i’ve been folding train tickets into paper planes and casting them like butterfly wings into the night sky, hoping they’ll bring me back to some form of normality like their incessant beating could inject some form of life back into bones that are aching, bones that are breaking, under mountains of nothingness and i watch them snap like wishbones, praying that their marrow
bleeds golden enough that you can look at me and say ‘well done’
i’ve been stripping bark off magnolia trees and i’ve been gifting it to myself in the form of late nights with eyes closed and a heart that won’t still, you have a carousel for a heart, it’s a kaleidoscope of just black, it’s all spin and go and you tell people when to get off and you have jaws in your stomach, you speak with teeth bared and violent, you scream from your gut and it’s a sound i feel in my broken bones.
you never wanted me and i’ve been trying to build myself back up out of clay, form myself into something beautiful enough that you’ll sit it on your mantle piece. something you can be proud of.
if lives are built from bricks of experiences, moments played live like movie scenes, then my life is built from those times you ran away, and if women are looking glasses then my life is simply a reflection of you running and my footsteps mirror yours, i am the product of a suitcase by the door, of vile words spat like venom.
i’ve been folding train tickets into paper planes, in short desperate attempts to get away, to get away from you. i’ve sat through enough anti drug assemblies in school to know the dangers of narcotics sold on street corners, but none of them warned of poison that already lay dormant in blood you were born with.

Feeling unconscious
Being in the lake
Can't find the light
I'm scared.

Help me, my saviour,
Save me from this day,
I am stuck as hell,
In the walls of a cell.

No one cares about me,
My family's a priority,
Binded by blood, there's
nothing more stronger
than this Love.

The sun is a candle...

burning inside the mirror

Yet another reflection

It's rays fall cold on my skin

A bleached rose

smell the sixteen,

Whirl in the abyss of love

An ocean,

Drowning in its waves

The salt crystals molten on the walls of my lungs

A burning thirst,

addicted to the flames of your kisses,

fallen into a shade by the moonlight

The forever winds

Breezing on my rugged skin

The memories to the grave

Wilted flowers carried from it's stones

Into the skies,

When I become gray

mummy listen
I am not sad and I am not lonely
Just because I prefer to spend time on my own, alone, with my books and my writing and my music all around me.
Mummy listen
I know you’ve been through a lot with your daughters and I know we’ve put you in situations we should not have done
But listen mummy listen
Your girls are fine
They have outgrown themselves
Outgrown who they were 5 years ago
Mummy
Listen
I love you
We love you

Have you not been what you should be,
   as a husband, father and dad?
Have you not been any leader
   failing My God, oh so bad?

Have you said you will on one day,
   then the next you really won't?
Have you hurt the ones who love you,
   hanging with the ones who don't?

Have you pushed away your family
   with the hateful words you said?
Have you spoken words in anger,
   then run out the door and fled?

Have you seen the hurt you've caused them,
   had a son who wished you're there?
Have you once had to console her,
   when your daughter cried those tears?

Have you held her tight in loving arms,
   when wife had one bad day?
Have you crushed her heart again,
   'cause she knew you wouldn't stay?

Have you failed your son and daughter,
   with the sinful life you live?
Have you ever thought about just
   what your wife has had to give?

Have you opened up your eyes now,
   put your self aside to pause?
Have you felt their broken hearts from
   all the hurt and pain you caused?

Have you reached the very end now,
   of the sinful life you trod?
Have you seen your family needs you;
   not to late, just turn to God!

Have you asked My God forgiveness?
   Yes, the broken hearts He'll ease.
Have you shown them what He's done now,
   filled you full of joy and peace?

Have you gotten back your family,
   fought so hard for ones who care?
Have you prayed to God above you,
   for His love with them to share?

Have you called on Him to help you,
   your relationship repair?
Have you now seen it's important
   to your family if your there?

Have you ever stopped to think,
   if tomorrow never comes;
Will your family know you love them,
   when your last day here is done?

Do you fill your life with earthly things,
   or work your life away;
Thinking money, fame or fortune,
   will get you through each day?

There's not one thing up on this earth,
   even those things God has given;
You can take with you upon your walk,
   through those pearly gates of Heaven!

God placed those loved ones in your care,
   He thought you'd do your best;
Have you nurtured, taught and loved them all?
   If not you've failed His test!

Now love, you see, is not a word,
   to be thrown at them each night;
But wrap them up many times each day,
   and forever hold on tight!

When you're angry, mad or hateful,
   thoughts floating in your head;
Don't say those words you're thinking now,
   but go to God instead!

Just show your family often,
   hug and hold them every day-
How much you love each one of them,
   then together kneel and pray!

Just ask My Lord, whose on His throne,
   to guide you from above;
He'll lead you family day by day,
   and fill you with true love!

Then follow God's example,
   and when your laid to rest;
Your love won't be in question,
   then yes, you'll pass His test!

It's almost as if you think I wanted it this way
That I wanted to be the reaper, blotting out your rays
I ask you, take a walk with me, and see the other side
The feelings that I'd been running from I sought no more to hide

I'm sorry that I hurt you for that was not my plan
I merely wanted to be right with you, let you know where I am
How could I tell you Truth in absence of being so blunt?
These past weeks were not to play; the feelings were no stunt

I'm sorry that you hate me now, and that your blood boils hot
I'm sorry I thought I knew who I was, only to find that I was not
I'm sorry you gave so much to me, you should have kept it all
I'm sorry I couldn't be there for you, to catch you when you fall

But do not take this as a hope that you will take me back
I've moved from wanting to be tied to you to wanting more than slack
I don't curse our past for you have shown me a different part of life
I wish my words read out as words, and not whispers of mocking strife

I wish that I could be there, to help you change your mind
But what I've done is better, don't drop me another line
You should forget me, and all the pain I've caused you
Remember what it means to love when eventually you love anew.

I'm trying to remember
The words my father wrote.

He was a poet, in earlier days.
When he lived my lifetime once,
(Now he's lived it three-or-so times over.)

And I remember one day finding the words he wrote,
Photocopied onto bright white paper.

And it was then that I first realized how much I am like my father.

His words then held just as much as my words do now--

As much love,
As much anger,
As much confusion,
And, at times, as much hate.

And now that I feel lost and alone, I try to dig up the pages
That were haphazardly tucked in-between the leafs of a novel, I think

Or maybe an atlas,
Or maybe in a drawer,
Or maybe under the bed...

Behind the bookshelf?
In a photo album?
In a book
Any book
In the kitchen
Above the fridge
In a box
This box
Not this box
That box
Not that box
Any box,
Try any box,
Every box --


Which brings me to now.

Now I sit here, on the kitchen floor
Stirring my lukewarm chamomile,
Watching the air,
And the clock,
Breathing deeply through my mouth,
Holding back any sound

Searching through my head
To remember the words he wrote
Long ago
That somehow might make me feel my father's comforting smile
Now.