some songs i listened to while writing this
soar / lights
staying up w/ u
the tranquil twilight
houses our past midnight calls,
numbered in parentheses
logged in your favorite color
only dashed with red when our thumbs go amiss, our lives awry
in the end, we always return to the same bed, yearning for the other-
i love your soft spoken wind,
rumored through breaths of static and
occasional beeps of annoyance
when etheric lines can't contain our conversation
as you pause, my own breath hushes
anticipating your response
your antics
your frantic laughter or clueless "repeat-what-you-said-cmon-please"
ngl
the overlap tastes sweet because it's the buzz of velvet cream
it's all in your melody
the broad strokes of voice cracks and talk backs
the jump from sleep as i wake when you speak
but i remember wilting when i whisper to silence
then
the urgent encouragement
against my burning the bridge
no communication, pushing away onto ice that's thin
and you're telling me the bridge shouldn't be burned
but i just can't bring myself to speak
the flames whip and bite my tongue,
the mental smoke strains my throat, my eyes stung
i'm descending into overthoughts
i don't like repeating myself
i don't want to replace sweeter words with harsher tones
i'm scared that you'll lose my sincerest, perfect "i love you" to the most cold, acrid "you don't need me"
i don't mean to break down under my own weight
i just want to save face
save you from buckling under our shared weight
when i strain the air with taut short words
i don't like what i say sometimes
and i turn to you so much more than i'd like to admit
that's because i'd rather have
your words hold me closer
i unravel at night
and i'm sorry for doing so
but i still latch onto the hope that
you'll never get tired of saying
or simply being
you
4
to the tune of do re mi by blackbear.
s/o
i’m sorry for being unrealistic,
thinking ‘bout the sound of this-
this speech now goes out to the sound
of breaking glass on tiled ground,
slow dancing to the pulse of music,
with hands on hips- no moving too quick,
with mistified eyes i have lied,
it’s only been month 1.5.
i know you hate my distance,
or the times i advise i distance from you.
but there can't be an us
without me and you.
under the cover of night, i am without you,
so i push off into my own ocean of blue,
of voidless black,
under waves of covers and sheets i'm slipping fast,
the soft pillows run with old rivers of tears and blood,
and i know you're not there to hold me.
but i don't blame you
you're off on some cliffside road,
moving on your own,
you're a fading mirage,
you're the beams of sun glancing off my temple,
but soon it becomes overcast, overshadowed
by a slight mist, the whispers of wind-
then the pressure drops.
there's a raging storm.
the skies roil with the truth
that i'm no good without you
without you telling me you'll be back,
that i'll be back,
that it's only for a night,
that i'll have a goodnight,
that we'll wake up soon, side by side but really i do miss those sleep-deprived words,
hoarse murmurs in the calm of before
and we understood each other
but these nights without you...
the crests of waves crash and i'm a little less stronger,
the undertow is harsh- is pulling me under,
i try and break from the current ripping me apart-
now i'm drowning under my spring-coiled mattress
without your voice anchoring me above it all,
without the hum of static as you tame my waters.
now i tether to older lines of hushed siren songs,
straining to remember the melodies we share
breaking the surface to gasp and grasp
at those wisps of you
as the distant you
sheds familiar moonlight,
unknown to the less silver, more real you
waiting on some far-off land-
and as i reach out, the clouds clear
and i can see the horizon again
i still yearn for you, my sun,
but the reflection- the midnight echoes of you is enough
as i'm lulled to sleep
clinging to a sea-foam pillow resembling you-know-who.
the morning does come,
and the storm is gone
as i swim back to shore,
the real you is there, salvaging my fragments,
knowing of the shipwreck unbreaking the surface
but i'll tell you about it later.
right now, i'm happy to be awake
knowing you haven't lost me to my own sea.
i don't see what you see in me.
you see ethereal, almost unreal,
despite the serrated past you had, you see me
and i wish my erected pedestal
wasn't so high- as to blind you with ideals of me, misbeliefs,
where you forget the dust on my sleeves and the scars on my body.
i'm not divine
as i defy the social constructs of time
when i hypocritically ask for you to shut your eyes
even as you tell me the thoughts twisting your mind
so much
that the words twist your tongue.
i sit in silence,
wringing the wrinkles of my own mind, making sense of your language.
and with my exasperation, your asphyxiation, i understand you, i do.
i want to keep the tower we've constructed,
almost 42 days now
into a future i could've never seen
believed
because i don't think i deserve the warmness you're giving to me.
i don't think i deserve gratification, the words on your breath, your consent
to let me blossom and bloom a vine of uncertainty,
to allow me to implant these thoughts, spiked and draining-
reptillian to some degree, my corrosion from a past i'd rather forget
yet you allow me to unlace the venom coiling my lungs,
and you pinch those acidic words between your fingers,
wincing at the fangs, the pain of being stung.
despite the blood and tears you've shed,
despite the conversation you could've dropped dead,
you went ahead to tell me that these thoughts
shouldn't bite as hard as they do,
because they aren't physical
like me and you,
and that they shouldn't burden you
like the stones you've been fed
by shadows in the sand, where you were convinced you ate bread.
but those relationships gave you fish that was rotten.
and i'm here to get that out of your system. and i feel the poison dissipate,
i feel the scars in my side lessen in their ache.
just for a bit, i blame myself less.
we share the same thoughts, the same fears,
but the same distant mirage of a future within arms-length,
i strive to grasp that with you.
even if my feet burn from the desert i must traverse to get to you
you're worth the distance.
1
Undo Me.
this is embarrasing, i wrote this at 1
i tear apart my seams
almost desperate,
won’t heed to the flashing of warning signs, sirens
raised by the same me
i want to clear the static
censoring my fallacy,
my truth to some degree
i lie bare,
defunct but still functioning as you
thread me through a needlepoint,
your focal focus on me
with steady intensity,
deaf to the creak creep of my ball-joints
first
you slip away my porcelain skin
yellowed at 17
but your hands don’t tremble,
careful not to shatter me
and what cracked facade i have
to grasp my insecure security
you then face me,
pause
rewind
enamored with the thoughts coiled about my caged rib cavity
you thin me out,
plucking my heartstrings, and yet
i’m tied up,
caught in myself,
pulled taut as you unravel my monstrosity
you jolt at the spark
at the sharpness of me,
the biting
that’s not meant to scare you,
but difficult for me to rein with totality,
those words that crackle and dry my tongue,
those words become high in voltage
molten
revolting to say aloud
you push those exposed thoughts to the side,
despite the ash darkening your fingertips,
you wrestle with
pick apart
and pull away these endings
until they end
and reveal the good parts of me
patches of whiteless color
not stained by the malfunctional
heart-break
self-deprecate
isolating thoughts that ensnare,
slice through me,
dripping ironic blood mixed with
the tar i think my veins run
you say,
there’s light within the darkness of you.
i say,
heavy is the hand that holds my heart.
you say,
you’re no burden,
you’re just as broken as me,
so let’s fix each other, together,
and then we’ll be complete.
and you have fixed me,
so far,
but there’s still parts of me to remain unseen
until i’m ready
once i accept these swallowed stones,
the sad epitome of these broken bones,
the targeted weakness to which these sticks were thrown,
i will show you the rest of me
for now, i’m just happy i’ve found the missing piece of my heart-shaped battery.