I look in the mirror
each morning
and see a stranger
reflected back at me

I take my fingers
and peel back the first layer
of glass, and reveal nothing

I accept that I have to invite this stranger
into my life, like an old friend
offer her tea, make her comfortable
love her enough in the hopes that one day
we may connect

and I shall no longer see her face
but my own, reflected, smiling

I hold
an undying hope
that I will one day
see in the mirror
what you see in
my eyes

That moment when I said goodbye to you...
I didn’t know it would be for the last time

ordinary Thursday’s, shuddering
with their sudden significance

missing
missing
missing

a word I’ve heard so often now
it’s lost all meaning

and what can I do? There are no streets left
to search, no stone left to be unturned...

I suppose all I can do, is keep you close,
and love you, miss you, and wait...

because I do not believe in last goodbye’s

no,
you are just testing how long
I will wait for you

to ask for forever
is like carrying Everest on your back
hoping you’ll survive it’s weight
I didn’t ask you for forever

I just wanted to share cigarettes and pints
and that mad rush of blood
that makes me want to take a star into my mouth
just to see if I can withstand the fire

your taste is spread across my teeth
like a tapestry of God

no forevers
let us live in this moment
and make this moment
Earth shattering

We sit
fingers wrapped tightly
around each other
as the sky falls in
around us

but it’s okay
because we hold stars
in the palm of our hands

and taste moon dust
on our tongues

who needs the sky
when we are complete
in a midnight moment

There will be a moment
when time places it's hand
on your shoulder
and forces you to
turn and face it,

staring you down
like a dog, with a bite
that threatens to take
every drop of blood,
of life, that your skin
contains

you will not bleed
before you hit
the ground, limbs
spread at angles
no mathematician
would dare
to calculate

there will be a moment
when you swallow
the entire universe,
feel it's press against
your gut, urging
you to let it
go

touching the shape
of the air, feeling
each pocket close
and open, like a flower
against your cheek

on your way down
there will be
a moment

to finally breathe

These are the moments that matter

the spark of friction
when our hands squeeze
together

the tender press of your lips
against mine

the gentle breath on my neck
that is a love song, whispered

these are the moments I’ll remember
when you’re gone

when you are calling me all the names
under the sun

fighting like a flock of birds over breadcrumbs

pacing like a  hungry lion with a deer between its teeth,
blood running down it’s mouth
contorted in an insane grin

I will not remember that

I will remember this

my cure and my curse

wrapped in one flesh

whose fingers flicker lightly down my back

until I beg for moonlight

to conceal the shame of this moment

I stand a monument of your prosperity

but I am really just a fool who cannot

say no

I wonder when the infection started

when did that darkness
in my heart begin to grow

like a vine, wrapping around
my arteries, until it became them

blood flow cut off,
until I couldn’t feel my fingers

was I always this cold to the touch?

freezing to the point that
I may as well have been a corpse

depression, they call it

darkness
despair
death

it pulls at my veins, like a tug of war

and it wins, every time

some days I feel
as infinite as the
universe, burning
as brightly as
the sun, my soul
a scattering
of stars

and some days
my heart is
as black as
midnight,
hurting
as deeply
as the ocean

You asked me how many moons
were in the sky

and I said, only

one that pulls fine chords from
our hearts and spins

one that clenches like a fist
at the beating in our chests

one that's surface is covered
with every kiss we've ever had

only one, because there is
only us, alone in the universe

in it's vast, grey, enormity

our bodies woven so tightly together
wrapped around each planet

our love burning up every sun
into a supernova

we are alone
we are vast
and our love is
infinite

we are children of the moon
but the sun is relentless
and we cannot fight
the light

we quiver under its rays
as we frantically drink moonbeams
trying to reflect the heat
back into the sky

as we anxiously await the night
where we can hide and cool
down our skin

with only the gentle stars as
company

Stars open between
the trees in which
I’m hiding,
the river catching
their light,

ghostly reflections
of the men
I have known
wink at me from
their watery depths

I play a game,
imagining a
narrow boat
that a family
inhabit,

a small child
running its length,
folding their bed
into kitchen
space

inside, I am
panicked,
knowing that I
cannot swim and
that the forest
is closing
in

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

smoking under midnight skies
I build my kingdom out of stars
(in my head)
drinking moonshine until I'm as blind
as if the stars themselves had
blazed into my eyes

all I want is to finish this cigarette
and blow the smoke into the sky,
as the sky blows the solid shape
of my body into stardust

I am cautious of
your frail heart

I dare not
touch it with my
indelicate fingers

that weave time
as if it were
a thread I
could simply
unpick

if I went wrong

these are the offerings
of lost things,
toy cars and thimbles
that no one knew
what to do with

but you heart,
like the flesh
of the moon,
sits in the sky like
an echo

calling me home

I entered the room
that you shared with a girl
whose hair was as gold
as honey, hiding a mind
as wild as a storm,
              
the night rattled against the door,
stars beating against the frame,
their fire desperate to burn
a hole through the wood,

possessed, deluded, she walked
the halls barefoot, talking to
the moon with it's face
white as arsenic and
just as deadly

and just when the stars
began to falter, she wavered
and turned, half smiling
and said,

'I fooled you all,

I fooled you,

yet again'

In the hospital I am drinking coffee
from a plastic cup, it’s edges have melted
into my hand, we are one, the coffee and my hand

There is no time except the movement of two
hands, in reverse, the movement of one hand
chasing down the other, in reverse

There are plastic seats that scratch through
the cheap cotton covering my legs,
they are thin, worn leggings, covering my legs

The doctors pass in secret, we are not supposed to see
to see the doctors pass, in secret they move like
ghosts we are not supposed to see

My grandmother is not yet a ghost
she has flesh still, incandescent and bright, it is on fire,
it glows pale incandescent and bright

they walk towards us, the doctors, these ghosts
and we see them, these ghosts, these doctors
we are not supposed to see

we go to her, my grandmother
incandescent and bright
she is glowing in her hospital bed

already an angel, an angel without wings
the wings that she has are burnt to her back
she won’t be flying anywhere

she is sinking, sinking into her bed
incandescent and bright she blends into
the white sheets
seamlessly

we watch her, sinking seamlessly into the white sheets
we watch her burnt wings crumple beneath the
six stone weight of her

when she stops breathing, we all breath
in and out, we smell the charred bones
that death left, with each breath
we take in what’s left

we leave the hospital bed, the itchy chairs
the ghostly doctors we leave behind
our coffee cups, cut free from our hands

we breathe in each step, our skin
burning for fresh air,
we walk step by step

and the light from the street is so
bright, so incandescent
and bright

They say that you should build memories

sepia photographs and inky fingerprints

a box hidden under a bed, gathering dust

a stash of dried flowers in a bra

I say I am building something stronger

with the way he looks at me as if I am the

sunset

a warm skyscrape of orange and red, a golden glow

that radiates

a rage, that will spread from my pink heart

into the cracks

a burning pit of coals, flames that flicker and

die

I am building...

building

building

hope

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

Before the coma,
silence was a virtue
we never indulged in

we would talk
until our throats
bled, our tonsils
burning as if
speaking words were
as warming as
eating raw chillis

we'd tuned our vocal
chords finely, semi -
tones were for
mornings as much as
black coffees

our bodies were
strings and ***
was just another
chord

a tangle of
limbs wrapped in
copper wire

after the car hit
you, we stopped.

the silence that took you
was big enough
for two

Before they coma,
silence was a virtue
we never indulged in

we would talk
until our throats
bled, our tonsils
burning as if
speaking words were
as warming as
eating raw chilli

we'd tuned our vocal
chords finely, semi -
tones were for
mornings as much as
black coffees

our bodies were
strings and ***
was just another
chord

a tangle of
limbs wrapped in
copper wire

after the car hit
you, we stopped.

the silence that took you
was big enough
for two

Murderer
they called me
Murderess...

to take a life
into my pale,
sculptured hands

to mix bone
and blood
into a thick
paste

to shatter the heart
of a mother, herself
reaching into the
abyss in fear of

nothingness.

I did not tremble
from top to toe

my back arched, catlike
sensing danger

where there was only
love, taken from me

beaten, burnt, corrupted
until only this shell

remained.

I take God into account,
hold him to his word,
beg him to remember
that night when I was

six

when heaven and hell
mixed as my mouth
filled with sweat
and blood

the taste of fear
caressing my lips

murderous,

the shadow on the wall,
the whistle of wind
through long hair

I take, plunder, delve
into fields of red
Poppy's

remberence

dear God,
remember me

My broken heart is still
teaching me to love

from the little buds of
first meetings

to the blooms
of full blown passions

when our arteries
entwine, blood
mixed and wounded

hearts beating as one

They said I had my grandmother's eyes
Cynical and bright, never watery
Like theirs

I saw her once, baking bread,
Kneading dough with floury knuckles
Into the shapes of her children

Did I come from that batch?

Could I trace the crumbs back five generations
And see a man in Victorian dress treat a lady
The way she deserved to be treated

Is this who I am when I'm begging?

Bleeding on a bathroom floor, in the moments
When I swear I could reach out and touch God

Is this void theirs?

Chewing my fingernails, playing with the flesh
Between my teeth, tasting myself

Or when I haven't washed my hair in weeks
And my skin shakes against my bones
Like loose leaves clatter in the gutter

I have my grandmother's eyes

my heart bleeds

not for you

but for the you I used to know

I imagine myself
in a house without
windows

I grow there,
stilted, like a
flower denied
of rain and
sunlight

I am always
cold, covered
in thin hairs that
rise like flames
when a whisper
reaches the back
of my neck

I am always
scared, rivers of
fear flowing like
blood through
my veins

I am always
hungry, remembering
the taste of fresh bread
in the morning

It has been a long time
since I ate

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

He said I would never forget
the taste of his name
on my lips,

the soft sound of his breath
against my irregular heart
beat

he told me, the first thing
about love was to find the
right cadence of their name
in your mouth,

it was more important than
the brush of fingertips on
naked skin,

hungrier than
the touch of lips on lips,

needier than a thousand goodnights.

My tongue fitted the shape of it,
somehow, and I know a name
by any other rose would taste
bitter, like unsweetened lemonade

and our goodbyes would be the same, passionless, less urgent,
asserting that I would never
forget the taste of my first
love's name on my lips

Through all your niceties
I see the devil that you
hide

I have felt it
inside of
me

moving to a beat
beyond my range
of hearing

sweat soaked skin
that crawled on
top of me

tattooed with Japanese
as if you were
a native

of any land
but fear

I walk barefoot through the forest,
notice the leaves shine honey blonde
in the late afternoon Autumn sun,
but grief’s lullaby screams through the trees,
shaking each branch with an echo of a memory, which I cling to, like those leave,
desperate yet hopeless
as natures clock ticks down on us both,
the cycle of life and death,
but there if no rebirth in grief,
because where does all the love go when the one you love is gone? Forever.
the only thing I can do is rebuild myself,
wipe away the shattered crystal pieces and start all over again.
He would want that.
He would want that, for me.

You can pass my heart through
the eye of a needle

it has shrunk so much since you left

I am amazed that it still beats

still pumps blood through
my thankless body

the nightmare of waking back up
to this loneliness, each day

is killing me

and I pray for my heart to shrivel away to

nothing

and cease feeding me

life

Like food,
dreams are rationed

children slip through holes
in buzzing fences

like bees

the light touches
of a fly

unconcerned by chemical spills

and broken hazard
signs

Like food,
dreams are rationed

children slip through holes
in buzzing fences

like bees

the light touches
of a fly

unconcerned by chemical spills

and broken hazard
signs

I miss you, but it’s not enough
to say that. I ache for you. For all
the memories we will never make.
For knowing I will never hug you again.
Hear you laugh or let you see me cry.
It burns like a fire lit in the
pit of my stomach.
This ache that no pill can take away.
The never memories rippling across
my skin, like waves I am fighting
desperately not to be engulfed by.
Fighting them is useless, though.
You just have to let them
wash you in salt water
and hope it
cleanses you

somehow

I don’t want to be a lady;

I want to touch the sun
with my bare hands
and consume it’s fire

I want to shoot arrows
at injustice
like a deadly archer

I want to pick the stars
from the sky and threaten
the whole world with darkness

I’m not interested in being nice
when the world is burning
around me

Pain dies quicker than love, they say

as I held your hand as your
heart stopped

and took your last breath
into my mouth

my pierced lips clamped over yours,
red meeting blue, blending into purple

colours mixed by artless hands
a shadow on a grainy photograph

the last image of our love
prised from my fist

pain dies quicker than love, they say
and I loved you too much

to care

A kiss is just a kiss
they say,

but your bones shudder
against mine

as your tongue guts out
the trenches of my mouth

counting the cavities of my
sugar wrecked teeth

I want to believe them
(I think)

as I wear your shirts, long and hanging by my hungry thighs

love notes carved into my flesh

scars that stretch, like rubber

and the bitter aftertaste of
love

leaves me shaking into your
skin

the edges where I end and you
begin

please, please take me home
swigging ***** from the bottle
on abandoned streets

grabbing me by the wrist
and flaunting my deepest
darkest secret to strangers
dressed in black

maybe I should have locked
the door, as you placed the first
touch on my frozen body

I don’t move, as you take my
innocence, inch by inch
with grotesque hands

please, please take me home
away from this house you’ve
bought me to with ulterior motives

I wake up a different girl
seeing the world through
a grey veil, all has turned to
dust and ashes and

I just want to go home

It was another dewy morning in  June;

the grass outside the apartment block was damp with promise
in the early morning sun

light streamed through the
***** glass of my bathroom window, highlighting my face as I lay stirring on the floor, my limbs bruised and heavy

an empty pill bottle, a couple of escaped tranquillisers, littered the black/grey slate floor

It was cold to the touch, and I

Frozen

memories came pouring back, before my head had a chance to catch up. My mind racing at the speed of a thousand cheetahs.

last night, my heart had been ripped open, left in ribbons for a child to come and play with. It was bleeding into my chest, I was drowning in my own blood.

Drowning. Drowning.

I had thought of it.

Ophelia had become something of a role model. A beautiful, tragical, wailing girl who had tied flowers in her hair and skipped off into the lake, pockets heavy with rocks

But no, there would be no ceremony for me, no bittersweet beauty.

The bottle was in my hand, like a grenade, and all I had to do was pull the pin

your holy wine soaked lips

find mine at 2am as the stars

sigh above us

a prelude to the cold November sun

that will come

chilling our bones until they

fracture beyond

fusing back together

again

It is winter
and I have had
no time to
prepare for it

tinsel tangled
around fake
trees

broken fairy lights
the flicker like the
wings of a trapped
butterfly

the smell of
cinnamon that
reminds me
of childhood

was I happy
back then?

was my heart
torn and troubled
with a quiet
discontent

do I remember
happiness?

I am sure it is
locked tight
somewhere
inside of me

a cage that
holds the ruins
of the past

it is cold and
wet, I am drenched
down to the bone

December shouts and screams
demanding my attention
like a crying, hungry baby

I am lost in its folds
a timeless tapestry
of snow and freezing toes

it repeats,
every year
like clockwork

and the cogs
are rusty and
creek as they turn

how many more years
can I stand it?

how many more
dreams of death
can I awaken from?

I fell for their promises,
the arrogant belief
that life begins again
as the clock strikes twelve

******* hell, it hurts
salt rubbed in an open
wound that people try
to fill with joy

I am breathless
and heavy with
the weight of
the future

when it feels
impossible to
imagine one

People used to worry about nuclear bombs
I have never understood the building of bunkers

the arrogance or foolishness to believe
that if you survive

you will be the ones to rebuild society
on a toxic planet

I wouldn’t worry about it

I would gather all those I love in my house
and paint an X on the roof

we would hold hands as they aimed
for our target

and we would sleep together
knowing we were not leaving
a better world behind

Like so many that fall here
I am hollow

The tendons of my neck
the open grave of sunken
skin and bone

Telling to story that language can't

It was like a spell,
a wild moment of black magic,
arithmetic bliss

hunger the only antidote
to the poison I swallowed

a childhood stolen
and replaced with a
decade cracking ciphers

years fell against me
like electrocuted trees

people hear the crash
and turn to look
at first, but soon
navigate their way
around the wooden
corpse

my twig-ed fingers
creeping out from
underneath, black earth
and ***** nails, a dead
thing crawling to reach
a last lungful of
dusty air

petals close when you are near

stars shudder at your finger tips

the moon shakes in it’s silver skin

and I -

blossom,

despite myself and my heart’s warnings

against your cruel caresses

I sigh, into your curves

and bury my head in the sands of oblivion

bloodsucker
night terror
ghosts that haunt the sheets
I sleep under

black heart
bleeding ink
desperate to write, but the words
won’t cut loose from my throat

black cloud
black dog
biting
teeth bared, ready to taste blood

I sink deeper into misery
looking for a hand
to pull me out of this ocean
of despair

Your goodbye
is an ocean

over bones,
the waves wash
leaving
salt stars

the more I drink,
the more my thirst
increases

growing, like
coral, away from
the seabed

turbulent ocean waves do not scare me,

I urge them on to reach the sky,

knowing that they never will
but still holding a small amount of hope

that maybe, maybe

all our spirits can soar

infinitely

and we will never be grounded

again

It’s dangerous to love you,

a fire burning without end,
a sea rising, threatening to
engulf everything I ever
stood for

I am prey to to the voices
in my head, that whisper
in their dizzy innocence
of “love”

but to find it in you
will cause chaos in my heart,
my soul torn in two
as I choose between
the path of devotion
in the face of overwhelming
odds

or the path of
loneliness

I was plucking out weeds from between the concrete patio slabs. You were watering the tulips and tending to the vegetables.

We could grow enough to live off, you say sometimes, when the whiskey trickles down your throat and the fire licks your belly.

The belly of a man, heavy set from years of sugared, milky tea. From using his hands to build the house we live in. To build the room where I am standing,

with its beech furniture and scrubbed floors, it's nooks and crannies which make it impossible to keep clean.

All those years, washing when the weather allowed. Picking colours from a paint chart. Talking passionately. Loudly and quietly. We even talked about the weather, sometimes. You made poetry out of the atmosphere. But weather changes, rapidly and without warning,

the gentle wind you once called Odin's daughter has morphed into thunderous roars, shaking the walls you so carefully built around us.

we are ******* hard at the sky now, gasping for air. It is raw, unsterilised air, that burns your tongue as you breathe it in,

yet breathe it in we must.

I wonder who we are now. Weather beaten, windswept tourists. Should we have left this place years ago?

We scrub the floors. We mow the grass. We wait for something to happen

next.