Rollercoaster

A long winter this has been.

Amidst the agony of another delayed phone call and the pain of yet another missed spot, in the core, there was me, seemingly the very same person as very always.

Another day, another train, another flight to an undisclosed destination.

My heart skipping beats prior to finding kind strangers, as some sort of compensation given by life to the mishaps that would follow.

And after waking up in the apartment of a high-rank officer and having breakfast in the sumptuous Int'l Airport of the centre core of the Republic, just to have, only some hours later, a delayed lunch in the form of a snack of dubious quality, in the bus station of the countryside town of Nowheresville, in the middle of vast uninhabited fields, I had the most precise glimpse of the rollercoaster life is.

What a disgrace it is to ride it without having your hands holding steady.

Falling just like the water, in the Great River, where three nations hold their hand.

In such a massive, indescribable nature wonder, too enormous to fit the modest human eyesight, I held my hands to that very well known stranger.

A new beginning. New hopes.

Classrooms, mistaken plans. This very ending of the year proved itself to be as messy as I myself could have written it, except none of it was planned at all.

And as the ships leave and fade in the distance, breathlessly running uncertain miles have become the main outlet to my unaccomplished dreams and the most successful manner to flee from the port.

The tender smile, with its twisted background stories, was hastily elected as my comfort while I would recover my breath.

And while I do feel like being comforted, I still sometimes sense the Leviathan within, swimming in the rivers not too deep in the undergrounds, being fed with all the fears, deceptions and loathing, thrown away as useless junk throughout the months, the years.

The magnificent, yet terrifying creature seems, at times, to be growing bigger and stronger, to my own dismay and, more accurately, utter terror.

The ups and downs of the roller coaster may shake Leviathan furious.

And I am uncertain of the outcome if it emerges in its full glory.

All the mental abuse I have been subject of, all the control I have lost, all the mess I have walked into, all the self-esteem that has vanished; nothing seems even remotely close to the scenario I was expecting at this stage of my life.

The awareness of such situation only bubbles the blood, only makes my vision dizzy out of the purest despair of, maybe, feeling unable to patch my wrongdoings.

The winter has progressed into spring, which itself slowly walked into what is expected to be the hottest summer I have lived, in plain terms of atmospheric temperature.

Soon it will be a new year.

Soon it will be a time to put on my best endeavours to start anew.

Meanwhile, in the middle of a soft summer rain, my troubles seem to vanish, as my selfishness, as steady as it is, is not strong enough make me blind.

It is time to reflect, to learn with mistakes, to multiply the hits.

It is time to hear the others. It is time to share and to realize that, in the end, we should be joyous and thankful. For the straight line may be the quickest ride, but the bumpy ride is the most delightful.

May the new year come.

May a new rollercoaster ride begin.

Xxx

The boy who murdered love

A story of blood, revenge and deception in four acts, four seasons.

act one: the dawn

A day, a year, a life, an age ago it seems.

While my heart was still baffling from first hearing the horns of victory being blown farther and farther in the distance, while I was still starting the million-piece puzzle, it all happened.

During the night, a second skyscraper erupted from the soil.

As the sun walked up, it shadow threw its cape around each corner of me.

The dreams of the dog nights came all at once true.

Flowers bloomed in one stomping momentum. It was spring.

act two: the day

Caring, gentle, passionate affection.

Intense, sick, tainted love.

As voraciously as comets, but as subtly as the growth of a flower, the branches twirled together in one big piece. All the leaves and flowers shared the same core. The forest became one single tree.

And as roads were being crossed and the unknown was being mapped, a particular paradise was hand-made, under the pallid sun of the late winter, particular spring.

The sunset, however, eventually comes.

act three: the night

A new season came, giving chills as the fresh breeze became colder and the weather went nippy.

Dead leaves were falling to the ground; with them, the decay of my own very establishments.

About then, I reached the big metropolis, almost immediately morphing myself into a cutting-edge glammed up version of me.

It was late at night. I was walking down the bohemian streets of the city, unapologetically bumping into faceless strangers and refusing entry to strip clubs. All sorts of thoughts were running through my mind, in a chaotic storm boosted by the intense sleepiness.

What is it you spend your entire life building and that the slightest autumn breeze can make it crumble?

What is this hatred towards odd numbers?

What is this single-lane road I gaze before me?

What am I here for?

What is it all?

The fire lost focus. It was spread to the lands out of sight.

My thin embrace could not carry the heavy, bulky load of all the items I picked along the way.

In the middle of the tug of war, I was aware of my very fragility, my faults and my failures.

Me, my ego and my aspirations were heavily violated. I was in pain.

act four: the boy who murdered love

His cheeky character is fool's gold

He will tell you the story mostly untold

He will make. He will break. He will overtake.

He is the boy who will murder love.

In the winter, my army failed. The rope was torn.

Felt in the battleground, their unconscious bodies were slowly covered in frost, forming a beautiful crystallized whitish field, not even loosely resembling the glories from the past.

And I -- I was left on my own, struggling to steer throughout the falling snow, keep myself warm from the intense coldness, and maintain some of my dignity.

I could see no further.

I could see no future.

My integrity was broken.

Being a victim of such destiny, I had a revenge to make.

A cup of coffee, maybe two.

I closed my eyes and became a statue of salt.

Forgive me.

Feeling safeguarded by the miles, I was in the sink again, trying and wash off the spider webs. The ugly face shown in the mirror was no help.

My limited eyesight will never be able to capture the immensity of it. All them flowers dead, them leaves dry.

In the very corner of my room I wonder again, what is it all?

You've dragged this fuckery way too far, young man, I scolded myself

I wish I could swallow your pain, I told him in thoughts.

A liar, a thief, a murderer. A criminal, it is. This bruises me too.

A new dawn will come.

And I shall be steering on my own.

xx

Last hour

This is my very last hour as a 24 years old man.

Gutted in fear of getting older yet again, I walk in circles, looking for some company, just to find out that, in all reality, all I needed was some proper time with my own self.

As the clock makes it way around, it will be a quarter of a century for me.

And what have I done in all this years?

Looking back in retrospective seems utter foolishness to me.

This is something I do every night before I sleep, whilst I pray to the Heavens, begging forgiveness for my sins and misconducts.

There is nothing new in my past for me to discover.

Everything seems so perfectly figured out…

There are, indeed, many missing and unfitting pieces in this fuzzy puzzle.

Uncomfortable situations and perplexity are part of my every day life, but so what?

It is undoubtful that there is still so much to do so as to make some sense out of this existence. Somehow, someway. I have no words for what or when, but I know. Deep inside, as a twirled reflex in turbulent dark waters, the answers calmly lay, staring back at me, while I cannot quite tell them apart.

For years, I have been caught in the middle.

Perhaps finding the beauty across the way, rather than looking far in the distance, searching for the face of the destination, should be giving me the best response.

Perhaps I should have worked harder.

A quarter of century it will be, in just a matter of minutes.

From a year ago, I can only remember, with a heartfelt fondness, the very first happy birthday wish I was given that night, and what a perfect life, framed in a single day, followed.

- And, must obviously, the figure that did not too take long to unveil itself, laying comfortably in my very heart.

A quarter of century it will be, as the clock ticks faster.

Memories, promises and wishes of starry nights and flowered fields remain in the distance, in the other end of the road, in the other end of the air bridge.

A quarter of century it will be, in almost no time.

And I believe I am blessed for getting older.

The third touch

Much north the map, where the one-o-one road no longer reaches.

A long messy summer it was; a third attempt to develop my life it was.

The very well known path took me to all these places I was very familiar with.

Lines, bubblegum to avoid the pain in my eardrums, bubblegum pop to avoid the pain in my soul.

While waiting on the hub, a stranger approached.

An overseas resident, such stranger sported a rather snobbish attitude and a very vague if not inexistent protecting instinct towards the mother language against the influences from the adopted home influence.

An awkward conversation began, just to exercise my abilities to remain kind and friendly even in the most hostile situation.

This, however, went beyond the mere cordiality; it was daring.

As it soon became clear, the stranger was in a blatant attempt to put my own experience to test, maybe to prove a point, maybe to prove me wrong, maybe as a pure ego trip.

I then not only managed to be cordial – I also became intriguing, to the point I was gifted a package from the Alps, which, as the stranger insisted to point, was a recurring travelling destination.

Take it as a 'good luck' gift, the stranger said, after learning my goals on the terminal.

As the stranger faded in the distance – to never be seen again –, I read, a little mesmerized, the wrapping.

It said "nice to sweet you".

Well, I thought, nice to sweet you too.

--

Upon reaching my destination, the familiar heat was a warm welcoming embrace albeit the distance and the time were fatal.

The water was not boiling at once and my heart missed the (expected) craving.

Slightly numb, I reckon, I reached the very same place where, not too long ago, was a marking point of my youth dream.

In hopes that the northern heat was to become my lucky charm to succeed, I prayed and went to war.

After befriending with folks from the South – how unsurprising, may I say – I did the best my luck and knowledge would support.

My dreams failed, yet again.

On the other hand, vacations unveiled.

The warmer sands, the brighter sun, the dearest folks.

That was the perfect scenario to my ritual of spiritual cleaning and renewal.

I'm ready to start anew, I, deep inside, prayed, although still startled by the imaginary wall built between us.

Time passes. People take hands. They leave hands. They look up to a new direction. They take new steps. They lick the edges. They jump ahead.

And then they are just never coming back.

And that is how life keeps moving.

We are born. We grow apart. We move on.

Sitting at the restaurant, prior to the farewell, I contemplated their faces, in all the young glory.

Together by heart, we lived what seemed to me as being a lifetime.

Northern wind, however, unveiled that such era was over.
Inside, we had all changed.

The good recollections will always remain, as the door is closed shut.

You then again learn; there is no forever.

The plane was due and the south was awaiting me.

No posh strangers in the way back; no much drama – much in reverse, a lot of joyful friendly laughter – when reaching the old Harbour town.

And it was then time to look for newer forms of building my dreams.

For nothing remains still.

Happy week, dear reader.

X