Daddy I got three stars today, said the little one. I was the best in our class; it's true. But the father paid no attention. He didn't make a move. He just laid still as his daughter left the room.

Daddy I made new friends today, said the little one. And the other kids were very kind to me; it's true. But the father made no remark. He didn't even give a nod. He just laid still as his daughter leaves the room.

Daddy I won in a writing competition, said the little one. They even gave me a blue ribbon for my poem; it's true. But the father showed no smile. He didn't even look. He just laid still as his daughter was about to leave the room.

Little one, what are you doing here, asked the graveyard man. I was just talking to my father, sir; it's true. But your father is long gone, little one; he died a year ago. He's lying still inside his coffin — in this crypt, in this room.

I know, sir, said the little one. Pain creeping upon her face, so true. She said, to tell you frankly, I didn't get a three star either; I did so poorly on all my classes. I have no friends because I’m an orphan. My poem didn't win first prize. None of it were true.

But please see, please understand sir, begged the little one. With pain so bluntly piercing. The sorrow, scorchingly cold. Her sweet voice a contrast to the bitterness of her words, she goes:

When life is too much to bear, reality too blinding too face, and love too far away to follow, truth is what you make of it. Truth is what you wish it to be.

My memories are few and far between -
a strange symptom of a strange sickenss -
a brain worm: one that chews.
One that leaves spaces, pauses,
where previously there were none.
A parasite, an affliction that eats, that consumes.
My memories are few and far between,
they keep me up at night. Loud and unruly.
Misplaced. Incomplete. Lacking.
They are a large crowd, gaining, invading,
growing, incoming, moving ever closer,
attacking. Pitchforks made of wood
and something I don't recognise.
A vague feeling of unease,
a displaced feeling, uncomfortable and unreal.
A reminder of all I am not. Of all I have not.

My memories are many and chronic,
a forever affliction, unending and all-consuming.
Mistakes I've made; feelings I've ignored.
Things I've lost: sisters and lovers.
Things I've found, fading out, fading in.  
It is a sort of death, in that regard:
I was a child and now I am not.
An age, a past, laid out beneath you,
stuffed in a box,
suffocated under six feet of dirt,
a tombstone rammed between its eyes.
One memory or two, a lifetime,
sinking into the mud.
An earth worm: one that chews.
Your body belongs to you,
and your body belongs to someone else.
A boy. An ancient thing.
You and the other you.
You and all you could be.
You and all you are not.

I am a man lacking in memories,
there are gaps in my life I cannot fill,
places and people, fuzzy, faded.
Real and not real, mixing together, obscurring,
distorting, corrupting.
False memories: tales of my youth
told only by drunk aunties and dead grandmas.
Fantasies created by others,
a lacking and a need to fill it.
Tales of my youth locked away, burnt into
diaries and journals,
hidden away or destroyed entirely,
told, scrawled and scratched
into the walls, into the mind.
A frightened mind. A disease,
an affliction. Delusions and hallucinations,
paranoia. Fantasies created by me.  

And I am a man drowning in them,
good and bad. Real and not.
We are patchwork quilts
of all we were and all we are
and all we will be.
We are sewn together and torn apart.
Our stitches just scars, our colours faded,
unskilled attempts at beauty, at life.
Worn down and dusty,
seams failing, patterns ugly.
Used and loved
and then unused and unloved.
A circle. A roundabout.
New and old. Good and bad.
Used and unused.  
But you are not your body.
Your temple prays to no-one.
You're a work of art,
and you're canvas
of just shape and colour.
You're a patchwork quilt
and your scars are just stiches.  

You have no memories,
a blank slate,
dead and now reborn,
a child and then not.
A body that is not you, that could never
be you, a mind -
a collection of memories, dreams, realities,
people, places, sisters, lovers -
without meaning,
a mind that has nothing.
A blank slate.
A momentary madness.
A mind that is not you,
and a mind that could be nothing but.

And yet you have so many,
written into your skin,
carved, engraved.
Trapped, running and jumping
through your veins.
Unstoppable. Unbeatable.
Real or not, it's all the same,
ask yourself:
which is the greater sin,
to have too many memories
or too few?
Which holds you by the throat
and which goes straight for the lungs?
The excess and the absence.
It's all-consuming; it's suffocating.
A brain worm; six feet of dirt.

You are a man lacking in memories,
and you are a man drowning in them.

you can't swim to save someone
who wants to drown.

One too many deaths like this one.

No, it’s not the workings of my imagination tricking me. There’s the past and the rose-colored threads that I pull from a tapestry of ****** reds. I know it wasn’t that good to begin with.

What do I miss, I ask myself as I play with the delicacy of a past death between my fingers. The moments of bliss were so little, the pain so great.

Would I come back, I ask myself again as the last piece of art that would know these hands burns in its absence. No, I wouldn’t.

I close my eyes, I’ve never really understood my masochistic mind. I step on the edge of a longing for a heart that never existed; one that cared, one that stayed, one that held me when the world turned into a despicable place.

For a moment I feel her hands around my neck, a caress that made me experience Heaven and Hell. Our moments play, they become a noose around my neck; and I jump.

Here I go again.

I met two couples today
caught behind love’s curtain

one eighty-five and eighty-three
other twenty-one and twenty-three

twin flames
one a waning
a dim hospital wing

dual embers
both a growing
a sunlit park

I always said I wanted
the love of age
that testament faltered today

I’m a human library.
My heart is single page with one bleeding word.
An empty carcass pervaded by nothing but
shelves and books.
Cut me in half, letters shall pour out.
Calligrams in my fingertips.
My eyes spell a p o l o g e t i c, in advance to the librarian tasked with decoding my being,
Death by literature, cursive written fate.
I’m a human library.
My brain misspells the word love on purpose
It always only finds the characters that spell your name,
as if it was the only way I was taught.
I used my fingers to write memories in every
system I could comprehend.
I understood what it meant to be a library.
A walking poem.
A talking blue ink pen.
I have touched every pain-cured wall
in this museum,
so ask me anything about him, the pages to my mind will unfold
and you will be filled with the same knowledge
As that of a librarian that used to work in a morgue.

sometimes you sit in the dark all alone
and it's not a guiding light that you want,
but for someone to be there with you,
to know that they know the dark, too,
to have them keep you company.
for the light can become a trap, you see,
like a constant pressure to push through,
so you'd rather have someone stay with you
to practice counting each other's breaths.
there's a sense of hope to mutual setbacks,
tethered by the unseen hand you're holding
as you co-write a step-by-step guide to coping.