books aren't meant to be beautiful
impeccably pristine, high on a shelf
out of reach
of grimy little fingers

no bent pages
or slightly stained covers
from that coffee
you had last week

to do so is an injustice
like buying a ferrari
just to stash it away
in a garage for the
entirety of its life
until
it
inevitably
dies

books are meant to catch tears
or perhaps
drool
from staying up
for just a moment
too long
because
i just have to finish this
one last chapter
then i'll sleep
i
promise
zzz

you
and me
we're like
cold
tea

what was once
warm and inviting
is now
tasteless and tepid

an afterthought

a sign
of long nights
i will
never
forget

whether i like it
or not

i always liked coffee better, anyway

i want to write,

but my words are

so shy.



they cling

to my brain

like a child

to a

blanket,



as if

their very life

depends

upon

it



little do they know,

if only

they would just

let go,

their life

would

truly begin.



the ink, their blood,

the paper, their bones.

With our fingers entwined,

Trapped in a gentle embrace,

It was impossible to tell

That we were not the same race

But it was him they came for, not me

They took him,

Shoved him in a home with several of his kind

Blocking him from the outside world,

They took him from me

And with him, my mind

The train came for him

But I could not grasp reality

How could they take my heart

And expect my breath to stay?

I pleaded for a delay

But not loudly

Not loudly enough

I waited and yearned

Only rarely aloud

Those closest to me

Begged me to forget

But the danger meant nothing to me

Forgetting would mean he was gone

Five years passed,

My heart never strayed,

But those who returned

Seemed to be skeletons that had yet to decay

I asked for him, cried for him

But not loudly,

Not loudly enough

He had no funeral

Only an unmarked grave

And a lone mourner

Crying at a threshold I dared not cross

I pleaded for him to return to me

But not loudly

Not loudly enough

He was gone

there is a beauty

in numbers

that so many

miss

and it

saddens me

so many things

would lose their

value

if numbers were

as irrelevant

as some say they are

like the number 11

side by side on the

front screen

of a teenage girl’s phone

as she stares incessantly

waiting for a call

that will never

come

she’ll be exhausted

come tomorrow

but she wouldn’t dare

miss him

she’ll fall asleep

at school

number two pencil

in hand

sharpened so carefully

by the pencil sharpener

whose blade

is now

missing

or the man

as he avoids staring

at the clock

on the bar wall

very clearly reading

6 am

his children are

getting ready for school

but he’s not there

and neither is his

wife

not really, anyway

her mind is elsewhere

on the man

who smiled at her

at the metro

yesterday

and convinced her

to stay away

from the tracks

after all,

the train to 22nd street

was coming,

and it would be a shame

for her to get

in

its

way

no matter how easy it would have been

even as i sit here

staring at my screen

at exhausted o’ clock

having deleted

words upon words

for the umpteenth

time,

it’s so very obvious

to me

how different

this poem

would

have been

if i had not

twenty-six letters

infinite numbers

and combinations

yet still not enough

to speak of

all the times

you’ve made me realize

how alive i truly am

the taste of salt water

and your lips

fills my soul as I

breathe in

take me away in your time machine

back to a time when love meant forever

and promises were meant to be kept

and secrets could be whispered

at three in the morning

the words spilling onto our pillows

and filling the space between our noses

echoing

until they could be heard by those

somewhere in downtown hong kong