: hopefully or hopelessly unabashed, through speech and silence
our willpower can crumble mountains
the dexterity of our hands tries as best as it can to reach you
but sometimes you're just too far away
on top of hillcrests in timbuktu
or in another woman's arms
or lost in your own thought
but it's alright, i laugh and you can still see the glimmer in my eyes even in the shadows you left behind

i am stronger than this

while waiting for the next girl in barnes & noble you can pull out an anatomy book and trace my bones like you wish you could have done before when it was still a viable option
you inched her name into our conversations because it tasted like honey and devil's food cake on your tongue, looked away when i begged for answers
left me writing you letters you never read and calling your name and wishing you good morning like the good girl i wanted to be even though i’d grown so weak
behind your frames who did you see when you saw me? i want to know, i want to know if the guy before saw the same wide-eyed half-smiling half-crying picture of naivety
i hate sensing patterns
you knew
you knew
you knew
but you did it anyway
i knew
i knew
i knew
the ending very well
and i let it happen anyway as if i didn’t know any better
i kept waiting for the broken traffic light to change.
i shivered because my cardigan was too thin,
high-low chiffon skirt pulling an unwanted marilyn and sending chills as i stepped onto the platform,
phone in my hand at 63%, got texts from everybody but you
body trembling on the walk home under the moonless sky.
from now on trusting is going to feel like an olympic sport
i've never been that athletically adept but i'll learn to pole vault the hell away next time when i see the signs loud and flagrant.
third time's the charm right?

you can find my head in the clouds if you look up the residences of bored angels who have made us pawns in their games

you can find my heart under the faucet, i've rinsed it already and it's nearly done drying if not for the occasional drip here and there,
but hush your mouth because it's progress, it's migrated from the hamper where you tossed your sweater after you realized you wanted to get "that piece of dirt" off your sleeve

you can find my soul when you shut your eyes and take a walk through the city in your mind, tracing our ghostly footsteps,
the pedometer refuses to start on the grounds of how impossible that number seems

you can find the rest of me every time you break off eye contact because you don't really want to have that tedious conversation,
in old letters
in music
in lonely 2 ams
in frustrations
in the leftover spaces your distractions and routines don't quite fill.

it's ok because i'm sure i'll reach out for you too somehow,
there has to be a yellowpages lying around my house somewhere.

today while waiting for the train a woman with a voice so immaculate it sounded like a recording sang "at last" and i felt the final slivers of disillusionment scatter,
i felt love the way carrie bradshaw would type fervently about it late at night in bed,
i felt renewed faith in love surge through me.
though the tunnel i then walked through reeked of incense, i marveled at my own rebirth of innocence. wide-eyed once more.

today while on the train a girl in maroon pants tippy-toed and kissed her boyfriend and he sat next to me and she sat across from him. a couple of people stood in front of me, bustling along, but i shifted positions to meet the girl's gaze and gesticulated, "do you wanna switch seats with me?"
the look on her face said it all.
do unto others, right?

when we met it felt like he was speaking to a corner bookshelf of my heart that needed a little bit of dusting. he swiftly picked up one of those books and read from it and it made me feel good.
or at least that's what it says, according to my new journal.
i hope a fellow starry-eyed soul switches seats with you on the train so you can laugh at inside jokes with him,
i hope you can hold hands and marvel at the street performer
i hope you call your best friend and tell her about it while you're walking home,
i hope this happens to you, over and over and over,
repetitive but you're so happy you shed the cocoon of routine and burst out: untethered, fearless, maybe even into song.

cheer up, don't give up.

we are the perfect friends because we freely hold hands
we are the perfect friends because we freely loosen ends
we are the perfect friends because we’ve learned how to listen
we are the perfect friends silent under sunlight prisms
we are the perfect friends, laughing in the middle of summer
we are the perfect friends, always running after each other
we are the perfect friends because we speak like water
we are the perfect friends though we are the imperfect daughters
and love is a soft spoken word shown in actions rarely few

and darling i heard it loud
while i was getting to know you.

i can’t tell why, but
your laugh is just the sweetest
dessert i have had

i think it’s silly:
we speak just like we’re dancing
in perfect rhythms

it’s so fun to dream
that i’d be happy without
my independence

you make me write poems
five seven fives just for our
little one by one

you don’t know it yet
but you are changing small things
like my little heart.

i arrived in this world with no map to guide me but the palms of your hands. you let me hold them sometimes, and they’re warm and inviting.

sometimes you make me feel starry-eyed with your words, or at least that’s what you used to do

but i’m waiting for you to send me constellations of goosebumps running down my arms and spine

i will shape myself into an amateur cartographer, and make it an active point to mark places on the map that we’ve been to together, and as i trace my fingers across towns and mountains we’ve yet to cross, a part of me wonders if we’ll even get to any of those destinations

because somehow you’re staggering and i don’t know why or what’s holding you back

still i persist, i yearn for adventure.

i leave the map unfurled and smooth the creases of my sudden remembrance that i came here alone. i made my own decisions and ran into you in the meanwhile.

you too, were a wandering traveler. your feelings as nomadic as your feet on these lands. i wouldn’t call myself foolish to have ever gotten involved, but you are embedded in my memories. a new story for me to flesh out every time someone asks me how i got here or there. i’ll keep meandering from town to town, but no longer will i seek you — you may find me.

i realized this was not your map, but mine.

warrior by day and writer by night
the machinations of your mind
be my heart’s delight
so give me eloquence if you wish to ****** me
reticence should you wish to repel
for a lover with smart sweet words
is keen to put me under his spell.

the pick of the litter
but it bit me when i walked up to it
any flower in the garden
but it wilted too fast in my hands
any star in the sky
but it was just a trick of light,
i didn't want to strain my eyes any longer
every seashell on the beach
but my jar was too little
just like my frame and my patience too, apparently

so please don't tell me i can have anything i want
when it's really not that accurate after all

if it was never deliberate or carefully controlled
then maybe i'm just intrinsically forgettable
ashes and wine, between the lines.
i'm tracing circles in my mind like a little whirlpool
swirling in the waters of what i was too ignorant to notice before
i remember this story already, it's happened a while back
i stifle a bitter laugh and play the rest of the track
i never wanted to be an afterthought.

at 0:01 begin the pangs of the oceans of longing
****, he's so good at guitar,
her voice fills my heart with tremors
she seems to really understand what it feels like
to choke mouthfuls of salt water while looking for pearls in the sea
and i keep listening because i feel that exquisite pain too:
"i don't want to imagine the words you spoke to her that night"
a feeling i've felt again and again

sad silhouettes form in the corridors of my brain
my pillow soaked with the scent of DIY petrichor
you said you loved the smell of rain, didn't you?
cerulean-stained fingernails glide along the screen,
eyes watering at the green and white,
symbols of bare minimum communication
hoping that the letters will rearrange themselves into different messages,
maybe my vision was fuzzy and i read it wrong
was i too distracted by listening to this song?

i laugh because i feel too high school writing this
but that doesn't make it any less accurate
how's that for self-reflection?

Teach me how to fight. Teach me how to be strong like you so I don’t cry that much. Hold me in your arms when I’m sad and spend the whole day with me to cheer me up. And when it’s late at night and I can see nothing but the light from a window or two in the building across the street from us, I’ll play with your hair until you fall asleep, and we can talk about everything and nothing while we do that, because between you and me, we are exemplary in the art of discussing everything and nothing. I won’t have to miss you because you’ll already be there, but I’ll miss you anyway because I understand the meaning of the word 'ephemeral', and I will worry until I’m fraught about not wanting the sun to come up and for me to leave later on, even though that’s much later on.

In the morning I’ll wake up first. I’ll catch a peek at you, still asleep, prone to really sleeping in. It's okay because we take turns playing hide and seek with self-control. I’ll turn pages in the meantime and then when you wake up we'll idly peruse tumblr, check our phones in case we have any messages from boys we'd sworn ourselves away from, and facebook stalk half the world before we realize we really should have breakfast. And I won’t let you do anything for me except maybe show me where you put the bagels, because I can get a cup myself (you know that I'm a little clumsy but you trust that I won't wreck your kitchen), and I can pour myself some orange juice.

We’ll talk but we’re also quiet, just basking in sunlight and warmth, and the contented comfort of being beside someone else who knows you so well. Later after we’re done with our late breakfast but not quite brunch meal, you’ll give me this look that says “Let’s go on an adventure.” And we scurry off into your bedroom, and get all dolled up and do our makeup but we never make ourselves into people we're not. I borrow a shirt of yours and slip on my flats and a bright scarf and we’re on our way.

Lather, rinse, repeat repeat repeat. This song is on repeat because it’s my favorite song, and everyday I want to spend with you because you are my favorite person.

last seen with mass amounts of tenacity,
bright eyes that glow whenever she talks about the moon,
she's just as loquacious as bodacious, and always seen with friends (a pixie, a well-dressed waif, a girl who speaks the language of skeletons and blood). she's deeply enamored with a certain mexican grill, and often writing or taking a nap on public transportation, or smiling really widely while texting certain person(s) unnamed... also, she knows a hell of a lot about pokemon and the way the human heart works.
oh, and her laugh--you'd notice it. when she laughs you just know something's hysterical

where is she now?

she's a little reclusive
her smile's a little restrained
she stares too often at hourglasses and writes fervently in a leatherbound tome given to her on her 17th birthday.
she's waiting for the storm to pass but for now she's writing about it
don't tell the news i told you this though, cause i know they'll find her and force her to feel better as soon as possible. just give her this clock necklace and put it around her neck and tell her that time heals all things, she's learned this before.
tell her to eat some sour gummy worms and go to bed earlier, and stop feeling so sorry, to listen to a little less john mayer.
tell her it's okay to miss ghosts and that it's okay to wish to not be alone.
tell her to call tonight a night and stop rereading old stories or knocking on enemies' doors.
tell her that it'll be okay (even though she already knows it will)
and i promise you-
this is but the fairy tale trail of breadcrumbs that will bring you the old girl back.

a couple of days ago we visited a land inhabited by deceivingly accurate portrayals of life. we grew so entranced by everything we saw. we spotted a very strange looking crustacean flanked by a really thin looking squid positioned upright. she quipped about how it looked just like a pen, and when we went to the store we made it our life's only mission to find it and buy a replica so that every time we confessed to our journals we'd remember the day. but it wasn't there. i think about it now and i laugh because what kind of a mentality is that? to just be so sure that something will be there, will work out in our favors, will come back despite all odds. i can't afford to think with such ironclad naivety. people are not infallible. funny as it is, i can't expect to find a squid pen, and no amount of determination can make tangible something that doesn't exist.

but the whale, above our heads, floated as lifeless and seemingly ordinary as a chandelier. a half idyllic half menacing scene at the bottom of the ocean. we laid underneath it and felt so small. our worries and problems themselves seemed even more infinitesimal. i pretended i was submerged underwater, letting all of my troubles disappear and become one with nature, and she was the only person who could listen to my thoughts.

The shirt you’re wearing as I sit next to you in one of the few pictures we have together that I kept. We’re smiling as though there is nothing to fear, and if there is, then we know we will be there for each other to stave off from such a feeling. I never saw you wear that shirt again. The shade of my ceiling when I wake up in the middle of the night, stirring from a sad dream. The color of the bow I wore in my hair a couple of times at school. The way you felt when you couldn’t remember the words to one of our favorite songs. The way I felt when you couldn’t remember the words, because I could tell it was the beginning of you forgetting me. The small waves gently milling about in the pond in the park we’d walk through every week together. A bright feather on one of the birds you tried to feed bread crumbs to during a walk in said park. Her eyes, a piercing hue that demanded your attention like a performer at a circus. The blanket that preserved our warmth during brisk mornings waking up beside each other. The mug you drank simmering tea from soon after getting out of bed. The ink from the pen I used to write you letters. The box you put the letters in underneath your bed, obscured by shadows and necessary secrecy. Your gemstone, because in dire need of amusement, I looked it up once. The sky just before it becomes truly nightfall.
The color you shirked off in favor of a “real” blue.

athymia:
1. the absence of emotion; morbid impassivity.

exhibit A.
she passes through tunnels of silken sheets and wind chambers with gusts that leave trails of kisses. she lives in a dream. when their lips met for the first time, she looked into his eyes with a question and he didn't say yes to take a crash course on the beating of her heart. he took advantage of the moment, unwary of the precarious nature of his words and actions. but wide-eyed and naive she said yes, because it is a word the vulnerable mutter all too frequently with uncommon ease. they are still an entity, but unbeknownst to her lies a world of secrets she has yet to discover about him. lies. he doesn't love her, he is still confused. yet he keeps the charade going like a mastermind. if you can't have the one you love, love the one you’re with. she continues to paint daisies on the walls and on her wrists. everything is perfect.

exhibit B.
physics says that force times distance is equal to work. she's more of a science ****** than anything, and i am not talking about breaking bad in the slightest. no one wants to do anything in the dead of winter because it is as frigid as the underbelly of a monarch penguin, but she moves as fast as a monarch butterfly on her quest for his heart. she's fallen victim to one of the most powerful spells of levitation, and we wait until the efficacy of gravity strikes. we wait so she can learn her lesson, that science cannot teach you the ways of the heart, that you can have as many late night conversations, warm embraces, and clandestine glances as possible, and it could still predict naught of the future. she has yet to learn this, and she also has yet to say "i'm sorry." and this, i wait for, but i will not hold my breath.

exhibit C.
stung. she has been stung by the harbinger of indecision. she dreams of a beautiful world that carries with it the love she needs, but it is by vicious nature for her to reject others and feel dejected. she does not stare at happiness at first, but she stares at potential. pretty little potential with a ribbon on top, glimmering in the dusk. she does nothing but question it ceaselessly until it shrinks away like the wrap used to encase it. he is potential. so was that guy, and the guy before, and so on and so forth until we reach the factorial of four. she was never good at math, but she could count up all her insecurities like simple addition and simply subtracted people in her life thereafter if they made her feel the slightest of some way she thought she shouldn't. but at the end of the night she is on the cusps of complacency, twining fingers with memories that dance with her until the sun stretches awake. cheating apathy with reflection.

exhibit D.
he remembers the teasing lilt in her voice and blue ribbon she set in the back of her hair ("it's more of a cerulean, don't you think?"), and conjuring the images of her within his clouded mind is elementary biology. he places the vinyl in the record player, and plays "no surprises." not his favorite, but when he knows it was hers. he sits on his bed and the each note hits him in a different part of his body, and he keeps withdrawing from the memory bank. they're slow dancing in his room, her gentle laugh at his missteps is glitter cascading to the floor, and soon their bodies are shifting in a foreign way and he later wakes feeling the weight of starlight nestled upon his chest. then the sky turns red. not maroon or soft sunset but a flash of pure red. the hands of the clock twist to form sequences of circles, the calendar pages turn like a bestseller. he says things he doesn't mean to girls who yearn to hear them, and his hands guide their way through jungles with quicksand and a sahara with no oasis. needless to say, everything has changed. he recalls the careful penmanship on the letter she wrote, and they are standing face to face at the bus stop issuing quiet goodbyes. the record ends but the images are bright and vivid. funny how piano keys, though simply black and white, bleed thousands of audible colors. he mulls this over until he enters slumber.

i’m afraid of affection, afraid of touching lips
so instead i pull away, and just keep sharing quips
a lot of times i’m lost, and don’t know how to feel
men ask for my hand, but i don’t let ‘em take the wheel
other girls sing songs of sweet things, how love’s the greater joy
but i’m too busy plucking petals, and warding off the boys
i spend my time adventuring, and writing lots of poetry
because i cannot find the one who feels so right for me
we all have our obsessions, and little pots of greed
and sometimes cannot tell the difference between want and need
i’d like to love another, and want to cast a spell
but staying in one place seems synonymous to hell
there’s a city in the distance, a city not too far
a sanctuary i can flee to when hearts come to war
sometimes i think of traveling there with my pocket change
cause again, the thought of staying here fills me up with rage
maybe he will come soon one day and i won’t even have to think
but in the mean time i’ve got lingering thoughts, paper, and ink.

little feet dashing across the playground with light-up shoes and arms raised and poised to hold our weaponry. swift movements mark the territory with memories of traipsing through our makeshift castles. when we’re children we gallantly save princesses with long tresses who cry from the tops of towers, fearing uproarious dragons and the darkness of the sky. we protect the princesses from terror, and some of us grow up to become them and learn to protect ourselves. the tall dragons shed their prismatic scales and flinch as they feel the girth of our swords. after much opposition, we face our fears and instantaneously make the final strike and become victorious. we turn and look through the binoculars of our hands and spot nimble thieves stealing the shimmering scales in exchange for their own greed. they climb medieval walls and we try to catch them. impulse clutters our line of vision and we go because there is no time to waste, we don’t want to lose them. sometimes they return the stolen treasure and sometimes its a lost cause. we learn the latter later, through long sighs at lonely 2 ams after seemingly infinite words have spilled out on paper and out loud out to those who can’t come back and those who can but won’t. but the former fleshes itself out when we experience moments of kismet. these days where we share conversations with people who satiate the hollow corners of our hearts and walk outside and breathe in the petrichor just as the sun has wriggled its way into the sky. we learn life is as vivid as any story we become momentarily enchanted by. people come and go as fast as the pages that inspired our childhood adventures turn, and everything happens at once. we face demons as beastly as our dragons but we have our warpaint on no matter how hastily drawn it is, and we convince ourselves of our strength until it’s real to us.
we were the heroes of the story then, light-up shoes running across the playground, and we are the heroes of the story now, playing and living in the light-up world.

the sounds dance as we are, the music like a waterfall right by our ears, and we are a part of the landscape. the photographer zooms in closer and he sees us. he snaps a photo as if to trap the ephemeral nature in a bottle. we drink from said bottle the liquid of opulence we are basking in. as lush as everything around us seems, with one too many chandeliers and dresses and tuxedos that cost a fortune, we exist as fireflies in the night, our identities remaining letters in sealed envelopes locked in drawers. we flutter and sway, chortle and whisper sweet nothings, somethings, anythings to whoever charms us for a moment’s dance.

she observes and picks at the seams of her maroon dress as if she’s entranced by a thriller novel. it’s so easy to feel tuckered out sometimes, she muses. she is an escapist by nature. she’s taken up running as a recreational activity, and she doesn’t run to feel the adrenaline rush. she runs to be alone. she hears their voices and their sheepish laughs behind their hands. these girls that are too scared to be themselves even under a silly mask. a physical facade to make poetic the abstract one.

she’s about to leave when he bumps into her. he is intoxicated by the late night energy and he’s decided she is going to dance with him. his hands aren’t awkward and sweaty but they’re soft and seem to know what they’re doing as they glide down the small of her back and poise themselves for a rhythmic rumble. she chooses not to be a rhythmic renegade and she accepts after it’s started that it’s going to continue because he has this coy grin that she doesn’t feel like resisting. a grin that tells her to trust him and to take a ******* chance.

they rotate like they’re a part of the solar system, and afterward share a couple of drinks. they talk about the vastness of the universe and share the same incredulity that they will never be able to touch a star or ever fully adjust their eyes to the intensity and immensity of sunlight. it saddens them both to the same degree. he shares his love of languages and his eagerness to learn about the world in which we were born as infinitesimal shapes. she talks to him about how she loves hearing a good story as much as she loves telling one, and how without words and the capability of expression she would feel paralyzed. they shift under the same wavelengths, twin fire signs. they drink up each others demons until their glasses feel half empty and save the other half for another meeting or twelve. and half past twelve, they remove their masks and the cages around their hearts.

the universe was toothache, the stars were giant cavities. “but it’s been far too long since i’ve had sugar,” cried the sun, the concerned star. “don’t lie to me,” said ever so smart mercury, “when we are right by the milky way.” the other planets jeered and the sun shed a tear and on the earth was rain, peeking through the clouds. you see, the sun was always body conscious. the planetary publication "zodiac almanac" always had an unruly comment or three to share, and after copious poring, the sun felt a little dimmer every time. but every night when the stars twinkled in all of their saccharine glory, they had the sun to thank. the sun, who boldly held itself up in the sky for the little specks on the planet earth, from the people taking walks in the park to the plants preparing to soak up their daily delight. they engaged in photosynthesis while the sun never felt too photogenic at all. the sun mused while listening to the twinkling music of the rotating planets and stars that kissed each other as they formed constellations, faint but audible nonetheless. the sun mused that it wasn’t shining brightly enough. it cried and wept and the people on earth mirrored its melancholy, for a day without the sun morphed into a day of rain-induced laziness.

mercury, who had since apologized, urged the sun to read a book to reinvigorate her intricate mind. jupiter and uranus suggested a workout for empowerment. mars recommended her to write an angry diatribe or five, she was so very fond of venting. venus reminded her again and again that she was beautiful. neptune sang her a lullaby every night. and saturn offered her a ring to lean on. pluto was on sabbatical, but sent her a postcard. all of these gestures were warm and lovely, but the sun still felt trapped and unworthy.

she felt too enormous, too blinding, and too far from earth, where she’d heard many wonderful stories about. the other planets had grown complacent with their distance from earth, but the sun always wanted more, and that was why it was so sunny sometimes, because she wanted to stretch out her wispy arms and embrace the world she knew she could never touch. so she never felt good enough.

but one day the earth seemed to have had enough, and the people were growing dreary of the absence of their beloved sunlight. the moon was especially privy to this information, as she’d watched over earth night after night (except in her first phases when she would rest), and witnessed many a complaint as the clouds would clock off from their shifts and heave sighs of resignation. they knew their golden friend was still weeping.

the moon decided to take a stand. she floated towards the sun even though they were so far away and told her softly: "darling, i know it’s sad that every day you can give so much to people who will never be able to give you anything back. i know it’s hard to peer over, having to watch their countless stories unfold and not ever being able to be one of them. but every time you shine down on that tiny planet over there, you change things. you are bigger because you are so full of light, gently cascading onto those lucky tiny specks down there. and i know you’ll never know what it feels to be fed rays of sunlight, but you can take all the moonlight you want from me and it won’t bother me at all."

and the sun cried more but this time, the tears were out of happiness, and the moon assuaged her again that it would all be fine. she knew she didn’t need to have her own sun, feeding her light, because she knew the light was within her, and her ***** friend, the moon. millenniums later the two would laugh about this.

"what was wrong with me?" inquired the sun.

"everything happens in phases," replied the moon.

your touch put language on my skin. you read my goosebumps as if they were passages in Braille. a hand against the small of my back was enough of a siren call for me. we’d sit and watch the people pass by but they weren’t ordinary to us. a man on a two-wheeled chariot, on his way to deliver an important parcel to the princess. children playing on a hastily scrawled hopscotch grid on the playground by the fountain, trying with bated breath to narrowly escape the lava. a couple of sparrows flitting to and fro, little dragons disappearing into the forest. we’d remark casually about these little instances we noticed and amidst it all I still happened to see the gleam in your eyes whenever you spoke about her. a small but fleeting gleam that made me shiver because I’m well acquainted with that sparkle and that tone of voice. I was scared you’d leave, that I was inadequate, that the stories we’d unfurled just based on our surroundings only existed in the realm of that moment. the kisses you left on my face and the cadence of our breathing only transient tokens of the day. you, just a book I’d have to put back on the shelf because I wasn’t allowed to keep it. restricted. instead of sighing I half chuckled. “I’m sure she’d find it funny too.” I know the story too well by now. I scratched at my collarbone, the place where you’d last left a breath. my body stirred because you turned a page and skimmed over more Braille. and we moved effortlessly into chapter 4.