SaviorComplications

I wonder if my big actions leave ripples of love

I wonder if they know that with each concession and lied reassurance that I hold my scarred palms open for more thorns

I want for nothing

I want for small things

I want for everything I gave away

I crave for him to be close

I crave for his skin on mine

I crave our breaths mixed into one

I miss the girl I met

I miss our light days in bed

I miss the feeling of her desire

I have no energy

I have no time

I have no opinion for things that are not mine

Can she not see through me

Can she not let me go despite the blood on her hands

Apart from others I own

that line the walls of the cabinet

inside you'll find plastic gold

The polypropylene canisters

are made with number 5 code

but look within and you'll see my heart

where boundless futures unfold

There is much magic in the mundane

That make you warm or make you cold

but my true magic is stored within

There once was a builder who used their craft as a means to escape their spiraling thoughts. They chose to travel across their sites and collect and build alone. It wasn't that they did not want company, but they knew they would be more productive alone.

The day started early for the builder, the work beginning as the first licks of sun brushed the newly flattened earth. No sound accompanied their labor save for the odd star who would shoot across the morning sky with complements and praise. The day turned to night. Over and over this pattern formed. It soothed the builder, for although the work was hard, their blueprints were finally made 3D.

As the sixth day faded from view and the framework had been finished, the builder began to think to the future. It was no longer a project of which beam went where but rather a labor of love. They were determined to reap the most out of their new home. The lights were nearly placed when a bumblebee flew around.

The bumble was a frequent of the area who knew all the animals in town. As they soared above the new home, they buzzed a warning to the builder, "This land is for the forest" they admonished, "these fields were designed for the animals to surround". As the builder realized the folly they had committed, they looked around at the spacious plateau. They admired their work from the previous week and the current one but rather than the pride they were used to, only sorrow filled their heart.

"Come live in the hive" the bee offered, "we have the layout down to a T, no bee out of place and no place without a bee". The builder had heard this offer before. While the walls were sweet with the golden produce of the bees, they could not feel at ease in a home they had not built. They did not reply to the offer. Instead, the builder and the bee set about the destruction of the builder's home. In a day, what had taken them a week was gone. The land left as pristine as the day ground broke.

"If I cannot build a home here, where will I go?", the builder questioned internally. "The plains by the hive are close to the forest but the nights are too cold away from the hills. The mountains are outcroppings waiting for life, but they are away from the world, a brittle pedestal to hold a lonely heart hostage. And the peninsula, the one so beautiful is now poisoned by the bitter memories of my broken home"

The builder decided, if there were no suitable places with their old forest friends, they would just have to find a new nation. They set out, building materials and tools strapped into place in their boat. But they did not travel far before the star flickered into view on the horizon. "Where are you going and why so blue?", the star questioned. "I am off to find home", replied the builder with tears brimming at the surface.

"Was the plateau not your home?"

"It was already claimed by the forest. The Bee has helped me to undo my work"

As the builder lamented to the stars, the bee flew by. "I am sorry for making you leave", they began "I only realized after that it was mean of me to make you leave". The builder blinked away their sadness and replied noncommittally "It will be ok; the house is already gone so there is nothing to do about the land now. I will find my place"

The bee floated alongside the boat, weighed down by the piles of supplies. They lamented their treatment of the builder, but the carpenter had no flowery words left to accept their apologies. As the night came about the bee made one final attempt "I am upset that I did that to you. I'm not very nice to you I think". This peaked the Builders ear. They waited for the bee to elaborate. "I keep doing little things that hurt you and I never realize until after". They took a moment to ponder this.

If the builder was being honest, they would have agreed. The bee had a jealous nature, used to the likeminded company of other bumbles. They were not bad for these traits, but the stripped bug had ways that were as foreign to the builder as another language. The bee had been generally upset when the star had shone brightly in the night sky above the builder's camp. The hive was hidden under branches and leaves so the builder, and the star had hours to themselves. While the builder was apologetic, who were they to note the times of the stars or push away the heavens when all they wanted was more time.

The stars were tinted with watercolor greens and vivid pink

The day my grandma died there was a hummingbird outside my sisters window

It’s wings flapping and flitting so quickly in a city they weren’t supposed to be in

The morning my grandma died my mother sat in a room with her mothers hand in hers

She slept in the foreign bed surrounded by her loved ones till she drifted away to the sky

A right into the road by the water

This memory swept me like the eddies we rode over that day

A white frothy twist of confusion to bittersweet nostalgia

I mourn those moments that hide from my present

I mourn the little girl bull riding the raft, one arm triumphant in the sky

Would she like the person I am now?

Would she wonder why two weeks is too long in my childhood home?

Warm meaning overheating

Meaning sweat dripping down the small of my back, it beads on my brow and infests my dreams

There was nothing unsafe about it

Other than your presences

We were in my home

Although it was emptier and different

I spent an hour cleaning

She helped me

L showed up first

Just materialising in my periphery like you never left

Like you never forgot my names

M was next

We drove across the dream into a past one

Where there was marble and paint and a car crash

The woods grew around into the buildings

I got out to find you

You were still M not J so when I got back in I let you drive

I say back with her, with Z

And the dream continued and it was warm

I was overheating

And I woke up, it had been 2. Hours

And I missed the good parts of you

For the first time

Your claws left scars. No really. I have lines on my back from your nails. At one Point I wanted them. You made me feel loved through pain. Never through pleasure. You should know. But you don’t. Or can’t. Who knows. Not me. Not you. Definitely not us!

How could you do it! I would have stayed forever! We said we’d stay forever! You did it all by the book! Sunk your teeth into my neck! Cast a spell and bound me to you on day one! But that wasn’t good enough! It wasn’t! Or couldn’t! Who knows! Not me! Not you! Definitely not us-

But this isn’t about you anymore- it shouldn’t be- or can’t- or isn’t- because I will not take you back- never again- because we don’t work- or can’t- we know

So go

Be happy

Or don’t

Or can’t

Who knows

Not us

But that’s what it’s about

The knowing

The ‘no’ing

We need to move on

Because it has been seven months

The same time we were together (for real)

So love on

Move on

Like me

So I can

So I can’t

So I don’t

You said it back in a way

I could have some things left forgiving for

But they don’t belong to you

I am not your pain

I tried to be ibuprofen

But maybe you needed more

Some OxyContin to soothe it all away

You viewed my profile today

Like a post I made

About how I was leaving you in my past

Do you see the irony?

And each time I think you’re gone

Your hooks reattach

And I’m not alone

But not because of you

Not anymore

I want to say go for good

I want to say stay

My for you page is flooded

Videos describing our relationship

Videos describing abuse

What a nasty word

It sits on the tongue

Coats my mouth and soul

But I forgave you

I forgive you

But you are stuck in the past

Our past

But also the past before introspection

Your therapist told you to break up with me

Save me the hurt

How fucked up is that

But I get it

I was your addiction

You were mine too

And I feel the cloying whisp of your smoke

You fill my lungs with poison

My mind with venom

My heart with ache

I want to forgive you

Ease your pain once more

Because maybe then mine would leave me too

And I could focus on those who don’t use me as a salve

The girl I love used Gods name in vain for me

I asked her why

She said ‘cus’

Like it was a small thing

For us it is

But the meaning surrounds our lives

You made me cry out at Him for not existing

I cried out again for her

But not because she asked for it

Not because it was the medication prescribed

Only ‘cus’

And that’s the difference between you

She is calm

You are energy

She is comfort

You were an experience

And we aren’t perfect

Her or you or certainly not me

But we are trying

And I wish I could see you try too

See you leave us in the past

But you still cling to my the numb peace I brought

Said before

Loved before

*Lived before*

The keyboard correcting me

Reminding my tired cannabalistic mind to leave space

But it is hungry

And starving

And it just ate

But it is never satisfied with its full plate

And I try anything to distract from the ache

I listen to the songs

I drive to the beach with a happy tired memory

One I forgot

One that made me

Tied to the person who made me

The person I forgot

And I want to scream and cry and laugh and cough and release everything into the empty sky

And and and and and and and and

The word repeats till it loses all meaning

Till the world around me loses all meaning

Till I lose all meaning

And I’m bleeding

And it’s fine

I’m fine

Always

I am the rock that hugs

But am I also the rock in the hard place?

Does my love crush

The crush is crushed

And all I can offer is the embrace of stone

But no I know I’m comfort

I’m stability

But I am so unstable

It has to hide beneath the gravel

The crunching sound beneath your vans

The ones you drew sunflowers on

They were your favourite

I was your favourite

Till I wasn’t

Till he left

And I realise as I text the woman I forgot that I cannot remember his name

The one plastered on every newspaper and street sign and water bottle

The one in my phone

And that pain, the one that made its place in your head, through your eye

Matches his wound

You lost yourself at that field

I lost you

But that’s a good thing

Because you only liked me for the sound I made under your shoes

It was like that before your headache

You were the sky on top of the warm sun baked earth

You surrounded me

Suffocating and light

And I didn’t realise it till after you were gone

The sky left the ground one day

Said she found more solace in the arms of the galaxy

The earth held too many memories

And the parts the sky said she couldn’t know were too much to bear

Even though she had been there to see them forming

So the earth was alone, with the sky still in view

Her back turned to the stars

And the ground hardened

And grew angry

And spewed lava and geysers and smoke

At the person I forgot

And the sky turned and turned and changed

Clouds and sun and moon flooding across her like the tides

But the tide was not there yet

And as the earth realised that the heavens never cared what happened to it, the lava continued and continued till there was nothing left

And the hot streams cooled and hardened and the rock hardened

And the earth turned away from the sky

And the sky turned back

Just to spit hail down

And the earth ignored it

And then the sea arrived

Consistent and reliable

She washed upon the shore belonging to her and the ground

The chilly embrace where her waters were warmed by the sphere

She would draw away sometimes, knowing her penchant for turbulent waters

But the earth stayed in place

Knowing it had a penchant for quakes

And the sky, who had turned away once more, finally looked back

She had grown bored with the empty of space

He never saw her as much and that feeling of being small was worse than the pain in her eye

And the ocean waved up to her

And she sent down gusts of wind

And the earth held on to the water

And the water held on to the earth

And the sky gave up for now

Now the earth and the ocean sit

And the sky hovers above

And the earth remembers

And I remember the person I forgot

And I wipe away at the ash that covers her spotted skin

And she blinks at me and smiles

Smiles like she never saw the eruption

And the Mother to the Earth reminds her where that memory was

But warns that it’s night and it isn’t safe to drive

And the water needs the earth

And so does the sky, although she’d only admit it in a time of regret

And the person who I remember needs me

So the spot waits till tomorrow and the water hugs the shore and the beach heats the ocean and the sky rains down tears that bounce off of all of them

True intimacy is hard to find

but it is easy to do

but it is hard to do

I sit here on call with the girl that I love

and I am reading out the words I will take to my grave

and it is scary

and it is safe

and it is love

I went to a funeral for a woman I never met

She was connected to me through the degrees

I wore black and mom wore black and grandma wore black

and I sat there and listened to all the stories of this familiar stranger

and I said hello to the people who thought my eyes were brown

and I found out about my distant cousin who was married to a woman

and the stories continued

but the one that stuck out, that I will remember till my turn

is that in her last week, she found out what mikes hard lemonade was

she loved it

and each night she and her daughter would sit down on the couch and watch reruns of the Batchelor and she would ask for her lemonade

I have never met this woman, but I have

God, why do You hurt these people

why do I sit in bed hearing her cry

she's miles away - I'm miles away

-her love is miles away - You have been away for two years

God why do You prove in this way

why do You make the good fall to rise

I want to scream into the void that You left

YOU LEFT- YOU LEFT- YOU LEFT

AND SHES GONE - HES GONE - I AM HERE

AND. I. AM HERE.

we are here

and they are gone forever

when there was no hole there was hope

when could we be whole

I'm angry and she is sad and she is sad and she is sad and she is sad and she is sad and he is sad and he is gone and he is gone and she is sad and she is leaving

leaving like the breath from our lungs

the ones You created

or didn't

or did

but who from now will know the air when it has left with him and with him and soon with her

and we can't breathe because they can't breath because You left

because You are gone

because every moment of life proved to us that the good things come to those who wait

but those who wait will never be on time

and those who are on time are too early

and they can't breathe and I can't see through these tears that are not my own