Uh Oh I Miss Something I Can’t Name Again. I Want To Go Home To Something That Doesn’t Exist Again.

bathroom sink meditations, r.a.

“writers & lovers” is killing me

@januaryhoney // @naynawrites on Instagram // @sunflorally // @geloyconcepcion on Instagram // @lucidloving // @petrichara

it is tiring, being endless political just as someone existing. my teacher asks me if i’m writing more of that “feminist poetry.” a lot of it is just talking about me, being a woman, being afraid in the city. i write about walking a line, about how i am expected to choose between home and work, how each comes with a slew of its own insults; how it feels when i am wearing shorts and there are too many men outside. these are just facts of my life. someone in the comments says, “where are woman even coming up with these crazy generalizations in their feminism?”

i hold hands with the prettiest girl i’ve ever seen and someone sighs when they see me. “do they have to make everything gay?” she asks her friend, loudly, “like, do you have to force those views in my face all the time?” i can’t stop blushing. my girlfriend holds my fingers tighter, tighter, tighter, until my knuckles are white, and i let her. somehow, this is us, protesting.

my father’s cuban blood stains my skin, i think. when i am honored with a position in the dean’s private council, a boy sneers, “you only got in because you’re hispanic.” did i? i spend the rest of our meetings wondering if i was selected for my stellar academic record, for the multiple recommendations, for the clubs i lead - or if i was just a move the dean made, to make use of me. when we all take a picture, the dean brings me in the front. in the first three we take, i am not smiling.

it is odd. “i exist.” i say, “i deserve to exist.”

“oh my god,” he groans, “we get it, you’re a feminist.”

mary oliver I’ll be honest I have not endured loneliness with grace

𝒯𝒽𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝒾𝓈 𝓃𝑜 𝒷𝓁𝓊𝑒 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽𝑜𝓊𝓉 𝓎𝑒𝓁𝓁𝑜𝓌 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽𝑜𝓊𝓉 𝑜𝓇𝒶𝓃𝑔𝑒 - 𝒱𝒶𝓃 𝒢𝑜𝑔𝒽

Franz Wright, from “Our Conversation” [ID in alt text]

C.P. Cavafy, from The City (tr. by Edmund Keeley & Philip Sherrard)

feels like every few weeks I have to relearn how to exist, that I do need to sit in the sun and move my body and not drink too much coffee and dress in clothes that make me feel good and talk to my friends and journal and get off my phone sometimes and eat vegetables and drink more tea and generally reclaim the space in my life for myself ya know

to my aro/ace friends and smols: if you’re ever feeling undervalued, remember Hestia

You know, Hestia. The greek Goddess of the hearth and home. simultaneously the oldest and youngest of the Olympian Gods. Hestia turned down marriage propsals from both Poseidon and Apollo, two of the arguably most desirable gods in the hellenic pantheon. Instead, she asked her brother Zeus, king of the heavens, for permission to never marry and never have to take a lover or anything. Which he granted. Without question. Zeus, lord of sleeping around, did not question his ace sister when she said that’s who she was. That is some divine allyship, yo.

She went on to be the Goddess of the Hearth. For ancient greeks, the hearth was the center of the home and the center of worship for the family. In ritual practice, Hestia always recieved the first (best) and last part of any sacrifice. Put that in context of patriarchal societies where the “father” of the group “always” recieved the best part of a meal. But not Hestia. No, your friendly hometown goddess was venerated before the king of the heavens, without question or anything. Hestia was the center of the family, the center and grounding point of the home, and was treated as such. 

The lesson for aces here is that you are worthy of being yourself without question. You are a valuable member of your community, a most valuable member of your family, and if you are not treated like it, maybe take after Hestia, and burn those motherfuckers to the ground.