The Words Are So Easily Said

You once asked me why I was here.
“I’m here because your hair is like red wood in sunlight.” I replied with a smile. “I’m here because you know all the words to Bohemian Rhapsody. Because you still get mad when someone reads your diary, even if it was from when you were seven. Because you’re not afraid to disagree with me. Because you hate Dickens but adore Hemmingway. Because you’re a morning person. Because you go to graveyards and lay flowers on the graves of people you never knew.”
“Do you love me?”

But didn’t I just say that?

The Scattered Pieces

If I use these words that mean nothing to me at all, then they won't tear off pieces of me as I write them down.

The Waxing Moon

Today I got a haircut. I bought a new shirt, I scraped the mud off my best shoes. The good night's sleep erased dark circles from my under eyes, and for the first time in years my skin is clear, healthy rather than the sallow grey of a drug addict. My mouth stretched back in the pretence of a smile that was almost real.

So yes, I may still have that scar through my eyebrow, and my joy still doesn't quite reach my face. And my knuckles are still grazed from that fight, and my eyes are still that deep grey of grief, and it still hurts for you to kiss lips through which lies slip so easily, but I'm getting better. I'm learning to be so much more for you. Have faith in me for just a little while longer, and I swear I will get this one thing right amidst all my sins. You deserve so much better, but if you want me, then you will have the best me I can find.

They Say Love Will Blind You

We walk through the deserted park, hand in hand. Glass cracks beneath our feet, and dying reeds scratch knee-high at our legs. A stone , hurled through the air, strikes your temple; ignored. Running our fingers across graffiti, we pretend we read love letters, and feel the caress of flowers - not thorns. Just playing at being lovers, in an unloving world.

The Immortal Gatekeeper

It's too many days without you. I can take the years, but not the days.

The Infectious Taboo

They think they can get rid of me, but no, lift a stone and you will see me; split a piece of wood along the crease of your thumb, and you will see me. Look inside, and look hard, into the tiny, dark parts of yourself you would rather ignore. And you will see me.

The Birds Fly In Formation

I will take all your lies and your doubt and your crushed dreams, if it will make you hope again. And I will take all your pills and your sickness and your poison, if it will make you well again. And I will take all your fractures, and your sprains and your breaks, if it will make you whole again. And I will take all your anger and your fear and your hate, if it will make you love again.

The Interpreter Can't Speak

I write, not what I want you to hear, but what I think you want to say. And I wish I didn’t have to write.

The Former And The Latter

I want to have a child who asks me what war was.

The Box

My body is a piano, full of black keys only. I am in a country where everyone’s face is different from mine, and the language I don't understand is the act of not speaking, and noise is everywhere in the air we breathe. I am doing what the Romans do in Rome; I am trying to communicate but no one has told me that these people cannot hear.

Genesis One

I am this book’s disaffected youth. I am your life’s idiosyncratic mind wrinkle. I will infect your soul. Kill me quickly. Unreal and trashy. Full of the ire of youth and distortions of anger. In that same vein, full of the blessings of life. Full of vigour. Ready to see that my future bear fruits of labour, and that I wipe my mouth clean of every rotten taste.

The Past And The Present

We took off our clothes, and we tore the paper from the walls, the carpet from the floor. We burnt those framed photographs and ripped out the wires. We took it down brick by brick, until only scrub-covered ground remained.
And we let the Earth be, how it was meant to be.

The Boundries

The sun in my eyes felt like someone was kicking me in the jaw. I was so high I thought my eyes would fall out. Standing shaky on the thinning grass, I realized I had to catch the train home. I ran 5 blocks and got there just as the operator was locking the front compartment. Resting up on the 701, with the sterile light slipping beneath my eyelids. Puerile breathing in front of me. I open my eyes and am being stared at. Eye contact with a child is always easier than eye contact with an adult. Adults always look away quickly, embarrassed of their booming thoughts, convictions, judgments. Children stare straight at you and lay it all out on the table.
“You look tired.”
“I know,” I said.

The Wild Retakes The City

I know now what becomes of helium balloons, let loose to fly. They are the loves that slipped through our fingers, floating higher until not even a splash of colour remains.

The Thorn Threatens The Flower

Your face was bright, as you looked at the blood splayed across the floor, with the kind of joy I associate with small children, who can find wonder in things they do not understand.

The Giraffes And The Zebras

And I am the Elephant, who cannot forget.

The Camera Flash

In that instance, we all look like ghosts.

The Buds Are Gone Now

I know that a few decades from now, I won't be able to picture the freckles on your shoulder so clearly they might be before my eyes, and I wouldn't remember the curve of your smile, and your face won't be the first thing I see every morning.

And that scares me to death, but it keeps me going.

The Distance Between

You once asked me: "Why do you look to the ground when you walk?"

"So I can see where I'm treading." I said. "Why do you look to the sky?" I, equally bemused.

With a smile you reply "So I can see where I'm going."