There Is Hope. I Promise. Young People Just Won Their Case Against The State Of Montana. Ecuadoreans

Do you know what I hate? What I'm really, really angry at?

We're not allowed to express love.

And it pisses me off.

Yes! That boy in my class looks stunning in that green sweater! I gaze in awe at the way my friend looks like an urban goddess at midnight drenched in street lights, surrounded by dancing teenagers at a party in the theatre parking lot! Another one looks like dawn and summer fields fell in love with her! I adore the way my classmate dresses like a punk fairy, with dirty blonde braids reaching to her hips and grazing her red leather jacket! The boy who lends me his eraser has the most fantastic sense of humour, the way he looks down for a second before he grins!

I love herb gardens! And perfume oils! Old books and fantasy novels! Dope-ass boots paired with a nice coat and conservative scarf clashing with my pink hair! I love poems! And jasmine tea!

I love how the old Vietnamese lady runs the best soup bar in town. How excited my seat neighbour gets over fancy notebooks. I love it when a fellow teenage girl hesitantly smiles back at me across the street.

Why is she hesitant? Because there's that ever-lasting question. Is this the socially designated response? Am I supposed to react differently? Am I supposed to react at all? Wouldn't it be "cooler" to ignore me?

Is it weird when I tell a boy I hardly know that he looks epic in that sweater? Is it over the top when I tell that girl in my French class how cute her boots are every time she wears them? Is waving at people I barely know but I get a happy vibe from bad?

Is it wasteful and expensive that I love perfume and essential oils? Is me wearing my mother's expensive coat with leather boots and purple hair childish? Is my idealism and wide-eyed hope to be laughed at?

We're not allowed to express love.

I had so much of it.

blue door by Kim Addonizio

the impossible return

Ginger bread bathtub

A friend once asked me for a sign

That the universe loved us.

I told her I had taken a bath today.

The water was green and the perfect temperature

The sky was darkening and the light was on

The room smelled like the ginger bread I had brought from the kitchen

Mixed with the eucalyptus of my bath oil.

A song played

It reminded me of a home we moved out of when I was eight.

It reminded me of my nanny teaching me how to paint my nails when my parents left the house

I would sit on a bar stool

My toes would barely brush the ground.

Oh, the universe loves us

The bath water was the perfect temperature today.

Hm, eternity

Or: gods speak

A definitive factor of being human is not seeing the big picture.

It's very defining. Humans don't see the big picture. They don't see the celestial game, they don't even know their own nature. With a garden full of secrets on their own planet they haven't even stepped foot in, how could they? They know nothing of the blazing, terrifyingly holy power of a not quite ripe apple. Although they have crafted an entire worship around that particular fruit.

No, they know nothing of true eternity. Or maybe everything. If the unripe apple is holy to them too, does it matter that it's not my kind of holy? Does it matter that it's miniscule? There is no such thing as a smaller infinity, after all.

If I love you like the feeling of atoms assembling into wind gusts and solar flares, a human will love you like the feeling of that wind on their skin.

If I love you like the prayer of a million people to the greatest being they know, a god, a human will love you like the prayer of a child to the greatest being it knows, a mother.

If I love you like two black holes caught in each other's gravity, forcing each other into an unholy dance until they collide, a human loves you like watching two coins circling in a cone. Drawing spirals and spirals until they fall, with a gentle ping, into the hole in the middle.

Humans do not see the big picture.

Perhaps they are redefining holy as we speak.

Perhaps they make their own holy, and yet it is equal to mine.

from hildegard of bingen - the woman of her age by fiona maddocks

via indiarosecrawford

Frog Paints a Water Lily Pond 🪷🎨🐸

𝑓ₒᵣ ⲕᵢ𝑛𝑔 ₐ𝑛𝑑 𝑐ₒ𝑡𝑡ₐ𝑔ₑ

There's something otherworldly about the way the scent of wet earth hits your senses and you feel nothing but at peace with the world

blood in the water 🩸

Soft and Safe

I have a friend, let's call her Soft and Safe.

Let's call her that because it's shorter than Fluttering butterflies and excited hands waving, lilac purple capris and silk blouse, also soft ripped jeans and oversize hoodie. It's shorter than the Life of the party, social butterfly, but also sleepover deep talk.

She was the first one to fully support me when I came out as bi. She's still the one I feel most comfortable telling my insecurities to.

She's physically beautiful, yes, with brown curls and doe eyes, but more like her soul would make any body beautiful, you get it? It really doesn't matter how she looks. Does that make sense?

I know Soft and Safe doesn't see herself this way, so this is my way of telling her. A Tumblr post she'll never see.

Because all Soft and Safe sees is her flat chest and her acne prone skin. All she sees is that she was asked to the ball last in dance class last year. She was recently told she has depression, and she said "yeah, checks out." I don't think she sees how much I admire her, and want her to stay in my life forever. But I never told her.

So, how can you be sure you're not someone's Soft and Safe?