Because it's hard to say i love you
I'll say you're crazy.
And that you should throw yourself away.
I'll say you're annoying and difficult
And i don't know why i talk to you.
Because it's hard to say i love you
I'll say every other thing but
the three words i need to say the most.
Because it's hard to say i love you
I'll argue with you day and night
because i don't want to stop talking to you
I'll overreact and act dumb
over the little things because
I love in unhealthy ways.
And because it's hard to say i love you
I'll wait for you to say it first.
Because patriarchy
and die inside everyday that you don't
Say the words i need to hear the most.
Because it's hard to say i love you
You'll stand me up on our first date
and then ask me if i want to be your bae
I'll say yes after five days
Because i really want to play it cool.
And not make you think i actually love you.
I'll give you all the benefits
And you'll perform none of the responsibilities.
I'll let you off the hook each and every time
You decide we're getting too serious.
Because it's hard to say i love you
I'll love you silently and destructively
Our love will tear me down and
burn my personality to the ground
And by the time you leave all I'll be is an empty shell.
Hollow and dark on the inside
Because i can't say that i love you
I'll **** myself on the inside.
Or i could tell you that i love you
I know you will run because I've scared you; because you know, patriarchy.
But at least I'll live to love another boy
And live to appreciate another day
At least i won't **** myself over you
Even though I'm pining over you.
Maybe you might even say you love me too, because ***** patriarchy!
And you thought that i didn't love you
Because it's hard to say i love you.
Jun 21, 2018
Jun 21, 2018 at 8:04 PM UTC
I'm almost twenty, you know.
I mean, I'm sure you don't care
but i'm almost twenty years old.
And I'm trying.
To be all the things you said i would be
and I'm not going to question
all the rules you've set out for me
because i need that foreboding affirmation of love so just know that I'm never gonna leave.
Because were it not for you, who would i be?
But I'm also struggling
To figure out if I am actually a talented artist
Or just some teenage kid going through stuff. i need
To see the answers at the back of the book of Life if there's such a thing
I feel. Oh Lord! I feel tired already. Like i could quit
But i can't I'm already nineteen years into this ****
And I'm already tryna make people take me seriously.
And I'm trying.
To pretend that i understand why old people are so entitled to an earth that might actually be revolting against the human race
That i know, why it is super ultra important to be the kind of feminist that is kind to misogynists
That i even want, to be part of an existence that so closely resembles a shitshow
That i even know, how to turn my feelings into a proper rhyme. I don't.
Honestly and i don't care.
So i won't even try
to pretend that woke mans are not the ****
and that i don't think, gay people deserve peace
and that I don't wish, child marriages was something i could fix
and that i don't think, that I'm going to marry an intersectional feminist
and that i don't think, that instead of vows he's going to recite to me his poetry
and that i actually need you to tell me that these are all teenage fantasies.
I don't. I've had nineteen years of this ****
And i’m just glad i don't have to pretend
That i love pink , i do even though i wish i didn't
And that i know i can take nineteen more years if only it means
More badly written poetry from beautifully imperfect teens
And more African literature and Twitter and sleep
More discussions with bae about the importance of memes
More inventive ways to show bae i exist.
I might be getting carried away but you see what i mean.
That i want everything this life has to give
Just no struggles. no pretence.no assumptions. and no guilt.
Apr 10, 2018
Apr 10, 2018 at 5:44 PM UTC
In this badly written love story the wanderers remain wanderers
They do not learn how to say "I'm sorry"
for who and what they are.
They never end up together
or settle down to play happy families.
The wanderers in this love story
stayed wanderers forever.
In this badly written love story
the wanderers never sought to cage
each other in a fancy prison disguised as a home
Wise enough to never forget the feel of freedom they kept the door open and had common sense over for lunch every other day .
Careful not to stifle the flame of love.
They loved when they could and knew to leave when they should.
In this badly written love story the wanderers eventually packed their belongings and differences and wandered far apart.
They set off once again with the wind whispering promises of sweet sweet freedom freedom in their ears.
They did not look back before they disappeared from view
or try to follow the other one.
No. Our wanderers looked straight ahead as the wind attempted and failed to wipe away their tears and did not once complain as he led them away from their lover's arms and into freedom's embrace.
And from freedom's embrace to the new lover.
And when they arrived they did not once try to alter this new love to look like the last one
nor did they try to fix this new wanderer to match the last one.
They simply learned what love had to teach
and got up when it was time to leave.
The wanderers love story did not stop with each other it continued on through the both of them.
Freedom being their ultimate goal they did not hesitate when she called them out of theirbeds at 3am in the morning for an adventure.
Nor did they refuse to partake of the new love she had prepared for them even though the love they shared was still lingering on their tongues.
The aftertaste interrupting and ruining the taste of this new experience.
Instead they tried to remember the time when freedom was the only thing that had tasted so sweet and tried to forget the feel of each other's hands as they reluctantly let go that last time.
The wanderers hoped against hope that freedom could not hear their sniffles as they tried to remember when life had gotten so lonely.
They feared she would take offence and leave them with naught but half of a broken heart and these useless material belongings.
In this badly written love story the wanderers did not turn back to each other and claim their happy ever after
but instead they buried their heads in Mama Freedom's chest and let out a gasp everytime their hearts clenched so hard they couldn't breathe anymore and let her rub their backs while breathing in her sweet soothing presence.
Comforted by the thought that she was doing the same thing for the both of them they let her help them move on.
Mar 16, 2018
Mar 16, 2018 at 6:02 PM UTC
Lost to me is me
the me i was before you
before you smiled and i forgot
what it's like to breathe and my old self
Left my body and left your clone in it's place.
Left the part of me that emulates you, loves you
breathes you. Now lost to me is the me
I was before i loved you.
So much i became you.
Lost to me is you.
The you that turned the old me into you.
The you that made a new me turned into a new you. Transformed, but the new me can't catch up. It mourns the loss of you
like a burned down home. Clutching the skin you shed hoping you'll return. That you'll wear that same smile again.
That you'll make me forget once again.
I should just evolve once again to match
the new you. But i can't.
Lost to me is that ability.
The new me cannot change.
So now lost to me are both you and i
That's what happens when you love an idea
You become an idea, a copy, a clone
Unable to function without the original.
You are my original, and ****** i need you!
I need you so i can be me.
I need you to be you.
But we are both lost, therefore:
Lost to me is you, and
Lost to me is me.
Feb 5, 2018
Feb 5, 2018 at 3:14 PM UTC
You taught me to be like this
to be physically here and mentally there
You taught me to disappear from the face of the earth when i felt like it
to leave if that's what it takes
To retain my sanity.
You taught me to reflect
on the state of life mid-conversation
To never apologise because reflection
is not a sin and you'd be here
when i came back ready to hear
that I've changed my mind about
everything except you because
i can't bear
To be the intolerant type of person
that subscribes to labels and promotes
fear of love that comes in different shapes, forms and colours.
You taught me to be like this
You taught me to be ever-present but never-visible
You taught me it's okay to feel like this
Like i was shrouded in magic because i was so **** invisible
To everyone else except you because
"My love, this us-thing is not so simple", you said right after the i-love-you or at least i think so
I don't know. I zoned out for a while there but I'm sure you said so.
You taught be like this.
You taught me to hide in the spotlight
Because they can never come for me there.
You taught me to use the bright lights
as a distraction and they would never know that I'm gone you taught me to that dreaming is not only for the night
you said i could do it with my eyes wide open in the broad daylight in the middle of a demanding crowd.
You taught me to leave the way you did you left, but you called it reflection
Of the way things were things are things should be of perception of the way humans are humans should strive to be to be honest i felt like a distraction. Like you were meantfor bigger things than me but i didn't leave because you were a manifestation of everything life should be plus you said it was only "reflection".
And i could do it too because you'd be here when i got back
But you are not here
Why are you not here?
You're not here
Did i not hear you properly?
I'm sure i did.
You're not here and i can't hear the sound of your voice anymore so I'm always absent trying to reach you over there, in my mind.
But don't fault me you showed me this
You taught me to leave and you called it reflection because that's how you saw it i still see it as education
Because you taught me this.
Jan 14, 2018
Jan 14, 2018 at 5:38 PM UTC
Everything means
what you want it to mean.
Nothing
means anything.
In particular.
No particular event
specifically signifies
a specific occurrence.
Unless we want it to.
Everything is relative
To our point of view
And no particular event
Is marked by another.
In particular.
Nothing means anything.
In particular.
Everything means nothing.
Oct 2, 2017
Oct 2, 2017 at 6:20 PM UTC
Dawn
Is beautiful .
Its new and raw.
It's beautifully honest.
There's something redeeming
about the early minutes our day
It imitates the early minutes of our existence
And erodes the nonsense and lies
Of day-to-day survival.
Dawn
Not only relieves the darkness
It exposes the darkness within us
The things we did to each other
Or with each other
Under the cover of darkness
At dawn they are brought to light
And in those first few minutes
We too are painfully honest
Beautifully honest with ourselves
Enough to let the dawn
Infiltrate our hearts .
Dawn
Is fleeting .
It's redeeming factor is not permanent.
Within a few minutes
we begin surviving
We commit fresh sins.
We start lying.
We learn to hide ourselves
and our sins.
In broad daylight.
In dawn's light.
We lie.
And dawn helps us.
Soon enough dawn
becomes
Irrelevant not beautiful.
It becomes unfair and weak.
Letting sinners slip through the cracks
Letting the guilty forget their crimes.
And so we blame dawn.
For not delivering on what it promised
In those early hours of the day.
We call it an accomplice of the evil
And we charge it with treason.
But dawn
Was innocent.
It's only crime was light.
It's beautiful and redeeming light.
That let us sinners feel light
And guilt-free when it shone
Through the heavy darkness in our hearts.
For the first time.
And maybe the only time in our lives
We knew beauty
And redemption.
If only for a few minutes.
Oct 2, 2017
Oct 2, 2017 at 6:16 PM UTC
I yearn for it to control my heart
I thirst for it like I do water
It's the one thing I can't seem to find
If I do I'll pour it out like a shower
And free us all from this monster.
My mind is an instigator
It always remembers what they did to me
And I wonder how many of us are actually prisoners
To the brain's manipulative power and ability
To forget that love conquers all.
I pray forgiveness invades my heart like a settler
And makes resentment forget it ever owned me.
I pray for hate to be purged out of my system
Because all I want to be is a true witness
To beauty and love in the form of human beings
So hateful but so loved
So underserving yet so forgiven.
Replace rain with forgiveness
So I can grow my garden of love
In gorgeous hues only you can create
White, black, brown and yellow.
I want to love them all.
I yearn for forgiveness to control my heart
I thirst for forgiveness like I do water.
Sep 14, 2017
Sep 14, 2017 at 5:09 PM UTC
When we sat at our desks
heads hung low over papers
and computers, furiously
pouring out our wildest dreams
and deepest feelings into words.
For others to read
For the universe to fulfill.
We were poets
But when we stood up
and joined our loved ones
in daily conversations and
laughter, at dinners and.
picnics and concerts
and enjoyed the adventures
of shared experiences
and similarities and differences,
We became the poetry.
When we left the safe cocoon of
solitude to meet people and
make friends and fall in love
with souls with eyes we'd
never forget and bodies
we never knew we craved.
Pieces of us we didn't know
were missing but now couldn't
live without. We became poetry.
When we shakily dotted that final "I"
with wrinkled hands and laboured
up the stairs to lie down next
to our soul mates. Heads filled
with experiences and memories
of adventures, weddings, birthdays
lessons learnt and loved ones lost
passions fulfilled and legacies built
When we laid down in the arms
of our loves and watched the moments
play in our eyes one last time
and waited for the show to stop
and for the curtains to close
To take the final bow and close
our eyes for the last time
while our breaths
left our bodies and our loves wept
while looking down at the shell of what
we used to be.
Holding it in their arms.
There in that moment, my friend
We became the poetry.
Sep 12, 2017
Sep 12, 2017 at 4:47 PM UTC
When you looked into her eyes
you saw that she was shy.
So you started telling lies
and making her feel alive.
For a while you thrived
because she was not too wise
and she fed your apetite
for what was between her thighs.
But the more she analysed
and the more she rationalized,
the more she realized
that you were just one big lie.
And even though on the inside,
she felt like she had died.
she let her pain solidify
so you could never see her cry.
Sep 11, 2017
Sep 11, 2017 at 2:22 PM UTC