𝑠𝑦𝑎𝑓𝑓𝑎

hi there! syaffa’s here :] i’m turning 18 this year. i speak english, indonesian, malay (hell yeah!). an enfp. i wrote stuff for fun and a placeholder for my yearning and insufferable pain. you may call what i wrote poems — or anything that you wish. i love and occasionally sleep to ethel cain’s music, or puma blue’s. i also love the 1975 A LOT, my top 5 artist on spotify are them and cigarettes after sex, also pierce the veil ☆ so pretty much everything. i also love watching movies, going out at night, and doomscrolling. you can also find me at instagram and letterboxd, my @ is citruscigs ;] oh! i also have another blog, it’s loversfever.blogspot.com !! check it out :]

...that’s all ♡

Still, this isn’t a romantic poem.

It’s laced with all good things gone bad,

and unanswered prayers from unsalvageable sinners.

This is a poorly-filtered whisper of an admirer,

one that’s passed through cigarette filters and mixed spirits,

left tasting like stale smoke and bottom-shelf rum.

I wrote this with no intention other than to be true to myself;

to show you what exists outside your loud,

yet suffocatingly small bubble.

And I’m inviting a few pairs of eyes to witness it.

To keep it eternally true,

to hold it firmly enough that it becomes real.

One question before it leads to another:

what would you think if I told you I’m not writing to confront any assumptions of love,

but only to face the way your glistening smirk

bends neon lights around me?

To admit I’ve traced your silhouette in the flashing glow of a stage,

rough fingerprints on my tired brown retinas,

burnt with sweat and reverb?

Honest, I think you’d laugh.

That half-lidded, jump pitched sort of laugh that feels both sharp and warm,

like a knife dipped in honey.

And you’d look at me without really looking at me,

your eyes darting just past mine,

as though keeping the truth from touching.

You’d tap the strings once, twice,

fill the silence with your presence

as you’ve been rehearsing it for years.

Would you flinch if I said I’ve caught myself

imagining the weight of your knuckles in my mouth,

pressing against the warm roof,

drying them off with the heat of my breath

as though worship was an act of consumption?

Would it scare you to know

that I’ve studied the curve of your jaw

like a saint memorizing the relic they’d die to protect?

That I’ve mapped out your every careless lean and sighs,

your ring-filled fingers slides on the fretboard like it owns the air?

Because here’s the thing,

you don’t have to touch me for me to feel dismantled.

I could be pressed against the furthest corner of the venue,

ribs and shoulders against chipped paint and sticky beer stains,

and I’d still feel you

in the split-second after the bass hits,

in the slight tremor of your lip as you breathe between lyrics.

You’re not the kind of storm that destroys—

you’re the kind that makes the air ache before it rains.

That’s the whole point. Not to be loved back. Not to be touched.

But to dissolve into the space

between your shadow and the crowd’s roar,

where I can taste the sound of you without ever speaking.

It’s not infatuation,

though I’m sure that’s what you’d call it if you'd ever known.

It’s more like hunger;

the kind you don’t admit out loud because the moment you do,

it becomes a real thing,

with iron teeth and claws and the power to ruin.

I’ve kept mine on a leash,

let it gnaw quietly in the dark corner of my ribcage,

where only I can hear the bones cracking.

And if you’ve ever felt my eyes on you,

you’d know they weren’t asking for permission.

They were cataloging, archiving.

Turning you into something I can keep long after the lights go down, long after the noise turns into ringing, long after the crowd dissolves into the night and leaves you alone with the version of yourself you don’t let them see.

So here you are, immortalized again from the tip of my fingers.

Not as a god, not as a man,

i was the match and you were the smoke,

i've known for clinging to things that always broke.

and i've known we burned like brush in a summer drought,

fast and quiet, then flickered out.

saw the river ran with what we hid,

now carried the weight of things we did.

i've prayed for the warmth, but you ran from flame,

and still, i stayed. i stayed the same.

your silence wore the shape of shame,

but i still missed you just the same.

i missed you in wind, in sleep, in bone;

even when i knew i’d die alone.

and you counted love like sheep on a hill,

said don’t touch nothin’ or you'd get us killed.

but i’d have taken the heat now, do i?

what’s one gone lamb

when the rest run by?

told ya we could’ve had a house, a bed,

somewhere your hand could rest

instead of flying off like something caught;

a wild thing tamed, then quick forgot.

the mountain kept our only truth,

a love that never left our youth.

the world don’t bend for boys like me,

so i only had you carved into memory.

they never asked, we never told.

we left it all to fire and cold.

but i still dream in dusk and dust,

Invisible lines choking me,

you felt them, didn't you?

For you had seen the house,

the flower-filled parking space,

and the loneliness still clinging to its walls.

This is where I grew up;

this is how I was raised,

this is how I was held my entire life.

And yet, you dared to cross it.

Maybe I left the door open,

maybe I let you stare for too long.

Maybe that's on me.

This is where I learned to breathe;

this is where I learned to hold my own hand.

This is how the world taught me love.

But you swore you saw it,

cursing that curiosity is eating you alive,

and still, you crossed it.

You knew better,

This is just an old story, repackaged in sugar and stolen stares,

you know how it ends.

Then why bother?

You called it bravery,

but all you did was burn what you couldn't fix.

You tore hours from her hands,

painted sorrow into her smile,

just to watch it collapse.

And when it's finally over,

Nostalgia knocks on my door,

lipsticked and lovely,

pressing Polaroids into my palms,

polished brighter than you ever were.

she blurs the fights out,

paints your voice softer,

your leaving kinder,

your eyes still looking for me.

Nostalgia hands me your brightest smile,

dressed in red and blue and ruin,

and it whispers:

“look how beautiful it was,

even as it killed you.”

so i bite down on the memory.

savoring sweetness and all of the tanginess

that never lived outside of my skull,

while the truth slumbers,

heavy and ugly,

all beneath my ribs.

and i catch myself peeling the time back like skin,

finding you fossilized between my ribs.

your name and touch still written there,

burned into the marrow.

then she walks closer to me slowly,

my heartache keeps growing,

as i know it Nostalgia sews you into my organs delicately,

sutures your sighs into the soft parts,

threads your laughter through arteries.

she keeps whispering right beside my ears to sell your smile, like a souvenir,

handmade lies perfectly curated in ribbon,

marked authentic and unique.

“all special.

and yours only.

this is the best offer that you'll ever get,

then why resist?”

however, Nostalgia acts kinder than you,

you were trying to hold the heart that can't be stored,

pressing it too hard, too rough,

as if i'm a moth pinned to glass.

and every step you took closer,

was a knife slipping between my weakened bones,

a surgeon with no oath, no mercy.

but Nostalgia is a beautiful, convincing liar.

i let myself lay open and let every sweet fiction you left behind spilling,

gutting the fairy tale with trembling hands.

yet, the truth is,

there is no cure for a wound you begged to keep.

there is no resurrection for a boy who was already halfway gone.

there's only Nostalgia left behind, and she carves you prettier than you ever were,

tucks the broken parts under velvet,

and tells me,

“it was real.”

maybe if you let me be your lover ... ♡