so, what now?

i told you i loved you and you clamped your hand over my mouth.

i still love you; my mouth is still sealed.

will that change if the sound of trains racing across tracks drowns out the confession?

will it cease to exist if you turn up the music in the car when my tongue wraps around the last syllable?

i still love you; you still know of it.

is there no hope for us, after all?

your teeth marks are still imprinted on my clavicle,

your hands still bruised against my hip,

your saliva still mingled with the bile from my vomit —

do you truly think if we pretend to be shadows in the night, the sun will forget we burn as fire in the day?

what could ever be worse that what should’ve been?

could and would are two ends of a spear;

should is the centre that tips the balance.

so perhaps that’s why i cannot fathom

what has become of me,

simply because i should’ve been more –

should’ve had more –

than what is present.

you wind up in the same place

you swore even your corpse wouldn’t taste.

your memories burn under your fingers

because they feel so betrayed

at how you stole their escape.

you’re telling yourself it will be different

but you are still a ghost

while this home is still a grave

and the world is still haunted.

you’ve crashed to the ground

because everyone always said

even the sun wasn’t high enough for you,

but they never said there were stars in the sky

and their spikes would cut your wings.

so, you exist in the shadow of ‘should’;

and everyone winces when you walk by

because the scars on your back

are too ghastly to withstand,

because a clipped bird is just that –

a clipped bird;

not what it should’ve been.

millions of stories dance across my tongue; tragic ones waltz, joyful ones tango, wistful ones pirouette. the page is empty as i will these stories to somehow mold themselves together — to clash and collide — in some semblance of a retelling of what should be our history. alas, there are too many versions of this story: he is a battle hero – savage and restless – and i am the bashful maiden eager to clean the blood from his sword, he is the poet – tortured and brooding – and i am the songstress with words he could not yet put to paper, he is the king – just and righteous – and i am the fair lady who holds him every night until the sun rises and the clouds call of duty. only one version is true. only one is real; that i loved him and i have lost him. this version i cannot come to terms with.

how old is this tale? how poignant and cruel and merciless is this tale. how unjustly difficult it is to accept that i have known him like the earth knows the soil and he is as far from me as the sky is to the sea. how grief inducing it is to consider that the world we once walked as one soul split amongst two hearts, my ghost will haunt in search of him. so, i write the only tale that i can believe: i loved him and i lost him and i will find him until my feet are blistered from every mountain i scour, until my knees are bruised from every desert i crawl through, until my hands are raw from every boulder i tear apart in search of any trace of him. even the sky and the sea will collide one day, there is only so much that can hold them apart.

the first time i realised

i couldn’t be saved

from this perpetual emptiness,

i collapsed to the floor

and wrapped my arms around myself

like a small,

small child.

there is nothing quite like despair.

there is nothing quite like

knowing

you cannot be rescued

nor salvaged

nor known.

you hide behind a cloak

that you wear each day

so they never ask

‘where that happy, happy child went.’

i am still her.

is she still me?

i don’t speak of the pain

because then i have to look after it.

so i paint my face

and i braid my hair

but everyone knows

it’s a cheap imitation.

when i think of the little girl

with my name

and my body,

i want to thrust her into my arms.

i’m sorry for what i’ve done to you;

i’m sorry for what i will do to you.

i wish you had stayed like this –

a girl who saw nothing in her face

except it’s purpose;

to smile,

to speak,

to see,

to smell,

to breathe.

a girl who refused to define her life

by how much she felt wanted

despite knowing

no one ever wanted her either.

i wish we will never meet

because i’m ashamed to face you

because i know you will forgive me

because that is who you are:

good and kind and pure –

because i know i will ruin you

because that is who i am:

cruel and dumb and mad.

i’ve gone my whole life without love and it’s left a gaping hole in my heart that threatens to fester into a vicious infection; i walk around with shaking fists and a bloody mouth from biting my tongue but it’s tiring me all the same. how long must i exist as a ghost in search of a house to haunt?

it’s december and the snowfall never slows,

it’s january and the ice never flows,

it’s february and the sun never rose.

i loved you best in the tempestuous winter

when time stood completely still

and our passion no storm could hinder.

when my gloved hands clutched your frosty cheeks,

with snowflakes kissing your nose,

and the wind sang our song for hours into weeks.

when you ravished me by the fireplace

whilst i giggled like a schoolgirl,

so overcome with an unruly, giddy haste.

we stamped angels into the blanched ground

where our bodies embraced,

whilst the stars hung high and the earth slept sound.

you held me in your arms as the children shrieked and played.

the ivory blanket licked at our feet.

the serendipity was something no price could trade.

still, the seasons will all wither and change and depart

and the earth will move on,

but this perpetual love will never leave my heart.

i had this dream where i collapsed against the staircase to heaven and a million others fell behind me like dominos. an angel came before me and held me up again; he asked me about you and i fell against the steps once more because your name is not an easy one to stand tall against. my voice was hoarse when i asked what of you. the angel smirked and looked down into the fiery pit tickling against my heels. when i looked down, your hands were clinging onto the clouds and your grief stricken face contorted into panic. i wailed like a little child, and only then did god summon me into his lair. i begged him to salvage you, i begged him to redeem you for your sins because they were all done against me and i would still put you in paradise again and again if i had to choose. “those are not your sins to judge” i warned god, so angry at his presumption that he could adjudge you for a hurt that was mine to shoulder. you see – you have slighted me and i would still trip down these stairs before i let them punish you for it. there is an extent of servitude, and i have crossed it long ago. god mistakenly assumed it was for him, but it was always for you. so, let me jump into this fire with you and eat the backs of the disbelievers just so you’ll never have to taste the flesh.

your last name behind my first,

our sin behind my last;

there are no silent letters

to cushion this pain of mine.

we hang an unsheathed sword

above the mantelpiece

but there is nothing domestic

about a house built above bones.

you come home with a suitcase and a smile,

with which you kiss me hello

but i’m tired

of having to look behind your back

before you close the door.

regardless,

i love you

despite this tragedy

you refuse to speak of.

i love you

despite this anonymity

that consumes your past.

i asked you

once

where your roots were;

you pointed to the soil

and spat in the grass.

i guess i never realised

why you kept the shovel so close by.

when i watched you sob by the fireplace,

you told me your skeletons had fangs.

we never brought it up afterwards;

i went back to sleeping

with a gun on the bedside table.

you told me you weren’t the hero,

but i guessed you couldn’t be the villain.

(evil can’t kiss with a mouth so sincere).

so, i still believed you were good

even when you broke my wrist

when i came home past eight.

even when you scratched my face

when i picked up a foreign call.

perhaps, by then,

i recognised you had a darkness

lurking in the confines

of a padlocked heart.

still, i said you were grey;

that way,

i could still believe there was light.

so, when you’d come home —

with that suitcase —

i never asked

why your friends never visited

or why i never saw

a family picture

stowed away

anywhere.

i suppose when someone gives you a home

with a ceiling tall enough

to sail the stars,

and a closet full enough

to wear a different shade a day,

there’s an obligation

to serve the platter hot

and never ask

why he let it go cold.

though i could always tell

there was something in the corners.

i’d see shadows leaping and lurching

and snakes hissing and heaving,

and all the knives in the kitchen

were speckled with stale scarlet.

the worst of it

were the skulls you kept

in the boot of the car;

always with you,

always watching,

always following.

i likened you to a warrior

at first.

a man so burned

by a past

he battled out of,

a soldier coming home

after a lifetime of running away,

an enigma, so shrouded in mystery,

that i tried to solve a million times.

but even warriors

leave blood

in their wake.

and even men

light matches

just to strike.

yet even soldiers

go mad

when the bombs hit.

mostly,

even an enigma

is often a mystery

for our greater good.

it wont matter.

you will still load your bullets.

i will still pass you the gun.

you will buy me diamonds

i will trade you knives.

you will kiss me with that bleeding mouth

and i will smile before i sob.

i will never ask what i should,

but we will both know what it is:

how many lives were lost

in the warpath

for our white picket fence future?

‘is it truly so horrible to believe you could be loved?’

no, but it is unimaginable to believe that i would accept it, and that is the worst of it all. behind every word i will scour for a ‘but’ until i run out of connectives to rationalise the very idea. you will say you love me; i will shake my head in turn. you will clasp my hands in yours and, dear god, my palms are sweating so profusely that you will lose your grip. you will whisper my name and i’ll pinch myself every time a consonant wraps around your tongue. everyday, i will sit and wait for when i see a crack in this whole charade so i can finally lunge for you and claw you to shreds. it is easier to turn a belief into truth than a fear into hope.