I can feel the barbs and the thorns
protruding from my skin
as i sit hunched and quiet
dont touch me dont touch meE don t tou ch me
every fingertip feels like knives
and your kisses are a cruel poison.
i am my own armour
because in this story,
the pinpricked princess
saves herself.

I.

There are parts of this story
Written for me only
Chapters not to be read aloud,

II.

The tears on the pillow
Moonlight illuminating the dew
Silent cries in the quiet hours

III.

The endless screams
Muted to the world
But piercing and agonising in my head

IV.

Blood in the bathtub
Blades hidden 3rd drawer down
Scars decades old that no one has ever seen

V.

All of these small chapters;
The little hidden tragedies
Of my short, bright life

Once upon a time, when the world was a feeble and wild drop in the ocean of space, a small crack was opened in the universe. Through that crack fell a great Bear, and she was magnificent, fur mottled blue with the constellations trapped in her skin. Her steps shook the earth as she traveled, seeking a place of great peace, upon this speckled planet that was scarcely bigger than herself. Laying down beside a mountain, with thunder in her voice, she birthed three cubs, bright as comets. To her first cub, Rainin, she said 'you, my son, shall inherit the sky, bring it sunlight and storms and lay blankets of snow upon this land, you will be vast and endless for all time'. To her second son, Seuro, she spoke 'and you child, will inherit the sea, from an island peak you shall rule the roiling waves, bring tides and calm to the waters, you will herald the first age of all things'. And lastly, to her daughter, who was sun-bright and borne of stars, she told her 'Maidah, you will inherit the Great Plains and the green grasses of this earth, break the mold of it and shake it, but also bring rise to mountains that reach your brother in his clouded domain, and tear in two the plates of the sea from beneath your brother's feet. With your breath you will bring life from soil to seed, and you will be queen to all that walks and breathes upon the ground. This, to you, is my last gift'. And the great bear who passed through a rift in the universe, having gifted her children, sunk deep beneath the mountain into endless sleep. Still, she slumbers, and her children shake and shape what she has given, until they join her in morpheus' domain when their world is dust and the well of creation has dried. They will sleep peaceful under mountains, their great paw prints everlasting as they let that which they have shaped greet its own sleep, its own death, yet the stars will remember them,
and this too, is a gift.

The winter winds blew in
Carrying salt from the sea
And ice from the north
It whipped and raged
Like a monster thrashing
At his invisible chains

And we brace ourselves
With layers and fire and coal
Dousing the monster
Dampening his roars
With our crackling embers
And hot cocoa hands

But you and I
With your eyes like arctic frost
And mine aglow with summer's
Forest fires and charred woods
We leave behind the warmth
To dance gentle in the chill

From spitting flame to air,
Air that burns like fire in this cold
And still we hear the roaring.
Us two, pale as fresh snow
Soulful as the cinder sun
We distmantle and destroy

Monster! Monster! With eyes,
Eyes like storms and sky
And lungs of triumph and freedom
We three, treading blizzard winds
Spirits dancing gentle, and joy!
Joy boundless, as the winter roars

I decided to stop following
The sparse and sorrowed rains
I will become my own storm
Cure the drought that binds me
These tears will feed my roots
And I will grow and grow and grow
In this savannah, where beast
Kills beast over scraps
I have become my own god
I have saved and salvaged myself

And if the soul were to bleed away now, tell me, what would be the words to die on your lips?
Who's hand would you be holding?
Who's heart would be breaking?
Tell me, who would shriek at the stars
Begging for you not to go
And who would rage and riot with God,
Demand he send you home?

often I think i can force the words from my throat
push past the floodgates and fix this drought
but they stick behind my teeth
breathed out - rearranged, changed - back in.
the hollow of my throat holds a thousand tragedies,
a thousand miracles, it births thoughts like colliding stars
and yet they will crawl around my mouth, humming,
a lungful of bees that sting and sting and sting
my thesaurus brain cannot find the right mixture
of vowels and consonants and breaks in sentences
to give justice to what blossoms within me
they say silence speaks volumes
and I have been shouting mutedly all my life.

I will swim languid in the River Styx, absorbed in its acid currents, and when these demons and soldiers place blade to my Achilles they will find no weakness there. I have been unmade and it has made me invincible.

I will, with thunderous voice
Shout love love love
Even if only
Just to hear the echo

And here, Icarus,
with his hubris and his burning wings,
who descends to the sea in fiery splendor.
But think of Daedalus, who watches his son,
exuberant in freedom,
fall wingless to earth,
all charred skin
and wasted dreams

Concept: the cities are empty, vines grow through top-floor windows and trees stretch taller than the buildings. Nature has reclaimed herself.

Concept: me, gazing wistfully at the stars, my favourite one has a haze of blue around it, and so bright, so bright.
Sometime later, one by one, the stars fall to earth, growing legs and arms and eyes. my blue hazed brightness lands in my garden, there is eternal peace in his light, and he, in turn, has been looking wistfully at me for lifetimes.

Concept: My tears return to the ocean, She curls herself around me and i sigh with relief. In the slow rocking of the tide, i will always be Her child. There are no tears now, only dreams of seasalt and an eternal embrace.

Concept: I am swimming through starlight on the back of a great, green turtle. She is benevolent and languid. Her voice sounds like my mother's.

I had jinxed it, this sunlight in me, with my hopeful words
and blissful smiles. how naive, to think
that the shadows ensnaring my soul would relinquish
such hard-won prey
I will curl into myself
hollow every artery, every vein if i have to
just to get this darkness out of me
the skies are cloudy once more
and the rain never seems to stop

Concept: I have stopped writing so much about the sadness seeping in my bones, somewhere along the way it has returned to stardust, somewhere along the way I began to smile.

Concept: i am sat under the moon and stars and they are so bright it is blinding, but when i cannot see for their brightness, i hear music, in the music, voices.
The stars are calling me home.

Concept: From a tiny pinprick on my finger blossoms a rich, red rose. She grows beautiful and when her petals fall, I marvel at her short, bright life. She knew nothing but love.

They teach us poetry
In dusty classrooms
With seats lined up in rows
Ballad, sonnet, metaphors
They are the proper prose
But we who bleed
In blackened ink
Have no such use for rules
We are the colours
We are the words
I create without your tools
But still we sit
Row by row
And learn to write in lines
My pen longs to dance
Across the page
Defying,
Rhyme by rhyme

Most nights i feel like a ghost, stumbling somewhere between living and drunk, haunting my past selves and kicking the graves of who i used to be, words i used to mean, loves that once found and ruined me. All the quiet and hidden spaces fill with tar and i sink into the dark knowing that i chose this, this life and this pain and this death. Cemeteries fill with ghouls wearing my face, eyes once so vibrant and now terribly, irrevocably hollow.
The soul awaits the sun and the sun never rises here.

The ghosts pass through the walls of our hearts, rattling chains and leaving a frost in their wake, and still we let them wander through our bloodstream. Why do we do that? Why do we open the shutters and unlock the doors, waiting for the empty souls to make their cold home inside our bones? I'm dark as a tomb now, with only ghosts for company and snowflakes for tears.

Mold yourself like clay to suit those you want to adore you, lose yourself in the pitch dark of their requirements and forget sense of self in the pursuit of acceptance. Reach wildly and blindly for their praise and call it love, love, love.

We fell
As Icarus fell
Wingless and burning
Grasping at shards
Of the sun

Once upon a time,
there was a girl who drank the moon
gurgled and guzzled until it filled her,
moonlight shimmering through her skin
and stardust lingering in her veins
she was waxing and waning
and the tides followed her small feet,
every month she shrunk into herself
before being born anew
glorious and whole and bright
bright enough to rival the sun
and how the sun loved her so,
his gaze warmed her back every day of her life
kissing her softly as she grew into the silver
that was her skin, her hair, her eyes
and how the night welcomed her
she could hear stars whispering
see adoration in every glimmer
the girl grew and grew, and the silver shone
and she longed for her sun, his warmth
and for the stars, her friends
every night she would shine
she could light up the world with that shine
white and silver and brilliant
she was love incarnate
and so
was loved in return

I cannot keep track of my love
I know not how much or how far
She can stretch for you
Or how many barrels she fills
Liquid and shifting and measurable,
I do know that she runs wild
Abundant and free
She sprints with the wind
And laughs, elated
We spin together under sunrises
And relish in the new dawn
Sunlight kisses reminding us
So much of your touch
I cannot keep track of my love
I know only that she grows
Each dawn, she grows.

Concept: it gets so cold in here that i can feel ice encasing my bones. But his heart is warm, god its so warm, and in his arms, i find sanctuary.

Concept: 32º heat with friends in the green grass. I am looking at you and you at me, i don't know where we stand anymore. You move from your 10 foot distance to kiss my head and rest yours in my lap. The turbulent sea inside me calms with relief.

Under the sun
Past the rivers that run
Over mountains that reach
To the sky
I will find love
On the wings of a dove
And through oceans
And forests
I fly