relentlessly

i remember a time 

when i was the first thing on your mind 

the days my head didn’t work 

the way it should.

i remember when you’d tell me everything 

in plumes of smoke and shared coffee cups 

whispering to me, you know,

i don’t think i’ve ever felt this close to anyone

and as we inhaled, and as we exhaled,

i couldn’t help but feel 

that was true.

i remember walking down the street with you,

sitting across the dinner table from you, saying,

i feel like you’re the only anchor i have left 

in the world.

(not saying, please 

please don’t leave.)

but there comes a time when someone 

reliable comes along, so the chair is left empty

and the doorbell stops ringing.

i didn’t understand when i called you my anchor, it meant

i was holding you down in the darkness with me.

but i see now -- you’ve let the light in.

the last time we spoke was three weeks ago.

i remember a time when you admired me.

i can only assume after knowing me so long,

you’ve realized 

there’s nothing left to admire.

(i stumble and miss my train

you kiss other people’s cheeks

and i miss you every day, 

relentlessly.)

home

  

if someone asked me to compose a list

of things that make me want to breathe, 

i’d seal my lips shut and point my finger

at you.

(i’d say that you’re my pen and

paper.)

i could name so many things,

could name iced coffees; or the way snow looks

when no one’s stepped on it yet.

i could name canals and kisses on cheeks,

melted chocolate and freshly mowed grass,

sleepy good mornings and whispered good nights.

but if someone asked me to compose a list,

i’d point in your direction, say:

 “if you really want to know.

(what drains the fear from my bones,

puts colour back where it is)

if you really want to know; it’s her.”

because i don’t always appreciate

sunsets and sometimes

i prefer my world in black and white

but if anyone could, it’s you --

(you’re the rope that pulls me out of the sand,

when the ground swallows me up, your hand 

will pull me back into my own head)

so if someone asked me to compose a list,

i’d accept the pen and just write down your name

because you manage to fix me 

every day.

(because you feel like home to me.)

aim

i am furious so easily these days
i’m afraid i’ve started to grow
razorblades in my palms and a dagger
beneath my tongue that aims and
lashes out, laced with poison
i've known you for so long; i know
just where your skin is softestwhere it breaks the easiest and
like a domino, i can make you collapse
with a single flick of my hand.


these days i wake up with an urge
to set fire to the things i hold close
just to see how long it takes for them
to turn to molten ashes; for them to
run and never look back.
each morning i see your picture
and wonder if today is the day
you finally see how dark and horrible
i am; if today is the day you see
how much time you've wasted
on a lost cause.

wednesdays

on wednesdays she looks translucent

her eyes reflecting everything she sees

you have to look twice to notice her

it’s on wednesdays her bones turn brittle

her feet sinking deep into the ground

she leaves dust when she walks

on wednesdays she counts down to midnight

coils up as her hands turn ice blue

she closes her eyes and sees snow

it’s on wednesdays the mirrors are empty

and she leaves no fingerprints behind

she’s stopped touching what she can’t feel

on wednesdays she’s acting out a half-life

 just a ghost, waiting to be roused

after a day of chasing shadows

thursdays are the ones she breathes

and touches until her skin is blistered

red, like the blood pumping through her limbs

(thursdays are the reminders

you’re alive, they scream.

you’re alive.)

colour

it's messy inside my head
a lot of effort goes into looking this composed,
but drop by at three a.m. and
you'll see the cracks


it's the stains i've tried to get rid of
but they just keep coming back
and in the daylight you'd paint me
adequate - i blend in rather well


but when the darkness comes
and the quiet seeps in through the floor boards
i lose the keys and the doors start rattling


(l e t m e o u t l e t m e o u t)


it's messy inside my head
there's things here you don't want to see and
thoughts you don't want to hear



what happened to me, i ask
in the eye of the storm when there is
a stillness in my limbs and a lull
in the back of my throat



wasn't i full of colour, i think
didn't they think me full of promise


is this all there is, i wonder
is this all there is



there used to be a time
when i spent my days dreaming
instead of locking myself away

strangers

sometimes i am torn
between which words to pick
my thoughts race and break every speed limit,
inside my rib cage; a fire that won’t go out no matter
how i try to dim the lights.


there is no on and off switch on my soul
i want to find the pause the rewind
so i can make sense of the click shutter flash;
of the thoughts that race me by,
faster than the light, quicker than a heartbeat.



but i am a bookshop after dark
filled with secrets and worlds to be discovered
yet on lock down, behind chains and switched off lights
there’s a password on my heart to keep the strangers out.

(everyone’s become a stranger now)

journey

tangled locks of hair wrapped around my blackened fingertips

the same that have smoothed out  the lines on your forehead

and have left dark shadows inside the dimples in your cheek

i’m not an artist and the world won’t know my name

but right now you are my canvas and i want my fingers to

map out a journey across your knuckles and down your spine

(and behind your ear, i will leave my name)

(in case you get lost and need to find your way back to me)