Diana Kurniawan

A few miles down the road, a cottonwood with hands for branches stands green in the prairie. The street of Highway 52 goes to 287 North and roads through Longmont like an asphalt river through the city. The cars drive without disruptions and it is always a peaceful road. A bus stop is on Main and 21st, near a Wallgreens with a free vaccums sign inside the plexiglass casing for the advertisement. There are no vaccums, but the promise gives a hope and a giggle for the woman on the metal seat underneath the stop. 

 

The bus is probably half an hour away but the woman sits patiently, with a brown purse that slings around her right shoulder. Not too skinny, perhaps a medium at Kohls, but solid with calves thick enough to kick a wild dog. She doesn't ask questions, but keeps looking down 287 North with a hope of a destination. Her hair is in a ponytail and her brown skin soaks up the sunrays beyond the clouds. She doesn't twiddle her thumb on the metal seat, rather places her hands on her purse, protecting it, because a woman of worth knows her belongings and it is her right. 

 

Her mask is not designer, instead the disposable type with a white stretchy rubber around her ears. Designers masks are in these days and sadly, it is the new normal, but for the woman, disposable is her choice. The woman has cheeks worthy to be pinched but no one will mess with her because her eyes are coal fierce and round like a steel wrecking ball. She looks down Main Street again and no bus, yet.

 

Next Urgent Care is close by, with just one car in the parking lot and no emergencies. Whoever goes into the urgent care doesn't know about out-of-network charges without Medicaid, and Obamacare is not part of the accessible plans. The woman stands and leans against the bus stop with her temple on the plexiglass. Dog days of Summer can cause a heat stroke, but cool breeze refreshes her as strands of her hair flies in the wind. She looks above her and the rectangular metal shade is over her head, attached to the plexiglass casing with steel outlining the bus stop. She looks over her wrist, but there is no watch, as she caresses her skin. Que hora es, porque el autobus es muy tarde!

 

Everything moves slower with the Coronavirus, and the woman walks back to her seat, waiting. 

 

Just write.

"Mom, can I have this?" I asked her, with a Spider-Man helmet in my hands. CSPC, ASTM as it said on the tag. I put it on and locked the safety class under my chin.

 

"Jeremy, scale it down a notch. You have to stop asking for things you already have," she said, holding a Purell anti-bacterial in one hand. "People are dying."

 

"It's Spider-Man," I begged.

 

"He took out his tonsils and kisses girls upside down, and you still think he's your favorite?" Mom said. Her cheeks turned red and I knew I had to stop asking or we won't go out for lunch and I'd have to eat left-overs.

 

"Are you angry with me?" I asked, with the helmet still on.

 

"Honey, you know how only fat people go to the Dairy Queen? Spoiled kids will always get bad parking spots when they get their driver's license when they turn 16," she replied. "Do you want to be spoiled? Do you think that's a fair life?"

 

I took a breath and walked to the next aisle and saw a man with his glasses upside down. I didn't want to ask what happened to him, but he probably had popcorn flavored jelly beans stuck up his nose when he was little too.

 

"Mom, can I have a pen?" I asked her and took a pen to show her.

 

"Yes, put it in the cart," she said, as she took the pen from my hands.

 

"I have one at home, how come I can't have the helmet?" I asked, with the helmet still on.

 

Her lips quivered, as she stared at my face, then closed her eyes with her right hand. 

"I won't be spoiled, I promise," I told her. The insides of my stomach tickled because I knew if I had this helmet, I could ride my bicycle faster than my Dad's Volvo.

 

"No, but thank you for the laughs, baby," she told me, as she burst into laughter.

 

"Fine," I dragged my feet to the back of the store and took off the Spider-Man helmet and felt lousy like yesterday's towel.

 

"Jeremy, hurry up!" Mom yelled at me, while pushing her cart towards my direction.

 

Like always, I ran to her cart and stood backwards on the front wheel with my arms stretched back, holding the front of the cart.

 

Mom pushed me down the toilet paper aisle, and I flew the rest of the shopping away.

 

"Mom, look at that Slime Kit!" my eyes popped.

 

Just write.

The rejections ransomed my thoughts, but writing was more than magic. The empty pages offered more than doubts as the invitation besotted me with a soulful divination. Although I was a wounded sinner, the calling for stories gave me a drive to push forward.

 

Writing my stories reconciled my passion with grace, my sins with forgiveness, and depression into healing. The fear gone and I was immersed into a world of mine own, that of which no one could harm. This word junkie propelled forward, moving against the devil who begged me to give up my life and my literary journey.

 

The fuel to write was the vicissitudes from self pity, an action towards love. Away sorrow, away loneliness, and be gone hatred. They were no more because these empty pages befriended me with kindness and compassion, a true love no one could sabotage. 

"Keep going," said my thoughts, as I wrote down the desires to live and to write, till I am no more. Why stop, when my life has been full of stories the world deserved to hear?

 

Just write.

Rejection felt as costly as doubt. Whereas doubt arose from within our thoughts, rejection was an infliction from outside of our control. Doubt was just an imagined worst outcome, but rejection felt so final. However, both felt it could cause one to the other. Push.

 

A fool cares for neither doubt nor rejections. He kept on going, oddly enough just as winners and champions. Was I a fool for literature if I was rejected by many? Or was I made like a champion with an unflinching faith as if I was made to write. Push.

 

What kept a writer to write other than hope after rejection and full of doubt? It has got to be faith and belief, for a voice original to society and mankind. Humanity held under the table as if a gun to an enemy. It could spark and fire at any moment. Push.

 

Fires and sparks were the elements they wanted as readers, yet there was no telling if I had ever caused any. Perhaps some kind of miracle could happen to me, turning me into a literary fairy, writing words of wisdom to children and adults that ripples throughout the world. Push.

 

No matter a fool or champion, my faith in stories and words won't harm none. It was a method to play, create, heal, and hope for, of which my mind could rest upon. Push.

 

Rejection or doubt, even worry or hopelessness could be erased with every effort I placed. Publishing or not, and making or not, even if it was just this blog, push. Until it ends.

 

Just write.

Healing takes time.

 

The wait in the hospital cafeteria felt like driving behind a semi during a snow storm, slow with apprehension. All I thought about was how much time I spent with my Dad, building shelves in the garage. Measuring the shelving, drilling the nuts and bolts, and centering them on the wall. It was our last home building project and I savored every minute when I had the chance.

 

I saved all of his voice mails to me, because now he slurs every word and we could hardly understand his speech. While watching The Great British Baking Show, he collapsed next to me as I panicked and screamed to my Mom to hand me the telephone. His tall stature and weight dropped with gravity while I couldn't even lift his shoulder off the ground. He battled infections after infections, as I cried and cried. All I wanted was to be five again, riding on his shoulders or standing on top of his toes, letting him walk me as he held up my hands.

 

Scarce times for writing meant I was busy with life and visiting my Dad, which was good, but dwindled down my hopes of publishing. My thoughts went to the times I cherished with my Dad, and I stopped caring about writing. I savored the conversations when we took turns mowing the lawn during a hot summer day. The time we compared our lumps underneath our skin because some nurses took out their aggression on us by injecting us with saline. The heartbreaking time I told my Dad about sexual assault, and the time I told him that my dreams of having a family and a loving husband might just be an episode in a Korean drama. The times I counted were worthwhile, so was this waiting. 

 

The wait was not the same as waiting for a test result or for romance to enter my life. It was more dear and tender, as waiting for a birth of a baby. I hoped and prayed, and thankfully, my Dad survived everything. I couldn't blame anyone on the infections and the stroke. I completely surrendered, as I surrendered my own life. All I could do was wait it out and prayed.

 

I couldn't dwell on the things that I might not have with my Dad. I was happy he was still with me. I didn't call anyone and I didn't complain. I waited, and I was happy I was with him.

 

Healing took time, as I relinguished mine. 

Soft creamy brown fur on its chubby cheeks as it held its paws in front of its mouth. Munching on nuts and grains found from the dirt around the barren land several miles down the street from my old house. My Mother called them her "friends," although they've never met but in spirit they were her soul children. These small prairie dogs would run about the unspoken land and some of them had families and pups perching on its mound of dirt surrounded by soil covered with weeds. 

 

At times, I would drive by that land for the scenery and to witness my Mother say, "My friends are out today. They must be looking for foods for their families." I would smile and with a lift of joy inside my heart, I felt satisfied of this moment in life. Just to spend the time with my Mother inside the car, driving by these friends of hers, made the novelty of life to be without sorrow. As if time stood still and life was about my Mother and me, in the wilderness of the city and streets surrounded by our small animal friends. 

 

These prairie dogs would mate, heterosexually, and create families as the seasons changed from Summer to Winter, they hibernate and impregnate, then give birth early Spring. The small pups would come out during Summer, ready to find nuts and pebbles to chew on as foods. Its parents sensed the pup's whereabouts and as with an antennae, they felt it moved outside of its mound with a hole underground. The parents would run as fast as possible back to the hole and the pup would return underground, for it was not yet safe for it to find food on its own.

 

These prairie dogs families were my friends too, as my Mother often reminded me, "even the smallest things as these are valuable in the eyes of God. How are you not more valueable to Him?" I would hold my smile for each time she reminded me and for each time I drove by, purposely for her. 

 

Unlucky ones were roadkill, and I recalled some on the street, bloody and squashed. I blinked for an instant, because I wanted them to stay alive forever, with their pups as parents with its families. Every life became valuable in my eyes, because of these small animals. They never bothered humans in any way, shape or forms, as they lived underneath the ground equalizing the biodiversity. Never have I ever found any justice in their death on the street as roadkill, and all I could hope for was for these prairie dogs to stay on the unspoken land, breeding and making my Mother smile. 

 

Just write. 

The heart beats differently with every emotion I feel. The pounding out of my chest from pumping anxiety throughout my body, sending signals to my brain of time nearing its end. The intensity flooding through, with no time to think.

The soft beats per minute out of charm and the sparkles of life, without noticing the lapse in momentary insanity. Holding the thought of him in my frontal lobe, memorizing his face and eyes, swooning me.

 

There is also a beat that lifts your gut, sending your eyes to the sky, to look at heaven pretending angels wings are on your back, even when everything is unfinished.

 

The heavy beating that droops your chest from moments of less unfortunate times. A stroke of hematoma flooding tears through summer, wishing for things that could have been.

 

Other beats murmurs with a voice, that speaks of more than just love. With a jostling shift towards the center of your breast bone, from a sudden change in life. Sending chills down your spine with a whisper, "everything willl be okay." Or the voice that only fairies can hear, coming from the holy cavern, taking me away from running on empty.

 

Every beat is a miracle with a mind altering result. It is an electrical current that can take your breath away, or hold you steady. Besides the brain, the heart is a personality, with an agreement to good faith without whom it can't exist.

 

If only my heart is truly in love, will I know what life feels. Just write.

My veins was once a dry creek over cracked ground as the rain poureth over me. The creek became a river wild as my blood now cold fresh water rushing through my body, crashing over rocks of shame and guilt. This repentant and forgiving soul birthed words through my lips. Chanting psalms, reciting prayers, O Lord have mercy on me.

 

Dry creek no more as the rush of river water flowed through the veins in my palms, writing cursive over empty pages. Tender moments of sweet weather and seasons of change alloyed the metals of my sorrows in my mind to the gold inside my soul. Writing love and grace with vermillion of faith inside my heart.

 

The cold water through my veins oxygenated the missing pieces in my ventricles from broken relationships. Molding me stronger as my hands kept writing life on these pages.

 

The wild river never stopped in current as it steadied on rushing through my body, with fervent desire to tell stories of once upon a time, long long ago, in a far away land. The cursive now fast and almost unreadable, as my veins rushed me physically to the computer, the keyboard, and I kept writing. 

 

No more dry creeks of blood, and drought no more. My river carried me to the ocean of words in my left and right hemisphere, flowing to the Euphrates. Focusing on the psalms, and now the Goliaths disappeared and my mind, cleared.

 

Writing rushed my blood, consecrating me with holy water out of the catastrophe of rain. Trouts swam in my belly, frogs jumped over the mitochondria of my cells. Sweet tunes of banjo of hymns sang me to wonder.

 

The grey clouds over my sunrise now pink and purple, with beauty for ashes. 

 

A river runs through me. Just write.  

What dreams may come during the night of peaceful slumber. Inside my mind, was a winding film with endless memories. It played a scene of a journey I never had before. 

 

In a silky light blue dress with layers trailing, I walked along a path inside a forest, with sequioas along the trail. Tall grasses swaying in the breeze as I walked and saw Lady Liberty in front of me. She met me before inside my dreams, but that was New York, and this time it was a different dream.

 

"Would you hold me, if I fall?" I asked her, her towering figure shading my path as she walked alongside me, towards a broader street, with a fountain, as if a city was ahead. "You won't fall. Stay positive. No suicide, no lonelyness, no suffering. Stay in the path," said Lady Liberty.

 

She held my right hand and we walked towards a domed building with a golden top, St. Paul's Cathedral, and we stood at the entrance, in Central London. Lady Liberty took my hand to her heart, and asked, "Do you want me to walk with you inside?" I nodded, and told her, "Don't leave, I want you to stay with me, forever." Her statuesque figure that towered over me shrunk to my height, and told me, "I am a woman, I understand," she said. 

 

I walked with her, and we entered the cathedral, as I looked to my right side and the prayer candles lighted the dark. I told Lady Liberty, "I need to write a prayer request." I took the small piece of paper on top of a small box to the wall near the candles, and wrote, "For me to have love and joy in life."

 

The sunshine from the sky bore through the stained glass windows, as I noticed far across the room towards the front pews stood a cross of gold much ahead of me. I walked towards the cross, with courage, as Lady Liberty let go of my hand and touched my shoulders, "This time, you must walk alone." She sat on the back pews near the candles, waiting for me to walk up to the golden cross. She knelt down and prayed for me. 

 

Writing out my dreams. Just write. 

Writing grows from a mustard seed. It comes from those shattered pieces inside your mind that you feel are ill or broken. The seed latches on to your synapses and travels to your heart and the spaces in between your chest. From just one seed, it grows and it roots to your soul.

 

Writing comes from love, the water nourishes the mustard seed, planting it deeper into the soil. The love of life, and everything in between. The lack of it, the errors, the yearning and caring, connection to memories. The mustard seed breaks open its shell.

 

Writing grows from pain. The valleys you travel alone and at times with limited vision, as it becomes food for the mustard seed. Gaining more nutrients from every cortisol you exert into your brain, excreting oxytocin as prevention from stresses, making the heart grow, beating, and increasing in volume. The mustard seed grows deep roots, germinating from your nutrients and hormones.

 

Writing comes from grit. Never giving up even when others tell you that you're stuck with nowhere to go. Not learning, not healing, not concentrating, not focusing, all with too much emotions. The mustard seed budding with leaves, out of the grown. 

 

Writing comes from soul searching, those times you cry into pieces. The time wasted on sufferings, becomes treasures of experiences, making words deep, grainy, and against the world. The mustard seeds grows into a plant, with branches and its leaves multiplies.

 

Writing grows from perseverance, although at times the mustard seed was almost crushed, and damaged. The mustard seed keeps growing, the root does not die, instead it clones itself underneath. It multiplies and begins a new growth period. The knowledge of growing from its inception germinates the plant quicker and branches out sooner than its season.

 

Writing comes from frequent practice, as the mustard seed keeps working in portions, and the small steps leads to more branches and tall shrubs reaching other plants. Network, communicating, working, building relationships, as the mustard seed keeps growing its roots underneath and over the Earth. It is tall, it is green, it is willing to learn its seasons, and the branches thickens.

 

Writing comes from reading, the mustard seed waters itself, fully functioning on its own as it preserves itself, forever. The mustard seed from my heart, mind, and soul becomes small tree, with small leaves, and as years grow and seasons pass, it lives with the Earth, with its painful past yet, beautiful in form and truth. The mustard seed becomes a tree, yielding pods of seeds as it grows all over the Earth.

 

Just a mustard seed to write with. Repeat. Just write.