I first met you at a tiny cafe that served awful coffee but was comfortable to me. Something about the walls in that place, something about the rough texture that I really liked. Often when I sat there alone, I would run my fingers along the uneven, grainy lines on the wall and it would feel pleasant.

You wanted to meet in the afternoon, which was strange to me because most men would conveniently want to meet for dinner and drinks. I usually have it all planned out, almost like a ritual. I ask the person to meet at this particular bar that I am familiar with and I always get there before they do. I order myself a whiskey-soda so that I am tipsy enough to bare sharing conversation with a complete stranger. When they finally arrive, I greet them with a big smile and a compliment. "You look great!" I'd say. They would be flattered and get comfortable. The date usually ends up with me sleeping with them and never calling them again. Sometimes, I do call but only to sleep with them again. Nothing more, nothing less.

So when you wanted to meet in the afternoon at a coffee shop, it threw me off guard. I was an anxious mess when I got there also because you had reached the café before I did. I do not remember most of our conversation that day because I was having an anxiety overdose through out our date but I do remember, that you were wearing a sky blue shirt because I had told you about my obsession with all the shades of blue. I remember talking about how bad the coffee was, making paper boats out of tissues and prolonged eye contact that made me more anxious and soothed me at the same time.

You were leaving the city for a couple months on the day after the day we met, so we decided to meet again the next day for a movie. It was a wonderful movie but the lounge chairs were too big and it felt like we were sitting so far apart. Every now and then, I would try to look at you from the corner of my eye and I'd laugh too when I would hear you laugh. I usually get dizzy when I stand after I have sat down for more than an hour, so I held onto your arm to prevent myself from falling when we were getting out of the movie theater. I took you to the bar I really liked and I had a couple of ***** drinks and you had a beer. I was tipsy soon and the candle at our table looked hazy, among other things.

We left the bar, swaying and laughing. "I don't want to go home yet." I told you. "Me neither." you said, looking into my eyes like you really meant it. I suggested we go to the beach. We did. I remember the calming sound of the ocean and your voice... It was a beautiful melange. We walked along the shore, back and forth, talking. "I really like your hands." I thought and maybe even said aloud, as I traced your palms with my fingertips. We kissed that night and before you dropped me home, you promised to meet me in the morning, the next day before you left for the airport.

I had lit candles at my tiny apartment and organized my journals and canvas boards, to make it seem a little tidy. We sat on my couch and awkwardly smiled at each other at intervals while we talked about random things. I remember us holding hands and talking, looking into each other's eyes. We made beautiful, blurry, enchanting love that evening. The room was filled with the low evening light from my window and the sound of us breathing. I loved every facet of the time I spent with you.

While we lay on the narrow bed, when you were holding my hand that was on your chest just minutes before we got dressed again and you left. You asked me if I would wait for you and I pondered about it for a moment before asking you if you wanted me to wait for you...

I am glad both answers were, yes.

Darling, I have been thinking of you
Lying sleepless in my warm bed,
Waiting for my sedative to
Cradle me to sleep.
I have been picturing you in a dark room,
Fast asleep next to your baby. And
The sight of your chest rising and falling
Is comforting to me.
You scare me, darling. I'm scared of the
decieve in your eyes, at times.
But there you are, right now
Your body sinking in your cold mattress
With your eyes closed and mouth half open, here, you are only a boy
Lost in this terrifying world. And
Here I am,
Traveling in my nocturnal state of mind,
To where I am most at peace.
And now, you are awake,
And I have fallen asleep.
Probably,
Forgotten each one of these words.

I remember the first time
When I knew what drowning felt like
It was in the gaze of his seashore eyes
And it would only be a lie,
If I said I tried hard enough to breathe.
It wouldn't be half true,
If I told you,
It wasn't more time that I wanted in his
Restless breathing waves,
Crashing against my collarbone.
His grasp like ocean currents that
Keep my arms as if in shackles,
No matter how hard I tried.
His fingers like, seawater
Seeping between my thighs.
Sinking in the sleepless ocean of his
Broad shoulders enveloping my skin and bones. I found home,
In his unloving stares and his need to only destroy me.
It's beautiful that he exists; as a seashore
Drenched in rain.
The first time I learnt what drowning felt like,
I didn't want to breathe again.

Love, you're lying awake at night
With your thoughts as tangled
As your curly hair
And your eyes, they are blinking away
In the darkness of today.
Love, you just don't say
How their stares drain you
Or how restless your heart is.
Instead, you
Paint that seamless smile
And blink away the night.
Love, you are magnificent
But do you realize?
That it is art, the way
You walk across a room,
Live in those long showers or
Lift your arms to tie your hair.
Times when you stare,
At ghosts from your memory
And nothingness.
You look like you belong
Anywhere but here.
Now, you are lying awake at night
Like an unmoving ocean
And I wish I could put you together
Like a jigsaw but for now
I'd rather wish for you,
Sleep.

Are you gone?
I can't hear you in my head,
Anymore.
It is unsettling to wear clothes that don't smell like you.
I have been stroking my arm with closed eyes
But it is not even close to feeling like yours
And that makes me sad.
Makes me mad that
Time flows and men go and
It is so strange that it at all matters.
Now I am staring at old buildings,
Thinking of your skin in low light,
Your face when you close your eyes
And wondering,
If you still wake up at dawn?
Tell me,
Are you gone?

I'm lying next to him,
Midst sweat soaked sheets and heavy breaths.
My small room painted in the last shade of an evening
and his perfume.
There is more to this man than his honey glazed skin or the white shirt that he had slid off of his shoulders.
Secrets in the shape of his hands and the roughness of his palms against my fingertips.
With his half hearted smiles, his melancholy he hides at the seams of the curve of his lips.
There is more to this man,
Than how he lowers his voice when he walks around, talking on the phone.
Something about his bonfire eyes and the sweet disguise of an ocean of lonliness.
He is not like sunday morning, deep breaths in the shower or anything that says— home.
He is instead,
Like bitter coffee, or like thunderstorm keeping you awake at night.
What is it about his tireless stares, his mysterious eyes or the lies that I don't understand?
Lying next to him,
Midst sweat soaked sheets and lazy nudges
I can't help but wonder—
There is more to this man.

I have lived like this for a longtime now.
Brewing tea at four am's,
watching the duet of my heartbeat and the flickering blue flame in the darkness of my kitchen.
So many nights that turned into mornings at the blink of my rose lit eyes.
Sitting at the same spot on the couch, trying to look through the fishnet skies.
From tea to coffee to cigarettes to joints to big sips of whiskey-cola.
Running away from addictions, time to time.
Running away from places and people before they could form a thought about me.
I live in a prison that I create for myself. Cancelling plans, dodging phone calls and avoiding eye contact.  
Getting drunk and making love to strangers that,
may or may not remember me.
Worrying.  
Worrying about what the world has come to and what my country is doing wrong and about all the innocent people that suffer everyday.
I am worried about my education and the future.
Also,  the life that I am creating for myself.
Worried about the dishes that I still haven't done,  
the mess around me that is growing like wildfire
or the whole minute that I haven't blinked.
I have lived like this for a longtime. Paranoid.  
Looking through the crack in the curtains and at lit windows in far away buildings.
At the dark patches in the sky where the stars aren't there.
Scared that the man in the television has looked into my eyes for too long and that the song playing is too relatable.
Too long have I been scared to now feel anything that is considered normal.
I have lived in my world of anxiety,  irrational fears and slow dancing curtains for too long to smile, laugh and love and not be it just half hearted.
But there is still hope for me in,
Quiet midnight's of making tea and
The one who stares back at me,
through the fishnet skies.