How I Found My Freedom in Our Destruction
I met him in the darkness of January.
He broke me open and cracked my soul’s glass shell. Now there’s light and dark and water and fire pouring in and out of the fissures. He let out my demons; they were ugly, disgusting beasts, but now they twist in the sunlight, glittering. They taste freedom. I won’t get them back, and that’s okay.
I thought I knew myself before I met him. Now I know I definitely do not know as much as I should, and that too is okay. When he shattered me, I found a lot of my pieces were unfamiliar. Now as I work to reassemble them, I take each one and feel its shape and smoothness.
I run my tongue along the sharp edges, and notice the way my blood tastes different with every new piece.
Each one carries with it a bit of pain, a dash of sadness; that is how it should be. The pain and sadness are simply the vessel to carry the goodness, the pleasure, for we cannot know one without the other. The pieces hurt, but they shine and glow and never die out. As I mend, I feel pain carry me towards gratitude.
Bliss is a word I have used frequently to describe what I felt with him in my life. It isn’t true, however. I did not feel bliss. Bliss suggests no cares, a completely free mind. That is not what I experienced.
I’ve struggled to put the feeling into words for months now. It’s almost impossible.
You’re lying on the beach with the sun beating down on you. Your skin is burning and blistering, but you can’t feel it because someone has their hands in your stomach and they are playing with your guts and you’re laughing the whole time because it tickles.
It was the most fucked up thing I’ve ever been through. It was sickening and messy, but it just felt so right. I was simultaneously comfortable and uncomfortable, in pain yet on the edge of climax, every minute of every day for four months. I loved every bit of it.
So, here is what I know:
I met a man who nearly killed me. My soul was broken open; a few things escaped and a few were let in. I was forced to come to terms with aspects of myself that were less than desirable. I also got to meet the part of me that is worth all the gold in the world and more. I gave my love, I was cared for, however fleetingly.
Marks were left. I know he left one on me. Did I leave one on him? I would like to imagine I did. I definitely left our names gouged into the pavement and scorched into the hills. I wrote us down and put us in a book that isn’t printed yet.
Can you really expect me to burn for someone for that long and not do a thing about it?
I burned out, like a candle. It took a while, but eventually there I was on the floor, a puddle of wax, wick smoking, defeated. It was okay. All my colors spread out across the ground and I had the opportunity to name some of them.
Looking back on this, I no longer carry the conviction that everything he showed me was truthful. I know he lied. I don’t know exactly what the lies were, or how many he let loose, but this is also okay.
Regardless of what was real and what was not, the feelings I had were as close to the truth as one can get. They were the most real thing in this mess.
I pull up little memories and they drag back the echoes of those feelings. Maybe the things he did which caused me to feel were all lies and maybe they weren’t, but whatever they were, they happened and it was real. For that I am thankful.
If I had to guess at what the lesson is in this, I would say it is to feel. Not just regular feelings, though. That would be too easy.
This type of feeling is a murderous and hellish experience. This is the feeling of your flesh being stripped away piece by piece until you’re a skeleton, and when you think it’s over, your bones will be ground into dust while you watch. It is raw. Unforgiving.
There’s no sympathy from the Universe. It’s as though everything is holding its breath to see what you’ll do, thinking: You asked us for this. You said you wanted to feel. Well, here you go. Feel it!
Yes. Feel it. Feel it all.
Feel the way your heart stutters and fails at self-destructing. Feel the stinging blood in your veins, burning through you and cleaning out all the shit you’ve stuffed inside. Feel your lashes flutter as your eyes try to welcome Death. Feel the ground beneath you shift as you try to dance with all the blood on your face and the wounds on your feet.
Feel the way your mind tries to tell you to give up, and the way your soul pushes back saying you can’t and you won’t, and to keep going because it won’t actually kill you. It only kills that which no longer feeds your purpose. Feel it all over and over and over. Feel it changing you; revel in the metamorphosis.
Whatever you are when you come out of this will always be better and stronger and more than what you were when you went in. Feel because you can. It’s a blessing to be torn apart in such a way that you no longer recognize yourself.
You can go back to reality now
I don’t think it will cut so deep
Or burn as hot, or shine as bright
But one day it will.
I hope it rips you apart
Until you have no hands
With which to hold the shreds.
I can promise you this:
There will never be anything more satisfying.
*****
Megan Frizzell is a young woman who is currently feeling the talons of something pulling from within her. There’s a story that needs to be let out, but it’s still forming. Sometimes, a little piece of it breaks off and she feels the need to share. She has recently finished polishing a book of poetry and is almost ready to self-publish, only the cover art is left to do! She loves nothing more than to have her words reach the hearts that need them. Leave her a comment, you’ll make her smile for days!!!