i’m so ******* sad because a boy kissed me in his bed in a london hotel room, late last sunday morning, and i couldn’t say no because there was something delicious in the way he’d bite my lips and filled my mouth with the taste of toothpaste - i walked in on him while he was still in the bathroom. there’s no embarrassment in the way i banged my head against the wall in an effort to madly kiss him, it’s been a while since i had a boy’s tongue playing with my own and he undressed me even though i told him not to, because it’s so easy for a seventeen year old to work his way around my clothes, touching me in places i don’t normally let see the glaring light of day. ‘kiss me more’ he said, every time i stopped to think about my boyfriend patiently waiting for me back home.

it's hard to find myself in the hours of the a.m. if i look in your arms i won't be there, my place already filled by a prettier girl with your british accent and my straight teeth. shadows in the doorway scare me back to sleep where i dream of our old text messages and how you wanted to kiss me and you were 'just saying' it but never actually got the chance to.

there was a florist and i really liked it, all the colours and flowers and tubs and bouquets and it was really just gorgeous, sort of too pretty for words. you know, like stars when the sky is the deepest sort of black; like how sometimes you can smudge paints together to create an image of clouds in front of a setting sun that takes your breath away; like you.
i told you my one rule when it comes to flowers, but it was too late, you had already bought me thirteen pink tulips. i smiled and thanked you and they were really beautiful but it made me a little sad because i would rather a rose bush for my backyard, a strawberry plant, a walk through the botanical gardens. something that wouldn’t wither away within days, something solid and lasting, like i hoped we would be.

how can i write about love when you admitted you loved me but were never in love with me?

i have a map of places i can’t go without thinking of you. from the park to the waterfall, to the ******* halls of that ******* high school, even the roads when I’m driving late at night because you made it a habit for me that i can’t even begin to break. these places pinpoint in my mind, glowing stars all individual until they join up to make the constellation that was us.
i live in a ghost town and i want out.

it was the city we talked about in those long nights when we had nothing to say, lying in your bed and memorising the way the dark painted shadows across our cheekbones and jaws. melbourne, you would whisper.
a city far away and cultured and quaint and brimming with old buildings and trams and coffee houses and american things like seven-elevens and starbucks.
it was different being there with you. much more different being there without you.

there's something in these long rainy afternoons, laying naked beneath the sheets alone with wandering hands   in an empty house that echoes with my moans and i love the excitement of leaving the windows open so my neighbours can hear that i'm not entirely joyless without you
i'm so lonely i would **** myself on the porch just for a little bit of attention , like a glance off the street from a stranger could ever equal the look of intensity in your eyes as you ****** between my thighs
my fingers taste how i remembered yours each night, a taste of skin and sweat and *** , i miss the way you felt on my tongue how you made me feel powerful and good as every drop rolled wet down my throat

those sour japanese lollies you mailed to me tore my mouth up with ulcers, but still they could never treat me as roughly as you

“goodnight,” your kiss says, our skin pale and lips red.
“don’t,” i say. “don’t go.”
you smile into my mouth because you don’t want to.
our night-time habits are ******* with our heads. it’s hard to tell now, when we’re still trying to impress each other with magic tricks and hidden knowledge and by tattooing flowers and words onto each other’s skin, but in the morning, when we’re squinting in the too-bright light of the school hallways and sarcasm can only be emitted through minuscule sighs and shakes of the head, it comes creeping back.
we exist only in the night.

i can't write about you anymore. when i hear your name i don't feel anything; don't imagine your lips on all the bruises of my skin; don't find myself replaying the recordings of your voice in my mind; don't shudder as my heart alights and my fingers tap the rhythm of your pulse and my veins remember the way you felt inside of them. i don't write about you anymore. i can't feel anything.

the small bumps and hiccups of the rattling carriage startled you awake. the green seats of the train were lined with cheap vinyl and stained with coffee. they held us in the glow of early morning and the glare of midday and the grimness of night. i looked up from my book and locked eyes with you. i wanted to whisper poems of e. e. cummings into your ear but you were so peaceful as you closed your eyes again, sinking into that place where you are both awake and asleep yet neither.
words of poetry could not bring to mind the softness of your skin as you sunk low into your seat, nor could they rival the prettiness of your closed eyelids and the way you curled your hands into paws using the sleeves of your sweater. i wanted to stay like that with you forever.

i write poetry on the back of street signs that read ‘one way only’.

yesterday, we were at the art gallery, wandering hand in hand, ducking into corners when rowdy groups of school kids ploughed past, sneaking kisses by the displays.
i had blisters on my toes, a product of them rubbing against the sides of my boots (on the train beforehand you leaned over and whispered into my ear that they were cfm - standing for come **** me - boots and i was astounded and pleased and trying not to make eye contact with you on that crowded standing-room-only train, wondering if other people could read our ***** thoughts) so i'd pulled them off and was slipping and sliding in my socks on the wooden floors.
it was a perfect day, really, but the only piece of art i remember seeing was you.

a song. “400 lux,” you said. “lorde.”
i nodded. i knew it. i loved it.
we’re never done with killing time, can i **** it with you?
first driving so slow, creeping through the dark suburban roads, the car’s headlights sweeping over front lawns and pale bitumen, breaking through the shadows from the trees on the nature strips.
then driving fast, on the highway, on the overtaking lane all the way to the city, where we wander aimlessly street by street for a long time but it’s really only an hour or so.
and then where we crash - a cosy little coffee shop with dim lighting and low seats - open twenty-four hours and the perfect place for you and me and other people like us, because there are others like us, i know it. i see them in the passing windows of crawling cars and across the cafe at two thirty am when i’m sipping my hot chocolate and holding your hand over the coffee table.
“do you ever yell at people ‘i want to *******’ but like in your head?” you asked.
i tilted my head and nodded a little.
you nodded too, leaning back in your seat relieved. “yeah. good. me too.”
and so it goes.

our voices cross oceans and continents; each sigh and breath dancing all the way from your bedroom to mine. i press the phone closer to my ear, close my eyes and listen, like maybe it can help me picture you there, within touching distance, a smile drawn across your face, eyelids droopy with sleep, fingers tracing the lines of my body.
after each sentence i pause, listen to your breathing and make sure you're still there, hung on my every word, like i am yours.
hours of this. you, shy and quiet, laughing gently and beautifully. me, carrying conversation, telling you stories and weaving lines of poetry into your day, crossing time zones, while i should be asleep.
after minutes and minutes of both of us saying goodbye but neither of us hanging up, i love you is what i softly whisper. you don't hear me and i don't mind, because you murmur it to me without thinking, quiet too, almost like it was never there, like i imagined it all.
of course you hang up first, of course i lie there for hours after, with the phone still pressed tightly to my ear, trying to burn the entire conversation into my brain to replay over and over when you are the one asleep, while i am still awake.

'can you hear me?'
'yeah, can you hear me?'
'yeah.'
'okay.'
'okay.'
-giggling-
'okay.'
'oh my god, stop flirting with me!'
-more giggling-
'are you there?'
'yeah.'
'okay'.
'okay.'
etc.

won’t you keep my photograph in the pocket of your ripped jeans, tucked in tight and close so you can always hold me?

i took a polaroid photo to give to you but it came out blank and i feel like that’s us; a shot taken and still nothing.

sometimes i think it's all in my head and we were never actually in love at all. i hate myself because i'm even crazier than that girl you kissed (kelsie, i never said her name out loud) when you were drunk and missing me. and you saw all the warnings, you used to call me a pyscho then say 'i love you' when you should have been turning your ******* back on me. i'm not a game to get your adrenaline going, trust me it'll be no fun waking up beside a dead girl

subway
ed sheeran, especially give me love, our ******* wedding song
black and white photos
england, you wanted to show me everywhere
6"2'
the fault in our stars
always
italian, why did you even feel the need to say ti amo
*****, you were drunk when you said it the second time
5.30am
scars on people's wrists, don't be silly, you said it was an accident
collar bones
tumblr
dreams, the good ones were mine, the bad ones were yours
voice recordings
11.11 wishes, the ones you promised you'd help make come true
the word ****
succulents, like on your windowsill
bastille and cars, you would always sing along in the passenger seat
postcards
airport and train station reunions
all those songs i played just for you on my guitar
my sister's birthday, why did you have to choose that date
you're perfect for me, you swore you weren't a liar
***
the anne frank house, where you were ******* texting me from
february 26th
melbourne's federation square
your name was in a movie and i started to cry

we made a resolution with our heads bent close together in the fading dusk and danger zone of parked cars on a highway. a pact and a promise we'd keep. we put our pinkies together as a shake that meant yes, always. always. silly and stupid is who we were, leaning past the steering wheel and the straps of our seat belts to find that spot in my neck.

i remember the 17th of may but i doubt you do. another day driving in your car, this time tom odell playing through the stereo. the sun was melting our skin like honeycomb, sweet and delicious as we kissed at each red light, slowing before them on purpose, even before the traffic lights flashed amber.
i only remember that day specifically because you turned to me and said, “this is what it’s all about.”
“what’s that?” i asked.
and you said, “days like this are what life is all about,” slowly and quietly, but i still heard you because tom was singing even slower and even quieter.
how can i move on?
roads and highways are plagued with these endless thoughts of you.

with his breath on my neck, his brown italian eyes exploring my body, he whispered, "i want to educate you, physically and mentally," and i shivered, a whole body shudder, longing and lusting, wanting him to take me by the hand and show me the way.

i had a dream where a girl ate me out and then we smoked **** - or maybe it was the other way around - and it was almost good enough to convince myself to catch a train to see a boy living 3 hours away so we could finish what we started

you were leaning against the frame of your back door, backlit and beautiful with the setting summer sun casting shadows on your face. i felt so alive in that moment, with the days stretching before us, and the countless days behind us, the ones we'd already blazed a trail through. i could remember the feel of your smile on mine from the night before and wondered if you would do it again. the stars were not on my mind at all; why would they be when you were looking at me like that and your jawline told stories of long nights past and i could smell strawberries in the air?

i can't find prettiness in his face anymore,
my phone storage is full so i deleted your saved selfies from my camera roll. i wish that one photo of us had never been taken at that party, where our heads rest on each other and i'm smiling like an idiot because everything was so simple with you
i hate you for trusting me. you're a ******* fool if you think people change, i haven't, i won't. 'i trust you not to touch,' you said when i told you about an ex-lover of mine i wanted to see. i don't even trust myself, what is wrong with you
there's nothing comforting in the sound of your voice, don't trust myself on the phone with you (i can't tell you what i did, i need you to learn to hate me without ever finding out). every murmur of 'i love you', the lyrics to my favourite song, after being on repeat for 4 months i need to burn that cd, get the sound out of my ******* head. i'm sick of it, sick of him, utterly sickened by myself. look at me - writing about 'him' and 'you', both the same person but i can't ******* tell anymore. you're not mine anymore
i lost more at that airport than just my make-up and shampoo

the ocean blue ring of your irises and sleepy eyelids. the prominent hollow between your shoulder blades. the bare strip of stomach revealed when you yawn and stretch your arms above your head. the pale place behind your ears, sensitive to my lips. the skin of your neck always bruised with love. your hands with their long fingers and short nails so boyish and cute. the curves of the backs of your knees where your calf turns into your thigh. skin and blood and bones and breaths.
the places i reach over to touch when i wake up at four a.m. and realise that the other half of my bed is empty with a shape that only you can and will not fill.

i'm not even pretty but my voice reeks of *** and my fingertips leave stains on everyone i touch
they can't forget me
can't live without me

i keep my window open at night to feel the breeze blow my hair across the pillow and tilt my head back to look at the stars. it always starts me crying because the night sky is so big and beautiful and because somewhere across the world your time catches up with mine while i am sleeping and because you may be looking at the same patch of stars as i am and that is crazy beautiful. i wonder if you look at them and think of me or if you can't even see them in your suburban block and you don't care anyway because you're too busy looking at the sparkle in her eyes to notice those distant specks of light.

the walls of your bedroom hold the american flag and photographs - none of me, i am too new in your life - and smells of girlfriends past and hours of quiet bedtime whispers and loud nighttime fights. i don’t ever want the sound of my screaming to be locked in this room of yours, we are not permanent but we are not unkind.
i look at you now and the lines of your shoulder blades that i’ve spent the last two weeks and not a day more tracing. we seem okay for now, but this summer will end and i will go back to college where there will be too many pretty boys down the hall tempting me with gentle bumps of their hips and longing glances.
we don’t have to think about goodbye yet, though. we still have tonight to get through.

dew drops and sprinkler smells flood the streets, and us here, in your backyard, naked together and hidden from view, laughing and trying hard not to, keep it down, ssh, ssh, be quiet, do you want them to find us? no, god, no. if they found us touching each other like this, wet against the morning grass… it’s okay, that lawnmower is louder than us, they won’t find us. my head dizzy with your mum’s roses and daffodils and gardenias and tulips and chrysanthemums and the odd sunflower or too, lost in all that colour, dizzy with being so close, so intimate like this, and even though we’re in all this colour, all i want to see is the translucent touch of your pale skin on mine.

a week before my birthday i told you i was turning sixteen and i invited you to my party that saturday night but here we are a month later and i asked you 'why didn't you say happy birthday to me' and you were distraught and genuine when you asked 'what when was it?', the answer you should have known, you used to know because we found out this fact about each other at 5am last october, the answer 'the 14th of june' and your lame 'i didn't know!' and the coincidence is the clock just ticked 12am and now it's the 14th of july and you're apologising over and over for not making the worst birthday ever any better.

my first
a lion inside a boy
a full moon (i thought you gave off light; you only reflected mine)
a breathless english winter, pale and icy
an explorer of collar bones and thighs and shoulder blades
my love, my life
the loveliest flower, or perhaps an entire garden
a time traveller (you showed me the world at 5.30am)
a stupid teenage boy
july 28th to november 4th
a semicolon - a story to be continued;

the sky over london
fingertips in a dark theatre
vintage clothing
november 19 - 22
a starbucks double-shot macchiato
the taste of toothpaste
canada
the sadness of missing the 7.30am snow
an empty hotel corridor
secret ***
a reflection (in a camera lens, the windows of the metro, the mirror opposite your bed)
old style rap
a hand to hold in an ice-skating rink
a sad boy
the only ******* thing i can think of

i’m seeing the 1975 tonight without you and i am thinking of all the times we talked about this, how i’d buy you a concert ticket if you bought a plane ticket and you said ‘you don’t understand how perfect that would be’ but i do i ******* do and now i have to trust myself not to get lost in the cheering crowd of the mosh pit without your arms there to pull me to safety.

we stole things. it was a game we played. just a stupid game between a good girl and a good boy trying too hard to impress one another.
you slipped a packet of tic tacs from the display at the register of the grocery store into my hands, and as a reward i kissed you out in the parking lot, love and laughter falling from my lips. it didn’t matter that i don’t like tic tacs.

it's not a pretty thing always living in the future, waiting on other moments to come as if now is not worthy enough so it's something precious when you're in a moment and you don't want it to end, there is that very special feeling where each second is an infinity sooner or later about to snap

i sit here in tomorrow,
as you lay there in yesterday.

i have a a cd of my favourite songs ('thinking of you' the very first on the album) wrapped in christmas paper, a present i never ended up mailing. a burned dvd of my dance concert (do you have any videos of you? you had asked) buried beneath a pile of books in my bedroom, patiently waiting to be given to you. there's a succulent on my windowsill, basking in the sunlight, facing towards the road, seeking your presence, your nurturing touch (you will never hold it's soil between your fingertips). i wrote a letter a month ago and never addressed it.
a plane ticket lies in my waste basket, ripped in a thousand pieces (much like my heart) in a moment of bitter rage. you don't know that, though. i bet you're waiting in england, kicking yourself for giving me such a hopeful present when i never gave you a thing (i never got the chance to).

i had a dream, and you were kissing me. and to be quite honest, if you kissed me like that every time i fell asleep i would never want to wake up.

i want: my lips on your collar bones, my fingers digging into your shoulder blades, to breathe in the sweet scent of your neck, my legs around your waist, your body steady while mine is not.
i want: my shirt off, your fingers working the clasp of my bra, thumbs caressing, your tongue working magic in places untouched, to see you smiling, smiling because it is lovely and you love it and i love it and we’ve been waiting and wanting for so long.
you want: things i don’t know about. things i can’t give.
you want: a girl, any girl, just a girl.
i want: you.

your mother hates me because i am the reason you fall asleep whispering ‘i love you’ into the dark at 2am when you have school in a few hours, all because i bought a plane ticket for milan but didn’t tell you until a week before lift-off. ‘i need to see you one last time,’ you said and what were we thinking sharing our first kiss when we knew we didn’t want it to be our last, it can’t be our last. you could fly to me instead of buying a car, but they were always your first love, so which would you rather ride? me or your baby?

i knew she went for a run every morning at seven am and that she loved red liquorice and that she despised pop culture and that she had an unhealthy habit of smoking cigarettes and that her favourite shoes were those black boots with the really incredibly high chunky heels and that she worked at the information desk at the local art gallery and that she had a college boyfriend whom she loved very much and that she chewed her hair when she was nervous or upset and that she hadn’t cut it for almost two years but i did not know her.

i want to write something sweet about this but nothing about you and us and that bad temptation is sweet and this isn't even a poem don't go thinking this is meant to sound pretty it ******* isn't.