remember and rob

sometimes I crave
the friction of a new notebook
undecided
whether I have enough poetry
to be able to ink
through its daunting thickness

the truth is
I'd rather pour my heart
into pages that are going to be 
forgotten tomorrow
like parts of me 
scattered
across time
and geographies

I list out the digits
that mark today
reluctantly
almost as if I 
want to remember
and rob this timelessness
in equal measure

but this - forever 
being stuck
in paradoxes
in loops
but also endless playlists
is perhaps 
as comfortable 
and familiar 
as it's alienating

how many instances
along time and space
can I point to 
that felt exactly 
like this
a lover's arms
home's windows
streets that had
scraped my knees
people who had
felt mine

this life
is nothing
but an act of 
nerve-wracking
courage

some pluck it
from the bottoms
of whiskey bottles

and others from
withdrawing to
the pillows laid out
by their soul
only to emerge
as music and melancholy

failed states

the fairy lights are up
some evenings we visit
the bottom of a whisky bottle

it seems like my 
field of vision 
has forever featured 
the silhouette of
two attentive ears
taut, velvet

a constant jarring 
is at work
like sandpaper 
against my heart
wonder whether 
it will come down to 
making choices between
tempered chocolate
or war-ravaged towns

it's either too little 
or too much

cold sun

one night
when the only colour
painting the canvas
between the earth and the sky
is green
titillating
choreographed

a lone light bulb
casting shadows
of ascending lengths
while she sings of
the cold sun and the chill
of exhales

the heart is better for
the love it feels
the love that tears it apart

paisley

drenched rainy clouds 
hemmed into
the linings of my skirt

greens around me
and my heart
heavy with
the groans of the sky

crying freedom

do you

what do you do
when love starts feeling like
sea salt

home and heartbreak

at some point
how I felt about love
was a song

it was against
rain streaked windows
red and purpled from
street lights reflecting
off of wet roads

it was in smells
that were at once
home and heartbreak

and in the
dusty, forgotten memory
of my mom
bursting into laughter

it was also in
a book I knew
I could never re-read

it's the stuff
that gushes out of my heart
on seeing Milo
comfortable within
awkward angles of my body

in loss
in sights that left me breathless
and in evenings with too much wine in them
love. there was love.

cursive

just one of those evenings
a warm balmy september kind of indigo
in a quiet house
that was just too chaotic
moments ago
with a random spotify playlist
about love
the kind that stays
that heals
your dog's full belly
warming your feet
and the purple of your heart
neither too happy
nor too sad

it's been quite some time
since you wrote poetry
in all lowercase
it's been escaping you
as most things have
making you wonder
if they'll return

return to inhabit
the cracks and crevices
which they occupied
when love was untainted
and unencumbered

love you see
is an act of courage
it looks deep within
and calls on hope
it sees the wreckage
without disavowing it
making it its own
going on all the same
like an orange post card
that smells a little bit
like a clementine
just hours past its prime