On my seventeenth birthday

I left talcum footprints

On the stairs

As my feet padded around

the house.

-

I woke up late to no buzzing phone

And a birthday cake

hidden under

the bathroom sink

-

I spent the day weightless

but as evening came

my body turned to

heavy lead

-

I was poison

amongst the lively

asian men

and women

that planted food

on my table

that I made toxic

-

I knew now

that my fate was sealed

in the gold wall decals,

the birds that never sang

A,

pretentious guitar wielding battle warrior quoting Nietzsche,

listening to old songs they don’t play on the radio anymore

and burning at night, burning alive with smokey lungs and charred fingers

and curls soaked terribly from desert rains in May,

lankey arms exposed for hours at a time in hottest weather, basking in sunlight,

still keeping pale but maybe his eyes darken a little.

marron, they say in french, those pretty eyes with lashes like down,

so long you could sweep the floor with them.

what a baby-faced angel sonofabitch smelling sweetly of **** in the afternoons,

a walking catastrophe Dean Moriarty flailing arms around,

a terrible dancer.

a terrible lover. a terrible terrible boy.

involved in a *******, no doubt,

by God he has all the little girls under his thumb,

under his bleeding fingers as he serenades them

songs they only know of because of him.

all the ***** characters from smokey back rooms in the 20’s, 50’s

he knows them all

and hammers out their songs bang bang bang on his guitar like a visionary

of jazz, ***, pills and powders all secrets hidden behind his eyes.

The ******* child of the stars

I am forced to hate him

But my love for him gnaws away at my sanity

all his friends are cracked,

deadbeat downtrodden unlistened to voices of our time.

he says he is a pacifist, but he’s killing us all.

Baby left his mother’s rollerskates on the stairs,

Watched her deteriorate

He held his sister’s hand.

Baby put on his cap

And his scarf

Oh his pretty scarf.

Baby smiled at his girl

Told her how it was ‘love’,

She wore armbands.

Baby wore his jeans low

So very low

And had a laugh that infected the honeybees.

Baby’s in a coma

He’ll come back soon

To remove the stings from the wasps

The hungry bees are singing

and chewing through the ceiling

above your bed

they are just like you

-

They sing songs about him

and they are as hungry as

you are just to hear him

whisper your name

My heart was filled with daisies whose heads sprung from each ventricle.

Their stems creeped through my arms and I radiated purity.

Then a new seed was sewn into the cavity of my chest

And thorns grew from my body, now nobody can touch me.

Do you remember

when you were thirteen

you wanted to dye your hair

just to spite your mother

and you would parade around the house

wearing

your sister’s stolen lace bra

and ‘pink lady’ stickers

on your nose.

-

Do you remember

when the house got colder and you’d wear

slippers over your tights

and you’d always cry

even though you weren’t very sad

-

Do you remember

when you turned sixteen

and you went to a disco

and walked home, barefoot and weak-limbed,

swearing you’d never go again.

-

Do you remember

when

you ended up alone

so you dressed up each night

in fancy dress

and you hated yourself

for having no friends

so you danced around

your room to led zep.

-

Do you remember when you dropped acid

tired of being a straight A student

and you told your mother you hated her

but bought her roses

and painted her nails as she slept

I knew you once before,
had passed you specky, lanky, characterless
in dusty corridors, retiring into C rooms

Now what are you, years older,
eyes uncomparable to clichés

What were we?
Invisible, 'part of the woodwork', the damp and must and old worlds

Why was it then you hadn't been of note to me,
of nothing to me

Perhaps you were not pin-marked,
bearing dead inks,
Perhaps your eyes could not sparkle behind thick lenses

I know now I fall in love with drug casualties, or wannabes,
who live their days as nights,
and set their lungs alight

Forgive me for all I say, all I believe,
all my vapid perceptions of boys like you,
being the Ginsbergs and Kerouacs of this world

Failing, always failing

And I'm empty still,
till I find,
boys like you made of easy exits,
and open doorways

I am not winning by having shallow feeling,
I am losing years from empty lust,
when brown eyed boys come profess love,
that is full,
and overbearing

Tell me,
will I ever be yours?

FIN

First love

Seeped in,

Bled out,

Dried up

a fragile heart

that now beats in time

to the Angelus bells

You came again on a weekday,
my oldest friend,
and whispered poison talk into my ear,
asked me to embrace you,
but I could not see you in the darkness,
because darkness you were

I thought I had killed you,
in the smallest rooms in the brightest clinics,
then buried you in a book I gave away to another

But your ghost would appear to me,
a malign presence,
that left scars on my arms and bruises on my shins

You poltergeist!
I wish I could be rid of you,
for you mean less to me than God,
who abandoned me when I still wore knee socks

I want not to hear your voice,
your venomous chanting
I will not pray to you
Your very name makes me shudder

Yet when we are alone, you ****** me
And when we are with others, you ******* me
to the worst of all men

You are a little god,
who perches inside my ribcage,
waiting until my brain comes down,
off all its non-prescriptions

And then you're here,
living in my head,
filling me with that emptiness,
I can't help but love to hate

I can't remember when you left,
It seems you were always leaving,
into the night, behind feathered trees,
and when the rain hit you,
you pretended you didn't feel anything

"I don't want to talk about my dad," you'd say
That unholy narcissist left bruises on you,
that you hid from us all

I wish you'd said your mother was a villain ,
who tried to send you to heaven,
but only succeeded in making you bleed;
a memory that resurfaced,
as the devil's stigmata,
on your wrists

You're the girl in a coma,
and have been since I met you,
who fell in love with her doctor,
the day she almost died

Her am I wondering,
are you alive?
Or are you a ghost,
haunting Christ Church,
continuing to do the only thing
that made you happy

I'm sorry you're gone,
your phone ringing out,
your profile a tombstone

I wish I could go,
go to your home
and ring your doorbell
without the fear of being told,

The girl in a coma has left,
not behind the trees,
into the dark,
but to the place her mother tried to send her,
not long after she took her first breath

The day I was born,
I lay in your arms, too young to smile up at you
My eyes still black, you called me Lucifer
but they faded to the purest blue

Father, I was so fond of you
and 'Da' was my first word, how proud were you
when you heard me say it from my tiny drawn lips
And now I dare not to breath your name

I was just an angel in the presence of God
and from heaven I was sent home, sent here
You cut my wings and let me fall
but forgiveness is not something I'll ever ask for

You appeared to me as something else,
a chauffeur without a hat or taxi sign
a bank with a voice that spoke of favours
You feel I'm forever in debt to you

But money is not a substitute for love,
Nor are conversationless car rides in the dark,
You're a God and I'm just a girl
who called you "Daddy" in quotation marks

I am female

I keep boys under my skin

they think they think

they’re

right deep under my skin

but my skin is deeper than

the fault lines

that carry love waves

and I like it that way

-

You know me, you love me

you care for me

sometimes

-

I do too, humouring

those that are lost in my flesh now

swimming in my blood stream

tunnelling through my veins

when really I just want to

rip apart yours

Dear you,
I hate you. I hate you and your stupid side glances, the way you smile at me like you have a secret in the back seat of the car at midnight. The way you keep your cigarette behind your ear. I hate that ******* sadness in your eyes and I hate wanting to kiss your tears away. I hate how your cheekbones cut the air, I hate how you look in the light of the street lamps on cold nights. I hate how I want to get drunk off your whiskey kisses. I hate that my head is filled with memories, things we did, things you said and every street I walk down I hear you taking the same footsteps beside me. I hate how that bench has your name on it, I hate how my heart swells when you say mine.
I hate you.
But I'll always love you just the same.

Are you as sad as your eyes,
Those dull blue eyes that
tell me you're carrying a dead love
like a heavy carcass
everywhere you go

Are you as weak as your lungs,
those tar-stained lungs that
I thought were going to give out
when you stopped holding your tears back

Are you as lost as your voice,
that husky voice that seemed to crack
and fade out, carrying unfinished sentences
as if you had been gagged

I'm sorry,
I cannot hold your heart for you,
wrapped in velvet to keep safe
when you keep letting her
                                            tear it
                                            tear it
                                            tear it apart
like the beer mats that you abused

You, blue-eyed boy with a once heavy-metal heart,
Who mimed slitting the throats of boys we now deem heartless,
Who suffocated under thick blankets of smoke in hot-boxed rooms,
Who gave beds and beer and ancient guitar picks to all who you loved

Who have you become?

You, once so full of joy,
have left your old heart behind,
crafted a new one out of felt,
and it is your darling who creates its cavities

Have you given up?

You, the boy with sad eyes,
shedding angel tears,
Who cares not for himself,
Who runs for his love,
Who dispenses coins from his mouth,
Who knows not the meaning of courage,
Whose friends left him like milk teeth

Sometimes I think I may pity you
But then I remember there's an exit door not far away
But you pass it by every Friday

And if I have one thing left to say,
It's that my heart is made from felt too,
Only I never let anyone tear it apart

Molly came to school when I was fourteen
but she was years older, appearing as a beautiful traveller
who'd circled the globe and made friends with everybody.

She was always the popular one, but one I never got to know,
because my sister at thirty-five told me that she had killed a man
once or twice.

The kids I knew found this hard to believe, as Molly got to know them all.
She'd hang out with them after school, and was always there,
waiting to widen her circle.
Molly never lost her charm,
and she stole the hearts of boys I loved.
She opened their eyes to a world I could not show them,
she drank their blood on Friday nights.
Every boy I'd meet would have a story to tell,
her name dropped like an atom bomb into conversation.

They'd all met her.
They all knew her.

They met her at nightclubs,
and stopped caring about how **** the music sounded
They met her on their holidays ,
and tasted her before the alcohol wore off
They met her at festivals,
where she'd creep into their tents before the main stage lit up

I wonder maybe one day will we be friends
Instead of resenting each other
because she's killed a man
more than once or twice

You look at me through half-shut eyes,
crooked smile playing upon your lips,
the high kicking in
and here am I wishing I'd shared that joint with you.
  Tell him
                                 Tell him
                                 Tell him how you feel
Another boy who is not you listens to me intently,
then suddenly distraction and he's gone,
his eyes fixed on someone else-
another girl who appears more beautiful in nature than I.

                                      It's okay. Turn back, tell the other
I turn to you,
laugh it off,
tell you this happens often.
                           Nobody listens to me
You laugh a little.
"Go on."
                   Tell him now, forget the story and tell him now.

Struck by those encouraging words,
I pour my heart out to you,
It aches a little.

Caught in your gaze, I suppress my carnal urges
As you hang on every word,
like it means more to you than it does to me.

We walk together.
Nothing said.
You apologise,
but your voice makes it sound like you're not sorry.

I wish you were sorry.

I wish you hadn't made all these promises to me.

I laughingly joke 'you owe me'.
But you don't catch  my words,
they escape from my mouth too fast.

                Tell him. Tell him about the promises he made to you...
I try, the words caught in the back of my throat
but you're gone,
with the clothes you lent me now on your back,
and all you say is goodbye
but I hear your words before I see you walking away.

                                        SAY SOMETHING
Traffic lights stun me into silence

                                       Why is he doing this? *

I think of  the night we were left alone,
you walking me home at 1am,
us marvelling at the beauty
of a lone fox running down the road in the dark,
the pavements basked in the light of street lamps.

I think of your drunken words,
your drunken promises that seemed so real
and so genuine.
The trips to town,
the mixtapes,
and the long walks you promised me.

I remember you telling me I was beautiful.

I try to steady myself against the pole beside me.
                               *Oh God.
Eyes swelling, chest tightening.

**I love you when you're drunk,
I hate you when you're high.
And whenever I think I know you,
I realise you're still wearing one of those masks.

Softly raindrops fall on window panes,

The dripping sound is soft and sweet

What could be as beautiful as rain?

The sound, the bounce, the tapping beat

Just like animals trapped in cages,

The raindrops push against glass like bars

Only gentle in its early stages

And glistening faint like dying stars

When suddenly an aggressive pounding,

The rain it pushes, bangs and hits

A crashing sound that’s so astounding,

The rain it laughs, it slams, it spits

And then so slowly fades away,

The sun it locks it up

Until it comes back another day,

To couch in lonely tulips.

Swallow it all you said

and tears began to flow like blood from burst veins

so she was put away for a while

and then you found me

-

You knew me by name and by nature

for so long, so long

-

I counted the months

but I lost count so quickly

-

imperfect I was

so naturally so

that when the end with her was near

you found me to be perfect too

-

Rainy weekends turned to dust

and you said ‘sleep well’

-

I slept so soundly and I never thought of you once

-

because I was just the rebound girl

I kissed you first at seventeen
and we continued to kiss for weeks,
even though your kisses always hurt.

I'm immune to you now

You were the only constant in my life,
When everyone else left me, you'd appear
to take me into the folds of your arms,
To make me believe you were the only thing keeping me alive
But your plan was to **** me all along

I had jealous lovers,
Who were harder, tougher and
who copulated with many in Vesey Park

They tried in vain to tempt me
But you were all I needed

I craved you always,
Saw you first every Saturday night
Then drowned myself to keep you
On those days when the rain never stopped

You were always there for me
Always always there

Friday,
you smiled at me,
as I made my way out of the wreckage

Your smile was all I noticed,
set in your soft face,
teeth brighter than energy-savers
Now I know why you still smoke

And now it seems,
every man clad in black or grey,
a trench coat that buttons up to the neck,
is you..

You are an effigy,
of every man who masqueraded under the guise,
of potential lover

Who fumbled for their phones,
requesting mobile numbers,
Whose sallow hands have caressed me,
unwanted

But their teeth were unseen

Yours are a badge,
you proudly show off,
in all those smiles,
you give like gifts to me

But I can not keep them,
because they belong to the girl,
whose swollen lips you kissed,
not long ago

There is always another,
who expects your smile,
and knows by heart,
            The number of teeth you keep

The cut as it happened was not quite so sore,

A sharp stinging pain at the most.

But the blood trickled down and onto the floor

Bright on the skin of a ghost.

The razor was sharp, bright pink with two blades

Used solely to bring harm

There was blood in the sink as the razor cut deep

Down into the skin of the arm.

Little did she know the cut would leave a scar for many years to come,

She would have to lie when asked what it was, unable to tell anyone.

She’ll never forget the day of the cut, the sinful, painful deed.

She hopes that one day the razor won’t come back to her arm like a trusty steed.

Did your mother mourn your first locks

whe she found out the truth

about the thoughts

hidden behind your eyes

as secretive as pressed flowers hidden

in pocket bibles.

-

These leaves you pluck from their bindings,

and roll into cigarettes;

they read ‘Ezekiel’.

-

Your mother

must look at you as a baby

with a two-ton heart

and your mind being

a whirlpool of water;

slightly polluted

but as warm as Sunday’s bath.

-

You’re forever drawing in bathers

that drown in your presence.

-

Being close to you

brings me ever closer

to drowning.

-

And your mother

wants your girls

to come up for air

shes the angel with the bowed legs, eyes lined like pages we rip from our notebooks, small hands cupping wine glasses. she was death. she was his.

he held her hands like stones to skid across water, he took her body like the butcher’s best cut to feed to the dogs. her body bares no scars but her soul is grazed. the word ‘****’ cuts through her; flashing, a glowing neon sign in a dark street. if only there had been others to save her on that street.

i saw him, dressed in brown, his jeans too long and his hair too short. he asked me what i write.

i told him about angels with bowed legs.

i told him about girls who’ve been broken by men.

i never told him about the girl he *****

as the conversation changed to plans for summer; drunken nights and hazy days and pretending to be in love with girls who’s names no one remembers.

When we meet, it is always for the first time,
A vague familiarity sweeps us, a dumbing of vocal chords,
As we struggle to find meaning in our chosen words

Do we use each other as apostrophes?
Are we consensual in our decision to never tune into the other's
words, feelings, actions?

Are we lonely, surrounded by familiar passing faces
but none we really long to see

We are both searching for something to make us feel better,
Does that take the form of another human being?
Of each other...

Or will those drunken nights spent semi-conscious suffice
to replace the warmth of each other's hands intertwined?

Do we really exist on the same orbit?
I am Venus and you are Pluto and I am afraid of falling into space,
Into the abyss,
Into your eyes

I may never know what lies beyond them

Some have said I lead boys on, but I feel we lead each other
through minefields,
Both of us end up adrift between safety
and a horrible death of our happiness.

If I could cry stars instead of tears

I would sit on the highest cloud

Sing the sun to sleep

Pluck water droplets from the rivers and

Sprinkle them on flowers that sway in the night breeze


My tears would twinkle and young children would marvel at them


I would not feel the need

To rub away at them furiously


I would be so proud

To cry every night

Thursday morning, I woke up empty
My limbs so heavy, I was sinking into sand
I knew by a few hours, all would be forgotten
Even though the photos would always last

I think my memory is better than that of others
Because even in dreams, I remember their faces
I remember their names, their voices, their talk of lost loves
And the unspoken acknowledgment of the broken divide

I used to think it was their fault, but maybe it's my own
As I wish to stop all the clocks, keep things frozen in the dark
Keep our hearts warm with drinks from cold cans
And our conversation flowing like the smoke we exhale from our lungs

I regret nothing but refusing to say more
in the day like I had
the night before

We came,
like young infants
stumbling head-long into hedonistic existence
Feeling air beneath our feet in the ****-smelling rooms,
hiding behind cushions and blankets and exchanging knowing looks
on starry nights.

We ran,
down green hills on hot, sunny days
and burned our hands on shed roofs
and the ends of rolled cigarettes.

We drank,
berry cider in the dark,
dancing drunkenly outside bars,
sharing secrets behind closed doors
and open whiskey bottles.

We needed,
no one but each other
and each other's mothers -
Some opening their arms to us
to swaddle us like newborns,
Others dismissing us with a wave of a hand

We spent,
the last year of our school lives
immersed in each other,
some more than others.

We cried,
like shell-shocked soldiers
behind locked bedroom doors
and into smashed-up mobile phones.

We returned,
to those dark evenings,
to drink ***** on hilltops and smoke endlessly,
laughing at everything ******.

We were glowing stars.

We loved,
and those immature jokes hit our shields
and not our bones.

And now our lives have changed
and all those heady evenings spent
hiding beer from Bulgarians
are behind us all.

We are alone,
in this world.
Some moreso than others,
But we are alive.

We are still us.

Why don't you want her?
She's everything you ever wanted when you were sixteen;
her lips drawn, eyes heavy,
ready to fall into your arms
drunk, gasping for air

Kiss her, you idiot

She's so ill, so sick, so tired of boys like you
who sit and stare at her from across the room
She's not made of porcelain, though her skin may tell you otherwise
She's not made of glass
She's made of living, breathing, flesh and blood,
all soft skin and rough kisses

She wants to hear you say her name,
voice strained from the pressure of her body on yours
But you'll just sit there
Maybe buy her a drink
Maybe tell her coyly that she's 'one of the prettiest girls...'
Maybe walk her home
And watch as she dissapears through her front door,
black space forming a vignette

Why didn't you just kiss her?

My home was a womb,
warm and safe
All noise muffled
by my own content at just being.

Mother, father
gave me strength
through food, shelter
Some empty words that sounded like
'I love you's
that faded like
the paint on the walls

And only appeared as goodbyes.

What happened to safety?
Who needs the cosiness and warmth of the womb
when hot climates invite us through flat screen TV's

Mother, father,
why are you leaving
and taking my safety with you?
And my two loves, my fur friends
Always there.

More than you have been
during my new life

How can you be so insensitive to the tears
that flow from my sister's eyes?
As you take her womb and give it to another

Inside, I suffer as
my old life disappears with the laughter
and camaraderie
to soon be replaced
by legal documents
and one question...

Why?

The room was icy

and my hands were frozen stiff,

I curled my little fingers

into my palms and looked at you

-

Your eyes were like those marbles

that I used to skip along the ground

in school

And all the girls would fight over

who got the biggest, prettiest marble

-

I wonder if they fight over your eyes too

Warm summer night, your hand in mine, dancing around the kitchen to Abba, the floor sticky with spilled ***** bubblegum blue, before I turned to whiskey straight stashed in my bedroom drawer.

Cool early morning, stepping out into a rainstorm, giggling like schoolchildren as we collapsed back into our beds, our bodies soaking wet,       before I started using my umbrella during the lightest showers.

Hot sunny day, barefoot by the ocean, my head on your chest listening to the sound of your heart close to my ear, before I found comfort in only the sound of the sea in a shell.

Dark Halloween eve, dizzy with drunkenness, sat on your lap, your arms around my waist before
I vomited into the bathroom sink
and washed all my love for you
away