to my nightsky,
you are the moon
and the stars
simultaneously.

here lies asteria.
and her falling stars —
they crash faster than they rise
here inside this starless chest —
a foreign place,
a refugee camp —
all leaden lungs and a leaden sky.

here she sleeps
under a blanket of nightfall one might mistake for the golden fleece,
but then again,
alchemy is a long, forgotten lover
all bag of tricks,
and sleight of hand,
all doves and swords
and a fickle heart.

so what of her?
what of a lonely girl?
what of her history and all her scattered bones?

what of a fallen Titaness?
what of this diaspora of all her dying stars?
what of this sepulcher for all her nameless stars?

here lies asteria
with her unbaptized stars —
here, where the dark side of the moon
goes home.
here, where wisterias and howling wolves
and stifled screams
go to die.

here inside this starless chest,
these pallid lips,
this leaden skin of mine.

here lies asteria. here lies her host.
and this is how a black hole sighs.

nothing good happens after 2 am.

and yet here we are —
a rather curious pair of star-litten messed ups;
they say that liquid mercury and bare skin
are never a good combination
but kiss me nonetheless;
hold me nonetheless,
burn me nonetheless —

after all,
temples get burned down for the idols they host.

nothing good happens after 2 am,
but then again,
this is no place for sunsets and poems and sunday dates;
this is the apocalypse —
trapped for centuries inside our skin.
so go on,
break me — crack me open and lick the wounds,
and then maybe we'll know why persephone keeps going back to the underworld.
and then maybe we can call it love.
so go on,
kiss me until running breathless
becomes our way of breathing;
this may not be something we survive.

after all,
the daylight is an estranged lover and we are this house's walls trying to forget.

nothing good happens after 2 am,
but you will be the reason for every word, darling.
you will be the nightfall-colored eyes,
the nails all painted black
from when you dug for the dirt in my chest.
you will be the forgotten histories,
the impenetrable groves,
the coffee shop clichés,
the storms that never pass,
the nights that never last,
the secret places and warzones
and cotton dresses and fallen peonies,
and a threefold heartbreak
personified —

after all,
heartbreaks feel better when they come from you.

nothing good happens after 2 am
but t h i s already is a cautionary tale, anyway,
even without the 2 am
and tonight will be us,
crying wolf and coming undone.
tonight will be us,
tiptoeing through a minefield of mistakes,
mistakes,
and mistakes.
tell me, what's the harm in another one?

tonight will be our mayhem
and our foreboding
and our free-fall —
fatal. irreversible. majestic.
tonight will be us —
foreign lands mapping each other,
baptizing each other, darling.

and tomorrow will be ours to regret.

She was an art,
but she wasn't the type
you'd find in museums
or the type that would
make you feel profound things
in your chest.

She was an art
tucked in hidden pockets
of a faded yellow dress.
She was an art,

slowly sketching herself
out of existence.