you are an optimist
and you see the potential in everything
but please,
do not see my potential,
see me as i am now.

to oppress
means to abuse;
the oppressed
are the people
you have abused
with words
to degrade them,
and actions
to end their lives
every day it seems
they pay prices
for sins they can't remember
and the people
who receive their money
are the people
they work for.

if it doesn't make sense,
make a change.

i don't know you,
as you are a stranger.

your arm brushed against mine
when you passed me by,
and i watched you carry yourself
with confidence i hadn't seen before.

your face is blurry,
but our nights spent embedded
in flame fragments and warmth
are crystal clear.

i can't remember your voice
but the way you made me feel
is imprinted in my mind
the way footprints line seashores.

the waves run up the shore
and i'm standing there,
waiting for them to catch me.
they catch everyone at some point.

i hear a voice,
and i cannot tell its owner,
but i can feel the traces of your words
sinking deeper into my core,
and the water fails to wash them away.

as i turn around, i match a face to the voice,
but i can't see anything but the fragments
of the fire that once burned
within these four walls.

and as you brushed past me,
i felt your arm and its warmth,
and your eyes met mine,
and your confidence fell.

and i knew it was you,
as we are now strangers
with memories.

the nights you call lonely
are the nights i spend
reading and writing and drawing
and loving my own company
i enjoy dreaming of possibilities
and laying in complete silence
you see, my mind is so loud
louder than the party you're at tonight
and for me that is enough
i balance it out by being quiet,
by producing shambles of poetry
and endless jumbles of words
to try and understand
that it is okay to love the silence
and the mystery of who i am
you find yourself in bright lights
and loud music
i find myself in the dark
we have been afraid of our whole lives
it is the darkness and the silence
that make you so scared of us
but we are simply introverts
trying to fit into a world made for you
while you are dancing your heart out
ours are pounding in pride
as we proofread our writing for the 100th time
your open arms and our open minds
embrace in harmony
you see, i started writing us instead of me
because i know i am not alone
on these nights you call lonely
i call lovely

wallpaper women
are ripped down in single sheets,
replaced by prettier ones
with more labyrinthine markings
and colours that shine,
but even then, a picture is placed overtop,
in a fine gold frame and a fibre canvas
with artwork drawn by feeble hands

wallpaper women,
are women.
they are you and i. we are bystanders,
eager to scream out, but a single hand
covers our mouths like a veneer.
we are to blend in,
we are to not speak,
unless we are asking,
“how may i take your order?”
we are a service, a factory,
we keep the world going.

wallpaper women
are artwork,
art that is not noticed by them,
who continue to believe
they are mere pieces of decoration,
something to make the walls pretty.
if we are artwork, why are we covered
with frames and photos and decoration?

wallpaper women
are people.
we are nurturers by nature,
lovers through hatred.
and so many refuse to see
the storm above the soft clouds.

wallpaper women
are told to blend in.
but we are ripped down like pages out of a book,
crumpled up and thrown into nothing.
if you value the story so much,
why do you keep taking pages out?

wallpaper women
are not the future,
they are the past.

women are the future.
women.
women.
women,
            need to be heard.
women need to say “i am here too”
because we are not
just wallpaper,
we are beautiful ****** artwork
that deserves to be seen by
every
        ******
                    one

let these adolescent accounts pass
with tedious thoughts and feelings
you are not bound by the ribs of men;
remember
you were grown in the womb of women
despite the rain and wind
you breathed life and felt loved
these tiny caterpillar legs
took you so far
from small steps
to large leaps
you bit your nails in nervousness
and your plans became wings
these faint worries and tainted promises
held nothing in your way
please let your adolescent accounts pass
your tedious thoughts will wash away
small problems like these will be unseen
from your home in the sky

when i say black lives matter,
i'm saying all lives matter
but right now our white people
aren't being murdered
for earning extra money for their families
or for a broken taillight,
it is the black people who are murdered
for representing all that is human
black lives are the lives
that are buried in the ground
and painted on white faces
because they're going to a music festival.
black lives are the lives
that result in names
printed in fine print,
displayed by candles and tears,
they are the lives
men in blue take each day
because their job
is to serve and protect.
who are you serving and protecting?
take your blue suit off
and put on a kkk robe
because the oath that you took
is not the oath you are practicing.
so when i say black lives matter,
i am saying there is a great injustice
i am saying save those people
i am saying our brothers and sisters are dying
i am saying they are our family.
all lives cannot matter
until black lives do.

we did it.
we got through another year.
another heartbreak.
another bout of laughter.
we experienced pain that felt like a lifetime
and every part of it was temporary.
but with the pain comes the healing.
with the end of 2016, comes the beginning of 2017.
so we're going to heal.
we are going to repair ourselves.
let our exposed parts
become windows into the soul.
let the light in.
we're going to grow together.

we fell out of love slowly
and i don't know
if that is a blessing
or a curse
i remember late nights
driving fast through the city
your hands in my hair
the next morning
playing with the covers
laughing until it hurt
and then nothing
why was it fast?
i wanted a slow love
that felt like your fingertips
on my cheeks
pressing down my tears
soaking them so softly into my skin
so when i wake you with my whispering
about slowly falling out of love
stop smiling like my hands are in your hair
and the city lights are passing by
i'm telling you how we fell
and how delicate it sounds
to fall from such a height
most are afraid of
these late nights
are a blessing and a curse,
like i said,
and the falling was slow
but my heart continues to pound fast

i hope your chest misses mine.

you're the book
i read once and never again
i didn't want it to end
rushed through it too fast
the pages are so clean
no memories, no touches
i hope when you read it
you take your time
to smudge the paper
and fold the corners
because you forgot a bookmark

and just like a book
i would give anything
to be able to read him
for the first time
all over again

you bought two coffees
instead of one,
your hands trembled
when you walked
and your clumsy ***
lost a shoe,
and the worst part is,
you didn't turn around
to see if i was there,
you didn't wonder
where your shoe was.
but i have one last memory
of you.
you bought two coffees
instead of one,
your hands trembled
as you walked,
and knowing your clumsy ***,
you'd step in the spilt coffee
and stain your socks.
luckily you have somebody
there to clean them for you.
she's getting a coffee for it,
after all.

he had a dream
where she slept in his lungs,
cleared the air and breathed his blood.

he made a universe
of stars made of her
they had her name and they breathed life.

he loved her
because he thought it meant
loving himself
but he should've known that
two explosions, when finished,
eventually result
in darkness.

he thought the universe was heavy,
yet he carried her to bed every night
for a week and a half
while she battled her tears
over “what if?”
and he would put her to sleep
with gentle cradling and soft whispering
because he knew stars needed to sleep too.

he made flowers grow
in her body,
he let their stems wrap tightly
around her ribs and hold her together,
and he was scared of the darkness,
but he'd come to love the eerie glow
of the moonlight.
his fingers were drowned
in the outpouring of her agony,
and they were fixed to her cheeks
like constellations in the sky.
the person she used to be
was now a faint ghost,
etched into his memory,
but it was how he kept her alive.

the things he thought about most
were the things he talked about least
often times,
the sounds of their children's laughter
stained the fibres of his mind,
but he couldn't recall those sounds,
for they had been replaced
by his wife's shaky breaths
and painful cries.

he had a dream
where she slept in his lungs.
perhaps that was where she should be,
for maybe life can begin to grow again
and wrap tightly around her ribs
and possibly, maybe, hopefully,
hold her together.

he wished the flowers good luck,
because even gravity
couldn't bind the universe.

she knows her mother
through pictures and tapes
and stories told by mournful friends

the home
we once lived in
with wardrobes in shambles
and drawers with clutter
is now empty.

i packed everyone's bags,
gathered the last pushpins
from the wall in the kitchen,
and went on with my life.

i made sure to grab
the books we'd hidden in the attic
as well as the photo album
you'd stashed under the floorboards.

i opened the curtains
and then swept the floors.
i made our bed for the last time
and collected the closings
of the dust on the mantelpiece
that nobody ever cleaned.

i got two extra boxes
for all of the medication unfinished.
i marked them "fragile", for they were glass capsules
containing the substance needed to keep my daughter alive.
but her illness didn't **** her.

i was well aware of the dog's bed,
and it found a place
in the passenger seat of my suv.
his quiet whimpers and cries
were all i heard that evening
as i drove away from what once was my life.

when i finally got to my feet again,
i returned to making dinner for myself.
i only knew how to cook for seven,
and i found tranquility in washing things in sevens.
now i made food for one
and washed for one.

i accidentally brewed two coffees this morning,
in hopes you were still here to take it
and laugh at me for making it too strong,
but you're not.
i awoke at noon the day before and sobbed,
for i was used to being awoken by child's laughter
and small bodies climbing into our bed.

tomorrow, i will bring your briefcase to work
and leave it on your desk.
i'll collect it when i go to leave
and frown at the fact you never opened it.
i'll dispatch you three times in the field,
but you won't respond.

i used to see our wedding day,
but now i see your funeral.
i used to see our children's births;
but i've gotten used to their bodies in morgues.

your physical features
become the trauma described during your autopsies,
and our family photos
became the ones used in the funeral program.

the home
we once lived in
with wardrobes in shambles
and drawers with clutter
is now a house;

a house with things
that even i can't pack away.

i watched the earth
consume the sun,
a rampant fire blazing within.
the sky turned orange
and pink and peach and purple
and everything in between,
it was like an explosion had gone off
and left the beauty and dust behind,

i eyed the green trees
become dark silhouettes,
painting themselves
against the backdrop of opalescence.
smoke coming from chimneys
took on a dark grey shade
and outlines of houses and rooftops
began to separate the gravel from the welkin.

i adored the sky ablaze
and watched it scorch and blacken
with rage.
it was everything and nothing,
and as angry as it was, it felt peaceful.
and at once, the sky was dead,
and small fragments
of the previous blaze dotted the dark coat above.

it was as if to say,
the world is sleeping,
but our problems are not,
for though the sky is dark
and no longer ablaze,
stars still coat the interstice
to remind us of what is unfinished.

waking up
and not feeling the pain
you felt before
for so many mornings prior
to this very moment
was all you needed to know
that you are okay
you can breathe again
these worries did not break you
they put you to sleep
and woke you up
so that you could see the beauty
in trying again

i'm not the rebound
when your conversation goes slow
my reply will satisfy you
the first time
but when my loneliness
becomes six messages in a row
each one more excited after the other
your vision starts to deteriorate
and you become blind to this gaping hole
on the verge of becoming a cavity
an auditorium sits in my mind
i listen to myself
go on and on about useless information
you once wanted to hear
the late night shows were always popular
to people who didn't listen
but rather wanted a night out
and the applause was customary
but you never felt the ambience
a thousand words gave off
as i sit at my desk
and transfer these thoughts into magic
six messages become one word
lonely
writing is hard, i keep deleting my thoughts
on paper i am limitless
conversation flows fast
and i am proud to message myself six times
and get six responses of the same excitement
the magic helps me see better
i love the auditorium that is my mind
the night shows are so popular
i took time to listen to myself
and clap for everything i am saying
because i give myself the chills
using words from seemingly useless information
lonely became lovely
and suddenly i was whole again
lonely stopped looming
and lovely was the name i gave myself
so when your conversation goes slow
and i stop messaging you
i am in my own auditorium
giving myself the attention and love
you forgot existed

i keep writing your name
and finding meaning in the letters.
every time i talk to you,
it feels like i'm talking to myself.
perhaps this is why i feel the presence
of a thousand people
when i am alone.

you don't mean anything to me
but i find meaning in you.
i see the bad side
over the good side
and i can't tell you
i love you
without cutting away the ribbon
that once held those words together.

you were once a mirror,
i saw parts of me in you,
but now you are an empty mirror,
i see my reflection
because you are no longer there.

this would be an excerpt
from a book i will never write
and i could read it aloud
and dissect it for you to feel,
but again, i will be talking to myself.
i have always been there for myself.
and every day, you remind me of that.

i guess this is to say
that i am done playing games
and finding meaning
in the way you ignore me
as i tell you my passions
and the lack of concern in your face
as i tell you i'm worried.

i am worried
that being alone and being lonely
are not two different things,
that i have been alone
for one year, seven months, and twenty-two days.

today would be six-hundred days
that i have known you,
or rather, six-hundred days
that i have wasted,
trying to be important to someone
who was blind to nothing but significance.

six-hundred days,
and it took me to realize that
you are an excerpt
from a book
that i will never write,
a page that i will rip out and throw away,
the scene that didn't make the cut.

the person i have no time for
is taking up my time now,
as i write with expansive vocabulary
about the pain you have caused me
and the time i have wasted.

and as i sit alone
in your presence,
i write this
but you will never read it,
nor will you ever hear it
come out of my mouth
because you never listened,
nor are you listening now.

still was the night
as i sat up in your bed
i tried to be different
i spoke less, i wore less,
my voice became like the fog;
broken and unclear,
i tried to be easier
women aren't loved
if they are difficult
i tore down my walls
so you could climb inside
and rattle me to my very core
you tried to make my body home
you broke my ribs
beating
beaten
renovations to this house of cards
empty hallways with no paintings
a stairwell leading nowhere
my mind is gone
it must have disappeared into clouds
emptiness was the fire that followed me
surrounding me when these nights got cold
you smelled like her
warmed by her love
i burned myself staying quiet
burning
smoking
black walls, soot covered
you do not live somewhere
you're not welcome
why do i welcome you
why do you call me home?
i am difficult, uneasy to love,
different, absent, broken down
a pillar holding this home steady
through the dark and broken hallways
i lurked like your lust for her
the easier, faster lover of you
i shouldn't talk so much
but i do;
the fog makes you unable to see
and my fire has burned through your desires
thickened my skin, beaten your castle down
a creaky structure still stands
easy to fall down
hard to redeem
still there
still

did you know
that no means no?

what does it mean?
it means no.
no.
no.
no.
no.
no should not be the last thing
you scream and cry in pain
as your body is manipulated
by somebody of your kind
that is supposed to be your equal.

no means no.
it should not be followed by
if's or but's or why's.
but,
it is.
because no is not enough.

no means no.
it is not any less loud
because it appeals
under the tinge of toxicity
or painkillers.
no is coming from a human.

no means no.
no.
no.
no.
no.
no is not a joking matter,
it is not the background vocals
for your hymn of menacing laughter
and aggressive fits.

no means no.
it means denying consent,
it means this isn't okay,
it means i do not like this,
it means please stop.

no means no,
no.
no.
no.
no.
no more aggression towards people
you ache for power over.
no more trying to fulfil your sad fantasies
of distress and desolation.

did you know
that no means no?
or couldn't you hear us
over the sound of your innocent victim
screaming,
                “no” ?

teach her to love herself
and grow peacefully
in a garden full of thorns.
provide to her an education
and a strength that can move mountains.
and lastly give her freedom,
let her see the world through different eyes,
for loving and living and breathing
are amongst the small simplicities
of her existence that will make
the world beautiful and new again.

i am sorry,
you have grown
to confuse
my love for my hatred
and like the fast learner you are,
you inflicted those lessons on yourself
and you taught yourself
that love and hate are equal,
that when you love, you must hate
and that is so painful
i am so sorry
you have learned
to hate yourself
in place of loving yourself
i am sorry
you told me they were equal
i am sorry
you believe love and hate
mean the same thing
i am sorry

we waited
fingers trembling,
trying to remember
the way we felt
before we felt nothing
memories of feelings
we never told each other
trapped under books
and strings and a paper world
locked behind doors
of anxiety and anguish
fingers trembling,
we waited

we are not poetry
our tears don't have words
fit to describe them
to their exact measure of pain
our eyes are not the oceans
you compare them to
because you've run out of hues
our smiles aren't phrases
you heard in your past
nor is our laughter
equivalent to your favourite song
don't hide us between lines
and this fine black ink
let us grow and live
please let us be
for we are people,
and not poetry.

the busy streets of new york city
never brought a ring to my ear
i silently ordered a tea
with milk and no sugars
by pointing to it on the menu
the phone never rang
and the only conversation i had
was with myself
a loud mind and soul
mixed with a voice box
but no voice

nobody knows of thunder
but the threat of lightning
we didn't fall in awe of the sky
or talk loudly over pouring rain
our voices felt lonely
isolated in this atmosphere
white paper stayed blank
and i know i wanted to write
but i could not hear my thoughts
over the silence that loomed overhead

a world filled with noise
and expression and love
will never win in the fight
against silence
for ultimately it is in silence
that we blossom and make sound

your arms
wrapped around me
were replaced
by loneliness.

i feel now that i am not wanted,
but rather here,
a disturbance in the calmness
of your peaceful atmosphere.

my passions
have become your annoyances,
every word i speak
makes your eyes roll.

i've started to wonder
if it's you or i that's changed.

i feel like winter,
cold and unwanted;
sometimes like spring,
tremendous rainfall
on flowers that will never bloom.

i don't feel close to anyone anymore,
i feel like a quiet noise amongst ambience,
waiting to be heard.
but not everybody can hear.

how many times do i have to try
before you realize
you don't want me?
why am i teaching you a lesson
when you so badly
believe you're teaching me one?

and lastly,
who are you?
is it you that's changed?

you used to love me.
you used to take me as i was.
you used to treat me like summer mornings.
you used to be happy around me.
you used to appreciate everything.

you used to.
but now you don't.

and as spring turns to summer
and the flowers die out,
i hope you dwell on the buds
that never blossomed
for after all,
it is your ignorance
and my loneliness
that kills all life.

the bright red flower
used to stand high
it was watered
and it grew
but it lost colour over time
soon it fell over
the way flowers do
it hung like a painting
draped in maroon
spring came quite quickly
and mothered the site
with fresh water and happiness
and a lot of sunlight
the flower was happy
and living and red
i want you to know,

you can live again.

a paper planet,
made of paper countries,
paper cities, paper towns,
and paper people.
a number on the bottom
that is never quite precise,
and the coordinates
of your happy place,
written in blue ink,
accompanied by a coffee ring
and a crease in the middle.
is this what it looks like,
perspective?
faults and failures
and everybody in one place?

it was a love like a summer morning,
the breeze coming through the windows,
the sunlight drowning out the darkness,
and laughter
coming from the most beautiful woman
he had ever known.
it was things like these
that he yearned to write about.
each page was dated july 2011
and her name was written
by feeble hands,
blue smudges every third letter.
she wanted to feel alive,
and he wanted to plant flowers
in places she thought had died.
he wanted to forget her and remember her
and he didn't know which was more painful.
the shade of her hair no longer existed
in his scattered mind.
her voice sometimes traveled highways
and met him at intersections
and bid him a safe drive,
but he couldn't recognize it.
he was disconnected from her
and he couldn't change that.
he sat under a blanket of stars,
while she lay under a bed of soil.
and everything he wanted to write about
was lying six foot under,
trapped in a mahogany box.
it was this love like a summer morning
that flowed from pen to paper,
and let flowers grow around her body.
because after all, she wanted to feel alive,
and the least he could do
was let her live through the fibers
of his tattered notebook
titled, ‘things to forget’.

my mind scrambles,
trying to place you
i search endlessly,
wondering if you are in a field
of freedom and daisies,
or if you are stranded
in an ocean as deep as the crevices
of my mind.

i place you somewhere
i can see you

you cannot be with the fires,
for they are far too hot
and you have been burned
far too many times.
i do not have enough fingers to count
the times i have cradled your crying body to sleep.

i place you somewhere
i can see you

i tried to put you in my pocket,
but i didn't want you to feel small.
to me, you are the universe,
you are all i see.

i place you somewhere
i can see you

yesterday, you expressed yourself
as ink bleeding into the fibres of my notebook.
but you cannot be in books,
for they are closed and ended
and you are not.

i place you somewhere
i can see you

perhaps you are in the cotton threads
of that stupid royal blue blanket
that i have wrapped myself up in
every night since you died.

i stopped placing you somewhere
that would one day be gone,
for you are forever
and the world is not.

i place you beside me,
you've been there all along.

it is so tiring,
having to bring meaning to things
i thought i had forgotten.
and i am so sorry that your name
is the only word my ink has written,
and i apologize for the smudges,
it can't be helped,
sometimes my words blend together.
they say when you spend time with people,
you begin to mimic their behaviour,
and i started smudging and blending
your name beside 'stop',
just like you did to me
with love and hate.

the ticking clock
has become my lullaby.
your voice is but a distant memory;
the beginnings of a nightmare,
trapped between
tick,
tock,
tick,
tock,
tick,
tock,
tick—

a childhood
ripped away so quickly
i felt it's whisk
like a smack to the face.

the grey lines
stopped appearing on the wall
after four foot one
and christmas presents piled up
in the untouched room
you once brought life to.

once upon a time,
we had just enough, perhaps a little less,
and now we have more,
always extras.

i can feel your warm hands
as they sit neatly in mine.
i can see your contagious laughter
and the lines you get on your forehead.

report cards stopped coming in,
as did paintings and mother's day cards.
toys stayed as dolls and crayons,
never did they graduate to more.
our house looks so innocent,
but the impurities speak otherwise.

your little boots still sit at the door,
red and shiny and untouched.
a baby coat hangs above them,
mud covering the bottom half in entirety.

and i will continue to sit on the rocking chair
in the corner of your bedroom,
cradling your blanket so ****** tightly
it's fibres embed themselves in me,

for all that started off as miracles
fade too soon.

i sit in front of flowers
and wait for them to open up
in hopes of one day
learning from them
and doing the same,

i do this because
flowers are living
and i want to live again too
so please give them water
and light and teach them
how to live
not only for others
but for themselves.