what grows beneath my skin is not beautiful.
i have never been one to consider myself as beautiful except in fleeting moments of vanity
when the curtains are closed, and the lights are turned off
only then i am beautiful.
i like to imagine that if i had been born into a world where mirrors did not exist
– then i would be beautiful.
only when no can see me am i beautiful.

“am i beautiful?” i ask the silhouette that dances around my room
it leads me as i curse my vulnerability and wish i could draw it out of myself like a spool of wool.
i wish it were that easy.
i contemplate death as i watch my neighbour tending to her roses
i think if i were to die right now
it would not be roses that grew out of my stomach
but thorns.

when i was young i dreamt of becoming a surgeon
(or a pilot or a fireman or a detective or a zoologist or an astronomer)
i yearned to save lives, fix people, all i wanted was to help
but now i have reached the despondent conclusion that i cannot save myself
let alone someone who really needs it.

nowadays i resolve my issues with cider and *****
the alcohol burns on the way down but i have grown to love the way it feels
once upon a time dandelion hands reached out to me and said, “you’re drinking bottled love now.” and I believed him.
if i breathe deep enough
sometimes i think i can feel what heaven must be like.

but when i open my eyes again my reflections grounds me
with the force of a thousand wasp stings and i am sheerly disappointed
i will never be a surgeon.
i cannot carve the cigarettes i have embedded into my heart into flowers

- sometimes even beautiful things cannot grow out of the ugly and deformed.

a thought that’s been consuming me as of late is of my imagination,
or lack thereof. i resent the void that has become my brain for swallowing you whole. i resent the way that it has turned you into nothing more than a memory. i want you to feel real when you’re not by my side. i want to be able to believe that you’re not just a figment of my imagination
when you’re not holding me close. i miss the feeling of your arms around my shoulders, so i substitute your warm with the lining of my duvet. it’s a weak substitute and nothing compared to how the weight of your arm feelings against mine. but if i try hard enough, i can almost convince myself that you are constructed of fibres, linen and cotton, and smell like my house. it’s the best that i can conjure and i loathe myself for that. i can’t remember what colour your eyes are, or how they look when they’re looking at me. how your pupils dilate when they interlock with mine. this has become the root of my sadness. what if one day i can’t even remember the shape of your face? or the contours of your cheekbones and how they feel against mine, when you can simulate mine so perfectly? what about the day when i forget how your hand feels in mine?
it feels like dying. only worse. because i’m petrified that one day i will exist in your mind and i won’t even be able to remember how it felt, when you held me close and made me feel something. i never want to forget this. i'm afraid of not being able to recall what you smell like and one day forgetting how you say my name.
it hurts that you can simulate me so perfectly, when i can’t even attempt the same.

the things we fear (& why they haunt us)

i. i’m afraid of the way that you look at me. but i’m afraid of you looking away just as much. i don’t think i’ve ever been looked on with such affection and kindness and that scares me. i’m afraid that one day your kindness will turn sour, and you won’t look at me like i could disappear at any moment. i find myself wondering why you look on me with such intrigue sometimes, i worry that i’m deformed and you’re cataloguing my imperfections, or that i have paint smudged across my cheeks again and i look like a fool, or whether i’m just something you can’t quite fathom yet. i’m afraid that when you look at me you see me the way i see myself.

ii. you’re afraid of being alone. i can feel it in the way you wrap your arm around my shoulders, or how you pull me close, even when no one’s watching. when you place your hand against mine i can feel the cells reaching out towards mine, gasping for affection. they meet and we are at peace. i feel you relax as we lie intertwined on my bed. one hand in my hand, your thigh against mine, your other hand exploring the valleys and folds of my body. your fingers run down my skin like glacial water in a stream. a shock to the senses at first, and yet welcome and refreshing. i think we need eachother as much as the mountains need oxygen. when your fingers interlace with mine you remind me of that.

iii. i fear your kindness as much as i fear it fading away. i fear our first argument and the silent pauses between the hurricanes. i fear what you feel and what you don’t. i’m afraid of the day that you don’t view me as yours anymore.

iv. you fear letting me go. i can sense it in those last few seconds before you have to go. i can feel it in the way you hold me, or the way you walk down my front steps, reluctant. or the way you pull me close and linger by my side in the hallway.

v. i’m afraid of eternity and what it holds. the first time you told me you could live like this forever i felt a knot forming in my stomach. & it’s still there, tightening slowly but surely. you live inside my stomach. you wonder if you’ll ever feel this way again and i plead to the great something that you won’t need to feel this again with anyone else. “i could live like this forever”  we whisper to one another in the darkness and i try not to think about eternity.

vi. you’re afraid of making mistakes. i knew that from the moment i met you. the day we were born you told me you were afraid of ******* everything up and i reassured you that you couldn’t do that, even if you tried. as a boy with such interest in physics and maths, mistakes are two-dimensional to you. my brain doesn’t see them that way. the way i see it, we’re all amalgamations of mistakes and chances in the end.

vii. i’m not afraid of commitment. that’s not what it is. what i fear is that one day you’ll wake up by my side and wish you were waking up in a different bed, with a different girl, in a different life. i fear what would come next. i’m afraid of you yearning for more and settling for less. i don’t want to become less.

viii. you fear intimacy and i suppose i do too. i fear you feeling my heart rate raise when you touch me and you fear being close to me and taking that step. you fear doing it wrong, no matter how often i reassure you. you fear not living up to my expectations and i empathise with that. you fear taking that step and me pulling away. we try not to think about it much and continue on, taking it slowly. we both fear moving too fast, and i’m thankful for that.

ix. the future terrifies me. more than eternity, or the darkness or my weird phobia of cling-film. being unsure has never come naturally to me and i don’t think it ever will. i’m afraid of thinking too much about the future and i worry that i could jeopardise it. i don’t want anything to break this spell and yet i fear being too cautious. i try and settle for a balance in-between the extremes. i've always existed in a no-man’s land of my own creation.

x. we’re afraid of being afraid. the fears gnaw at us and we’d do anything to stop them from grinding us down. sometimes i think there must be more to life than fear. we’re afraid of doing things wrong and ******* it up, but i can’t help but be glad we’re both on the same page of this unexpected tale. i fear reaching the final chapters and pray that the novel never ends, and the author never stops writing or gives up half-way through.

xi. i’m afraid of loving you.
- because i don’t know how to love something that doesn’t want to destroy me.