if "you are what you eat"
was true
i would help myself
to a bouquet of sunflowers
everyday,
because
i want to learn how to shine
like the street light
outside my bedroom window
i'd line my stomach
with old leonard cohen records
so i could sing all my "i love you"'s
i would stuff my face
with the pages of your favourite book
so i could regurgitate the words
you love so much
whisper them in your ear
while you sleep
i'd take a bite
out of an oak tree
cut me in half
& count my rings
there are so many things
i wish i were
i am not graceful
i'd like to make a toast
to every day that i haven't fallen down
or slipped
or tripped
on my words
see, i am full of mistakes
i never learned
how to ride a bike
god, my parents really tried
but the ground was so unforgiving
& i was too afraid of falling
now,
i would eat those training wheels
so i could keep my balance
walk in a straight line
i'd swallow my watch
so i'm always on time
don't be surprised
if you see me
tucking into those sunflowers
please,
come & bask
in my rays.

this is for the queer kids
who are taught their ABC's
but not their L's, G's, B's and T's
for the Russian government and the I.O.C
who deny Russian queers their visibility
to the people who call me "******"
i wear your name-calling like a pink triangle
stitched to my sleeve
for the Harvey Milk's, the Christine Burns'
and every queer in between
to the allies who do more than say
"your sexuality is okay with me"
for the Jamaican trans* teen
who was murdered needlessly
to the television networks
who portray LGBT individuals positively
for the radical queers
the POC queers
the genderqueers
the queers who have felt excluded
this is for you
for us
this is a celebration
and an ultimatum
we are here
we are queer
& we will do more
than survive.

my first boyfriend bought me an etch-a-sketch for christmas
with "i love you" drawn onto it
then broke up with me on new years day
the irony is not lost on me
and i still don't know
what shook him so hard
that i was erased
i was young then-
didn't know much about life
about love
hell, i still don't
i stumble my way through it all
i often trip & fall
yeah, i'm clumsy like that
but i'm saving all my "i love you"'s
and keeping them to myself
'cause honestly,
my love is the quiet kind
it's not candles & fancy table-cloths
or nicholas sparks dialogue
no, it isn't shouted from rooftops
instead,
it's whispered into pillowcases
in lonely beds
i make valentines mixtapes
that i never give out
i catch my tongue
before it runs away
with the words
i don't have the guts to say
i keep them locked up
somewhere in my ribcage
when i see you
i feel them rattling in my bones
there are claw marks on my throat
from times they've threatened
to spill out my mouth
i cry for you
like spilled milk
as white as your library smile
let me inside
i wanna learn everything
your wisdom teeth have to offer
i promise
i will be the perfect pupil
get straight A's
in the curves of your lips
anyway,
what i mean to say
is if i kiss you
would that
be
okay?

brighton,
you made me feel
like less of a cage
for one night
my bars were branches
i have since, however,
thrown away the key.

you,
wore your heart on your knee
we spent three months
in bed
until i found you
washing your sheets
of me.

11am,
you made me impulsive
i knew nothing but your name
we shared our skin for three & a half hours
until i faked a text
and rushed to leave.

one night stand,
and sit,
and all fours,
we were eachothers last resort
it seemed
the whole time
i felt like the aftermath of a catherine wheel
all my charred skin wanted
was to find something for breakfast.

we
found comfort together
2-3 nights a week
only,
momentary comfort left me
with uncomfortable shame
maybe that's why i never said your name
always tried to hide my face.

promised land,
your arms were meant to be a haven
i was supposed to find god in you
we ought to have been scripture
but i am not a holy temple
and i stopped praying years ago.

october
you made me shine
from across the bar
it didn't take you long
to get me into a taxi
didn't take you long
to stain my skin
didn't take me long to let you in
now every time i see you
i know i'll never be clean
again.

your snoring is so loud
it sounds like you are feng shui-ing
the furniture in your head
but i love it
see,
i could list all your bad qualities
& the thousand reasons
why i love them
but instead
i wanna catch your flaws
like fireflies in jars
and hide them on a high shelf
so you never
have to
see
them.

i was born second
out of a pair of twins
on march the 1st 1990
i always ask
for an extra shot in my coffee
when i was a kid
my favourite power ranger
was the pink power ranger
i felt like this was wrong
so i pretended my favourite
was the ******* ranger
i am black & blue
from all the things
i beat myself up about
i used to carry my shame
like bags under my eyes
it was so heavy
i think that's why
i always over-pack
when i'm away from home
i am almost always
wearing sweatpants when i'm alone
if these walls could talk
i'm afraid that they wouldn't have much to say
except to tell you that
i'm getting better at letting go
of my shame
i live vicariously through drew barrymore
i can't ride a bike
my sense of balance is terrible
sometimes stringing together a sentence
feels like an assault course
and i am the least athletic person
you could probably meet
i am a perpetual mixture
of sunshine & sleet
i'm scared
that if you come into my bedroom
you will read all my secrets
on my sheets
the wrinkles on my forehead
are really threads
holding an earthquake
inside my mind
one day
i will burst at the seams
climb to my highest tower
and scream
"my favourite power ranger
is the pink ******* power ranger."

i am a wishful thinker
i make wishes on bones
that are not necessarily wishbones
break me in two
and place a bet
on my better half
i'd try & come true
if you wanted
yeah, i can be selfless like that
but in my head,
i am so selfish
selfish enough to wanna share my bed
with you
you,
with the bright spark eyes
and the catherine wheel heart
i wanna make you dizzy
i'm not a firework
but give me a chance to explode
i'll show you all the colours under my skin
swim through my blue veins
and turn them white
with your library smile
climb to my highest tower
and breathe in my clouds
that doesn't make sense
i often don't make sense
i wanna make sense
out of every corner of your body
i want to wear your frame
like a tailored suit
'cause around you
my sunday best is wearing nothing at all
but your lips & my sheets
i often sing songs for you
into my pillowcase
in the middle of the night
this bed is the arena
of me & you
i'm often echoing in an empty room
but once in a while
i hear you knocking
on the door
i always
let
you
in.

i
have felt more honest touches
from straight boys
honestly telling me
i am honestly worth nothing
they treat me like a ***** magazine
they get so much pleasure
from tearing open my spine
i am a centre-fold
of ****** lips & bruised eyes
there's only so much
my staples can take
how can i feel safe,
when bricks don't build homes
but instead fly towards me
with labels like "******"
from the mouths of boys
who don't have the *****
to put on a ball gown
and throw their stilettos
at homophobic policemen
on hot summer nights
you wanna talk about fights?
i know what it's like
to french kiss
your "oh-so-british" fist
so don't talk to me
about equality
until i don't have to walk the streets at night
with my keys between my fingers
expecting the worst,
always.

this floor feels like a raft
& i am a castaway
in an ocean of empty bottles
"don't worry wilson -
i'll do all the paddling"*
wading through the night
looking for morning's land
the soothing, softness of sand
i still feel you,
like phantom limbs
clinging to my hips
like the tide to the beach
like the smoke to my lungs
beer & cigarettes heavy on my breath
dread weighing heavy on my chest
last night,
my fantasy you fell out of love
with my saintly me.

when i was young
i drew hearts that looked like the letter "B" -
B for battle
- for bullies
- for boys who would sting me
a thousand times over
and i worry about my allergies.
when i was eight i was a cub scout
enlisted in a group on how to become a man
i didn't want to play dodgeball,
you stupid ****
i just wanted to sit back and look
at the other boys in their uniforms
my heart pounding like a moth on glass
i promise that i will do my best
to keep it inside of my chest
to try and suppress the urge
to walk over to peter
and kiss him like i ought to kiss girls
well, i didn't earn many activity badges
and i never won a game of dodgeball
but i've washed away the shame,
come to learn it's okay to kiss boys
like i ought to kiss girls
infact,
it's
*******
great

when i think of your soft sleepy smile
looking across the pillow at me at 4am,
i wanna kick you in the throat
i hate you so much-
there was a time when your eyes
made my insides glow
you played me a thousand miles
while i sat smoking on your floor
but you have done more damage to my lungs
than any cigarette could
it's as if you held a magnifying glass
to all my flaws
and one by one
they've torn me down
there are times still
when i look at my body
and shy away
sometimes,
i can't look at my own face
but i am done blaming myself
you are a lost cause
your ship sank so low
the ocean floor can't hold you
let me say,
i would rather stub my toe
every second of every day
than see your face again
there are nights
where i scream "thank you"
at the top of my battered lungs
because thanks to you
i know
that i am worth more
than cigarettes
on your bedroom floor.

if i was a plant
i'd be overgrown
untamed
tangled roots
sitting on your shelf
i am always sitting on your shelf
i trip over everything
my feet
my words
my head is a hurricane
i wanna be your natural disaster
'cause yes,
i am a disaster
but i can't help but think
your shoes would look so good
resting next to my boots
come & pick out my petals
one by one
i intend to live this life
till my flowers are all dried up
so
if you wanna press me
between your pages
be my guest,
be my guest.
the only ring i wanna see
is you cutting me in half
peel back my bark
i've got all the ******* nutrients
you'd ever need
i was just a seed
when we met
so young,
but i bloomed the first time we kissed
you make me feel so beautiful sometimes
so even though i am a ****,
please
take my dandelion heart
growing through the concrete
i'll grow
through your concrete
you find beauty in unusual places
find it in me
please
find it
in
me.

the only knot i tie
is the one in the thread
i use to stitch you a smile
see,
i'm not saying i want you forever
i just want you in the moment
your mouth curls up
at me
boy, i call that smile a library
'cause i want to know
every word you've ever uttered
so come at me
with all your pages
& i'll fill every "to-do" list
i ever write
with your name
over and over
you know,
i can't run a mile
without tripping
or gasping for breath
but i'd lap
your marathon skin
til we both
reach that finish line
that's to say,
i'm not looking to make you mine
i'm not,
i just want to feel your frequency
vibrating around me
i'll let you untie the knots
in my stomach
if you let me climb inside your heart
till it's covered
in stretch marks
boy i just love the risk
of kissing your cigarette lips
with my flammable chest
so light me
& i'll spread around you
like a forest fire
my burning bark
is worse
than your charred bite
but if there's one thing
i know for sure
it's that i'd let you burn me
i'd let you
burn
me.

pop music tells us
"listen to your heart"
but all i know is
my heart beats
ten times faster
when i see your face
i don’t know what the **** that means
see, i don’t speak in beats
i already trip & fall
over my native tongue
and i don’t think vital organs
come with translators
i look to my hands
for answers
but what use are my fingers
when they've dropped everything
i’ve ever tried
to cling on to
when you smile at me
my skin breaks out
into a rash
to remind me
that my allergies include
grass, dust, anxiety
and pretty boys
just like you
i have to tell my legs
that no matter
how hard they look
they will not find yours
in the depths
of this bed
but they keep searching
for something
to wrap around
see,
i talk to my body about love
because it has the sweetest memories
of your skin
so when it whispers
of your fingerprints
i can’t help
but listen.

I grew up
As a medicine cabinet
I thought I had it in me
To fix them
The “everyone”s
The “everything”s
Now,
I’m older
And wiser to the fact
That god gave me wrists
And man made knives
And how the two
Can go on the sweetest honeymoon
I was given a throat
Which cannot fully wrap itself
Around the deteriorating state
Of my mind
My words come out gargled
I’m learning to wash them down
With the pills
I guess
I am a medicine cabinet
After all.

truthfully, i am amorous
you are a fever
cover me with your symptoms
i will stay bedridden,
laid on my back
till my neighbours know your name
i was a waning moon
you are apollo
take one small step closer to me
to my uncharted territory
leave your footprint
on my lower back
i'll leave my foot
in my mouth
because i can't eclipse my awkward
no matter how hard i try
call me bonfire
i will burn every word
in one flushed face
on escalators & train carriages
i picture your denim
leaving your skin
at 70 miles per hour
your altitude
gets me all lightheaded
light me up
like mars in the night sky
boy, crash into me
like a meteor
i want you to be my natural disaster
because i've never loved
without blowing up
please,
******* up.

the second i spotted you
in your barista uniform
i knew,
i wanted to wipe the coffee grounds
from your face
while you bend me over
your periodic table
& join together
our celestial bodies
boy,
come study my astronomy
for one night
you could see my galaxy
in the night sky
so feel the pull
of my gravity
'cause you know
we have
*******
chemistry.

they say the creases on my forehead
poking out under my curly hair
are frown lines
that signify anger
but i don't think of them
as frown lines
because they're at their deepest
when i'm smiling
no, they're more like life lines
or souvenirs
from the time you called me beautiful
in the middle of november
yes, i remember
i hope by the time i'm eighty
i'm covered in love letter wrinkles
please, come age me gracefully
i wanna wash my feet
in your bloodstream
maybe that's a little weird
i'm scared of telling you how i feel
but at four in the morning
under my sheets
you ******* clean
you fold me
like the most beautiful constellations
i wanna be your north star
look to me for direction
i have no sense of direction
but my heart is so big
you can see me from space
like an egyptian pyramid
bury yourself
in my chambers
every time i buried you
i was really burying seeds
you always
grow back
to
me.

i
move
in ways
my brain can't contain
i often
spill nouns
adjectives
and verbs
before my mind
can move my lips
around the words
sometimes,
i've noticed
i make noises
while i'm riding
alone on buses
it's pretty ******* awkward
when you pick words
at random
and throw them at strangers
on the street
maybe,
it's my body
telling me
i should lose control
more often
loosen the reigns
around my teeth
stop them
from biting my tongue
so often
but mostly
i worry
about my
neurological
condition.

i'd confess all my crimes
to wind up behind your bars
watching airplanes cut the sky with their contrails
through my window
i lay on your chest
my coffee breath on your neck
you touch me soft like piano keys
my strings aren't in tune
but you play me like i'm a symphony
when your lips found mine
you left your song in my mouth
my chest is the vatican
bellowing smoke signals
from my highest tower
for the day that we met
i will never forget
the night you looked at me
like you were seeing me for the first time
you sent shivers so hard down my spine
that my rivers flowed over their sides
you make me feel like crooked trees
on the sides of mountains
your altitude was so high
and so was i.

this is my body
all awkward limbs & jagged frame
a mountain of bones
arranged haphazardly around wooden joints
i didn't want to be a “real boy”
but i didn't want to be a real girl either
i wanted to be a beach ball
or a kite
now my throat is a chimney
my lungs are a fire
& i don’t care who’s between my legs
as long as they spread me
like bible pages
that’s to say,
i don’t believe in god
unless i’m getting nailed
or writing boys eulogies in my underwear
the way i draw maps on my skin
to where the wild things went
i think monster in the closet
is synonymous with my coming out of it
skeletons and all
clinging to me
like dream catchers
full of expectation
that got caught in their nets
that’s why i take
"proceed with caution"
signs so seriously
and i do,
i do at night when i am alone
far from home
& scared that my gay is showing
i do
when boys want more
than to just split me in two
& leave both halves of me
draped over the bed
i do
when it comes to loving him
so unconditionally
that my heart feels like
the only muscle in my body
with any fight left
this is my body
it’s bent & broken
with anxieties
but it is mine.

i am asthmatic
i found out that i have hayfever
when i was around 10 years old
recently,
i discovered i have a deviated septum
sometimes,
i think i wasn't designed to breathe
but it is you
who takes my breath away
when i see your face
i feel a blow to my chest
the oxygen is flushed from my system
my lips turn blue
but all it takes
is a smile from you
to breathe life
back
into
me.

we are
creating our own constellations
from the streetlights
outside my bedroom window.

turn down the lights
turn down the bed
i am so sick
of playing this over in my head
my arms outstretched
pointing my veins to the sky
like empty canals
baby, i am a sinking city
you are a skyscraper
i wanna get lost
in your vast metropolis
my small, village skin
can't compare
to your beautiful concrete
i am still not a firework
my back fence flare
isn't enough
it was never enough
but all i know for sure
is these sheets feel too big
without you
so i will continue
to send you postcards
from the darkest depths of this bed
till you could cover your walls
in love letters
that i don't actually send
instead,
i close my timid eyes
& wait
but you won't
no, you won't.

did you know
after you spend the night
i don't change my sheets
for at least a week
until they don't smell like you
& i'm just left with a ***** bed
it's just that touching you
feels so rare sometimes
i want your hands grabbing my hair sometimes
did you know
i've read about 109 books in my life
some nights the pages would hold me
when someone told me
you were dating somebody new
i tell myself "they don't get it-
your sparks aren't like shooting stars
'cause they say shooting stars are dying
and you are so alive"
but, they probably do
it's okay though
because your smile is the sweetest library
i've ever seen
& all i wanna do is kiss your volumes
till i can recite the shape of your eyes
from memory
don't you know, i'd be so well-read
lying here
in my
*****
bed.

i didn't know what love-making was
when i let men storm my castle
******* felt like a battle
and my shame was loud as thunder
as coarse as the men i lay under
i hate ******* with the lights on
because i look for you in their eyes
every time.
i have shared my sheets
with too many substitutes
but you hold me
and fold me
so well that my bed is a sanctuary
i'd let you stain my skin all night
if you wanted to.

i
am like a second-hand record
my surface is scratched
and i have been passed through many,
many hands
the grainy silence between my songs
can be so long
and sometimes i skip a note
but when i'm under your needle
i play like an anthem
you
are so well dressed
it's as if the whole world
is tailored to your perfect frame
sometimes, it's almost a shame
to pull your shirt away from your skin
i wanna watch you fold your laundry
i wanna share a *** of coffee
and play with the food on your plate
but i'll never ask for it to be that way
and that's okay
when you smile my way
it feels like warm weather
you are the sun shining on my face
there are days
when all it does is rain
but everything needs water to grow
there is a tree in my chest
it's roots run down to my feet
and when it flowers i feel it
in the palms of my shaking hands
i hold them up to those rain clouds
because i don't want this feeling
to wilt and die.

if i tattoo your favourite words
all over my body
would you breathe in my pages
& kiss my spine?
because for you
i could be a timeless classic
come,
quote me
from head to toe
so i can find myself
on your lips.

i wanna be a map
that you fold
& keep in your pocket
mark me with
"you are here"
on my chest
just a little to the left
take a drive down my veins
you'd be surprised
where my roads could take you
tie your thread
to every inch of my body
that you have ever visited
i wanna wear a sweater
made entirely out of your hands
'X' marks the spot
open me
like a treasure chest
i am not gold inside
no,
but my hidden treasures
are all yours
you are an adventure
i wanna get lost
all over the landscapes
of you
plan a route
that leads you
straight into my sheets
there are cities in the palms of my hands
won't you come
& explore
the vastness
of me.

boy, i love the way
you make me arch my back
you bend me like a bridge
& how do bridges stay up, anyway?
that’s one of the million things
i just don’t know
like how
you curl me like a sunset
it’s always dark when we kiss
but i long to see you
in the sunrise
forget kissing in the rain
i wanna feel you on my skin
like a thousand sun rays
or how there’s a science
to the way you part your lips
when we kiss
like it’s a secret you can hardly keep
or why in those moments
i don’t feel ***** or little
or why,
when it comes to the spring cleaning
of my cluttered life
i can never decide
if i’m trash or treasure
so i hang myself somewhere in between
like a lonely t-shirt on a washing line
what i mean to say is
i just want to ******* HANG OUT WITH YOU
boy,
if bridges can stay up
why can’t we?

i would wrap you in all my sweaters
so i could leave you safe in the notion
that if i can’t keep you warm
my closet can.