1
Ease me, don't tease me
Quantify your love aloud for buckets to fill
Prodding my sharp doubts I incise into your soft corners
But, if you don't appease me, who will?
I soaked myself in rain
Muddy glory, sensuous in petrichor spark
Your breath seemed fresh when we kissed
I buried my hand inside your lungs
To throw out all the hurt, disease,
You smoked into the air in rings
Red. Love. Passion.
Are you scared of my obsession?
Alas, we had come so far.
2
I love you so much it breaks my heart into glass dust on the shore
The music stops, suddenly
I am so bone-haggard, alone, termite hollow and sick
Bereft of you, my love, I waste away into dust
I love you knowing you cannot return
I sealed our fate as we sealed our lips
Cold blues rippled on your face as I refused your kiss
I hate you, I'd said, and you believed my words
I'd pictured pain but it turned out worse.
3
Grieve the skin that has burnt in black
New flesh takes over, you say
Rapid and anxious
Pink and glowing in health
Won't you grieve what smoked and peeled?
It was you, too
Even if it was brief
Skin cells now turned to dust, broomed away
Such pain
I must grieve the skin you'd set ablaze,
So I can let it be replaced
Can we not begin again?
I was playing with words and he got stuck in them
I knew the craft of meaning making
He was too blind
With river eyes and saltbeds of skin
He never asked me why
I then played with a gun and he got killed almost
I relished the skill of slaughter
He was too kind, again
He held my wrist not to wring it
Asked himself "why did I bring it?"
The gun was thrown away
I took him to the bedroom and locked him inside, I was bored
Closed the doors on his face, so cute
Why didn't he hate me then?
I wish he were a brute
I tossed the keys into the fireplace
Read a book for fun
Ended up breaking in through the window
Our life has just begun.
Coffee beans brimming over my cupped hands
We're so many, so small, too much
I think it's fine
Everything green turns grey someday
Our planet, its climate, its crisis
Everything born must die a death
We know.
I think about plastic hazards only when I get some
free time
Only when I can think
Over the noise of my dad watching the TV
Over my mom's relentless questions
Over my agonising thoughts that take me nowhere
“Free some time to think :)”
Free me so I can think
But you say I'll be free if only I think.
I say, I am just a word-mincer
I only care about plastic clogging the drains
Because it flooded the city when it rained
Because I wanted to write a poem about it
Or maybe I needed to write an essay
Alternatively, to impress a man
In truth, I'm not doing all I can
And I know neither are you.
Yes you're reading it, and you cannot run
We feel responsible for ourselves
But we leave things undone.
One day I gave you two stones to keep
Then another one
And I stopped.
You said you'd build a castle
For us to live in
With playful curtains and hours of kisses
Music stained walls
Flowered garden and coloured windows
You said we can have it all
I thought we could, too
I scoured the riverbed for more pebbles
Keeping aside only two
The ones which sang as they tinkled against my
anklets
I, the happy explorer, paused for some rest
Floating like a moonclad lily in motherly waters
I worshipped the god of love
I danced till daybreak and slept like a child
The fourth day we met
You poured before me a sack of stones
They were so beautiful
You were so beautiful
My eyes widened and shone
Your little boy grin and our pile of stones
We couldn't stop smiling,
Our cheeks were alight with hope
I dropped the two stones I had
Our hillock rose by a hair's breadth
I looked up at you and you were a changed man
No longer the boy who matched my faith
But a man I'd think twice before talking to.
How incredibly our pillage of precious pebbles
Turned to rubble
Ashen and disgusting
Cold and dull
You looked at your watch
I looked away
Perhaps we had always known
It was only a castle of sand
You should not have held my hand,
When I was meant to let you go.
I gaze at a man who never looks at me
An amused grin hanging over his thin lips
(Like a curtain I’m supposed to uncover)
I lie down on the grass, counting my piecemeal joys
Wondering if the day is over
Sighing, nodding, humming a tune
Waiting for my sacred moon
He pays no attention while he smokes rings into the
air
I wish he were a gentleman with flowers
He doesn’t look at me, yet
Life is so unfair
I’m sure he’s up to something
He lectures at the empty sun but I catch his shy breath
I look at him, for hours on end
A nasty tiktok song stuck in my goddamn brain
How long will it take for him
To kiss me in the dusk?
Before it’s too late, I might have to ask
What did you mean when you hugged her
What do you mean when you hold my hands?
Look at me, face my eyes
Or I’ll leave to look at another man.
How can I hate myself When I smell the city in dusk The green trees Naive nobodies stuck in jams I lay my feet to sleep My ears clouded with music I close my eyes and rivers ripple Through my toes Through my bones My ribs are open in my dream
I keep speaking of dreams But I cannot hate the reality It’s cruel but it made me And I cannot hate myself anymore Without a reality, there’d be no dreams No stories, no songs, no lore I make peace with the real Even if it’s not ideal
The wind whispers in my ear It knocks against my window The trees nod in agreement
I keep to myself
The sun shines warm and red Blows me a kiss Before it’s about to set I sweat and I glow
I keep to myself
The neighborhood bursts into sounds Everyday noises turning to music The birds, the leaves Clinking of utensils I hum my favourite tunes
I keep to myself
The world moves and dances in my heart I cannot keep to myself You are moving and dancing in my heart I cannot keep to myself I will reach you As you have reached me I will love you As you have loved me
We will keep to ourselves
We’ll weave a little tale for us Or write a whole omnibus
The dream-catcher dangles in my bedroom
It hangs heavy with my bloodmetal burdens
It isn’t supposed to catch the bad ones, I sigh.
The windows usher in a breeze and I let my hair down
My sweat is cooled and my sticky tears are dried
New nightmares start crawling up my unkempt mind
A lizard munches on a bug on the wall
I’ve lost all taste
There’s an ocean parting me and him
All my words have gone to waste
The dream-catcher dangles in my bedroom
I break it, I throw it away;
I wait for the moon to shine,
Weaving a song for another time.
I feel earthy and soft
In a world of concrete rocks
Coloured in apathetic gloom;
Dreams break free inside my room
Not all lives must have meanings
Some are spent foolishly dreaming
Or in nightmares uninvited
I don’t expect the ocean to dry
I’d rather paste on a plastic smile
I don’t know what I am becoming.
Rants for my lover,
For an afternoon in summer:
I want to live a happy life
I don’t want to be only crying
I want to be yours, I wanna be mine
I want flowers, and your time
I want me to be worth your while
I want to succeed, I wanna try
I want this and I want that.
I love you to the moon and back.
In a sunlit sky, your rainbow eyes
Take me to ancient gardens
I was born in your hair, and the gods stood there
I turned your life into madness
No scriptures, no songs, no story of us
We were soon forgotten
A goddess birthing a mortal being
A scandal, and a problem
You worked alone, you fought for me
The sun slept and you toiled
I cried in my crib, my tears shining
Lit by the midnight oil.
I hold your hands, I want that strength
That fed me, clad me, soothed my cries
I’m basking in your luminescence,
Your goddess-esque motherly smile.
To all mothers with absent help
With babies a bit different,
To all goddesses outcast, but strong
I offer you my little song.
mimimusing 