little boy
I cradle you in my arms gentle
soft arms soft eyes
tiny and innocent in this moment
the light framing your eyes bright
through darkness that you will sink through
So my baby cousin
who will grow into a man
I want to tell you

You are strong
you are a man so you are strong strong enough to break things
with words or fists
you will be given weapons at your disposal
a bar a beer and bare fists
but i beg of you
your mind unpolluted by sprayed spit glass shards and oxygen hard to breathe
so i warn you know

there are girls shredding their souls to find forgiveness
squeezing hearts through a meat grinder to try and see a way to get past their bruises
there are men winding flowers around girls necks
let them hang
‘because i deserved it didn’t i?’

little baby
you are strong
you are a man so you are strong
strong enough to twist a daisy chain of sweet nothings
around a girls thin fragile neck
and squeeze
you can
i will not say you can’t because you can
but i do not want your tiny hands to bear a death sentence
look at you
i will not say you can’t because you can
but i do not want your eyes your daisy chain fists to inspire fear

I have been an avid reader of you for two years
sticking with you through every fat melting, curve creating, ‘scientifically tested,’ filling, plumping, thinning… lie
Dear Mr Magazine
I was there through every fad, every phase, every diet…
and now, it is now, it is only now, that I realise.
Dear Mr Magazine
I realise that even though I was there for you, you were never there for me
wrapping me up in your pages
I thought you were a blanket of warmth and solidarity in a world that only lied…
but you were the liar
Dear Mr Magazine you lied to me and I trusted you
I wrapped up my heart in your pages to absorb what would make me beautiful
because I could never really be beautiful, could I Mr Magazine?
Dear Mr Magazine
you gifted us with a free makeup brush and a trip to the psych ward
you gifted us with ‘TOP 10 TIPS TO PLEASE YOUR MAN!’ and an eating disorder
you gifted us with diet shake recipes and bottles of green happy pills
Dear Mr Magazine
I was an avid reader of you for two years
sticking with you even though you never stuck by me
I wrapped my trust up in your pages and you swallowed it with smiling white teeth
Dear Mr Magazine
you tear away little girls self esteem like I am tearing you now
the rip of your pages slowly pumps belief back through my heart
I cannot believe I let you control me for so long!
Dear Mr Magazine
I just want to thank you
thank your shreds lying on my bedroom floor
I just want to thank you
for showing me what it’s like to live
as a ghost of myself

i am a ball of fire in a house of hay just waiting to ignite

i wonder what the cool taste of water is would be against my hot fiery body

i hear my arms my arms my chest crackling with flame

i see a sleeping boy a crying woman a man hunched over with no knowledge of the fire under their feet

i want to be real to ignite and burn this house to the ground

i am not real

i pretend to be real to be made of water but if you could just push through my god i would burn you

i feel the throb the pulse of a deeper hotter brighter fire one that i can only imagine

i touch my burning body and wish a thousand times that i could just burn out here alone

i cry tears of water but never enough to put out the fire that races across my skin

i am going to burn you

i understand that you will try to scrub away the ash and the burns and the memory of what i am

i say that i am fire and you say that i am a disgust a disappointment

i dream of you enveloping me in your arms not caring of the fire that will cling to your body

i try to believe that

i hope for that i want and will for that but all i can know is that the fire will come

i am burning and i am unchangeable