Soulshine

We are all leaning on lamp posts, steps away from the spotlight. Who are you? The child who is afraid of the dark, or the adult who is afraid of the light? Either way, you’re losing. The volcano and the spring come from the same source, but one is explosive, reckless, wrecking, destructive; the other one is…

But that’s not what I want to tell you. That’s not even what I want to tell myself. That’s the page I ripped today, because I didn’t like its truth.
We’re in my world now, and my world I’m allowed to shape and stop from going to sleep tonight.
On my playground I come alive and it’s spectacular, regardless of what happens when it’s time to go home.
I burn bright with shiny, sparkly words, decorate my walls with beautiful paintings and have large windows in every room.

In my world, I meet you in smoky bars. You wear a hat and the kind of clothes I wish men wore more often. There’s a cigarette hanging out of your mouth, one that you take out every time you pause and smile. You look kind and gentle and tell me story after story, and teach me how to love after storm. The way you talk is like Heaven bursting into flames, giving me the thrill of a lifetime in the safest of all places.

In my secret world, I let you see right through me. I don’t play hideaway and, ironically, I keep no secrets. Here, I break all silences and illusions. It is a magical, sacred place I wish I could always show, but fear that people might walk in with their dirty feet, and it’s my one and only refuge. But every now and then, thoughts like you show up and make a mess, leaving me breathless for days. I get us drinks, take a seat next to you and laugh at your jokes, because you’re refreshing, and mad, and pure – and I can always recognise others like me.

I know you’re real, but you have imagination stains all over your face. I’ve filled all the gaps with cotton candy and fell in love with a man who brings me poetry and mystery. I wish I could be sure it is you. I’m trying, I’m trying so hard to let you shine through. I do my best to listen to you, to feel the taste of your every word, your every experience, your every state of mind. I’m just overly excited at the possibility of having found someone beautiful, that I’m afraid I also made up miles of you. I’m not sure how much of you is really you and how much is me now. I finally understand the vampire myths. You want to suck on beauty, on youth, on love. On life.

Every time I remember that not even I can stay here for long, sadness melts into my bones. Sometimes it’s closing time in my world too, and I’m once again torn between reality and promises, between your imperfections and my highs, between consistency and intensity. Between my madness and my life.
And my God  – as indecisive as women can be – I know that I might be the spring in the outer world,
but in my inner one I will always choose intensity.
I will always be the volcanic girl.
I will always be that flame that burns twice as bright, even if half as long.
I will always run and dance and spin on the fine line between the rain on my skin and the stories I write to send myself to sleep.

I know I can’t be here forever, because the flames would burn me alive, but I’d rather be pushed out at the end of every show than never make it in. I’d rather have a feverish mind than a heart sucked dry of feelings. I’d rather live my hot red seconds than let let the world uncomplicate me for blue evenings at an outdoor table, where I could never blow magic dust on the ways I see the world in. And, more than anything, every now and then as the curtains close behind me, a lava stream makes it through. It pours into my writings, into the world, into your worlds. That alone would be worth bursting into flames for.