my phone was on silent,
and i missed his call.
“i called you by accident,”
he said, when i rang back,
“i have nothing to say.”

nineteen minutes later,
his sweet sound of nothing
was still on the line,
untangling his day.

i dreamt about us —
a forbidden touch,
where hands met,
souls intertwined,
shirts unbuttoned,
drunk on wine.

i dreamt of the slowest burn —
sparks from your lips
merging with fuel from mine
tilting my entire world
upside down.

‘did you sleep well?’ you ask,
stirring your morning coffee.
i smile, face flushed with heat.
‘i had such an angelic dream.’

i was warned
i'd fall for you.
stay away from him,
they said.
sweetie, he’s bad news.

i laughed it off,
thinking i knew better,
thinking, that this time
would be different.

i always loved a challenge.

three months it took
for my mind
to catch up
with my heart.
by then,
you’d already
moved on.

he always asked for permission.
not like a formality —
not the way someone asks
after they’ve already decided.
but like he meant it.
like my no
wouldn’t make him flinch.

and every time,
i said yes.
and felt his hands
move like they’d just been
gifted a map —
not to conquer,
but to understand.

even when his fingers slipped
under the hem of my shirt,
found the small of my back —
he paused.
and gave me a chance
to say no. it’s enough.

even when his hand
brushed against my bra strap,
barely there —
he whispered sorry,
as if the air between us
deserved an apology.

i didn’t ask,
if i could touch you
further up.

and that —
that’s what i remember.

not the way he kissed me.
not the taste of that night.
but the way his respect
intoxicated my mind.

looking back,
i think that was the moment
he opened me up,
let my feelings spill,
whilst keeping his own still.
and god.
i loved him for that.

he touched my arm
as he paid for his latte —
i smiled as he talked.
he’s going to budapest.
same time as me.

he asked if i could
recommend things to see.
easy.
the ruin bars,
the chain bridge.
the gellért baths,
if you like steam.

i could be your guide —
i didn’t say —
i know a great place
i could take you.
it doesn’t need a ticket.
conveniently,
it’s located
in my bedroom.

been wearing the truth
up my sleeve
for ten whole years,
yet people who've known me
for half that time
stumble
when it gets revealed.

inside and out,
time has sealed
those battles fought in vain.
we're like family now—
truth and i.
but when they flinch
at the unconcealed,
i still don’t know
what to say.

i said your name last night,
to no one — just my shadow on the wall,
softly, a suggestion of a whisper,
pretending it didn’t hurt at all.

i carry you like bruises,
and although i swore i wouldn’t beg,
here i am, on my knees,
inside every text that i don’t send.

it’s not the act i fear,
but the breath before the yes —
as our worlds begin to unravel
like silk, shredded by violence.

if i break, please, break with me.
let’s fall apart together now.
let’s cry, as we burn to pieces.
i expect you to break me right.

sleep-heavy eyes, my hand reaches for you
then flinches – you’re nowhere in view.
the imagined shape only a breath ago
fled like a bandit
into dawn’s dissolving glow.
now my waking mind falters,
disappointment finds the door
through which you chose to leave –
once more.

help me smother
these chaotic sparks
you’ve fed, fuelled
and let grow
whilst gasping for air,
my bleeding heart
submits quietly
to your soul.

i told my friend,
it wasn’t like that.
we said — agreed —
this still wasn’t a date.

then you sat down
with a coffee,
making me forget
every careful phrase,
every non-confession
i’d whispered to my mind.

we wandered the city
until sundown,
as if we didn’t know
every corner of it.
and when the night
started to settle,
i offered you an out —
you had plans.
you just smiled,
waving them away.

neither of us knew
what we then began.

because i told my friend
it wasn’t like that.
but now i’m not sure
what i was trying to defend.

look what you’ve left on me —
a bouquet of stitches,
still-healing scars,
fine lines i can’t conceal
etched across my heart.

and what of your voice
haunting me?
i hope to god it disappears,
and someday,
i won’t even remember
that all of this was ever real.

my cat is crying,
crying still, and always loud.
his mouth is grief incarnate.
what name could hold you,
you feathered fury,
you opera of complaint.

i always thought,
the darkness fed on me.
hunted me, like prey.
made me weaker,
made me lose control.

i realise now —
darkness did nothing.
i did.

i offered myself up
on a plate,
walking paths
i'd already worn thin.
it’s all my fault.
it’s all on me.

what a freakish thing —
blaming my wrongdoings
on him.

if anything,
darkness is a mate
i owe an apology to.

i didn’t mean to bad-mouth you,
when you’re the only one
carrying me
on your back,
when i get deep,
dark blue.

i’ve put you out of my mind.
pages, chapters were turned.
we’ve carried on with new lives.
but seeing you stirred
something in me
i can’t quite comprehend.

we were so good for a while.
overwhelming,
and grossly fun.
i remember the shivers
that ran down my spine
whilst you opened up my heart.
why you stopped,
i’ll never understand.

you were taken aback
by the chemistry,
the almost-could-have-beens.
you called me the enigma,
full of mystery —
a work of wonder
left feeling cheap.
words off your mouth
like ambrosia i drank.

and now i’m having dreams about you
when i’ve filed you away.
i would have been yours,
if you’d asked me to.
i’m sorry you realised too late
that you ****** it up
right at the start.

(on the ten-year anniversary of leaving home)

without looking back,
she boarded a flight,
concealing that piercing anxiety.
to soothe the ache,
packed her language as a guide,
weeping quietly for her country.

recognition came in tears,
stretched paper-thin—
that her home couldn’t yet grasp
that love begins within.

the early years, under flickering lights,
were spent seeking solace.
with inner voices softly humming—
inhaling cheap wine,
books as her compass—
enough to outweigh not belonging.

some nights,
she danced until her heels
worn the skin away,
bleeding her truth into tile,
whilst friends, thick as thieves,
melted into laughter, and gin.

she loved badly,
lit candles to soften the silence
that screamed louder at 3 a.m.,
scribbled poetry
on the walls of her soul—
long forgotten, left forsaken.

her twenties were a strange gift,
she never thought to ask for,
memories scattered down the hallway,
like spilled drinks, laced with honesty.
sometimes the weight is still sore,
and yet she’s walking,
barefoot,
unfolding.

i miss the simple life
in the way we all do.
bringing water
from the well –
the blue one –
at every street corner.
collecting firewood
so the winter stock would last,
toasting bread on the fireplace
brushed with a garlic clove,
and salt.

i remember the signs
in windows,
people selling eggs.
creeping into the barn,
scared of spiders
and chickens,
but still collecting them,
while still warm,
and fresh.

we’d scavenge
at the edge of town –
never allowed,
but we went anyway.
swimming in ***** waters,
slick with chemicals
and gasoline,
we didn’t have allergies
to the world.
just rolled around
in grass and dirt,
not caring
what lay beneath,
or might bite.

once, we let the cat taste
the tomato soup
from my mother’s bowl,
while she was on the loo.
we snickered,
choking on laughter,
watching her savour
every spoonful.
we were partners in crime,
my brother and i.

i even miss the smell
of the old theatre.
its worn-out curtains
heavy with nerves
as we danced,
competed,
recited poems,
pretended to be
one of the great
figures of the past,
and lay on the cold,
hardwood floor,
covered in dust.

i could list
these memories for ages.
what it felt like
to be a child.
weightless.
magical.
curious,
and bright.
i wanted to grow up
too quickly.
when i should
have held on tight.

i tidied the corners,
stories simmered in the chilli,
scattered petals on the grass —
rose-red, next to a single lily.

i’d chosen the music with care,
but laughter co-wrote the score,
each chorus pulling us closer
to something warmer than before.

we bathed in rain, clouds, and sun,
each one carrying a moment,
where secrets come undone,
and quiet truths are spoken.

the fairy lights lit up,
as the world flipped slowly —
a circle of soft goodbyes
turning intimate into holy.

as the solstice faded,
and it struck twelve once more,
a day like this feels sacred,
as the season shifts the shore.

this night won't conclude us,
though the dusk will surely dim.
we are only at the beginning,
on the edge where stories swim.

i can't seem to wash you off my skin.
yours accidentally touched mine.
as shadows fall onto the eclipse,
my heart turns into a landmine.

exhausted it lays, beating faster,
whenever you're on my mind.
breaths, drawn in sharper,
i can't seem to shut you out.

it's ridiculous, i say to myself,
the power you have on me.
thoughts of you send splinters
throughout every inch of my body.

your presence itself feels like a sin.
you're all i think about.
my wishes, never leaving my lips,
could cause the stars to burn out.

it all weighs heavy on my chest,
like ruins no one came to save.
so i leave it there—forgotten, rotting—
just wishful thinking
digging its own grave.

it still hurts.
your memory’s radioactive.
it’s no use thinking about
how much i lost
as the script of my life kept rolling.

you caught me as i fell,
i was searching for a way out,
and found you instead.
but reaching for you
only pulled me deeper down.

looking back is hard.
toxic dust i breathed in,
a chemical romance
that burned through my lungs,
your atmosphere seeping into everything.

maybe fate turned kinder
the moment i left.
what i might have become
is folded quiet,
neatly kept.

but it still stings.
not the loss — the time i can’t reclaim.
you weren’t a lesson.
you were a delay.

so take the version of me
you once believed.
i won’t ask fate for mercy,
nor beg time to rewind.
i’m done with your ghosts
that never tried.

for years, i turned a blind eye.
sweeping caps beneath the rug,
until first light cracked,
then by morning,
it still wasn’t enough.

i drank, after greeting the day,
sometimes with coffee,
often just straight,
took a taxi to work,
then drank more on my break.
customers adored me,
or who they thought i was —
my second self
with blurred edges,
slightly louder than the dark.

some i crossed paths with
tried so hard to help —
to drag the demons out.
but the deeper they dug,
the harder i pulled away,
instead.

i’d sketch pretending on my skin
with ink from an earthy red.
dressed up for therapy,
clouds trailing like a veil —
midnight fantasy
chased with violet gin.
i called it survival,
but it tasted like sin.

spelled my sorrows on the carpet —
each drop a false reprieve.
and whilst they dripped
like honeyed mercy,
no one asked about the burn.
now bare, without prayers,
i’m an offering at your altar
after swearing i’d never return.

i'm drinking a lot.
forgot why i started.
one excuse, it seems like
became a hundred.

it hushes the demons
for a moment or two,
but the silence feels borrowed,
and it never comes through.

i'm smoking a lot.
unsure of the whys.
trying to gather
the parts i call mine.

they used to help,
but keep dragging me down,
just like we do each other,
deep underground.

echo island
invites me to dine on its shore.
the wild orchid, hidden and torn,
begs me to linger,
weaves gold in my hair —
and claims me,
its trophy,
unaware.

i'm a lost soul,
ash for pieces,
stranded
with failures
that pray
in quiet memories,
to be remembered.

my brain doesn’t understand
that we have no right to exist.
and still, it conjures her —
lips burning from the kiss
where I forget
where I end
and she begins.

i went back at twenty-three,
to the school that survived me.
the rebel, the headache,
the girl who wouldn’t listen —
and thought of this building
as being trapped in a cage.

it felt like coming home.
my teacher grinning wide,
filling me with warmth,
hugging me from the side
during the memorial,
as if the teenagers on stage
weren’t reciting poems
about the war.

he kept leaning in,
whispering jokes
of old times.
shushing didn’t work –
i was secretly glowing
in their unexpected pride.

they called me the proof.
an example, that
the troubled can bloom.
but all i could think
was how they loved me
through my worst,
and still do.

i wear his shirt,
long-sleeve, pale grey,
too wide at the wrist.
it still smells like him.
like oak, sleep, fresh rain
and the breath before the kiss.

i'm terrified.
that my own scent
will settle, and claim
what history stitched.

i'm holding onto it,
as if this is the last embrace
he'll ever give me.
maybe it is.

the melody can be heard again.
i know the notes by heart.
i try to rip them from memory —
but i can’t.

the rhythm’s different,
but the tune’s the same.

like a possessed demon
it chases me underground,

and yet i sing.
sing along to it
the entire time.

a ring of embers—
with my heart
gently dancing around it.
my face is flushed,
damp with tears,
as if they’ve started
boiling in the mist.
i miss you—
but you know that
already.

in my mind,
i’m still running
through the churchyard,
over stone paths,
stepping on yellowed leaves
that gave up weeks ago.
inside me:
homesickness, awe,
anger, grief—
a hundred hands,
all pulling.

you’re a morsel of bread,
bird-snatched, half-left—
carried home in my satchel,
like a labourer
at the day’s end.
you are what you say you are.
and more.
a frame around my soul
i can’t keep building.

i cannot call you mine.
i have a homeland.
you gave the exile shelter—
but she, the other,
birthed me, shields me,
and one day
will cover me with earth.
i cannot betray her.

for what you made
and left behind,
i owe you still.
i’ll bury your legacy
like treasure
in the quietest parts.
it’s mine to guard.

and maybe one day,
when time has vanished,
i can return to you—
shed a tear for us
on a rainy evening,
wipe you clean
like an old photograph,
and place you gently
back into
a quiet corner
of the past.

you called me
the cure
without
ever reading
the fine print.

now you call me
a curse,
despite my explaining
that healing
comes with a burn.

in the future,
call me
however you like,
just don't come back
when you miss the high.

(a tribute to C.S. Pacat)

on a bed
of white flowers,
etched on my wrist,
i wear it as a vow,
above the place
my pulse
tenderly blooms,
forgetting to lie.

her soft handwriting
is a reminder of a journey
i had once taken
between the lines,
forgiveness forming,
from lashes to petals,
on bruised pages.

i carry her with me,
their story, her essence,
kingdoms folding into skin,
her words marking
not only a change,
but a becoming —
the slow-burn
of identity
i can finally place.

i was always the kind
with a toothbrush to spare
reserved for only you,
not knowing who you'd be.

a friend, perhaps, in need
of a soft bed and duvet,
a midnight love, leaving
just as sudden as it came.

maybe i was always
hoping that my sanctuary
would be enough,
and maybe, just maybe,
you'd peel the old love away,
like paint from a windowsill—

but you never stayed.

you lifted me in a dream,
like it was nothing—
like the years hadn’t passed
like storms
through our bodies.

we spun until dizzy,
grinning like we used to:
in a world filled
with lollipops,
doorway dates,
and curfews.

you never kissed me
the way stories end.
you only loved me
in the narrow space
between your name
and your friend’s.

you told me
i should be with someone good,
someone who could hold
all my stories.
but never said,
someone like you.

you held my heart
when it spilled,
drunk, full of ache,
and my hand on a bench
before life swelled
and whisked us away.

no fallout.
no fight.
just the silence.

you are
a burden
i carry
in every breath —
a firestorm
destroying all
ahead.

you are
a monster
waiting for me
to sleep —
an anchor
knotted at my neck,
pulling me
to the deep.

you are
an echo
of my voice
caught in a fight —
the lurking dark
that smothers
all the light.

you are
a void
consuming
the best self i had,
leaving nothing
but the throbbing
in my chest.

and yet,
you are
the question
i can’t answer:
why do i still hold you dear?
that remains a mystery —
even to me.

these days, my soul feels heavy,
bursting with a secret still untold.
bearing it, it scorches steady,
but you broke our dream i’d hold.

your cruelty lived in me, raging.
i long craved what you’d denied.
it took an age to stop the blaming —
i, too, had darkness inside.

and yet, to this day, i’d circle back,
turn the bitter wheel of time,
re-play our teenage soundtrack
with a sip or two of wine.

knowing everything, i’d hit rewind,
see where our road leads to,
appreciate you, with a mature mind,
and undo all of your wounds.

maybe we’d stay ‘in the zone’,
maybe we’d claim the world —
wander every corner of our home,
or england’s cold and grim shores.

we wouldn’t be so far away,
pretending, frigid strangers.
i’d know all of life’s mistakes,
all your whispered prayers.

defiant thing, the past.
it offers less than what it stole.
my heart still pulls toward
a time when yours was whole.

i’d know you’re not tormented by
neither the past, nor the present.
i’d know you healed with time,
and wish our sorrow never happened.

but if one day, you still look back,
know, my heart is pure.
as you turn back, breathe for me —
then don’t look back at all.

i watched a grainy film once,
through blurs of a stolen light,
words dropped like crumbs.
i picked them all up,
kept them safe
tucked away in my mind,
until i had the puzzle pieces
to give them back their shape.

years later, i etched
a number on my hand.
not for him,
but for the girl,
who mimicked the words
before knowing what they meant.

now i wear his language
like a second skin,
slightly flushed
from the heartbeat beneath —
pulsing with all
once chased,
and incomplete.

i didn’t know it then,
how far that ship would sail —
how it would anchor me,
then leave behind a trail
to places only dreamed,
with a way back for when i was ready.
i didn’t know it then,
how it would lead me
to chart entire lives
into maps of unfolding,
guided by a compass of poetry —
all of it
once borrowed
from a screen.

i started typing.
just a simple text:
i hope you’re okay.
but i was
too much of a coward
to hit send.

i write of heartache.
it's all i've ever known.
so if you want a poem,
you'll have to break my soul.

(a tribute to becky albertalli)

i learnt english at sea,
traded my tongue
for salt and compass,
but it was becky
who brought me back to land —
when a boy fell in love
with another boy,
and his words dared me
to claim that same love
as my own.

her book lived on my nightstand,
spine worn to a gentle curve,
sentences humming in my head
until they belonged to me
as much as they belonged to her.

she offered me the strength
to feel less ashamed
of being different,
gave me a fire that burned
through the blame
i was ready to bear myself.

she gifted me with confidence
to leave my homeland
my heart outgrew,
and find my way to a place
where love was not a secret —
a shore worth swimming to.

our first photo was taken
sometime in nineteen ninety-three.
two toddlers in nappies,
neighbours, before we had a word
for what we’d grow to be.

inseparable.

weekend mornings started
at six a.m. beneath blankets.
eyes heavy, pyjamas warm
with your brothers half-asleep,
watching cartoons in the dark –
argai, the lion prince
and some other world
that promised we’d never grow up.

half a life was spent
with football, martial arts,
scavenging, and video games.
but a universe opened between us
when you moved away –
only a few streets down,
where the brink of manhood
said, no girls allowed –
unless.

so i went on
carrying your absence.

years later, our parents
arranged a movie afternoon.
it was a hundred minutes of silence
and small flickers of a conversation
that mirrored who we used to be.
i thought, maybe.
i thought, still.

but the closure i sought
was a door shut in my face.
as if fifteen years
of childhood were a secret shame.

it still hurts
to dream you colder
than you already were,
and carry a reminder
that you don’t have a say
in when and how things end.

(a tribute to richard walters)

under the soft stage light
richard walters performed
a song called awards night
he’d written about elliott smith.
my heart ached quietly
for the ghost his voice carried.

sofar fairy –
as i call her in my head –
said i looked like
i was in the clouds,
living in the memory
of someone else.

his energy followed me
into the next morning at work.
half-stunned, half-joking,
they’d insinuate
my joy must have come
from someone’s warm embrace.

how could i explain to them,
that music and words
can whisper through your ribs,
settle in your chest,
and lift you higher
than any touch permits?

richard’s voice just lingered
like the aftertaste of honey,
like rain caught in leaves.
i carried him home in my pulse,
where elliott still lives,
softly whispering between
the notes of his guitar strings.

sorry, no pets
no pets allowed
constantly,
no matter
how much higher
we go above asking price.

they tell us,
tenants have rights,
to formally beg
to keep a pet,
and landlords
must consider
each request.

bite me.

because ares
is apparently
dirtier than a child,
crayon on the walls,
smearing god knows what on tile,
sticking stuff up nose and ears,
to guarantee a hospital stay overnight.

please.

he drinks from human glass.
sleeps like a king.
catches butterflies
and runs at the sound
of a door opening.

he’s neater than i am.
neater than you.
what’s your excuse
for the issues reported,
but never followed through?

i cried last night
because you weren’t mine.
i cried because you hurt me.
i cried because i wanted you
to do it all over again.

he said
i wasn’t feminine.
he said it twice,
hoping the echo
would re‑write
my code
of not being lady‑like.

he came to the conclusion
we should stop.
i talked like a mate.
and didn’t fit
his narrow idea
of a woman.

and i told him,
i won’t fold myself
to fit his frame.
no one
gets to offer lessons

on
how
we
should
be
shaped.

in between downward dogs,
my phone buzzes —
again.
and again.

for fifteen whole minutes,
i leave you unread.

you’re drunk, smitten,
with someone i know,
someone you spotted
at a gig.

you send a live-feed
of your spiralling heart,
ask what to say,
if the moment does come.

i tell you to try.
say hi for me.
talk about music,
the crowd, the energy,
the way the incandescence,
blurry but kind,
makes them look soft
in that lavender light.

and you do.
of course you do.
you take a leap of faith,
while i sit here
in silence,
finding a hundred ways
to rehearse what my heart would
but my mouth will never say.

ten nights,
my glass held nothing
but water and light.

ten mornings,
i woke to myself
instead of forgetting.

tonight,
my heart spilled open
and the world drank me in.

i didn’t want to,
but i wrote anyway.
cracked open
like a shell,
flooding with memory.

some words
arrive as if they’ve waited
their whole lives
to be read.

i don’t want us
to be anything.
but sometimes i wonder
if i crossed your mind
the way you drift through mine.

why else would you give me
your plushie crocodile —
just in case
i miss you
while you’re away?

we’ve been spending
so much time together.
you keep finding ways
back into my head.

we’re not going to be a thing.
you told me.
i told you.
we shouldn’t work.

but baby —
we do.

i find it unnerving,
hearing my voice out loud,
after being branded, growing up
the quiet one, who’s a bit too shy.
small talk is pointless.
the weather is the same—
too sunny, too windy,
everyone’s always
baffled by rain.

we exchange ‘y’alrights’
to seem polite
when no one really cares.
but where i come from,
we ask, dig deep,
we share.

talking is personal.
intimate and sacred.
we ask how your day’s been
with space designated
for your words.
we don’t pretend
sharing doesn’t hurt.

it does.
standing on a stage
fearing becoming
too repetitive, too boring,
running out of stories
to share.
i focus on the words in front,
not on the people who stare.

but it still wrecks me—
and my voice does tremble.
i’m not used to strangers
in moments so tender,
it fills me with dread.
but instead of rotting away,
i’m finding i shed.

i shed the heaviness from inside,
and beneath the words,
i’m fuelled by fire
outweighing the hurt
rubbed reeling.

i’m using it in lanterns
on my journey of healing—
however long it takes.
it is my becoming,
it’s never been a phase.

sometimes it gets dark,
but do witness every line,
observe every spark.
i’ll be here standing—
voice trembling or not.

sometimes
i need to remind myself
you’re my therapist,
not my buddy.
but man,
i wish i could text you.

i’m breaking
to pieces,
tearing
at the seams —

could you please
clear your calendar
for me?

almost everyone had left
by the time the clock
struck midnight.

you kissed me
at the top of the stairs,
then, after getting more wine,
announced to the room,
i’m staying here,
by the way.

my housemate
offered you blankets —
bless him,
so unaware.

you said
you’d take over my bed,
and i could sleep
wherever i wanted.

that was the night
i realised
i was madly in love.
i knew it may hurt,
but i couldn’t refuse
signing up.