Daily Archives: October 22, 2020

October 22, 2020

THE INNOCENTY OF THE WATERS

By EPRobles

PEOPLE with eating disorders are “allowed” to keep their identity secret. You’re not allowed to be a person.
You are simply “a stomach that ate.”
Everyone who sees you has a lot of power over you. You must be nice to them, speak in a certain way, present
yourself in a certain way, and never be so self-conscious that you don’t want to eat.

You don’t want to eat because if you did, you would be severely sick.

You wouldn’t be in control of your life.

You would be a creature.

You would be weak.

It was during my treatment that I learned who I really was.

I understood that my eating disorder could be cured, because it was merely a disease of mind and body.
I didn’t have to be afraid of food, because it’s a powerful human tool.
I knew that I was not being a stomach that ate; I was a person who had been infected by a brain that
wanted control. My illness wanted to make me not a person but a mind that ate.

A mind that went through life being controlled, and told what to do, and how to feel.
A mind that no longer could think for itself.
A mind that wanted to give up control, but didn’t know how.
A mind that could think but couldn’t act.

I understood that I had to take back control of my life.

I had to make myself be a person who was not a stomach that ate.

I was a girl who thought, and had dreams, and wasn’t a blob.
I was young.
I was a daughter.

I had big plans for the future.

I was a Christian.

I was a girl, who needed love, and felt loved.

I needed to be loved, and loved.

I wanted to be strong, and able to live a life that my illness would never again keep me from.
I wanted to make a difference in the world, and to love others.

I needed to learn to love myself, and to use my illness to help me learn how to love myself.

I could choose.
I would choose.
I would love myself.

I could have a beautiful life.
I could be happy.

In order to be healthy, I had to learn to let go of that which I didn’t need.

I needed to let go of the need to control my life.
I needed to let go of that which scared me and made me afraid.
I needed to let go of the struggle to know what to do next.
I needed to let go of the confusion of what I wanted and who to be.
I needed to let go of the struggle to say no.
I needed to learn to say yes.
I needed to let go of my imagination, because life doesn’t work that way.
I needed to let go of my imagination, because my illness was reality.
I needed to let go of my imagination, because my disorder was my life.
I needed to let go of my personality, because my illness was my character.
I needed to learn to find my own self.
I needed to learn to let go of being tired of not being a stomach that ate.
I needed to learn to be a person, because being a person is what I wanted most.

And after I learned how to let go of that which I didn’t need, I became a person that my illness no longer could control.

I learned to say yes.
I learned to say no.
I learned to laugh, and be silly.
I learned to cry, and have emotions.
I learned to write, and speak, and love.
I learned to have fun, and to love life.
I knew how to make choices, because my disorder was not only no longer controlling my life, but was helping me to make choices.

My eating disorder was the healthiest thing that had ever happened to me.
It was a sickness of the mind, and a sickness of the body.
It was a sickness of the body that was a sickness of the mind.
It was a sickness of the mind, that could be treated, and a sickness of the mind, that could not.

I learned, over time, how to say yes.
I learned to say no.
I learned to find my voice.
I learned how to be brave.

I had not learned how to be brave when I was diagnosed, but I learned it with the help of my mind and my illness.

I learned how to be brave, because I had to be.

I had to be strong.
I had to be able to overcome this disorder, and be brave, because there was no other option.

I needed to be brave, for me, for my parents, for my friends, for my boyfriend, and for everyone who loved me.
I had to be brave.
I learned to say yes.
I learned to live in a world of uncertainty.
I had to live with the uncertainty that my mind and my stomach might not agree with.
I had to live with the uncertainty that my disorder would destroy everything that I ever wanted in life.
I had to live in uncertainty, for me, for my parents, for my friends, for my boyfriend, and for everyone who loved me.

:: 10.22.2020 ::

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October 22, 2020

FIGHTING FOR COMPLETE UNDERSTANDING

By EPRobles

i held my arms, sleeping, around her breasts, bending, allowing myself to fall, the ghosting, dark wake, the fiery sands burned by a storm of thorn trees, burned by the march of sea and the keys of incense that hang near her bed. Soft and fiery sweetness, a book of songs that didn’t affect me, a white dress with a tattered hem, elegant skin whose breath has already evaporated.

There is no physical reflection on her breasts, my love, the fluidity of a river in the shadow of the heron’s head. There is no destruction of a dead river in the pale water of her beauty. Your eyes, the depths of their ravines, the fire in the dark, your hearts, holding mine, their tornness, the loss of a companion, in the silence of the corridors where the footsteps of strangers run.

From the raves I must admit I will never feel intoxicated, but I need so desperately to feel intoxicated, to finish my life in the warehouse,
under the light of an old beveled mirror with a knife propped against the square of glass, the light of the ghost, of the burning card,
of the ghost of unimportant dreams, of the funny dreams I dream every night. I would like to exist like the strange creature that thrives
in the laboratory of an art dealer in an abandoned warehouse.

Held her ankles, enjoying her existence, trembling, embracing, trembling, our breath circulating the smoky air of a kiss.

She only exists when my back rests on a cold polished floor, in the darkness, in her natural state, my brother, my pride, my hope.
To touch her, to feel her breasts, her lips, her hands, all the parts of her body that run all over mine, that brings me nothing, for this expression
is simple, low, they do not consider her existence, my love, to raise her up or to lower her, to grab her legs, to kiss her lips, to kiss her nose.

Everything but the head, where she is still touched by the forehead of a stranger, from one of the corridors, one of the cracked doors, where her
lovers walk, from the stones and shadows of cold halls, the one that is lifted from the depths of a world of books. You only exist, my love,
with the touch of your palms.

From behind my childhood wall, I have met the daughters of stars, from behind my own walls, the girl that lives in the corridor, has warmed up my life, there with me on the cold polished floor, my passion.

Everything is there, hidden in the dark depths, revealed by the hallway, the fading curtain of candles, the evening light, a kind of passionate romance,
my love, whose bones are growing every day as if they were long-dead, those young girls, the memory of the last night, the abandoned street,
the shadow of an old bed, a memory of the night that passed, but only lives in the room where I am lying.

Leaned against a window of a skyscraper, red-eyed, like a demon, muttering, covered with a black apron, sobbing from an open wound.

What was that, love? What did you see?

Those eyes of the future, seen in the silence of my mind, in the chaos of my thoughts.

It was dark, I have left the house in the street, I have entered the house.

What was that sound?

I can not go further, there is nothing here, it was dark, it was closed, the doors were closed, it was dark, the house empty, but it was empty as
the city when the people pass through fighting for love, compassion, and complete understanding.

:: 10.21.2020 ::

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October 22, 2020

LOVE CAN BE THE BEST TREASURE

By EPRobles

Love can be your best treasure, and all the rest after that—by that I do not mean money, that is after all in very short supply in any society that places more of value on family and society than it does on money—do not compare.

My treasure is a bit of you and a bit of me, a scattering of memories, of places and sights that speak of us.

When I am old, and if you will still be with me, I will hold up my pocket knife and let the tarnished blade drag against my body and stare into the wood, as if to study the grain, so that I will know you better than ever before, so that I can tell you a few stories about our days, our strolls along the marshes and the rain-swept fields, and we can close our eyes and remember being together, like in the days when my name was Cassie and you called me Jennifer—at least for that night, when your name was Silvio and I called you Toma—in my dress with a jasmine moire ribbon in the back and a couple of velvet braids going to the middle of my back, and you in a white dress with ruffles at the collar and a buttoned-down plaid jacket with velvet trousers and stockings. We are wearing white hats, white gloves, and white shoes and holding each other by the waist. I love you very much, Toma, very much—so much so that I fear I will fall, if I close my eyes, to that dark, cool, damp land, which has been calling me for a long time. You love me too, you say, but in the way that one loves a mad brother—you love me in a way that reminds you of a friend you once had, but you don’t love me. You love me in the way that a child loves her father: you love me unconditionally, and you tell me all the time that I am beautiful and that you can’t live without me, but you don’t love me like a woman loves a man.

You tell me to get a head start if I want to get home before dawn, so that you can sleep without your fear waking you up in the middle of the night. Sometimes, in the middle of the night, I wake up, thinking of you. I am lost in dreams of you. In my dreams you are waiting for me, standing in the courtyard, waiting for me to arrive.

:: 10.21.2020 ::

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October 22, 2020

TRYING TO SPEAK THE UNSPEAKABLE

By EPRobles

Is it a society of wicked liars?

Is it a race of contemptible malefactors?

Or is it, instead, just a group of people coming to terms with their lives in a different way?

A growing number of people are choosing to live—and die—without judgment, without the reward of popularity, without the flattery of public adulation.

Most people—without much fuss—are choosing to die quietly, often in comfort, not coughing up blood, losing organs, gasping for air. Rather, they do the things they like, they have their lovers, fall in love again. They experience as many experiences as possible. They have children, watch them grow up, let them out. They do the things they love. In fact, they do as much as possible.

Maybe they are only one of millions who will die this way, quietly, without much attention at all. But for those who read about the Swedish model, maybe they’ll read about this man who, when he was ten years old, decided to end his life when his family wouldn’t let him live the life he wanted to. Maybe they will read about one of the last people on the planet who were given the opportunity to kill themselves.

Maybe they will read about the first person.

Whether he knew it or not, it was Doran, the poet, who led us here. In 2020, when he was 36, he pulled his wife and a friend onto a commuter train in Paris. They sat at a table, drank wine, and ate wild boar with the train’s conductor.

After that, he had a drink with friends. By 2:

Then they all took colors all within their head. And they tried to say the unspeakable.

:: 10.21.2020 ::

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