reject the peace offering

if in your heart you demand
bare bones, raw and reckless love

if you want their eyes to bleed
with red hot passion

when they gaze into yours

if you want their fingers to burn
when they touch you

because you, my darling, are on fire

reject the peace offering
if chaotic love sits easier in your soul

Autumn came
and swept away the debris
that was clinging to my heart

making space for the roots of winter
that will test its resolve

in bitter frosts and pines

but ultimately -
the space is made for Spring blooms

daffodils and peonies

that will hold its hand and teach it
how to love again

your weak breath tickles my ear,
with fading heat, like a September afternoon,

and I hate myself just as much as you hate me,

for my greed and loyalty to the cards,
instead of the stars that were your eyes,

but your heart was impenetrable, always,
like Everest or the Atlantic Ocean,

I could not get close enough to touch it
and make it mine,

close enough to make you mine,

so hate me, and I’ll hate myself,
but I’ll know my faults wondering
if you’ll ever accept yours

in return

speaking softly on rocks

that cut our thighs through our jeans

the contrast not going unnoticed

but this is how it is for us, always

a painful contradiction of love and hate

in the same breath

a swelling heart, deflating in a second

but we would not be lovers

if love was a straight line

(anyway)

I tattoo your name on my arm

as if I am scared that time may
erase it from my memory

as if flesh speaks louder
than a heart that beats

to the rhythm of fractured souls

your name -
I will bury in my skin forever

long after you have forgotten
how to form the sound of mine

I have been waiting for my demons to
mould themselves around your heart

to sink their teeth into your soul

so that you may bliss me with the kind of absolution I have been craving

since before I was old enough to drink

but I have learnt that shedding my scarred skin
so that it may become your

skin

is not only selfish of me
but will also strip me to the bare bones

shaking spine and clavicle

so that there will ultimately be nothing left of me
to see

your eyes speak of dreams
that were abandoned

and as my fingers wrap around yours

I want to inject old passions into your blood

so that the fire you lost along the way
is rekindled

I want to be the flame that sets alight
those long forgotten hopes