I love you, but I have to go home now. I love you, but I have to go home now. Will I ever go home? It’s all I hear in my head when I touch your back, your back that feels like wood, hollowed out. I step gently around you but nothing prevents me from feeling your heaviness. Nothing at all prevents me from feeling how tight your body is coiled, you are so tense my breath is shallow around you. Is it because she said we were sisters in a previous lifetime? Should I cry all night about this or should I go home? Will I be able to make it home? My eye movements are quick now, my brain scattering information.
Goddess Freya once disclosed that she cried night after night for more than two weeks over things that happened between them, until one day she awoke, epiphanizing the truth to herself over and over. The truth was this: it’s a deep seated guilt. And no one was crying but her. The tears welled in my eyes for her and for me. I opined it is a swallowing of the pain in my throat, it’s in the trying not to be seen or heard for fear of appearing too happy. It’s three fucking windows from the ceiling to the ground, opening all at once and flooding the kitchen. It’s me seeing the ocean waves in the backyard, coming toward me. Then it’s Eliza’s eyes burning, through me like they always have when she’s not pleased. Her voice is higher now, higher than it’s ever been, and her screaming tears down the whole house. Worse than the ocean, you’re worse than the ocean that’s come after me I lament. I’m sorry, I love you, I’m sorry, I matter!
There have been many nights where I have sat inside your mind Eliza and cried myself to bed. Dragged myself away from your depths as to not ruin my own. I know what I’m capable of, but I can’t get past you. I can’t get past your darkness, your wrath. Bricked in and left to die like Julian of Norwich in anchoritic devotion. And this blind devotion, it hangs over me like vines, as it should—where I come from, as it should—I feel so very responsible for you. Responsible to you. Responsible for you. I’m clairsentient, you may have heard?
Thank you for bearing witness to Dark Lord Show Me the Way. Lately I’ve been writing my heart out and I’m so grateful you are here. In other news:
Darknessthriving.com is now live, and you can access this Substack via that address at any time. No more having to remember the Substack link. I am so proud of this brand’s name and how it was birthed. It’s an Aries, leading me and leading the way.
I’ve decided most of my paid posts are going to be utterly personal accounts and I’ve already backlogged a few. You can check them out in the Archive section.
Have you seen my notes? They’re small tidbits of me; think goth witch scholar on a smaller scale.
Jennifer Diane is a witch scholar, writer and model based out of New Jersey. She’s authored Folk Horror, Rural Horror, Devil’s Manifesto, Emotional Horrorshow, and Salvation. Book a one on one session, shop her books and zines, or find her on Instagram.
Please note, I pen free and paid content for this publication, Darkness Thriving, as well as monthly fictional stories for the Dark Lord Show Me the Way section. You can control what you receive via email by going here.