a purple, aching darling
of a dawning day
unfurls her chilly fingers
over a greying grassland
to close the creaking door of night’s cabaret.

she slips her feeble sun-rays
through a cracked window pane.
dust motes, sauntering in their orbits,
float through a parched concrete bedroom
where once false love was made.

here lies a brave soldier
who fought for hell’s brigade
and shot a widower in love’s name
after which he bartered souls for simple comforts -
oranges, canned fish and pain.

and he never met his son
or saw his daughter’s face
for he had left his lover’s morning singing
and life’s sunlit meadows
for a wartime martyr's charming ways.

so he took cover in the city’s ashen shadows
from the crossfire of his mistakes
and faked his life and death and everything else,
while his sole mourner slipped into his sparse, concrete bedroom
(where he had once kissed his darkness into secrecy)
and wailed.

—

i raise the barricades
and watch the deaths from within
of day, of night, of soldiers and of sunlight
and tell myself to hold my breath
and wait.

my sister fell soundly to sleep in her duvet
once i sang her the song of the moon;
her curls framed her delicate face in the night’s light
and her breath hummed a rhythmless tune.

i had sung her the story of an elegant princess
who haunted the moon’s sunken hollows.
her dress was woven of lonely girls’ tresses
and rope from the broken mens’ gallows.

i walked through the amber of the living room lamplight
and stumbled back into my bed;
i gave myself up to the threshold of nightmares
but sleeplessness came instead.

i told my brain to be quiet and rest
and i turned and twisted and waited
but no matter how tired my eyes were of shadows
my thirst for sleep was not sated.

so i went to the forest where the owlets were hunting
and climbed the first tree i could find,
then thought of the place where the sand was ashen
and the darkness was quiet and kind,

and i wished and wished and wished myself back
and not a moment too soon
for next morning my sister found that my heart was beating
but my soul had flown back to the moon.

Last night
I heard you leave
By the back door
12:22 AM
And the neighbour’s dog was barking

You left your jacket behind
I thought
Of calling you back
And sliding the sleeves up your shoulders
Cracking your icy demeanour
With the warmth of my gesture
And making you smile

I heard you
Muffled laughter
An audible kiss on her cheek
The quiet purr of an expensive car
Crunching gravel
Rolling up the driveway

I ran my fingers
Through your tangled bed sheets
I can’t remember
The last time
You slept well with me

I pulled the covers over my head
Drowning in your warmth
In this darkness
You were still here with me
Your limbs
Intertwined with mine

Your photo
On my bedside table
Your coffee mug
Next to mine
The dishes
Still in the sink
It was your turn to wash them
But I let it slide

I got up and put your slippers on
My toes crinkling with the feel of you
I put on your sweater
And I took your torch
And I grabbed your lighter
(I never told you but
I hated that you smoked)

Last night
I heard you come back
3:45 AM
And police sirens were shrieking

The house
And my heart
Were aflame
Drowning in your warmth

I heard you cry out my name
I heard you cry
I heard you
I heard you
I heard you

(But I don’t think you heard me)

I have
A train ticket
To the sea.

I have no relatives left to visit,
No business to justify my stay,
Nothing except
A sense of abandonment in me.

I have
Some loose change
And a candy wrapper
In my pocket.

I have no place to stay,
No place for dining;
The seaport has nothing besides
An old lighthouse,
Rusted and forgotten.

I hold its keys in my hand
And unlock the creaking door,
Climb the spiral staircase to the top
In a sort of restless agony.

We are one and the same,
Too close to the crashing waves of reality
Yet still with the silence of disregard,
Gathering dust and cobwebs
And echoes of human warmth.

We both sit,
Quietly looking out into the frothy churning of a violent ocean,
Salt spray crusting on my fingernails,
Its railings squeaking under the turbulence of the grey air.

I feel less alone
In the presence of loneliness;
We are one and the same, like I said.

So we sit
And we wait
For the tide to come in
And my love to come home.

I have been knotting and re-knotting my headphone string

For twenty seven minutes,

Trying to re-enact the exact contortion of your fingers interlaced with mine.

I have been staring into my coffee for eleven minutes,

Trying to find the exact shade of the brown of your eyes in it.

I have been glancing up at every stranger who passes me by,

Trying to see if any of them resembled you;

One had a jawline with the same sloping curve as yours.

I have been watching the grey skies outside the pane glass window,

Trying to find the cloud with the exact billowing contour

Your cigarette smoke made in the mornings.

I have been listening to the metal detector beeping,

Trying to recall the sound your alarm clock made, sitting on your bedside table,

Waking you up from a woozy dream.
——-
They have announced the boarding call for flight 207 at terminal 6.

I have a ticket in my hand

But I am glued to the seat,

The warmth of the person sitting before me still lingering.

Perhaps he had used the same cologne as you;

The smell was awfully familiar.
——-
I have not moved from my seat

For three hours and twenty three minutes.

I can feel the eyes of the security guard burning a hole through my back into my chest,

Trying to judge if I am a criminal or not.
I would be a criminal for you, love,

But it is too late

You were the one 

Who stole 

my heart 

first.

They say that

Van Gogh ate yellow paint

To put the happiness inside him.

But she, instead, would

Cut out the sadness from her skin

And let the hatred pour out

In gushing streams of red,

Her screams echoing

The injustice of colour.

Her wheat skin looked prettier, she thought,

With the raked furrows of half healed scars

And painful slurs
Etched into the deep ochre of her soul.

She quietly detested her terracotta skin,

Smooth like a polished stone

Picked up from the Ganges.

But here in the pale waters of the Thames

She was a blot of burnt sienna on an otherwise ivory white riverbank.

And every new cut

Would heal bloodless and waxen,

Which made her vow to herself to cut off her skin completely,

Leaving nothing but

The darkened red of her fury

And a frightened echo of a scream

In a room filled with bitter laughs and slurs,

In a room filled with the muffled cries of the oppressed and unheard.

One day

I will wake up in the early morning

My fingernails aglow with sun

And I will not want to scratch the pain out of my skin.

One day

I will not be subject to

Pleasantries and masquerades,

Hellos and goodbyes and see-you-agains,

But be greeted with a small smile

And a nod of understanding.

One day

Someone will say they will stay by my side

Even when the sea inside me

Overflows, and drowns him too;

He says the tide will bring us back ashore.

One day

My fingers will not shiver

In summer, because the cold is never gone.

The blood in my veins will not carry the echo

Of hate and self deprecation.

One day

I will wake up without internally screaming,

And hey, who knows, maybe I’ll smile.

I will put on my yellow boots

Not as a reminder of the sadness I hide,

But a proportionate guarantee of the happiness I feel.

But today, you see,

Today I cannot find the strength to leave my bed;

The blinds will be closed the whole day and

The postman will know not to knock on my door.

Today

The sea inside me rages

And ****** the backside of my eyes,

Drenching my pillow with saltwater.

And in a blurry pointillism of blues

I will drown

Before I reach ashore.