rottingbranch

[rottingbranch]

look, i / still have nightmares still think of you am still / reminded of you everywhere / because you sank your teeth in / like a bad dog who never learned to let go. / look, i / never want to see you again but i don't think i've erased your pictures yet / i'm too afraid to go through the camera roll. / look, i don't know how to say any of this to your face / i will never say this to your face / but / you ruined me. / laid salt and barren on these fields and / ignored my weeping. / taken my home and everyone within it. how dare you / when i placed my heart to hand / trusting delicate, already twice-shy, / you did this to me.

but i have left behind homes before / let them crumble to houses behind me. / you will not / (can not) / define me. one day, / i'll stop screaming at you in my dreams.

Is everything ruined? / What ruined everything? / What can we excavate from the remains?

[rottingbranch]

sometimes sometimes sometimes

i have these scars, beloved, and only some from blades. the ones that still hurt, that itch, come from the bad punches. skin split open over bone. when im angry, i think about my teeth. they feel longer. like they no longer fit.

when i play at fighting, something sharp simmers beneath the surface. i don't want to hurt anyone. i control myself.

but there's a difference. harmless isn't the same as careful. i'm not safe i'm simply sheathed.

Are you harmless or dangerous?

[rottingbranch]

“you know—” and he pauses here, even tho he’s just started speaking. “you know—” (repeats himself) “—much as i’ve got this whole—whole system here, you know what it relies on?” he’ll tell you, if you stay quiet. he’s learned, sure, that silences encourage ppl to keep speaking; he uses it all the time. works, he says. and still on him, too. “ppl who’ll let you fade. who get too caught up in—in not overstepping, so much that they—” he frowns, here, and he’s either staring at his hands (guilt) or the sky (contemplation—words come slow for him. it’s okay. you wait.). the silence stretches. he shakes his head. “they can’t hear what you’re actually saying. ‘don’t leave,’ you say, ‘i don’t want to be alone.’ but they’re already taking six steps back. what more can you do?” he shrugs. “the ppl who want to are always gonna leave you. you don’t have to try. if you’re quiet enough. if they can’t hear you over themselves anyway.”

he clenches his hands. you know he’s trying to quit (doesn’t like reliance, for himself, doesn’t want to give himself to anything anymore—but he does, he does, he does), but you also know he wishes things were duller. smoother. went down easier. he tries to think, when was the last time someone was gentle?

“they don’t notice,” and his voice is tight this time. “and either they never have, or now they just don’t care, or—” he sighs. “whatever. better alone than lonely. i’d rather it be a magic trick and i’m the one saying the words than—” horizon, again. he’s thinking about cinematography and scowls. “nevermind.”

and, this time, he lets the silence swallow you both.

How To Disappear Completey

[rottingbranch]

protagonist. noun, a character—you know, i had all these terms memorized. exactly as you please, the words, they all tumbled around my head, scattered like marbles now, still clicking together when the heat turns on—radiators, you know? took the exam for it all and maybe even enjoyed it. i say i enjoyed it. i remember saying it. i don't remember if it was true.

protagonist. protagonish, maybe (although antagonish was a reference to the place of the haunting, wasn't it—was it? mearns, i feel i've forgotten. hughes, are you still there? still upon the stair?), but but but. i don't know. main figure, central, am i ? the protagonist here ? or simply the eyes, the ears, camera, rolling but not (never) acting. am i.

i don't remember the great gatsby anymore. how it ends. i just remember nick, listless. he's talking to jordan at a party and she says—something. like that there's nowhere more private than a room full of people who won't pay you any mind. they could say anything. nothing would change. nick could, in that moment, say anything. nothing changes. he's the point of view, and maybe he's protagonist, sometimes, but. but he's not gatsby. great gatsby. what was his name?

protagonist. protagonist. no. i don't think so. i spin and spin and spin, not effortless, always around someone else. the center of my life isn't my own struggle. it is not, i know, me vs. man, or nature, or g-d. (maybe, maybe, it's me vs. myself. i lose i lose i lose)

i'm not the main character of this story

Do you feel like the protagonist of your own life?

[rottingbranch]

guilt like weight, guilt like anchor, guilt like every decision here was mine but i also couldn't have changed a single one. guilt like my stomach is trying to corrode me away with all its acid because i'm lying. i don't want to lie, i miss the way the truth tastes, but i don't want to hurt them. anything i say, if it's the truth, will hurt them. i made the mistake. they shouldn't suffer for it. they will, though. i can only lie for so long.

What keeps you where you are?

[rottingbranch]

love. you are so alone & ache so much more than you thought possible, in the core of you, a place no hands can reach, and you just want to be full. but your mother critiques your feasting habits so you learn smaller portions. you go to bed hungry.

solitude. everyone wants a piece of this, of that, of time, of you. your boss sends an email on the weekend and your mother wants you to call and your cousin just had his second child and you're across the country. can't see the kid, who knows if you'll even get the chance to meet him, with how tangled the family feuds are getting, but your mother still wants you home for christmas. funny, it's not even your holiday anymore. she doesn't know what your holidays are.

food. money. rent. jobs. you're trying so hard, you're working two jobs but it's still not enough. you know you should get a third but what part-time places are hiring? you work with kids. can you get another job, a remote one? will that be enough to keep them safe? your students are back in school, in person, and they tell you about it. the attempts at protocol that don't work. the teachers who don't believe in them, surprised when they place into their AP courses, when they have higher aspirations than the state school an hour away. one of your students has a running tally, broken up by month, of the times she's cried this year. one of your students is so anxious she thinks she's responsible for taking care of every one of her friends. you don't know if there's anyone else looking out for them. you don't know if any of them are looking out for her, in turn. you can't do anything more to help them. you go to bed hungry. you nightmare about food scarcity. nothing much changes, does it?

you. you you you, you're flesh and blood and bone and smiles and the warmth of your hands reach the skin of your friends. the lies on your tongue are bitter but at least the words are yours, you still have music stuck in your head and still remember the smell of cupcakes and still put one foot in front of the other. you haven't crumpled yet. you can rest here. eventually you'll have to get up. but you can rest here.

What is divine in this century?

[rottingbranch]

nothing anyone thinks would – should – have. it wasn't the struggle, wasn't any of them, that sewed steel in my spine, i didn't build myself into brick for defense – the defenses aren't a strength (they never have been) they're a hazard. no. it wasn't anything like that.

at first, it was his kindness. he was a bit of an asshole – pedantic and overconfident and couldn't let himself be wrong – but he was also kind. generous. he could recognize danger and set himself to lessen it, for others. for me. he can be wrong, now, and so can i. i learned it from him.

then it was her. her smiles and how cold her hands were and the fact that i wanted to be able to carry her everywhere. i can, still, pick her up and spin her around. i miss dancing with her. but i learned to bring an extra jacket with me, reached for her so she wouldn't be too cold, i wanted my hands to be gentle for her.

i've changed, since then, of course. it's been years. but i'm still stronger now, for all the time i've spent with them. for all the love i hold for them. it made me stronger. it makes me stronger still.

What made you stronger?

[rottingbranch]

quiet. not necessarily cruel, i try very hard to swallow my teeth when they sharpen; i want my hands to be kind, but truly my face keeps no expression. how can i comfort, compassionate, when i've erased the space i once took, required? i've become a ghost, haunting my own (once) home, awake when the others sleep, walking the hallway aimless in the dark. i sleep during the day. hoping not to be disturbed. i've become quiet. maybe one day i will become silent.

What have you become?

[rottingbranch]

the cold creeps closer now. it curls, gentle, at my wrists, child that it is, not yet grown to winter. it lulls me close, beneath the blankets, whispers after stories, wants to hear my ghosts, wants to take my hauntings as its own. little sister, and so on it i dote, retrieve the warm woolen socks from their yesteryear box, and remind myself of recipes for sugar cookies.

it asks, voice youth-soft, what it will be like to grow old. i tell it: life is a cycle and you never stay still long enough to stagnate. you spin and spin and spill and it will be beautiful. i don't say: the spring comes quickly, quicker than i expect. it will take you away.

(@nosebleedclub october prompts, autumn mystery)

[rottingbranch]

no, but they're selfless ones. no, not for me, but i've carved into my space, consumed it all in this alchemy, to build safety for someone else. i'm sleeping on the couch – i have no room of my own – i'm watched watched watched, no way from this series of public private eyes – but at least they're safe. is that enough ? is that enough ? i want it to be but instead the north calls and all i want is to flee, to fly, to find some place to hide that isn't under the dining room table. i no longer have a cot to sleep under. i have no place for myself. i'm burying myself beneath others' expectations & it's a drowning. i'm losing this battle.

Are these hospitable conditions?

[rottingbranch]

the warmth is seeping out of me. the light fades so quickly already, hours before it should, it feels, even if i am wrong. my watch is wrong. i sleep in the living room but there sits no fire in the hearth. i eat cold soup & find myself hungry. im losing myself to the flickering stars, im going out just as they are, unnoticed. the past is the future and im blurring. blending. the summer hung warm, comfortable, but im losing it now. goodbye

Summer is on its last legs, how do you feel?

And how was your summer?

[rottingbranch]

there are as many answers to this as lives left. this is the only life there is. i'll live a million more, i'll break into a million pieces, other versions of me that could have been, that will be, i could live so many of them and yet none.

there is a life for me, somewhere, with the mountains to the west instead of standing at their peaks, there's a life for me in buildings made of brick, no flat roof in sight. he waits for me, there, beyond the horizon yet i've been to the end of that road, i visited. i cling to the possibility of chasing that life.

but i will not leave this one. it might not be the last life i lead (there is an ending, in the distance, where she leaves and i don't know the troubles that wait there, i don't know if i can stay here, after that, with someone i love, maybe more than anyone else, if such a thing is quantifiable. i don't know if he'll want me to. i don't know how to afford it, if he will) but as painful as it is, it's worth more to me than running north.

how many lives do i have left? i don't know. enough, i hope, to love who i have now. enough, i hope, to someday go north without running, or to wait for him to fly south to me, to love him too. how many lives do i have left?

as many as i have time to love.

How many lives do you have left?

[rottingbranch]

1. you give & give & give & who gives to you. to take is to be selfish, to indulge in your wants too much a burden for others to bear. you'll craft yourself into someone else if only to be lighter on them. it doesn't help but you bleed for them regardless

2. you'll save them but only by damning yourself, you know, but there's nothing else you can do. stay up too late, crumble within yourself, hide beneath the table—but only when they cannot see you fall, only when you can't hurt them with how heavy their burdens are. you're collapsing. it's worth it

3. you weep while looking at him. he's so beautiful it hurts and you shake when he touches you (you're falling apart) and you cannot tell him again so you don't. maybe he knows but probably not so there's no harm. except to you. it always hurts you.

4. i want to disappear to the bacchic woods. why is this my life but it's better than any alternative (isn't it)

5. you cannot sleep here. you cannot sleep here. you curl up on the couch & wish to sleep forever.

Discussion 4/16/21

1. Sacrificial lamb 2. Dark savior 3. Loverboy 4. Girls & wild animals 5. Master bedroom

[rottingbranch]

g-d. so much. too much. i—are you listening? i'm saying i don't eat fish anymore because he hates the smell. i'm saying that i let my life orbit around them, that i'm always trying to make things better, but there's no better for me if i'm always this alone. i'm surprised when he touches me. (most of the time, it feels like she just pities me.)

g-d. adonai. i'm tearing myself apart in love with your creations, when do i get to rest. when do i get to know love, not just convince myself it's there (& it is, i'm sure, but i still have to convince myself it's so. the evidence stacks up but it doesn't reach me unless i'm analyzing it, why can't i just feel loved). i say it feels like we're sitting in a coffeehouse together, finally sitting down after too many missed connections. please hold my hand.

Do you care?

[rottingbranch]

anger forged quiet, ashamed, dull blade— no more quick wick & catch fire, no more for-its-own-sake fury, arises from nothing, nowhere, first law (thermodynamics) violation, yet: that which howled cried aloud and demanded teeth, wanted buried into flesh & bleeding. it's quieted, now, but as ashes or embers still ? give me this ever-silence & set no more blazes in this belly. i want to lay down these arms, my weary head. let me rest.

Weapon

[rottingbranch]

i dont know is it. its safer, safer, but is it safe safe safe i call this place home do i know what that means. i want to run away. i want to go home but im in my bed i want to go home but im supposed to already be there. here. i want out, want away, want someplace i dont feel. unwanted. auxiliary. im a stray taken in here by charity & im just waiting for the other shoe to drop. where will the boot kicking me out come from. im waiting. im watching. my looking for the mold is going to rot this place from the inside. im sorry.

Is it safe where you are?

[rottingbranch]

trying (failing). trying (falling). trying.

Your life in five words