A poem about how love and peculiarity come together, creating chaos and wonder. Emma and Jacob are teen lovers who struggle with their shared past and the difficulty of fitting in. This piece is also about celebrating destiny and oddity, embracing them as reason to live. photograph by John Von Noate.

What happens when someone so used to running away from deepening connections, is faced with emotional stability? Told through alternating perspectives from a hotelier who crosses paths with a fateful guest, and collages of personal conversation excerpts I’ve had, “Heartbreak Hotel” explores the peculiarity in choosing healthy attachment while unlearning the tiring cycles of familial dysfunction, chronic self-sabotage, and most of all, the fear of intimacy and loving.

ART BY TURTIKE (@TURTIKE on Instagram)

This personal essay aims to describe the consequences of my near-obsession to be normal and have a perfect life. Questions surrounding my identity which have grown to be unavoidable as I grow older, have now forced me to confront my beliefs on why I ever had to be “normal”.