I can't sleep
Everytime I remember your words
They snap and recoil
And hurt me awake
Next time when someone
Promises me forever
I'll just smile
Look them in the eyes and ask
How long is forever to you.

We lost ourselves
Somewhere in the sands of time
We lost sight
Forgot where we were
Who was there and why
I waited on every reply
Every word you wrote
Crack addict wishing for another dose
Withdrawals 10 times over
You were my best friend
All I wanted
All I could need
Therapist to self inflicted scars
Motivator of my soul
Yet you stripped it from me
When you said goodbye
We lost each other
And neither one bled more
Then the emotions that blossomed
Still in bloom
On sunny days
When I read your words again

We are waiting
at the foot of the stairs.
All afternoon
you have been hidden from sight
as women fidget with your hair,
paint your face with the latest brands
to make you more beautiful
than you already are
but say you are not.

The boy you have chosen
for tonight, this season, this life,
fiddles with his wrist,
impatient as the clock scuttles
towards seven, when you’ll
and he’ll be free.
The evening unfilled,
but no doubt dancing
will be involved, a kiss
under the lights.
What you could be doing
may keep me up half the night.

I shall not judge him.
I know his folks
and they’re good people.
I think over dinner once you said
he was on the basketball team.
A Bulls fan if I recall.
We don’t speak much.
He is merely doing what I once did,
eyes on the time,
suit and tie and the shimmer
of gel scraped through the hair.

When you arrive
the obligatory pictures are taken.
A smile, wide, a drizzle
of jewellery, a cyan dress.
He’s beaming, and why wouldn’t he.
Goodbyes charged with meaning
flicker in the room like lazy moths.

It’s seven when you depart
and on the sofa in the front room
I know this is the beginning
of the end, when you’ll say to me
you are no longer a kid
but of course, we both know,
you haven’t been for a long time.

(read forward, then backward, line by line)

I ran.
Not knowing what else to do
There was so much blood on my hands
It was mine
The kitchen knife
Caught in my chest
Guilt
Consumed by
Fear
I was heightened by
Adrenaline
But running on
Wasn’t enough
While trying to stay calm,
Losing control
It was me that would end up
Dead. Because
He was
In front of me
The whole time
It was too late
Trapped
I found myself
Locked in chains
My fate was
Death.

are holding hands.
I think
they think they are
in love,
in the eye
of a glorious storm,
with aisles of x’s
in text messages,
a wink that suggests
anywhere but here
is better.

The babies of
this century,
maked-up more
than the generation before,
flecks of snow
in a blizzard
of pimples and kisses,
condoms and phones.
There is no jealousy,
just a shift in the times,
a jolt in the system
of snotty noses and whispers.

They look happy, at least.
Love, or something like it,
a blossom in their lungs.
Now, I wonder,
walking,
if they know what comes.

Then there’s the attire.
You spend hours checking yourself out
in the mirror, the drool across the floor,
******* of your dress
and the ******* smothered in lace.

Step back, look at that face.
The realisation seeping in
like blood into a bandage
that you are almost ready.
A cast of a hundred or so
seen-once-in-two-years
with eyes on your eyes,
the cold finger ringless for
just a few seconds more.

Here it is then, the moment when
you settle down
as a child clambering into bed
for a parent-read tale.
You have chosen this man
with this face and these hands
and he will do.
The search cannot be continued.

In one month, an argument.
In one year, a child
after the umpteenth round
of relatives' questions.
The story writes itself
and oh how plain it seems,
the predictability like gone-off milk
makes you want to gag.
But, you say, it’s how it goes.
How it goes.

The woman asks if it’s the one.
You’re flummoxed for a second -
the dress or the man?
Yes, you reply.
I think so.

petrichor hour
colour bundles
on the windowsill
amber and blood
blood and amber petals
flecked with blobs
of rain

child chases the dog
by the love-lies-bleeding
amaranth ponytails
a rainbow somewhere
hemispheres of dandelions
breeze-swing
wet dog chases child

I thought about texting you last night to tell you I cheated on you
To tell you I was sorry and it was so wrong of me
To tell you how I cried every night for 4 months because he didn’t even love me back
To tell you I was a heartbreaker and I caused myself just as much distress
To tell you he was not you and it always made me feel sick
To tell you I was just sixteen what did I know about love then?

I thought about texting you last night to tell you I cheated on you
Just so I could feel some kind of emotion from you at all
Just so I could see if you even thought about me still
Just so I could try to validate what I am feeling now
Just so I could clench my fists onto the thought that maybe we could work it out
Just so I could try to feel anything again in these cold and lonely apartment walls