think of all the people you've ever met,
and all the conversations that have ever left an impact on you.
think of all the thoughts that those words prompted in you,
and all the actions they led to,
which went and touched more people than you can count.
innumerable words and thoughts,
little cosmic representations of the
souls of people touching us
every.single.day.
your life is forever and inexplicably interconnected with a million others.

pinecones are
childhood summers spent tripping over the syllables of dense forests
folded somewhere between real world Europe and my very real imagination,
nestled against each other on bookshelves made of pinewood -
a childhood game of hide and go seek pressed in photo albums
where a version of me lived;
a version of me who delighted my mother and father,
a version who to me remains a stranger -
smiling gap toothed, shoes in snow boots,
sticky fingers pressing pine cones against her nose -

the present, a fragrance;
the future, a rolling pine forest.

pinecones are what the years between 17 and 19 felt like
in perennial wanderlust,
soul spliced into shards trying to make sense of
everything I felt and everything I thought;
everything I needed and everything I still want.
pine cones perfume the edges of a dream
dipped in the streams and stories of far-off lands,
pine cones are the crutches of a crippled mind
still building a new home for itself
in the basements of other people’s hearts.

pinecones are
platforms which I danced from,
leaping limber, slaying fear, the win always near;
pine cones are a reminder that while
a man can break his shoulder trying to tear one from the tree,
the true mark of bravery lies in how well you can break free.

pine cones are
the skeletons upon which hang the colourless drapes of my future
before stepping into galactic puddles that splash colour
all over every unmade plan,
memories’ strands shining technicolour through translucent skin -
the touch of your fingers no longer feel like sins.

pine cones are young green and supple,
seeds of love lust and chance encounters
that blaze into fiery shades of yellows and oranges,
every colour turning a tinge darker, a daily time marker;
pine cones are what remain, dark and unyielding
after a lifecycle of fires starting
and dying
within the embers of consciousness.

and somewhere in-between
i'm okay and it's fine
i lost myself.

when i was young,
i only lived
between the pages of a book
between the words of a sentence
between Privet Drive and Baker Street
between bookstores and libraries
where I did not have to speak
to make friends;
where I made friends
who would not leave,
where I could leave
and return to see
that nothing had changed;
nothing, except me,
but only a little.

now that i’m older
i’ve been twice
to the other side and back;
i think i’d also like to live
between time zones and skylines
between silken sheets on starry nights
between your fingers and your eyes,
where conversations are passports
to other worlds in
in other hearts beating
in other bodies;

if only for just a little.

who cares*
how brightly
the sun shines?
all I need
is to be
enveloped
by the depth of
the elusive
night.

The only trouble with expectation is,
it crawls invisibly into your skull and
paints vivid pictures in your brain and
promises your heart happiness and
gets you to actually trust someone and
makes you wait for something you should be able to give yourself (but can't) and
snakes around your chest and
crushes you with its full weight when
it
doesn't
happen

oops, did I say 'only'?

if there is an experiment to determine ways
of permanently doing away
with this everyday weight that is
depression,
i volunteer.
take me first.

take me first
before i send myself away.

no one really forgets
what hands look like
dripping in red.

"until death do us apart!"*
declared innocence.
"until time do you apart"*,
whispered wisdom.

you're my favourite novel without an ending;
a story i'll never tire of hearing.

i like writing you poetry -
at 2 am, night lights glowing through
rain streaked windows, i listen to the city
and wish you'd listen to me.

i like writing you poetry -
angsty little love notes where
every word betrays the cool countenance
i otherwise wear on my face when
we're warring with our words but
teasing with our tongues.

i like writing you poetry -
it's where i can tell you the stories
that belong to the dead of the night
and the dead of my heart.

i like writing you poetry -
because it's the only way
i can tell you that i love you
*without you ever having to know.

of course* i want to die
i think of it every
second every minute every hour.

and now you've all begun to
ask questions,
whisper behind my back, she
looks dead;
has the lord of the underworld staked
his claim over
me *already?

we’re the cool girls of this generation,
the ones with the words ‘i .cannot. give. a. ****’
slashed across us in bold red,
the little lies we tell ourselves to go to bed,
instead of spending midnight hours strung on the edge
unable to seek behind or storm ahead.

the ones who fell asleep
to the sound of constant yelling, artillery shelling; bitter bullets exploding
into ugly bruises splattered across still skinny limbs,
shifting stories of anger and frustration, guilt and regret
expressed across inches of innocent skin;
the ones whose clothes were just a little bit frayed on the edges
the wear and tear of secret battles
fought behind sunset alleys,
behind midnight tea stalls
or on bright Sunday afternoons
at the bus stand,
desperately fighting hungry eyes and hungrier hands.

we’re the cool girls of this generation -
the ones with the
red tips red lips
red ribs red wrists.

we’re the cool girls of this generation -
the ones that house boys in our hearts and
smoke in our lungs,
the ones who spend way too much time inside their own head,
asking a hundred questions before every step in this game of wizarding chess that
never seems to slow down -

we’re the ones that can be found
wandering insomniac across sulphur-sodden streets,
wisps of distant wishes
settling into the foggy vestiges
of a high mind longing to soar higher.

we’re the cool girls of this generation
the one that are still allowed just the right rationing of
action emotion expression complication communication
while wearing a constant resting not-so-***** face
head sorting information in a frenzied daze,
heart swinging between your fingers and a suitcase -

the ones with one foot in the present and
other parts traversing through parallel dimensions,
searching for a back up plan if your hearts refuse to allow us home;
the ones whose mouths became graveyards
for all the words that went unsaid,
for all the words to which we came undone,
for all times your eyes asked us questions that we shunned

we’re the cool girls of this generation -
the ones that belong to roads unknown and bodies untouched,
the ones that find stories in shipwrecked planks
that ride stormy oceans only to find homes
or perhaps even build them -
amidst the crumbling sand castles on the sea shore.

because we’re the cool girls of this generation -
the ones with the
*red tips red lips
red ribs red wrists.

we do not have to beg and plead
to meet with our Gods in mosques and temples.
holy isn’t the space between stone pillars and walls -
holy is the absolute power of our ***,
holy is the space between our legs.
we do not have to hide and disguise
the pain of a hundred muscles writhing and twisting
and sneak into warm kitchens to feed cold stomachs
after hours;
a pounding heartbeat
marking every second stolen to steal food
from a home that is just as rightfully ours.

we do not have an obligation to remain
a glassy lake that lies still throughout the storm,
pleasing every passerby with a picture of themselves;
the narcissists and egotists can go straight to hell.
we do not have to cut our lips on our teeth
by setting our default response to a ‘yes’
when every cell in our bodies unite to protest.

we do not have to pretend to smile at the
uninvited embraces of unwelcome hands and eyes.

because no holy man in a holy temple that exiles women
deserves to rub his filthy hands over the valleys and mountains
of goddesses cast in stone,
and no tradition can lead to the starvation
of a woman who has to bleed if she is to live.
lakes do not stay serene in a storm, they do not surrender;
they bend over backwards and swallow the horror.

you see?
we do not
we absolutely do not
have to
need to
or be forced to
do anything at all -
unless we
really, really
want to.

word by word,
i strengthen the walls of
the immense fortress i've
build to safeguard myself as
moment by moment,*
i begin to
unravel.

So
will I
ever get to
be with you in
the bright sunlight, or is
The idea of you and me a concept -
Two people who are only
allowed to be with
each other in
the dark
*night?

if
i had things
go my way, then
right now, you and i
we'd be screaming through the
mountain air, hanging upside down
on a cord made of bravery and love, we'd
dance
under the
naked moonlight,
waterfalls calling out
in the distance; i'd have
my hands around your neck and
legs tight around your waist as we paused
between the slipping rocks to steal each other's
breath away.
if
i had
things go my way,
baby, we'd take on the world
together; with a sky full of secrets
watching over us as we make memories
(and love)*
all over this world.

i lost it
to the mountains, that night when
the fireplace consumed log after log
throwing orange red and yellow
across the underground walls, and
the river rushed above us
winter wonderland;
where three feet beds of snow
kiss jagged glacier lips and
bleed rivers.

i lost myself
that night, with you
(to you)
*in the mountains.

my hands would like to thank your hands
for the time we were drunk out of our minds
but your hands knew enough
to hold, not grab
to hold, not push
to hold,
and hold on.

my hands would like to thank your hands
for being constants, not variables.
for having a thermostat so perfect,
holding hands is like entering
a fire-warmed cabin
after a snowstorm -
and you’re the only light around for miles.

but most importantly,
my hands
would like to thank your hands
for keeping other things from my hands;
things that shouldn’t be found in hands,
like the last cigarette
or a sharp pointy object -

and the last time
it was desperation that
got the better of me;

and not your hands.

little drops of me start
melting into the velvet skies,
i'm a hot sticky
dark and twisty
mess that needs to
go away into the
mysteries of the night.

2010
learned to swim in an ocean filled with
jellyfish that didn’t sting,
seashells,
and more hands than i needed to hold
in a party that of more than four,
our brand new family strung together with salt water.
this time, everything is for the last time.

2011
this
is the
first ever time
my decisions are the
children of orphaned thoughts.
they swing across canyons of hope
attached to no rope.
reality is a maze with no roadmap.

2012
there is so much lesser now, than there used to be,
there is also so much more now, than there used to be.
somewhere nestled inbetween is satisfaction.

2013
today, my heart joined the gym.
the mission? twenty seconds of bravery.

2014
mission accomplished.
twenty minutes of bravery,
here i come.

2015
there was a time before.
there will be a time after.
from today, there is no going back.

2016
the trek has led to
an obstacle course.
let the games begin.

worn hands
stained red from dead
remnants of animals;
old wife still finds
love there.

and maybe we spend
our entire lives
running away from
our greatest fears
*only to have them consume us in the end.

it hurts to write down
all the words i feel.
memory is a blade,
slashing through the numbed skin;
i bleed in thoughts.

by now i
should have could have would have
had all parts of me
in words
scattered all across the cyberspace
grabbing eyeballs from
all continents.

but without my voice
i'm struggling,
(my wings have been slashed),
its been
days
weeks
months,
*i cannot write.

and every time
you break my heart,
i learn to bleed
in *prettier patterns.

thrice already bungee jumped / said with much pride,
but haven't yet learnt
to not carry knots of tension in my shoulders
to not clench my teeth together in terror
to not dig trails of red into my palms
with chewed down nails
and not trap stale air in my lungs until they nearly explode
let them turn the colour of rotting grapes as
every last molecule of oxygen leaks from my nose

when all I want is for my muscles to let loose
let go
for my feet to stop clawing (desperately and at the very last second)
to every ledge and corner
because these hands
and these lungs,
these thighs,
these eyes
and this heart
wants
to go
away -

far, far away, like that land from the fairytale
my mother read to me at night
to send me away
(just like Hansel and Gretel's mother did
when her bones got leaner
like my mother's is getting, now)
into a land she could only send me to -
never follow.

my letting go was the paradox
of sunshine on a snowy mountain,
a mother's lies to her children -
"I'm okay",
"It doesn't matter", -
my letting go
let go
only to slink back between the sheets
and hold you close.
my letting go
wears love in its eyes
stitches in hope from the sky
and prays for what was let gone
to come back;
else, you were never mine to begin with
but i, i am now yours,
(and only yours)
until the very end.

your eyes with questions dripping off them;
we need to talk.
too late;
*i've forgotten how to.

i love these
ribbons of smoke that
you weave around
my vision,
igniting shiny bursts of
colour in the dark.

home is
city lights sparkling bright
across the seas and into
the stars of the sparkly nights.
home is
waves thundering into the
shore, welcoming me
back into their frothy
arms,
home is
where I'll drown
to my happy end.
home is
silky blue candles
throwing yellow shadows
across our entwined bodies,
home is
where I'll
give myself to you.
home is
where I'm
not afraid to be
me.