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ellie's Reviews > How It Feels to Float
How It Feels to Float
by
by
oh.
”Life does kind of suck,” I say. And it’s true. Life is impossible, chaotic. It’s a maze of sorrow and sunlight; it can’t be mapped.
We stand on the path, five or so steps away from the sea. I could run and jump and in a second, I’d be in all that water. And the sea would say, “What took you so long, Biz?”
Stare into a fire for more than a minute and it’s clear we humans are ridiculous for thinking we’re solid. We are built from nothing, collapsible in an instant. We’re elements arranged, empty atoms ricocheting, atoms coming and going. We think we’re these tangible things, but really we’re just ghosts walking, dust waiting. Our insides are made of flickered, fickle light.
Why are you so sad and empty when you have a house with walls and a roof and people who love you?
Elizabeth?
Why are you so ungrateful?
Elizabeth?
Why is it so hard for you to be happy?
“You’re better,” and “I’m so proud.”
Am I better? Can you be better when you’re still sad—long patches of sad swooping in at night when there aren’t any sounds to cover it? Are you better when you still feel blank, fog rising in you, empty spaces like those moors people walk on in British films? Are you better when, as you’re going through the motions—talking, laughing, listening, walking the dog, helping Mum with dinner—at the same time there’s this lost feeling walking beside you, so you can touch it, like a tongue on a tooth?
Here’s the shape of it. Here’s the gap. Here’s the space where something good was. Here’s the want.
”Life does kind of suck,” I say. And it’s true. Life is impossible, chaotic. It’s a maze of sorrow and sunlight; it can’t be mapped.
We stand on the path, five or so steps away from the sea. I could run and jump and in a second, I’d be in all that water. And the sea would say, “What took you so long, Biz?”
Stare into a fire for more than a minute and it’s clear we humans are ridiculous for thinking we’re solid. We are built from nothing, collapsible in an instant. We’re elements arranged, empty atoms ricocheting, atoms coming and going. We think we’re these tangible things, but really we’re just ghosts walking, dust waiting. Our insides are made of flickered, fickle light.
Why are you so sad and empty when you have a house with walls and a roof and people who love you?
Elizabeth?
Why are you so ungrateful?
Elizabeth?
Why is it so hard for you to be happy?
“You’re better,” and “I’m so proud.”
Am I better? Can you be better when you’re still sad—long patches of sad swooping in at night when there aren’t any sounds to cover it? Are you better when you still feel blank, fog rising in you, empty spaces like those moors people walk on in British films? Are you better when, as you’re going through the motions—talking, laughing, listening, walking the dog, helping Mum with dinner—at the same time there’s this lost feeling walking beside you, so you can touch it, like a tongue on a tooth?
Here’s the shape of it. Here’s the gap. Here’s the space where something good was. Here’s the want.
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Reading Progress
January 7, 2019
– Shelved as:
to-read
January 7, 2019
– Shelved
January 7, 2019
– Shelved as:
2019-release
May 20, 2019
–
Started Reading
May 20, 2019
– Shelved as:
queer-and-here
May 20, 2019
– Shelved as:
2019-faves
May 20, 2019
–
Finished Reading
