the sharp extremities of the world cutting deep
droplets of you falling
forming
a sea deeper than my wounds
blurred at the edges
melting the heart strings
soft
leaving only the pitter patter of calm
to rest among my withered shoulders

but the droplets they
dissolved
drained away and
I am cold
for the sharp edges have gone for good
but replaced by a fog
a void
your absence
clings to me
the way damp clothes do
after the rain.

stained.
I can see my breath in the air
you are everywhere
maybe if I absorb you
i'll change
with the rain

a discarded umbrella
an open window
unsheltered heartbreak
if I bleed all that I have
without protection
maybe the clothes, like the droplets
will fade away

and you'll no longer cling
to my skin
because the cuts will be clean
after the rain.

times and rhymes and anxious spines
tired chest, worn weariness
"you express yourself eloquently", she said
"but you seem flat"
how do I respond to that?
fallen body, sunken in the chair
I say the words, am I really there?
a monotone voice and shaking knees
is this what it truly means to be?
they teach you the alphabet
and how to count to three
but not how you're supposed to see life differently
when the streetlights are smashed
and your lighters ran out
your whisper barely heard, in your head it's a shout
a distant plead
an aching need
the desire
to be freed
from this fatigue.

a body
floating in space
a mirror
unknown, a face
a chest, that rises and falls
*******, unwanted, I stall
this label, this name, this "girl"
whom only on certain days, echoes my world
otherwise i'm known as the ghost
an inbetween, a maybe,
almost.

"But why don't we have straight pride?"
"I don't mind them really, I'd just rather they didn't shove it down my throat".
"Did you see those lesbians holding hands?"
"Do you have a boyfriend?"

These moments are usually filled with silence. The room is suddenly so quiet, that I can almost hear my fear in the key holes, tucked away inside draws, behind laws, In the space between us.

I sit there and I swallow my pride. I swallow the thoughts of years of coming to terms with who I was and kissing boys to try and feel the way I was supposed to. I swallow walking down streets and staring at strangers, trying to figure out who I found the most attractive. I swallow every time I used to think to myself "It's not real. I'm making it all up. I'm not gay". I swallow the first time I said it out loud. I swallow the first time I was proud. I swallow the way I traced her freckles softly in the sunlight. I swallow the fights with my father and the tears behind closed doors. I swallow the stares in public and the glares and hushed whispers that stayed with me for days. I swallow every time someone would say "but you don't look gay". I swallow being told I can't take a joke. I swallow teachers talking about "homosexuals" as if there were none sitting in the room before them. I swallow being myself. I swallow the very essence of who I am. I swallow loving who I am. I swallow reclaiming the word lesbian, the word that used to sound like a slur. Like a ***** piece of language that only lived in **** videos and his wastepaper bin. I swallow falling in love with women. I swallow each time I stared at my body, and didn't recognise myself. I swallow all the shame in the world. I swallow my pride.

But then fifty voices are swallowed. One hundred loving hands. Two thousand threckles. 20 different countries. 1 million breaths. Fifty hearts whose beats echoed in pride.

And suddenly, I stop swallowing, and start living. For they can take our lives, but they will not take our pride.

the words that whisper inside your head,

the thoughts that hang on feeble thread

sowing silent stories inside your mind,

unwritten, lost, the kind

that never reach the lips.

the conversations exchanged in glances

in the darkness of night, an eye that dances

I hold my breath and let my eyes speak

"what are you thinking”

“I don’t know"

but in all honesty

I'm thinking,

I'm weak.

Running through the streets of New York in the rain

is like standing at the edge of the world and having no idea where you want to go.

All I know

is that as my hair hung, wet, and the moisture that hit my skin, set,
I could feel myself living.

I could feel the people parading the streets.
Their feet hitting the floor harder and faster than the raindrops that fell around them.
Their sound
echoing the gun shots they walked in dispute of.
Their shouts
screamed louder for them by the skies above.

I was but a particle of one minuscule droplet that fell to the pavement on one street of that entire city that night.

But I felt like the storm.

He awoke and found himself
inside the body of another.
Safe in the darkness
gentle amniotic arms held him whilst muffled voices dictate his fate
“You’re having a girl” they exclaimed,
and he lay, wondering what this meant.  

He awoke and found himself  
inside the words of another.  
Inside the “brother” he never was, rather than never had  
and the “boy”  that scuffed his knees in adventure.  

He awoke and found himself
“a pretty girl”, “a princess”, “just like her mother”
so he closed his eyes and dreamt of another.
A world of train-sets and barber shops,
birthday candle wishes to replace long, curly locks

he awoke, and found himself floating
in space
his face, unrecognisable in the mirror.  
His chest seemed to grow branches  
as if by night the doctors that had pulled him from her womb
had suddenly discovered his secret.  

They grew like thorns until they were all he could see.
Those and the other boys, s h a t t e r i n g jigsaw piece body parts
every time he looked at them.  
He wondered why when their voices deepened, it was called a voice  
break and not a gift.  
A broken larynx. A birthday present lost in the post,
instead he unwrapped their super glued puzzle pieces,
piling them onto his plate
if you eat your vegetables, you’ll grow up to be a man.

“You’re having a girl”, more like “You can pass go but you will never collect 200 dollars”.
“You’re having a girl”, more like “earthquakes will erupt inside your mind every time you hear the words
“She”, “Her”, “Sister”
“You’re having a girl”, but he was  

“He”, “His”, “Mister”.

And when he cut his hair, and found himself  
in the arms of over-sized t-shirts and grown out leg hair,
they would say
“you look like a boy”, as if they expected him to protest in offence
but his heart feels as warm as the breeze that blows through thornless branches of trees  
and he wants to say thank you.  
He wants to say that the words  
“You look like a boy” manage to stitch up his jigsaw piece body parts,
for these are the words that cut through his mothers dresses and threw away the thread
these, are the words that in time would cause his voice to break;
remind him that he is not broken
and bury his girlhood beneath his bed.