I fear pain, but I wear it for the story

It's easier to love, when the worst case is having a funny story to retell at bars. It makes more sense to believe, knowing truth left untold will never make it into the final edit. It's almost too easy to draw blood, when I tell myself the red is just footnotes in my forgotten tale— It's a relief to be forgetful when I know my mind will kindly fog the heartwrenching memories... It sometimes worries me when blood runs dry on my sleeves and pain settles into a quiet itch— that the footnotes will drown my voice in the margins... But it makes pain less monstrous when I live my story as a seagull skimming through the water.