When you were seven, someone gave you favors.
Negative favors, that felt so wrong.
Ten years later, it's still in your mind.
You drink about it.

When you were fourteen, someone broke your heart.
Heartbroken, and full of self - hatred.
Three years later, you still hate yourself.
You smoke about it.

When you turned seventeen, nobody knew.
Nobody knew your thoughts.
Two months later, you were found on the floor.
You never talked about it.

Through the colors of dusk, you enticed me
Wide-eyed and inquisitive
Laughing in modesty,
Yet filled with desire
Fast friends in honest notions
Too close too quickly, perhaps
Yet so similar in design
Too tight a fit
Too much to handle
Bonded passion through darkest night
The colors of dawn bid the possibilities adieu

but i will.
i will write it and it may take me
five minutes
or it may take me fifty.
and neither of the two is an absurdly long amount of time,
unless you really think about it.
because five measly minutes
is just the same
as three hundred seconds.
and three hundred seconds
is just the same
as three hundred thousand milliseconds.

we've only just covered one-tenth of an entire fifty minutes,
yet already we have before us
three hundred thousand intricate units of time,
each lasting for the blink of an eye -- no, less --
then vanishing,
like the evanescent remains of a flame
that has been reduced
to first sparks,
then dull embers,
then ashes.

the funny part about it is that you never know
what each tiny little bubble of time might hold,
what might happen when it forms,
or when it pops.

a millisecond is incredibly short,
almost unfairly so.

but three hundred thousand milliseconds?

it can't be said what could happen as those fleeting fractions
slip away.

we may try to grab hold of them,
to catch them in our palms.

but time stops for no one.

so you may find yourself
with empty, bleeding palms,
as a reminder that time is harsh, cruel,
tyrannical.

and as you wrap bandages around your wounds
(or maybe not),
those fleeting milliseconds
will laugh with sudden bursts of cynicism,
like fireworks,
deafeningly silent.

they will laugh
at what a fool you were,
thinking you could catch time
in the palms of your hands.

(a.m.)

He's so beautiful
with his midnight ebony skin
& well sculpted physique
I crave to touch the descendant of Adam
I want our bodies to connect
& become as one
He's beautiful,
beautifully refined,
a breath of fresh air
An intelligent soul
I'm in awe of him
& his name, a sweet benediction to my lips

By Cheyanne Ntangu

I take a walk into the parkour graveyard,
looking for Polish dealers and cellphone halos.
I heard Thoth resides in sobriety,
but words fail me
whenever you are near.

I let my tongue run in endless stutters,
disguising 'I love you' as some off-hand request.
I could take you to dinner,
I could show you a longing
without the need for ***.

This late-night food has lost its flavour.
This ******* never picked up.
All that is left is to dial these numbers,
and wait by the window
for any car but yours.

Let's take a walk to the railway bridge.
We'll smoke a joint by the open forest.
You'll push your breath into mine,
make me high,
and forget why I ever
felt so low.