2017

2017.

It's seems like a number from a futuristic storybook but it is not.
The future is here.
And I'm not sure if I'm ready to embrace it.

2017.

you sound like a year
from a world that's not mine but someone else's
you don't sound like a year that I can be a child in
you make it seem like it's time to grow up

2017

how many tears and laughs and sighs and screams will you bring?


2017.

What a scary thought.
What a lovely thought
What an interesting thought.

3 am

Lying down at 3 am thinking of the way
My sharp edges hurt you
I didn't mean to

The greed for attention
Arrested my weak heart
I'm sorry

Sorry for the times
I pushed you down
So that I could protect myself
From vulnerability
Sorry for the times
I let my walls build up so high
Shutting you out

I'm sorry
I love you.

heart

I feel like my dictionary
of words
to form bodies,
reality
is too narrow

breaking at the seams
my heart
the threads
they run
the metal screws
rust
my heart is loosed

liquid everywhere
blood perhaps
pumps
falls
why

I don't want to be clingy

Darkness
and tiny lights
here and there

broken bones
everywhere

I'm chasing lights
tiny candles
chasing winds and tides
crying
misty
absorbed by nothingness
meaningless
sighing like Solomon
screaming like Nebuchadnezzar

Be strong
be weak
slut
die
move
cry

punch

you're like guitar strings
ever making me try to tune you
to be accurate
but what is accuracy
you pretend to make beautiful sounds
but how do I differentiate beautiful and ugly
who cares
why

I don't want to be clingy

eighteen

When I was younger

I dreamt of kissing misty clouds

mysterious hearts

shrouded

then I grew older

and I wanted pure gold

strength and beauty

now I'm only eighteen

I dream of kissing sunsets

warm, hovering over me

light but weighty

mine alone

I don't know what I'll feel like

when I'm twenty-five

but I know that when I'm eighty

sitting in silky, ragged pajama bottoms 

I'll just long for weathered kisses

both sunshine and storms all wrapped into one

my beloved will be every season wrapped into

screams and laughs and tears and smiles

cinnamon buns and coffee and vodka and celery

misty clouds, gold, sunshine and You.

I Dream of a World

i am trying to tie these emotions
into a neat knot
into words
but i cannot

i am dreaming of fulfillment
i hate that word
it is too lofty
satisfaction is also a very unsatisfying word

i am dreaming of fullness
yes that is a better word
i dream of fullness, of joy
i dream of touch but sweet touch

i dream of a world
where everything is deliberate
where there are no sweet caresses for self-satisfaction
where there is no pretending

i dream of a world
where we say what we mean
but alas i would never dare help to build
that world

but if these dreams remain dreams
then they are not dreams in the least
but mere fancies
dreams are meant to come true

i dream of a world
where beauty is distinct but not exclusive
i dream of a world where there is love.

Little Girl and Music

I once knew a little girl who lived in the outbacks of Southeast Asia. Pretty smile she had. No mom and no dad. Little Girl loved to sing and she would sing all day in the humidity that bound most people to negativity. She sang in the humidity.

When she turned twelve, she realized that the moist air pushed down her voice. That her voice didn't matter. That every note that rang from her strong throat would only rise to the first molecule outside her mouth, then dissipate, never to be seen again.

The joy of the song was no more. She cried for a little while then she learned to live without song. She realized no one heard the music, no one knew what music was.

When she was fifteen, she heard a strange story that there were elves who could touch you in ways that made you feel music again. She longed for music again. She let the elves touch her.

It turns out the elves were evil. Their eyes glistened like silver but concealed only rusty hearts.
And so even the elven music died and she felt no joy again.

When she was eighteen, she saw a baby singing. And to her surprise, she felt tiny traces of joy as the baby's mouth moved. She began to sing with the baby. The baby looked straight at her with piercing blue eyes and they began to sing together. As they sang, the girl began to hear the music get louder.

She realized that even though the humidity of the air seemed to absorb the music, the collective sound of a persistent song became potent in the air over time. For you see, the music was never absorbed. It simply diffused, spread. And the more of it you let into the air, the stronger the sound became.

And so she sang again.

i sleep in

i sleep in
because i know that waking
up will only bring with it
knowledge
unwanted knowledge
of being unwanted

i stay up
because i don't want
to give in to death
to cry again

i stay up waiting
for somebody to hold me
i stay up
waiting

but i know tomorrow will come
and i will need to rise
i do not see a purpose for my life

I do not love. I merely tolerate

“Charlie, don’t you get it? I can’t feel that. It’s sweet and everything, but it’s like you’re not even there sometimes. It’s great that you can listen and be a shoulder to someone, but what about when someone doesn’t need a shoulder. What if they need the arms or something like that? You can’t just sit there and put everybody’s lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love. You just can’t. You have to do things.”

Chbosky, Stephen. The Perks of Being a Wallflower (p. 200). MTV Books. Kindle Edition.


This resonates deeper than it should. I cannot justify indifference as love. I cannot justify being unfeeling towards myself and faking feeling towards others as love. I do not love. I merely tolerate.

Sajak Cinta Generik

Andai kata aku melambai jiwaku
di depan matamu
Pasti kesannya hanya muka merah
kita berdua

jadi aku menenangkan debaran hati
dan aku menunggu
pasti di pelantaran
bilaku berputus asa
di sana ku akan menemuimu

tangan di tangan
hati di hati
jantung berdebar
irama sama

roh penari
hidup berkobar-kobar
dalam pergerakan kita

Ed Sheeran and Elf Land and A Land That Is Not My Own

I am a a little concerned because I don't seem to be inclined to socialize and I am sorry and I am sad and I can feel my tightened nerves and I know that if I were to descend they wouldn't care and this rambling is uncharacteristic of me but I do not care and I am trying, trying. I lied. I am not trying. I was trying but now I am just typing because the thought of rejection makes me squirm and I will go back to listening, or perhaps only hearing music and I will always hear the horns of elf land and if you read this and understand this then we must be kindred spirits.

the concreteness of life bothers me
the brick walls that surround my strange existence
in a land that is not my own
and yet I am not sure what is happening
I am scarily blur today
maybe that's a good thing
this is a horrible poem
but it's okay
it's okay to write horribly
it must be okay
tender buttons was okay
surely this is okay
I feel like punching and crying
and compulsively listening to Ed Sheeran
probably hasn't helped with that.
there must be mist
and shadows and things not quite seen

I will not give in to nothingness.

Random Gushes

This floor makes me feel like tap dancing these shoes make me want to run
I cannot wait for my Narnian walking tours. May I go to New Zealand

The Rainbows Won't Fight

Faerie stories
and windblown nights
you and I

I wrote a manuscript for a book
but forgot to dot the "i"s

It's not an animal longing
it is a panting deeper inside
I can hear the rainbows falling
as they give in to the  rain that won't stop
that becomes a storm that rages
that kills the rainbows
but the rainbows won't fight

the rainbows seem to die.

I used to dream of pirouettes
and apple pies and warm kisses
but now all that's left seems to be
groping and tugging

cuddle.

my fingers are restless
they need to write
but the longing tonight seems to paralyze
rather than revitalize

with every word i write
i feel anxiety dripping from my pores
tonight

this is a plea for you to care
dare

how shall we fare.
tell me
how.

I don't blame you anymore
I don't blame anyone
I dream of it
The beauty, reality
But I realize that not all is as it should be

I've sold myself to lesser things
I just don't wanna be alone
I've had enough of the tears cried
At midnight
When everyone else is laughing on the outside.

I've had enough of the fairy tales
They bug me with perfection
I've had enough of loving myself
All that's led to is rejection

I reject myself as a person.

I feel like just giving in to the tide
I'm unbeautiful
Cries
Fight for me
Fight for what's right
Don't stand down
Fight
Fight

God I'm sorry for giving in.

I suck.

Can You send me a group of the lovely friends?
I'm uprooted and still flying
I cannot do this
I am dying
there is no more beauty left
When all that is sacred is ripped and tried and ugh
I do not make sense anymore
And I don't care
I want to die

When I think of you

When I think of you
I don't imagine a sharp nose
or gelled hair
or a smooth, clean shaven face

I think rather of a raspy voice
rough, dry but flowing
I think of words

I think of the songs you sing
No, you're not a man the girls are after
you're a man that sings the songs
that other guys steal

I think of a man
who cares far more about the poetry
than about the shape of his beard
about where his feet walks
than the state of his toenails

Sarah Kay says it is hard
to build a body out of words
But when I think of you
I think of your words

When I think of you
I think of a man
who cares far more about the world
than about whether the world cares about him

When I think of you
I think of a man like your Master
More than the words that I'm so drawn to
I think of a man
Not with haloes and crowns
But a man who sees

When I think of you
I think of a man who has wept in the darkness
Who has cried and shoved and finally slept
In the arms of the Man of men

Like a hand

Like a hand that presses down
on your chest and refuses to leave
and the fingers are tainted with poison
and thorns
yes, thorns that were concealed by roses
and fairies and dreams
and when the sun left
and it went to night
and you could only feel
you couldn't see anymore
then you felt for the first time
you felt the thorns against you
the poison seep in
the poison that had been disguised by pretty roses
and dainty smells
now poignantly, pointedly pushing you into
darkness.

Ode to Metaphors/ unlike you

Compulsively listening to Ed Sheeran
Smiling then crying
I can feel the knot

I was gonna write this for beauty
I'm too distracted

No matter how much I do
It's never enough

Ugh
Ugh

My fears have been realized
I am nothing to you
And by you, I mean all of you.

Nothing
If I screamed
As I do
No one cares
I have no beauty it seems
regarded to my existence

you say you miss me
but i'm the one hunting you down
you, me, we
i don't intend to make sense
i've neglected that long ago

i am compulsively writing
just trying
to make sense of these words

i want metaphors
but i will not search for them
i've searched for too long
just like i've searched for you too long

the metaphors must chase me down
if they want to be written

shoot
i just made a metaphor of a metaphor
they have chased me down
unlike you.

Rose.

you cut me
with a knife my blood ran
onto your fingers, then to the ground

you left in glee
at the sight of me

i stared at the ground
knowing the need to rise
but never quite finding strength

the blood flowed
mingled with water
diluted
it ran in the shape of a rose

it reminded me of life
diluted
but shaped like a rose.

No Words

There are no words
For anxiety
Fly
Fly

There are no words for apathy
Combined with disparity
Of a broken entity
This broken entity
Cry
Cry

There are no words
For a heart that doesn't beat
No words for the tears that won't fall
The soul is pulled in all directions
To cry for oneself is sympathy, is humanity

There are no words
For this inability to concentrate
on the task at hand
For the sharp pains in my back
For the aching

There are no words

I don't mind doing it alone
Not that I don't want you
But it's hard to let you serve me
If I'm not worthy.

Rough Edges

In this song I hear you sing
There are swallows here and there
As you question the beauty of the rasps
And the runs you try so hard to make
To impress me

In this song I hear you sing
There are rough dips, rough rises
of pitch, of pinecone dust
rough edges of the mountains you create

I can hear your soul
In the highs and the lows
As you make spontaneous poetry

I see the rough edges in the tears that fall
The skin you try to conceal
I see the rough edges in the hunch in your back
In the shadows; in the real

I see the rough edges in the blisters on your feet
That ran till they had to fall
I see the story that you're trying to complete
But the fear overwhelms it all

I see the rough edges in the folds of your praying hands
In the echoes of your mistakes
That play again and again
And like a series of tidal waves
Push you down to the seabed again

I see the rough edges in your smile
The consciousness creeps in
I see you biting your lip
And shying away
from the pain, from the beauty

I see the rough edges in the breaths you take
In the periodic gasps of life
I see the rough edges in the art you make
The brushstrokes must have strife

But somehow,
I see no rough edges in you.

I'm not asking you to look up to me
I've had enough of that
I'm begging you to hold me
To tell me I'm good enough

To tell me I should sleep
To tell me you'll wake me up
To tell me I'm not taking care of myself
To tell me it'll be okay

Not to tell me that this abuse
Is of good use
Not commend this tired half-eyed typing
Begging for words to come
Ugh.