[Invisible] Monsters | Danny

mara gabrielle de avila

God knows what is hiding in those weak and drunken hearts
Guess he kissed the girls and made them cry
Those Hard-faced Queens of misadventure
God knows what is hiding in those weak and sunken lives
Fiery thrones of muted angels
Giving love but getting nothing back

We were taught Gospels instead of fairytales, and by the minute our birth records printed out the name ‘de Avila,’ our future was set in a solid straight line. We were pure and holy, eternally altar girls bounded to the cross like our mothers and our mother’s mother and their mothers once were. We wore thick bleached wool dresses that grazed our ankles and wore our flaxen hair down like how innocent girls would, untouched and free as having invisible shakles that stretched on for miles. God made earth and for God thought saw us good, the earth noticed us too, and by that way it sended us messages more concrete than what our God would ever give us. The wind whistled through bare branches and sent the wayward leaves dancing along with our arias and the ground trembled as the church bells toil and shook in disapproval as I peel off my sandals and felt the upturned soil in the cracks between my toes and underneath my soles.

But the earth, for once, has nothing to say.

I found its silence as disturbing as how the air was tossed and turned with the smell of war coming on, and while the rest chatted feverishly about the inevitable bloodshed I looked out the window. We all had seats by the window for whatever class it may be, my sisters and I. It was more of my parents’ work than God’s, but they all gave us a sight outside to revel in His wonders, to see if He has given another message. I never fully understood what the messages were supposed to be, what they were supposed to look like or let alone say. Father told patted my head and smiled in response, saying doubt is essential to keep faith going, but would we still smile if I told him my faith was made entirely of doubt?

I doubted the world, and perhaps I doubted Him too.

I didn’t wait for a proper dismissal before going straight outside the minute class ended. Silence was good if you wanted it, but I didn’t. I didn’t want solitude of any kind. I’ve had far too much of that inside church walls and prayer times and far too much insincere prayers building up in my head. I needed to the earth to speak – and so I went outside with no regard for the rest.

(It’s a lie.)

If I’d have no regard for the rest, a clean slate instead of the muddled one I have, perhaps my prayers would be far more heartfelt than what I was sprouting out since the dawn of time. Perhaps I would be more at peace, more contented than whenever I looked at the rest and compared what they eye sees. They had a handfull compared to mine – I had a landfill, to say. And that’s exactly what it is, isn’t it? A landfill: just heaps of empty things and nothing more.

(The one inside your head certainly isn’t nothing more, because it is, isn’t it? It’s seeping to the rest of your body and there’s nothing but green coursing through you veins and they surround your eyes until the world sees it and they’ll know your heart is green for what’s it worth – )

Anastasia once said I had the prettiest eyes, the bluest of blue, but one look at the sky and thousand pairs of sapphires, you’ll know she’s dead wrong.

But I wanted her to be right.

(Look up to the sky and feel more small than ever, grip your arms and whisper – )

“You’re alright.”

God knows what is hiding in this world of little consequence
Behind the tears, inside the lies
A thousand slowly dying sunsets
A thousand slowly dying sunsets
God knows what is hiding in those weak and drunken hearts
Guess the loneliness came knocking
No one needs to be alone, oh singin'

a n a u t h o r ' s n o t e | wow i'm so sorry this is very late and stuff and short but hi