They are not thinking
about you - do yourself a
favor - go to sleep

4:49 PM
20/12/21

I never knew love before seeing him—
a beauty under the southern night sky—
as he danced, his strong body pliant and slim,
to the tunes of a distant guitar.

I never knew love before seeing him
with his heels on the pavement click-clacking.
As he flares his dress, goes to a spin,
with a rose in his hair – he is striking.

Each step, each clap – I am at his mercy.
Each beat, each dance – he is all I can see.
I'm lost, I'm in love, I'm down on my knee –
each time I pray that he also sees me.

He asked her what it's like living with anxiety.

She smiled sadly, "It's a never-ending pulse-race. Like knowing you don't want to jump off a cliff but not being able to talk yourself down from it.

Your fears take on a nebulous, unidentifiable form that tightens around your throat and incapacitates you.

There is no calm. No peace. Only the edge of a very strained thread."

you are always leaving me
yet waiting is what i do best
i collect every fragment of you
and let it fill the void inside
but remnants are never enough
is it wrong for me to desire?
to talk about our future together
as you lay under the rubbles
of your ruined past?
i am no virtuous saint
but i want to leave this hell
yet waiting is what i do best

The swell of your feverish hands over mine.
Sweat soaking into my skin.
I’m clutching every part of you I can grasp,
Every part of you I can fit into my palm.

We’re sitting beneath the hollow tree,
Beneath the ocean of a sky,
Beneath the screaming black-billed cuckoos.

We don't say a word because we don't need to;
Just silent prayers burned between us,
Scarred into pale, malnourished bones.

I look at you as your sloe-eyed gaze
bores into the mountains of clouds swimming above us.

I want to kiss you,
But all I can do is lay my head on your shoulder,
Wishing I could build a home out of your collarbones.

I don't ever feel safe anymore.

Except when I’m forgetting everything, with you.

At dusk,
I tried to unlearn the way the gold in your skin,
Possessed your face in scintillant rays of spots.

I could count each one if I had the time,
But you’re already turning your spine stuffing back away from me,
And skipping back home

Without the bother or concern to look back.

For once
he asked the sun to set
to bring his own

For once,
He strummed her heartstrings
and turned her into a hymn

For once,
He dawned on her with
new colors, she couldn’t believe existed

For once,
She melted at the sight
Of a smile … a specific smile
Too beautiful for poets to describe

For once... this might turn
into
“a while”