june gloom

You wouldn’t embarrass yourself like that

You are reading a book about a woman who is lonely. You are reading a book about a woman who is lonely. January turns into March turns into summer and you are still reading a book about a woman who is lonely.

“Loneliness engulfs me like dry heat. It is New York loneliness, hot with shame, a loneliness that tells you you’re a fool and a loser. Everyone else is feasting, you alone cannot gain a seat at the banquet.”¹

A bird flies into your window. It raps against the glass with its mouth desperate like its heart is sugar dissolving in salt water. You wave your arms and jump up and down. You turn the lights on and off. The bird disappears and you cannot tell if it fell or if it chose to dive.

“She rolled her eyes, as though loneliness were a ridiculous concern to have for an animal.”²

Is everyone you love mad at you? Everyone you love is mad at you. But you keep blocking out your calendar. Leaving texts unread like little sad things. You keep saying yes and then no. When you mean help.

Or please?

You taste copper, smell bread, you step through a small opening. You send an email and another. You backspace, you backspace, you backspace. You had a good feeling and were wrong. You regret almost everything. A version of you, long gone, purchased 12 forever stamps with drawings of hearts on them.

You keep opening the drawer where you put them. Even though it sticks, a cheap thing. You can’t fathom why you bought the stamps in the first place.

“I am so lonely.”³

Once in Paris you were very drunk and you wrote on a piece of paper that you still carry with you: I am extremely drunk. In Paris you wanted to be happy. Admit it. You cried on a green chair in your favorite garden because you wanted so badly to be alone and happy.

You would never ever ever ever say, out loud, that nobody understands you. You wouldn’t embarrass yourself like that. But sometimes on days that are vast and unbroken, the color of notebook paper, you wake up and this is the thing resting on the top of your head like a feather. You see it when you walk into the bathroom to make sure the lines on your face are still there.

“The funny thing about walking alone was that I never felt alone in a physical way. Sometimes I wanted more of it, that loneliness.”⁴

You get a glass of water from the sink and try again.

1. Approaching Eye Level, Vivian Gornick

2. Hothouse Bloom, Austyn Wohlers

3. Hot Milk, Deborah Levy

4. Pilgrims, Devin Kelly