reading room
NEUROSPAGHETTI
I. BOOT SEQUENCE I spoke in metaphor before I could tie my laces. Other kids played. I did 100-piece jigsaws, upside down, for fun. I was three, asking how the universe began and why grown-ups lied with their eyes. I knew. I knew. My brain was not built to follow instructions.
II. TABS OPEN [] email miss re: ensemble clash [] that bird in Year 4 that nodded at me [] 17-minute bass solo (notated in back of maths book?) [] how to sound curious without sounding condescending [] what even is a normal sleep schedule [] define “pedantic” + synonyms that don’t sting [] Bedwars: low-ground clutch strat (test at 3am) [] tone of your voice when you said “I miss you” [] oven status: Schrödinger’s preheat [] mental inbox: 374 unread popup: your brain has encountered an error. click [continue anyway]
III. HYPERFOCUS “Just five minutes.” That’s what I told myself. And then: a chord, a line, a thirty-seven-layer polyphonic cathedral rising out of muscle memory and hunger. I forgot to eat. I forgot to move. But the counterpoint was divine.
IV. STATIC SPIRAL The light too bright the room too full shirt like needles air like shouting stillness like punishment The ceiling hums a C# — and I’m the only one who hears it. I forget my body. I remember everything.
V. TRANSLATION TABLE when I say: “That’s not quite right.” I mean: “Let’s wonder deeper.” when I say: “Technically…” I mean: “Isn’t truth complicated and beautiful?” But they hear: “You’re wrong.” “You’re difficult.” “You’re trying to win.” When I say: “Actually—“ they flinch. I wanted to say: “Please trust that I care.”
VI. ECHO CHAMBER I remember: the exact angle of sun on my Year 2 workbook, the pen-click rhythm from the boy behind me in Year 7, the scientific name of the laughing owl (now extinct). But I forget: birthdays. lessons. messages. to eat. what I meant to say mid-sentence.
VII. TIME SIGNATURES on meds: quiet order a room with all the doors shut and no music inside. no wrong notes — but no melody, either. off meds: cacophony, sure but full of colour and risk and me. some weeks: 5am jogs and timetables drawn in pen. others: 3am arranging binges and a sunrise lullaby for no one.
VIII. PSALM FOR THE STORM I am not a glitch. Not a system to patch. I’m a symphony of misfired sparks and exact metaphors, of overwhelming floods and holy obsessions. I know I crash. I know I drop things. I know I burn brighter than I meant to. But I would rather burn than dim.
IX. LOWERCASE PRAYER i love my brain. even when it betrays me. even when it drops every plate just to show me how they shatter. i love it for the music the logic the laughter the way it builds galaxies from conversation scraps. i love it even when it does not love me back. and still, i begin again. and still, i begin again. i spoke in metaphor…
— Lilith