Open Letter #7 - Perspectives
- Terry a O'Neal
- Mar 16
- 3 min read
Sunday, March 16, 2025, 12:39 PM EST
Dearest Albert,
Words seem to be all I have—all I will ever truly possess that holds meaning. They are the only place where I can exist fully, where I can be both myself and someone else, slipping between realities through the eyes of my characters.
Life is a strange thing—a paradox of sorrow and resilience. It has broken my heart more times than I can count, scattering the pieces, forcing me to sift through the fragments, searching for something still whole. If my husband left me anything, it was rejection—rejection wielded like a weapon, delivered by those he worked to keep away from me. The weight of that loss sits heavy in my chest, and the tears come, unbidden, at the thought.
There is an ache so deep, so absolute, in knowing that some things are lost forever. Bonds once sacred, once unshakable, now reduced to ghosts of what they were. That, more than anything, is what wounds me the most. And yet, as much as it hurts, it has given me something in return—fuel for my stories, breath for my poetry, a well of inspiration drawn from sorrow itself.
For years, I have worn the mask, hiding the wreckage behind a carefully constructed smile. The greater world sees only the light I offer, the warmth that radiates from me, unaware of the storms I keep at bay. They judge me by what I allow them to see, never suspecting the weight I carry.
Perhaps, without meaning to, I have become a master of deception. A smile can be a veil, a well-placed illusion.
Shift the light, and even the sharpest edges can be softened. Tilt the lens, and the truth bends, reshaping itself into whatever the world prefers to see. Point of view is indeed an interesting thing.
What is unseen often weighs as heavily as what is seen, and the missing pieces compel us to construct our own narratives. It may not be fair, but sometimes, it is all we have—fragments to stitch together understanding, to make peace with the disappointments that life so often hands us. Sometimes, we must adorn the past in different colors and shapes, reshaping its edges until it resembles something we can bear to carry.
But you left me with so little to reshape. All that remains are the moments we shared and the scattered remnants of our words—the messages I was able to salvage from the wreckage. The rest? Gone. Erased. My husband saw to that. He destroyed most of them back then, as if he could tear away what had already been etched into me.
And yet, even in absence, some things refuse to be undone.
I know you will resent me for writing this—perhaps even more than I hate having to write it. Maybe it will only serve to confirm what you believed back then, when you turned away and left me lingering on the threshold of your world. “I let you in, and you never closed the door behind you,” you said. Words I will never forget.
Yet, it feels as though you’ve left me no choice. More than anything, I wish I could release this, let it slip into the void, erased as if it had never existed. But the weight of it lingers, pressing down like unfinished business. Maybe, in some way, I am writing this out of desperation—just as Billy, Holly, and Patches of Fire were for you. Not an act of joy, but one of necessity. Not a desire, but an inevitability.
But between us as fellows, there is a difference. Writing is not merely an escape for me; it is the rhythm of my breath, the pulse beneath my skin, the force that anchors me when everything else drifts away. You once told me you envied that in me—my unwavering passion, the way words flowed through me as if they had no choice but to exist. And perhaps when this is finished—when every syllable has been wrung from me, every truth laid bare
upon the page—I will finally be able to close the door on this chapter of you.
For good.
I can only hope.
Sincere Regards,
Terry a. O’Neal
댓글