******* internet,
Stop picking roses and asking me to ignore the thorns,
Cut off their heads,
Give me the thorns,
I don’t need to make myself smell sweet for you,
Empty head,
Brain dead,
Fill it up with faults in our stars and the perks of being a wallflower,
We all know ants can carry away common sense,
If there are enough of the *******,
But don’t peg me as a simpering idiot,
Sitting in the dark waiting for poetry to illuminate demise,
I’m not black and white, tears rolling, all alone,
Go **** your rusty razors,
I don’t need anyone to kiss my scars,
I am forty thousand thunderstorms,
I destroy what I want and I will always make you run for cover,
I will use all my energy to summon starving rain,
Just to make everything feel normal,
I have been my own casualty and I have been my own champion,
But victim isn’t in my vocabulary,
I never wrote wailings on white,
Or measured my problems in aesthetics and ‘reblogs’,
You are not ‘beautifully broken’,
Love is not masked by exquisite pain,
And I don’t believe in the charms of your never ending night,
Because the sun always rises,
And I would rather let it burn me up,
Then lurk in the shadows like you.

I didn’t know what I was doing,
But I left three buttons undone so I still blame myself,
Because I thought having somebody touch me for more than one night,
Would surely follow from letting them touch me at all,
Slap naive on my head,
And send me home,
Oh lover,
You’re a pyromaniac,
And I’m too flammable.

“Here’s your morning PSA,
Laced with saccharine and anaesthetic,
Unfortunately the missiles are on their way,
So leave the sick and try not to panic,
Ignore the hysteria, and those calling your name,
Avert your eyes as the world sets aflame,
We apologise for keeping this from you,
Secret for all of these years,
But please keep in mind, though we’ll aim for your rescue,
Death is the least of your fears
This will be our last transition,
I’m afraid the president must catch his flight,
You may wait to hear from us but until then,
Goodbye, goodluck and goodnight.”

We were the PVC plastic barbie dolls,
Waiting to be burned alive,
Unlucky enough to live,
We woke up to an absence of we,
No Nevada left to test in,
So I’m a model mannequin,
Melt me down,

Tick-Tick-Tick,
The light was white and empty,
Tick-Tick-Tick,
My madness steeped in silence
Tick-Tick-Tickety,
Geiger is telling me to run,
Tickety-Tickety-Tickety,
But it’s no use now,

I threw up on Monday,
Tuesday, I choke back fallout,
Ignore the bubbles when it hits my skin,
On Wednesday, my gums blink bright red,
Thursday I know I am all alone because the wind has ceased to blow,
And Friday I realise I am not,

They came with rubber masks,
Silicone,
Respirators and coils of filters,
We both had ******* eyes,
But neither of us saw people reflected in them,
I counted three,
Alpha, Beta, Gamma,
One smiles by exhaling clean air,
Reaches out a hand across the barren wasteland,
Fingers tipped with lead and tells me:
“There’s a prize for the last standing.”

I am not ionised,
So I bruise every time they touch me,
These guides through plagues of acid rain,
The graveyard of monuments stripped bare by a world of rot,
My hair falls out as I breathe dead air,
I don’t remember what PSA stands for,
I don’t remember my name,
I bleed sand and the echo of a failed civilisation,
But with heavy breathing and a muffled voice,
Gas masks filtering what used to keep me alive,
I wonder if there is anything behind those masks at all,
I know there is nothing behind mine,
None of us are human anymore,
And we haven’t been for quite some time,

Together, we watch the sky rain black ash.

Sip my wit like lemonade,
Kiss between my shoulder blades,
Concentrate,
Can you even remember my name?
Skitter, sicker, savage, sad,
Pop a pill don’t feel so bad,
You say I can do anything,
Yet you’ve never seen my eyes glow like coal,
I am Skaði and I will always be cold,
And I have broken more boys easy as shattering glass,
Cut palms and no class,
I am contagious,
My tongue is forked and poisonous,
So roll up roll up,
Watch me make everything worse,
Watch me spit and snap and talk in curse,
But don’t get too close because without any doubt,
Being near me will rot you,
Both inside and out.

Sip my wit like lemonade,
Kiss between my shoulder blades,
Concentrate,
Can you even remember my name?
Skitter, sicker, savage, sad,
Pop a pill don’t feel so bad,
You say I can do anything,
Yet you’ve never seen my eyes glow like coal,
I am Skaði and I will always be cold,
And I have broken more boys easy as shattering glass,
Cut palms and no class,
I am contagious,
My tongue is forked and poisonous,
So roll up roll up,
Watch me make everything worse,
Watch me spit and snap and talk in curse,
But don’t get too close because without any doubt,
Being near me will rot you,
Both inside and out.

I was taught,
To hold my head high,
And laugh when people tried to pull it down,
You put a sword in my hands,
A helmet on my head,
And sent me to slay the dragons knowing that I could,
But even when I came back with my hair all singed,
I came home to a hug,
Because with a teacher like you,
I understood I could be the princess,
And the hero,
I could manoeuvre an axe made of steel,
At the same time as manoeuvring six inch heels,
You sort of wish my art wasn’t always covered in blood,
But I’ll still produce it because you taught me weird is good,
And that it’s okay to be different,
Although you still rescued me,
From several fashion faux pas,
Because I liked to make people laugh,
But we both know the difference between ‘with’ and ‘at’,
You didn’t want me to get hurt,
Tried to stop the inevitable,
But when I did get hit, and I did,
We could pin-point each pin and pull it out,
With ease,
Because they don’t travel far through thick skin,
I got that from you,
I got everything from you,
You taught me to throw rocks at boys,
Because at the end of the day I’d throw rocks at all of them,
There’d just be some that would tolerate it more than others,
Maybe even like it,
After all, you threw rocks at Dad and he married you,
I’ve asked you countless times to get off my back,
Only to discover sometimes you were the only one who had it,
You’re my anchor,
You’re my rock,
The net that constantly catches the,
Whiny,
Moody,
Temperamental trapeze artist,
Who keeps jumping after eighteen years,
Knowing that you’ll stop her from falling on her ****,
When she misses the bar,
There’s so much more I could say,
About things that aren't poetic,
All the hard times and the ugly times and the sad times,
You stopped me from falling off the edge of the world,
By nodding your head,
And understanding,
You’re more than Superman,
Batman,
Wonder woman,
Anyone,
You’re my hero,
Forever and always,

Mum.

I didn’t know what I was doing,
But I left three buttons undone so I still blame myself,
Because I thought having somebody touch me for more than
one night,
Would surely follow from letting them touch me at all,
Slap naive on my head,
And send me home.