Her head resting on your chest
as you flashed your teeth
and bared a smile.

Your arms around her shoulder
as she curved her lips
like crooked pins.

Your eyes
betrayed your grin
as the camera clicked

one
two
three

and preserved the moment
that was supposed
to be ours.

Seeing your picture
with her,
whoever she is

to my utter disappointment
I did not feel
any pang.

Actually, not anything.
Apart from the fact that I have wasted an effort bracing myself
from something powerless.

Gloom covered your face
as you held the remaining strands
of your little doll
pressed to your chest.

I wonder if it hears your heart beating.

The muscles of your jaw tighten
your fist clenched on the tip
of the skirt of that rag around the waist,
covered in sand.

Are those lies piling on your plate?

Arms flailing, limped like stretched promises
subject for renewal
displayed on the rusty railings
of overpriced prisons
and underpriced confinements overthere

overlooking the slums,
the displaced,
the violent, barbaric, filthy slaves
over here.

If I may inquire,
Are you one of those people flooding the street,
making the world go round
and red and red and red?

Dear You,

Elope with me on a fine summer day.

We'll ride a random bus and hope to end up somewhere strange and unfamiliar. We will communicate in strange languages; laugh at silent jokes. We will lie under the stars, talk about distant islands and let the night hear our secret happiness and endless regrets. Because we're the vikings and we will never be defeated.

We will reappear under your blanket. We'll turn off the light and make love under the faint glow of the moonlight until the inconsolable heat of the afternoon. We'll flicker like a fire, we'll perch like butterflies. I will hold you the way I hold my pen - you can be certain that even after the last drip of the ink, still I will never let go. In my stories, I pledge to make you immortal.

Because you will never age for me.
Nor fade.
Nor die.


Until we defy immortality,
*Me

The light in your window
I will always remember that.
As we propped your pillow
and hid under your blanket.
As we conversed in strange languages
and laughed at silent jokes.
As we exchanged battered whispers
while promises fell like raindrops.

I will always remember us
as we locked the door
and left the world outside.
As you tossed my shoes, burnt our clothes away.
As you consumed my name
while the looking glass admired
the ways we dissolved
then inevitably disappeared.

And I will forever remember
the interminable look in your eyes before you sleep
and your fingerprints
here, there and everywhere.
You are the sweetest scar that had stained my whole existence.

Because we have cheated destiny;
and until we defy immortality.

Find him commenting in some poetry site. He is the one who has an avatar taken some 8 years ago. He usually floods people's notification with likes, sometimes comments, encouraging them to pen more and appreciating how talented they are.

In his page you will see old poems which record the details of his life. The happiness, the pain and the longing, the failures and the regrets, the endless hope and the secret dreams.

Layer by layer, he will take you in the various avenues of his past while constructing the future he imagined will exclusively be for the two of you. Certainly, it's not the tomorrow of the moon and sun and stars, shining and splendid, but it's not the tomorrow of ******* either. Because the guy who writes has the courage to face the truth and defend it no matter what.

Date a guy who writes. Sometimes, you will find yourself arguing with him about drugs, and you will find him comparing weeds with make-ups or coffee in some car accidents. You will find him absurd. You will call him stupid. He will call you a dunce. He will walk out. But when all is said and done and frustrations had subside, you will see him retracing his steps and staggering back to you. Yes, that's my man.

Be with the guy who writes. He's the type of person who remembers the details of you and never forgets. He even knows what your breathing sounds when you sleep, the sharpness of your every inhale and the gravity of your every exhale. And he could write about it. In sheer metaphor.

He gets paranoid sometimes, the guy who writes. There are moments in your life, nights like this, when all the worlds are asleep including the moon, when an idea must be coined and placed on the palm of your hand and handed to him as soon as possible, lest it would disappear.

In this kind of situation, do not ever give a hint until the surprise has been wrapped. Because he will press you to talk about it, insist his desire of knowing what it is about, accuse you of being difficult then claim that you are merely trying to annoy him. He can be obnoxious and suspicious but when everyone sees you broken, beyond questions he will find you beautiful.

Date a guy who writes because he has the will to stay and the strength to maintain his loyalty -- through the ups and downs of life he will never give you up. To him you are more than every poetry that has ever written in human history. To him you are greater than literature and far larger than biography.

To him, you are more than the stretch of the ocean to nowhere and the bend of the river in the mountain. To him, you are more relevant than the reality of everything and at night, before he sleeps, he will look at you and you will see in his eyes the infinity of forever in various forms.

If words can make you immaculate
Then I will not speak for a thousand years.
Until I have captured enough of them
To stitch and wrap round your neck
Dangle down your chest.

It will be the colour of the sky, that thread
A pendant molded from the solitude of the clouds at night.
Drifting and swirling and wavering then bursting
Countless incoherent constellations.
They will be scattered on your hair and shoulder,
those stars.

When people fall in love,
They write poetries.
Perhaps,
a little like this.

As your fingers fell flat
on the key board,
your head turned upward
eyes closed, mouth curled in one edge
your hair in sheer uncertainty,

and one at a time
the notes suspend themselves
in the atmosphere
lingering as if
they know no tomorrow.

Watching you from the half-opened door
I want to tell you how beautiful you are to me.
So beautiful that every word in English language
is inadequate to describe you.

You are an enchanting scent, my love.
An addicting fragrance
that I want to wear
all day
and night.

The crows spent the entire night on your roof.

They have swallowed the moon, and rested on the curtain. Soil and death lingered on their feet, as if ready to take their final clutch.

I flinched as you lifted the lid. You can almost imagine me down here, I suppose, yellowed by the hanging street light which warmth had abandoned after fireflies found a sanctuary in its suspended cold feet. I'm afraid I can only last until morning, but I will still love you until then.

Please, leave a gap on your window.

Let the breeze enter; I will part the wind
and I will slip past your curtain.

I will lie with you
and we will exchange battered whispers.

I will alter the stars
and we will dismember the hours.
We will defy infinity.


**We will disappear.

Even the windows had acquired the moss. It sprawled on the pavement, the moss, with all those leaves, fallen barks, soda bottles and old hapless notebooks. The pane was shattered, its edge towering, watching time and absorbing solitude.

The **** on the front door was damped and covered in rust. From the roof, stray veins dangled and decided to suspend themselves in mid-air. Scattered on the pavement leading to the entrance were glittering kisses and shards of glass. A shadow from the past lurks apprehensively – hiding behind the wind, bending below the grass.

They say it was sleeping down the cellar. I never found out. But in the middle of it, a chair has been deserted – broken and abandoned.

The hinges creaked as l slipped my foot inside. I shivered at the face of desolation as my leg touched the corner of the door. The passing time ruined the flooring; stray plants and bleeding flowers sprouted the space and occupied the place. Sometimes, at night, fireflies light this void and drown themselves in ecstasy.

Sawdust fluttered carelessly round the stairs that ceased breathing halfway. The steps have retained the sound of the shuffling footsteps. Even the birds fear this spot, the windowpane had lost all its former glory and shining reflections. The edges of the glasses hang loose and proud, captivating than summer, sharper than words.

I moved close, bended my knees, placed my ear near your half-opened mouth and listened to the sound of your breathing. Your hair draped down the side of your arms, half of your face is hidden away from me and I wonder if you’re calling me in this dream, exhaling my name

Over
And over
And over
And over

Leaving traces and creases on the sheet as I staggered my way back beside you from the labyrinth of this captivating decay unfolding on your very palm.

You will remember me reciting poetry between our acts of making love. You will remember the traces of my fingerprints trembling on your temple, my mouth cloistered across your name. You will hear, again and again, my rapid breathing round your neck and my battered voice consuming the space between you and me.

The long walks, my verses, the place I used to occupy, your hair strands perishing on my palm and my disappearing warmth, they will forever remind you of the endless times and everything we are breathing somewhere underneath your propped pillow and creased blanket.

Between your fingers will wrap the ways you have read me like Braille and the countless ways I have responded fluently. They will live in your head, feed in your memory, tear your flesh asunder. They will annihilate you.

They will break your heart.

Say goodbye to Keats, Gaiman, Bukowski, Eliot, Woolf, Plath and to the thousand years I could have made you immortal and love you like sickness and its cure together. Say goodbye to the smell of the verses I have exhaled on your skin, in a locked room, to our glittering kisses and shards of hearts strewn and dying on your bed sheet. I will take the next station Southbound, with Hemingway, and will dissolve with the clouds and swallow the stars alive.

Say goodbye to me and go on with your ******* ***** and endure the fact that she will never ever write a poem for you because she can’t and you have lost me forever.

*Remember that your muffled hair,
In this broken world,
Is one of the most beautiful things I have ever beheld
But be wary of my books.
There were constellations between the pages
Which tomorrow,
I will tear apart, one by one
And stitch in the shape of legendary airplanes that one day,
As we stand face to face
I will crush on your chest
And they will explode
And dismember you.

Today,
I walked back and forth
and tried to shrug off those memories
words
and promises dangling on my hair
like confetti strewed on our favourite park bench.

In the end,
you will be measured
not by the titles
stitched after your name

nor by the degree you have attained
or the clothes you wear
the brand it has
or the wage you earn.

You will be looked upon
measured, honoured
and remembered
by living humane

And being human.

No.
I'm fine.
As a matter of fact,
I'm happy. And perfect.

Yes,
my hair's uncombed
and my clothes are ragged
and I live everywhere

Under the table, sometimes
framing infinity.
Or on the edge of the precipice
conquering literature and flying

Or somewhere in the street
scattering the everlasting tunes
whilst letting the wind dismember
the feathers swirling round my earlobe.

It's my choice.
I refused to inhabit the life of conventionality.
On a fine summer day,
if you prefer, you can

Run away with me.

Your voice on my hair
Your breath on my skin.
The arch of your spine.
The void in your mouth.
The flood on your tongue.

They say it's beautiful,
but it's not.

I would very much like to tell you
How my last night went through.

It was raining, that time.
Distant ramblings of thunder
And constant slice of lighting
One could almost capture
And preserve in a bottle.

I would have, if it’s possible.
And would have handed down to you wrapped in a cloth and guitar strings.
To remind you that whatever might happen in the morning
We have lived everything we could.
This night, tonight.

From the coffee shop’s window,
I watched all these unfold
As the raindrops dripped and draped
And my hands scribbled your name
Barely readable on the tissue.
But it was still your name, nonetheless.

So that’s what I did,
While waiting for the rain to cease:
Stared past the window
And thought entirely of you.

They came again, last night – those women in black suit contrasting the sheet on my back.

One of them was holding a tray; the other was pushing a cart. All in all there were three women, one with a tray and one with a cart. The sight of the clattered metal made me shudder; the coldness crawled from my neck down to my spine. It was rusty and ****** and somber in that dimness of the endless corridor outside.

I, however, cannot tell those things inside the cart. I wouldn’t want to. No one will believe me. If I do so, they will hurl me in that room then wrap a cold, unfeeling machine round my head and fire indiscriminate gunshots. No. I will not. I cannot. They wouldn’t believe me. They will chain me, call me mad and electrify me while guaranteeing nonsense.

But it happened, really. It happened. They pushed my blanket down and my robe up, its edge touching the base of my chin. And it was very cold, and very rough, and very sharp, that metal the woman dragged on my chest, on my skin.

It was very rough.
And very cold.
And very sharp.

And she was too strong, the other woman in black. Her left hand covering my mouth I could barely breathe, her right keeping my arms at bay while she dragged the metal on my chest, creating this curve and that slice.

And my skin burned that kind of thin burning consuming not just a tree but the entire forest with all its silent secrets.

Believe me, my love,
a beautiful scene in-between the creases of those sheets

And the world wavered, and quivered and threatened to burst into flames!

You are the morning sun,
the beauty whom lights this world of mine,
as you peek over the crest of my horizon.

You are the evening moon,
the beauty whom lights the sky,
every time the sun cannot cover half the earth.

A constant dance we adhere, opposite sides of the earth…
you rise while I sleep,
only passing for a few moments.

A constant song we sing, opposite sides of the earth.
You sleep while I rise,
another step for the beginning ahead.

A delicate noise,
playing amongst our ears,
strumming the strings of our hearts.

It is our ballad, this song-
one the overflows with words of our hearts
to illuminate and give direction to that beginning.
Our beginning.

Our beginning, days anew.
Standing on the edge of the earth, hand in hand,
chasing time and defying storms.

The precipice crumbling beneath our toes, as we begin flight.
Stretching for those stars,
beyond our time,
on the outskirts of the universe we know – hand in hand.

Hand in hand we venture the cosmos,
defying gravity and reason,
but with definite purpose…
To create our composition.

*The stones of the precipice falling beneath our feet, beyond the surface,
as we soar high and above,
rearranging the constellations that time has disarrayed.

I have deceived the fairies
and made a beautiful cage.

There,
in flame
and on the wreckage of the world we will dismember,

we will dance
and flaunt our hair strands.

The fireflies will sing.
The stars will fall.
All the flowers will perish.

We will eradicate the sun.
There will be no moon on summer.
We will swallow the sea.

Come closer.

Disappear with me.

I went home last night.
Bought some *****,
and brought another man
I met in the pub.

He was so unlike you,
you who opened all doors.
He was scrubby
and rather rude.

We lit the cigar,
inhaled the smoke,
exchanged lies,
got high.

As expected,
we had ***.
That kissing
and fondling

and all those things
I need not elaborate
for the exhausted bedsheet,
and propped pillows

And crippled blankets
all looked at me,
accusingly,
asking where you were.

So I went back in time.
And there you were,
near the porch
waiting for me.

A hand of yours apprehensive
under your chin.

Your heart was bruised, ****** and broken
before my arrival.
You stood up, I half-expected you to run
but the void in your chest seems to be keeping you
at bay.

And the pieces strewn round your feet
glittered in the heat of that Thursday afternoon.

From my pocket I withdrew
a scotch tape I have been carrying since the last time.
And on my knees
I picked up the pieces of your heart

and un-broke them, one by one
like we never left each other at all.
Then we entered the house
and we were happy.

We were so happy.

And days rolled back,
and we went out for the first time
like a romantic date, but not exactly.
I was shy.

And then, one day,
I woke up and I don't know you.
And you woke up and you don't know me.
And we have never met.

Not at all.

So if our story were written backward,
certainly, this is what I'll read.

Tonight,
in the midst of
barren buildings and deformed mannequins
I will meet you again.

And we will dance.

Nice eyes, though. Lauren's.
But not striking enough.

I like bluish-gray.
I see the ocean during the storm.

Or greenish brown.
I see forest and moss,
or sea weeds.

But with hers,
it's dishonesty and flourishing deception.

Hey
What are you thinking?
'bout me?
You said you're thinking 'bout me.*

That you are incredible
and how much I adore who you are.
That you do not compromise who you are by what you think I want to hear.
That you just are you,
that you made this easy and intimate
me showing you those photos.
That I want to make love to you
and kiss you a whole lot.
That I hope I make you feel as comfortable as you made me feel.
That I hope you love me more
and will continue to love me
for a very long time.
That I am getting tired
and I wish two things could happen:
you be here to keep me awake
and you be here to wake up to,
after we fall into slumber.

I think a lot.

And then I began to see everything in detail:

Her arm around my neck
her nose buried on my cheek
her breath clinging on my skin
her hand tracing my face
the final trail of her fingers
and her steps pulling back.

The interminable look in her eyes before she sleeps
and her slightly open mouth.
The way she turned away
and the way she ran back to me.
The sound of her footfalls
the weight of her embrace
her pressing lingering scent
and her ******* crushing on my chest.
Her skin devouring my skin
and the time perishing in our hand.

The wave of her hair
the flaunt of its strands
the arch of her shoulders
the sway of her arms
the spaces between her legs
the years between her steps
her last endless glimpse
her back becoming walls
her sheer infinity
and the sound of the stars as it explode
one
by
one.

I stood there watching her warmth slowly disappear.
Because this is what it's like when someone who does not love you any longer
walks away.

While the afternoon is glum
I would draw my chair
and write my verse.

I would choose the words carefully.
I would calculate the space.
I would blend the atmosphere in all perfection,

and I would prop its truthfulness
until it is strong enough to stand beside your name
under this overcast sky.

In the corner of my room
stood a mirror
that had witnessed
our countless hideous crimes.

Even now,
I can still smell
your scent
lingering on the bedsheet.

I can still hear
your gasps
sitting in the air
like tiny atoms

composing my flesh
which had grown so
accustomed to the warmth
of your skin.

In front of the mirror
I stood
and the last thing I remember
is the tempting sneer

on the razor's edge.

Do you want to walk with me tonight?

I'll take you out;
we'll find stone walls.

I'll compose poems for you
and recite it in low, husky voice
while the wind trembles and
the pebbles shake beneath our steps.

I promise we'll stop when exhausted.
Catch our breath.
Laugh around.
Throw banters
to the stars.

Then maybe --
maybe --
kiss.

The night will adore us.

She must have come here in the pouring rain.
In the form of the pouring rain.
Falling down the roof.

Down you hair, if you’re outside. Down your temple, your face. Kissing your skin.

Reaching my skin, draped over my body like a warm blanket…
A wonderful thought.

You may not be aware of that single drop,
but she did kiss your skin before she fell down the pavement.

Like promises on your favourite park bench.

That sometimes
words are not enough.

Most of the time, actually.

Because people need reassurance, always.
And not just the ordinary kind
of reassurance.

It must be the kind that is certain,
that is constant
that never falters.

The kind that is strong enough to weather life's series
of resonant, unending storms.

It should be the kind
that people can hold on to, always.
Most especially in moments
when every bone inside them begins to shatter.

She bowed her head
and picked up the questions
which fell on her plate.

The fork was marked
with doubt of otherness
engulfing the atmosphere

as thousands hands
escaped from
the thousand rooms

while the walls
and the picture frames
and portraits

and windows
and tapestries
and candle-sticks

exhaled her name
and shook and screamed
for her to run.

You see,
the border of her dress is stained
and is filled with sand.

When someone takes a picture of me and asks me to smile,
I will think of you.

*I am in that flash,
that click of the camera,
one that lightly grazed your body,
captures your beauty.

I am holding you tightly to my chest,
my beating heart.

My ears pressed against the fabric of your clothes.
(No, you don't wear any clothes when sleeping)

Sorry, I will, for you,
when you arrive.*

So, my ears then,
pressed against the warmth of your skin.
Your heart beating my name.
You humming softly,
looking out the window,
watching the poundings of the rain.

It's a bit funny how the greatness of universities
from being the very institution
responsible for the cultivation of the critical mind
has been reduced to a mere store
retailing false assurance
and bits of paper.

What if the cure for cancer is just lurking somewhere,
somewhere in the head of someone
who happens not to have enough funds
to purchase the commodity
and privilege of education?

Dude! It ***** to be you. The ******* love of your life, you see, is prettily living her ******* life in a ******* kingdom by the ******* sea - with a man she just met in the gymn last Saturday - while you, you have your ******* left hand flat on your ******* parchment as you bury your head on the edge of the ******* otherness and curl your right into a ******* fist containing various worlds and stretches of forever.

Apart from curses, I have no other vices. My life is incredibly dull, you see? You have put me here atop your ******* tower overlooking the ******* ocean on my ******* own and then ******* killed me eventually.

How dare you composed a masterpiece out of my death you ******* *******!


*Your ******* Annabelle Lee,
to loved and be loved by me

Says the bird
restless on the stem
perching on her wrist.

And so I will make love
and as we devour our skin
as you bury your mouth on my neck
and as my whisper engulfes your cheek
I will scatter verses of Shakespeare
destroy John Keats
curse William Blake
lament over Sylvia Plath
disarray Bukowski
set Hemingway afire
annihilate Gaiman
and when the morning comes
I will disappear
and all that's left
will be the creases on your sheet
and the stars on your blanket
and it will remind you that last night
we danced on the shards
and wreckage of poetry.

It will break your ******* little heart.

Dearest.

I had spilt my coffee
on your working table.

The manuscript that you were finishing
flinched, yelled, bled painfully
then stared at me accusingly

doubting your existence which is
gracefully drowning in the fatal glow
of left-overs and world dropping dead.

Perhaps, after a long time,
your heart will take its beat tonight.

Your breath hung heavy between us,
rapid and dense
As your hands traversed
the fatal land of thousand songs.

And upon the river,
the stars descend and inquire about
the beginning of equinox
and the stretch of the sea.

Because in those hands consuming me,
I found all the certainties
needed by the hesitating days
and all retreating worlds.

Because if poetry has a face,
I found it in your palm
closing on my chest
like the wings of elusive butterflies.

This morning as I stroll along, I passed by two security guards carrying guns that could practically shatter
a person's head in a single bullet. Between them stood an ATM being refilled by a bank associate.

This is capitalism:
**An era when paper has more protection and value than human lives.

Flocks of birds
flew past overhead
and patched the clouds
which drift ceaselessly

on the interminable stretch
of the ocean and sky
that connects the passages
between you and me.

Today,
The waves rolled
and unrolled
and remembered your name.

Dear Anon,

******* for running away. I've waited so long under the tree, when the moon was waxing and waning, and when it was full. The flower's stem cloistered in palm tried to hide the growing anxiety that engulfed me as minutes became a long procession of hours.

That was the night when you ran away with the director. And I was there - I stayed there, and still loved you the morning after.

I guess, you will forever occupy a largest portion in my mind. That no matter what I do, I will not be able to shake off the memory of you running away and of me, waiting.

And just so you know, *****, I'm still waiting.
Even now.


*Barbons

Between the pages
I will dig your grave
and bury you.

Your promises will stand
scared and shaking
at the edge of otherness

And I will let them explode like stars
and in that fleeting glimpse
I will capture eternity.

I will force the spine;
seal it with iron-lead
and imprisoned poetry.

Then one day,
I will tear those pages
one by one

and fold its edges
one by one
until they become

a collection of unwanted airplanes
that I will crush on your chest
as we stand face to face.

It's weird
how most people
looked at love

as a field of peaches
during the harvest time

and not as two palm trees
trying to weather the storms
of the barren land.

You can love
anyone on the planet
And anyone on the planet
can love you.

But there are varying degrees of love.

Some love are meadows.
Some are graveyards.
Most, however,
are graveyards dressed as meadows.

But in either three,
all flowers are bound to perish.

If I were to conquer an arena in fiction writing,
it would be the field of morbidity.

Say,
human hearts strewn on the floor,
with spiders trailing on its artiries
while the entire room is screaming at you to run.