She was told from
an age so young
that she indeed possessed all
the magic she needed
within herself
to set
the world
to right.

She placed daisies in
her long black hair
and skipped to the beat of
the songs her mother
had sung to her
before she left
escaping
her father.

She was often alone
rarely with friends as
she found comfort in the faeries
she spoke and sang to while
the wind
gently blew
hair in
her face.

She giggled when with
her only little sister
the best part of her world
to whom she adored more than
the breaths
she took
each and
every day.


She stood firm at home
never allowing
her father’s drunken words
to penetrate her self made wall
of anger and despair
because inside
her mind
there
were angels.

She closed her eyes at night
wishing the demons
to disperse into the heavy winds
that howled through the rafters
reminding her
she was
in fact
alive.

© Sia Jane

For hours, I tried to sleep.
The rain drums down on the tin roof;
the demons are knocking.
I see their tears stream down the window;
a cleverly designed artifice to distract
from their true intent.
I ignore their subtle attacks, but they always
find a way back in.
I watch their shadows drift in through
the windows;
morphing from one shape into another,
hovering around me,
their whispered breaths cloud the air –
there is barely a space unfilled by their presence.
I can’t seem to chase them away, and I’m
wrapped up into their world.
Empty, cold and alone,
my reality remains stranger than any dream.

© Sia Jane

encased with passion & desire,
love & lust he waits for her still,
a muse

he's restless & listless, his heart beats,
& bleeds, catch up, catch up,
a muse

leaking lover lost through, a dripping soul,
red raw, vulnerable, closed,
a muse

a fragility so unknown to her, a naivety,
oblivious, at risk from all men,
a muse

he couldn't have her, so he destroyed her,
she disallowed all men in,
a muse

denial & unfazed, she's dazed, confused,
he watches from the sidelines,
a muse

this obsession won't hit him,
or maybe the day she is gone, he will,
a muse

drugs were a power, greater than her,
releasing caged birds, an angel above,
a muse.

© Sia Jane

Muse hasn’t left my bedside for days:
         she races around
         the garden when I sleep:
                            it’s the only time she leaves,
                            she’s so loyal.
A few days ago, I heard Muse barking
         in the garden;
         I knew she’d seen the woodpecker again.
                       I’ve learnt the differences in her voice:
this is what comes of weeks bedbound.
But when the sedatives wear off
         I can do more than lie there:
                       I can feel the touch from my grandma,
                       I can smell last night’s family supper,
                                    I’m lucid.
Yesterday, the electroconvulsive therapy shocked my brain
                       today, my muscles feel as knotted
                                    as my oesophagus.
I’m on my back now; my only company
         is the ceiling; not even
                        the canopy of stars I once gazed at with joy.
                                      
© Sia Jane

You became dust
at the falling of another
biodegradable relationship
I'm kicking up ashes
from a paper urn
decaying beneath
where feet now tread

The Centre of my Universe
in just the palm of one hand
a completed process
no bone fragments
of shards, just ashes

b
   l
     o
   w
n
a
   w
a
y

Our whole world in mere
grains, each part of us
ground into ounce weighing
particles; each a tale of
experiences shared

It was a mourning
a funeral service
without a death, only
grief racing through
my every vein

I'm dressed in black;
veiled
my skirt dragging along
gravel below, I know
as the crow manifests
it's time to let go

cah
cah
cah

Times are to change
a passing of the old
rebirth of
my beloved

Candle light forms
shadows, as night draws
closing in, &
I understand

Life is ephemeral
my appreciation grows
&, as I lift myself to
the temple
I scatter what remains of

us
     us
          us

&, as darkness falls
carried by the crow -
our communicator,
he crosses us from
this world
to the next.

© Sia Jane

I’m a graced angel in flight;
Strawberry blonde hair cascading down my back.
I’m being devoured by the Parisian night.

Racing past the library a thief in sight,
Henry à la Pensée envelope chemise, André Perugia shoes.
I’m a graced angel in flight.

My heart kidnapped, I’ve lost the fight.
Black streaks of mascara running down my cheek,
I’m being devoured by the Parisian night.

Happiness quashed, dreaming of the afterlife-
Now the games are about to begin!
I’m a graced angel in flight.

I’m looking up at the moon shining so bright,
Sedated by drink I’m waiting it out.
I’m being devoured by the Parisian night.

With dancing feet I’m kicking off the last shoe
And stumbling to the edge, I fall.
I’m a graced angel in flight.
I’m being devoured by the Parisian night.

© Sia Jane

He said:
“In the dark night of my soul
I stayed with my darkness.
When a pain struck voice
Came to me, I did not chase
My demons away.
Thinking of all, the suffering I’ve endured
I walked through the street of my past
Solemnly, soberly,
Witnessing all my experiences again.
Before me, light reflected on the pavement –
Iridescent fragments joined to form
Pictures below my feet.
Stories from my childhood played
Like a movie on the ground,
I’m the star of my own show,
I’m powering through each scene
With such verocity I leave nothing
But ruins in my wake.
I reach to pick up the fragments
Of the life of a girl unhinged -
To think my own mind had led me to this.
I wipe the tears from my eyes,
Then, I pass on.

In the dark night of my soul
I stay with my darkness,
For it has so much to teach me
And I learn, so little, if I flee.

© Sia Jane

Fourteen years ago, I was entering a new Millennium.
I was a broken girl.
A mere nineteen years of age.
I was celebrating with friends.
There was drink and music and a fancy dress.
I don't recall much, only two photos of that night, sparked from a disposable Kodak camera.
I scribbled out his face, using a black pen.
I did the same with the Polaroid picture I had of us all.
The "crew," those who claimed to be loyal and best friends.
We were all in the image, and I took his face and made it go away.
At the same time I scribbled out her head.
She was the best friend that turned full circle on me.
She made life hell.
She made me never want to be anywhere near any of them.
Both their faces were removed.
Like in the show Revenge, where as she revenges those who did her father wrong, she writes them out.
And I did the same.
Little by little, only my face remained.
No one believed how he was with me.
I never even told them the full story.
Just minor details, and I used to be laughed at, the crazy one telling lies running from the truth.
But what went on behind those doors, will only even be known by us.
And of course the therapist who recalled the details with me, to reform and rejuvenate my tempered mind.
Secrets I shared with her.
In the room, which had a white noise switch, so only us and the walls knew the verses sang.
I'll spare the reader the details of the nights ***** and beaten, another poor girls cries through the night.
And as dusk turned til dawn, on this treacherous love affair, I ran.
And the running took me home, and although safe, he was a presence there for almost a year.
Outside he was waiting, the door bell ringing, the phone blowing up.
I would cry and rip the cards and love letters he so wrote.
I would be on bended knees pleading for release.
I wanted to take it all back, all the screaming, the shouting, being muted and used and abused.
It was so prevalent in my head that I eventually lost all conscience.
So detached during such attacks, no memory really remained.
It was scattered and fallen, and my body mirrored the deterioration of my mind.
Thinner and thinner, I escaped all womanhood.
I shrank, to the point I shopped in the children's section.
It pleased me because I felt safe, it pleased me because he could no longer hurt me.
But that night he did. And I purged in the bathroom for the first time, after he forced me to my knees.
He even had the audacity to come into the bedroom after, and express his concern for the waif I now was.
I told him I was fine.
Decades later, that "fine" response remains.
I dealt with his force and pain, the pain he pushed and locked on me.
And yet every new year, I am reminded of what went so terribly wrong.
Three months down the line, celebrations into 2000, he is thrown out by security.
I actually can't even remember what he did.
I guess he did enough for others to see that he was wronging me.
Yet I always questioned, how could something that felt so right, be so wrong.
I asked my mum earlier; "do you think he is married with kids?"
"Yes!"
"Do you think he hurts her?"
"Yes!"
All my answers cleared.
Here I am, 2013, alone.
Single since the start, and single at the end.
I hurt.
I am tired.
In many ways, I am thinking that a little pain, for a life time of sleep, could be worth it.
Goodnight.

© Sia Jane

Through a vision in my dream, I see her there standing
a smile, unpainted, authentic and real, hopeful
opening the door, I feel a smile emerge, and the butterflies
oh they kick within me, like a life is growing there
a baby in sight, with no bump or pulse, just a gathering
of fluttering wings, that should I rip my chest open
out they would fly, a mélange of colours and shapes
purple swallowtails, adonis blues, lacewings, painted ladies
and finally, my favourite, the Menelaus Blue Morpho
escorted by the Duke of Burgundy, my springtime hero
each flutter, each movement, a collection from the continents
my self, my soul, my body has travelled, wanderlust
keepsakes of beauty and bliss, bordering on extinction safe within me
in a heartbeat they cover my whole self, they move around my body
my legs tremble, barely able to hold, this grown woman upright
a gulp, a gasp, a stare in wonder,
speechless, tongue tied, dazed, dumb, silent
my head empties, no thought passes, the parietal lobe vanishes
adrenaline is racing through my body faster than the light hitting my eyes
moments later I find vocal sound waves breezing past my ears
they are in slow motion, her voice mumbled, incoherent
she touches me and I jump in fright,
my eyes adjust, my heartbeat slows down, my legs steady
"Rachel!"
"Rachel!"

I wake up alone.

© Sia Jane

---

"In through the window a moonbeam comes,—
Little gold moonbeam with misty wings;
All silently creeping, it asks,
"Is he sleeping— Sleeping and dreaming while mother sings?"

Eugene Field

You only told me, at the tender age of three,
Just how beautiful this very life
Could be.
That as a young girl, a child let go,
I could run so freely, through
Fields of fruit trees, days of May
Owls howling, despite, such clear
Daylight.
Birds chirping, how they fight for
A place,
Among the cacophony of,
Sounds, dogs barking, cats purring,
A gentle breeze.
Spring is slowly, about to fall
Yellow daffodils, purple crocus,
Even a magnolia begins to find, flight.
The moles this garden so, loves
To hate, a little soft face, rising
From the ground, a cat
In sight, waiting for just one catch.
The days are longer, nights colder,
Stars protecting a moon that beams,
In such clear sight, a blackout in
The sky.
The sun sets, slowly and all at once,
The way I described how,
Depression felt, so slowly that
You don’t notice, and suddenly,
Like the shining sun, you are gone.
Squirrels play, Oak trees surround me,
as I ponder the age, and decades that
they have stood so firm, asking myself,
what secrets do they hold, who do they share
the tales of this Hamlet I call home, with.
Home, a place I could never,
Dismiss,
Without my heart, remaining
On the concrete slabs I walk,
Bare feet on grass, still carrying
Morning dew.
My soul a bird’s song, in love forever,
A practice of freedom, an entity oh
So rare, in a world so stripped,
Of the essentials of life.
Saving myself, from the roller coaster
Of life,
I am brought closer, to all the things,
That matter, as I continue to believe
We will be in love forever.
Clouds marry, then within a glance
Of an eye, fade, a puff of smoke,
Only blue skies, an orange tinted
Light.
Sins forgiven, seeking redemption,
****** sits,
In the dim sunshine, oh
Yes,
I know, we will be
In
Love forever.

© Sia Jane

At precisely 01:58am I logged;
I am
So
Unhappy
I write with pain and anguish
Playing games with
All, including myself
I tell stories that
Feel so real and
Yet, in hindsight
Seem like lies
I log;
I’m really happy right now
That was Saturday
At approximately 17:35pm
I remember because
At that moment
A person, I love
Typed; it’s so good to see you happy
You deserve it
I smiled, kept walking and agreed
At 02:02am it is Tuesday morning
A tear drop falls to
The page, where the pencil
Has written and now
Smudged,
It reminds me of how
Easily my emotions change
And are forgotten
How easily they are erased
Because all I say
May as well
Be
Written in something that
Can be easily washed away
This is how I live
And I can’t keep living
This way,
I am a broken toy, a soul
Who has been hurt by those who
Barely even realise what they have done
No apology, only lies, disloyalty, betrayal
All because I took a stand
Alone.
Maybe I always will be
Maybe I never love in the right way, or enough
Maybe I am not enough or any of it is enough
Nothing I give is enough
Lovers pass through me
I am like their garbage
They throw me out, toss me out as though
I am nothing
It is hard to believe I will ever be
Anything
Anymore
An empty vessel lost at sea
Oh the cliché
Relying only on air to live
Until I final pass, unwillingly
To greet those I too have lost
Above.
Unnoticed, unseen, I am simply
Gone.

© Sia Jane

Barefoot standing backwards on
            the doctor’s scales; the weighing games begin.
I can’t make sense of how or why
            I’m here; dragged from my mother’s car,
when only earlier I was dancing
            at my ballet class; I slipped and fell
on the cold dance floor, and now
            I’m under hospital arrest. All I want
is to escape; because I truly thought
            this was all in my past.
But the Devil and God are raging inside me
            all the time.
It began with only one pound lost;
            a controlled experiment, one I thought
I could win. And now,
            I’m barefoot standing backwards
on the doctor’s scales –
            There’s only one way; Up!
                No spiral down.
I’ve found my way back here, somehow,
                    and I’ll find my way out of here, somehow.

© Sia Jane

Letting go, the deepest fear
I could ever imagine

But I had no choice
not if my heart was
ever to be allowed healing

Not stitched or sewn together as
a patchwork cloak that would be
a duvet for the coming months

This would be
the ultimate surrender
to loving you, knowing
wherever I was going
you may catch me up

An uncertainty, I too, let go
without a kiss goodbye or
a farewell glance
as the words
stopped falling
from your mouth into
the vacuum of space
between us

Standing in the smoke of words,
I sit, I lay down
and I watch clouds
fade to nothing.

© Sia Jane

Unbeknown to her, she was the other daughter.
The clairvoyant said she was born of water.

“Your beauty is your saving grace,
for so admired is your cherub-face.”

“My dear child, hold my hand close to you,
& see here, a young girl; veiled in black.
Worshipping the moon, beside a wolf pack.”

“For you, are celebrating a Lunar New Year,
requesting the spirits, my dear
beholding the Universe in the palm
of your hands. In the shadows, a silhouette
is walking towards you; a woman of a quintet.”

"You hear the piercing tone of a shawm,
a choir of voices & women barefooted
whose anklets ****** as a ritual dance
begins. But you stay. A statuette in stance."

© Sia Jane

Hazel eyes lost in seas, of red ruby wine lips,
Drunk love lusted after, crimson caress,
Parted lips tasted, sweet my love, thy love, my love,
Open heart, surgery retreating for the risk the unknown,
Arms wrapped ivy, anaesthetize beating hearts heard,
Coming undone, to be made complete soul struck,
For I choose, freely with will to love each day,
You, you, oh yes, you.

That old cliché, setting the one free letting go,
How I died, a thousand times over, over, over,
Letting go, letting go, letting go,
You never flew from me, you flew towards me back,
Aching, shaking, soothing, beats pounding freely you returned,
No restraint, chains, locks to keep you so you stayed,
Thousands of; ‘I love you,’ ‘I love you,’ ‘I love you,’
Penetrating cold hospital air, waves crashing to shore returning,
A Thursday fell upon us days later, as you followed me home.

Colliding we fell, such deep velocity impulsive desire,
Those weeks blew up, nuclear blasts polluting air,
And on the Saturday you flew, it felt like coming home,
I wanted you, I needed you, oh, how I needed you,
Because of course, I was so catastrophically in love,
Loving you not because, I needed you,
But needing you because I loved, you,
And I had waited, for you, again, again, again,
Never believing so openly, your wings would spread back to me.

A week passes, speed shaking on amphetamines,
Walking through the door, your eyes hit me diamonds,
And nothing mattered, you become me, I become you,
Bubbles closing in, fantasy reality merging marrying,
I say; ‘you need to take your gum out so I can kiss you,’
And you smiled, giggled as an eternity passed by,
Secrets unknown land, wrapped encased feeling,
I felt, I had never been kissed before that very moment,
Leaning into you craving you wanting you, more enough,
And I knew; knew it then know it now, crazy eyes withheld,
For only, only, only, you,

And I could never had known, that one day in May,
I would love you,
                            could love,
and
                           did, love you.

© Sia Jane

You asked me
"if you were a flower
what would you be?"
I said I'd be a red
Amaryllis
because they bleed
before they die
just as my heart
bled
for each day
you were gone.

© Sia Jane

Do you remember the night
I translated a dream for you?

You agreed and later that night
we began to put your pain into perspective

You're sending me letters
signed, sealed and delivered
from your new home

I'm saving all your letters
where only longing lingers
we've not known each other long
but waves of your scent
are already mapped on my mind

In your stories you write of
an explosion in your chest
bats burst from hibernation
forcing your ribs to break
your skin ripping apart

You tell me of a whistling in your chest
a candles been blown out
smoke rising from a darkened hollow cave

The emptiness feeds off flesh
you're scratching at your skin
the remains tipping into your chest

It's filling-
filling every day

And that is when you wake
choking, gasping for air

Your letters end as abruptly
as your night terrors
bad dreams leaving you breathless
waking up drenched in sweat

Your last lines of this weeks letter read;
When I lift my tired body
from the bed
the bedroom light illuminates
my skin
I see I'm real
I see I've not clawed my flesh
no track marks from my fears

We're sat together with
the letters all telling
the same story, again and again
you voicing your dreams,
dreams spawning nightmares

Do you remember I was going to
translate these dreams for you?

How the bats are actually butterflies
how butterflies are subjected to
a caged darkness before the light
How the whistling in your chest
is fertile ground for growth
How the suffocating filling
is the abundance of love
this world can give us
if,
if we only subject a change
to our perceptions

Love and fear cannot exist
together within us
with fear is suffering
with love is healing.

Do you remember the night
I translated a dream for you?

The night we set fire to the letters
imagining the crimping paper
as the disintegration of
each and every
fear.


© Sia Jane

She walks on water as the stars reflect
their shining brightness only lightening
her paradisiacal face and unclothed body
beauty may have it's layers, hers always
more than skin deep in the selfless benevolence she
gives forth in every interaction she herself
engages herself within,

In my years of wandering, I have never found
a soul I feel so compelled toward, frightening even
myself with my augmenting attachment and need
to hear her voice, feel her soul, listen to her heartbeat
to see her smile, and know her stories and tales from
the days that passed between the time we last spoke
my heart skipping beats,

An internal battle brings forth, an ever forging narrative
of realistic practicalities and the contrasting drifting
dream lands, entwined with fantasy and longing,
fears and hearts, left on the line, of a blurring demise
restore my heart, set me free, allow me to love,
let me
be
hers.

© Sia Jane
---

“The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.”
Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

I saw my world expand
the day I looked
in to those
eyes and
loved
seeing your eyes tell me
that all you knew
was to only
now love
me
kissing me hard as I'm
lay naked in your
arms & trusting
all you
said
when you whisper to me
our love is eternal
& nothing will
ever break
us
how beautiful the universe is
to bring us together
as stardust souls
now as
one                            

 © Sia Jane

Souls wandering, Midnight Mass
Rescued hearts, craving less distress
Willing participants, for Gods graces
Sinner or saint, all worth measured
Through the extent to which they
Carry this life
Dreamers & wishers, take a backseat
The strugglers making confessions
Their first feeble steps, starts at one
Plea forgiveness from those
They hurt or betrayed, when they took
This path, to not be with another
Or at one with the life around them
Never in life, will we know another
Truly know all of them, exposed
Even secrets kept safe, between lovers
Parted kisses & naked skin
Flesh on flesh keep them together
How could she know it would
Ever come to this
Walking out the door for his next score
He swore he was done
Baby tears crying into his mummies
Eyes, promises made, broken only
Hours later, leaving mother & child
Losing his family, she remained his last
Hope, those wandering souls
Lost in Midnight Mass
A fall from grace, cupids arrow
Wrapped with a bow
Then later the bundle from heaven
That kept daddy in those meetings
Counting the steps, bronze chip
Sobriety for a year, lost the day the
Door banged behind him
Denial his confidant, only friend
Left behind a mummy cried
Holding their only son
Crack *******, **** or smack
Choose your sin, lose a life
She knew
He knew
This baby was all that was left
With no sign
Or clue.

© Sia Jane

Cigarettes* ignited
       sips of champagne.
Naked; smoking,
       playing ebony & ivory,
       piano stories
Singing souls of ghosts
        & secrets.
Broken rainbows form & flee,
        light catching green
Hazel eyes, tear drops,
       of love; forming
       drowning oceans.
Planting forests; replacing
        papier- mâché covering
        a blackened heart,
Of a lonely girlfriend
        wrapping herself in a
        lovers left
        winter jumper.
Full exposure; a camera lens
        focused in on clouds
        dissipating.
Window panes,
         pouring mirrored drops
         of translucent balloons.
Wishing dreams
          of,
Letting
          go.
Lift her,
           to that place named,
           silence.

© Sia Jane

She was always the other woman, flowers in her hair, cascading down her back
freckles covering, porcelain skin, cupids bow, painted dark red, hair strawberry blonde
vintage fashion of Henry a la Pensée, envelope chemise, peignoir, blue iris mink fur
shoulders forward, rain splintering, bare legs, André Perugia shoe, one lost amidst the cobbles
favourite novel in arm, to read, as she contemplates her choice, Gertrude Stein; Fernhurst
oh how can one author write ones heart so articulately she thought so pensively, the other women
spring blossom blown away as a puff of pink smoke, a thief in the night, racing past the library
the winding stair case, the oh so fabulous and opulent parties, laughter and cocktails
the tower in sight, a beating of an empty heart, lovers lost, a baby once nurtured
taken, those back street black market abortion clinics, she'd never recovered
she shivered, the time was now, black streaks of mascara, tragedy, loss, pain
the tower was in reach, she gazed upwards, it was near to midnight,
perfect, she thought, the exact time she lost her sister off this same tower,
both plunging to their deaths, love broken, hearts kidnapped nowhere in sight
the game was about to begin, her happiness quashed, every hour, the motions run
dreaming of the afterlife, sedated by drink, she waited it out, effortlessly thinking,
what now,
with a kick of the last shoe, a stumble to the edge, she fell, like a graced angel in flight
devoured by the night.

© Sia Jane
--

“I too am convinced that life is dark, and at the same time I love life.”
Simone de Beauvoir

If you would chase her
     to the ends of the earth
climb ladders in to the sky
  jump on to clouds that
                            ascended
  just to follow the light
                 of a thousand stars
and rest on the moon
         to counter
                  the light years you
        pursue, racing to catch up
if you would wrap yourself
         around this infinite
                   Universe
  just to say: I love you
make sure, she's the one
   to say: I love you back.


© Sia Jane