Photography and Text by Leniqueca Welcome
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It is another day but it is of no consequence to her. It is never a new day. Each day, each hour, each second simply counts the time served in this sentence of his. She is a servant to her sins and a martyr for his. To curb her paralysis, she clutches to her chest the only life remaining in that house. It is his exuviae that has now become an extension of her body. She knows every edge, every corner, every crease, every pen stroke, every particle that composes the card.
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She knows it in the way she wishes she could recall every surface of that which is no longer with her. She would sacrifice every part of herself for another moment with him. Her mind is tortured by the emptiness that has come to fill the space of a perfect story. The postcard haunts her. He haunts her. But she longs for the comfort of this specter. The words like his gentle whispers qualms the fire in her lungs. Her breathing slows to the resemblance of something bearable.
But quickly her eyes become damp again. She tries to free herself from its clutch but it is only in this sickening submersion that she can orient her body. The passion she feels in the grasp of the words he left is the limit of her existence. She reads it again as if the words are not burned into her.
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For a moment the sides of her mouth elevate allowing an exiled sentiment; reprieve. Brief reprieve. He has committed her to this asylum. If the binds meant to thwart her urges to run were not present, she is unwilling to plot her escape.
She capitulates and her smile is a distant memory once more. She cannot recall a self before him. An image of a future without him holds only a silhouette in the space where she should be. Her imagination of the future is as lifeless as the reflection taunting her in the mirror in the rare instances she allows her mind to wander and in shameful betrayal it abandons his memory.
Disenchanted with the idea of resuscitation she gives herself over to her wreckless liminality, floating through the places that he left, reading and re-reading the words to fan the flame, angry at his desertion, longing for his love, hopeful for her destruction at the chance that she may be reunited with her loss.
Photography and Text by Leniqueca Welcome, Copyright 2016
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About The Author: Leniqueca Welcome is a native of Trinidad and Tobago, has a degree in Architecture, and is currently enrolled in the graduate program of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania.