Author S. K. Nicholas

Through the woods and through the seas, I walked and swam lost to the world and everyone in it, and then there came a day when I put pen to paper, and lost I was no more. There was a time when I kept myself locked up and boarded shut, but the more I learnt to be open the less I felt like giving up and the more beauty I recognised in myself and my surroundings. It’s there for everyone, and yet how funny it is now to see those who are as I used to be. They just float around unaware of anything that doesn’t fit into the confines of their tiny lives. They exist within themselves and nowhere else, and even when they try to make a change, they make no effort in acknowledging who and what they really are. To be who you need to be, you need to pick at the holes in your soul and know what’s inside of you. Until you do, you’re just wasting time. Until you accept the mess of what you are you can never be beautiful, and to be beautiful in what you are is a gift so few will ever know. I’m not the world’s greatest writer, and never will be. I’m even less of a lover, and yet there is no shame in my flaws and no shame in my sense of brokenness because I know what I am and what I will never be, and although I’m poor and growing old and drink too much and am far too foolish for my own good, I smile in the face of my failures because there will only be one me, and the life I lead is just what it needs to be. Sometimes, when I’m writing into the night, tears well in the corners of my eyes at the thought of all that I’ve lost, but there is no sadness, only euphoria at having been lucky enough to have felt these sensations when so many were never given a chance. There was a time when all that had ever slipped through my fingers left me weary and crushed, but now I am a magician, and my losses are outweighed by my secrets, and these secrets guide my hands in ways I never thought possible. Well, in ways I was told were never possible. Because that’s the problem, isn’t it? Most of the time, it’s not you, who fucks you, it’s other people. And once those seeds of doubt are planted, they take hold and flower until you’re as washed up and useless as they are.

A Journal for Damned Lovers on Amazon.co.uk

A Journal for Damned Lovers on Amazon.com