I remember waking up to a morning that reminded me a lot of the movies and the country-side, like my grandparents’ garden filled with bright red tomatoes, emerald-green mint leaves, and faded-yellow vines that were dying from their own thirst. My entire body chilled as the blankets shifted around my malnourished being and I swear that I did not go to sleep alone, so why did I wake up alone? The soundtrack refused to play and I was chocked by eerie silence, a desolate yet solitude feeling of great strength that created a fortuitous burn against the rest of the world. Often, I would be in the press for opposition, rebelling against the morning’s glorious beauty because quite so, I was jealous.

Jealousy. Jea[lust]y, you see? I was never hateful against the world but the mornings destroyed me and even now, I am fearful of such sadness and I only want to paint. Just outside my door, beyond the border of my case, the silence grew louder and I felt unsafe, uncertain, and powerful. I had just recently recalled a moment in time when the ice just began thawing and your voice was all I needed because it reminded me of cherry kisses. But these wicked, forsaken scars are so woeful; they pierce your shallow skin and dig so carefully beneath the hide, squirming under your flesh. And this, this was only the morning, du matin, as is in French, but I am not troubled. Ultimately, the fear could not consume any of the quintessential essence that fueled their drive.

“Good morning, love,” my faint ears heard, “I miss and love you,” and that was probably the last time I ever heard from my past for months. What a hopeless sack of organs we have all become, sacks that absorb the distant past but never preparing for the future. Never was another there to catch my smile, no direction to follow, and we fall, fall to our knees, hoping the false hope, that we would not slam our knees onto nail-beds but the comfort of out beds. But I slid past the faded white sheets onto the sapphire carpet with trimmed silver lining and rubbed the chapped soles of my feet for warmth. I did not want to hear about the sunshine that hung itself on the tree leaves and the winds that fabricated itself over the world. The transition from rough sheep fur to polished marble bones was harsh and difficult for the blood in my feet to handle; I could feel it slowing down, making me seemingly lethargic but I did not complain, these walls never listen, anyway, and I believe the truth of why we complain is for reassurance. I am in this for life, for death, and I will suffocate from smoke. Making my way through the knife-splintered floor, I listened to the walls whispering derogative things at me, hissing at my name like their plaster tongues were caught on fire, sipping on each other’s comfort to quell the dispelling of their hate and anger. But what would they do with a creature such as I?

I hated the way my face looked in the mirror and I found my features distasteful; they must have done this on purpose, they have disgusting humor. They? Them. The ones that laugh at your mistake, your accentuated flaws, and the way you speak, way you walk, everything, or maybe I was just a bad person – that could be the answer to this madness. This must have been the reason why shadows failed to follow me during the sun’s high-rise but creep so closely, lurking around the corners, stalking, preying, during the moon’s show time. The most interesting part about this unfavorable moment was not the realization of truth but the discovery of masks I had but never noticed. Through the lens, the aperture of the world, I have many faces, which I was not someone but that I am many some ones. But I scoffed my sarcastic scoff, shrugged my shoulders and turned away from the reflective glass. I am tired, very tired from the kisses of black lipstick and tucked, button shirts.

I thought about water painting – it is difficult. Earnest trials and tribulations never done enough; scrunching up leaves, breaking wood, and soaking horse tails. I wanted to throw water all over these tiles and pound paint into them, clawing indentations, creating canals of paint that led to polychrome countries. I want to farm hills of agricultural paint, plant seeds of fuchsia trees and plow through the beige soil.

But instead, I capped the cinnamon and maple syrup in this jar, shook it and placed it at the top of my redwood shelf. I now know what to begin and finish.