note from the editor:
“i wrote you a letter. i hope you never read it” is a compilation of submissions from anonymous strangers to someone in their lives. it’s a compilation of texts you’ll never send, internal monologues, word vomits, journal entries, emotional crying venting, and release. though not exclusively so, many of letters were solicited from the queer community and reflect an emotional experience that to often exists in the margins.
i am so grateful for all who contributed, for all your trust, vulnerability, and rawness. i have not and will not sanitize your words (though some were edited for space and form). there is a pressure in our communities to present perfectly & cover up the messiness of human relationships, to shield ourselves for fear that our internal world will not be loved. i hope this offers a space of some kind of safety, to say and be.
while the zine is now completed and published, i’m still taking submissions to be posted on instagram. send me a letter or follow the project at @ning.arts_ . love,
ning)
to exes, to lovers
xióngmāo,
You were never meant to handle a woman like me, not at this stage.
You carried me too much and as much as I am so grateful, your back would have broken if my yearning to blossom didn’t first explode in all its messy ugly glory.
I’m sorry for the ways that I hurt you. I hope you understand the need I had to be free.Thank you for all your support, for everything you showed me and all the love that you poured into me. I hope this life gives you everything you deserve and so much more. I’m always rooting for you.
endless love,
you said hearing your past partners tell you how they thought you initiated and pressured the relationship fucked you up. you said it traumatized you. even when i broke up with you, even when you sent me a hundred messages after no contact i didn't tell you that... i felt the exact same.
i hope you realize one day that you're the problem because i know that telling you will just deepen your denial. i think i hope it hurts when you do.
i can't earn love that isn't being shown i can't infer a love that only exists when they're in the mood for it when it's easy when i'm easy i'm sore and aching and exhausted my heart is heavy but it's planted it's in my chest and it's staying there even though there is a rip in the lining i won't surrender it to you anymore it's mine
i hope youre better to your new partners. i hope you learn to have a conversation with them, if and when your feelings change, like a grown ass man. Because feelings change in a relationship. And if it feels worth it to you work on it. I hope you find someone who is worth it to you.
.everyone after you has tried on your shoes but they don’t fit. so i roam trying to find the one and can’t help but feel she’s lost from me forever.
i eat flowers and forget about you, i climb the stairs and oh, yes, there's the pain.
.just one question: am i in the way you love her?
we say were still friends but i have never felt like i was your priority. even when we said we were in love. I was ready to marry you damien. i would have done it, despite my fears and reservations, the fact that i think im actually a lesbian, that i would have frequent panic attacks about it.iI tried so hard to be in love with you only for you to tell me after stringing me along for MONTHS and STAYING AT MY APARTMENT that you werent in love with me anymore. Out of nowhere. No conversation. No nothing. And now were "friends" but you dont text me like you used to. You dont text me the way you did when you wanted to get in my pants. Which makes me feel like we were never friends.
i went to the emergency room for you twice. I would go again now for you.I was dating the concept of you for half of our relationship. And then it took me 2 years to recover from that. Two. Fucking. Years. I was still in love with you. I was so fucking stupid. Im honestly kind of embarrassed how down bad i was for you. Cause you were giving me nothing. Im not even sure we can say we dated for a year because you were checked out by January. I fought my own fading feelings tooth and nail.
which i guess is my own damn fault and i should have just dumped you then but god i was lonely and i truly thought you were better than nothing. no one had ever looked at me the way you did and i didnt want to lose that. but i deserve to be treated better.
i wish i could say that what happened doesn’t still hurt. but i dream about it like once every few weeks and i hate you more for it.
i wasn’t good enough for you. and honestly, i don’t know why you’d want me back or in your life at all. i hate to say it. but it’s pathetic. and we both know you deserve better.
to lost friends
it has been more than three months since we talked. since you sent that faithful message, that out of the blue, ended our friendship and possibly our relationship. you might think that i am mad or angry for this choice. but i am not. i am only sad for losing you. one year of friendship has gone away in a matter of seconds.
even if i don’t want to think of you and move on, my mind and heart cant. you have invaded my heart and there is no silent moment in my mind where i don’t think of you. even if my friends tell me about treason, you seem like a pure saint to me, with no flaws in your character or spirit.
i love you deeply and i will love you until the end of times. no love is forgotten in my heart and you, as a part of my love, shall forever accompany me to the last of days.
my dear, there is no hate in my heart neither a wound in my mind by the words you wrote. i can only wish you total victory in your pursuits, and while we never speak again, i will always be here for you if you need me.
i wish i could let go of the best friend title we have on paper, because in reality, you're living your best life being someone elses best friend whether you realize it or not. And that makes me so upset that I can't let you go because you fight for something you think we have.
to those who raised us (or didn’t)
Mom, I love you and I want you to be in my life forever. I dream of the day we fully understand and show up for one another. I don't think that's possible if you are unwilling to support who I am. Please reconsider this line in the sand for the sake of our relationship.
it’s not that we’re not okay, it’s not that i don’t have peace, it’s just that i grieve a relationship we’ll never have. it’s too late.
i know i lost you when went from a kid to a “woman” (in your eyes, at least). so i have to ask: did you know i spent my early twenties wishing i was a child again? if only so you would hold me without this weight on my chest.
you were a better mother to me than i deserved.
what am i supposed to say to you? i can’t see you. i love you. i want you to be okay. i’m sorry i’m not a better daughter. i’m sorry someone touched you when you were younger. i’m sorry you didn’t have anyone to go to. i’m sorry you watched your sister trapped and losing her mind. i’m sorry no one ever gave you the support you needed. i’m sorry your father was overbearing. i’m sorry you don’t see that you’re doing the same thing.
i’m sorry no one protected you. i’m sorry you didn’t protect me.
to all the in betweens
simple disagreements that arent simple disagreements but pieces of me that dont fit pieces of you
If A word I say to myself too much So I can let myself feel things And let in happiness, the idea of it Before I lose my mind This kind of hopeless love, life
i’m sorry
You are the sun. I’m learning to love your absence the way I loved your presence. I hope I meet you in every lifetime. i wish i can hug you once more. I hope we can grow together again. i love you, you’re always going to feel like home to me.
.We haven’t seen each other in months. Me bringing you starbucks was a selfish excuse to see you. I’m proud of us for wanting better for our selves.
The warmth of your embrace melted me i nside. Made me feel great at the time. But deep down I feel like you’re protecting me from the truth.
I did it because I thought I deserved it. I thought things had been hard enough for me, not that hard, but not easy, that just this once I should go for what I wanted. I wanted to burn everything up, to tear everything down, in the pursuit of pleasure for once in my life. How you felt about it, my emotions were strong enough that I didn't really care. We weren't really that close anyways, I always thought. And it was only later, when I learned how hurt you were, or are, that you considered it a real betrayal, that you considered me a very close friend, that I thought about it, really thought about it. There was always, to me, this unspoken separation between us, and maybe that's why I didn't think we were that close, why I didn't think you'd care or didn't think I'd care how you felt. This dead man that went before me, who you knew, but who you never mentioned. And I never mentioned him either, even though I wanted to know, so badly, what your friendship was like, if it was even a real friendship at all. He told me 6 months before he died that you were someone who never really liked him that much to begin with, that's what he thought. And when you and I started to become friends that was always something I thought about. It haunted me, his unspoken death, the fact that neither of us acknowledged it. I never brought it up, I guess out of fear of imposing on you, even though everyone tells me I have a right to impose on anyone with this, like I'm the one who died or something. And now it feels like I'm providing justifications. Like I'm abdicating responsibility like I didn't go willingly to bed with her. I let wounds fester, wounds I didn't even realize I had, and in some way I blamed you for inflicting them on me. And now I pretend like that's why I betrayed you even though i can't say for sure that's why.
i wish your suicide attempt had succeeded. i hope you try again soon. you deserve peace.
to those we grieve
I miss you
When i wake up from the dreams
Where i see you
That ive had so many times
Since youve been gone
In those dreams you are sick but still here
And i hurt all over again
And when i wake up
And know that that is behind me
I feel that horrible relief again
I miss you
Like i missed the training wheels
Of the bicycle i learned to ride too late
Teetering and careening
But flying
I miss you
Like i miss the balloon
I let go of as a child
By mistake
Floating into the new york sky
Crying that my precious thing
That was made to break
Had floated away
And I would have others
Yes
But never that one
Not just the one caused by you going
I miss you
Like i miss those old beat up shoes
You made me throw away
The ones i used to wear every day
Until they were grey And full of holes
But they fit the contours of my foot
So perfectly
After years of wear
And i made you promise Youd keep them somewhere And not throw them away
But I know you did
We were different kinds of sentimental And i knew you wouldnt understand
I miss you
Like the tomato plant
I tried to grow in my first apartment
That germinated and withered
Before it even got an inch tall
I wished i could have seen its fruit
Or even a blossom
Even a bud but ive never had much of a green thumb
I miss you But i dont
Because youve buried yourself Into my brain
For the past 23 years
So how can i miss you When you havent gone anywhere? But the form youve taken Is so different now
