You have always thought if you opened your mouth in open water you would drown, but if you didn’t open your mouth you would suffocate. So here you are, drowning.

You decide freedom might be a narrative. Freedom might be in the place beyond the fence. Freedom might be inviting others over the boundary.

Multiple truths do exist, and you do not have to be the sum of your traumas.

Sometimes you forget that to be you is to be unseen and unheard, or it is to be seen and heard in ways you did not ask for. Sometimes you forget to be you is to be a Black body, and not much else.

You do not want to die before you can live. This is basic and audacious, but you want to lay claim to it while you still can.

You get the feeling he feels how you do sometimes: like you’re bobbing and weaving in the ocean and it’s a fight you didn’t sign up for. You don’t want to go under. You can swim in water, but the oil will kill you. You don’t want to die. This is basic and audacious, but you want to lay claim to it while you still can.

Besides, sometimes, to resolve desire, it’s better to let the thing bloom. To feel this thing, to let it catch you unaware, to hold onto the ache. What is better than believing you are heading towards love?

You know that to love is both to swim and to drown. You know to love is to be a whole, partial, a joint, a fracture, a heart, a bone. It is to bleed and heal. It is to be in the world, honest. It is to place someone next to your beating heart, in the absolute darkness of your inner, and trust they will hold you close. To love is to trust, to trust

You are ending the summer, wondering how it is possible to miss someone before they have gone.