Hundreds of Worlds

I don't know how you can leave me like this. I don't know how you can pretend that this is all normal, like time apart is immaterial.

Everyday that I wake up I wish I could fall back asleep and live in another world for a while. One where I am so strong, like you expect me to be. One where I am invincible, nothing can hurt me. Where the demons can get so close, stare at me with glaring eyes, bear their teeth at me, but I laugh in their faces because they cannot touch me.

It's so much easier to live in a world like that. The one that you live in. Where 90 days is as long as 90 seconds and the giant cerulean monster that constantly threatens to swallow you is nothing but your queer pet, tamed by your mere command.

I want to live in the world you live in. I want to feel nothing. I want to live in a world without "goodbye"s or "I miss you"s. One where they are only spoken when your body can find the energy to provoke your vocal chords to find the power to vibrate.

I want to live in the world where I understand you. One where you do not let me cry in bed one day and forbid it the next. One where you do not recoil from my touch, take my hand in yours for a few moments only to drop it like a child that has lost interest in walking her dog. Find me the world you live in, where your ship turns skywards and the sheer force of your will and apathy sends you through the layers of the atmosphere. I want to go with you. Let me join you while you cruise through the unpaved antigravity roads. I want to look down on the rest of the world and laugh too.

Let's find a barren planet and promise everyone that we will return one day. Let's promise lands so fertile that there is no need to replant what we take. Let's promise time that stands still like we've discovered the Fountain of Youth. Let's call our space ship The Ponce de Leon. Let's crash it.

Allow me to hurt you and I promise I won't. Grant me permission to feel something and feel it with me. We don't have to feel it for long. Let's get caught in the doldrums of life and know that we can create our own winds if we need to. Let's leave. Let's fly, walk, cruise to lands and pretend we are conquerors. Let our flags be the footprints we leave in the soil. Let our treasures be the leaves we find in our hair after rolling around in the earth. Let's stay. Don't move. Let's be present. Let's stand at attention. Let's stand at disregard.

Let words be words. Let them be nothing more. Let's not speak. Let's create a language of our own where we trace lines across the landscapes of our bodies. Let words be what our lips do. Let love be what our lips do. Let's pretend. Let's never leave the pretending. Let's kill our obligations with the sword of adolescence. Let's walk from east to west. Let us be underdressed and overtired. Let's never eat anything but a few bites of Italian food in an ambience that does not match our aesthetic.

Let's cry. Let's never cry again. Let's cry some more. Let weakness be our strength. Let us be human. Let's not deny. Let's not pretend. Let's never pretend again. Let's be who we are. Let me know who you are. Let me love you for it. Let it be more than words we speak before we shed our layers. Let it be real. Let me wait for you. Let me feel. Let it be real.

Priya