In 1914, Tove Jansson was born in Helsinki, Finland to father Viktor Jansson, a sculptor, and mother Signe Hammarsten-Jansson, a graphic artist and illustrator. From the age of 16 to 24, she studied at three different universities for the arts, Konstfack University of Arts, Crafts and Design in Stockholm, Sweden, the Graphic School of the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts in Helsinki, and L'École d'Adrien Holy and L'École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France. Then, in the 1940s, Tove also began illustrating for Garm, an antifascist political and satirical magazine published in Helsinki. It was during this time, in 1943, she drew a strange creature labeled a "snork." This wasn't her first time drawing the creature, however, this was only its first public appearance. This "snork," in actuality, was designed years earlier in an attempt by Tove to get back at one of her brothers, by going to the outhouse and drawing the ugliest creature she could imagine on its walls. She would write in a letter to a friend that drawing these creatures helped her when she was "feeling depressed and scared" about the state of the world and the loss of life during World War II, with her going "into an unbelievable world where everything was natural and benign" when she wanted to "get away from [her] gloomy thoughts."

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Sharp edges fitting into rounded curves, puzzle pieces.
A piece of something unfamiliar that's always been in my veins—
Red blood cells, your brown eyes.
I never had a name for it, because I didn't know yours.
Were we made to watch the sunrise? Were we made to see the stars? Were we made for us?
I've lost my strings, I've never felt so much myself than when I've been part of you.
Getting used to never getting used to it.
Love with ease, curtains drawn, under covers. Wah, wah, wah.

Open windows lets the air out, you're clocking in and out at record pace but the dust on the frames says I've always been here. Like this, at least.
Half written post-it notes claiming I belong somewhere, unfortunately the adhesive means it can't be recycled.
Four-leaf clovers get cut the fastest, bodies encased or weighed down to maintain the facade of luck, all this to say that maybe the odds are against me, but the evens keep their distance. It's not so even between us anyway.
You don't know what I'm looking for but think blindness is the answer.
Sometimes home is a person, sometimes it should be being alone.
I value what most people throw away, I hoard details and perceptions. I hoard benefit of the doubt, but doubt it'll give more of an advantage than it'll take.
We're all built for communication but we never will perfect it.

"You give an inch, they take a mile."
Yielding is weakness. I loathe my own brain, my own evolutionary nature for human connection. I despise you. But I need you.
Flesh and bone and hair. A cloth coat on a wire mother.
The definition of insanity:
doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
I imagine burning them like letters, the longing for approval, love, appreciation. I imagine being free.

Pier-edge living chasing lighthouse highs, breaking the barnacles off my legs to anticipate the real thing. What do you do when your guiding light haunts you like this? Who will guide you away?
It's attempting to catch a beam of light. Even when what you want feels tangible, within reach, it will never be yours. Creation deems it so.

I'll Never Be More Than Someone Else To You
Clear Blue Skies, Headache Lullabies
Nothing You Say Means Anything To Me
But You Mean Everything To Me
Take Your Pick, I'll Be Last

I'm not who I want to be
I want to be light, vibrance
But it seems the air I exhale turns into dark clouds
My birth name meant radiance
Maybe I killed them both
The lighthouse both attracts and repels
It shines not for itself but to keep others away