the steaming ground sporadic
calmed by balmy humid evening breeze

pungent sharp tang of *****
lifting into the air

i remain naive
eyes covered
walking face forward

my hands my maturity
but i have none

i wear headphones
the news headline flashes

businesses rise
people becoming impressive

my hands my maturity
maybe i've regressed further

i talk of trivialities
but people talk of people
talk of doing things with
people who do things

and i do not do things

so if i show them a poem
do i get a job

the floor digging into curves
i did not know by body had
with my body curving absurd
my hands full of realization
that my shapes are awry
off-the-mark

my legs sit ahead
lax tired filled with exhaustion
of not enough miles walked
enough sitting around day
to day and working on
support of my sitting body

i feel sorry to have taken
away their purpose
a life should be better
lived but it's owner
weary and filled
with excuses

works day and night
on sitting or sleeping
not doing much but
just a floater
focused on
a sky always cloudy

a pathetic soul
one of many
just a sad sad soul
in its generalizing
with the many
and the soul has no
shine

but hit escape
life has its
own rhythm and groove

but the groove that once
made itself known
seeps into the silence of
trees, nights, stars
rarely seen

words barely written
unartistic
unassuming
arbitrary
uninteresting
invisible

­screaming heart
quietens under
burden of
weightlessness
of existence

I've been writing such exacting words

Addressing questions

Too many of them

Where's the love
the fun

if it's all laid out in print

It's supposed to be shady
The elusive meaning


Darting

                                                                   W  i  n  d  i  n  g

E                  r r            a ti                                        

c
  
                                                          T
                            u
                                                                                                 m
                                                                  b
                                           l
                                                                                              i
                                                               n
                                                       g

around



The lines.

Where's the fun if it's easy?

something in my world broke
- i sometimes think to myself

i don't feel very young sometimes

i feel i have lived a thousand lives
and


and
i don't know if this is the way i'm supposed to feel

i feel empty and lifeless
like i can't hold a conversation
these days
not small
not big

i don't think i'm very interesting
or young
these days

maybe i never was?

End of the street
Face hidden in shadows
Body cloaked by darkness
A stick
Thick stick in hand
And his eyes shown
Shining white
Crystal white
Across the road
Piercing into my vision

I halted hands shaking
Holding up my phone
Like it could ward off anything

This apparition stared into my eyes
I could not hear anything
And he did not make a single move

I thought
- ****, I should've listened
And **** is this really happening?

A part of me giving in

This is inevitable
- I thought

It had happened to so many
I knew and
I knew
How easily it could happen
And I walked

And as I walked past him
I held up my phone to my face
At the ready to start running and
Fight

Adrenaline at peek

He mouthed words at me
I could not hear them

I passed him by and he did not
Make a move towards me

I looked back to make sure
He did not move and then
Saw another sharp crystal
Pair of eyes looking
This time
Somewhere besides myself

And I saw man and beast
A cat crouched
A man ready with stick
Staring into each other's eyes

Pondering the unknown
I walked faster as I saw
The man move a bit

They continued to be locked on each other

Apparitions of the night
The strange, the mythical
Who am I to say what happened
Maybe it never happened

But my hands shook and were cold
And now I think but I know
I will travel the same road tomorrow and the day after

It is the way I take home
and No Man
Will stand in my way

I fight
And will fight

It is my right to walk
There, if I wish
And I will walk there

Not a brave martyr
Just a tired soul
Taking the faster way home

i was thinking of you and me
in our pieces and places
thinking about our own selves

not thinking about each other
until time space place things
put us where we breathed air
in same situations here-there

what a strange conspiracy
would place us here to down
grade the importance of selves
ours mine yours each others

we did not prioritize so
this world put us at number
one for each others for some
time leaving us without options

we made do with companionship
some brief moments of time
where we prioritized each other
then time space place things

moved without us a tidal wave
of shifting things so we shifted
too and moved to others priorities
but you were fortunate enough

to take a plus one for these
black-tie events while i carry
the heavy space around me as if
it is an option a conscious choice

no one rsvp-ed as my plus one
thus no witnesses to call me out
when i don a new face to greet
the faces i meet prepared to leave

every second every day- i barely
remember those i met a minute
a blink a movement ago but
music forges ahead life brims

knowledge is added and crushed
into dust by the relevance of time
disallowing for anyone to put any
hold onto it with intellect or paper

my song remains empty silent fake
lights fake smiles fake laughs fake
fake tears fake companionship so
helplessly temporary i feel the

drowning air of words unsaid anxieties
untested in my bones at my lips as i
slowly nervously keep moving always
being rushed in as a late attendance

by an impatient usher too busy with
bigger details to explain the rules
of a party where i always arrive late
with none to take my coat at the door

i remain hopelessly dressed in red
dungarees worn since i was three
my version of a skintight red dress

painfully obviously underdressed

Nowadays I find it so difficult to think
- it's like there is cotton
inside my head
asking
for something
more
than
I'm willing to give.

I lose sight of what's
important and
I don't feel very
real.

There is no
anchor
in my life as I continue
to question the
value that it might have.

The darkness
of the nights are
what
I remember
from the nights I can
never
fall
asleep
- it is in this darkness that I have grown.

And
the
white
light
with
its
white  
noise
seems like a haze,

an illusion dropped over my eyes
which I cannot help but live out.


As I lose                                                             ­                          (my sanity)
touch
with
everything
around,

this keeps resounding within me
and
my words
continuously
fail
to reach
the recipient.

i crossed one of my biggest goals
off my list for the next summer
but i was thinking of what i were
to do now that that is done and
i was hoping i would have a better
idea of where i was to go what i
was to do and something feels as
if it has given out inside of me

as if my body has forgotten what
keeps it upright moving through the
world and i cannot speak to anyone
not my family or the friends i only
pretend to have so i am alone for
all intents and purposes so i keep
my phone on do not disturb to ignore
all the calls and messages i do not
get and spend holiday nights away
in strange places with people who
are unknown and strange hoping that
the next morning it will make a
little bit more sense and i will know

there is something in me
that tries to get out

and i like how sylvia ended her life
'baked to death'
- sounds fun

it seems like an interesting time

what is the point

i struggle to understand

i want to cry and cry
and never stop

but i tire with the thought
so i stop right there

and all i want to do
is sleep on
your floor of still hopes and dreams
stare at the walls of nightlight
and skies still reflecting the moon and the stars

then look up at the infinitely dark ceiling of sound sleep

without thoughts of tomorrow and baking and living and points being lobbied like endless ping pong ***** around my head

all i wanted was to lie in a pool of sunshine
so hot i could barely breathe, dream or think
ripping them away like crunchy autumn leaves
falling from trees in gusts of strong winds
i wanted to be engulfed in a hot pool
so hot i have difficulty breathing
and my clothes get covered in sweat
this uncomfortable heat and brightness
cruel in its desensitization but also
a mercy for my brain which churns and pivots
bouncing around thoughts and dreams which
make me wish for sleep and then hate sleep
wish i could run run and lie in pools of
molten sunshine burning my skin to the bones
so i can perhaps breathe for five minutes
without a weight on my chest
a crick in my neck tightness in my back
surprising liquid on my face
where does it come from?
what is its purpose?
where does it go?
all evaporate in this stupid pool of garbage
sunshine and i

i can pretend my heart does not beat blood
my presence matters
i am not sad
not contemplating numerous ways to die
in the spaces between my thoughts and dreams
in my thoughts and dreams

i remember and i forget hoping

hope kills and love dies
belief lies and relationships burn
a hollowness a cavity

there is sadness and there is a rhythm
but i
do not remember the paths i tread
following these endless roads to that rhythm
i once had
where is it now?
what is its purpose?
where does it go?

i lie in embarassment and bashfulness
dance around to pretend that love never dies
relationships soothe and hope survives

but in that pool of sunshine
half-truths and half-lies
concepts of gray do not exist in
pure bright white blue
hotness
so i wanted to burn for a bit
let my bones get some air
so my tears can evaporate
the moment they escape
so i can continue saying
my heart does not feel
my heart does not exist

i think i think too much of you
so i try to forget you in others
but others do not last so now i
feel like an overexposed wound
on the face of this earth trying
to hide my vulnerabilities in
the silence of the crowd which
is that spot when you are sitting
in a crowd of people but no one
is talking to you or looking at
you really so you have this haze
strangely around you where you
catch bits and pieces of others'
conversations but you remain a
bystander and there is silence
around you as you commit actions
like moving and talking so you
remain undisturbed and really
this is nice but i think of you
too much so i think of you in
this noise or the galaxies, and
stars at the point of my finger
tip exploding into colors and
slow motions in a tug of time
that we try to understand and
we pay millions and billions of
pulp of trees to try and see
as if by understanding we will
seize the tug and pull all of it
into the palms of our hands
so we can have these celestial
bodies in the palms of our hands
but really how can you and is
it not ridiculous that you
are infinitesimal in the face
of these constellations but
you sought to bring it to heel
like an errant dog anyway
but i think too much of you
and you are here lurking at
the bottom of my mind now
as if to say, stop, do not
think further of that, come
back and be grounded do not
dream silly dreams of stars
too big to move with finger
tips or even the full weight of
your body and i think too
much of you and i just feel
so so small

I will rear my hand back
And let it fly

Across the space-time divisions
The empty spaces of our
Memories and hatred

Rear it back
And tear it all away
Rip into shreds the nights
We had nothing in our hearts
The nights when we
had it all


I will let it crash against the mirror
of your absence

and let out a choked breath

As I bring myself under control

Leash the emotions
Always bubbling the constant laughter

and happiness

And love

The multiple echoes ringing out
Splitting my hands with the
Shattering windows and mirrors

Staring into my eyes
Spell-bound
Seeing years pass by
Speaking to the faces that no longer
Stayed
Wished for a breath
Washed-out on this beach of regrets
Wandering around, clutching to
Words and smells of who we used to be
Whispers of the air

The sinew of my hand breaks
As it recites to me the long-lost saga
Of my race
It tells me its sins and hopes and regrets

and regrets

and  r  e  g  r  e  t  s

I dream on

Hollow-eyed
Sleep-deprived
Backed into the corner
of my nightmares
The scar above my eye
Needle-marks on my chin

Throbbing
Remembering

I hold up my hands
A raw meat hammer


And they reach nothing
Past the empty fjords and valleys
where you used to reside

I am left










here

I was calling you today

on the middle of a bridge

that lit up colors

striping through the

night skies

i like looking at



and i thought of all the times i had spent

chasing dreams, chasing chasing chasing

fat stacks of money a sense of accomplishment a life worth living



and i thought

thought about my life and its trajectory

through the streets of broken stones

spent staring at cracks on pavement



there is this hollow feeling in my chest

i feel a conscious space there

there is this empty feeling in my brain

it feels disconnected from my body



they do not respond to my emotions



i reach for a smile but my lips do not respond right



i am walking but my legs feel so light

but my arms feel heavy

my head remains bowed



but friend,

where are you



i have forgotten what you look like

my therapist told me
i have anxiety
and that i should spend time
breathing

in&out
slow&slower

i am trying
to be honest
once again
in my life

the mess at the bottom of my stomach
- is there a possibility it will go away?

i feel blue in this
resonance of being
under water
with loneliness

going through motions
doing what i must
or have been told
i should waking up
eating working
working sleeping
day in day out
is it april
is it november

is there really
any difference?

take pills talk
about scars bring
up hurts from my
past that might
have been better
forgotten take
pills increase
dosage wake up
brush teeth eat
food take medicine
work sleep work work
eat **** is this april
is this november

**there is really
no difference...

time was spent
writing and in that
I thought
it's been a while



I was counting down the years
looking at my fingers
two hands not enough to contain
all of it



a palm full of life
two palms full of life
three... and
(well, I'd reverse or continue
but my age
should remain a secret)

but after so many handfuls
there were some more
maybe too many
maybe not much or perhaps
were there any?



some palmfuls of life
and I realize
that maybe I need to
be a little kinder



looking past the now
remaining stuck in fear
fear of what may come
what may be said



I realize that is not good
not healthy
and I wish that above all else
I regain my strength to live
as fully as I wish
as fully as I want to be remembered



but it is hard
and I know it takes time patience skill
to bring everything I have
up to the standard I want to reach



so I stay clustered in my room
preparing myself
rejuvenating myself
re-motivating myself
to try
be better than who I am



apparently motivation is like showering
so it's something that needs to be pursued
not done once and forgotten forever

i feel scared, love
my heart hurts
love
i want to clamber into your lap,
love
the way i never did when i was two
i want to sit in your pool of warmth
and be drowned by the rough timbre of your voice
as i count down my fears and cry
because love
i am so terrified

but this world does not look familiar
and i
i'm losing sight
drowning
d r o w n i n g
in this ocean of work
a cross between my shoulder blades

a memory at my lips
scars along my wrists
i am so scared my love

and i find myself mumbling numbers
i should not
talking about deals
talking
c r a z y,
love

i am scared
and i cannot clamber into your lap
because i am no longer two
and i do not have love, love

i was feeling lonely and low again
but this time it had nothing to do
with volume of work just the over-
whelming sounds of not-people tal-
king talking to me to each other

it feels very much like being a
used rag beat up with others tears
frustrations broken dreams but none
of their joy optimism hope love or
happiness so i thought again about
life being for the living existing
stability competence steadiness
about wishing away forever but never
finding anything like today in the
infentissimal spaces between our
gaping web stories i wondered if
yours and mine would intersect
like eye-contact across railways
apathy indifference ignorance of
always being in the same place
at the same time but never sharing
the same moment in the same space

i thought of the intersections
of my veins and my synapses electric
and the nerves on leaves that
look an awful lot like the arrangement
of vessels under the skin of my
thick solid wrists with some bulging
out belying their strength with
their deep blue-ish color
blossoming brusie-like under the
surface pulsating with life-blood

then i thought of fishing by oceans
sitting cross-legged on wooden
benches overlooking rolling cold valleys
with a hot cup of tea in my hands
or waking up and sitting on the beach
in the sand hands wrapped loosely
tugging my knees to my chest
watching the ocean waves come in
in the soft light of stars giving
way to some of the early morning rays
spreading like coffee slowly spilled
across the thick cheap carpetting used
in cheap office spaces with all
the color of a muted mix of yellows
reds oranges pinks blues refracted
across the skies forming impressions
on the water that waves more prominently
preening in the separation between
itself and the now lightening skies

lately ive been lost
looking at others
hoping that there is
a life beyond and
bigger but reality
gets and stays bigger
with age; bills are
no longer in hand
they are just like
everything else-
numbers on screens
too bright to see
through the glare

left at three am
leaving fairy lights on
knowing that i would be
coming back

sometimes the pain is so searing,
so blatant

that it brings me to my knees
i felt that writing become a dagger
that i kept reinserting into old scars, open scars,
an implement that i impaled myself on
repeatedly

when i tried to explain and
communicate how i felt to others
by way of prose, by way of tears,
by way of sighs, by weight of grief

i felt the wounds scar over
the dagger still resting under the surface
continuing to hurt awkwardly
as i shifted my weight from foot to foot
to walk from my kitchen to my couch

i hated the feeling of it scarring over
my tears having already been given
no longer healing the scab that had formed

what do they call these fake scabs anyway?
it's just disguising the rot below.

would it not be better if i cried in fetal position on the floor?

it all hurts anyway.

i'm tired mom
i'm tired dad

i cannot stand to hear the birds sing these days
could not bear the hot sun for the past week
my heart danced when it rained and was quick
to stop with the rain and now i feel like
the colors bled out again but was this not
supposed to get better? i have been trying
to not live inside my own head and the hole
at the bottom of my stomach, the pit inside
my heart- i have not succeeded but i try to
fill up the spaces in my head with music-
that does not work either- and was all music
this flat? i lose sight and my hands are
shaking- now, i notice the gaps in pores,
the lines of my hands and- mom, are you there?
can you please talk to me for a bit now?
i am sorry i can only speak about my work
but i cannot tell you how i feel and how
i am alone and the only person in this mess.
dad, are you hearing me? i just wanted to hear
your voice to remind myself that someone cares
about my dreams and passions, someone who would
go above and beyond to ensure i am not crying
myself to sleep at night. brother, can you
scold me a bit longer? i am sorry but it has
been a long time since someone cared enough
to tell me how to do better and be better.

is friendship meant to be this hollow, this
easily brushed past? is it meant to be so
fleeting and brief? i do not want summer here
for i appreciate the coldness of winter instead
that tells me, gives me an excuse, to have hope
because summer comes with bright sunlight and
no excuses but with resounding harsh silences
in the pauses between the bird song and the
baking heat of the sun. love is too hard
and friendship is a lie-- so mom, dad, brother,
would you stay on the phone a bit longer?

i was dreaming about you
last night

thinking about perfection
and its

relevance in my life
my fractured

pieces that come together
for average

cannot compete against that
of yours

where you burn and fight so
you can

best everyone and i i just
try to

get by with some work some
smiles to

help me while my nights away
and a

dream of how i one day want
wish i

could feel living in sleeping
bags half-

stolen songs sung soft in
moon light

on a fall day crisp leaves
falling crunching

slow under my feet while this song
plays out

my life my insecurities and i hope
to live

a life so beautiful that when i die
they cry

the stars were falling down last night,
love,
in my mind and over my head,
in the privacy of my bed with the yellow fairy lights
glimmering and i imagined them blinking at me but i set
the light source to one of stable continuity.

the stars were falling though,
in my hair and inside my head
- freezing them with their cold blue light,
easing the migraine,
the pounding inside my head.

i dreamed their scaled sizes smaller than
pinpricks of light in the distance,
and i dreamed you up last night
at your cruelest where you,
you stopped and cared for me.

it was the cruelest i had ever seen you
as i knew that once i woke up,
i would be left bereft of warmth in my life,
always striving, never achieving.

i scolded myself for my actions and expectations
but i knew that it was futile as my mind
kept moving ahead to other times,
other things i must do, and i realize
it is futile to wish for time to stop.

They sat, locked fingers across their knees,
curled against their chest. The sand uncomfortable-
gritty in their teeth, irritating their scalp,
in their pants; little red ants climbing on their bare
skin. Shells lie broken, a hazard, they've been told.

There is something beautiful about the way
the sea comes back to kiss the shoreline,
taking things but also leaving little surprises
behind- some gifts returned like a spoilt child
or some deity unhappy with the offered selection,
and some new unopened treasures brough in from
cousins abroad, as if an angry mother still
serving food to misbehaving children.

i burnt
in
time
with the staccato
of the rain
howling
against
bars round
my room

i burnt
in
twisted words
an
unsaid
anger
and
riffing
nerves

i burnt
in
sanctuary
ice
cold
air soothing
frayed
hair

i burnt
in
whispers
echoing
in my
ears

i burnt
to
the ground
in the
heat
ed
words

Dreamt of forcing politeness and eating
human flesh served at a dinner party.
We sat at tables looking our finest,
eating slow, my stomach and the knowledge
Taught to me in my crib fighting each bite.
That flesh continued haunting the inside
of my eyelids-- this was not my war; this
was not my struggle; this should never have
been my battle. Yet I see it in my
news, my tables, my tabloids, my back-alleys
and I-- I'm helpless, unable to move.

i was hoping that sleeping would become easier with age
and exhaustion

money was always the problem but now that it's not, i
genuinely thought

my shoulders and neck would unwind and i would rest
easier

my neck twinges, protesting my naivety, my wrists
have stiffened


i am contemplating how better to grow up...

should i...

learn pottery?
drive a car?
invest my money?
go on dates?
find new friends?
lose some weight?
go for a trip?
eat some good food?
do something interesting?


i am sitting in front of the tv, i laugh

a funny joke, some good-looking people struggle
with relationships, stupid games, insane challenges


my mind wanders and i forget


now, the chill is in the air, leaves fall to the ground,
night grows longer, i am exhausted

my knees hurt, my back hurts, i shed more hair,
cannot down pizza like i used to before

my mind wanders and then, exactly when i need the sleep,
lands again in this **** hole

of picking something again

i prefer the noise of river flowing
there's this overall gush you can
hear and some weird sort of continuity
you really don't get when you sit
beside the sea so when i think of my
favorite water sounds i like thinking
of the river and sometimes when i am
in the shower i like to close my eyes
pretend i am in the middle of this
great river which is engulfing me
in its tide and current but i am
strong and big enough to stay steady
at the center and in this place i
am no one but the person in the middle
of this river and this person has
no cares of who is waiting at the banks
and who is not because this person
is so strong and can hold themselves
against this magnitude this volume
of water and i sometimes change the
temperature of the shower from
hot to cold so i can make it more
realistic in my mind and i imagine
myself to be big and invulnerable
dignified and respected with many
scars from battles won with a strong
back that does not hurt as much as
mine does and i sometimes wonder
what i would need to be and do to
become as stately as i want to be
in my mind i am that person in the
river untethered but firmly rooted
knowing that they are exactly where
they need to be because when needed
the river erodes this person's foothold
and then rather than panicking this
person allows themselves to be carried
by this great mighty river because
now they know this place is no longer
theirs to be so they are moved at the
will of the river and themselves to
another new place where they will again
firmly root themself until the next
cycle.
i wish i knew to move myself when
my time was up. but i don't.

i thought of the waves in the shore
dreamt of nights passed
wished the water was as clear as they
showed in those tv shows
one by one faces came to mind
interactions analyzed one by one

i broke it all down without meaning to
i did not care but my mind worked
without letting me breathe in
it showed me critical commentary
on the last time i stepped outside
and i felt the gnash of self
realization mixed in with profound
absurdity

my hand moving ridiculous
mouth moving ridiculous
words i was saying ridiculous
work i was doing ridiculous

i could not stop it
so i stared at my toes
trying to drown my thoughts out
with the waves that
crashed with a loudness
inconvenient plastic sticking on my feet
i find i need to move

Lying back on the scratched bench
I heard the sound of horns approaching
A sign of sorts maybe for me to move
I tempered my urges and looked up at the skies
As kids of the night chased each other
Through streets in dreams that stitched together
Their own world where socks were plentiful
Their cuts were because of paper and
Their houses were free from debt collectors
Flashes of yellow made me pitch forward--
I sat up, my back striped and riddled with
Holes of a dream that did not belong to me.

P. B. J.
Peanut Butter and Jelly
P. B. J.
I eat this everyday
Is this really healthy?
Who cares? We're rats anyway
P. B. J.

if they knew all they would become to were
some scars i regretted and did my best to forget
i wonder if i had known would i have changed my experiences
would i have tried to be colder stand straighter more upright
chin jutting out, daring the world to try one more time to put me
down, defiant and confident in my struggle that it was for me alone
but then the thought strikes me is that if even now all i gather are scars
instead of the cooling aloe that i need to heal past burns, some ice to cool
the heat under my skin from the betrayals and hurt i had felt once upon a time
a heat that still burns my insides today, the sharp tears of which left scars on
insides of my eyelids, a movie on repeat whenever i close my eyes to sleep or blink
in the middle of a good conversation with a new person standing in my casual self wishing
i could be somewhere else the moment i remember the slashes, the quiet shattering of my insides

They stand next to a kitchen island.
One clutches an orange peeling its layers,
her sweater casual and her hair tied back.
The other, with a tight smile,
gazing down at reflections on a bottle,
her hair loose and hands clutching the counter.
This is not our home but we break bread and
drink wine
on a night meant for blood relations;
we silently wish the world flat
so if we climbed high enough,
we could see them tonight.
I stand here soaking in the moment,
trying to capture the smells of cardamom
and cinnamon, sounds of the tv nearby,
Christmas lights strung up,
light-hearted laughter from
soon-friends soon-strangers.
We are perpendicular lines, meeting
at this house for a brief pause.
Our strange family of strangers
done up in monochrome-- our colors
brightened by laughter lines.

the familiar feeling of bile rising
from the pits of my stomach
all the way up up up

now at the bottom of my throat

-- i am basically gargling it now

some thoughts and fears never leave
my mind needlessly conjuring up
paranoid scenarios repeatedly

my imagination never failing me

that familiar choking feeling
closing my air passage
and hands shaking
inhaling and exhaling deeply

a panic attack overtaking me
black spots on my vision now
i try to forget the caricatures
drawn in my imagination

heart still racing, flecks on the
sides of my eyes, throat feeling torn

that familiar feeling of helplessness
solitude, loneliness, sadness,
righteous fury, despair, alone,
alone, alone, alone, alone

-- no one around

my walls are whispering,
my memories are ripped apart
every relationship, conversation
overanalyzed, brought to the forefront
of my mind's eye and every worst-case

brought up and the walls that
once seemed sturdy enough to hold
out against the world in my isolation
don't feel thick away anymore

my dreams, miles away, seem like the
worthless struggles of a coward
who can only run away, helpless
clueless child in some adult body

has not read the book everyone
in the room already read-  left
without pretense and a mask

cannot read the cues, hardly
knows when to move on and no good
at drawing lines or forgetting

my heart is pounding, numbness
falls over-- everyone leave,
leave, leave, leave, leave

let's be more stubborn is my recent motto

let's love myself more, even if it's tough, especially when it's tough



to do that, let's start being more honest with myself, right?

i am going to lie to myself actually.
i am going to stand on my own side and defend my own feelings.


you? you are a joke to me!
you can defend yourself and justify yourself.

you believe you did the right thing?



good! good? good good!!
i also believe that i did the right thing so ***** you.



====

such a simple childish conversation, why did it take me so long to realize how powerful this is?

if I am not on my side, then who will be on my side? why do i always have to view it like others do?

why was i taught that i was bad if i hurt others' feelings??
what if they hurt my feelings?? is that right, then?

i am not sorry.
i do not want to feel a second's worth of guilt or hurt over it.
you hurt me and i hurt you back. you deserved it.

stop trying to take advantage of the fact that i am nice and desperate for people.

no one is really that important to each other.

not even lovers last!
divorces are ever-growing. no one wants to actually stay married. even john mulaney and his wife broke up. :(

parents can **** too!
orphanages keep growing in population, child abuse is rampant globally.

who says friendship lasts forever?
talk to all the middle schoolers and adults who have fallen out with multiple people over their short and long lives.

i call *******!
i was just taught to be a ******* doormat.

circling the boxes
expectations
ideas and fantasies
once dreamed

pain strikes thunder
a roar of noise
flashing of future
beyond this now

darkness and substance
both cloak
heart racing skin warm
chest not

enough to contain this
feeling which
spills out like a full
stop ending a

sentence and like some run
away in its own trance the
water precipitates flowing
into an ocean of movements

cut off like a highly
irregular sentence.

when did writing start hurting so much
being honest with myself so hard?

my words bled into sunsets, moonsets, dawns, dusks and the like
all my times were marked in some thing written for me to look back on

but when did it become so physically difficult, so heavy
to be honest with myself?

maybe it was when i realized that the mundanity of life is the
gravebed of my soul, having money to myself was not that great?

maybe when i realized that art for art's sake just reeks of desperation

and those younger than me became renowned and my age started to join
the generation meant for engagements, marriages, less social possibilities

and i then realized that i was lying to myself out of sheer desperation
but that i was desperately alone, desperately fighting scared,

flying was no longer a dream come true, and the worldspan measured
across the palm of my hand had already happened and i was an emu

left for extinction, my soul just a joke, an ironical metaphor
for the jaded cynicism that i had condemned and i read more and saw more

realizing i am frog at the bottom of a well and my victim mentality
was maybe a figment of imagination, and the hellscape of my perspective

being skewed drove around, round, round in my mind, such a frightening
possibility that what if?? what if?? i was just insane?? i was crazy??

was anything that happened to me that bad?? is there something wrong with me??

i was almost convinced and then i felt my heart truly shatter
i realized i did not actually matter

frantically drawing boundaries

a childhood filled with people louder and angrier

insults thrown across, boomeranging into stings on cheeks

loud nights, where breaths, laughs, tears were stifled



under covers, my escapes built on castles of words

so now at nights, i continue running across drawbridges

made of bitten nails, dry throats, cheeks already tingling

moats of cotton blankets, sweet moonlit tones



how did you learn when to stop caring?

how did you learn to care for yourself?

selfishness i never learnt

loving myself a concept foreign



now my brows crinkle when i think

of myself and questions naturally

arise when i consider doing anything

for myself



working to the bones, bank balance grows

why do i still not do anything i ever dreamt of?



shadows of insecurities and anxieties

rains of tears and never being enough



i never learnt how to be a human for myself



i look for the next avenue to turn

for others to care for



but i learn and learn-

no one really cares



i flail and panic, my arms lashing for the shores

sinking again into my dreams



my nerves keeping on asking, "if not not, when? when? when?"

echoing "when" in my ears as i try to sleep



i muffle it all and drown it in the neons of social media

television shows

drinks with people who won't remember my name

presents for people who have already forgotten my name

my shoulders sag as i head home



the heaviness of leaving and pain of my existence

now that it does not cost anyone else anything

feels less burdensome but why does it still hurt so much?



life is really not that bad anymore

why do i still hurt so much on the inside?



why do everyone's voices sound so sharp coming down the phone?

find myself screaming into the void
a time of calamity and peril
others say i am so blessed
but i say it's just a matter of time

body so stressed
my spine is taut
shoulders so stiff
their edges so thin
it would cut into your presumptions

you don't know my story how dare
you know how i fare

my breaths are staggered drawn out
suffering im stretched always at a
point of tension. someone just snap
and get me out of this my heart hurts
from mediocrity i am going out there
chasing after a world out of ferocity

i know what it is to burn the edges
of my hands and my fingers and i just
just wanted some time to pay attention
to the quell of my heart my blood stream
weakening to the slow death march of my
genes and i wish you

i wish you would take a second and stop
and this world would just let me figure
it out. i want to figure it all out just
please please can you give me a minute?
my heart has not yet caught up, still
hurting from the blows you had dealt
a minute before

please give me time i beg, i am just a
little slow, walking through sludge
living through silence, enacting some
pantomime of desolation a modern dystopia
i smile in the sun for a beat between the
shadows of two buildings

give me a second and a minute, i truly
want to care but my heart and breaths
feel choked up. i just want to perform
better and do more for you. i want to be
more you know. wish i could be brave and
say it out loud.

you know what i say to myself and the walls
the hum of my fridge as it taunts me with
my anxiety-- my fear is not something you
paid for. you did not pay the high price
of defeating me into a ******* corner
ya you risk me and my life.
ya you risk my career and my dreams.
ya you risk everything i love about my life.
ya ya you do.

so come for me *******. come at me world economy.
bring my life crashing down if you must.

i will face you and everyone and everything.

my voice might be small, i might be trembling.
i am definitely crying. if anything happens,
there will be no one left, and no one will be
able to help, but there are wide oceans and rivers,
wider paths, and wilder roads. who knows what
will happen next? life is for the living.

life is for the living.

at least, i will be living.

winter spring summer glazes
taste the same when the cake is isolation

spending time mindlessly in dark caverns
emerging only for sustenance
i barely had time to note the time i wasted

pressure rests heavy on my heart
as i struggle to breathe through it

years go by and then a thought-
                        what if this is just an extension of maybes?
                        is not just more of the same?


regrets sweep away, the moonlight is painted over again and again until it becomes sunlight

failed ambition
reeks of delayed hopes
endless doubts
a subversion of normal
admittedly
but sadness springs
of unrealized dreams

unfounded grandeur
inflated thoughts
and goals

is it a failure of oneself or a letdown of generations?

gaps between reality and aspirations

bottomless chasms

sitting on the sides
dazed new dreams
falling in

Often at night,
I find myself breathless
Windows wide open
Curtains fluttering

Probably not
A lack of oxygen
Right?

Right
I firmly nod
My heart hurts

Pits scraped from
Empty restaurants
Voided relief bills
No handouts from
Mom or Dad

Chest pounds again
Pang of pain
My ribs feel a little
Brittle this
Late in the eve

Off the pills
No thermometer or
Medication

An island
A world
Alone

I dance with you in my heart
But my breath is staggered

Job really nothing much to
Write home about