An Open Letter To My Heart

Dearest ones far and close, my beloveds and total fucking strangers:

I’m writing you instead of dying.

I’m writing because there are untold chapters for me, and because there are so many people who need each other to make it through this difficult and brutal and violent and beautiful and magical world, who I need, and who need me.

I see you. Thank you.

I’m writing to let you know that I too have felt like I might die.

I’m not equipped to talk about astrology but I know that Now Is Big And Hard But It Can Heal Our Hearts If We Caretake Them.

As I sit here in Brooklyn, sweating and hydrating, I feel damn lucky to have people in my life to appreciate. I spent many hours this week writing love letters to some of my revolutionary chosen ones because: we can do this. Because: without them, I could not do this because I feel like I might die.

We, are a loose collection, ever growing and shifting, of people who want another world so badly we can smell the sizzle of the old one each day as we move through the current world.

Can, our collective capacity, never a demand of each other but a promise we make to ourselves and one another: I will do what I can do. And I will not cut you out for what you can not do.

Do, we can create, think, struggle, change, shift, transform, rest, love, fight, challenge, restore, organize, educate, agitate, hold up, hold tight, hold on.

This, this is a dream or a sci-fi novel or a demilitarized zone or an opened door or a halted prison construction or an education opportunity or a chance to be loved or a transformation of pain into connection that looks different for each person who dreams it.

We can do this, but we need each other. At least, I need you.You know who you are. You, whoever you are, probably need someone, too.

I need the people around me who reflect and challenge me. For me, that’s working-class&poor white queer radical folks who challenge me to rise up without selling up.

I see you: glorious and in struggle, loud and thoughtful, big-hearted and deeply committed, gorgeous and focused.

I see you, and I really need to see you. If I didn’t see you I’d feel far too alone. Thank you.I too have felt like I might die.

The new things, personal things, historical things, traumatic things, political things, all build up to be too much.

There is such a thing as too much, and you do not have to be strong in the face of all of it.

It’s ok — and actually, really fine — to be broken in the wake of so much harm. We move through a harmful world. We have terrible home training.

I can so you can’t is what I was taught in my terrible home training that is given free with western culture and WASP privilege and ethics. And so when I can’t — I feel like the world is shutting down.

Like I am shutting down.

We are told that love is discrete when it is giant, and that I can have things only when you can’t. That’s driven home by racism, classism and capitalism, colonialist mindsets, patriarchy and christian hegemony, ableist modalities and a western lust for reason.