the daydream I can’t shake off

The love of my life is fickle.

With every move, with every turn, time brings me further away from my love, but its sweet image nearer to my heart.

It trickles between my fingers, running away.

A hologram of happiness, desire and pain. A flickering glimpse onto something like inner peace, a delusion pinched from a clouded dream.

There is that tiny space, where I belong.

Only a spec on the map of reality.

In those nights and dawns, spent in the silence of that milky yellowish grey of the sky, my love becomes more vivid than anything around me. Or anything inside me…

I keep imagining that I’m on a space station in orbit, and look down on that filthy place I call home. A wonderful and terrifying place I origin from. Itself equally an enigma, truthfully lied, made up and real, beautiful and ugly.

I am ashamed and proud. Even that contradiction is heartfelt and true to me. Equally me, equally not me…

a record keeper

WHY I WRITE – a Chuck Wendig prompt

I fell in love with stories.

It hit me one day, without warning.

I remember it perfectly. I was about eight years old, and it was a rainy afternoon in November. Outside, everything was washed grey, silhouettes started dissolving into the murky atmosphere. Dust washed away with dirt water… Even the sunlight through the rain clouded more than it revealed.

Somehow, everything about my childhood seems grey, hollow and vague. I grew up in a socialistic land on the brink of revolution, and its aftermath. Nothing was like it ment to be…

That day, I stood at the balcony door and stared out into the rain. Below, people were busily running around, surviving the strains of everyday life. I thought of my everyday life, and I didn’t like the pictures forming in my mind. I hated my everyday life. The ink stains on my thumb fore- and middle finger itched. I saw no differences, no contrasts, just boundaries and limitations.

That cursed moment I felt my heart bursting with anger, fear and frustration. There was no way I could escape that grayness around me; in me… No matter how far I went, what I did, it won’t rub off. Ever. It was etched under my skin, in the tone of my words, it was the background noise of my dreams. That special kind of grey, it will always be part of me. It will always stay there, dulling my senses, my thoughts, my emotions.

I was lost.

The pain of swallowed glass shards and strung heart kept me company for a quite a few years after that day.

I started writing. That day, I started writing a little story. I don’t remember it any more, only the ruled paper and the unevenly scribbled sentences stretching from one end of the line to the other, in purplish ink.

Something happened. In that domineering conformity of grey, the paper seemed glowing snow white, although I soiled it with my pen. It was different. It was new. It was; I was dumbstruck.

I felt the lash of a whip over my head, a cracking thunder, or  maybe a sudden notion of meaning (though I never had the right words for that, just an overwhelming pull to the Inside-of-whatever-that-Was). I remember how desperate I was, not knowing what to do, or who to tell. What was going on? What happened to me? I kept wondering, how long this state would last. What should it mean to me? Wrecking my brain for a solution, for any solution, I got none…

Thinking back, I’m convinced that something important hid itself. Something that mattered and still matters to me, I guess. But like all (really) important things, it’s invisible, untouchable, not tastable, not audible… I know it’s there, it pulls me.

It still plays hide and seek with me. It makes me crazy! It is on the tip of my tongue, and I´m not able to reveal it to the world, nor to myself. I dubbed it my core, my everything, my love, my dream.

The struggle began: I wrote, it ran through my fingers like sand. I wrote, it changed shape. I wrote, it dissolved into thin air.

So I wrote…

With time, I´ve achieved tools of revelation : words, languages, pictures, stories. In that sensible time of my life, I fell for stories. I truly did, as soon, as I realized, they ment freedom, they were my escape route. I was so happy, that I could explore the infinite silhouette of That-which-refuses-to-show-Itself…

You know, the wonderful thing about stories is, that they manage to still my hunger, my anger, my anxiety. Which is pretty impressive, I can tell you that!

I´m not sure if I have a style, or talent of any kind. I´m not sure, if I´m even good at what I´m doing, nor that I´m ment to have success with it. But that is not the point. What I do, I need to do. I´ve got a regular job, which keeps my brain distracted from this obsession. It distracts me from my tracks and fakes my needs. It holds up my hunt. Frustrating that is, being caged up like this… I´m a physician. I have to help others.

Can´t wait that others will help me one day, cause that´s not happening. Never does. Writing is my own medicine. Storytelling is my doctor. It keeps me grounded. It keeps me happy and… sane. Yes, I know, it sounds pathetic – it’s therapy.

As it is, it helps me to observe ´n recognize, what I´m not able to see under my own power.

I don´t think, I´m a writer, or artist. There is no art in what I´m doing. I´m only recording, what´s happening inside… I may not be a good record keeper either, but I try. So my writing is more a documentary work. It is proof, that I exist… Somehow…

Does this make any sense? I don´t know.

why a storyteller

I fell in love with stories. It hit me one day, without warning. I was bout eight years old. A rainy afternoon in November. Outside everything was grey – and I mean everything. I started writing. I still know exactly, what it felt like. The lash of a whip over my head, cracking thunder –  maybe a sudden notion of meaning (though I never had the right words for that, just an overwhelming pull to the Inside-of-whatever-I-Was).

I remember how desperate I was, not knowing what to do… Or who to tell? Speechless, I kept wondering if this state would last, and what it should mean to me. Wrecking my brain for a solution, for any solution, I got none…

In there, something important hid itself. Something that mattered and matters. Possibly only to me, but it matters. I know it, I can nearly smell it. But like all real important things – it is invisible, untouchable, untastable, not audible…  It makes me crazy! It is on the tip of my tongue, and I´m not able to reveal it to the world nor to myself. The struggle began: I wrote, it ran through my fingers like sand. I wrote, it changed shape. I wrote, it dissolved into thin air. So I wrote…

But I´ve achieved tools of revelation : words, languages, pictures, stories. In that sensible time of my life, I fell for stories. I truly did, as soon, as I realized, they ment freedom. That I could explore the infinite silhouette of That-which-refuses-to-show-Itself…

The wonderful thing about stories is, that they manage to still my hunger, and my anxiety. Which is pretty impressive, I can tell you that!

I´m not sure if I have a style, or talent of any kind. (I didn´t chose any of it). I´m not sure, if I´m even good at what I´m doing, nor that I´m ment to have success with it. But that is not the point. What I do, I need to do.

I´ve got a regular job, which keeps my brain distracted from this obsession. It distracts me from my tracks and fakes my needs. It holds up my hunt. Frustrating that is, being caged up like this… I´m a physician. I have to help others. 

Can´t wait that others will help me one day, cause that´s not happening. Never does. Writing is my own medicine. Storytelling is my doctor. It keeps me grounded. It keeps me happy and… sane. Yes it sounds pathetic – therapy. As it is, it helps me to observe ´n recognize, what I´m not able to see under my own power.

I don´t think, I´m an artist. There is no art in what I´m doing. I´m only recording, what´s happening on the inside… I may not be a good recordkeeper either, but I try. So my writing is more a documentary work. It is proof, that I exist… Somehow…

Does this make any sense? I don´t know.

food for fire

Somewhere between now and fifteen years ago, I lost my fire.

I didn’t even notice… It is one of those things, which disappear without traces.

Fifteen years ago, I was stubborn and defiant. Resilient to the hostile impulses from outside. Resilient to everything. I clung to life and my goals, with teeth and claws. I was desperate. I showed everyone what I was capable of, when they laughed at me. It seemed, I had important goals to reach. 

But nowadays…

I’m older. And tired. The goals faded, their importance vanished. I do not cling anymore. Today exhaustion rests on my eyelids, my back. It is the dust on my shoulders, the weakness of my hands… Still I’m desperate. Silently thrusting my claws into the fabric of my dreams, ripping them apart. I sleep a lot, than I can’t sleep a bit. Something tells me, that I should be angry… 

One thing changed in those fifteen year. There is no one  left to laugh at me now… No one to compare myself too… I’m alone now. Isolated  from hostility and contempt. 

Is this why I rip myself apart? 

Is the missing other component the friction to light a spark?

Why can’t I find my own motor? Why do I need others?

Why is there no strength left in me, only the stiffness of my joints? The rigidity of my mind, the rigidity of my body. I’m slowly turning into stone without that fire.

What should I do?

 

sticky

My writings transforms to a ball of glue, when I write something meaningful to me. It gets sticky and heavy… Like caramel to your teeth. Struggling… You can’t scratch it off, even if you try with tip of tongue, or nail of your index or pinky – just sticking there  and disturbing.

Ugh, agglutinated words, clinging to my fingers, lips and my tongue. Gummed up in the back of my throat. Clogging the way out… 

Wheezing. 

Again. The freedom to breathe is what keeps me going. A cheap freedom, if you ask me. It’s nothing I fought for.

Why can’t I let them go?

Choking on silence… Eventually the wheezing stops. 

Eventually it transforms to sobbing. 

Eventually it fades away into the approaching summer storm.