I remember the stillness of that night;
and the silence we felt because nature doesn’t really count as sound.
I remember the cat-tails we’d dip in kerosene
and watch the glean of the light that rode the coat tails of summer into fall.
I hear a clock deep inside me that counts the seasons I’ve watched; tic tock tic tock
Someday this is going to stop.
It threatens to stop.

30 | 31 Poems for August

I set myself on fire just to keep you warm.
You should see my third-degree burns.
I was taught to never play with matches but I guess I’ll never learn.
You stand there with no sense of panic and watch me as I slowly burn.
Ascending to new heights and I still want to take you higher.
Burnt every flower in the garden of my heart and you’re still fuelled with a burning desire.
All that I needed was the kind of love that I mysteriously couldn’t find.
I’m the boy who didn’t give up on love and you’re the girl who stopped learning to love again.
For some odd reason, you enjoy watching me going through relentless pain.
With your kerosene hands you ignite every single thing you touch.
All I wanted you to do was love me, I wasn’t really asking for much.
Every time I say your name, I feel a burning sensation at the back of my throat.
Swimming in an ocean of kerosene with no signs of a lifeboat.
I keep thinking about how loving you is complicated while I try to stay afloat.
I’m the boy who taught himself how to love through the pain.
I thought that your love and laughter could keep me sane.
You constantly scorch my skin with your burning love.
I set myself on fire just to keep you warm.
You should see my third-degree burns.
I was taught to stay away from fire but I guess I’ll never learn.
You stand there and watch me as I slowly burn.
Slowly burning, now here comes the smoke.
But a phoenix will always rise from the ashes.
A phoenix will always rise.

17 | 31 Poems for August

I set myself on fire just to keep you warm.
You should see my third-degree burns.
I crave for your touch even though I have never truly experienced it in its entirety.
I wasn’t asking for much all I wanted to do was love you.
But you were fuelled with a desire to set my heart on fire.
I was looking for love, and I was hoping that I would find it in you.
Drench me in an ocean of kerosene and watch me burn as I sail away.
It doesn’t matter whether you use matches or a lighter.
Set me on fire because a future without you won’t be any brighter.
My mind is uncertain about your intentions but you’re still the one that I desire.
I long for your burning love and warm embrace.
I just wish that you longed for the very same love too.

Maybe she was looking for somebody to warm
her up all the time and God, when it got
too dark outdoors you cried kerosene and set
fire to yourself just to provide her safety and security.
And maybe it's true that everything
comes in a paradoxical form and that's
why even though you were born from
a warm womb, your soul was so icy cold
she burnt her fingertips just touching it
and probably mistook it for the heat she
had always been longing for. I know that it's ironic,
I know that your dreams lay somewhere
beside her perfect body and shiny hair
but your reality is four suicide
attempts and cutting your wrists open
over some permanent tattoo where
her love was supposed to be skinned.


-- Eleanor

tell me about the fact that you never sleep on your left side.
describe every turn, every toss, every other hour where you open your eyes again.
your hand reaches into the humid air, trying to remember the width of my throat.

and isn't that like you? to run your tongue along the taste of piled bones against a torn mattress.

not the heat, not the growls in between,
you are beautiful, i see how you burn for me.

but didn't your mother warn you not to play with fire?
kerosene is unforgiving, my fingers striking the evening in the shape of matches.

and so we scream, you slam your body into mine.
a breath into my neck, just like this, baby?

but don't forget the way my lips burned your skin.
you won't find destruction like this in any other life.

and that is the art of my absence.

so, tell me again how you don't sleep on your left side,
because that's where the fire started.