A Piece of Them; a Piece of Me  

I have a friend who I’ve caught like a squirming orange fish in between the mirrors of her multitudes. She picks up songs and finds a picture of herself within each one, as if the yellow flash of a camera and the stark blue switch of a beat dictates where the drum of her feet will take her next, and in doing so, she’s become the colors of music herself. Her name is Arden.  

I’ve seen infinity in an ocean, in a stretch of green field, and in the eyes of friends expecting me to be here tomorrow.  

For them I am to become earthen; let fingertips walk amongst the freckles of my back by the beach in early August, let laughter massage stiffness after a long week of classes, feel their words caress my heart as we melt into nostalgia over shitty ramen  

When I began to let people in, I looked away from the mirrors, I moved my leg when it touched theirs. I cut my bangs too short, I dyed my hair, I dyed it again, I cut all my flowers in hopes they’d still recognize me barren.  

Those that have pried intimacy from me unsheathed mercy’s sword before my eyes and chiseled the scape of my back down to an arch that satisfied them. When they’d leave with parts of me, it felt like people had a weird way of showing me intimacy, and I called it love.  

One too many times I’ve questioned the value in being butchered; laid out raw- pricked, and quiet by those who have come through my life to leave with my tenderness.  

There lays within me a nameless desire to return to the soreness I had let mend me. When you’ve been hurt repeatedly, your wounds begin to manifest reassurance. I used to think that if I let my sores go untreated, untouched, they wouldn’t get any worse. I let them metastasize; I let them grow one hand to hold me, and another one to push people away.  

Though I have ripped grace’s delicate, sticky fingers from forgiveness like ripping a bee’s legs from the flower of its body, I choose to believe that my friends can turn my perspectives otherwise- now I admire their intimacy as it grows through my own.  

And because of that, I must write to them.  

I have a friend who is always ten steps ahead of herself. Her light and love shine brightest when I see her trot in a scurry behind East and West. Her voice speaks affirming, condensed volumes- she will never beat around a bush in her self expression. She’s taught me how to remove this heavy coat of limitation. She has the perseverance of a mantis taking flight, and in her own bug-eyed way, she hooks her pincers onto every detail I’ve mentioned as an afterthought- to know her is to be seen raw. Her name is Maddison.  

I have a friend who holds scissors in her hands like someone she knew once-upon-a-time, cutting apart magazines and gluing her dreams to refurbished boxes kept under her bed with every post-it note and birthday card from a friend serving as lifelines she’s dangled from. Her name is Lily.  

I have a friend who has sewn herself with another, and together their hardworking hands have shown me how the act of making food and eating it together physically creates connection. They make salads and pastas and soups infused with their love for each other; and when it’s been me and my wall at my lowest, they’ve let me drink from the warm embrace of their outstretched hands. Their names are Abby and Eliza.  

I have a friend who shoves her passion into every medium she explores- from crochet to scientific papers, she’s done it all. It only makes sense to me that we met in our tutoring practicum last year, because I’ve been given the chance to witness something endearing about her. She’s loved the uncomfortableness that comes with growing as she learns. She’s loved to admire, adopt, and apply even the smallest sound she hears; and in turn, she has spread such music to those around her. Her name is Lily.  

I have a friend who fell asleep buried in the ground, and when he woke up to dig himself out of New York, he found himself in Maine rooming with a similar soul as a freshman in Featherman. Together they’ve shown me the gems they found while buried underground together- now a pair of vocal, chirping cicadas who’ve attached themselves to every piece of glinting sea glass they can find on Freddy Beach. Their names are Daniel and Kit.  

I have a friend who I would wait a lifetime to see again. It feels like several have passed since she left for Morocco this semester. In my dreams her hands aren’t so far from my own- she’s still out by the cliffside sitting next to me with some sort of trinket in her pocket and a dream she has yet to realize she can act on. In this distance I hope she lives not against herself but with the song of who she is. Her name is Lauren.  

 I have a friend who runs to the pace of his own book. He’s often out of breath from writing each direction his life will take him down, and the other day I caught him with a sore ankle from tripping over scattered pages yet to be written. He’s planned his life out in a sketchbook full of ambition; he takes everything line by line. When I’m with him, there are no wasted days or conversations- he looks at me and I see a life to be lived in the reflection of his green eyes. His name is Hudson.  

I have a friend who has soothed every worry I’ve had with enough brush strokes to draw ourselves a future where we’ve made it. I know they’re in a mood when there’s no origami strayed across the library desk, and their aspirations dance on the wind of a salty breeze, and with a good book in hand, the warmth of their smile radiates every time the sun shines. Their name is Claire.  

I have a friend who makes me believe he’s the reason the world turns, that within his words are baptisms of faith I’d follow even if blinded. I know he has been there for me in every lifetime, and I know that he would pick out every grain of salt from my wounds without me asking. His name is Kevin.  

I have a friend whose carefully curated curls of pinks and purples cascade down ruffles and laces and silks and satins. Those who have dipped into pools of loneliness and isolation find that her illuminating warmth, in all its brilliant shades, extends abundance. I’ve discovered over Thanksgiving breaks and shitty Christmases that her family are who she’s learned this from- and I’m happy to say I’ve experienced each of them in the same deep dive of love that she’s graced me with. Her name is Alanna.  

I have a friend who has found someone to spend the rest of her life with. While she’s bronze and gold and silver, he’s become a polished rock in her hands. When we’re walking around Old Port on a Saturday night, they’ve shown me how my mind can be outwitted by the affinity in their understanding. I’ve seen love’s twinkling dance ripple off the streetlights of Warf Street leaving them an illuminated centerpiece of warmth. Their names are Andrew and Lily.  

I have a friend who compels me to write and learn and experience the disciplined life that she has drawn out for herself. She’s come a long way to U.N.E., and every time we hang out, I’ll never remember that my time with her isn’t infinite. For her, in this trek she’s made from Iceland where the sun only sets a quarter of the year, nothing has to be- she compels me to measure my life by width instead of length. Her name is Birta.  

I have a friend who only could have met her other half in Costa Rica, where the weather always makes the flowers bloom while love’s arrows pierce hearts. Together they are a free-falling, tumbling, feel-the-air-rush-through-your-ears love story! Where she is outspoken, he is a microphone. They’ve scored the clay of their hearts to my own, and they give everyone who meets them smile-lines. Their names are Shelby and Michael.  

I have a friend who holds a guitar like a lover, and when he breathes enough passion to warm a hearth within his harmonica, out springs the notes of laughter he’s kept in his belly for a bad day. He reeks of Maine pine, sailing in August, a hearty conversation, and a full meal; he becomes a fireplace with the right crowd around.  His name is Tommy.  

I have a friend who has baffled me- I never thought I’d say I have come to miss living in Sokokis Hall. He’s shown me that the greatest distance I’ve travelled hasn’t been in feet or miles, but in the small moments we’ve spent apart when I’ve thought “wow, I wish I could go upstairs and see him again.” His absence speaks to me in nostalgia’s tongue. Whereas my prologue of college has died down to an epilogue in time’s childlike hands, he’s the last page that ends the book while I sit amongst drafts of unfinished chapters. His name is Evan.  

All these people are the collage of who I am. The nape of their neck, the small of their back, their soft temples, their heels- I let them undo me; I let them pool my hands into a cradle around their hearts.  

For so long I thought that my tenderness had gone rotten, that letting people leave with such a weakness had become part of who I was. But whether we share our stories or exist in the quiet of who we are amongst each other, love overwhelms. I hold theirs and all its blood protectively with my own and decide that I will show this love to my body, and that it will sore me.  

I decide that we will hurt each other so loudly I’ll deafen, and that when we sit with tired tongues afterwards, I’ll still want their voices echoing in my head. I want the all of them to catch this all of me off guard with how unraveled I’ve become in their undoing.  

So, for them, I will choose to be infinite. I’ll choose to show up tomorrow, and the day after that, and the years to come when I lay beside them.