I wish you weren't flimsy
Like the newspaper bit I picked up and scrunched into a ball
And threw away
I wish I could kiss you and the stain would stay.
Your words are mineral oildrops
They perfume my hair
And damage it
I dig graves to look for suppleness and return with bare hands
Why couldn't you be of soft clay?
I'd sculpt every bit of you into a god
Give you everything I can imagine
I'd learn your favourite language and sing you songs
If you were sincere I would never have let you forget me.
You're not,
And you don't even know.
I wish you were everything you're not
Can't you see I'm tired of looking for him?
I kiss you and wish my lips were ash
I love you and I keep coming back
One day, one day you'll be him
Won't you?
I'll keep coming back
Until I find him. For once.
I write out my soul onto your ragged paper heart
You give it away next morning to ten other women
I write myself onto you again
And again
I kiss you for others to wipe it off
You stay a stone statue with words too perfectly carved
I stay a girl looking for love
Until I find it
I wait
I see through you but I can't not stay.
The pots and pans clank in the sink
I cover my eyes as they shout
I forget to shut my ears, so silly.
The TV is still muted, I think.
She sobs,
I saw through you as you saw through me
Darkness wobbling in a poisonous well
We jumped, shrieking
Our hearts were breaking
The sun cracked apart as we fell.
We've turned invisible now,
Our graves are murky, reflecting hate
Did you see through me as I saw through you?
Some things are best left to fate.
And I hear him growl,
I've loved you as best I could
Wouldn't you have done the same?
Did we not think this through, should we not have broken shells?
Time ties me down, I can't grow up
Alas, I have grown too much
We're stuck wishing we were free tomorrow.
How can we live in blackened earth?
I lift my eyelids, I've heard it all
The show goes on as the TV glows
I look for the remote, unmute it.
Perfect.
I really like the background song.
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?
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.
1
She's shaking in her teenage tears
Life is waiting with its claws
I'm looking, it's not perverse really
Just breaking the fourth wall
Instant gratification grips us
Ten thousand kisses inside a group chat
But the kisses are so small
She's wondering where she can go wrong
Sifting crowds for lessons to learn from
It's scary and exciting,
She is meant to fall
I smirk at this, I'm such a cynic
It's so clichéd, not even thrilling
Keep crying, doll.
2
Where is the little man who fell in love with me?
I was stuck with him, playing the lover
Returning his kisses with my cold lips, barren
I couldn’t love him as long as I was sober
He didn’t complain once, not even a little.
I needed to be the silhouette woman
“She was too hard to keep”
I laughed (and then cried) when I left him,
When he said he needed me
Where are you, my little man?
With your songs and letters and eyes of sheep?
Here I am, a little woman (surprise)
But you have no more love to give.
I'm stretching my smile to cover my face
I'm blinking too, to punctuate your gaze
I'm learning to stay and not say no
Because I've learnt that I can't go
Not when death is alive and cold
Uninvited guest at our doors
I will stay and learn your steps
You will stay and hold my waist
Us against the world, so naive;
We kiss and love and stay alive.
How many arms did I touch
And flinched away
Before the blink of an eye?
How many words did I miss
To mouth into a phrase
To greet a passer-by?
How many smiles did I keep
Chained into coldness
Instead of laughing wide?
And more importantly,
Why?
Why is it that I look back now
Recalling names who could've been friends
Heaping on sighs as the hours go by,
Why is it that I know I'll drown
Making the same mistakes again and again
Knowing I'll never be able to try
Am I dooming myself to loneliness?
I wonder what's the worse case-
Feeling lonely in a crowd
Or lonely enough by oneself?
I don’t know what it is to be a daughter They say that blood runs thicker than water But why is it that I feel no ties? I look at my mother and I see it in her eyes The pure, unconditional love she bears I know ‘motherhood’ has been glorified for years Their sacrifices becoming not a choice but a consequence. Yet unmistakably I’ve seen love in her, hence Her love must make me a daughter? There have been days when I have thought her Love for me was misplaced, a mistake Because despite my desire to reciprocate I’ve let my heart be an impassive stone Despite her love, I have felt alone. My father does listen to what I have to say But smiles at my concerns, at the end of the day I’m not the older son whose advice holds sway And not until my brother had to move away Did I become my father’s right hand Despite a daughter, (almost) a dependable young ‘man’. I was twelve when one day I served him tea Without being asked to, and he Smiled sweetly and said “It’s great You’re finally learning how a daughter should behave.” What it is to be a daughter I don’t know yet I’m putting together pieces from the society’s set Of rules and do’s and don’ts I can find So that one day I can have my peace of mind.
mimimusing 