I feel *****. I can feel it still.
I can hear the echoes and taste the blood.
I hear myself say it
No
No
No
You told me not to lie,
You wanted me to lay
Not my heart just my body
I said it
You told me not to lie
A day and six hours
It's been a day and six hours
And I can still feel your hands and your lips
I tried to pull away
But I got caged
By myself
By you
I let it
I let it happen
I said no
Didn't you hear me
I can hear your voice
The phantom limbs
Please
No
No
No
Don't touch me
Please
"Don't lie, you like it."
I don't want it
Please
I'm sorry
No
No
No
I can't
It's a nightmare
And I flinch
I can't
Hold myself together
It didn't go as far as you would've liked
What if the movie didn't end
What if
What if it never ends
Please don't
Please
No
No
No
I said no
I swear I did
But I let it
I let it happen anyway
I'm sorry
He was stronger
I got scared
I let it happen
I LET IT HAPPEN
I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN
I SHOULD HAVE
I couldn't.
Please don't touch me

I want to sink
let me sink
A day and seven hours
Please
I don't want to feel it
I don't want to remember
Please
Please
Please

I can still hear his voice
Feel his touch
Smell him
I see it
Clear as day in my mind
The movie isn't ending
Please
It needs to end

Your father told you that a boy of his stature will only see the way your eyes blink and not look at the galaxies within your irises.

Your mother has always said that your life has to be like the linens in the drawer; bought, used, washed, dried then used again.

Your Math teacher was adamant on equating your worth to a quadratic equation with only two variables; tears and blood.
But you told her that her equations were nothing compared to the way his hands held your face like you were as fragile as woven silk.

Your English teacher once recited a verse to you the way your high priest knelt by the flames but all you heard was a humdrum murmur.

But your art teacher... She could name every tone and shade yet she taught you to confine yourself to primary colours all through life.

Your best friend kept your feet on the ground while your worries flew over you but they couldn't understand the heaviness of that morose feeling in your chest.

Your lover stood by you until the only darkness he could see was his own and yours began to ebb away under the moonlight. He told you that being around you damaged his fragile frame of mind for he could no longer look you in the eye and tell you he loved the way yours were starting to sparkle.

And he was the last one.

He was the last bit of your heart rotting in the dusty corner of a forgotten picture frame in an abandoned hall of memories.
For when you looked at his picture one last time, you flung yourself into the air hoping the water would end things kinder than he.


The end.

I remember the sunshine in your eyes and the pale moonlight on your skin and the only thought in my head would be, "Am I dreaming? Is he really here?."

It's been four months since I last saw you. Four months since I've heard your voice. Four months since I last touched you. Four months since my heart broke apart.

I remember first seeing you, under the shelter of our school. You sat right in from of me and asked for my name and introduced yourself to me.

I remember being alone with you, blanketed by the stars, and our own bubble of comfort. You would ask me every time we met, "When can I see you again?"

But I couldn't live in the shadows and in the world we created for ourselves. I couldn't look at you and not be irrevocably in love. I couldn't be with you one day and be without you for months on end only to come up for air when your arm is around my waist.

For six years there was love and for six years there were secrets. For six years you fooled yourself and for six years, you made a fool of me.

We were kids hoping for happy endings that never came with an expiry date. God forbid we still hope for it now. But knowing you was my blessing, and having my love was yours.

You said to me that there were things we just couldn't change, that there was no point in pursuing what we wanted. You said to me that our hope was a fool's errand and that our denial was a temporary bliss.

I said to you that I couldn't decide if I wanted to punch you in the face or kiss you. I said to you that we could still be friends. But how do you befriend a rose with thorns for petals and how do you befriend the person who had your love most.

You were the saviour of my soul and the thorn in my heart. My only regret is I never kissed you and your only regret is that you didn't fight for us.

I still wear that ring you gave me in a warm September afternoon. Once I take it off, it'll be over. Irreversibly over.

your beauty is so
overwhelming
that i want to open
multiple tabs of you,
crash my computer
with curiosity
and overwhelm capacity,

in the blue screen that follows
i unscramble coding language,
and spell your name and
traits that i admire,

in that moment during restart
staring at the black of screen,
thoughts of 'us' are interrupted
when i see my own reflection.

It is three years ago now that the boy first saw the girl;
She had smiled at him and he melted for the very first time.
He thought her eyes looked like caramel and her freckles like little sprinkles on her cheek.
She thought she could lay forever in the folds of his chest and that his hands were as soft as flour.
The boy realized he used to be frozen and he felt himself thaw each time his fingers graced her leg.
The girl told herself that if she could just stay locked in his eyes she’d make it through.

It is one year ago now that they questioned their relationship;
The girl felt loneliness in each breath she took.
He thought being apart may be good for the two but still kept a framed picture of her at his bedside.
She thought the last time they spoke he’d been too quiet and wondered if she should go knock at his door.
The boy loved the girl and felt himself ache with missing her what she used to be; what was she doing right at this moment?
The girl loved the boy and lost herself in the confusion of it all; what was he doing right this at moment?

It is a month ago now that the boy and the girl went separate ways;
Not a day goes by that they don’t think of one another.
He thought that the girl became too engulfed in her sadness and hated himself for not being able to kiss it all away.
She thought he no longer loved her and cried more than she ever thought a person could cry.
The boy realized that his love lacked the strength to patch up the cracks that blew through her and even himself.
The girl hollowed out but knew it would be okay because sometimes affection and sadness are romanticized in all the ways that make love a staggering piece false hope.
And oh, did they hope.

a message to every person who's name still echos in my mind and makes me shiver.

1. you were the first to give me a purpose. my body was small and your hands fit me almost as tight as your sheets. you were lost, and found home in the curve of my neck and the touch of my tongue and every story I dreaded to tell. you were a headache that throbbed in my teeth and crept down my throat. but I had a taste for a different type of pain.

2. you were nights without sleep for fear of the dark. you were the monsters in the closet and the dust along my bookshelf. you were The Calm Before The Storm that made me wish I was landlocked. you were venom in my veins and rope burns glowing along my throat. I've never believed in God but I pray for your victims when I watch you play life like a vicious game, and I still hope for your salvation.

3. you were a test I knew all the answers to but still proceeded to fail. you taught me to crave everything that was wrong. adrenaline has become the new form of oxygen. you are speed and I am the streets and everything inside of us aches to be free of the roles we are still forced to play. the lines in your palms are more familiar to me than my own, but you never let me hold your hand.

4. you were red in a world of black and white. I watched you fall like waves at my feet and I felt you pull back over time. you were the tides, you were the new moon covering me with shallow darkness, silent as I stumbled in the sand. you were the whistling wind pushing my hair over my eyes just so you could have the chance to pull it back behind my ears. you were salty kisses and warm skin, but you were too hot to touch.

5. you were a fairytale I so desperately needed. you gave me purpose like 1, sleepless nights like 2, had the same name as 3, and held thoughts as loud as 4 but a mouth just as silent. you were a thunderstorm in a four year drought, a fire in my mind, a force I could feel and never see. you held flashing lights and warning signs but I only squeezed my eyes closed even tighter. you are the scars along my wrists that show me I am so, so fragile. you are the suicide note waiting so patiently to be read, a reminder that I am not the only one who doesn't want to breathe anymore. but I would die for you.