The freedom of crying your long summer days under the folding brances of trees that must have watched over several other types of worlds of which we only know from books and worn-out photographs turns priceless when you confront yourself with the possibility of losing it. I got used to seeing cracks bursting all over the crib where I live my life to sleep, waiving to volatile leaks of sleek slush and jelly poison, strolling over my scars of everything that seeped through my pommeled flesh, but also of a great deal of things that got aborted before their due time, suicidal drag queens of the un-happened. For as long as I can recall, I’ve been counting down days, minutes, unpredictable years of months that speed like racing cars then crash into parapets of infirm consciousness and dreary mutt, waiting and rushing myself to tear out the dress of the child that swallows its bigger-than-itself words and burked cries for help in front of strange void of faith and unaccountable malice. I am hard on her even when I do not know it. My sleep is a silent skirmish where certain fears grow arms with piercingly silver bones quivering under their skin, covering my mouth and slapping me, tearing wisps of my hair with tidy scrupulousness, and when I feel the sweet goosebumps of growing strength in front of the ghostly cutthroat, I knowingly give in to a meek lack of resistance and take those fists with salty masochism. I think I am getting to know the grip of growing up as a way of growing out of the habits that suck out the dowry which we so easily disconsider. I wanted to vampire and conquer the ones that cross paths with mine, to make an useless point about what I can do without actually doing it. And now I started to grow backwards. My body is tinier by the day, my secrets spark friskily in my eyes when I stop taking everyone seriously and my favorite dresses are girls’ dresses. I want to hold myself back from trying on the adult suit just to be sure that it will finally convince me that toys are better than guns. I probably won’t make the best of it, but what I do hope is that when I get back to myself, childhood will still fit me.

 

* Wearing a 12-14 year old girls’ dress, thrifted shirt & bag, vintage earrings & sunglasses, Asos socks & wedges

* Photos by Ioana Bernaz