the happy cactus

Numerous times in life I have lacked the courage to articulate what rests heavily within my heart. Instead, I just allow it fester and gnaw its way through my mind, endlessly floating, churning, spinning, morphing into a false narrative that has no capacity to eventuate. The main characters mutate into a villainous shadow wrought with hurtful dialogue deeply rooted in what I would envisage them to spit out of their faceless mouths.

Their venomous verbal bile spouts some semblance of truth, some essence of altered reality clenched to the fictitious story that slowly gains momentum to forge its way into my palpable existence. A momentary element of actuality that has me silently retorting with justifications, plea bargains and a plethora of emotionally charged responses all synced to this one imagined scenario which continually plays like a highlight reel. If only I could summon an ounce of valour and trudge ahead with reckless abandon and verbalise what lay dormant and entangled within the depths of my heart before it seeped its way into my soul, becoming my actual perceived truth.

Unrelenting in its pursuit of a torturous dark soliloquy encompassing this one tiny, one minute speck of truth roosted in my heart and dissecting each syllable, each intonation into a foul, abhorrent imagined conversation of delusion. Suffocation and overwhelm befalls the unbearable weight of holding space for this one small heart truth which beseeches me to speak it out into the abyss of the universe. Upon the dawning of the dusk, it brutally beckons me to tether my voice to the thinnest of threads fastened to the heaviness woven within my heart, my truth. My unabashed truth.

The blinding light of day silences the darkest of narratives and all is righted again, all is quieted and calm because what shrieked incessantly in the murky dark of night abruptly fades away to dull nothingness. Rumination is now replaced with requited readiness to reveal the darkness indeed shrouded you in a momentary dizzying spell of hopelessness thus creating a non-existent fictional dilemma which leaves you wearied and disconcerted for wayfaring down the black hole of desolation.

You faff about your day, exchanging the one-sided fantastical narrative with daily chores ebbed acutely with a black shadow of foreboding and an unseen clawing sense of stupidity for allowing the endlessly floating, churning, spinning false narrative for selfishly captivating centre stage and greedily commanding the crushing heat of the spotlight.

Your heart truth remains forcefully hidden, patiently biding the precise time when it feels strong enough, safe enough, secure enough to warily embark on the arduous journey of being spoken gently, lovingly and compassionately to your loved one. Timing is key.