astoryfullofwoe

[astoryfullofwoe]

Tree Lights

Each ornament I watch you put up

feels like a step towards the horizon.

It's our third Christmas together 

and I’m more in love than I’ve ever been before

(granted, I said that last year, 

and the year before that one, too). 

Whatever, it might all be consumerist bullshit 

but I’ve found my new religion in the way

your cheeks flush pink and your eyes reflect the tree lights—

I like to believe that you’re glowing from love.

You could break my heart tomorrow 

and I’d keep this damn tree up forever. 

What a privilege it would be to be hurt by you,

to have loved to the point of pain.

What a privilege it would be to have 

the pain of my loving come from you,

not from some man on the street corner shouting Dykes!

The air smells like cocoa and some voice

is crooning about giving his heart away;

I can’t help but think about how

all lovers think they’re inventing something. 

Make me your George Michael,

I can write the next Last Christmas;

but I know I’d fall for you again next year

(what can I say, I’m predictable—

I’m a poet, not a revolutionary). 

So what, maybe my Church will never marry us

and maybe your mother will never see me as a daughter, 

but we have our own little microcosm here:

you, me, our love, and our Christmas tree.

And look—it’s expanding, a growing golden stream

spilling out of my seventh story window panes. 

It’s expanding, filling the dark streets with light,

a light they haven’t seen in years.

It’s expanding—

can you feel it, too?

[astoryfullofwoe]

Her Lungs

Dead is the green of yesterday;

the forests have all turned red.

Can’t you see their scarlet foliage

kissing the sky? The kiss

of death, the kiss of

noxious breath, the darkening

exchange of air that we

have granted a season.

We’re in the end times, baby.

The rivers run crimson with blood

and waves paint the sand a pretty pink

as we run blind and wave goodbye

to the array of hues we once knew;

we’re at the end of the colour wheel now.

Dawn seeps into the sky and

no longer fades like it once did.

What was once blue

now rusted over

and mother looks tired and old;

the wrinkles seem to have formed

overnight and only now you realize:

this can’t last forever.

There is an ending worse than death

and it’s watching the clock hands

count down and join in the middle,

intersecting like your hands do

around Her throat.

Can you breath without Her lungs?

Keep strangling Her with greedy hands

and tell me, can you

breath without Her lungs?

[astoryfullofwoe]

Petrichor

The sickness clings to your skin

like rain beating down on you—

persistent and desperate

to infiltrate your bones,

to rot you from the inside out.

The scent of despair follows you around—

you wear it like armour, like an umbrella.

Can’t you smell it?

The damp melancholic air

tinged with the scent

of an indescribable sorrow;

it surrounds you like screams,

like the thunder shouting her anthems of rage—

the same rage that you harbour, child,

longing for a reaction, for an outlet,

for something that your faceless

bedroom walls cannot provide.

Time floats on by, indefinite,

blown by the ever-changing winds.

Shades of grey contorting

and melting into white,

cotton clouds replacing

the gloomy overcast;

the sun has come out—

you didn’t even notice, did you?

Feel Her joyful rays dance on your skin,

evaporating the rain that has soaked your bones.

Wake up and smell the petrichor,

that earthly aromatic hymn

of the calm after the storm.

Breathe in, breathe deep,

let the dewy air enter your lungs

and embrace you like a mother.

The black sludge that lives

in your chest is evaporating,

fading, fading, fading,

until it is almost entirely gone—

reduced to puny tendrils of parasite,

suspended in futile attempts

to cling onto your ribcage;

and in its place, a sphere of light

amongst the likes of which

you have never felt before:

a blazing, all-consuming light,

but not blinding, no—

for you’ve never seen so clearly;

the veil of fog has lifted.

the world is so vast,

its corners unfolding before your eyes.

The storm has been long and harsh—

you deserve this happiness, child.

so breathe out slowly, lie down,

feel the grass tickle your bare skin

(don’t be afraid of the earth,

we are all an extension of Her, anyways),

breathe in the petrichor,

the promise of blossoming life,

and start anew.

[astoryfullofwoe]

I’d kill you with my kiss but you’ll kill me just the same

What can you say to 

someone who licked 

blood from wounds 

while others were sucking 

milk from teats?

How do you love a rabid dog?

The answer is simple:

you don’t. 

You euthanize it. 

You euthanize the dog 

because it’s contagious;

it is sick and you are not. 

It does not even have to bite—

a lick would suffice to kill. 

Sinking my fangs into tender flesh 

and holding on for dear life 

is the only way I know

how to call something mine. 

If I were to hold your hand,

I would crush your fingers. 

I don’t know how 

to love without possession  

to the point of destruction. 

I cannot love you in the way 

you deserve to be loved;

I could claw my heart out of my chest,

feel the veins popping, 

hear the ribs snapping,

and offer it to you like Holy Communion,

still beating in my hands and

bleeding down my arm, begging

consume it, make me a part of you,

but that won’t change the fact that 

you’ve never quite acquired 

a taste for raw meat. 

My tastes are known;

kindness and I were never friends. 

A gentle hand did not raise me, 

wolves did, and they do not 

take kindly to a soft belly. 

Don’t you understand? 

You’re a complete crisis of my faith. 

The sun could never love a black hole

without eventually succumbing to the darkness. 

I would ruin you for anyone else. 

My hands would stain your lovely skin–

ash-dirty handprints marking you up,

scarring like an infection, ‘til the end of time. 

My rabid dog kiss of death 

would follow you around, 

the foam from my mouth 

sticking to your teeth like plaque. 

I beg you, don’t let my rot fester

and peel your flesh from bone. 

Besides, you would ruin me for everyone else. 

I wouldn’t be able to feel 

the sun on my skin 

without recalling how much 

it feels like your touch. 

I’d never be able to open myself to another 

because in every lover I’d take,

I’ll look for grains of your face, 

haunting my narrative with your tendrils of life. 

Love will forever be 

synonymous with your name. 

You’ve made a graveyard of me, my dear;

your chest: my final resting place. 

I sleep in your aorta, eyelids fluttering,

with dreams of your smile and warm mouth,

and hope to never wake up. 

[astoryfullofwoe]

Covenant

I. 

I met the devil in a dream. 

He ripped my heart out with 

nails sharp and curved like talons,

took a bite, and put it back. 

I watched my blood drip down his chin 

and couldn’t help but smile. 

We shook hands and ever since,

light bounces off of me,

refracting in all directions,

never truly reaching my skin. 

II. 

I met the devil in a dream. 

He showed me heaven and 

I can't seem to remember it,

but its scent still lingers 

in my nostrils and on my skin,

hostile as the stench of death. 

I don’t remember what it looked like

but I remember I wasn't welcome there. 

III. 

I met the devil in a dream. 

We shook hands while he 

told me his name. 

His mouth curved around 

the vowels he uttered, 

dripping from his fangs 

in a ghastly whisper—

and though I can’t recall 

the exact sounds, 

the precise melody of

his name on his tongue,

for a moment, 

I swear I heard yours. 

IV. 

The devil kissed me in a dream,

with blood dripping down his chin—

hot, wet blood, my blood—

and he tasted like heaven, my heaven:

like rust and sweat and you. 

We exchanged breath and saliva 

as I felt a contract being signed 

in viscous scarlet ink:

from then on, I was bound to hell 

through body and soul,

but with his bloodstained mouth on mine,

I couldn't bring myself to care. 

V. 

I met the devil and no longer know 

if it was a dream or hazy reality,

but he held his hand out to me,

promising a life 

of sinful kisses in dark corridors,

of wicked lust, angelic in its purity,

and of hiding from the sunlight.

He promised a life of blasphemy,

forever dancing on the outskirts of the almighty plan,

and I followed, willingly,

never looking back. 

[astoryfullofwoe]

worship // greek lovers

i play your body like a lyre

and savour the sweet songs you sing;

my fingers know every string by heart,

i’m fluent in your vocal poetry.

i would start and end wars

for your ambrosia lips

and the way they trail down my figure—

your mouth more devastating

than any of Eros’ arrows.

we make such beautiful music together.

modern greek lovers; Sappho must be proud.

caress me like you’re

making love to Aphrodite;

i’m all soft curves and pink skin,

dripping sea foam, ready for your touch.

gently work the oyster shell open,

and polish the pearl ‘til it shines.

trace my flower petals with your tongue,

drink the nectar forged only for you.

bite me like you’re

fucking Dionysus;

claw me open, hear me cry out—

you know i like it rough.

curl around me like ivy,

scratch down my back and feel it arch.

sip on my wine, suck on the cork;

watch how i put on a show for you.

embrace me like you’re

bedding Hera;

spread yourself wide, peacock-style,

give yourself up to me in offering.

brush heavenly kisses down my neck,

you know i’m your queen—

your hands gripped in my hair, my crown,

your face of carved marble, my throne.

make my mortal body tremble

on our altar of honey-sweet elixir

and damp, discarded bedsheets;

climb Mount Olympus, make a religion out of me.

[astoryfullofwoe]

the birds

limbs heavy from exhaustion, and

head foggy from probable sunstroke,

i collapse on a bed of stone

below the famous arches

and contemplate the birds.

the stiff rock i lie on digs

into my back, and i know

i’ll be sore when i stand up,

but i don’t move;

comfortable in my discomfort.

with legs bent at the knee,

and my dress awkwardly scrunched

between my thighs and

not on the littered ground,

my feet rest on jagged cobblestone.

stone that has been here for

decades, centuries, a millennia;

stone that bears the weight of

hundreds, thousands, millions of people

and now bears mine.

how many have come before me,

and how many will come after me?

how many will lie here, just as i do now,

with lungs crushing under the weight of time?

how many will sit here and write a poem

about it? how many already have?

the question makes my head

spin more than my dehydration does.

here i lay, bumpy stone digging into my soles.

here i am, a single grain of sand

on a beach spanning infinite miles.

here i lay, with my sunglasses pinching my nose,

dizzy from heat and sticky from sweat,

watching the birds.

watching the pale birds glide,

the sole white blots against the blinding blue,

landing on the empty spaces

between the towering bends

the same as it would on a plain beach rock.

the oppressive grandness of

my view suffocates me,

but the birds fly over and under and through,

in a taunting tango with time

that they appear to be leading.

my body is heavy,

so heavy,

but the birds look weightless,

and right now,

that’s enough for me.

oh, to be a bird flying through roman arches!

oblivious to the historical weight of

the stone that holds up their nests,

passive towards the clock’s choking hands,

knowing only what it feels like to soar.

[astoryfullofwoe]

look at me

tw: s€lf h@rm, $ui€ide

i’ve never outgrown

the child who purposefully

trips and scrapes their knee

for their parents’ attention.

years later and i still

wail and scream just so someone

will spare me something more

than a fleeting glance.

because my knee isn’t

the part of me that’s hurting.

my knee is bloody and scratched

but it will heal by tomorrow

and you won’t even be able to

tell i was ever bleeding.

it’s not my knee, it’s my heart.

it is my heart that hurts,

cradled by my ribcage and

stowed away in my flesh—

who would ever be able to tell

it is cracked and bleeding?

out of sight, out of mind.

i put a bandage over my bleeding knee

and my mom kisses it better

(it’s the only way i can be the center

of an adults attention);

i wrap gauze around my bleeding wrists

and fall in love with the colour red

(i never fell out of love

with intentional infliction).

the screaming child in me lives on;

i want someone to notice

and beg me to stop,

beg me to stay alive,

because it feels like i could

take a flying leap of faith off of

the bridge over the creek near my house,

or bleed out in my bathtub,

or choke on a bottle of mystery pills,

and no one would notice.

or worse, no one would care.

intentional falls evolve into unscrewing

pencil sharpeners and still nobody notices.

scrapes mutate into cuts

and still nobody notices.

so please, just look at me.

i’m not asking you to rip my body

from the bridge barrier,

just look at me.

look in me not through me;

look into me.

see me for who i am

beyond this wounded persona.

sorrow is all i’ve ever known,

but with soft words and gentle hands,

maybe i can forget what torn flesh feels like.

maybe i’ll rediscover sunlight.

take the blade out of my hand

and place your heart there instead;

for i am only cruel to those

who i believe deserve to suffer,

and that is not you, never you.

you are safe with me,

i am not safe with myself.

no one has caused me as much hurt

as i have myself.

these scars would not exist without me—

i have only myself to blame.

look at me.

i want to scream:

look at all of my ugliness,

and love me for it anyways.

[astoryfullofwoe]

The Symposium

the blood of gods

runs through my veins;

slit my wrists and watch

the golden ichor trickle.

bow down to my

crown of ivy and laurels,

kneel before my

throne of precious stones

and ignore the cracks

in the sacred foundation,

creeping up the sides

like mold in an abandoned house.

avert your eyes,

because you see, my dear,

it is not just achilles

who has a damned heel;

for what are gods

without humans there

to worship them?

altars are built to worship,

as the source of divine rule;

but tell me, my dear,

who is it again,

that creates these altars?

who is granting them

their life-giving power?

the creators of the creators

are ignorant to their own influence.

don’t you see?

don’t you understand?

i need you.

i need you the way

mundanity needs divinity,

the way immortality

needs death.

you are the bones

that hold up my body;

you are the moon

and all her stars

that chart the skies

and guide me home.

with your ambrosia lips on mine—

through you i feel divinity.

pour the nectar that sits

sweetly on your tongue

into my mouth,

lick it onto my teeth.

your skin against mine is something holy—

touching you is an act of worship.

my hands on your milky skin

and my mouth on your neck,

your scent the strongest aphrodisiac.

bury yourself into the crevices of my body—

confirm zeus’ fears and show him that

he was right about the first humans,

but i still found my other half anyways;

no divine knife can keep

the two of us separated.

i will always find my way

back home.

home is where the heart is,

and my heart lives nestled,

beating hard in your gentle hands.

pull my mortal body flush to yours,

exhale softly against my lips.

breathe your warmth into me,

this sacred exchange of spirit;

and watch as i rise

from the rolling sea foam,

radiant and glowing,

golden from your love.

[astoryfullofwoe]

shelter dog

i’m nothing but a shelter dog;

mean because i’m terrified.

desperate to be loved but

snapping at anyone who tries;

needy and overly attached

while being cold and distant—

but i can’t help it,

call it survival instinct;

i can’t be left broken hearted

if i have no heart left to break, right?

your love is a new home but

the feeling of being trapped

does not go away just because

you can’t see the bars anymore.

the cage disappears but that

doesn’t mean the scars do.

i’ll bite the hand that feeds me because

what if it’s not pets this time, but a strike?

i have my hackles up at all times,

growling at sudden movements,

because i have been through too much torment

to let myself be beaten again.

i’d rather be called a bad dog

than be kicked in the stomach

by yet another foot.

but why do you keep stepping on my paws?

it’s an accident followed by apologies

but i still yelp and must

lick my wounds alone nonetheless.

every time i show my belly,

that vulnerable skin ends up wounded,

and there you are, oblivious

in the other room,

and i’m left with only the stars

to hear my aching howls.

[astoryfullofwoe]

snowfall

the sky spits out shimmery snowflakes

that land in your hair,

and i feel like i’m suffocating;

how can a person be so beautiful?

the sky is heavy and dark

but i’ve never felt so light.

your sweetness is new and melts on my tongue—

i’m drowning in your honey, honey.

i want to drink you with my morning coffee;

because she called me baby

but you call me

your love, your dearest, your muse,

and there is something religious

about the way you make my soul

feel like it’s been rinsed in cool water—

clean, revitalized, reborn.

i like to think i see a future

in the palm of your hand;

one where all of our socks

are mixed in one drawer,

you’re wearing one of my shirts,

and i’ve had a bad day,

but i come home to you,

and suddenly i can’t remember

what was ever bad about my day

in the first place.

you whisper my name

in the heavy darkness of my bedroom,

to the shell of my ear

and to the crest of the moon,

and it sounds like a wish, a prayer, a promise.

i never used to like the snow,

but with you looking at me

like i am all you’ve ever wanted,

wearing a halo of snowflakes

and a smile that thaws my soul,

i realize the snow has grown on me.

no matter the temperature,

and no matter the snowfall,

winter is pure warmth

when you’re there to hold my hand.

[astoryfullofwoe]

divine anguish

it is involuntary, at this point:

the urge to scan every room for all possible exits,

to analyze every relationship for gaps in my extension;

to agonizingly wonder what it will be about me this time that will send someone away.

why does all that i touch with loving hands

blacken and shrivel under my embrace?

when will all the love i have sent out into the world

circle back to me?

lord, i am terrified my love

is incomprehensible,

poured into outlets

that don’t recognize its voltage.

lord, i worry i am the 52 Hertz whale—

spending a lifetime calling for company,

only to realize you’ve never

even spoken the same tongue.

even worse, lord, i fear my love is repulsive;

a revolting, ugly thing that my fellow creatures

would rather perish

than be subjected to.

lord, i’ve sat at your son’s feet

and begged him to let my love

come back around,

so that i can stop living

with the hole in my chest that is

aching, crying, screaming to be satiated,

even just a quarter filled, an eighth—

but his stoney face of final agony remains silent.

i convince myself my suffering is christlike,

a torture to be immortalized in church frescos—

because humans like believing that they are not insignificant,

because at least i can embrace my pain if it is divine anguish.

because it is so much nicer than the truth:

that i am hurting without reason,

that i will not be praised for my torment;

no one’s knees will ache for me but mine.

i am not a martyr nor a saint,

there will be no title granted for most pious self-punisher;

i am simply a burning human lost at sea,

calling out to a sky that won’t answer.

i’m sorry that i worry this is one-sided,

that there will always be someone else you’d rather have,

i’m sorry that i fear i am funnelling

my love into a beautiful black hole,

and i’m so sorry

that no amount

of your sweet, sincere “i love you”s

can make me believe it.

[astoryfullofwoe]

august, personified

There is no greater feeling in the world than

opening your eyes to see your love peaceful beside you.

Morning shines through the window above her bed, 

where I sit up and watch her with awe stricken eyes as she lays there, 

trusting, bare, vulnerable, beautiful,

like a muse posing for her painter, a masterpiece waiting to be realized,

and sometimes I wish I could pick up a brush and fill a canvas the size of a mammoth

with strokes of stawberry blonde for her hair and bright prismarine for her eyes

and hold it up in the city center for everyone to worship because

I have truly never seen somebody so beautiful in my life and I need others to know that

she is mine.

Instead to heal my heartache I write laughable poetry with the rawness of paper, ink and quill 

in attempts to share my visions and emotions through words but

the words to describe the hurricane that swells in my brain at the mere thought of her

simply don't exist.

Instead I tell people how she is like August, her warmth like the sun, 

her love so fleeting like the summer month that escapes my arms

as soon as I am finally able to embrace it 

and I become an ascetic while I wait eternities in my frigid sorrow for her return.

I long for her arms to be the blankets that protect me in my slumber every night and

for her smile to be my "good morning, honey," every day,

but for now I sleep a 17-minute drive away as a licenseless citizen

torn from the tenderness I’m starved of

and meet her a paltry once a week just to make sure

we don't perish of yearning hearts.

So on days when I am with her

and text my mother good morning at nine but

don’t eat my breakfast until twelve, it isn’t because

we stayed up past midnight dancing to Darling Nikki and Dirty Diana,

but because I relish in dawn shining into her bedroom and the touch of her skin on mine

and let the gentle trace of her fingertips on my back and

the soft kiss of her lips on my cheek linger so I can

continue to feel her presence when I am back at my house.

There, I feel the greatest loss in the world

unable to wake up to see my love peaceful beside me.

[astoryfullofwoe]

tulip, unbloomed

no one ever thinks about the death and decay

necessary for a single blooming tulip;

i want people to know the radiant garden

without seeing the rotting ecosystem underneath.

you make this so difficult;

you peel away my beautiful petals

and are slowly uncovering

the decomposing pistil inside.

how cruel of you to pluck away my defences,

my husk and my walls and my masks,

that i have spent an eternity perfecting

to shield my fragile heart from voyeuristic eyes.

i hate you for this

(you pull off my protective petals

with such an ease

that i want to scream out

in panic and fright—

the potential of you terrifies me;

you are the living paradox of all the

angst and solitude i’ve ever believed in),

but, also, i love you for it

(maybe softness

isn’t weakness when you

hold me like not even

the harsh forces of the earth

could tear you from me;

maybe budding softness is necessary

to cultivate the healing air of spring).

still i remain unbloomed,

terrified to reveal my soft spots—

my aches and my scars and my ugliness;

my body and mind in all their tainted glory,

because i don’t know

what would hurt more:

if you were to notice the damage

or if you were to not.

what would i do if you ever decide you

don’t like the taste of rot on your tongue?

what am i left with—

a gutted body, a cold bed, and empty hands?

i offer you a single tulip;

speaking in a wordless language,

and yet saying more than i am ever able to.

[astoryfullofwoe]

december’s elegy

tw: brief mentions of sh

the icy december winds engulf my hands,

curling around my fingers like the antithesis of a glove,

and it catches me in a tornado of cold,

throwing me back to past decembers.

a wind that feels like

needles pressing into my skin

reminds me of the annual aches

that accompany winter.

a voice in my head sings:

it’s nectar reaping season again!

(and the other voices wail their despair)

but i say this year will be different.

i say this year will be different;

but after dipping my hand into the freezing gusts

and relishing in the unbearable cold,

i’m not so sure anymore.

am i really strong enough to resist

the sharp steel allures of the winter’s cold?

i ponder as i sit

cross legged on my bed,

chest constricting

from the python grip of relapse.

am i a fool to think i won’t surrender

to december’s metallic essence?

my hands are not

my own anymore;

i grab at my forearms,

hyperventilating.

what sorrow are the biting winds

of december laced with?

my blood screams

to be let loose,

to be freed from

its prison of flesh.

how is the summer’s foliage able

to shield us from such misery?

i quell my dry sobs

and bodily tremors

by reminding myself

that this is on a deadline.

soon the sun will come back and

evaporate the sludge from my lungs,

loosen the black tendrils curled around my heart,

melt the deep rooted pain off my skin.

winter woe will be a mere memory

when summer serenity resurfaces.

and then i will be myself again;

i will be reborn.

i will stand in the sunlight,

listen to my body sing,

feel my gold re-emerge,

and i will glow.

[astoryfullofwoe]

a room of our own

these four walls are our own little universe

where time doesn’t pass,

and no one else exists

except for you and me.

in our little universe our troubles vanish for a few hours;

everything outside of this room is decrepit wasteland—

your hands and your hair and your voice

are the only indisputable truths.

we’re pressed so close that the space between our bodies vanishes;

the hard lines soften until my arm is indistinguishable from your torso.

bodies curled like two parentheses, blocking out the rest of the world;

inside containing soft words and gentle touches and greedy kisses kept just ours.

your skin under my fingertips is tangible poetry,

and i want to lie here until i can recite every curve and angle from memory.

but in a few hours you’ll be gone,

slipping through my fingers like ice losing its nature,

and all i’ll have left is the ghost of your outline on my pillow;

so, please, forgive me for being a nonbeliever.

you’re a dream, im convinced—

every kiss is too good to be true;

your achingly sweet phantom touches,

always fading away before my longing is fulfilled.

so kiss me again to prove to me that you’re real,

and then kiss me once more, just in case—

you could make a believer out of me.

[astoryfullofwoe]

sanguine

no, no, no.

the gleaming steel of the knife in your warm hand smirks

as it plunges into my abdomen and twists at a sickening angle.

not again, not again, not again.

the sensation of my vitals being churned into indistinguishable chunks jolts me;

my liver is torn apart from end to end,

my intestines are sliced and minced,

and i can feel my stomach being ripped open like a soft, rotten fruit.

stop, stop, stop.

you pull the knife out, stained with the liquor of my livelihood, and my body follows it.

i hold my miserable, mangled organs in hands that are shaking too hard to actually keep them contained,

so they spill onto the floor, painting the concrete a menacing maroon.

please, please, please.

the nausea strikes me down all at once

and i collapse under the weight of dry heaves and wretched sobs that splinter the very ground i am bleeding out on.

i can’t see through my tears and i can’t hear anything other than the blood thundering through my veins,

like a soldier who knows he’s losing this battle and can’t help but fight it anyways,

and i am so very hopelessly, pathetically lost.

i am lost in my thoughts and lost in my blood

and lost in your eyes that still hold me like a vice, even now.

why, why, why?

i clutch my sides and curl up like a displaced child,

and my chest aches with a red hot pain as if i had been stabbed there instead.

you turn and leave, lacking the decency and courage to bear witness to my expiration at your feet.

my heart is beating much harder than it probably should be,

considering the sea of scarlet soaking through my skin,

and all i can think about as my limbs twitch like a vehicle-stricken rabbit,

is how inevitable this entire calamity was:

a grotesque end for a bleeding heart;

i was always destined to die by my own hand.