perfect logical sense, sure
Until the it that isn’t and the was that wasn’t
Is just a silhouette of your insecurity
And truly nothing more.
As my body writhes around a different bed
It feels taller even though it’s not
Semi-clothed and cold it feels different
But not lonely
It feels older and as though it knows further and fresh
It learns less of you and no wider of me
But it understands something new
That isn’t uncomfortable
It just wants to find you again and for you to know me once more
And for that once more to see what I wished you’d seen before
Before it would cry out a screech of heart strung bedlam
Lying with a bread-bloated belly that looked pregnant
Pregnant with the thought of you
Coming back to bed soon
But you didn’t
Different cities and marbled skies
Slow the pace between us
And Indian spices heat the burn our tongues loved together
But now saffron and chai
Taste an unsavoury uncleanness
There is no loneliness to chew
Just a space in the creases of linen
That should belong to the weight of you.
Let me kiss you close mouthed
Let me rouge your bitter cheeks
With this darker red
Let me wrap the gentle curve of my body
Into someone else’s bed
I’ll let you wipe the cherry plum stain off
With the memory of when you said
‘Cheer up sweetheart, the thing with
People like you, is they’ll only love you
When you’re dead.’
I hadn’t noticed it at first
It was done with such kindness
It hadn’t thought to hurt
But as I stumble off the train
With my knickers hitching my skirt
It would’ve been nice to know of the night
That instead of just leaving my phone charger behind
I’d be taking away a lovebite
A ‘hickey’
A purple blue yellow not nearly skin-coloured enough to cover
With make-up
Tricky
Situation
Learning to flatten my tones from their guilty high fluctuations
When I say
It’s eczema?!
At school a girl had one on her head
And said
She’d headbutted a cupboard
And cut in a fringe before the teachers had discovered it
Is so silly that they must be hidden
That something which once brought pleasure
Is suddenly forbidden
Like, grossly forbidden
Like, I walked into a party and everyone was shocked
That I was either bursting with pride
Or should be embarrassed that I’d forgot
To slap on some concealer
Or that I was akin to a slapper who’d hooked up with a drug dealer
Which for the record would be fine
It’s my neck to be decorated by whomever I desire
Minutes of passion holstered to a circle
That gets flashed every now and again
Like being autographed with a biological purple pen
It’s a bruise from a kiss
Not a place keeper for a fist
Just a splodge of romance stamped profoundly pissed
It’s as fleeting as the youth we’re scared to miss
As it’s administered
I struggle to cast it off as something sinister
And for whatever attention they seem to seek
I’m happy to laugh in their existence
And thank god that they only last a week.
She squirms nearly naked beside me
Lollipop stick legs
Like a Lowry
Waiting to be coloured
I fill her in best I can
With a haze-hugged recital
Madness over just one man
It splutters slurred and sloppy
I feel her skin soft and on me
She breathes a sigh drenched in
Yawns for coffee
We put on one of his shirts together
Find the slunked-off socks
And bury down secrets we now have to keep forever
His face is unimaginable
He’d have guessed it sooner
Had his lust been made more tangible
But he was busy
When we were busy for him.
Mesmeric in the most disarming demanding way
I flash honesty brazen and wasted
As you kiss the words from out my mouth as though they’re still untasted
Satiated
We lay
As you press your head upon me and lie about my beauty as though it’s your unspoken duty