Anca Dunavete

If love is the light that dissolves all the walls, why did it make these ones thicker? What you did was ultimately love, I know. Well, mixed with the quiet desperation of never making it outside the realm of Almost There. You wanted out so badly that you made love up. Love was going to… Continue reading Are You for Real? →

Picture this: there is an empty space next to you at the table. You make it the shape of everything you need. Now you say hello. This is you at your best, also known as Your Strength, but you haven't been properly introduced yet. You don't know what it is, and you don't know that… Continue reading Some Words, the Way They Look at You →

Hi WordPress 👋🏻 I'm as happy as my blog's logo to tell you that I’ve decided to self-publish and that my book is here! I’ve been wanting to publish my writings for a long time, but excuses over excuses let fear win for years. Two months ago, though, along came lockdown—and together with it the need to find a… Continue reading Mindscapes is Here 📖 →

I curl up in the empty bed. I can’t get warm. When I don't write, the warmth trickles out little by little. My body keeps the score. Have you expressed yourself lately? it asks. I sigh. I can't write when I can’t feel. What am I supposed to do? My heart is elsewhere, and I… Continue reading Love on Toast →

Sure I'm mad—but behind the anger, frustration, and hatred there's only sadness. The other layers aren't even real. I made them up to cover it up. Boredom is rage spread thin, and sadness is grief the same way. There's just so much love inside me, and it's got nowhere to go from here. I've got… Continue reading Say Hi to My Feelings →

‘How odd, I can have all this inside me and to you it’s just words.’ – David Foster Wallace It's been another year. Let me pull you gently now and take a good look at you. You are vibrant and gorgeous, and your mind is insanely cool. But you say, 'I am trying to be… Continue reading Taking Shelter →

I write fiction because it feels less intrusive. We invent the worlds we need to make sense of reality. It's a safe space to enjoy taste the juicy goodness of the present moment, or stretch your heart open to let the vague foggy sadness out. No one has any idea what you're doing, and it… Continue reading You Call That a Knife? This Is A Knife. →

I want to believe in God, but I doubt that He'd believe in me if I were to make Him up again. I've been staring into space for so long now, and not once have I felt like we could get along again, even if I let Him exist again out of sheer desperation. It… Continue reading I Miss, Therefore I Am →

from a work in progress Towns at rest, people on their way home, intermittent patches of glitter and dark everywhere, all the little things that make up life danced restlessly through her lashes. Leaning her head against the car window, Kara felt wide awake with fear and curiosity. Houses rolled past her by like a… Continue reading Getting Ready to Meet the Devil →

When you fictionalise your life you have to invent some of the words yourself—the way they taste, the way they sound in the air—and twist them until no one can tell what hell you pulled them out of. When they ask, you tell them you read a lot as a kid, and then you let… Continue reading How to Be Your Own Story →

Takes a deep breath and exhales. Pauses for a moment. Then begins to type. It's been months now. It feels longer, like this has always been my life. If you knew what was raging inside me, you too would see the flat cloud formation at the top of the storm. I rain over myself, pull… Continue reading The Storm Before the Calm →

From the height of my balcony, the world seems smaller, easier to tame. Easier to love. Sunlight lay across my knees. I feel like an episode of my life, one that keeps repeating. One I can not bear to hear myself type alive and put on an imaginary shelf. 'This past doesn't need to be… Continue reading Writer Girl, Interrupted →

The morning was only growing colder. The streets were still dark. He crept through the streets, staring as if through a window, drenched in old, haunting images of days that now seemed to never have been. He stood waiting, coughing. The cold of the night had gotten into him. The lamp by the bed was… Continue reading In Praise of Blood and Noise →

Melanie is the product of someone's imagination, a character in a story that is still being written. As she develops—as she is developed—she begins to question her existence in between her maker's writing sessions. Why can't she remember her childhood? What do the blank spaces mean? Why does she not feel free in the world?… Continue reading On Fire, But Not Burning →

this post was published in Letters of Love I hope this letter finds you alive—all senses and engines burnings—and well. It might find you waiting in line at the Christmas market. It might find you taking a break from sitting in the sun. It might find you in your most uncomfortable outfit, a little too… Continue reading Just Another Love Letter →

Every second of the day is a question that only I can answer—and, because it keeps asking, I am no longer giving it the truth. I say this, but it could have easily been something else, and the best part is that lightning does not strike me when I push back my sleeves and work… Continue reading I Am a Work of Fiction →

'I write because nobody listens' was the first thing I noticed about her. She had scribbled this sentence on the first page of a notebook left open on the table. She had flaming red hair, wore little makeup and wore a loose black dress. There was a homemade sign hung on the wall that read… Continue reading No Matter How Many of My Cells are Replaced →

'The world is not made up of atoms; it’s made up of stories.' – Muriel Rukeyser 'A week? A whole damn week?' she complained. That wasn't what she had planned for. But then again, it wasn't her who'd planned it. in the first place. Rolling her eyes at the sudden, unpleasant thought, she walked slowly across the… Continue reading Badland →

One day, you decide to take back the lead ropes to your life. To do this, you need to go up to the top floor of the building that is you. You need to knock, say your name, befriend your inner dragon and ask him to share the power. It's scary, but it's the only… Continue reading Here Be Dragons →

The street shines glossy black after the rain. The sidewalk cafes are crowded, and vehicles hiss by—their roar constantly approaching, breaking off, receding. I watch them and hold my breath, forgetting to blink. I am alert, but null. The restlessness of the city mirrors mine tonight, and slowly softens it. I've always enjoyed lights, sounds,… Continue reading Nothing Is Ever the Same As They Said It Was →

Sipping on coffee, I contemplate the bunch of contradictions screaming at each other on the paper in front of me. Some tell my stories in more detail than I'd like, while others tell me the stories I'd like to hear instead. Good. It means I've written it all down, and now nothing makes sense. I… Continue reading Where I Hide Secrets →

'Tell me everything,' he says. It’s getting darker outside, and his room feels colder. 'Like what?' 'I don’t know. Everything, from the beginning.' I smile and bury my head in his pillow, imagining the love that could grow in his heart for the baby I was before I became his baby. 'I have memories from… Continue reading A Thunderous Mind →

He still thinks this is how I was born. How terribly naive. Sometimes I wish he'd realise that my cells didn't decide to man up and learn some coolness when they put me together. That was my mind, many years later, laying out in front of me a detailed plan to make me good, and… Continue reading Following New Love Out the Door →

November rain is cutting through the stillness of the day, like a reminder to be present—a reminder that they are finally together, even without much to say to each other, and that maybe they shouldn't drift apart from each other yet. It's still early, and conversation is hard to hold. Their voices are breaking too… Continue reading Sneaking Out of Your Second Story’s Window →

The old wooden staircase, the black bricks in the wall, and the large plants on the sides of the stairs all gave her goosebumps when she first entered the building. Her body felt heavy, like it was wrapped in layers of questions and blank spaces that she could not get rid of because she knew… Continue reading A Scene That Should Have Been →

During their first months of dating, he often asked'What are you made of?'and his eyes were always wide and hungry for her. She just smiled a little and said'I have no idea'And kissed him with hot, burning lips. Being with her was like playing with fire, but instead of burning him alive, she burned it… Continue reading A Neon Sign That Read Exit Was Glowing in a Bar →

It was late November. Or April. Or August. I guess it could have been Christmas, but most cafés would have been closed—and where else would I have run into him? I'd say it was New Year's Eve, but that would create too much pressure for one day. When is the best time to meet someone… Continue reading Alegoria →

There are nights when I still burn with passion for all the things we've done and for all the things we could still have done. On those nights, I don't sleep at all. I toss and turn in my bed for hours, fervent and longing and alive. Other nights I sleep well, and I wake… Continue reading Waking Up With Stories on My Mind to Tell Nobody →

There is a beautiful apartment above the bakery. It is welcoming, relaxing, with a touch of elegance and sophistication. It's where he first time, he said those magic words to her, and for the first time she touched his face with new love on her fingers and warmth in her body. On the white walls… Continue reading Piece of Mind →

He's been staring at me for a few minutes now, and I'm starting to feel uncomfortable. I tried to make a joke to show him that I was fine, but he didn't believe me. Of course he didn't believe me. 'What did he do to you this time?' 'Who's he?' 'I don't know,' he shrugs.… Continue reading Warming Me Up →

It's summer, dark and quiet up here. Imagine the heat, the lights, the sounds—and the girl, curled up on the black wooden chair, chin propped on her knees, gazing absently over the city. I bend over the table to pick up the pack of cigarettes and take one out. I'd ask her to sit with… Continue reading Mindscapes →

He said he was going to write a story about us. I took it seriously. Later I found out that it was. I was thrilled to hear that we could inspire someone to turn us into literature, even if no one would ever read it. Maybe some stories aren't meant to be read. The man… Continue reading Sharp Prose →

I know you're real, but you have imagination stains all over your face. I've filled up all the gaps with cotton candy and fell in love with a man who brings me poetry, mystery and desire. That's everything I've ever wanted from you. I just wish I could be sure that it's you. I'm trying,… Continue reading Filling Up Gaps With Cotton Candy →

It was summer when, night after night, we fell asleep with fast hearts and hurried dreams of sunlight, fresh air, and new adventures. You kneading my spine and pulsing through my veins, me telling myself that happiness never hurt anyone and, if worst came to worst, misery is always refundable. Seconds turned into days and… Continue reading Swallowed Whole by Life, Not to Be Spat Out →

In my world, I let you see right through me. I listen to my truth on every radio, I decorate the walls with beautiful paintings of my most precious memories, and I have large windows in every room. From here, you can see right into me. Those trees over there? I have so many stories… Continue reading Soulshine →

Our bodies brushed together. I was getting closer and closer. For a while I remembered what it's like to be young and scared and to want so badly to give yourself away, because you don't know what to with all that's been given to you. You do it with your eyes shut and your mind… Continue reading A Few More Bricks to Add →

Art, I suppose, is when you create life and meaning and out of nothing, and not everyone in the world hates it at the same time. You take the nothingness, thick and sticky, and you shape it. It's fun and wonderful and imaginative, and it satisfies everyone's fantasy of playing God. Creating new worlds from… Continue reading You Don’t Always Want to Play Alchemist →

'There is another world, but it is in this one.' – William Butler Yeats 'It's 3 am,' I say. What I really mean is, I want to go. Even though I don't really mean that, but now isn't the time. Not the time to make my way into his heart by any means possible. Not… Continue reading There Is Another World, but It Is in This One →

In the beginning, he taught me about fear. I liked that one, so I decided to remember it. 'Why do you speak of fear in the third person? Fear has no identity. You are the fear.' He also taught me about the ugly side of love. I hated that one, so I can't seem to… Continue reading If Only You Could Put Your Fire Out First →

'How did you become you?' he caught himself asking, rather loudly. She laughed. 'What do you mean by me? What do you know about me so far, so I know where to start?' He took his time. She was the slightly unusual type—his type. She could probably open her heart as wide as it'd go… Continue reading The Softness Still Seeps In →

I had a crush on your mind since I first walked through your doors, all marked Private. I liked what I found inside, and I didn't think twice about the signs. I looked around hungrily and imagined changing the locks, pulling out the Welcome Home mat, and maybe cleaning up that corner. How did this… Continue reading Keen to See It All, Missing Only the Essential →