I am blooming for you. My body is the soil and your love is the seed, tucked carefully beneath the safety of my breastbone, ready to burst forth into being. Together, we are growing the flowers that will adorn the garden of our love forevermore. O to glimpse that beauty, O…

The love affair of a single mother of two and a raunchy cult classic. — The ticket checker was shirtless and braless, pale skin visible beneath her cropped black blazer. A rainbow tulle tutu surrounded her willowy waist, and beneath it a tiny pink thong left nothing to the imagination. “It’s your first time seeing a live show, right?” she asked expectantly, towering over me…

A story of breaking societal expectations. The traditional notion of “womanhood” has always been both a curse and blessing to me. There’s two reasons for this: One: puberty hit me like a Mac truck at 12 years old, gifting my tiny and fast girlhood self…

Self-help can help, but it put pressure on me. — There’s something so tidy about order. All of the boxes checked. All the to-do list items crossed off. Accomplishment in simplicity. A routine unfolded, crease by perfect crease. Order calls to me. From across a great and vast abyss that is my own willpower, I can see its stark lines…

Once in a blue moon, the truth of shines through… — The afternoon sweltered, sunshine eking into every corner and crevice to drain sweat from formerly-unopened pores. I climbed into my father’s burnt orange Dodge pickup truck and sank into the seat, thankful for the liberating ice-cold air shooting through the vents pointed at my face. Seatbelt buckled, my father and…

A day in the stereotypical life. — Wake up. See a text from a male friend who won’t leave you alone. Ignore it and get ready. Forget to take out the trash. Get yelled at by male roommate, since that’s clearly your job, just like all the household chores. Take out the trash. Get accosted by a…

The argument was over the bill. — The campus unfurled past my car windows in facades of pristine red brick and graceful nineteenth century arches, towering and ancient live oaks swaying their green ground-spilling fingertips of Spanish moss in the strange Tallahassee wind. It was my last time driving through the…

I wouldn’t be alive without it. — My mom always told me I was alive for a reason. I was born into this world with a holy purpose, one I was meant to find. There were so many points at which I almost didn’t make it into the world — several health scares during my mother’s pregnancy…

What a journey that failure was. I look back on June of 2019 with a certain sort of cynicism, nowadays. I quit my retail job as an assistant manager of a vape shop and…