learning to breathe

they tell me the same things.

first it was the boy who never learnt to love

then it was my mother and third

was the look in my father's eyes when he realised

everything was wrong.

i know what it feels like to

wear the same clothes and forget the days of the week

dressed in my contorted rib and layers of fresh skin

where cigarette buds and pain once sought ground 

like friction.

i get uncomfortably warm

and sick in the gut

when i remember this

for i remember everything else,

like the seconds it took before his eyes went blank

and the hate from his words hit my skin,

the nights spent under my table with the lights turned off,

like the way everybody tried to remind me

i was not alone and eventually

it worked.

i will remember what day it is

and how long i have felt like

nothing, and i will remember my mask,

which i left on a pile of better-looking clothes

and light conversation.

i resent the smear of a smile that creeps up

when i digest the irony of them telling me 

she should get some help,

so ignorant to how i need it

just as much.

and i feel hate for them,

them who think they can understand what it is like 

to be broken.

i am transfixed by my own mood swings

and wonder what a constant emotion feels like

without the sudden urge to push inwards and

destruct from within.

they tell me the same things

first it was the boy who thought it was alright to hurt a girl

then it was my mother holding my head up

asking why i wanted to die

third was the look in my father's eyes

over my drained and wasted body

first it was the boy who continued to hurt the girl

who wanted to die

then it was my mother on the other side of the bedroom door

hiding knives from my view and screaming at a depression

she knew so well

third was my father giving me pills i never took

and pinning me down in a room as i screamed at his

yearn to understand my pain.

they tell me the same things

like they know better than

what it is like to piece your own pieces together.

first it is the boy who deserves hell,

then it is my mother wishing her years away,

the third is my father wishing me well.

the fourth came in good time,

searching for the love i was capable of giving. the fourth

shelters my pain from a world too big for me

and taught me my own strengths. the fourth is a boy who 

knew what it was like to be broken

and respected the importance to think

different as he told me the same things. 

the fourth is a boy who understands

the only way i can get through the hate and hurt

that aches inside me is to love. the fourth changes my mind

and wishes my depression away

in ways he is not used to

because he knows i do not deserve it.

i know what it feels like to watch disasters from afar

and up close,

i have done it for years, 

from the day i understood the pain in my mother's eyes

and the comfort in understanding something i will grow to inherit.

if i remember the motions through it all clearly,

i promise i will turn out alright.

the hatch is open

i dress up in yesterday's clothes

and feel the weight of the pain i left on my sleeves

the bane of my mind on the loose strands clawing on my skin.

i am tired, in body and mind, my entire rattling being,

hearing whispers that seep out from my sleep,

from the core of my thoughts when they are unshaken and still.

i do not respond to them

because something will break, otherwise.

i speak to my mother, putting her mind in place

to feel like i am still capable of healing broken souls.

i cough up my regrets and too many words said,

trying to retch out enough until there is

nothing more left in me to dispose of,

and begin from the outside in.

sometimes, you need to deconstruct matter

to allow creation,

and as i look out the peep of the window,

i find a world not meant for me

looking in

and decide that the only way to forfeit this pain,

is to forfeit this world,

collecting the leftovers of its leave,

to fit under my shoes.

only then, will i be able to lay new skin

over the wounds that are now

stark and open,

like the truths i never learnt to face

in my reflections.

no place for a tarrorist

sometimes the air will thicken and compress on my skin

locking me into a most shattering fear

by the emergency exit of a bus or a tram

the backseat of the taxi back to you

or walking around the corner

that a stranger will leave death for me 

to endure. i will remain restless and scared for 

the "i love you"s and "i'll see you soon"s 

i forgot to take with me that day.

i will think about death again

and remember the last conversation i had with him

whilst i lay on my mother's lap wishing it all away

as she prayed for all the love and protection in the world

to save a wretched child like me.

i will wonder if the world would've carried on

or slowed to catch a breath at my leave,

realising things will be as black as it is white,

for the lives i have touched,

for the lives i have not,

and the greys will seep into the lives i will touch with my journey on.

the trees will still grow to greet May,

the day will still remain grey,

in search for the sunlight it promises,

the nights will continue to steal

the warmth of our bedsheets and it will

leave you cold and shaken.

passer-bys will mourn the morning news

and forget it by evening for their own lives to lead,

friends and family will weep and soon find a time

and courage to share stories of a girl who they once shared life with.

they will lay their heads down to sleep a good sleep

but you will not be ready and feel the most

indescribable pain i would never hope for you to feel.

so i learn to watch my steps

and get angry when i trip on my mistakes

slowly grasping the importance of life and

and the permanence of impermanence

and the beauty of things that can be misplaced,

misconstrued, misheard, misjudged, misled.

missed.

many wept on the twenty-second of december last year

because they still saw dawn and felt cheated

but i woke up with an embrace of the sky

that shone on our three hundred and sixty-six days

we built from our own two hands.

death can be a friend

if you know he is a fickle one.

i haven't spoken to my mother in days

and this is wrong

as wrong as smoking five cigarettes too many 

before six in the evening.

i have forgotten myself

by a bus stop or under a streetlamp somewhere,

therefore i have forgotten my place,

waking up for thirty-six consecutive days from dreams

that make me dislike what i see when i see myself,

so i rely on your eyes and everything it touches on

when you look at me.

the rain is pouring again,

because my soul is weeping

for the strength it needs for the both of us.

for the strength it needs for the both of us.

alone with four years ago

Within an hour, I have wept seven times.

My most productive thought so far
was counting the seconds somebody will call for help
if a car ran me over.
And if nobody did
will you find me?

These thoughts are familiar, they have plagued my mind
many nights for a long time
until I met you, until I was given more to think about
instead of car crashes, of late night wanders, of escape.

But these thoughts scare me, they push me in
and make me weep like a child with scraped knees.

I cried for all the beautiful things
still trying so hard to shine a light on me
sitting in a corner where all is shadowed and refracted.
I cried for the moments
that make my heart skip a beat
and my insides erupt with ecstacy,
the moments I feel so strongly
every now and then
like the hint of sun in these ungrateful Manchester days.

My body is drained and metaphorically
out of proportion but I cannot sleep
because the sheets feel different this morning
and the walls are breathing down my bones
giving me shivers even the coldest night out
could not.

I cried for a day of
too many cigarettes and
too little food. Of nausea, of strain
of weakness.

The side effects all seem too familiar
and I feel them just from watching
the healing process of a genuine soul
slightly jaded and restrained
and I feel them so deeply
because I cannot contain my emotions in a box
even though at times like these, I should.

I learn to steer my thoughts for my own keeping.

I cried in greeting to the next six days of the week
steadily turning into a blur of selflessness,
of commitment and obligation, the next six days of
not enough hours to lie in bed
and wish for nothing
because even my days are now not my decisions to make.

The best of times are when I am in your arms
shaking my head at everything I feel now,
because we promise each other things always get better
and they do. Always.
But I cry today because you are not here
and things are not better
and no leaflets or photographs or cigarette buds
or mantras can shake my momentary loss of balance.

I weep for the happiness we bring to each other,
scribbled on crumpled paper and locked in glass bottles,
for the hurt that it all mistakingly latched itself upon.

I have to remember the ability to recycle these useless waste of feelings.
I have to remember the ways of an expert healer,
of closure and of resistance.
I have to remember how to withstand feeling sick and tired.
I am sick and tired.

So fucking tired.

Within an hour, I have wept seven times.
Four times for good reason, three times for
all the pain this world brings with life.

the days we never wait for

these are melancholic times,

wrapped in dried tears and torn laughter;

a sincere smile, a beautiful stagnancy,

like diamond drops on cracked windows 

after rain, heat rising from beneath earth,

the aftermath of a stretch broken,

lingering over like a constant hangover.

my mind, it ripples like stoned water,

musing on how perceptions shift with

waves of emotions, but never time. 

my eyes are tired, the blackouts blazing past

the shine of my light,

greying everything in sight.

a parquet soul, linear but easily scarred,

i sit in the centre of all that touches me,

a mural of my memories,

and i watch from afar,

when you touch me from the inside

because our happiness is sometimes worth

standing back for to admire;

i believe that much that it won't just

wilt and fade away.

this is the beautiful stagnancy resting on me

altered and obscure,

and i get scared sometimes,

like a sleeping child in reach of colourful dreams

because everything else is so

goddamn monochromatic.

i watch our struggles through the best of times

from afar, counting back fourhundredandthirtyseven days ago, now

fourhundredandthirtyseven days on, feeling as tested as the twelve cuts on my hands.

carry me with the strength left in you

for i cannot carry the weight of our entirety,

but i will carry yours, and set mine aside

for you, 

because i trust in you to believe, too.

this is an uneventful feeling,

what twenty eight days can do to us,

with a string of bad sleep, bad health, bad timing.

bad thoughts.

i can sometimes taste the fear

at the back of my mouth, dry and

uncouth, teaching me familiarities

of the fallen like a second-timer.

the things i gather start to ache

and stain the hoards of happiness

i bring in baggage, so tried and pushed to the limit.

the shadows in the day have begun to shadow me

like mirror image. i am sad,

mind as blank as the road i stare down,

forfeiting all thought, raging a war that is so

sickeningly and obviously self-inflicted.

i look into your eyes,

and see myself, worn out and stripped down,

knowing i will never see 

the better version like you do, because you 

make me feel stronger than i really am,

even through the harshest gush of unwelcoming friction.

these are melancholic times, like a mother's weep

and my shaking hands.

tell me,

will it only lift up from here?

my favourite phase

I carry this much talked about weight

once again,

like a catch of breath above my diaphragm,

it is difficult to get used to this,

like bags that never get lighter with time

and rich food you always leave unfinished

but keep ordering anyway.

I take the same route home everyday

and begin to notice things that

never before touched my sight

like which pavements accumulate the most puddles,

the regular accordionist's second favourite spot,

the time it takes for the bus to pull away from Sainsbury's,

and the number of steps before i reach his doorstep

depending on my mood.

sometimes i wonder what would happen

if everything ends and i never got off at my stop

and carried on

like a role i have never played before.

in life i have earned so much,

and lost more.

like the smiles i could've given my mother

in replacement of slammed doors and cold dinners,

like the virginity i shouldn't have saved for someone

who never saved his violence,

like the friends i would've kept but let fall out like

loose waste off a truck,

like the passion of my hands and my heart when i created,

like the happiness i scrapped as an end,

made instead as a prologue,

like the life the students from my school would have

that i chose to walk away from,

like the life i once chose to walk away from.

i listen to songs that used to play

as i dangled my feet out my bedroom window on the 5th floor

never really believing i could fly away from everything that

ached

and wonder if i would be able to take it now

if i ever felt such pain again.

i lost that too.

'don't change' she says, and we laugh

knowing it is easier for her to say

than for me to do

and wonder how much hurt i will inflict in the process

of standing still when the world keeps pacing

ahead.

sometimes i cannot keep up,

but life really isn't something i want to lose

entirely.

bedsheets and frost

There is a weight that sits tightly against my chest,

Like tyres on the dry of a road,

Glasses unbalanced on a tray

Or the weight of our bodies

Waning the beds we sleep on.

It is the weight of

Counting every breath he takes before he falls asleep

Like second nature, watching his eyes

Drift a thousand miles when he is

Vulnerable, the weight of

words that left our lips, or 

Remained untouched in our thoughts

Wearing us down,

Like the episodes of a favourite show 

we have left unregarded 

and the splash of night looming over 

a thin line of dusk.

It is the weight of unfamiliar feelings

And familiar worries

Creeping into our dreams as we sleep

To greet us at our wake.

It is the hunch of what could possibly leave us stale, or make us

Invincible.

You know you are meant for somebody

When you do not predict what the next steps are, when with pure love at its happiest

comes a string of negatives,

And situations you face are

Uncontrollable and breathtakingly

Overwhelming.

Everything is not the same

Because fresh air never hits twice.

There is a weight that sits

Neatly in my mind,

Of things I can never fix

Like the ache in my ribs and my self inflicted paranoia,

The weight of things that I learn to 

Accept, like our pasts and

Our present flaws that comes 

naturally with every life that is tangible.

It is the weight of emotions that have

Accumulated from extremities,

Stretched and compressed

Into a bulb of intensity,

The weight of our passion seeping into each other and sometimes

Going straight past what our eyes can contrive.

It is the weight of looking forward to the times

When everything sits firmly

And strongly

In the best of places

Like the hint of his smile and the warmth

Of his breath on my skin.

This weight is what fills a soul

As longing as mine,

Like my head when it rests on the dent 

In his shoulders,

Or his hand on the curve of my chest 

as I curl in.

Without it, I will only be empty, 

hollow, opaque.

So I learn to embrace the world

At its heaviest,

As it settles on my shoulders

Only hoping it balances out

Eventually..

And for the meantime,

I guess I could always shift the weight

Like backpacks and guitar cases,

Until I find a the place it will

Rightfully belong to,

Just like the way I have found my place

Rightfully beside you.

scratches

I am sad. Upset like spilled wine on white, 

like a stomach doing laps. Sad 

like an old lady left standing on a tram, 

sad like a child with a sweet smile 

who will never learn to use it. 

Sad like an empty shell, like the people 

who die alone. I am sad like 

Sarah Kane and my mother 

at their darkest thoughts. 

I write poems that astound people 

but it's nothing to celebrate because I have only 

ever done that when I felt the way I do. Undressed 

and naked from the happiness I genuinely feel,

left staring at whatever is left over. 

And everybody else is staring at it too, 

unsure of what to do with it, 

like a fish out of water flapping in their palms. 

Everybody knows, and I still 

don't know why I am typing laughter 

at every sentences in conversations 

- like it makes a difference.

I am sad because I have no reason to be. 

I am sad and I feel like I am imposing it, 

and I feel guilty because of this, 

so I get even more upset.

So I remain sad. 

Sad like the way he looks at me 

like I have shadows in my eyes, like the way 

they try to place a contagious smile back on 

my lips because my mind is

overworked and out on display. I am sad because 

I do not know when little things like buses and 

light banter and the lack of skins 

for my tobacco started getting to me and I

don't know which junction to take myself away from this. 

Sad because I don't know when the left overs of myself

began to matter more than my entire being.

Down like a basement tenants 

never use, like the bottom of a mountain,

the centre of a cave. 

It is obvious. 

What isn't obvious, is that 

I am happy. Despite all that, I am happy 

like the sun, like the father 

and son having lunch together, like

stumbling upon a sentiment you once 

thought you'd lost. Happy because 

I have somebody to wake up to, to

love and to comfort. Happy because I can 

still feel like I am alive. Happy because 

I am alive.

My mind is at its darkest but 

my soul is still light - where do I go from here?

Tired.

Can't I be tired?

Can't my eyes sink as low as graves,

Can't they shade their under skin dark?

Can't my body deteriorate and cause me pain

And set itself loose at the joints?

Can't my mind wander to the tip of the sea,

Can't it weigh me down and overwhelm?

Can't my senses be muffled and less aware,

Or accentuate with alarm into emotional disarray?

Can't I be tired?

Can't I be selflessly undernourished,

Can't I be helplessly weak?

Can't I be recklessly lashing,

And frighteningly coiling?

Can't I be foreign to the world,

Can't I be familiar nonetheless?

Can't I be afraid of nothing,

Or scared of everything?

I am so tired even my poem is tired and structured and stupidly

bland.

searching for buttons

I settle in the centre 
To give myself leeway of falling back 
Or moving forwards 
When a side becomes too heavy to balance, 
Because I believe I am a coward. 
It is comfortable like a purring cat on your lap 
And the veins on his hand under my fingertips 
When the time is right. 
I watch the sky tell me a story of 
Life as it passes, the many times 
I have missed it happen because I try 
To appreciate the closer things 
Like milkshakes, tobacco, the right films 
And the right dreams and him. 

There are cobbled paths 
on the journey to my heart many have 
tripped and stumbled upon for they were 
too used to easy living, 
But I have found one who has paved 
A similar path a thousand times enough to 
Push on. 

But walking the same road can get a bit colourless sometimes, even for the most determined. 

He shapes his shoulders and I 
Whisper a kiss on the middle of his back where 
The curves were made for me. 
I shiver at the touch of beauty 
In the closure of his eyes as he 
Drifts through a sleep so unperturbed 
As I fight the nightmares away. 

I like the idea of loyalty cards. 
Of how you 
commit every inch of yourself, 
and with every bundle of mistakes 
You can expect at least, 
Achieving something good out of it. 
Safe. 
Sometimes chances are the choices you make. 

Sometimes I smother 
And break concentration 
From the clog of his mind 
But I am impulsive and spend my time 
worrying if I don't tell him now 
Then I will never tell him 
And I will become the secret 
He never speaks of. 

So I give the choice to say more than 
He might care to hear and 
Be assured he has listened and the 
Choice is now out of my hands. 

There a several snapshots that 
Stay vivid in my memories 
Like learning how to swim 
And my cousin's ability to morph into an old man, 
Scraping my knees playing chase outside my uncle's house, 
And my soul scorched red from the impact of once colliding very physically with somebody who wasn't so nice. 

Some snapshots that 
May not be real, 
Like the man outside the gates on a stormy night 
Sat in with my cousins, 
My grandmother sat on her bed 
A week after she passed 
And the colours I saw when I 
Acquainted with the end. 

There are many chances that come with 
A choice but 
Sometimes the chances run dry, 
Like how I will not have the time now 
until Thursday 
To sew the buttons back on my right boot, 
To have proper sleep, 
To take a trip to the doctor's, 
To take the bins out, 
To make amends with time lost with him, 
To make amends with time lost with myself.