there is something to be said, for
a twelve hour time difference
perhaps the train ride takes longer
when there is nothing to look forward to
that station it comes to a halt.
and there are moments i look up
at the crowd teeming along the stairs
and see your face in some other's -

how do you miss someone
you know will return?
there is waiting to be done,
and wait i will, for
my nine days wonder.
(come back.)

it's going on a long journey
with your suitcase packed
with all the essentials, you've
got your heart stowed safely
in your pocket and your coat
on your back, and every sunset
so many miles away from where
you started is beautiful. but now
you're finally home, the steps you
take all the way up to the front
door are assured and it all feels
so right but when you put your
key into the lock it doesn't
fit.

it's standing with your feet on the
mat and you haven't even taken
your shoes off and your suitcase
rests by your feet and your backpack
is growing heavier by the second and
the straps are cutting into your
shoulders but you can't breathe
and you can't see because you're
jamming the key into the lock
and you're confused so confused
and it just it just it just doesn't
fit.

it's looking through the windows
and seeing everything you've ever
known through glass panes and
nothing has changed within or maybe
it has but it hasn't, it hasn't and
everything is the same. the address
the mailbox the garden the door
(the lock?) it's all the same and you've
got that selfsame key in your hand,
but that can't have changed, only
you're trying, trying, but it still doesn't
fit.

it's watching the storm clouds gather
behind you and come closer closer
too close and you're screaming now,
your fists are slamming against the
wood and you're twisting the ****
and you think maybe if you cry loud
enough someone will come and open
it for you but nobody ever comes
and the lightning's about to strike you
down but the key just doesn't
fit.

it's the rain soaking you to the bone
and nobody has come for you and
the mat says welcome in gold and
red beneath your skinned knees and
you're looking at that key in your hand
and now you finally see it for what it is,
it's bent, twisted, rusted, broken, and
you finally understand why it doesn't
fit.

(and you wish someone had told you
that no matter how safely you keep
your key and how often you oil it one
day it's still going to fall apart betwixt
your fingers. you wish someone had told
you that no matter how far you run and no
matter how many times you say goodbye
and no matter how ready you think you are
you are never truly ready to leave and it
never stops hurting any less. you wish
someone had told you that the moment you
locked the door behind you, you should
have dropped your key in the grass because
no longer, not ever, never again, will it
fit.)

three years- count 'em-

it was papaya and pasta. 'vegetarian' fried rice with ikan bilis in it. an assignment that i failed. my room is above the kitchen, and sometimes i smell meat and curry and i still think, i still think,

of the kitchen that isn't mine. of utensils under the stove. of fingers butter-yellow and dappled with flour. three years- the sink still drips, drips, drips, i still shuck garlic with unskilled fingers,

three years, and you still smell like home

i will spend my whole life cupping your face in my trembling hands and pressing innocent kisses to the seamless curve of your jaw and still you will never know the sheer depths of my desire

until i put a bullet through my brain. they will have to pry the gun from my cold clenched fist but their hands will come away soiled with more than just gunpowder and iron, they will

find them all. my secrets, hidden away in the ridges of my fingerprints and the crags of my scars and the dips and valleys of a story that has spanned a lifetime, a sentence ended with

a comma. the air will hang heavy with all the lingering question marks that will never have their full stop, and they will smooth out the parchment-thin confession beneath their palms and learn of

my sins.

this is the god-honest truth: i was never as brave as you believed me to be, and;

this is the god-honest truth: i wanted you and always did, although i always knew i couldn't hold a candle to him, and;

this is the god-honest truth: i would have given anything, anything in the world and beyond it, to have been him, and;

they will stain my skin. these words of mine inked in blood and held in the vaults of my heart, in the deepest, darkest corners of the catacombs, this is the god-honest truth: i love you and always have.

what city this is, it's clear to me,
where silver steel is all i see,
winding, turning, to the left and right,
where no man is content to simply be.

it glitters and gleams even in the darkest night,
flickers with flashes of flint-edged light,
o, the people, with their long-dead eyes,
they know not the secrets this city hides.

o, the people, and their anguished cries,
i hear them all, the lies, the sighs,
alas! these very things i dread,
the city moves on, the clock ticks by.

a penny for drink, sir! a penny for bread,
a pound so i might find a city-bed,
no place to lay my city-head,
no place to lay my city-head.

these are the words they etch on your skin,
sentimental. selfish. too loud.
this is the legacy you leave behind,
vicious. violent. too proud.

this is all you try to be,
stronger. better. more.
while they stand and watch and turn their backs
as you crash and burn and fall.

but stand just a little straighter,
hold your head up high, my love,
you never had to be perfect,
or more than they deserved.

the due you owe for your place on this earth?
no silver. no gold. no fee.
nor is it for you to be flawless, faultless.
but simply just to be.