I’ve got the blue. Not the blues—the blue, in its singular glory, for there is not an array of ailments that have colored my world in this solitary hue. There is merely one culprit to blame for it all. The blue is dangerous. Far more so than the blues. The blues indicate a mixture of shades that swirl together like an inviting whirlpool, the lighter regions providing a false sense of hope for one to cling onto. The blue is deep and unforgiving. It exists purely to lure; one dip of the toe or graze of the finger is all it takes for the blue to plunge you into its vortex, in which there is no bottom visible to the eye. There is no end to the blue. To my blue.
Is the ocean all that divides us right now? You claim it to be so. You claim normalcy is a house I can step back into so long as I conquer the distance. You claim eternal friendship is a pair of shoes I can lace myself into so long as I remember how to knot. You claim a lot of things; I used to hold on to shipwreck rafts for those claims. But even the iciest snow thaws; I realize bitterly that your claims were merely waves, promising with beauty at first glance, but ultimately gilded illusions that are so quick to dissipate. In spite of your claims, you will turn off the porch light as soon as I ring the doorbell and cut out the soles of my shoes. You made the mistake of thinking that because the ocean is so vast, I would not hear wind about other fishes who have taken your bait. But the waves, deceiving as they may be, always come back with the truth.
On your end of the ocean, you are looking into the blue. I do the same from my end, only I am in it. Against the ripples, I see the best parts of you with claw marks; through the foam, you see only the worst parts of me with tourniquets. I write a message in a bottle and shove a wishbone in with it, hoping the winds get it to you. I write, Your moving on looks like swimming; mine looks like drowning. Do not confuse me for attempting to subdue you with the blue, I am only trying to prove to you its existence. Blue has always been your color more than mine; on you, it looks regal, belonging; on me, it looks sickly, careless.
You think you are grand with your words, but I prefer to think of you as loud. You insist that if I endure the sweeping of waves and turbulent nature of the blue, I will emerge stronger out of the storm. You do not see how every hit is wearing my body down, stripping away my skin. The blue will continue to erode me until all that is left is my voice—even this is done out of perversion; the blue knows that if it leaves me with my body, someone might wander past and pull me out, but if left with my voice, the blue can always drown my wails.
You are no consumer of the romantic. You fail to observe in the way lovers do that the greatest love stories always feature the blue. Gatsby and Daisy. Noah and Allie. Anne Elliot and Wentworth. But we were no great love, undeserving of the blue; yet, I find myself in it. I find it most peculiar why lovers come back to the blue because it is something you can’t hold. Something you can see, hear, taste, and smell—for sure—but you simply can’t hold it. Should a lover be so lucky, the blue holds onto them for a fleeting moment. Should a lover live forever, the blue never touches them at all.
You left me with the blue. You left me no choice. Now, I have to build a lighthouse with all these bricks you’ve thrown at me. No, not at me. Between us. Now, I have to build a lighthouse so I can search for myself in the blue.
Sailors don’t come by anymore because you spread the myth of the lighthouse. You told everyone that the cries coming from the tower are that of a sea witch. You talk of punishment but never whether it is just. Never who brought around the imprisonment. And so, sailors, they don’t let down their anchors and fly their flags half-mast.
When I sink, don’t think that it is against my will. Recognize that I have embodied the blue, and that the shore will never be calm again.
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