Sometimes I imagine sitting under our dining table wanting to chop my hair off, days and nights oppressed, yet not to run the rat race. Partly because I was too resistant to be happy, but with the first monsoon showers, I almost collapsed inside my oversized grey T-shirt that began to turn white, infinite gaps inside mind channels, I sat and watched strange men winning Wimbledon. I stopped writing one thousand words a day, themes and perspectives slipped into a closed brown diary, and I always worried what if someone finds it and reads it aloud in the public sphere in Prague, right in front of David Cherry’s rotating Kafka, how miserable he died thinking he was worthless, how miserable it would be to listen to voices that came beneath my dining table. I talk to a shy Kafka, every day, under our dining table, today he shaved my head.

In the monsoon,
I walked colonised streets
trying to befriend a city,
forged fields and bright street lights,
they often vanished inside my eyes
to see happy children on beaches;
glass ceilings shattering to find a sky,
that broke down abruptly
to weep on my shoulders.
I swam in the rain
only to meet those children at the beach.
They roofed me under white curtains,
for the Witch might try to grab me,
plait my hair
and take me back
to her hall of circus.

Every flower,
every breeze,
every wounded bird in a city
are part of a folklore
where minstrels live,
they all sing me
back to beaches.

Mickey,

I will not get guns for Scout and Finch to shoot
the blue jays, I will not raise them with guns, ever.
I want to read them Eddie’s messages to his Mum
Before ‘he’ came and killed him, them, killed us.
They should learn what the world felt next morning,
Let them weep, sob and finally feel love, for our world.

This is where I cannot compare myself to people,
I weep as I write to you, my bones weak, skin tearing,
The 20-year-old girl did not understand but agreed
With your Mum when you said “even rapists don’t
Deserve death penalty”, it took me three years to
Realize and not agree with your Mum’s Spanish TV.

I didn’t sleep yesterday night, I watched a film with A,
At night, I could hear the boys screaming from
Tents of their Afghan allies, the scream, pain and
Moaning an elite clout wanted every night.
I threw up dinner, they called it their ‘culture’, I-
Couldn’t look at those boys dancing with bells on feet.

There’s nowhere I feel safe with Finch and Scout,
When will ‘he’ feel love and not think to “fire who?”
I fail every day unable to scream, being a coward, but
I feel good, sense hope when I see HUMAN BEINGS,
I feel exactly what Kern felt when he saw Valentine
Walk safe from the ferry, I feel home, I feel safe.

Maybe that's what people call peace
Maybe that's what people call bliss
I need sleep, I want to sleep peacefully.

Love,
Gaye
13th June 2016, 10:56 pm

It's that time of the year again,
There are jasmine buds
Inside my pocket
And I walk my yard
With ink stains on fingers.
At a distance
I see you and take refuge
In your love
The hooting breeze
Walk my door, but
When I sit to write
Love poems, there
Are only bald-chested hills
And ghosts of dead farmers
Grazing my eyes
What should I write to you?

He will not fix it,
He is such a bleak assignment
He is bigoted as ****!
But I'm surprised
You're voting him to power,
And in English, that would be
Ignorance!

He will push you back 50 years
On opinions about modern living,
He will **** your families and
Ask you to never leave Churches.
Somebody come and look at this,
All puny mods are voting for
A Phoney Republic!

You might very well need
More oil
Stage 9/11 and get more
Private armies to Middle East?
Create more ISISs, Make
All Muslims look Evil,
Give them a free ride to
West and EU
And finally make them
Fat, Dumb and Addicted to Reality TV!

Well, just run off to Mexico,
There'll at least be a wall between you and Trump!

I feel jealous that I wasn't there to grow up with you, in the rain. The matchboxes I used to play doll house burst yesterday night and it rained my entire face, wet pillows weeping over my loss. You haven't seen those match boxes but did you feel the rain under the city?

In the end, I never really climbed-
Them, they gave me panic attacks,
Razors loped my flesh and I ran in
Circles over a reverse nightmare,
Spiral staircase, awful storeys,
They all scooted to 1999.

I want to climb down my 1999, burn
And not be smolder in an ashtray.
I hope to fall asleep, away from
The city, away from my guava trees.
I have my history of walking,
Suddenly lost without postage stamps.

Will you take me to Ferris wheel?
Push me down the spiral staircase,
And sleep next to my 1999? Will you?
Will you take me to Ferris wheel?
Push me down the spiral staircase,
And sleep next to my 1999? Will you?

“Some other day”