We’ve been walking long thin lines for a long time. 

This slippery slope doesn’t unite us since the last time. 

Welcome to my dark side. I’ve been here for a while. 

This side, my side, is not a more powerful side. I’m vulnerable to attacks and I’ve wanting to achieve the freedom of not always not wanting peace of mind. 

You keep saying to yourself that your side is the bright side. You adhere to ideals you haven’t questioned. You follow a strict set of rules. I still can’t tell what your fuel is. You have an agenda for your emotions. You say you want peace. But you’re at war with yourself and you are our worst enemy.

Our sides cannot exist without the other. 

You are not on my side. But I am at your side. 

Both of us want peace, but we don’t share the same reasons. 

I’ve been questioning our sides. I’ve compared the expected version to the real picture. 

Comparing and contrasting never led me somewhere. I’m immersed and merged with both sides and, no, no, somehow I could never draw my lines back to you. 

Somehow, I can’t manage to tolerate the idea that daily,  I don’t shine. Nightly, I don’t shimmer. 

Our years are living in portraits that are not hanging on the walls. 

Why am I feeling like, not always, time heals all and maybe not always, all we have is time?

Why do I feel like I should return to home I feel I don’t belong?

I can’t bear being bare feet. I’m vulnerable, and I know that’s what you wanted. 

I’m naked. I’m without layers. I never opposed it. You never had to peeled me away and I never said it out loud. 

I’m here. I’ve always been here with my chin up and my head down. 

There are many mirrors in the room. I see me in all of them like a distant light of a deep tunnel. 

You see yourself in all of my mirrors and you still can’t see me. 

How come I can’t dare to see me eye to eye? 

I light a match and burn all of my enemy fields.

I’m not punching myself against my thoughts. I’ve put the gloves down. 

You are now bursting all of my battles and you are on the enemy defenses.

I was often on the trenches of the war, but never on the battlefield.

I’m now a sentinel on the front line.

How come, I’ve put the gloves down but you want to put up a fight?

I’m here. Screaming from the dark side, wanting to draw lines for you to come to my side.

Not sure if I should just shake hands with the time, stay in my side, leave your mirrors behind and dare to feel bubbles a thousand times.

Fotografía por April Schultz

Michelle Miller

(I share dialogues with myself with a lot of parentheses and suspension points)

www.instagram.com/mmiller_/

La entrada Mirror Fields se publicó primero en ERRR MAGAZINE.

Cause I’ve played us in slow motion in one million futures, and in all of them, there’s you.

Cause I’ve been trying to find meaning in all corners. I’ve also checked under the table. You left no clues. No traces.

(Your silence is too loud)

Why is it there’s a gallery of us in my head if you have always been busy being make believe?

How’s that insatiable appetite? You still want to bottle me up? 

I imagine you imagining me in that dress. Do I still make you feel that way?

I’m playing the fear I’ve felt when I realized there’s nothing but none nonsense scenes of you and me. I replay all of those scenes in my head and I’m seeing all I don’t have.

Should I get used to that?

Stop judging me with your inner voice. I’m done doing that. 

See? This is me being cynical. Let’s not be scared of our imagination.

Photography by Elina Lex

Michelle Miller

(I share dialogues with myself with a lot of parentheses and suspension points)

www.instagram.com/mmiller_/

La entrada Bottle me up se publicó primero en ERRR MAGAZINE.

I know. I’ve been out of touch.

I know, I’ve been quiet enough.

I know you have a lot of questions.

I know you don’t want to know the answer to any of those questions.

I didn’t bring a sword. I’ve came in peace.

I know you are halfway out the door.

I’m around the corner.

(But I thought that you should know)

At first, I couldn’t write this.

I guess I wasn’t brave enough to read what I had to tell you.

But maybe, I just couldn’t confront myself. 

I guess, maybe, just maybe, I couldn’t face the fact that I was the one that stopped the race I could never win. 

Cause it’s true. I’ve been running away from my true feelings. But this time was different. This time I didn’t run away from my vague or irrational emotions, this time I ran away from someone I loved. 

At first my words were filled with anger and anxiety. Every single thought in my head was bleeding. The thought of you suffocated me in every corner along with the scent of bursting candles in my room. Everything was blurry. And I can say that even right now, I haven’t been able to see this with true clarity because breathing the airs of all the seasons without you has been feeling like touching the bottom of hell. 

I’m at a crossroad.  Cause I can’t seem to walk towards the truth and neither towards you. Cause you are far away.  I haven’t been able to imagine you, talking and gesturing in synchronicity in the moments when I pretend to pause everything and I close my eyes. I know I’m far away from the place I used to feel like home, I know I can’t touch you cause I’m too late. And, the thing I know the most is that I won’t be able to walk the streets of this crossroad never again. 

I’ve eased the pain. But the only wound that I won’t be able to heal is that after all,  we are not who we promised each other to be.

I count the days and also my mistakes.

Sometimes I feel that everything happened this year. Sometimes it felt like the past year has been cruel and made me missed you slowly. Sometimes this year has passed quickly and I’ve been feeling ashamed for running away. 

I never understood what was my urge for wanting to run away too fast from everything I was attached to. 

Sometimes this year has been too slow and too fast…

Yet, sometimes I just want this year to be the sum up of the golden mornings and the slowly Sunday nights we spent together.

Cause that was the moment. That was the moment I knew that heaven was not overrated. 

(I bet that no one has ever had a love this violent)

I feel selfish praying. I only look at the sky whenever I need a smile. 

Yet, I’ve been praying. I’ve praying because nothing takes me to a certain state or place, nothing gives me peace. 

A lot has happened. If you see me walking down the street I bet you could never recognise me. And I know that you would probably be scared, because now I’m trying really hard to overcome the predetermined set of outcomes that correspond me since I ran away. 

I grew apart. I changed.

I found refuge in soft-lighted rooms with wide windows.

I’m finding comfort with the unfamiliar. 

I have apologized to myself for overwhelming me with uncertainty.

I’ve had minimal attempts to trip up and cross dangerous lines.

I’ve decided to stop punching myself. 

I’ve put down the gloves.

I know now that I’m not guilty and you are not a victim. And viceversa. 

I know now that even our worst, darkest and wildest moments weren’t as poisonous as we thought. 

I know now that we can manage to change our bad habits. 

I know now that I’m not ashamed of this narrative. 

Because sometimes, things don’t go out the way you planned it. 

(And, no, I know it’s not fair)

All that is left for me to do now is to extend warm thanks to you. 

Thank you for the golden days, all the transparency and peace you made me feel.

Thank you for letting me read you, because you never were indecipherable.

Thank you for sharing me the best and worst of you. Cause the worst side of you was the thing I loved the most of you. 

Thank you for everything you gave me without realizing it.

Thank you for fighting this war with me. Thank you for being my ally.

Thank you for shaking hands with our decision. We will never be enemies. 

Thank you for being brutally quiet to me. Because now I can hear what I feel out loud, and now I’ve managed to share my words to you without anger. 

I know now, that these, are the right words. 

Thank you for letting me, start again, once more. 

P.S. Thank you for loving me, brutally honest.

Photography by Patrick Liebach

Michelle Miller

(I share dialogues with myself with a lot of parentheses and suspension points)

www.instagram.com/mmiller_/

La entrada (The right words) se publicó primero en ERRR MAGAZINE.

And no, we weren’t enemies.

We were from the same team.

(We thought we could get away with this)

We keep clenching orur naked fists to one another’s ache.

Our thoughts keep bleeding.

It seems like we’ve committed to our sins.  

We both drained ourselves.

Yes, we are both guilty.

We are traitors.

I betrayed you.

You betrayed me.

But who’s keeping the score?

We are floating in an aquarium filled with reproach and embarrassment and somehow I’m the only one that keeps drowning with all this liquid fear.

How come we are learning to hate each other?

At what point it became a point of no return?

We keep dialoguing with our inner voice.

We keep repeating the speeches we told ourselves to justify our crimes.

None of them are valid.

Still, I feel like a victim and you feel a knife on your back.

Symptoms emerged. One by one.

We feel sick.

We can’t touch each other’s face without feeling sick with unfulfilled unforgiveness.

We become slaves of our habits.

We can’t seem to forgive each other.

Then suddenly…

Without special effort…

All those memories are alive and all the warnings are away.

Me and you. Sailing beyond all depths.

Laughing under covers.

Alleviating each other’s loneliness.

Rubbing each other’s eyes whenever we felt threatened by an old lover.

The fear of how more intimately we became.

The times I danced with all the heartache all night long.

The times I followed with my fingers, the wire that unites us and how I found every single knot with which we tie ourselves.

And how I discovered that the knots aren’t ribbons anymore.

And somehow all I have left is this rage that keeps sharping day by day.

And everytime I do it, I avoid my void. Once again.

And no, I can’t seem to manage the forgiveness.

Because my fury is marked in my fists.

I can’t rationalize the pain I caused you nor the many times we underestimated each other’s pain.

Cause I’m hurt. I’m hurt because I can’t understand what you don’t dare to tell me.

Cause we never thought we would be facing a brutal damage.

They say love seems to solve everything.

But does it?

Maybe it requires more than just adrenaline.

That being said…

Come back. I know you know the way.

Bring a change of clothes for the next day.

I’ll wear my best dress.

Yes. Let’s go home. Cause that’s all I want to do. Yet, I don’t know how.

Let’s run from this nauseating narrative.

Let’s run towards something.

Let’s detach ourselves from this atmosphere.

Don’t be a victim. I’ll quit that too.

You aren’t guilty, because I was, too.

No, we will never be innocent. But we can say our apologies.

Let’s quit this strange and too familiar habit of hating each other’s mistakes.

Just come back. Stay here with me, in this empty room.

Give me your hand. This isn’t a warzone anymore.

Stay here with me in this sterilized room.

Come back…

You know the way.

Photography by Lars Wastfelt

Michelle Miller

(I share dialogues with myself with a lot of parentheses and suspension points)

www.instagram.com/mmiller_/

La entrada Warzone se publicó primero en ERRR MAGAZINE.

Not even half-truths, because they are just undercover lies.

And those lies contain inaccuracies, distortions and assumptions.

And even though partial truths can be helpful, they may hide mistakes.

Mistakes that can make a substantial difference.

And also, generate suspicion.

They say that the truth can set you free, and even though opinions are very much divided, it really sets you free, yet it’s inevitable not to feel cornered and judged by your inner voice.

So, you do it. You brace yourself for the inevitable.

You can’t eradicate that feeling of rupture and hollowness that consumes you on the inside.

You can’t help feeling brutally damaged.

You can’t forgive.

You can’t forget.

You can’t help seeing all the unseen images that surround the corners of your insecurities.

Her.

Him.

Them, together.

The way you taste her mouth without knowing her.

The way you taste her lover without knowing him, too.

The way her lover doesn’t know the truth because she didn’t dare to come clean.

The way your lover decided to lie to you, too.

The way you told the truth. The way you were brutally honest with you.

And how all of that remains as poison in the corners of your mind, because you aren’t innocent, and somehow you are supposed to endure the pain.

You can’t afford to be offended not even humiliated.

But how dare you?

How can’t you forget?

How come you feel damaged, when you inflict unbearable pain on someone, too?

Really, how dare you?

You carry the crime, too.

However, in everyone’s eyes you are the only one that has blood in the hands.

And then, suddenly the idea of not being transparent feels good.

The idea of choosing the opacity isn’t as outlandish as it may sound.

Cause you can’t mask the confusing pain of the stabbed on your back.

And he can’t change that.

And you can forgive.

But you can’t, forget.

Photography by Ace Armstrong

Michelle Miller

(I share dialogues with myself with a lot of parentheses and suspension points)

www.instagram.com/mmiller_/

La entrada Brutal Transparency se publicó primero en ERRR MAGAZINE.

I’ll just turn the lights off.

1, 2, 3…

I’m counting my reasons.

1,2,3…

I’m counting my crimes.

I close my eyes and I can’t see what’s inside.

I can’t find the “why” and neither the “you shouldn’t ” but I’m immersed with the “I couldn’t”.

Should I leave my hands behind?

Yes, I should.

(But I just couldn’t keep too much to myself)

1, 2, 3…

His tongue is running down my neck while my conscience collapses quietly.

(Thousands of voices inside of me are trying to say what it’s obvious)

(But, I can’t get enough of it yet)

This room suffocates me.

There’s sin everywhere but there are also many traces of doubts that gave me answers.

You see blood on the sheets, but I see the reasons that I tried so hard to find…even though I can’t dare to look at them closely and right in the eye.

There’s too much to see.

There’s too much to seek.

There’s so much more to judge.

But there’s also much to hide…

I don’t want to close my eyes but I don’t dare to see what you left inside me and neither what I hid from myself.

The voices are clear and my fears are becoming real even when they seem weak to me.

1, 2, 3…

I’m guilty.

(There’s no doubt of that)

1, 2, 3…

My hands are not the only ones that carry the crime, but somehow I’m the only one that needs to leave this behind.

I’m looking at my sin over my shoulder.

Somehow, killing my feelings didn’t hurt, at last.

No, don’t you dare turning the lights on.

No, not yet.

Why? Because I have not bled enough yet.

1, 2, 3…

I’m leaving this room with a drained body…

And you?

I’m leaving you here with the knife that killed my kindness.

And this crime? Keep it. Please.

1, 2, 3…

(I guess I’ll just whisper to myself that I want more even though I shouldn’t.)

And yes it’s true…

1, 2, 3…

I shouldn’t do this.

But I just couldn’t.

Photographers: Stefano Majno

Michelle Miller

(I share dialogues with myself with a lot of parentheses and suspension points)

www.instagram.com/mmiller_/

La entrada Couldn’t se publicó primero en ERRR MAGAZINE.

Someone before me congratulate you for the beautiful veins you have?
You've cauterized her past?
You've walked many skin miles?
You've bruised someone else's face?
You've lied that bad in the past?
Don't look at me that way.
Stop bringing that face around.
I can't bear to feel that weak at last.
I can also make you bleed at night.
Do my words upset you?
You don't have a pretty face but you really know how to leave a trace.
You have an ugly tone but you make me feel like if I had a soul.
You use fancy words but you don't really know how bad I want you to leave me alone.
I've been looking forward to meeting you for the first time in my life and I'm so glad I did...
You hold my face with both of your hands because you can't stand the fact that I want to turn around...
You were once was polite.
You once held me tight.
And that night... I swore you would actually leave my skin alone.
I guess you always knew how to use your hands...
You just couldn't keep your hands behind.
Yet, you have beautiful hands.

Photography by Ace Armstrong

Michelle Miller

(I share dialogues with myself with a lot of parentheses and suspension points)

www.instagram.com/mmiller_/

La entrada Yet, you have beautiful hands se publicó primero en ERRR MAGAZINE.

las uñas que muerdo cada que me quiero morir de ansiedad

las heridas que me he dejado en la espalda

las cajas en las que me guardo porque me aterra saber que me tengo que desempacar

los cuadros que no cuelgo en paredes porque no tengo asegurada una semana aquí

las noches que me escapé hace unos días y caricias

las mentiras que no me creo

las verdades que no me atrevo

las noches que te extraño y no duermo

la vez que te grité que te dejaría, A

las veces que no lo logré

frases etílicas mal estructuradas que no quiero que me recuerden al día siguiente

mis ganas de no quererte olvidar

el amor que le tengo a tus lunares

la tristeza de cargarte bajo la piel y nunca poderte tener

las mañanas que me duelen amanecer

las noches que me emociona poder dormir

el apetito perdido por no poder creerte otra vez

las ganas de pedirte perdón por algo que nunca te hice

las líneas que quiero cruzar

las líneas que ya crucé y no debí hacerlo

mis consecuencias

blanco

gris

black

la vez que A no tuvo miedo de quererme

las cartas que escribí y mandé a quien quería sin querer recibir una respuesta

mi temperamento predecible

el miedo de que se me rompan los huesos

el modo en el que te veo en mi mente y luego me distraigo contigo otra vez

el modo en el que te hablo telepáticamente mientras espero a que algún recuerde se cancele

el ardor que me causabas al levantar tu cuerpo de la cama y dejarme desnuda y enmarañada

la incomodidad de sentirme enmarañada con nudos que provenían de mi pecho

las veces que me amarrabas con tus piernas y arqueabas tu cuerpo contra el mío esperando encontrar algo de mi cuerpo que realmente nunca entendí

Soy lo más simple A.
Soy estas palabras.
Te encuentro en mis recuerdos y en cada baño al esperar el chorro de agua caliente…y cada que te encuentro, no están tus lunares donde los dejé.
Me convertí en esto.
Me convertí en constantes líneas que me he vuelto adicta a cruzar.
Ojalá todavía fuera blanco.
Ojalá sólo fuera negro.
Pero soy gris, A.
Todo aquello me volvió gris.

Fotografía por Doctor Popular

Michelle Miller

(I share dialogues with myself with a lot of parentheses and suspension points)

www.instagram.com/mmiller_/

La entrada Líneas y grises se publicó primero en ERRR MAGAZINE.

I want to scream you all my silence.
But you won’t listen.
You never listened.
I’m tired. But sleeping doesn’t help.
A pain in my chest.
A pain that doesn’t sleep at night.
But no, I don’t want to talk about that pain, no, not tonight.

Can we talk about the gory bits of your past?
Let’s bond.
(I can talk first if you want)

Why am I so damaged?
Maybe that’s not the real question.
(Is that even a question?)

You can’t tell that I’ve been crying.
(But I can show you my bruises)

Any bruise left on your body?
Any tear?

Too angry for tears?
I’ve been there, too.

You can read me between the lines.
Yes, you can do that.
(I can’t let you read my mind)
(But you are reading my body)
(And go ahead, read my mind)

The first time?
I remember many first times.
That’s not a fair question.
(You should try asking me when did it was my last time)

(I roll my eyes)
*I’m lost in the roof*
(I’m not feeling the gory bits of him)
(No, I’m not feeling him but I’m feeling you)

*I’m lying in bed in a bad mood*
(I don’t understand the scarce memories of his neck)
(But the body next to me taste like fresh air)
(I’m lost in my thoughts)

*I don’t understand my body language*
(But I don’t want to understand the thing inside you that is mine)
(And I don’t want to understand my skin)

*I don’t miss his neck*
(But I want your tongue around my neck)

*I don’t miss his taste*
(Because…)
(You could never taste like the sea)

*I feel like my wrists are breaking trying not to let him go*
(But you can even break my ribs)
(And he can go, too)

*I feel a collapse inside of me*
(But you can crash into me)

*I’m holding my breath*
(But I found you and there’s no water)

*I see myself in my inner mirror*
(I’m scared to death)

*I see myself in you*
(I can’t help but stare)

*I see you*
(I see you)
(I feel you)

*Seems like I’ve been holding on forever*
(Sometimes it felt I like didn’t mind waiting forever)

*I don’t believe in crosses*
(But I don’t mind kissing your face on my chest*

*I don’t want to talk about the pain in my chest*
(But please, let’s talk about that)
(Let’s talk about my pain)

*You are kissing my face*
I feel.

Lover?
It all seems like I can’t love another.
But lover, it actually seems like I can love another.

Fotografía por Doctor Popular

Michelle Miller

(I share dialogues with myself with a lot of parentheses and suspension points)

www.instagram.com/mmiller_/

La entrada The pain that slept one night se publicó primero en ERRR MAGAZINE.