Not all fires burn.

Art by : @cadmiumyellowdeep

The nights are growing cold here, and I’m using old memories to kindle a little warmth.

Just enough to feel my fingertips, to not let my heart freeze over.

There was a time when I would have lit a blazing fire, enough to outlast the wintry winds, the night shivers. There was a me who would have fed off of the warmth of another time, who would have nurtured back to life the smouldering remains of dying fires.

But you see, I am not this me anymore. I am brave enough now to venture into the cold, to let the chill crawl up my bare arms and invigorate me.

Now, if I want warmth, I have just enough spirit to reach for it, trusting that it will not burn.

(Because that’s the thing about memories, isn’t it? They warm without burning. But you can never tell what it will be with the present, you can only experience the full shock of it when it happens.)

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The Garden On The Other Side

 

Art by: Unknown Artist

I hope that one day, you get to look on the other side of fear.

I hope that the weight of all the lives you are not living comes smacking you in the face and startles you from your numbness. I hope it shakes your bed made of the bitter comforts of days that are all the same. I hope you realise someday that the emptiness you feel cannot be filled with just anything. No matter how much you eat or how many things you buy, the hole will still be gaping. The only moment when it is filled is the split second when all these things pass through, only to be dumped on the other side.

I hope that one day, you no longer have to hide. I hope that you learn to not fear loss. That, instead, you find it’s something to be accepted. Because I don’t want to see you clutching what you love so close to you it bruises, anymore. I don’t want to see you telling yourself that this is fine. That this kind of life is okay, when you have dreams bigger than the world. I hope you will no longer be chained to the past. I hope, I hope that you can learn to trust the world a little more. Trust that, on the other side of that rough, heavy wall, there is a garden awaiting. And freedom.

Freedom from fear.

I hope, one day, to see you running down these plains, laughing like a younger version of you you never got to be. I hope to see you grow like wildflowers by the riverbank, defying the currents and dancing with the wind.

I hope you can be as free as the child who jumps running out of the water only to splash in it again, her laughter like the breeze in between the dangling pieces of a wind chime.