your absence is
like the aftermath
of the storm

i'm left to wonder
whether i prefer
the desperate
insanity you blew
into my life

or the deadly
silence.

She was nature, beautiful
But deadly, her cheeks as
Scornful as a rose, the smile hid
The thorns underneath.

Her presence though unseen,
Could be felt, like the sun's warm
Breath on bare winter skin.

She led him somewhere secret
As the night lures the stars,
As clouds gorge on the
Fragile light of the moon.

Over the crumbled bodies
Of leaves, into the alien
Land of tranquility.

When he woke, hands burning,
There was nothing left to see.
Only a faint feeling glistening
In the air, a failing heart and
A tongue full of dreams.

would

in the screaming breeze,
a whistles sound forms,
in the winds,
the hibernated scorn of hidden violins,
strung together the suspense.
In the aftermath of silenced stare;

the glare from colours crystalline,
the subtle manipulation of light beams,
in nice dreams,
across the shallow lake,
whilst opaque clouds fade, pale.
In the sound of the backgrounds snarl;

in the woods darkness, black,
the music chooses ehoes between branches,
dangling in tone in the malarkey of
the pain of the mandolins gaze;

each pieces together with tiny,
frost bitten childs sized fingers.
The icy touch lingers for the seconds of death,
that last a pastime,
a lifetime of lust,
in the blink of the dust in the wind.

“have you masturbated yet”
no i haven’t
“do you even know how to”
yes i understand the mechanics of it
you put a couple of fingers in and
wiggle them around

“why haven’t you masturbated yet”
i lied when i told you that there was
a short answer to this
either answer involves yelling
and screaming so loud
that a fire blossoms
in the middle of my chest
and my voice cracks
and people can hear me on the
other side of the restaurant

this is not a quiet answer
it is not a quick one
it is the pull of a trigger
right into who i am
and it is a cruel
slash at my insecurity

have you ever heard of
****** autonomy
or maybe personal space
questions that
a grown man
an elderly man
should never ask a teenager
let alone a transgender teenager

and the age gap
42 years
a year younger than my mother
doesn’t make this a friendly thing
it makes you a pervert

(but i will answer this again
so more people than you
can look at me like i am
even more of a freak
than they originally thought

i do not *******
because looking at myself naked
even before getting into the shower
when i brush my teeth
and my ******* swing
like twin pendulums
over the basin of the sink
i want to cut it all off

and no
at this point
i do not care if i bleed to death
i have been bleeding for years
since that first person asked me
if i was a girl or a boy

and no
you do not understand
because you were not born
in the wrong body
you have the hanging anatomy
between your hairy thighs
and the biologically male on
your birth certificate
as proof of that

there are no
scars on your arms
or on your chest

parts of you are not going to
be cut off
and scooped out
so people will see you as
and address you as
male

so do not pretend that
you understand
because you do not
and you do not try to)

if you are ever at a bus
stop then take a good look at the person not standing near
everyone and know that this person is a
writer. know that their hands are in
pain and know that they have cried themselves
dry in front of darkened
mirrors because they can’t stand the sight of
themselves. know that the night into which their lover
fled is that which owns their
soul. they know much more than
you yet they would give anything
not to understand. they’re wearing long sleeves for a
reason and they are taking the
bus only because they know that their life has no
purpose, no more than that of an abandoned
cigarette. know that these people with the very melancholy
eyes and the pigeon-toed
feet are writers and that they will love
you even when they can’t
love themselves.

Sunday morning,
the air froze, the dahlias
once bloomed angry,
now they shiver and sigh.

Autumn breeze, faint but still,
the padded ghost-steps
of your laugh, running wild,
like vintage photographs;
scattered Polaroids of
my memory - a smile here,
a grimace there.

How the heat of
emotions buries itself
in the clothes of yesterday,
How difficult it is to
fetch from the seams.
The needles only *****
at a faint feeling.

I wonder; do you forget me
as winter forgets the living?

Because once an old man
told me I had sad eyes

Sunsets melt to chalky lines,
like cigarette stubs, they died
when you met her.

These days only my fingers
remember summer,
I touch the hearts of others
to warm them too.

My voice wind chimes,
the eulogy of the storm,
when I breath your
name I shudder...

And listen-
because I am in
the echoes
of her, of us.

Hundreds of thousands of years from now
I hope they’ll find my bones
Cradled in the womb of this earth
And the archeologists- as careful as midwives
Would scoop me up, brush me off
And deliver me from the dust
Then when they softly blow off the rest of the soil from my skeleton
Ever so softly for a better look at what I used to be
They’ll see my sandy frame and they’ll **** their heads to the side
In wonder when they notice two sets of bones
Yours gingerly entangled with mine
And as they pick up the pieces of us
That used to be we
They can’t tell them apart, which parts were mine
And which parts you lent to me.