i am so tired of
my wrists being a battlefield —
the shrines for all the times i fell —
they all keep falling apart,
and nothing lasts long enough
for all these wounds
to turn into scars.

maybe the problem is that scars mean you're healing.
maybe the problem is that i'm not.

i have worn this skin away —
long shunned by softness
and each day, i cannot fathom how
i can ever manage to hold gentle things —
press them against my chest
when everything i hold
bleeds and breaks,
including me.

i wish my tongue was more made for poems
and not for dry-swallowed poppies;
the moon flinches at the very sight.

i flinch too.

and i am so tired of my entire skin
being a battlefield
when no one can see the casualties
buried quickly —
buried well.

and oh, what i'd give to be
soft enough to grow flowers on graveyards —
and soft enough not to break myself.

this poem is a lovechild
of my weary skin
and the sensual creeping of an all-consuming melancholia;

my voice, hoarse
from calling for the gods
whose names all fall away
at the sight of my undoing —
besides, who falls apart
at ungodly hours
but sinners?

why hast thou forsaken me —
there no longer is a need for this
when they had all forgotten your name
hours before the daybreak.

and yet everyday, i still wake,
waiting for this bed to collapse
under the weight of my hollow bones, holding
the weight of the frailest chaos
to ever befall these sorry sheets —
i thirst,
for a new kind of skin, unstained,
untouched —
wide enough
to hold all this weight of sadness
lying in these sorry sheets.

i've wanted too many epitaphs for a girl who's still alive;
today it's started wanting me back.

now, i tire,
wrap the cloth around my skin:
all ashen, all stench,
all cold, all dead.

now take this poem.
take this lovechild in your arms —
all brown eyes and little hands;
half melancholia;
barely a girl.

now take this body;
take its peace.
bury it in a pauper's field.

oh, to be a
delicate thing
in these feral waves;

i remember steady grounds,
veneered floors,
greek columns —
my hand pressed softly
in the small of your back;
fingers —
aching
for the slightest of touch,
i remember sunlight;
our hearts were
lighter back then.
oh how we were
the envy
of chaotic things
and lonely gods.

now,
look at this war
i'd waged for you
as termites
eat away
at those
sunlit memories;


what's the point of fighting
when the sea already
has swallowed
and spat poems
written from the
losing side
of this war:
a mess
of what used to be
a delicate love;
now,
i'll fit
all of these
heartbreaks
in a letter if i could —
leave it on your shore.


and i
loved you
so;
i remember you
loving me back, helen;
i remember
sunlight
and
happier times.


now this love
is a wreck
of a battleship,
sinking,
drowning
in the weight
of these sighs.

now this love
are embers
dressed
in all
the muted shades of blue.

now this love
is not delicate —

it's just
breakable.

it's just
broken.

and oh how we were
the envy
of chaotic things
and lonely gods.

August took it all away — the long peaceful drives before the daylight, the fresh sheets and coffee kisses and the scent of calm after the storm, the eyes — your eyes, deep brown in contrast of the afterglow.

August took it all away, so easily — all slender fingers and somber face — the comfort of the hearth, and the promises, and the sunlit, warm days of summer; how happy we were. Darling, how happy we were. Now the walls are oppressively dull behind vibrant photographs, and the room is cold, and the silence is loud. How could I have known that I was walking around the pitfalls elaborately built on your fragile skin? In all this obscurity, I only know that I loved you so. How could I have known all the impossibly cruel ways that you would break my heart, when all you did was loved me so?

And you loved me, right? You loved me, for some time, before all the wrong there is — before all the pitfalls gave in, spoiling midnights and tainting mornings, taking down everything that I ever called home. You loved me, darling; at least that you did. You loved me.



At least that you said.


Now August has taken it all away, and all I know is that heartbreaks are worse in the early hours of a cold morning.




I hope September is warmer. Brighter. Gentler.


I hope September is kinder to us.

Mine is just another room lit in the cold of the night —
this just another poem in a bedside drawer,
written by just another girl
whose windows she left open to talk to the moon —

it's just another liar

to another naive girl, reading into every word,
splashing into every wave, rising.

Oh, to drown in grace
under the moonlight
was not something I'm supposed to know;
now, didn't you think
I already was broken enough
to have this dress, all drenched,
these cheeks, all wet,
these boats, all wrecked?

The moon is just another liar,
and epiphany is just a pretty word
for truths, finally unveiling themselves

as betrayal,
as ache,
beguiled by the moon to spread,
to map these bones and joints,
flooding,
claiming my body for its own;
now all this hurting is the ocean
and I, a whale carcass.

And the moon is a liar and the windows are closed

and in these moon-forsaken sheets,
I do not know where to start healing first.