dried white mulberries smashed between soft lips in the library. smears of Revlon on burned skin. fire gleaming through a glass of gold liquor; sparks the same color shooting the full-moon sky.
lipstick smeared across the grocery list; familiar wine-red. too dark to kiss away. black clothes, black eyelids, black eyes. a cold park bench, a playground at 2 AM and a chest that tastes of bile. a phone call she doesn’t remember.
splash violent violet and green onto skin in the shape of a crescent. “i can give you a better bruise than that.” rap blaring from under the bridge. breaking into the theatre,
corridors echoing and empty. the pattern of streetlights on tangled hair. the pattern of sex and ache and anger. the pattern of abandon, before throwing it up to consume again. bleeding in bed, in war, and after the running is done. the stink of vomit on clean sheets.
the stink of the love that won’t let go. the ache of the ones who won’t leave me.
I find it fascinating that people who choose not to have children are generally assumed to feel really strongly about not having children (or even to feel really strongly against children, anyone’s children, in general). I am probably not going to have children, not because I REALLY REALLY HATE the idea of having children, but because I don’t really really love it. Out of all the major decisions I will make in my life, this one is the only irreversible one. I can sell a house, quit a job, divorce a spouse, whatever. I cannot unhave a child. I cannot opt out of being a parent once I become a parent. I can’t even take a step back for the sake of self-care or whatever, or else my child will suffer.
So for me, having children is fuck yes or not at all. The default will be to remain childfree. Having children should be an opt-in decision, not an opt-out one. Until/unless I develop really strong feelings about wanting to have children, I won’t have them, even if that means I never end up having them at all.
The Carving Witch 