your unshaven face rests on my shoulder.
your hot breath sends shivers and little speed bumps on the surface of my tanned skin.
the unforgiving sun stinging us and reminding us of the cool breeze around us.
you smile at my lips and my creases deepen tempting me to smile more at you as if you knew what I was thinking.
your messy hair falls on your forehead and I move it, trailing kisses from the top of your face, right down to your mouth.
we say nothing.
we've said nothing for 2 hours, but our traveling eyes are having conversations irreplaceable by our mouths.
we can't get any closer, and contact wont allow us to get any closer than we are.
we hear each other breathing and it reminds us that we're living. and dying doesn't frighten us, because right now feels like forever.
your lip biting and slight looks up doesn't shift my gaze, as if staring at you has been innate.
your washed out jeans and faded black shirts lay on the floor like my dignity and composure.
loving you something terrible and letting you sink in.

It starts off with your lungs playing tug of war with the air around you.
Your body knows it needs air, but it doesn't want to give it to you.
And you open your mouth wider, in the hopes that someone would hear you but white noise swallows you, and anxiety grabs you, and pulls you deeper into the airless atmosphere.

objects don't look like objects, leg bobbing, finger twitching accompanied by chest filled with nothing. Swollen chest as if you had just swallowed a gulp of water, un yet there's nothing there. A chest with nothing but a confused heart and broken lungs and helpless as you meerkat search for air around you to save you from this waterless drowning.
Anxiety.

It has the power to make you feel helpless, like a power driven man pushing his dominance against you reminding you that you're a powerless woman, and this is what feminity has given you. weakness.
Anxiety.

It has the power to make you feel powerless until you submit to it and give it everything you have.
Your deep breaths can't save you, your stress ***** and uncontrollable twitches are not enough to save you from this feeling of uncertainty.
Anxiety.

I tried writing a happy poem.
But in turn it reminded me how truly unhappy I was.

I'm happy when I sing in vacant places,
or when I see shadows in open spaces.
I'm happy when I was with family,
and sad when I think of how happy we were,

Now its 4 strangers who claim they're related, and when asked how we are, put on painted faces.

Now I'm sad and happy is nowhere to be found.
I think I'm happy but sadness reminds me I'm not.
I'm sadder than sad's sad and happiness laughs,
and miss my Moms hugs and Dad's morning coughs.

I miss having hope in something that was certain,
where faith was assured and separation forgotten,
now its me living my fears and my happiness rotten.

I'm happy when I'm not sad, and its not often.
I'm happy when I speak to you and your soft voice makes my rough heart feel like cotton
candy and lipstick and makeup to cover the hurt.
because now this is a sad poem and theres tears on my shirt.

The room went quite quiet for what seemed like 3 hours.
3 minutes had never seemed so long.

It was harsh, unromantic and plain coward,
The walk down the steps had never seemed so wrong.

It was eyes strained and fixated on me, it was loud music
a big door but a small key.

It was questions the next morning and answers by night.
It was disgust and distrust
It was my fears on the cusp
It was 'forget, forget forget', but remember denied just that.

It was mistakes I want to take back.
It was me that did just that.

Have you ever sat in a dark room and thought about how disappointed you were in yourself?
How you let yourself back in the trap that you set up for the victim, but in turn you just entrapped yourself.
You sit back with your heart stuck in the bear trap and somehow although you created  it you still can't figure out how to get yourself out.
You tug on little parts of the mechanism but it doesn't budge.
You use your tears they warned you would cry, to lubricate the joints but still nothing worked.
You lied to yourself on how you deserved better but still couldn't escape.
You made empty promises to get someone to help you, but they saw right through you and wouldn't give you a lending hand.
You re-read and re-read old texts just to see if you can remember how it felt to be let down, and hopefully those feelings will make you press the backspace button on your phone, instead of pressing send.
You look at chats you had with your friends on how you complained and how you'd "never go back to that stage", but right now, you're the one in the audience applauding his lies, and false charm and all the things that stopped you from self harm.
You see his smile, and the trap hurts your heart a little less. so you wiggle this and you wiggle that and he smiles a bit more, and all of a sudden that stops you from closing the door,
on something that was evil, hurtful, regretful and resentful, but he let that all go.
So you assume you can go back to the beginning.
The days that you sat in that dark room, planning your trap and how it would work, but not how in turn it entrapped you and you still haven't learnt.
You'll never learn these lessons, not now, not ever, until you meet. so that he can disappoint you again and that feeling you'll finally feel.
You'll feel those feelings of hurt and regret and somehow you'll find a way to forget. like how you did the first time, and the few times after that, and until you get to that day when you can finally move on,
you'll realize that you were in the wrong.
You let him set the trap and you put your heart there on purpose.
But who's going to remove it, fix, patch it back together?
These chances are slim
Unless you forget him...

Do you want to know how to get rid of the person you love?
Lie to them.
Do you want to know how to convince yourself you don’t love that person?
Lie to yourself.
Thats what I did, I lied to myself but what hurt me more was that I lied to you. And although I’ve stopped lying to you, I’ve continued lying to myself, but it's only a matter of time before you start believing your own lies
and when someone comes along and finally starts telling you the truth you will start questioning and answering and doubting and lying, and crying and hoping that someone comes along and shares honesty. But honestly, who's the liar?

have you ever asked yourself where the sun goes to sleep when the moon steals its shine?
what it would be like to be mine?
do you ever twist the the spoon around to make your tongue fit in the dip
do you ever dream about taking random trips
are you amazed by really big ships
and how they stay afloat
and how planes stay in the sky
or the speeding up of time
do you ever miss the one you don't have
and how this wasn't part of the plan
or how being lonely made you find yourself
yet being alone brought your feelings off the shelf
the shelf you dust every now and then
going to classes you wish you didn't attend
but you go cause you're too diligent
and pay attention to boys who are insignificant
but you know you'll find the one that values you
because you do
value the old you as much as the new you
and as much as he used to
as much as he's going to
love you.

I drove into town.
I drove into town and saw you.
I saw you with that confused face as you drove in this town you were unfamiliar with, but seeing me made it familiar.

I drove through that street.
I drove through that street and saw you standing at the foot of an artwork. And you looked at it with such confusion, but looking at me and looking back at it is what made it familiar to you.

I drove past that sign.
I drove past that sign and saw you at the 2nd to last step of the Museum. and you looked down at your phone googling the next destination with such confusion. But the look you gave me when I was dazed in my own town which I lived in, made you familiar.
familiar with the air
familiar with the streets, and what made it bare.
familiar with the people, although you've never seen them.
that ten rand tip that you so generously gave him
and with that same hand you put it in mine
and although at the time
I might not have felt it
to love me is what you wanted.
I couldn't give it to you then, but I want to now.
it just shows how time wouldn't allow

two teenagers to love at the same time
to share these memories we now decline.
memories we're forced to share with others
although the other is neither one under the covers

Regardless of its never return, thank you for that love you've shown
because although we are lost
you are the way home.

I think about him all the time.

I check my social networks, just to see if he's left his mark anywhere. similar to the mark he left in me.
I make so many excuse for him. " Maybe he's not talking to me because he wants to get over me"... when in actual fact, I'm the only trying to get over him... Us.

I'm curious about him.
The way he smells when he holds me close.

How his hair would feel like as it brushes across my check and bounce on my neck.

I smell his Nicotine fingers as he grabs my jaw and pulls me in for a kiss.
I taste his tobacco lips on my ****** tongue as the dance in tangent, on a dance floor that is used to being 500 Kilometers apart.

I'm curious what it feels like to be surrounded by him, around him, behind him, next to him... with him.

I miss his messages:
The ones that got to me and the ones still hesitant to send.

I miss his imaginary laugh;
The one I hear when he sends the Emoji, the One he fakes, the one he exaggerates and the one she gets to hear.

I miss his hands;
The ones I'll never know the feeling of, but the ones that plan on holding me, grabbing me, caressing me... but right now...
The ones that are pushing me away.