He had been away. Just a few days, but long enough to feel coming home was necessary. He carried with him so many thoughts and plans, and the inevitable list had already formed itself. But the list was for Monday morning. He would enjoy now what he could of Sunday.

Everything can feel so different on a Sunday. Travel by train had been a relaxed affair for once, a hundred miles cross-country from the open skies of the Fens to the conurbations of South Yorkshire. Today, there was no urgency or deliberation. Passengers were families, groups of friends, sensible singles going home after the weekend away. No suits. He seemed the only one not fixated by a smart phone, tablet or computer. So he got to see the autumn skies, the mountain ranges of clouds, the vast fields, the still-harvesting. But his thoughts were full to the brim of traveling the previous November when together they had made a similar journey (though in reverse) under similar skies. They had escaped for two days one night into a time of being wholly together, inseparably together, joined in that joy of companionship that elated him to recall it. He was overcome with weakness in his body and a jolt of passion combined: to think of her quiet beauty, the tilt of her head, the brush of her hair against his cheek. He longed for her now to be in the seat opposite and to stroke the back of her calf with his foot, hold her small hand across the table, gaze and gaze again at her profile as she, always alert to every flicker of change, took in the passing landscape.

But these thoughts gradually subsided and he found himself recalling a poem he had commissioned. It was a text for a verse anthem, that so very English form beloved by cathedral and collegiate choral directors of the 16th C (and just that weekend he had been in such a building where this music had its home). He had been reading The Five Proofs for the Existence of God from the Summa Theologica by Thomas Aquinas, knowing this scholar to have been a cornerstone of the work of Umberto Eco, an author he admired. He had also set a poem that mentioned these Five Proofs, and had set this poem without knowing exactly what they were. He recalled its ending:

They sit by a lake where dead leaves
Float and apples lie on a table. She
ignores him and his folder of papers

but I found later the picture was called
‘In Love’, which coloured love sepia.
Later still, by the time I sat with you,

Watched your arm on the back of a chair
And your hand at rest while you told me
Of Aquinas and his proofs for the existence

Of God I realised love was not always
Sepia, that these hands held invisible
Keys, were pale because the mind was aflame.

He remembered then the challenge of reading Aquinas, this Dominican friar of the 13C. It had stretched him, and he thought of asking his wordsmith of thirty years, the mother of his daughters, to bring these arguments together in a poetic form for him to set to music. She had delivered such a poem and it took him some while to grasp it wholly. He wondered for a moment if he actually had grasped it. But there was this connection with the landscape he was passing through. She had mentioned this, and now he saw it for his own eyes. She had been to Ely for the day, to walk the length of the great Cathedral, to stare at and be amongst the visible past, the past of Aquinas. He remembered the first verse as only a composer can who has laboured over the scheme of words and rhythms:

The Argument from Motion

Everything in the world changes.
A meadow of skewbald horses grazes
Beneath a pair of flying swans
And the universe is different again.

And no sooner is potency reduced to act,
By a whisker’s twitch or a word,
A word, that potent gobbet of air
Than smiles and tears change places.

And everything has changed. Back
Go the tracks beyond seen convergence
To a great self-sufficient terminus
Which terminus we might call God.

And so it was in such a spirit of reflection that his journey passed. He had joined the Edinburgh express at Peterborough to travel north, and the landscape had subsided into a different caste, still rural, but different, the fields smaller, the horizon closer.

Alighting from the train in his home city on a Sunday afternoon the station and surrounding streets were quiet and the few people about were not walking purposefully, they strolled. He climbed the flights of stairs to his third floor studio, unlocked the door and immediately walked across the room to open the window. Seagulls were swooping and diving below him, feeding off the detritus of the previous night’s partying in the clubs and pubs that occupied the city centre, its main shopping area removed to a mall off kilter with the historic city and its public buildings. What shops there were stood empty, boarded up, permanently lease for sale.

Sitting at his desk he surveyed the paper trail of his work in progress. Once so organised, every sketch and plan properly labelled and paginated, he had regressed it seemed to filling pages of his favoured graph paper in a random fashion. Some idea for the probably distant future would find its way into the midst of present work, only (sometimes) a different ink showing this to be the case. Notes from a radio talk jostled with rhythmic abstracts. He realised this was perhaps indicative of his mental state, a state of transience, of uncertainty, a temporariness even.

He was probably too tired to work effectively now, just off the train, but the sense and the relative peacefulness that was Sunday was so seductive. He didn’t want to lose the potential this time afforded. This was why for so many years Sunday had often been such a productive day. If he went to meeting, if he cooked the tea, if he ironed the children’s school clothes for the week, there was this still space in the day. It represented a kind of ideal state in which to think and compose. Now these obligations were more flexible and different, Sunday had even more ‘still’ space, and it continued to cast its spell over him.

He put his latest sketches into a sequential form, editing on the computer then printing them out, listening acutely, wholly absorbed. Only a text message from his beloved (picking blackberries) brought him back to the time and day. There was a photo: a cluster of this dark, late summer fruit, ripe for picking framed against a tree and a white sky. Barely a week ago they had picked blackberries together with friends, children and dogs and he had watched her purposely pick this fruit without the awkwardness that so often accompanied bending over brambles. He wondered at her, constantly. How was this so? He imagined her now in her parents’ garden, a garden glowing in the late afternoon light, as she too would glow in that late-afternoon light . . . he bought himself back to the problem in hand. How to make the next move? There was a join to deal with. He was working with the seven metrics of traditional poetry as the basis for a rhythmic scheme. He was being tempted towards committing an idea to paper. He kept reminding himself of the music’s lie of the land, the effectiveness of it so far. It was still early days he thought to commit to something that would mark the piece out, produce a different quality, would declare the movement he was working on to be a certain shape.

And suddenly he was back on the train, looking at the passing landscape and the next verse of that Aquinas poem insisted itself upon him with its apt description and tantalising argument:

The Argument from Efficient Causality

We are crossing managed washlands.
Pochards so carefully coloured swim
Where cows ruminated last summer
In a landscape fruit of human agency.

And I think of the heavenly aboriginal
Agent of all our doings in this material
Playground of earth I can pick up,
Hold and crumble and cultivate

And air that is mine for the breathing
And the inhabited waters that cling
As if by magic to a sphere. What cause
Sustains the effects we live among?

For there is no smoke without fire
And as we sow, thus we reap. Nihil
Ex nihil, therefore something Is,
Some being we might call God.

So ‘nothing out of nothing, therefore something is’.  Outside in the city the Cathedral bells were ringing in Evensong. The sounds only audible on a Sunday when the traffic abated a little and the sounds in the street below were sporadic. He thought of going out into the Cathedral precinct and listening to the bells roll and rhythm their sequences, those Plain-Bob-Majors and Grand-Sire-Triples. But he knew that would further break the spell, the train of thought that lay about him.

He sketched the next section, confidently, and when he had finished felt he could do know more. There it was: a starting point for tomorrow. He could now go towards home, walk for a while in the park and enjoy the movements of the wind-tossed trees, the late roses, the geese on the lake. He would think about his various children in their various lives. He would think about the woman he loved, and would one day assuage what he knew was a loneliness he could not quench with any music, and though he tried daily with words, would not be assuaged.

J.
Ah, J.
A love I hath excitedly longed to find,
A love t'at previously had no name.
J.
A love too thrilling for my sights to feel,
and perhaps th' only love t'at couldst make me thrilled;
A love so genuine and benevolent,
A love so talented and intelligent.
Ah, J.
A love t'at just recently landed on my mind;
And made all my lyrical days far more splendid;
A love t'at briefed, and altered me more and more;
A love so chilly and important, with subt'leness like never before.
Ah, J.
My very, very own J.
Perhaps my future king, my precious, but at times villainous-darling.
Oh, J.
And perhaps I am just not as virtuous as I might be,
But t'is poem shall still be about thee;
For thou art-within my minds, still awkwardly th' best one,
With a pair of oceanic eyes too dear; and a civil charm so fine.
J.
J, o my love.
If only thou knew-how oceans sparkles within thy eyes,
And 'tis only in thy eyes, t'at any of t'ese complications might not become eerie,
And then t'is destiny is true, as well as how truth is our destiny;
So t'at any precarious delicacy is still faint-perhaps, but not a lie.
Oh, J.
A bubble of excitement t'at my heart feelest;
But if consented not, shall be the wound no blood couldst heal;
Ah, J, if the heavens' rainbow wert fallen, t'an thou'd be purer;
Born as a sin as us all humans, thou art cleaner to my heart still, and canst but love me much better.
Ah, J.
If only thou knew-how madness floweth and barketh and drinketh from our spheres,
But even th' devil cannot spill its curse on our strangled love;
At least until everything is deaf-and we duly cannot hear,
As skies descend onto th' sore earth; and our dumb sins are t' be sent above.

J.
How pivotal thou art to me-if only yon foliage couldst understand;
If only t'ose winds were not rivals, but one-or at least wanted to be friends.
Ah, J, even only thy words filled my comical ******* to th' brim;
And as far as heavens' angels canst hear, I am no more in love with him.
Ah, J.
'Tis cause my verses are seeking thy name, and his not;
I may create th' words, but thou deviseth my plots;
Ah, and him, the bulk of egotism, and whose frank misery;
Are but too disastrous to me, and in possession of too much agony.
Oh, J.
Thus thou art th' only one who remaineth solemn;
Th' one to remain ecstatic, and as less aggressive as calmness;
But of the broad thoughts I used to think of him, I feel shame;
He is just some unborn trepidation at night-though on fine mornings, he is tame.
Ah, J.
Let me disclose th' egress of thy journey, and tellest me now-is which towards mine?
Ah, thee, thou who art so bounty, and deliciously fine;
And t'ese thoughts of thee-are often tasty, and oft'times generous;
'Ven when thou'rt mad, and thy chanting is vigorously serious.
Ah, J.
Thee, a soul of painless blood;
Whose disgrace hath been buried;
Whose vanities hath been laid off;
Whose miracles hath been lavished on.
Ah, J.
Thou art one bright portrayal of my merit;
I fell'n love with thee in a single bit.
Thou bore my tears, and scorned away my guilt;
And in th' swaying summertime, thou wert my protective shield.
Thus my, my very own J.
My gale-like, and unutterably luscious poem;
About whom my thoughts are jolly, but mindful and insensible;
Ah, J, I wish I were more frail, paler, and gullible;
Ah, but if only being so couldst make me more compatible.
Oh, J.
And compatible, compatible with thee alone;
Fleshly be thine whenst all is borne on thy own;
Be thy only trusted companion, and thy eloquently verified wife;
Be thine, and thine in wifery only, throughout and for th' rest of thy life.
J.
All Let me then guess but the tranquility of thy thoughts-hath thou gone mad?
Behind us are rainbows, and thus thy songs should not be sad;
But even though they were sad, I wouldst lend thee my heart;
So t'at no summer sunshine couldst further tear us apart.
J.
Ah, J, why are th' blue skies far too impatient in thy eyes?
Just as how thy deep scent is febrile in my air;
Thy gushes of breath are thick in my young weather;
As buoyant as yon summer itself; as voluptuous as lingering daisies.
J.
And t'is ****** scream, within my heart, needs indeed-t' be fulfilled;
And its vulnerability t'ere always, to be killed;
Ah, J, t'ere is 'finitely no poem as beautiful as thee;
T'ere is no writing yet as such, as trivial and distant-as my eyes canst see.
J.
Ah, J, darling, and my very fine darling; is chastity to thee virtuous?
About which my soul is hungered-and t'ereby curious;
But if 'tis so, I shall be merry-and ever meekly laborious;
I shall make it tender, and maketh it a reliant gift, to thee.
J.
Ah, J, and thou came to me one aft'rnoon, with a sweet muteness;
For to thee, poems are far more pivotal to a young poetess;
Yes, and far prettier t'an a beastly bunch of words;
Whose curse is whose sweetness itself-and whose whole sweetness is curse.
J.
Ah, J, so shall I be thy pure lady t'en?
For purity is a curse-and related not within t'ese walls;
Walls of discomfort-irresolute and at certain times foreign still;
Walls t'at shun us-and be ours not, due to t'eir own reserved castigations.
J.
Oh, querida, my random rainbow-but still my dearest querida;
My poetry in th' morning, and th' baffling flute, for my evening sonata;
And as it is sounded, I shall be thy private lonely prelude;
But th' one who maketh thee singular, and nevertheless, handsomely proud.
Ah, J.
And thy perfect red lips are th' stillettos of the sun;
Critical but radiant-all too agonising in t'eir inevitable shape;
So t'at kissing might be just too much fun;
And from which, o my love, t'ere is no such a famous escape.

J.
Ah, J, thou knoweth not-I am asleep only within thy remembrance;
As how I am awake only in thy life, and partake of my justice, in thy glory.
Ah, J, but if satire were the only choice we had, shalt thou be with me?
Ah, my J, for be it so-I shall never regret anything, I shall never say sorry.

J.
Ah, wherefore art thou now, my love? I am now cursed. My dreams are mad.
I am now crawling out of whose realms; I wanteth but'a stay no more in my bed.
Ah, J, but in my dream thou wert too miles and miles away, and indolently anonymous;
I hatest sleep t'ereof, for t'ey piercest me so tiringly, with a harm they deemest as humorous.

J.
Ah, sweet darling, and in our dreams, t'ere is no strain, nor piety;
Even thou-in th' last one, despised my pyramids-and my chaste poetry;
Ah, querida, I am but afraid our loneliness shall be gone 'fore long;
For its temporariness is not sick, and canst work its way along, with a belief so strong.

J.
Ah, love, but t'is loveliness itself-is indeed tyrannous,
And its frigid poetry is randomly perilous,
As how th' daydreams it bringeth forth-which are luminous,
But as love is innocent, by one second canst all turn perilous!
J.
Ah, J, thus our story is brilliant, and in any volume real' magnificent,
With curves palatable, but with some greyness too fair-and too pleasant!
Ah, J, if passion dost exist, and thus maketh it all real;
And at once I shall understand thee; and listen only, to how we both feelest.

Ah, J.
My very, very own little J.
My dearest J.
The harbour of my ultimate love.
My most cordial, and serene spring of affection.
My most veritable nirvana, my vivid curiosity-and shades of frankness.
My dream at heart, and my sustainable ferocious haste.
Th' love in which my ever fear shall subside,
And be overwhelmed by its unfearing light.
J.
Oh, J, my glossy, exuberant darling.
And as more winds sway, and amongst the green grass outside,
I canst but feel thy eyes here watching;
Thy eyes t'at widely grinneth, and flirtest with my poetry itself;
Thy eyes t'at forever invitest, yet are all more daring than myself;
Ah, J, even though t'is love may be a secret scene,
But I hath felt, even vulnerably, not any provoking passion so keen-
For though they couldst my flowed veins hear,
They were still delicately unseen-with a serenity t'at was ne'er here.

I can already feel myself healing, growing, getting happier. It doesn't hurt so much when I see you because I know you are still in my life - for now.

Gone are the days when I knew you were mine forever.
But at least you are with me.

For now.

T'is silence leaps from one self to another. Betrayal, o betrayal, doth greet it-so violently and startlingly, along th' entirety of its journey! Undelightful as 'tis, but made worse by t'at hostile dubiousness. Another fact aside from its ambivalent hatefulness: recognisable to every questioning eye-is t'is downright scary on its own, with unmolested quietude, and ******, but involuntary, unspokenness. Resolutions made within undesirable ambiences! Sacrifice t'at outwardly suggests th' presence of glam profuse in rich elaboration-but bland enough! And on top of all, t'is brimming immovability, and 'tis pool of doubts is causing me but to commence feeling weary about 'tis raising thorn. How didst I send myself into ferocious wanders-about t'is airless rooms, heated like sunflowers bathing themselves to death on th' giggling surface of raging snow. Battle of nature-and war of its childlike beings! Like a stoical plant in th' midst of 'tis glittering forest; vacant and idyllic-passive and unquestioning towards th' blades of farmers t'at come to exploit 'em: with morbid and futile, savage desires for rebellious treasures-unbecoming in t'eir temporariness, and unavoidability of sincere devotion as t'ey wilt soon leave t'eir offspring bereft of t'eir provisions once more. Yet look, look how red t'eir eyes are in t'eir hunger-eccentric vivacity gloweth in t'eir eyes, but mockery governs 'em-as ruptured t'eir weak souls are, by loathsome uncertainty and severe senses of greed. How t'is consideration made aggravated; agitated my soul is-o, seriously agitated! Yes, indeed! No longer doth vanity boast away about being my pride, but th' sultry pointlessness of my power of self-esteem. How melancholy t'is life is! O, and th' raising thorn itself, th' one aforementioned so discreetly within my fourth phrase up t'ere-growing dominantly and selfishly-aye! every day, is unlikely to be abashed by any remorseful incarceration, or stony suicidal attempts hurled by t'ose disgraceful beings out t'ere; but in t'is case, yon disgracefulness is comprised of grateful swarms of exquisite laughter, divine in its own roots, like th' sacred nook of a moonlit river. And how t'ere, on its most godlike slice of rock-so dearly scented by nature and innocent greenness-a sight be so dear to my longing eyes, shalt thou dwell with thy poems, and heart trembling with thy fullness of passion. For me, yes, for me, selfishly! O, my love! Cannot help I uttering thy name-thy very name, whom I am undeniably besotted with, like a feverish storm mooning over its lifelike sea, and whose eager cruelty so invincibly blanched by 'tis romantic tides-gone as it is, in just a seeming couple of cordial seconds! My love, whose name is so unmistakably dear to my heart, and indisputably belongs to 'tis greedy layers-ambitious, my love, desirous of,  and bland to solely th' dormant rains of thy love! O, t'ose pristine tears of blessings t'at are volatile but decorative to my half life-for thou art unarguably th' other half of me! And splendid in t'is very breath, t'at recognition t'en beats furiously along with t'is frail voyage of my humanness-grounded inevitably by unremarkable velocity are my wheels, and sometimes imprisoned in helplessness amidst th' pursuit of my fierce dreaming. But I admire 'tis core-as it is but thy warm, genial slumber; and 'tis skin is but th' very depths wherein I conceal my very whole love for thee. My love, my darling! If only thou wert here-yes, here, querida, to indulge t'is pr'saic quietude, shalt I shrink into nothing but a piece of thy fallen star; and t'ese feeble hands shalt t'en thou own, just as thy heart I should'th won.

you are utterly torn apart. your heartbeat seems to accelerate but time is trickling to a near complete standstill. are you still in existence? all around you, voices are getting louder; the soft whispers reverberate throughout your numbed, hollowed skull,  and occasional laughter crackles like thunder to your ears. you blink, and with the effort descends a paralysing paroxysm so excruciating you bite your lip, lost and alone.

the feeling overwhelms you. a definite feeling of loneliness, even though you are surrounded by people, by the crowd. a feeling of solitary despair, enveloping your entire being and folding its wings around you. and you shiver, the cold gleam in its eyes piercing right through you while you are at your most vulnerable.

what is happiness? you ponder the question in your subconscious. what is it really? is it a good thing, or is it something that crouches in the corner, always ready to pounce on you and hurl you into the fathomless depths? is it something you would want, something you would embrace, or something you would abandon?

you can feel the weight; the unmistakable pressure of an unidentified burden that is lodged deep in the crevices of your broken heart. your heart— it is a shattered mess blown into smithereens. you know that even if you were to find every shard left, you will never piece it back together, and even if you succeed, it won't be the same.

you are a wreck of sorrow, a maelstrom of uncertainty— abandoned and cast away. joy does not favor you, and hurt is too protective of you; it won't let you go. you are trapped, a definite prisoner within the limits of its palm. and maybe, you don't want to be set free. maybe, this is where you belong— in a world of darkness and misery, where you are tossed about by the storms of a merciless vortex.

the atmosphere is familiar to you, but you'd decided to give light a try. you'd opened your eyes to a possibility of joy— something you'd never had. you'd decided to try to be everything you are not. and in those moments, those transient, evanescent eternities, you thought you'd finally understood what "happiness" means. but you'd been wrong. you'd bitterly realized that you'd never been right about something and that hadn't been an exception. you attempt a laugh but it sounds like a choked sob.

the amaranthine disappointment is suddenly too oppressive for you— you can no longer drag the weight of the chains after a taste of your brief wings of freedom. the difference is too wide, a distance comparable even to the gap between temporariness and perpetuity.

the sky in your world has lost the bright vividness it had for the short stretch of time. time, you realize, is but an illusion. and you wonder, are you living in "time"? if time is an illusion, a fiction of someone's imagintation turned into reality, then where will you be, if not in "time"?

an endless gray drapes over the landscape of your world, condemning your entire universe into unending bleakness. of winters colder than Siberian nights and mornings darker than a void.

you leave footprints in the snow.

but you know that you are torn, broken beyond repair, jaded to the point of no return, and that you've gone further than the lines of belief that marked the boundaries of your once bright soul.

you will no longer believe, you will no longer trust. because you are the essence of sorrow itself, the epitome of despair and hopelessness.

you are what they call "life", and you finally know what "happiness" is.

happiness is a lie; a picturesque delusion of doom, of the dark unknown.

happiness is everything life is not, and it is your enemy.

I feel like a sick lady waiting for well wishes from my sisses and mates. I’ve been a giver and a settler and in three weeks, I found myself hanging in between. And now here I am, in my sickbed crying for attention— living in this pocket-sized, time-filler, slick box for most of my days just prying on everybody else’s lives to check how incomparable it is to live a life less like mine.

Everyday at five, the sun sets, overshadowing the blue sky with soft transitions of reds and oranges. And just right before I knew it days, weeks have already gone by. I found myself with nothing but dull empathy and collective misery. I re-spiraled down to the mantle of my being until it hit me— attention is cheap, but intention is gold. And I have wasted so much time, so much time, chasing the idea of perfect romance from the most impossible people. It made me worry, too, on how bad I have been in making decisions just to curtly satisfy my longing for any human who can provide even the slightest damp on my cold skin.

I’m not trying to compose a self-help quotable narrative nor ****-**** essay about self-love. I have stripped off the idea of 1-2-3s, of healthy coping mechanisms, of capturing perfect moments from the most mediocre, mundane fragments of life during my trying times. These past few encounters have been merely playdates and guessing games where I’ve lost sight of innocence and sincerity, making it hard for me to differentiate temporariness with permanence. And knowing kindness with or without an agenda is like a cloud in my head. Therefore, throughout these years, the flowers I planted have slowly wilted under the shade of infinite uncertainties. I have lost the love I was willing to give, and I can’t help but think that romance is not for me. I’m tired of giving and losing; I have given up moving mountains and breaking walls just to find myself being stabbed for being too much. From this day on, I am going to be me, with me. A bloke. A woman—alone in a swarm of parasites and flock of birds. A strong, pragmatic, detached woman in this horrifying epic journey of self-salvation.

—Advent
3:27am

I am my //thoughts at 3 am // broken and shattered // within the silence // my mouth is shut // there is nothing to indulge // not even the air particles // It hurts so much // to feel // to sense // to even be human // to be me // actually.

I just want to // go home // but // I don't know // if it even ever // existed // I just want to get away from people // I hate // the temporariness // it 's wrapped around my neck // like a string // more like a rope // for // every tear that falls // from my eyes // my neck // my chest //my heart // my feelings  // burned relentlessly.

I want // to drive // I want // to breathe // I want to go // on a road trip // to the furthest destination // to a beach // with the darkest sky // the lightest shade //  turquoise sea // the brightest stars // to fulfill the night // I want to lay // on the beach // pretend // the sand in my life // didn't bury me // I didn't suffocate // I wanted to lay // there for so long // that I would // forget I exist // similar to // the way // I ignore my feelings // for so long// just so that I forget // how to feel.

Sometimes // I wonder why // wouldn't the stars // just fall in my arms // the future // the unknown //
I'm afraid // of drowning // once those feelings // become // too heavy.

everything is labeled // life is // like a side effect // slowly // killing me// I want to // seize many moments // replay them // I want to forget // and forget // just forget //  I am human // that // I once existed // leave no trace behind // disappear into the atmosphere //

I want // impossibilities // to turn // into realities // those thoughts // the scene of them // it could make // everyone // flee // I love to make them wonder // how long those lived // wandering // in my head // how I became // a prisoner in my own mind  // with my own will // I cant // flee // from the human // I am destined to be // I can // never have enough // wanting so much.

I have been trying to stop romanticizing introductions
Attempting to grasp the reality
That not everyone I meet is a potential soulmate
My mind was just born open I guess
Conditioned to want to love at first sight
I am more so addicted to people than I am smoking
I have been trying my hardest
To keep my expectations low
Understand that not everybody has the intention of staying
I have had too many hellos turn into goodbyes
And
Too many hugs turn to leaving
I had been trying
To learn the opposite of welcome
Embrace temporariness with arms as wide as my eaget heart
So when we met
On a directionless sunday
In the living room you were calling home for the week
Know that
It took everything in my power
To not let down my guard
It wasn't until the quiet of the night
That I realized
I had already dropped
Goodnight turned to words to questions
To 3am caress
I was in your arms before I could even stop myself from letting go
But you
Are not the meaningless
One night momentary bliss I am used to
You
Are everything I have tried to avoid
For fear of losing again
I am trying to figure out how it is possible
That you are the kind of thing I'd been attempting to refrain from
Yet exactly what I want at the same time
You are the nicotine from the 5am cigarrette on your last night in town
Your goodbye serving as reminder to everytime I have been let down
But there was more hope in your seven letter goodbye
Than there is in any poem I have ever written
I am saying grace in a language that I still do not fully understand
And although both distance and time
Are two names that usually define ending
I see beginning
I see different
When we kissed
I could taste the promise of future on your lips
My hands spelled out in the creases of your back
Said exactly the same as you did before you left
Said please don't forget me
So please
Don't.

cinnamon tea in a chipped
thrift store mug
a minute ago
it was too hot
and now it's too cold

here and there
fast and then faster still
it all happened so quickly

i barely had the chance to blink
it all happened before i even
had the chance to stop and think

but the red light on 6th street
lasts a minute longer at midnight
and that's where i usually
come into my remembering

sometimes revelations hit you
less like a brick and more like a burn
it's a kind of hurt that stings longer
than the bruise of the initial blow

i guess you never know
when the last time
becomes the last

it happened so fast
you forgot all the times
you ached so ardently
you thought you'd become
symbiotic with the pain

but the idyllic recollections always linger
like scalding hot shower steam
hanging around a winter room
you illusioned elation because
it felt better than the truth

it was the last time
but somewhere deep down
you already knew
you held the feeling in your gut
begging for countered proof

you've unfolded the understanding
became transparent with the pattern
joy is punctuated by brevity
the very reason it tasted so sweet
on the tip of your tongue

time follows a template
of give and take
the longer you live
the more natural it becomes
to see your fair share of loss

and you know everything ends
you know the swift current of this
breathtaking experience in space
is the temporariness of existence

but why does everyone leave

a minute ago they were here, now
the sureness you cultivated is ripped to shreds
and thrown like confetti in the wind
and love is carried away
like it never held any weight at all

the wheel spins,
the last time
becomes the last
and yet again
you become just another piece
of someone else's past

It's hard to breathe when all your regrets are bouncing in your chest
that hollowness
and the never-ending echo that vibrates throughout my entire body

Have I made a mistake?

All the connecting, glowing, and seemingly sweet certainties have faded

I stand here stricken
My accomplishments in hand
And crumbling

Pieces of the last few years forming into an outline of your face

My fingertips pulsate with warmth as i recall your touch

I've never felt anything
Anyone
So perfect

So smooth and soft and unreal

Moments like these never last, do they?

We were so tired and yet so eager
To intertwine

Fixated on deep breathing
The flavours of eachother's mouths
And the momentary synchronisation of our existences

You're always so busy

And i'm always leaving

It hurts to entertain the idea
Beyond temporariness
But i can't help myself

I know you told me to say it less and yet
I am still sorry

I will always wish for a chance to get to know you
And for that I am not sorry

For once

It wasn't until my acceptance of the fragility and temporariness of life that I was able to embrace the obscurities of the universe
Although,
Its nature, incomprehensible
I begin to understand
The anatomy of all life is as extraordinary as the number of grains of golden sand
And that even I,
A mere spec in God's eye
Am just a man...

Ever heard of anxiety?
Just the word itself feels like eternity
A feeling that is born to multiply infinite
Still indefinite for the definite
Well, I have the social anxiety
That sounds like a self diagnosis
But every nanosecond I am going through metamorphosis
I do not have the profession to state this reliable confession
I know we are all different
But I know we are the same when it comes to biology
I am not saying this for unity
The sad thing is I cannot sell this brain for rent
Yet the hardest needed medication is empathy
For this distorted mentality
Why do you have to hurt when I am already in hell, reality?
Now shifting to maladaptive tendencies
I am not afraid of the crowd
I have fear they will not let me just be myself all year round
Say something positive
I will always flip it into something negative
Because I am provocative
Please see that as a prerogative
Do not be interrogative
This brain is too active for the inactive
Imaginative radioactive
Lacking in the interactive
Yet the fact that is also not enough
I am not enough is not enough
Since my problem is not in the physical
It is in the mental
And it is never going to turn only rental
Say you are only temperamental
Body burning like metal
Stuck in the bungalow
Now that they are all after the afterglow
Oh, when will it show?
The sweat excess
In this overthinking process
Overthinking the fact that we are all wired in "survival of the fittest"
Oh, brain! Just let me rest!
Can I just leave this to tomorrows' nests?
How can I show my best
When I need medication regardless
When will I find egress to this madness?
This is fine
Since suffering will lead you to happiness
Even for temporariness
What is worse is that it repeats
Until you are out of line
It was better all along if I became a mime
Better 'off with my head'
Better off dead

Like the love we keep fighting for
Life sometimes we don't know the core,
Questions the things we can't fathom
Why do we keep on holding on?

Things happen, fast-paced
Like one minute temporary bliss,
Things happen, creeping all over the place
Like the seemed-endless sadness

Temporariness in everything
Moments, people, feelings,
Like making friends out of strangers
Making strangers out of friends

Is it because things happen for a reason
Or they happen because of a reason,
When things get out of control
And choice, the only thing left not to fall

And when to choose it not the best choice
For in this world, nothing's so sure,
When even our inner voices
Couldn't help things be endured

Terrified, that's how we become
The way the universe put things on our palm,
To feel that, we need to feel this
To have that, we need to get through this

But sometimes, we tend to lose the reason
And it keeps us from going on,
And cause it's hard, it's now easy
To fall out of love with this life of weary

But hey! Life it is
Spontaneity is its thing,
Isn't it makes life more exciting
Serendipity, wondrous as it could be

The highs, extraordinary
The lows, we wish to bury
And the mundane things in between
They were all supposed to happen

Twas never really about the choices
Twas about feeling everything- the bliss, the sadness
And that's what keeping us on falling in love
With this life we will ever have.