Sometimes it feels like I’m still hiding behind words, like I’m not showing up in the simplest, truest, clearest way for people to see me. I don’t want to be seen and don’t care to be seen, which I feel somewhere as the angry truth, like I’m avoiding the hard work of sitting down and figuring out what it is I’m trying to say. It’s like I’m lighting the fireworks then running away as to continuously keep the reader’s attention over there.

Sometimes the firework goes off, sometimes it doesn’t. Most of the time, I don’t care what you think, “you” being the person who is outside of me, the person not in my circle, not in my world, not in the space where you can light the fire with me. “You” is the one who has no idea I’m even out here. “You” are forever the multitudes of regulars, who are not behind the barn beseeching the mountains, horses, and electric fences.

Suit yourself, I don’t care what you do, as long as you’re not telling me I should be more like you. Call me a hypocrite if you want, I don’t care, because a hypocrite is exactly what I am, sometimes. But call me a name that isn’t true, and you’ll be the one with hell to pay, not because you so righteously hit the nail on the head, but because you missed it again, again, again, and again. Not that I can truly stand to hold this flame against you. I won’t lie.