You tell me to grow a pear
Just so I can put the fruit between my lips and eat it.

You have stolen the one thing I thought I never had left to give,
And the funny thing is it was yours to begin with.

I put on my dress and smooth the creases under my eyes.
It just falls right, falls right on the curves of my hips
And hides the shadows between this rib caged heart.
For that moment, it reminds me less of myself
And more of you.

Alice sits beside the looking glass and touches her reflection
Breaking down beside the girl she cannot see is perfection.

There are times when the clock waltz's faster
And steps on her feet till she can't keep upright.
There are times when the clock stands still
And she looks into the eyes of the one thing she cannot master.

Stop trying to save the girl that isn't worth your pennies.

I don't want to be her background noise
Or the star she forgets to wish upon at night.
I don't want to be the frayed photograph
Left in draws to fad, left out of sight.
I will never be more than what I am
And what I fear is that is never enough.

Isn't it ironic that I need a map
To tell me what I left behind is still right in front of me?

There are empty pages that yearn for ink describing her loving caress.
There are empty beds that beg for the arch of her lower back.
I know which one I would rather fill.

She stood next to me in knickers and a t-shirt,
Needle and thread in hand with a grin between her legs.
"I will unstitch your heart" she said,
"And wear it on my sleeve so you never feel hurt again".

The girl never believed in science.
When asked why apples fall
She answered darling, even apples fall in love.
So she baked an apple pie to make her feel grounded, rooted;
She wanted to be consumed like the sea engulfs the mountain in a storm,
Like a core is mounted by those thirsty for the taste of something left unwholly , vulnerability caressing the bitterness left by someone else's lips, traces of time browning their soft edges.

The girl used to lie outstretched on hilltops each night to watch the moon sweep away the stars each morning so the sun could still shine.
If she shut her eyes and opened her mind
She could hear the moon waning "she'll never be mine"
for the sky is a canvas of desire, a constellation of lust that looks different to every lover.
Their wish is the same regardless of the star: that gravity will soon become the real reason their hearts begin to sink each time they see her hand in another's.
every day the girl shuts her eyes to talk to the sky as if she still believes that's where God lives, as if that is where hope is, and whilst shes on her knees her lovers kiss rises amidst the heat of another girls thighs, synchronising moans as if she has finally found one to call home.
maybe she has, but now the girl can't help but think she may drown in this ocean that is empty without its pull to the crash, that her stolen heart is now her lovers buried treasure, buried so deep that shes forgotten she even had it at all.

The girl sits at the windows pane knowing why it got its name hoping she will some day navigate her way to the only star she sees, the only name she breathes.
If only leaves remembered where they fell from.
If only gravity was the reason she fell.

For I fear I am no longer alive
But paralysed in desire.
The thought of your breath on
My pillow like sheets of unwritten music,
Lines no longer ironed straight,
This is the rope that tempts my fate
And throws me in the fire.

The fragility of female flesh,
The feminine depth within each pore
Hides a deep havoc beneath glowing embers,
A storm man fears and calls a *****.

There are times when I see her face in the moon,
And every time I see her there, I know she loves me too.

When she bent over to plant a kiss on parted lips
Her red hair fell and rested on my hips,
And as I prayed this moment would never stop
She whispered, "darling, I am the cherry on top".

She was an ordinary girl.
Plaits beside a waistline she drew on with ribbon,
Fastening her thoughts she'd sworn to keep hidden.

Behind closed doors she would loosen the noose
Man ******* before her,
And bind up her lover
The milkman's daughter.

She wasn't the kind of girl to wear lipstick or paint the town red.
She would ask me to kiss her and bite her lip instead.

"Breast stroke is the only way I can keep myself afloat"* she said,
*"So bind my hands. I want to drown in you."

Her lover told her, "I am organic".
She peeled off her skin and saw her bare
And lying there she pressed into her
Like flowers left under books
Forgotten, fleeting moments
Captured in time.

Do not touch yourself.
Your body is not yours to claim,
Reign in your securities
And tie them to the bedpost
A notch that your crotch will never

Remember,

Do not try to regain
The strength to stand up tall,
It only gives you a place to fall from.
If you hold your head up high
People will start looking what is inside.

Remember.

Only let others touch which is yours.
Now open your legs for a round of applause.

She was the girl who was made out of sugar.
Perfection crystallised in an hourglass figure
To be laced with ribbon around her small waist,
Pulling tighter on your chest, her bittersweet taste.

A nun whips me bare and broken
Against a wooden table Jesus once ate upon.
"Beg for forgiveness"
I get on my knees
and thank God for what I
am about to eat.

Will you be there when the sun paints a canvas of green?
Envelopes of colour closing in around my body,
A forgotten art form.A broken sculpture.
Wrap me up in a blanket of cellophane
And eat me like an evergreen bathes in gold.
Your seasonal fruit between bitten lips red
But when the leaves envy dances into passion
I wonder if we will be there to see it change.

She was the bottle that said "drink me"
And lifting up her dress I did just that.

If only she heard the water falling from my eyes
She would realise I am no longer alive.
If only she knew her kiss planted between open hips
Will wither away in this dark abyss.
If only I asked him to loosen his grip
Then maybe I could breathe without
Gasping
             for  
                  her
                        lips.

Do not tell me you love me,
Or speak sweet nothings in my ear.
Just spread my legs
So I forget that I'm here.

Lying beside the safety blanket of an open fire
You ask me why I am scared of the CD player.
A question no one dared to ask,
As if asking was like the warmth that
Would unravel me bare skinned
Limbs against floor boards
Revealing the things I hoard under
The loose fabric of a summer dress.

I confess to you them parts of me
You would never see unless you
Asked that single question.

I bite my lip, the tip of my tongue
Hoping it can charade its way out
Of these words, these words
I have been trying to drown,
to sink with sips of sauvignon blanc
Till I had dried the glass of myself clean, empty.

I bite my lip.

His eyes were like silver discs,
Scratched on the surface
Playing nothing but broken records
So no one could hear the fear inside my chest.
The melody of his muse would ring through my veins
so I shut my eyes,
Opened my thighs and I bit my lip
Drawing blood to my tastehah buds
To forget the thuds of his open palm
So no harm would come to me
If I forget to see, forget to breathe
Each night I would cry to the wake of the morning,
hoping tomorrow would never come.
For some, darkness is safer than light.

It wasn’t how they told me it would happen.
Slow, sober, a blur of moments
Woven together into a noose that would
Hang out my hope on the thread of a rope
And it wasn’t how they told me it would happen.
That I would go back to him when the darkness came.
That I would know it would always be the same
But I would never be the same again
He locked me in the closet for 6 hours,
Hands bound, mouth taped shut
And I never thought I would pray to stay locked away
I have never been so afraid
Waiting for the door to open to two discs
Reflecting the fear that was living in my heart.

I don’t know where to start.
Fear is an emotion that can scare you
to silence the secrets wrapped up in your lies
Beside the tears you keep in a jar for no one to see.
What is that bruise?
I fell in the shower.
Why are you bleeding?
Mother nature
Why are you not eating?
Im eating later
Why are you limping?
I am struggling to stand myself in the mirror
Can’t you see I am starving myself thinner and thinner
So please guess what is happening beneath this dress
My womb is ***** empty,
There is nothing left inside me to fill
Nothing left that is real
Can’t you see I am trying to **** myself before he does?

You ask me why I never told you.
I bite my lip-
This poem has been hidden beneath the
Smile I now wear, under my tongue
Within my lungs, inside my fingertips
That itch to write the truth
But I know if I say these words,
Unseal my lips, this story is real.
Tracing the lines he left on my body
I know he’s telling me to not pick up the pen
And that is exactly why I have picked up my pen.

I don’t want to condemn the people who ****,
Who try to escape the law
With threats to their victims
Hidden beneath words disguised as love
I don’t see myself as a victim anymore.
Him. He. That man. That boy.
He isn’t me.
I cannot blame myself for what happened.
You cannot blame yourself for what happened
Between closed doors, open alleys,
The bedroom in your own home
With your parents on the same floor.
People ask me why I am scarred
And I say these are not scars
These are my battle wounds
From a fight I thought I lost,
From a life I thought I tossed aside
From a time when I didn’t know if I was even alive anymore.
I didn’t survive, I am tired of being told
I am lucky to be alive to survive to be normal
The sad thing is, this is what is becoming normal
for too many women and men
and when are we going to make it stop?
Stop is a word so many know too well.

My ****** still lives in my bones.
He’s made it his home to roam,
To decorate and play the same song
Each night over and over and over.
I never invited him in.
I couldn’t escape my ****
But maybe it could have been prevented
If we teach our children what it means to have consented
That consent cannot be confused with silence
Why are children still not being taught
That ****** violence should never be silenced?
Instead of questioning what I was wearing
We need to start caring that 1 in 6 are sexually abused,
we have got used to a culture where we remove
a persons right to question whether this is normal.
This is not normal.
This is never normal.

When are we all going to stand up and say stop.
We need to stand up and say stop.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2q3IPH7SE0

Whispers and rings
you promise to bring,
that is what our love is made of.
Whips and wails
and back scratching nails,
that is what our lust is made of.

You are my cup of tea.
*And you are the sugar that kills me.

Turn me over like your favourite novel.
Run your fingers along my spine.
Bite your lip at your favourite parts
Then read between my lines.

Do not run from the sun, the bluebird said,
Your feet will unravel, leaving nothing but thread.

Then lend me your wings , she said in reply,
And we'll fly to a place where the shadows don't lie.

The scent of her skin is the sweetest perfume,
A sentiment left, leaving traces of you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2q3IPH7SE0