[Diary] the Third Entry

Spitting out owl pellets of verbose prose, are you proud of me yet?

London, UK. Friday the 28th of November, 22.39pm (danger zone after three quarters of the clock)

A red [pen] entry in my new new new diary. The third day of reflection. Lucky number three. Pretty soon I might start ascribing meanings to my pens, even if sticking to my rigid patterns. Alternating red ink for wanderings (left, mysticism, heart, tails) or jet-black for devotion (right, astuteness, double heads). I am only ever phrasing the prayer or dictating scripture, never in between.

“I’m not allowed to write fiction” I said in my daydream. What I meant is: I am only allowed to feel. And what I feel right now is that writing is something I love like a tired dog, always in search of adoration. The scraps never suffice and the hunt is paltry. Behold the spoils of war with the self; unending artificial scarcity. The leather of the collar tightens around my throat. (Author’s note: no erotic connotation yet… Give me enough flame and open enough windows and it might yet appear.)

In truth I love a lot of things like that: love that is a wanting, a saying, or rather, an asking. Pleading eyes / Please perceive my efforts. They are not just stitched inside of me, but outside too!

((( Intrusive thought: should have never posted that one untrue picture, will withdraw it now, actually. Sanctify the record. I looked asleep in my white gown with eyes wide open, blank-slate-faced in a bad way. Must expurgate what little of me is out there that falls on my unflattering side. )))

Tonight I want to love love love and leave behind this infantile awkwardness I’ve uncovered: I used to be much sparklier in my teens. I had reason to perform for my dinner then. Lit up at ruins, and napkins, and raindrop days. Chasing hotel guest gratuities, something to both bite into and believe in. Euro-pa-bills with shining canines to match. Coins are the closest thing to a god in a country of lingering protestantism and cobblestones; they make all the major decisions. Sometimes I feel that they never stopped spinning, up in the grey air. Maybe I can’t heads-or-tails my youth like I was taught to.

Suppose I should be writing my ninety-five statements. Instead, I am hiding out in my attic (soon-to-be-lost), cocooning. Spitting out owl pellets of verbose prose, are you proud of me yet?

Come winter-time I always yearn for smaller spaces, a smaller home. Easier to heat than the chambers of the heart. On the unending bright screen, a stranger confesses to being unable to explore suffering in their writing. That’s the delicious kind of voyeurism. I greedily assume admitting defeat would be easier if I was not so intent on feeling the sting of it. Watching the red-burn of the lash, the way the edges are soft, and the colour pastel pretty. I can’t help making my own inadequacy my biggest secret, tangling it up in self-mythology.

Another confession, then. Forgive me, my dear friend, I dropped out of your writing group as grasp for pure self-soothing. I am a masochist who cannot tolerate ego wounds when related to my practice; it contains too much of myself. My methods were so unexciting and my results so unembellished, I couldn’t have been more vulnerable if I tried. No, solitude is my preferred chaser to self-flagellation. My burnt offerings go straight to the mirror. In my mistaken oracle it is always neater to retreat than to unfold clasped hands. The doctrine of my country believes in building oneself up, even if it costs you the skin off of your back and your feet, and the nightmares still won’t end. Public displays of suffering are second only to ascension. Best to be held out on until the Inevitable arrives.

Anyway, I aimed the question of writing at my grandfather clock just now. Its answer sounded like ticking, like wheels turning, like the metal of currency re-forged into a tool, ultimately, devoid of meaning. “Entanglement” Desire responded, stared at me, and asked why the scraps can’t make the meal.

“I wasn’t always laced with skepticism” I defended. Somewhere in my aging, I sewed it into me. I weave this story of my own hardship in hopes of it shaping a prologue someday. Genesis like a shrug, like casting off the chains of foreign language, like inspiration in its infancy. Second only to my own ability to numb the wound, to pretend it away with circles of people, and clumsy religious metaphors fit for a girl raised in atheism. Writer’s stigmata. Glassy eyes. At the end of three red-soaked pages now. If my heart had a sound it would be the hushed caress of journal ribbons tying, shut.

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Sabrina Angelina is dedicated to the intersection of love and violence, a term she coined to describe classical Romanticism’s tendency to pair passion and suffering, tragedy and pleasure, together. Consumed by this concept, she writes on Substack and curates the White Lily Society page dedicated to arts and culture.

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