The Beginning. Such a tenuous state of mind. I find it driving me onward, searching in blissful ignorance. What am I searching for? I am searching for the answer, the solution to my endless troubles. My mind drives itself in endless cycles. The beginning. What happened? I must know how it all began to understand how it must end.

This is my introduction. This is my story. I have a part of me, cursed into a darkened silence that I cannot undo. What makes it all the more vicious is that this is the most important part of me, yet it is sealed even from myself. Do you know me? Can you see who I truly am? For I am more complex than you ever realized, hurting deeply, in three dimensions and finding happiness on higher planes of existence than you are capable of fathoming. The mind finds hope for me yet. You cannot see the intricacies of my behavior, cannot reach beyond the void towards true understanding. There is nothing standing in your way but yourself, and yet that is an obstacle that can never be moved. You are trapped, much as I am trapped. You see how my mind reaches cycles?

Logic tells me I am safer, with the darkness locked away, but I know my logic is wrong. Logic is always wrong. I am a person in pieces, some trapped and out of sight, and some on trial for the world to see. Something of me must be seen and am required to show it. I cannot go on without revealing parts of me, though I can never show the whole. It is a broken self that stands here, lonesome. I am a wandering tribe of self-inflicted misery but I did not choose this. Someone else has chosen my fate. But I digress. It would be easiest to look at me as the sum of the parts inside me. Each part is my emotional transgression. My darkness is locked away, my brightness here for the world to see. Love tends hide its true nature, much as an iceberg hovers only just above the surface. After all, if all is visible, then all is vulnerable to the fiery heat of the sun, which melts it. Hiding the brunt of love keeps it safe. The hurt is suffocated, stifled, bottled to remain hidden from view. It hurts too much to let it free, hurts too much to ask for help. I must keep it safe, from others and from myself. And yet, the more it bottles, the harder it becomes to contain and the more I suffer. There are some battles impossible to win.

Do you know me now? Is my introduction sufficient for you? Because if I were reading this instead of writing it I would find it hardly a beginning. There is nothing here. No mention of lost or found loved ones, no hopes or dreams, no belongings, no self. How should we define the self? Is it in our choices? Is it our behavior, who we surround ourselves with, or is it in our emotions? The immediate reactions before we have time to think…. Are people so easily explained? The measures of life run far too deep and nothing I say can give you a true glimpse into my humanity. Am I sentient? What is true sentience? The belief that one can think? How can we ever truly know? But I do not think you could ever truly know me. There is too much too see and too much that I hide, whether by necessity or otherwise.

There is a twisting, a wrenching, a certain ephemeral nature to hope that despite all else seems to die, cold on the ground with nothing but the sprinkling rain for company. That is often how I find myself, spread-eagled on the unfeeling pavement and wishing my oblivion would find me faster. And the coldest part of all is the tingling in my fingers as the tendrils of blood continue to curl outward, away from me.

But what kills me, what drives the torturous agony like a knife straight into my beating aorta, is the hope that rises again from the ashes, my effigy of the phoenix. It takes to flaming wing and drives high into the sky, floating and soaring on the wind’s breaking currents. It is awe-inspiring and totally overwhelming in its all-encompassing fervor. It is inescapable. And the worst part is knowing that in all its terrifying glory, it will end; the hope will vanish, disappear beyond the distant horizon and die out, bleeding on the pavement, just like I am now. Another endless cycle.

The claustrophobia is catching. The frantic, frenzied edge to every motion and thought that terrifies me. There’s nowhere to run, no place I can be safe. I have to get up, but my body refuses to move. Someone give me strength to stand, to fight the demons clawing in my back. I have to get up! But it’s impossible. My mind struggles, my body flails, every inch of me fights the horrifying oppression weighing me to this freezing pavement that grows colder with every moment to no avail. I cry out, my heart beat racing beyond my control. I panic. There is no hope for me, but I cannot give in, cannot give up. There is no destiny for me, but I must try! My breath comes quicker, panting as I search for a way to fight the indefatigable. I cannot simply lay down and die! Because surrender leads only to a paralyzing stasis of permanently increasing suffering and that state of being is the most haunting existence a person cannot hope to endure. The fight is exhausting but infinitely preferable to the torture of letting go.

The assault is continuous. It is daily, hourly, minutely, pressing down on me. Every moment of the day, talking to others, walking, driving, eating, I can feel the cool breath of wet pavement on my cheek and warm blood at my fingertips. I feel the plunking drops of rain dripping one by one onto my cheek, onto my clothes, onto my hair. Everywhere I go, it rains. There is no one to hold me up, because anyone that tries, I pull down with me. I prefer company on my drizzled concrete and so I push them away. I’m dangerous. There’s fear in the blood skimming my fingertips and you would do best to heed my warning. I will hurt you. That is my inevitability; it is my curse.

This is my introduction. Because my bleeding body in the rain is not a metaphor. My battle with myself is not a difficulty humanity can truly comprehend. And if you get too close I will glory in the sheer anguish that unquestionably follows.

Do you know me now?