Hint of Purple

Tangible

The first time I've ever felt pain, as my distant memory serves me, I was a stubborn little thing gazing out the barred windows fantasizing about my next adventure sailing across the bright sky on my trusted steed. The weather would melt off the skin, but the rush of wind through my hair would suffice as a cooling method. Or perhaps I was waiting for my neighbor to stick their head out of the window facing mine to greet me with a toothless grin, and we'd spend the next few minutes shouting each other's name until my lungs gave out on me. It was weird, because we could still hear the other if we spoke at a normal volume, but my childish brain liked the adrenaline rush of expanding my vocal chords for everyone to hear. It was then and there the window was shut against my poor finger, and red trickled down the scarred tissue.

It hurt. A lot. I cried. A lot. Not my finest moment.

The concept of pain was purely physical, tangible. An ache you get when you trip on your own feet, or when someone shoves you in a game of TAG, or when you touch a scorching hot pan because you're curious how it'd feel like if you touched a damn hot pan. Stupid reasons that leads to painful outcomes. I never expected pain to evolve like it did, to progress from my arms and knees straight to my heart like a sharpened dagger.

No, that kind of pain was never fun. It was torture. It was brutal. Because it mocked you for feeling weak, it haunted you when you closed your eyes in the dark, it laughed at you when you're shivering in the cold dark abyss of your nightmares.

I couldn't breathe. My lungs were constrained within burning chains, not expanding, just shriveling up until the world went pitch black. Pain. It had to be tangible pain, it had to be seen and heard. There was no other reason. But after getting the linings of my ribcage, the stutter of my heartbeats, and the shallowness of my heavy breathing checked, I was told I was fine. I was fine. I was fine. But I didn't feel fine, I couldn't breathe. I wasn't fine. I wasn't. Then their whispered discussions reached my ears, talking about the state of my mind. I stopped. I just stopped.

That's when I first thought of pain. Not temporary, but the one that lingers.

I had contemplated my nonexistence, I've dreamt about being gone, and I wondered would've that taken away the pain? Would've that eased the weight on my mind? If so then I want to be gone. I want to disappear into blissful nothingness and maybe I'd be at peace.

The reflection of the hollow shell of who I'd been stared back behind a veil of fog, lying down against the cold tile of the bathroom floor, holding a sharp razor's edge on their already scarred skin. I've written about my attempt in flowery language, hidden behind beautiful imagery of arts and paintings and metaphors, for many years now; but I won't sugarcoat it anymore. It was dark, it was chaotic, it was brutal. I hated myself so bad that I did not want to exist. And for a moment I didn't, but I thought of so many things; of my parents, of my siblings, of God; will He condemn me to hell for doing this?

I think I've always wanted pain to be part of my life. Physical, tangible pain. But my soul got riddled with emotional scars instead. Bags of despair weighed on my shoulders as I moved through life, my back pleading for relief. Though, despite every speck of agony drawn on my skin, I'd rather feel the pain.

Feeling pain meant I am alive. I am surviving. I am thriving. Pain meant I am not numb, but that I continue to live. It meant I am not a lost soul, but a tangible human being.

I am still alive.