ORIGIN: We have a soft spot for this Brush. Who knows, maybe it’s because our hearts are black as apple seed.
The thought crossed my mind. Sinking my nails deep and ripping that apple in half, stem and lone leaf be damned. I have never cared for birds that puff out their chest. I am not an angel; I know that I will never fly. I can do without having poison rubbed in my wound. Sometimes I wish I were a horse. Thicker skin and a stronger bite. I wish apples were my favorite treat. I read somewhere that winged horses stem from the blood of monsters. Who knows, maybe if flying were wrong, instead of something to aspire to, I also would enjoy my apples.
When my mouth was full of deciduous teeth, my mother told me that I brightened her days. She used to pray for my health, but I didn’t take her selfishness to heart. I gladly ate an apple a day. There is nothing like having the moon in your hands, let me tell you. So new. So red. Who would walk on tiptoe? I always leaped straight to a waning gibbous. That first bite always tasted like Hell in my mouth. No, you didn’t hear wrong. I said Hell because flames go up, like arms that can’t help reaching for more. Heaven can keep its sunlight; I don’t care for droopy wings. My mother’s prayers were answered, and it would be unseemly to go through life as someone who has given up.
The vague recollection of an apple. That’s all I have left of the lullabies my mother sang to me. Some children are blessed by fairies, I was given the evil eye. A peacock grew from that pair of black, poisonous seeds. It spread out its tail, and my imagination took wing. For the longest time, I lived in my own world. It wasn’t little. Iridescent colors stretched beyond the horizon, like a story with no end in sight. Open to change, to any description I came up with. But the world kept turning, my imagination was no match for it, and eventually reality reasserted its control. All my colors have come to nothing. And if that isn’t a curse, I don’t know what is.
I doubt they ever thought of me as the apple of their eye. But I know there was a time when I was an apple-cheeked child. All innocence and enthusiasm, I had yet to have my first taste of poison. I wish I had never spread my wings and gotten to know the outside world. Even though there was no love in the house where I grew up, I should have left well enough alone. But I was drawn to apple reds. I needed intensity. To feel seen. I wish they had told me that out there, peacock blues reign supreme. That most people set out looking for love, but what they find are apple seeds. Ugliness. Pain. And that is what they spread. The bluest misery.
I weighed my options. The apples. The dogs. Temptation. Loyalty. I was not ready to leave my paradise behind. It was all I had ever known. Home. But it turns out that the choice was never mine to make. Wolves weren’t tempted, there was no trail of apple seeds. Wolves were taken. Reshaped. They were given a new name. A purpose. I can only describe their loyalty as artificial. But I wish someone had taken pity on me. Because I never wanted to leave. My bones haven’t changed, and neither has my name. But I can no longer call this place home, I don’t know how to be loyal to something I don’t recognize.
Do I look like the type of person who would fall for a poisoned apple? I am not gullible; I wasn’t taught to see the good in others. I would sooner let slip the dogs. What I was taught was to give free rein to my imagination. To leave myself wide open to my own lies, never anybody else’s. People are too predictable. Words die in my mouth, and I lose my appetite. But I would gladly unhinge my jaw to try and bite into a whale. I like the way foam moves. The way it disappears. Unlike mice, foam never uses the same route. And if that is all I can sink my teeth into, so be it.
I learned from the best. Owls get rid of feathers and bones, but I take my apples with poison. Did you know that cyanide is used in gold mining? Kind words don’t prepare you for what’s out there. Ugliness does. Think of it as the difference between gold leaves and nuggets. Illuminated manuscripts are a work of art, but there’s a reason we can’t have nice things. Paint peels. It blisters and cracks. Expecting kindness is asking for raw wounds, and I would never expose my heart. I have a cast-gold stomach. Apple seeds only bring out the best in me. My resilience. My shine. That which has already left more than a dozen owls blind.
Who cares about feathers and bones? If I were an owl, I would already have found a way to regurgitate my own heart. I want the pain gone. But I am not an ingenious child. I can’t dream up an apple corer, I only have these worn teeth. To reach my heart, I would have to bite off everything else. All these other pieces that make me who I am. I would be reduced to poisonous tears. Only pain would hold my name together, but I don’t want that. I would rather be a teddy bear. And let somebody else hug me and put words in my mouth and a heart in my chest.
I have read many definitions of love, but I am still a possessive child at heart. I don’t understand the inner workings of light. Owls see in the dark. They drink moonlight. I can understand that kind of thirst. The one that drives you to the brink. I have reached out. Worked my fingers to the bone. Felt them turn into claws. Blood trickling down. I have dug so many holes I have lost count. You would call them stars. And if I were an owl, others would have to wait their turn. They would have to wait, until my heart was done with that light.
Wolves might howl at the moon, but they aren’t dogs. Wolves don’t beg for scraps. They let out what’s in their heart, darkening the night and making it their own. Owls might hoot at the stars, but they are all eyes. Owls just foretell the future, they aren’t inclined to wrest control from the stars. And then there is me. I eat apples because I am no longer a child, and I know that happiness begins at home. This is my one and only heart, all I will ever have to my name, and I would hate to have just enough to get by.
I would never cut an apple horizontally. Stars sadden me. All I can see is the empty space around them, and just the thought of it is enough to increase my loneliness tenfold. Apples are meant to be cut vertically. Revealing only two seeds. One for each ventricle of the heart. It may not be black, but there will always be empty space around you and me. I get lonely easily. It doesn’t take much. Just the thought of breathing out and no longer having air in my lungs. But I take comfort in the fact that a kiss could, in theory, shorten the distance between us.
Apples have black seeds. I have white bones. That’s where I keep my poison. I can rest in peace, knowing that even if a dozen black cats feast on my black heart, the world won’t become an uglier place. Nothing will sprout from my bones; nobody will inherit my hatred. I have always believed that children should be allowed to make up their own mind.