You are such a sweetheart
I'm a cold-hearted *****
I think we are perfect

When I say I am out for repair
I mean I am removing, rewiring and renewing
the toxicity that is slowing my progress

All these bolts missing and screws loosened
no wonder the machine does run smoothly
it's ok to be out of service for maintenance
it's ok to have to remove some anomalies  
that maybe causing your wires to spark
you have to replace the bad with the good
and the old with the new
to be whole and fully functional
or just be a better you

you are the apparition that finds me in my nightmares once in a while
I wake up and I'm scared because I know it wasn't my mind being
over active
that you actually hurt me against my will
and I couldn't do anything about it
I couldn't even cry myself to sleep
cause even crying was too much of a comfort

so I plastered a face that wasn't my own
a face with no emotion
to hide how broken I was
that façade I still uphold today
even though your thousands of miles away
your imprinted into my forever memories

I hide behind the synthetic smile I stitched and embroidered  to my face
I smile because I don’t know what’s wrong with me
I don’t know why I’m different
I don’t know why the palms of my hands look the way they do
I don’t know why the skin on my face feels the way it does
I don’t know why my feet wander they way they do
I feel like my body isn’t mine
That like I’m foreign to this world
Like I’m alien
Alien because I don’t fit in
Alien because I stand out
Alien because my own body rejects my life essence
I smile because I don’t want them to ask questions
I don’t want them to **** and pock at me like I’m some science experiment
Or I’m broken and need fixing
I’m broken and need fixing ?
Am I broken and need fixing?

I have dropped all my weapons pointed at you
I'm not used to having to surrender and seize fire to let an ally in
but love has waged a war against me in the past
I was just defending myself

Even the feeling of a void is amiss
I have gotten to the point beyond nothingness
How did it get this bad

every new person I've tried to fall for
every love letter I've tried to write
every mistake in love I've ever made was because I met you.

Don't leave your "I love you" until your tears fertilise the ground that carries their vessel.

There were millions of words you could have used
but you chose the ones that acted as a dagger and penetrated my back

I cried a river
only so I could drown every bitter encounter with you

I've given myself more bruises
than any fall could have

I envy how the rain can just wash away what it pleases

While looking for the meaning of the stars in your eyes , I saw only her reflection in them
I knew I she had already become your moon
To you I was only a passing cloud

I know it's hard to be comfortable in your own skin when the world tells you it's not pretty enough
Don't let them take away your omniety
your freedom to roam this world as you please is your born right
don't let their adjectives subject you to living a life of suppression
in fear of feeding the label of being "angry"
let those words be as brief as a fleeting breeze
let it only brush past you and get caught in the trees  
Do not give them the power to restrict your oxygen
So when they throw blows to your chest you can quickly recover

I have learned that these types of encounters come frequently as a person of colour

Dear past me, if I could tell you one thing it would be that
you are so strong
no one will realise how many things you have overcome by yourself  but yourself
so don't forget that those ordeals have broken and remade you into the blossoming woman you are now

Dear past self, you are not everyone else
you are you and nobody else
so you do not have to pretend to be a different person
you do not have to fit into anyone's mould, it would never hold  because everyone is sculpting using different materials

Dear past self, you do not have to be loud
because the people that are supposed to hear you have heard
everything you are saying

Dear past self, I want you to dry your tears now
because where I am, the sun is shining so fondly on your face
you are more or less happy in your skin, it is beginning to feel like yours

My forever never seemed so far away

you have in every way
obscured my vision
blocked my path
and diverted my attention
to you

what do you see when you look at me
do you see me at all
the real me
do you see it ?

through the straight lines they try to balance us on
do you see me in the way I stray away from the parallel

do you see the real me not the picturesque airbrushed version I present to you
blemished and bruised do you see me?

do you see the way I hesitate to say what I'm feeling and whats on my mind  
because I don't have words that can make those things cascade beautifully from lips

can you see I am not a spoken word or speech
I am a written letter , twisted font conjoined cursively
on a blank piece of paper, not restricted to lines

not many get past the sealed envelope
not many want to

Sometimes we regret that we let people flicker in and out of our lives
like a broken light bulb
we think that its our fault because we didn't hold onto them with our whole souls
and now empty rooms seem to echo even louder now that they are gone

but now the light bulb has finally died
and we sit quietly in the dark
we've realised that light bulb wasn't worth replacing ever
because they chose to leave you in the dark

You're everything I want but nothing I need
So don’t think I will cry at the thought of losing it
It being your warm hands wrapped around my cold ones
It being the way you wiped away the sadness from my tear ducts
It being the way you made me breathless as you kissed away the words from my lips
It being the way you would draw patterns on my skin leaving a hot trail of your passion on my flesh
It being the way you made the rain go away when I didn’t have an umbrella
It being the way you covered my eyes and I was able walk blindly because I trusted you
I didn’t need to rely on you for those things
I wanted to …..

I rather age like fine wine without you
Than be poisoned everyday by words that do not allow growth

All I ever wanted was stability
somewhere I could be safe
not afraid
but the universe has chewed up every bit of familiarity I held like a heartbeat
and made it flatline

Don't think about it too much
just drop all the weight that has been causing you to sink
then maybe for once you will be able to float

I still stare outside the window like a puppy waiting for its owner
for my former self to come home

Lose me in the depth of your recklessness
Indulge me in the intensity you disseminate

If you listen carefully to the way my heart beats for you
it will tell you all my secrets
but you seem to  never have your earphones in when the beat drops

Not every wound creates painful and ugly impressions
some create beautiful illustrations on a beautiful soul
so be careful to nurture those wounds
accept them because they are yours
time will provide healing no matter how far in the future that maybe
so beautiful soul hold hands with time
because it is your friend
a friend that has been with you on every journey

Find home within yourself
don't rely on someone else to be the only place where you lay your head at night, the only place where self restoration occurs, the only place you can heal

because I guarantee 100% they will let you down
because they are human
we are made of around 50- 70% water
we are bound to drown some stuff

I don't want to get up and walk through the rubble
gathering pieces that had been glued imperfectly together once before
I don't want to disturb the peace
it only just became quiet , muted

I will just lay still here
clinching to the hushed disarray

It's hard to live in a world with so much emotional violence
It's frightening
One minute you can be alive and the next you could be a ticking time bomb
Ready to throw yourself off of a bridge  cause of the words being thrown at you bruising your fragile skin
Or even better yet dead already
Then what?
years , months, even days pass and your nothing but a distant memory in everyone minds
Only remembered when something reminds them of you
Then you realise they never really cared          

I don't want to be like one of the 20 billion that have died without their voices heard
While the people that killed get to walk around free
Is it fun to take dreams , hopes , a life away from someone
How can you live with yourself knowing you killed ?
Or nevertheless contributed to digging someone grave

It's doesn't take physically piercing a knife through someone's heart for them to die
You could just so easily pierce a hole through someones mind
Stabbing their hopes and dreams until they bleed out
Or rip out fleshy the lungs they need to breathe and survive
Taking away the foundation they needed to build an empire
Leaving them have nothing
That's not the kind of person you want to be
The one that kills using words
"Your ugly "
"Worthless "
"Your not going to succeed "
"You can't do it "
"Who do you think you are ?"
"Well , I think I am the daughter of a King and Queen"
"I think I'm beautiful "
"I think I have so much worth it doesn’t have a numerical value"
"I know I'm going to succeed "
"I know I can do it"

If the ache in the core of my being stops
If my eyes stop flooding dry land
If my mind stops gasping for air
If my sleep becomes tranquil
If I stop thinking your going to walk into my room
speaking the word I longed to hear
"I never left Chris, I'd never leave you"
does that mean its getting better
or does that mean I'm going crazy.

I have already mentally prepared myself
because you have already drifted
So I know where this is heading
but physically i'm not ready to go through that kind of pain
It’s soul ******* .

What is a love story if it isn't written in tears and hard-times  
what is love if not the days you can't stand each other but can't stand to be apart at the same time
so you lay watching the ceiling on separate sides of the bed while hands are still intertwined firmly
what is love if not the ear wrenching screaming and the bruised knees from the tumbles and turns
what is love if not the heart swelling affection you have for each other
that heals everything else
and the eyes that smile admirably at each other  
while the world seems to freeze and observe such as sight

Because they will pick out the bad
and poison the apple before it begins to ripen
I scatter my seeds in secret and only when they begin to sprout they shall know

I had the craziest dream
where in it you said to me
"let's just run away with each other"
it's so crazy because you don't even know I exist
I am nothing but invisible.

You know I smile because it’s better than crying
It’s better than showing everyone I’m in pain when I’m trying to be strong
But sometimes I can’t help it
Sometimes I still cry because your not here anymore
Because every single thing reminds me of our story
Of what you’ve been through
and what I've lost
And I wish I could have taken away some of the pain every single time
I wish I could have absorbed all the bad energy so it couldn’t hurt you anymore
But I felt helpless
And all I could do was watch you slowly leave me.

I did not ask for you to paint your feelings of past hurting from other lovers on my body
But you did
I want you to know
That I would not never clench your heart
And squeeze out its contents
In an attempt to fertilise my own insecurities
I want you to know that
It is ok to show emotion and to be delicate
It is ok to show weakness because after weakness comes strength
I want you to know
That I know it takes great courage to pick yourself out of the rubble war has caused instead of burying your head in the dirt
I want you to know
that I am not like her
I am like me
I would not inflict the pain of a million heartaches on you to appease my own hurting

Let me know if I'm wasting my time
let me know if this,  whatever this is has all been in my mind
let me know if I conjured up these feeling from thin air
because it will hurt a lot less than knowing you were playing some sort of game with my frail heart
a game I was late to get the instructions to

let me know if you feel the same way
just let me know so I can loosen the tightness in my chest
because it's getting harder to breathe