I want to be
an unforgettable thought
in your beautiful mind.

Love is an art.

And I can barely
draw you a stick figure.

I am afraid,
in a way I haven't been before.

I am afraid
of the way people fall out of the sky,

I am afraid
of the way people disappear into the sea

without saying goodbye;
Suddenly the loss
feels like a snake

slithering from across the room;
venom in his blood
and names on his tongue.

I am afraid
of the way people find themselves
at the bottom of the barrel.

And I
am scraping
at the end of it.

She asks me “what do you think of me?”
I stop;
Reflect upon what just happened,
When a complexity of a girl
Asks a simple guy
What he thinks about her.

She asks me “what do you like about me?”
I’ll tell you what I hate;
I don’t hate your eyes,
Like round circles we used to make
With our dancing bodies
In preschool playgrounds.
I don’t,
Hate your lips;
They could be traced
From a million miles
And they curve so beautifully.
I don’t hate your smile,
The semi grins you keep
Before the flashes,
Before the posts;
I don’t hate your eyes,
Like bullets entering the soul
With an insertion of dopamine.

She asks me “do you really think I am worth your troubles?”
You are not.
You deserve my delight;
You deserve my green days and blooming flowers,
You deserve my watering mouth
Nourishing the vines underneath your tongue,
You deserve the sunrises in my playlists
And sunsets in the warmth of my jackets;
You are not worthy of my troubles
I am not worthy of my troubles.

She pushes me away,
The walls are too tight
And the stares,
They scrape on our throats.
The girl is lonely,
Her social circle spreads wide enough
To leave a gap;
Her friends walk next to her
And not on her side;
Her smiles-
Electronic cigarettes that look genuine,
But the smoke never rests
On the teeth,
Just a vapor that fades away.
She’s anchored to her reality
Her ships are not meant to sail
Just yet.

She asks me “what do you think of me?”
You’re a concept;
You’re a fusion of vivid elements
Wired with secret buttons
Hidden in your desires.
You’re an emotional rollercoaster
That we ride
You and I,
When I think of you
You’re just a white canvas
That whispers into my soul
The true meaning of art.

She asks me “is this your real answer?”
She ask me “is this your real answer?”

She approached me
Tiptoeing from across the room,
Although no one was asleep around us to wake;
I watched her lower lip bleed
From biting too much,
As she deciphers the DNA codes on her hair
With her fingertips,
Stroking the life out of it
Up and down-
And up and down again.
She said don’t get me wrong
But I found myself;
I found myself lurking underneath the light of your words
Bending with your o’s and standing straight with your I’s,
Because I
Got lost;
I got lost in the stories you wrote
About the girls who broke
And they felt just like me-
Dazed
By the love poems you cried down for her,
And I wondered how beautiful she must be.
I got flustered
In the blank spaces
That you chose not to write in,
And it felt like I should cut parts of myself
And add them in the vacancies
But I just don’t know what to add.
For every time I rest my soul
On the tip of a pen
I feel like I’ve said too much,
And every time I scratch my words
Throw away my being
Behind
Unread books and dusty light stands
I believe I haven’t said enough
For I could give more,
Be more,
If only I could start over,
And you
You seem to know me more than I know myself;
You have built bridges
Out of my paper shreds,
Tunnels out of my unexpressed thoughts-
You have created your haven inside my brains
And settled down in my heart.
You’ve managed to make me chew your words
Like breakfast
Was a poetic meal to be served
At all times of the day;
You’re an image,
I re-create you in my mind
Before I sleep
After asleep
And even during I sleep-
The thoughts of you never quit my head
Like a gamer would never quit
A game of Warcraft
In the midst of hunting season”
She took off her glasses,
And I could see the marks of them
Being there for too long.
She closes her eyes
As if she was about to take a leap of faith,
But instead she leaped two steps into my arms
And that was when
I got to ask her
What her name was.
And that was when I realized
It didn’t even matter.

You forgot your pictures
On forgotten bed side tables
In the back of my brains.
I was supposed to sleep two hours ago,
But I was busy tracing the tracks
You’ve crossed with your fingers on my skin;
And when I reach the end of the map
I don’t find a treasure
Instead I find your dead cells
Lurking on my shoulders
Like dust lurking on my book shelves,
Like tanned blondes stretching on the sea shore,
Like red and blue highlights that you’ve kept for so long.
I found your sea shelled bracelets
And 3 fingered rings exciting,
I found the simplicity of you wearing no necklace soothing,
But I knew that I was at the peak of a roller coaster ride-
When everything slows down,
When that loose feeling of safety
Tingles up your spine
And stays long enough
To amplify the shock of falling suddenly.
I picked up a flower shaped safety pin
And as soon as I brought it close enough to smell
Your grenades exploded in my face.
Instead of shattering,
I blew up into a thousand words
That can make oceans of me ,
And instead of you swimming
You learned how to drown;
Avoid my words,
Swim through the sharks and create jewels out of my sea shells
Till I become just another
Pendant from your arms,
Or glitter on the corners of your backpack
Where you hanged memories you force outside
Because the demons inside are not on good terms,
Because the demons inside of you are screeching
But you don’t want the world to hear;
Yet you left your pictures on my bed site tables,
And you meant to keep a retraceable mark of you on my hands
And you want me to come back,
But your mines were too dangerous.
Your mood swings
Flew me over the bushes,
Your cigarette smoke, filtered in my lungs
Made it hard for me to breath out the words “I love you”,
Your eyes are my only solace
But sometimes,
It takes less effort to exit home
Than to stay in it.