damakaia

when we speak of martyrs, my mind drifts first to the selfless — the grand gestures, the sacrifices made in full view of the world. they burn, they bleed, and their suffering becomes a currency for something greater. but what is the essence of a martyr? is it the act of sacrifice itself, or the enduring myth that follows? and more quietly, more personally: does one become a martyr through the act of giving, or by the story that remains in their absence? the narrative left behind shapes the perception of the martyr, transforming their choices into symbols larger than the individual. these stories often serve as tools for those who survive, casting the martyr’s life into forms that fulfill societal needs or personal grief. is this reshaping a gift or a theft? does the martyr’s legacy belong to them, or to those who remember them? kaveh akbar in his book martyr!  writes of the martyr as a figure simultaneously luminous and haunting, their existence both exalted and tragic. to be a mar...

it begins, as these things often do, in the dark. a kind of dark that is not night but suspension — the air tight and spent, the press of something mineral, something permanent, on your skin. the world outside — if it can be called that — continues. it hums along with the living. traffic moves. someone stirs sugar into coffee. but here, underground, time is less a passage and more a pause. not peace. not chaos. simply the middle distance between the two. and then a voice. firm. masculine. unmistakable: “come forth.” against all reason, you do. not out of desire. not out of faith. because the body moves before the soul consents. you inhale — a rusted gasp — and the air cuts. your hands, stiff and unaccustomed, rise to tear cloth from skin. you are breathing now, standing now, but the grave has not surrendered you. it only widened its reach. you are alive in name alone. this is not resurrection. it is survival. in the sparrow , mary doria russell gives us a man who survives. not a h...

it begins, as these things often do, in the dark. a kind of dark that is not night but suspension, the air tight and spent, the press of something mineral, something permanent, on your skin. the world outside — if it can be called that — continues. it hums along with the living. traffic moves. someone stirs sugar into coffee. but here, underground, time is less a passage and more a pause. not peace. not chaos. simply the middle distance between the two. and then a voice. firm. masculine. unmistakable:  “come forth.” against all reason, you do. not out of desire. not out of faith. because the body moves before the soul consents. you inhale, a rusted gasp, and the air cuts. your hands, stiff and unaccustomed, rise to tear cloth from skin. you are breathing now, standing now, but the grave has not surrendered you. it only widened its reach. you are alive in name alone. this is not resurrection. it is survival. in  the sparrow , mary doria russell gives us a man who survives. not ...

being pretty is not what they tell you it will be. no one tells you how slippery it is. how strange. how it follows you like a shadow you can’t claim. you catch it by accident in the window of a store, in the way someone looks at you too long. you see yourself suddenly, not as you feel, but as someone else might. and it startles you. because there’s a difference. a distance, really. between the person in your head and the one in the mirror. the one who hesitates, who bites her nails down to the quick. the one who gets it wrong. and then the other one, the one they call pretty. it’s a word that doesn’t fit, but it sticks anyway. it shows up in the pause, in the smile, in the way people want you close. there’s a kind of power in it. yes. things open. people soften. you don’t always have to explain yourself. but the power is borrowed. thin. and it doesn’t last. because it isn’t about you. it’s about what they see. what they want. it’s never been about who you are. and who are you? no...

i’ve spent much of my life moving between extremes. intensity and detachment. never the middle. even a minor misunderstanding can tilt the balance, reroute the entire conversation. there is no space for subtlety. no buffer. people call me intense. they say it like a diagnosis. but what else am i supposed to be? should i offer half of myself? should i listen without listening? when someone speaks to me, i listen. completely. not because it’s a technique. not because i want anything in return. i do it because it feels like the only honest way to live. focus, in its clearest form, is just respect. but even respect gets misread. people confuse attention with interest. they see focus and think: pursuit. they see stillness and think: invitation. i watch them respond to me in real time. the slight shift in posture. the glance to the side. the careful distance. they assume i’m interested. not in the conversation, but in them. it’s a familiar assumption, wrapped in condescension. as if focus si...

i walk with fear. not of spaces themselves, but of the people who move through them. the ones who make a sport of presence, who treat eye contact like contract, who regard silence as an invitation. it’s not their company that unsettles me, exactly. it’s the insistence. the persistence. the expectation that i be a participant. the assumption that i want to be reached. sometimes i think the word for it is misanthropy . other times i think it’s something smaller, more granular. like static, or grit. lately it feels more like repulsion than fear, more like weariness than dread. not agoraphobia. not quite. more like the sensation of being scraped raw by endless exchange. the too-loud greetings. the empty words. the demand to smile, to respond, to play along. what i want is quiet. what i want is the space not to perform. people ask how i’m doing. they do this without meaning it. the expectation is not truth. the expectation is rhythm. you say i’m fine , they say good to hear it , and the mac...