I imagine myself
as an architect
crafting buildings
out of broken
bits of rocks
pencil lines
on paper
shaping into
something
beautiful

it must have
been beautiful
in the beginning
when our mind
had no pictures
to compare
to the ones
our eyes could
take

I imagine the
start of the
universe
dark matter
and energy
and how it
would feel
to absorb
any light
that hits

to hide where
even Galleo’s
gaze can't
reach

We are not strangers,
and yet, our names unknown
our lives, unspoken of

we navigate a see of,

first glances,
first dinners,
first dances,

I do not need to know your name,
for it is already woven into my own

I never believed in love at first sight,
I still don’t believe in it

but magic,
bewitching, spellbinding, enchanting
(magic)

I believe in that

It's an echo of war

a battle no-one can
remember fighting

or winning

but we know that
we are the
losers

somehow

even if we can't
see it

Two cups of coffee
- unsweetened - untouched
sit on the table, smiling,
between us

chair legs creaking
like old bones
as we pull away
from each other

hands crossed
cracked from washing
with bleach at midnight,
breaks in the middle of
meetings and meals

the table is glass
and when the light
hits it we have no
choice but to look
at each others
eyes

desperate, passive,
almost dead

I can see the words
sticking in his throat
but I'm not going
to help him set
them free

he can ask
me

Is it over
now?

I saw the ghost
of you

on the pillow
next to me

as you slept

and I realised
I had to leave

before the ghost
became me

He asked me how I've changed.

I guess it starts with the little things,
a braid instead of hippy locks,
an inch taken off the heel,
white wine instead of shots

I hold my keys between my fingers
and spread them out like claws,
I keep my back to the traffic
and turn my head to the floor

I practise screaming in my living room,
until my throat turns to sandpaper,
I drag my nails across my skin
until my skin soaks red

I check the doors and windows
once, twice, three times
and then repeat
repeat again

I take sleeping pills when it's daylight
and drink strong coffee when it's dark,
I tell my friends that I'm busy that night
and hope they stop asking me out

I never risk the last train
or stop for a driver with his window down,
I don't approach the homeless
or acknowledge my name

I try not to think about the big things,
the shard of ice that sits where my heart used to be,
a shame that threatens to **** you,
a rage you can barely contain

I tell him that I haven't changed at all.

We used to sit up and talk
all through the night,
sleeping only when
our mouths ran
dry

at first your voice
was the only bit
of you that I
could stand

but soon,
your eyes
began to shine
bright blue
and wide

and I fell
into their
waves

now I stare
into their sea
and wait
hopeless
for you to
speak again

like a deep
sea diver
running out of
oxygen

I drown
and choke

and wait

for the water
to claim me

shadows -

concealing secrets

time digging in like a claw

there are messages
ebbing and flowing in the tide

moons collapsing

footsteps -

like locks

My thoughts freeze my senses

every emotion has become
a knife piercing my spine

I share more in common with the night
and yet I am dragged, unwillingly
into the day

There was a moment when I could have stood up to the all-encompassing storm

thrown my fists to the heavens
and not cared about the consequences

I was idealistic and naive,
assuming it would pass over by itself

I should have stood up for myself
and fought for my freedom

told the darkness it was not welcome here

not welcome inside me

You are a liar
not a poet, he said,
and your feelings
are as meaningful
as an invitation
made in September,
that new year bliss
that covers you in
new notebooks,
fresh pencils and
friends. If you could
only love a person
as much

if you could only
love me

she walked in the shoes
of the prince who charmed her,

blood smeared black leather
and frayed laces,

she did not mean to
destroy him,

but she learnt too late
that life was not like a fairytale

and her happy ending could only
end in the ******

of the one who claimed to
love her

but if he loved her
why would he have

pulled her hair out, stand by strand
until the pain made her blind,

took a knife and twisted it
in her chest until her

heart split its arteries

and bled

and bled

and bled

but she patched up the damaged
and returned the favour,

and now she walks away
from her tainted bedroom

away from her dying, bleeding prince

undefeated and proud

in the shoes of a dead man,
making freedom out of chains

This is the first year
when the tulips grow without you,
and as they bloom my heart bursts

with a kind of melancholy I have learnt to nurse
during bitter cold mornings and ink blank nights
my eyes searching for you at breakfast, your coffee mug still intact

unlike your body, unlike my heart

but the tulips bloom and so too
does something new

peace,
peace settles in my soul

my head stops spinning with
what if and might have been

and those tulips,
those gorgeous silk like
purple, orange, yellow and red tulips

save me

the storm
shakes my
soul

like the roaring
wind shakes
the oak tree

to its roots

its thunder
steals my
heart

like the
waves of the
wild ocean

engulf the
shore

I have known
terror and
rage

and sat hand
in hand with
misery

yet I would
not trade a
single moment

for a still
heart

there’s a wild, hungry pain in my heart

that longs for your fingertips
to brush lightly through my hair

a reckless sorrow that longs
to scream at the moon, like a wolf
and find a place for its song among the stars

a sleepless malice that knows no bounds
of misery to inflict on my soul

wild heart, sweet sorrow, mad malice...

please add up the sum of my parts,
and leave me whole again

even if I am whole in misery

in the shade of the Autumn trees

we twisted fallen leaves
between our fingers

pulled their veins apart
as if they could bleed

shredded brittle bits
of orange leaf until
there was nothing

nothing

but dust

I have weathered storms that shook
my heart against my rib cage

Battled lightning bolts
that gave my brain electric shocks

and yet -

I cannot withstand this goodbye
that tastes like battery acid in my throat
everytime i try and say your name

I cannot find the strength to let you go,
even though you are

- gone

your face echoes, wild as the wind in my memories

all I have is love
this love that was not enough to save you
so how can this love save me

from crumbling with grief

We ran from our homes
like a flood

Our limbs burning
as the pavement
fades under our
feet

From city
to city
we move

Like a shadow
creeping out
to reach

The sea

It's an echo of war

a battle no-one can
remember fighting

or winning

but we know that
we are the
losers

somehow

even if we can't
see it

As roots we grow

unsure of what is waiting for us

above the soil

we stretch out, trembling

trepidation clinging to us

like moss

yet still, we reach out

and when we sprout branches

we climb

(we climb)

At your side
I feel like a stranger
to love

my heart skipping
beats

my breath
catching in my
threat

you have awoken
the ghost of
my soul

and now I am
searching the sky
for patterns that mark out
our future

hands clasped tightly
entwined, two bodies
dissolving into one

in your arms
I feel like a stranger
to myself

forever washed over our skin

like water

waves against the shore

boats against the current

we struggled, like sailors

to control the ocean

to bend it to our will

but in the end

the deep sea took us

and we drowned in beautiful

blue

we are in debt to
the stars

each one carved
with our

initials

sighing our name
out to the

sky

we are children of
the moon

ever chasing its
craters

across an endless
sphere of

silver

They said my vulnerability
would be the death of me

my soft red heart, beating
away in a world of its own

my wild joy and
deep, deep sorrow

my ability to love in the face
of overwhelming odds

but I don’t think so

I feel like it’s the one thing
that makes me feel

alive

I have watched a trembling bird
fight for life

it’s nest destroyed
in a man made storm

and as I watched it cling
to each last breath

my heart started to beat faster

as the life drained from it
into me

I take my coffee
black with two sugars
and drink it at 4am
when sleep eludes me
hiding my face
behind a cigarette
staring at the smoke
hoping an apparition
will appear to guide
me through the day
because if my heart is my compass
then I will be lead astray

gauge out my eyes
never let me dream

of you again

you’ll only fade away
again anyway

A clock
that has stopped

years of black dust
clogging up its mechanism

hands that are bound
by unseen hands

an echo of a memory
diluted over time

until it runs like clear water
containing invisible particles
of pain and grief

the clock starts to tick
and I run behind it

always too slow to be part
of its motion

I am terrified of being

cut loose

I long to rip open the seams of my wound

and bleed, bitterly

***** stained breath
and the ruin of my family’s name

in the gaps of my bared

teeth

You illuminate the worst parts of me,
an unforgiving mirror
bouncing off the surface of the moon

but I am a child of moonlight,
I drink starlight for breakfast,
spitting out that bitter reflection, like fire

until it reaches the very edge
of the solar system and kisses
the face of the sun

as it rises

I have been

lynched

by love

and sadness

sometimes not knowing the difference

if the difference even matters

I am hanging

by a thread

that is too weak to **** me

but not strong enough to sustain my life

I have eaten rotten fruit

gladly

given into temptation

and now I shall neither die nor life for it

but the thing is

I have never been truly

alive

Wandering amongst Oyster card
holders and paper faces, they aren’t
beautiful at all, but when was
life?

This is the aftermath
of my heavy living
the reflection of
a streetlamp
in a ***** puddle

the ringing sound
of keys being threaded
through fingers
Awaiting attack

strangers find me,
under the orange haze
of light, as if my body
is a broken truck
waiting to be
recovered

one of them tells me
to never trust a man
who walks in step with
his shadow

they say that ***
has a smell and
they’re right

the air itself
is choking on
exhaust films, on
the curling, reaching
smoke of a cigarette

my skirt (my skin),
is torn

some of the older ones
take trophies, tearing bits
of fabric away from
my body

as you would separate
a phone number from a
scrap of paper

I can afford new clothes,
of course, and the powder
that hits my mind and settles
it, the way that sand
thrown over snow
softens it

the racing thoughts,
the tides of red and gold
and yellow memories wash
over me

stinging my wounds
with their salt

no-one remembers pain
that can't break the skin

and on those nights where I
satisfy a lions need for meat

neither can I

and in a second
there was nothing

not even a star
between you and I

and standing on the precipice
of making the biggest mistake
of my life

He sunk
his teeth into
me

my body
still as the sky
and heavy as
lead

wrists shackled
above my head
a single breath
more than I dare

utter

I knew the taste
of blood and it
was my own

from biting my
cheek so hard
swallowing my
screams

he left me
empty as a
carcass and
just as alive

I had tasted death
with its bitter root

I had wished for it

Sun shines bright
Like fire -
Light fights darkness

There’s no future in the past
so I carve out a path for myself
like an ancient scholar
carving lessons into stone
a path that leads me out
of the darkness
and into brilliant sunlight
I take my first steps like a child
always pushing
always dreaming
but despite it all
you are forever looking back

The first pill was bitter
and stuck in my throat like lead

I had to force it down,
like swallowing sand

The second pill was sweet
and slipped down like honey

I barely noticed it,
deceptively sugar coated
and innocent

The last pill broke apart
in my mouth, powder on my tongue

I felt every milligram disintegrate
like my life

I swallowed

I swallowed

I swallowed

I never wanted to read
the letters you left
me

black ink bleeding
across the page
like the letters on
tattoo'ed skin

that touched water too soon

I imagine the pen-
nib scratching, stinging
like a thousand, angry
bees

you're smoking cigarettes
they don't make anymore
and your yellowed fingers
remind me of caterpillars
that never made it
to butterflies

swollen with new life
and coloured ugly from
the effort of trying
to transform into
it,

and failing

I make coffee at 3 am
and take it out to the porch
nursing the heat
between my freezing fingers

the stars smile down on me
I spell your name
like a new constellation
but I can't find you

here

It’s time that I wasn’t
your possession

a coin in your wallet

a doll for you to dress up
and manipulate

into any position you like

I am restless in your collection
of figurines

I crave independence

and a voice
of my own

weak, he called me
never knowing that
my weakness
was him

in a fog of fear
and hatred

I rose like a phoenix
and consumed everything
in fire

in the end
the only love that you’ll remember

is the kind that made your heart break
with each act of kindness, or cruelty

made your lungs burn, as you gasped for air
between each kiss

made you feel like you were going to die
each morning, when you said goodbye

that kind of love
is the only love that will leave
fingerprints on your mind

My father hated him
at sight

Stolen glances from behind
his crystal whiskey glass

He prefered the last
one

Tall and dark and
strong

A real man

The kind of guy that looks
like he carries photos of
his kids in his wallet

With spare twenties and
condoms

My mother keeps
quiet

I know she liked him
too

But she noticed the bruises
and fat lips

She knows the smell
of pressed powder
over black eyes

I really was her daughter
back then

A broken bone bond
between  her child

She hates that I got
out

That I refused to carry
on their name

She looks at the new guy
whose arms hang over my shoulders

My father smokes cigars
and sighs

Trying to work out if his hands
could make fists

If his knuckles could
smash against my skull

He can't stand to see me
with a man who lets me answer back

A man who gives me his coat
when it's cold

He likes to see a mirror
reflecting back his
brutality

Telling him that his daughter
is safe (in a way) from
the wolves that walk the pages
of fairy tales

like rolling mountains,
the arch of your spine
takes me on a breathtaking
adventure

to the highest peak
of pleasure and the
lowest valley of
despair

it is a terrain I have
learnt to navigate ,
a landscape I have mapped
with the tips of my fingers

I stand at the summit
elevated and elated,
surveying the land
I know

your eyes
I claim as
my own

Stars are pinpricks reflecting
our footprints on the Earth,
in the sky, you can draw rings around them,
lines between them,
to see how you came to stand in one spot,
the route you took to get there,
unlike footprints, they can pass,
unseen on a cloudy night,
you can walk the sky, invisible,
not leaving a single breadcrumb behind you,
you can trick yourself that you will
never be found, but you will,

for pinpricks or footprints,
they always lead home

(whether we want them to or not...)

It's five-thirty
when I walk
barefoot and
hesitant

eyes wide open
against the
dark

towards the place
I last kissed
you

I can hear
your lungs
lift and fall

lift and fall

like I fell
for you

I am wearing
one of your
shirts

it's sleeves hang
loose

I can almost
wrap them
around me
twice

my stomach
clenches and thinks
of breakfast

cups of coffee
and newspapers
to argue over

our kitchen is
bright and clean
red gingham curtains
like the ones
little girls

dream of

scrubbed wooden
table and chairs

each with a leg
that needs to
rest upon
a book

I'll pass you the
milk and sugar

smile into
my cereal
bowl

tell you where
you left you
car keys

stand in the
doorway waving
you off to work

I reach down
through the black-
ness

to where I think
your blanket
is

searching for the
soft corner of
warmth

my fingers touch
nothing but
air

my feet are
freezing

I hear the clock
strike six

and wake
up

the pit of my stomach
is like the black pit of Hell

they say;
“she eats men like you for breakfast”

but they never say
where they go once they have been

(swallowed)

(un) settling like lava
that has erupted from a volcano of

shame

my belly rounded with regret

I carry the bodies of my enemies,
kicking and screaming, inside me

they will never see daylight,
and I will burn beneath it

curled up in agony,
the price of my insatiable appetite

at night
the gray whispers
of smoke that
weave like ghosts
from the end of
your cigarette
reach my window
and freeze on
the glass like
a handprint
that presses gently
through
my dreams

Autumn hits our hearts
like a wave crashing against
the shore

the dead leaves of love
are falling off the trees

and in the orange canvas
of sorrow we

scatter our secrets
in the soil

to be discovered
in the Spring

It's an echo of war

a battle no-one can
remember fighting

or winning

but we know that
we are the
losers

somehow

even if we can't
see it