#poetnetwork

They don’t deserve you.

You with your blazing stare,

your hair framing the changes

that are mapped onto your face.

They convince you that I’m a disaster

And I am. But so are you.

What’s more, you love it,

fearing the fact that you do.

I don’t feel but you make me feel things,

Terrible things, amazing things.

So don’t you dare tell me that

I don’t know what love is as you leave.

We kill and betray and suffer;

you stuck a knife in me and

I put a bullet in you, we are equal.

But we live,

Because we have too much hell to raise

before we are allowed to die.

a deafening yell to the stars: glory, glory, glory. tears burn my eyes like whiskey burns the throat. give me glory (a demand made to a higher power that doesn’t exist)

i stand by the belief that love is a weakness. vulnerability manifest; those who i cherish and love are hurt by the universe. so instead of love, give me glory

peace is thought sacred. but it is nothing to me but rot, stillness, boredom. the universe made me to fight, to maim, to kill. peace pains me terribly, so instead give me glory

i was meant to be a Greek tragedy from the start. but i have no wings of wax, no heroic trials. but the universe punishes my love, has made me shun peace.

so if I can’t have love, and if i can’t find peace, give me bitter glory.

and i promise you the world

when you trace fingertips over my lips,

the blush-pink soft of them.

i am melding the meanings of pain and love.

someone tells me, there will be a rebirth,

and i question it, always.

When you kissed me softly,

when you drew me into you,

when your eyes flickered open,

when your lips quirked up,

my stirred-up soul calmed for a moment.

You came from the blue;

You stepped into the light with me.

You held my hand.

I may not know you yet,

but I remembered how it felt to be wanted.

Whether for a moment or a life time,

I don’t mind too much;

I want to ride this wave of peace.

How beautiful that we leave marks

on every person with whom

we cross paths; from translucent lines

to burns from fires searing across the skin.

Some claim us, some ghost around us

with ease, little more than a whisper.

The marks of two people can shackle,

arms, legs and fingers intertwined

in an intimate dance of a night.

Many mark knowingly, possessively.

Mine doesn’t sting so much anymore,

I’m not afraid of it.

I feel drunk when I remember,

my fixation the product of a missing part;

I thought you were the part,

and realised you are the door to it,

are you leading or am I?

I think it’s me, now.

But your marking of me is reflected

in fragmented moments where I still feel

your presence, vicariously, in what I do.

A silver trail, barely there at all,

some might say.

Hello!

I just wanted to apologise for barely being active over these last few months, I’ve posted the odd piece here and there but I don’t feel that they were up to the standard of some of the ones I’ve posted previously. I have been drowning in university work quite a lot of the time and struggling with my mental health over the last few months. Suffice to say I am feeling better than I was and am in a more positive place... which hopefully will mean more frequent and higher quality poems!

The wave is dying out, it fades slowly.

Not a sudden drought or an endless collapse,

but a gradual slipping through my fingers,

so noiseless and tranquil that I do not notice.

As with many of life’s wonders,

you were always going to be transient.

Yet too bright are you to shine your light

on only one person, to touch only one life.

I feel I have mourned you like a death,

although you are very much living.

The waves do not vanish completely,

they come and go, getting softer and softer.

Perhaps I don’t need you like I used to,

the waves have shifted for I don’t feel weak.

Yet, I still look back with infinite fondness.

A tenderness resides in me, all my life long.