First, you must have blood.
The blood needs to be contained within some sort of skin-encapsulated vessel; you should be familiar with this concept by now.
Some people call it the body.
The body’s boundary is marked by what I find to be a perfectly designed net. Strong enough to hold the entire human machine but still capable of softness, allowing sharp objects to pierce it.
Bleeding isn’t nice.
But it is necessary.
To live —or at least that’s what someone I trust said.
Okay.
Once the first step is taken care of, you’ll need a knife.
Or something that can do a knife’s job.
I enjoy a needle.
You might have a different preference.
I’ve heard some have a kick for long nails.
To call an event bleeding, the bleeding must stop at some point.
Otherwise, it would be called death.
What we’re after is a reminder of our pulse.
To bleed.
But only a little.
—
When I was pregnant, I wrote something I didn’t understand:
A compassionate knife
does not wait
for the heart to be ready
to free the blood.
This is exactly what being alive feels like. Thank you for your words.