AnOvertureto Illumination

COLLECTED

WORKS BY VAREESHA K

HAN

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One Line Poems

she lingers, she lingers, she lingered.

my body is a crime scene,and your fingers are all over the evidence.

loving you is like letting a wound fester…eventually all you can do is amputate.

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One Line Poems

Let’s talk about this savagery; I am just a broken breather that makes no time for anything but you;so save me, save me God because I hear the Rapture is for the good only, and I have been good only.

I’ll get you out of your cocoon and you’ll get me out of mine,and we’ll open our wings and soar as butterflies.

Absolute certainty becomes absolute uncertainty with a simple second glance.

ink

i knowthat it is all in my head

but that’s why i need to get them out(why do you think i write?)

verse

let me decipher your poem,and count your stanzas,envelope me in rhymes,

and treat me to an allusion.

honesty

why can’t you say this to me sober?you’re slurring your words, and you’re blurring

my mind,you’re caught in the bottom of the bottle,and you stink of alcohol and cigar smoke,

fuck this, this isn’t bravery, this is cowardice.

armistice

maybe this was just a fallout,maybe this war has no ending,

like a bedtime story that trailed off as you fell asleep,

maybe this is just a break,a pause so catch your breath,

because maybe this is just the beginning,and there’s a whole battlefield for blood to be

shed.

harmony

i may be tone deafbut your name is music

even though i can’t stand the soundshe makes, screaming it at the top of her lungs

as you press her up against the bedpost.

chasing

slur me sonnet,praise me like spilled rum,

dance the sunrise like the world is ending,blur vodka into my crevices,

note my disintegration,and hold me close.

improvement

i thought we learned from our mistakes,but i guess we became them,

gauzes of lies and regrets break our bones,and all there is left to do,

is to shake our heads.

s p a c e d

may symphonies be the echo,

that you kiss your lover to sleep,

every night,

i’ll make my way,

out of your moonlight,

into the silent noise,

of the silent night.

algebra

i never imagine anyonemore than i imagine her

she is the variable in the equationthe X i keep trying to solve for

but you have left out so many detailsso i hide in the unknownas you whisk her away,

all your problems solved.

drugs

addiction feeds me better than water,i live off absence, can’t you tell?keep your syringe away from me,

let me beg a bit stronger,the lack of you in me,

sustains me a bit longer.

healer

let me be your antidote,i have all the answers,

(you’re just not asking the questions),i’m trying to give you the medicine,

it’s spilling out of me — i’m made of broken glass,

and all i am trying to do is save you,i have been a savior before,

(i’ve been called a destroyer before),but i know i’m free from the disease,

so say yes and understand please.

due payment

the crushing weight of all you could be is falling on you,you’re atlas with all his deeds in the form of a towering

rock,but you’re missing all your chances to turn it to rubble,

they’re pleading for you to take responsibility,you’re crushing their souls and spirits as you run into

nothing,i’m picking bad hands, but you’ve always had an affinity

for the eerie blackjack,and i can’t help but notice you’re bluffing,

they’re coming for you now,you’ve shrunk yourself to nothing, but they’ll find you

still,you may be a pebble,

but you’ve eroded them to gravel.

depth

they flock to mebecause they know

I am a sort of oceanfull of depth —

I am water;they come searching for deepnessthey call for me — and tell me —

drown us in your wisdom,let us tell you all our thoughts and

all our philosophieslet us freeze you over in our abstract

minds,in our high regards;

and I — the ocean — find their de-sires so desperate

so human, but I am not human — I am water

and I wish to just evaporate, because I do not want to drench them

in the easy pickings that is depth for me,

Rather the volumes upon volumes of my spirit yearn to be whisked away

by the wind — they come to me, but I seek the

freedom of the airand in my bitter longing, I punish

them all(I become the ice with its soundless

calls)

Tides

She said, “The sea always leaves the shore.”He said, “But the sea always returns.”

Departure

You are the water.I am the salt, staying while

You evaporate.

IQ

Mental attractionEquals mental distraction.

Tell me you agree.

4D

I feel as if allThe possible dimensions

Live inside my head.

Whorrible

Close your fuckin’ lips,A bitch like you knows no bounds,

Just lies and secrets.

Validation

You seek attention —I give you none

(It’s my way of sayingyou have all of it)

I Am: Overf^lowing

It’s likeI am a reservoir

And a flood just hitExcept that

No one here drinks water

Purgatory

Hell was the magnet,we ran to Hades,chased by angels,

seeking demons in a devil-run world.Heaven was not the paradise they promised.

Fragility

Sex is just the touching of our souls,The kissing of our breaths,

And the holding of our hearts’ crevices,Of course it means nothing.

Universe

They said that it takes 93 years

to traverse to PlutoAnd there are

trillions of galaxiesstretching the space in my mind

So how can you sayyou know me?

Dopamine

Chemistry is just a function of the brain,So let me explain it neurologically,

Your lips cause the currents of my mind to rush,

A glance from you,And my nerves spark electric,

My synapses threaten to fry, and your touch has me magnetized.

Heavenly

Angels get high off wings,Get drunk off holy water,

Smoke off the rims of their halos,And get down on their knees,

So when the kingdom comes crashing,Don’t say you didn’t see the signs.

Milky Way

They say thatAt the center of our galaxy,There might be a black hole

— Of course, from you,I’ve learned to expect that —

What your life revolves aroundEventually kills you.

Addict

I am full of strawberries,But I am seeing the orange sunrise —

Maybe you are purged from my system,Can’t tastes change?

I never wanted a fruit basket,Just love,

Love,Love.

Pierce

I disguise my heart as a dagger and shred my-self to pieces,

I scream softly, but I keep the most important words silent,

I wrapped all my feelings in layers of diamonds,Knowing that nothing can cut through,But I forgot precious jewels get stolen,

I cough up my desires, but I melted all my fire,I swim away in a basket of salt,

Hoping dehydration will keep me quiet.

Breath

The night erodes the ocean,And I can’t grasp the water at all,

What’s the point of learning how to swim,When you’re still so dependent on oxygen to

live?I rather collapse than drown in you.

Pompeii

Let the ashes of our sins drench us,They will make this volcano a phoenix,

Yes, we are dormant, but our lava never cools,But washing the world ablaze burns us out,

Sometimes, I wish we had become the lovers they found,

Intertwined beyond the valley of sorrow,Intact skeletons —

Instead of these scattered bones.

Forget-me-not

For so long, I denied fireworks,Always waiting for another trigger.Before, I plucked the petal that saidI love you still; Before, I plucked thePetal that said I don’t love you at all.Now, you’re as inherent as breathing

As addictive as air.

Compromise

This feels like an accident,How we break into each other’s bones,

Saying that we matter so much,All the while throwing words into the abyss,Maybe you’re someone I should keep at bay,

But I am a wisher,That makes desperations on memories,

Long faded away.

Dichotomy

I blame you, I crave you,I’d kill you, I’d save you,

You’d be the death of me, you’d be the breath of me,

You took all my glory and gave me all my en-ergy,

You block the sun, but you bring me midnight and noon,

I only ever find you standing underneath a twelve foot monsoon.

Suggestions

I should not be tempted to ensnare another one,

It’s only summer, only a few months until I leave for good,

But he seems so interesting,Someone I can talk to (you need to under-

stand),(And it’s not like you’re paying attention),

So tell me,If I told you I was going to go for it,

Would you even bat an eye?

Personality

My identity is hinged on you,Whatever you want, I’ll become,

I’ll be a prude,I’ll be a whore,

Whatever it takes to be all yours,Religious or atheist,

The person to take you to the clouds,Or the one who keeps your feet on the ground,This dependence has gotten to the point whereI’ll hold my breath until you tell me to breathe,

And stop my heart until you tell it to beat.

Priceless

Why are you pushing yourself into a box?You’re not meant for this world,

(Maybe not even for this universe),Why won’t you come with me?

We’ll escape, we’ll escape into a sense of insanity,We can find gold on the ground,

Make your choice and weigh your breath,Because we’re stuck in a daydream and I’ve been

meaning toEscape, escape for so long,

So why won’t you understand?I can’t stand leaving you alone here,

Because maybe I need you,(Maybe you’re my escape).

Independence

The suits are sneaking through from the slits of your fingers,

My feet are wooden soles, and I can’t move at all without aching with agony,

The road is so cluttered now, broken dreams littered on the sidewalk;

And what do I do without a map to trace a des-tination for me?

I’m on my own, and I know this isn’t a post-card,

But (P.S., wishing you were here)

Tragedy

I met my villain, and I met my savior, and I found them to be the same person,

I starved myself of everything I needed, and I can’t make sense of anything anymore,

All I strove for has turned to dust, and I made a mess out of myself,

Mispressed triggers and turned over paper linger on me now,

I thought I could control my life, but instead, my life controls me,

I could count the ways that I look at the moon, but then I’d be up all night missing you.

Anywhere

I could be at the corners of everywhere,And still find you there,See you in my dreams,

In the folds and in the seams,Where you would slip in, unseen,

And uncover all my hopes and fears,Fill me up with smiles and tears,Leaving me with an empty space,

As I try and try to leave this place.

Haunting

I tumble, and I fall, and the stars never seemed further away than they do now,

You stumble, and you stall, and the sun refuses to fall down when it promised it would,

I took nothing at all: I was generosity, and now I am left with noth-ing at all,

Now you’re overcome with guilt, now you’re running to and fro,My veins are getting deeper with all the disappointments,

Now I can’t help but notice how beautiful they are,You painted the world with glitter the color of your eyes, and I am

mesmerized,How have we never noticed how I feel? How you don’t feel?

I have been thinking of confronting you, but how will that work if you won’t turn around?

You scared me in my dreams last night, and now my days are night-marish too,

I am nothing but bones; you’re nothing but skin,All we cam be is parallel — never touching, never touching.

Marbles

I can make words for myself,I can shine and polish my own being,

For being’s sake,For life’s sake,

Without cracks, or even with,I can still function,

I am like a glass moon,With glass eyes,

And a glass heart, Only trying to look through all this light,

To find my own beam at the end of it,But there is no light from the moon,

Nor from glass.

Apart

And we are getting so much farther,And so much closer,

I can hear you, but you won’t say anything,Yet when I am screaming, you are deaf to ev-

ery word,The distance between our lives seems so jum-

bled,Spaces and backspaces,

How can we be nothing and something?We don’t even have to try to be a mess,

But we need to try to not to,No wonder you left, with such restrictions,

You were in a cage, and I called it freedom.

Maybe

The distance between yes and no is equal to a universe,

For so many things have been altered,The train has set,

And the tracks have changed gears,A part or apart?

As if I can decide,As if this is so simple, without complications,

You can’t promise me anything anymore,And as much as I want it work,

I can’t help but feel that soon you’ll leave again,Leaving me wondering why you bothered to re-

turn in the first place.

Hue

Bland and unprepared,They lavish it with praise,

And raise skeletons for ribbons,Ribbons for medal honor and badge valor,

God, they know nothing of versicolor,They sing of black and white but I have only seen

reds and blues and yellows,They mute the world, and everyone screams silent,

We meet on a blank canvas,And the war begins and begins and begins,

We shatter, and we bawl, and we stutter, and we crawl,

Space and time stretch and convulse,And in the end, we become just sepia, only sepia.

Feather

You’re eclipsing all the effort I made to keep us from growing apart,You keep turning in the wrong direction only to come back to where

you started,Creating circles that look all the same,

Fluttering away in the wind only to return, return again,Stealing my wishes and my promises,

Wishing you’d hold to your promises that you somehow keep break-ing,

You’re running away, but you can’t help walking back,Why have you made this our lives?Where we build, and then we break,Stuck in our lies and our mistakes,

I accepted how I always cared more, cared so much,So when you go off on your wanderings that lead nowhere,

I am still standing here,Wondering why I don’t own anything but the smallest part of your

heart.

Solalune

This is the story of Sola and Lune.Or Sun and Moon

They never met, how could they?For they were locked in their own dark abyss.

Sola’s love was found in the burning of her soul,A fiery dance racing through space,

Lune would twirl in pleasure,As he saw her token of their embrace,

Reflecting her illumination, showing his endless adoration,Telling her, I’m still here, this distance means nothing, I love you,

Yet no matter how much she knew he meant it, she would never fully accept it,

So Sola and Lune continued in a timeless spell,And we can only watch their love story,

Never meeting,Always one rising,And one setting.

i sip on intricacies that i thought i lost in my runaways. i try to hide the fact that i can see you everywhere. that i could be twelve million miles away and trace your echoes still. i wish and miss for the days i could pluck out a laugh from you. now i just catch the leftovers that everyone else resonates. i thought i was a mountain, but maybe i am just the wind. easily lost and easily unseen. i could be every-

where, i could be nothing.

the world turns to dust and i think of everything i never said. i can see you right next to me, hiding in the shadows with your infinite-less wisdom. you catch your sins twelvefold in endless ashes and i wonder if you ever knew how light and how dark you made my life. i question my sanity when i realize i’m okay with being like this forever. i guess i never thought myself worthy of love, rather, i just grasp the sadness from everyone else and save them instead. i used to be your savior, but now i’m your destroyer and you can’t pos-sibly know how much that hurts. you wear your costumes of black and blue but i can’t help but wish to roll up the sleeves to reveal the

lines and scars that rise beside the horizon.

i paint my flaws with all your criticisms and for some reason, i feel so close to you. i tilt my head at all your anger, wondering if did anything to set you off. you shout and you scream, so why do i still find you sweet as strawberries? i smirk with superiority but i shatter inside, for i have no one else to bestow happiness on me, i only have those that distract from sadness. i paint everything black, because only in darkness can i see. the tea has been placed on the porcelain table and i fear sitting alone. i wonder if you caught me again, but i have stopped caring. i can’t help but become immune with every war, but i am scared that eventually i won’t feel anything anymore.

but I know in my heart that you are not right for me because i need someone that i can talk about string theory and can quote literature to and drag to poetry concerts and can analyze music lyrics and create theories about people and let me open them up and not flinch away and i need someone that i can talk to at any time and realizes that i take time because i love a lot so i love slowly and i just need someone that knows theres so much of me and i want to share it all. i want someone that will click all the links i send them and go on dates with me to forests and let me take months to hold their hand.

what is love again?

there’s nothing but sickness in me when i imagine you entranced away with everyone else. i am wise enough to keep from anything sharp, for fear that i will rip to pieces. in the night, i lay awake dreaming of futures i know will come true. i have seen everything in my deja vus but i haven’t seen this, i haven’t seen you. so i let the earth circle the sun without saying a word but i can’t help but stare at the silent moon, the only one who does and doesn’t belong. i trap all my mis-givings and i fear one day having the chance and losing it. i would much rather never have had anything at all. i smile as you cheer for the joys i sneak in, and i can’t help but hope that you miss me at least a little bit. i sleep under false stars and listen to racing cars, wishing to forget everything, wishing to rush away into the universe where the

earth circles the moon.

your words are so silent now, i don’t think i said anything yet. you count in your high regard and i wondered what it would take to have you look at me without hate. my heart speeds when i think you stopped by. i’m wish-ing for her to collapse you, i’m wishing for you to break away from her black venom. i look and i see you but you don’t see me. i am a shadow in disaster. i thought you could measure love but this is something else com-pletely. it is everything and nothing but something or anything. i lose all meaning when all i ever wanted was to help you, and you said i tear you to shreds. but i don’t think it’s true. maybe i am just exposing the darkness you wished didn’t exist, maybe i am holding you to confrontation and that is something you can’t do. i look for familiar faces but i swear, the sun comes after the rain, and i may bring out the monster but i can also calm it. all i wanted was to save you but now i am dying trying to keep myself

alive.

I used to cite infinity when I measured the depth of the sea. But now...what is now? A hazy line between yes, no, and maybe. Time and time again, I have washed away flaws in the hope of something better. But my forgiveness and compensation have dried out — is it so much to ask you to care? I fear I was right never to take a chance; if we cannot even be friends, how could we ever be anything more? I planned so many things to say to you — and I thought I was done resorting to writing out my words. Yet, I can’t spill anything out. I will sew my lips shut, and I will cut off my fingers. I will be a mute to you. You will count my silence as compliance, and when you take a knife to my heart, just don’t say I enjoyed it. Crushed by the ambiguity of lies that can’t match the puzzle pieces of truth, I don’t know what’s real anymore. The shore has been a lifeline, but the tides are too strong now. They drag me from the only form of sanctuary I have ever found. I screamed as I drowned, but by then, I have had become a mute, and by then, you have had become so deaf to my

words.

crossroads. crossroads. they dare me to choose, they decide my fate in a fraction of a heartbeat. you shudder and you shake but i have found solace in you, only you. i shift my keys to opposite directions, in the hope that somewhere along the lines, i would meet my match and cause an infinite catastrophe. i shudder and i shake and i fall through every loophole. i think i have been so caught up in my own misery that i haven’t for a second, really thought about your own toils. would you want me there to help you through every mess? i wish i knew, but i found you heartless and cruel and caring and kind. the years come and they go and i run from my ecstasy. i shelve myself into the dancing light of glitter water and i wonder if the bubbles would pop my insanity. will you, the one that doesn’t believe in anything, meet me, the starstruck wisher, in the shallow grave of destruction? can i count on you for this, if not anything else? please, i need a guardian, i need a savior, and if you’re not him, then i don’t want anything else, i don’t want anyone else. i’ll make my way by run-

ning through this world, trying to hide my attempts to turn water into ice.

Dear ________,

Please tell me that the last 536,112,000 seconds have meant something. Let me count the ways I know you. Let me rattle your brain and find myself in the mirror. How many years now? I am ashamed to say that the beginning is so blurry to me. Why can’t I remember all the memories? Everyone else tells me my timeline, but what happened to my head? I read about this rare sort of amnesia….maybe this is that kind of convolution. I look up at the moon, when I try with utmost desire to leave this world. I can’t see the stars and I can’t see my past. How much of my life have I lived not knowing my soul or the world? I have missed myself entirely in the way I trembled away from commitment. The words fall apart and I blank out at the start. I love you, but sometimes I

wish I could run away from you and be nothing.Love, ________.

my parents were engaged for five years, and married for twenty-one, but they never whisper sweet nothings, or go on their second honeymoon, instead they create arguments when the house get a bit too quiet and sleep in different rooms after a fight over nothing but my mom always smiles when she says we have driven her crazy, and everyone tells me the love letters my father wrote her every day she was away. maybe they never say i love you, but my dad calls her the queen of his heart and more than once i have seen them dancing on New Years to no music. my favorite word has always been you. y. o. u. but my dad says his favorite is ‘jaan,’ which means, when translated, ‘the most important part of a heart.’ and i have grown up being called my father’s jaan. maybe they never sat me down and warned me how cruel the world could be, but the way they watch pakistani dramas on the same sofa and the way they gang up against my siblings and me in every game of carom board has taught me more about life than any thing else ever could. they told me you know when you love someone when you miss them in their absence, and their echo is the sound of every inhale and exhale you take. and this has resonates deep in my bones and plucked wings from my veins. so know that i will go to sleep tonight and dream of the maroon red petals of the roses my father brings when my mom comes home from her job in Wisconsin, and know that my fingers will reach for the folds of the rust orange leaves that my mother presses into her diary from their annual trip to see the fall colors, and know that i will trace the word jaan all over my heart, and know that i will smile despite being in a constant

state of missing you — y. o. u.

entity

so make me something more than i am because i have been gone all my life, i have been asleep all my life. the world is beautiful, but it’s not for me to live in. i have been breaking bones to get to where i am, so deny me the pleasures of existence and bring forth narration instead. they tell me there is much more to experience, but life is

immediate, sex is art, and love is truth.

f^eel again oh i met the lonely souls that thought they knew me. time ticked by and i thought i could only be equal to the bread crumbs they threw me. but i grew tiny wings that you cultivated with feathers, and now i am making my own air; so i guess the winds have changed because i can feel again. my heart seemed like a vessel of nostalgia and well thought memories, but your friendship cultivated the best sort of insanity. i try not to repeat metaphors or analogies, but i have found imagery to be so much stronger than statistics, so when i echo your words that i see streaming down my lifelines, know that that was the old me. i will rewrite my body with shad-owed ink, the ink that bleeds with darkness and silence. make me dreams that aren’t nightmares anymore, and i will free you from those that never knew that rainbows are just the skies’ mustaches. if you can’t, then i will forget, for it’s not your duty. but i will smile if you do. i’ll feel again if you

do.

perpetual permaf^rost alcohol runs rivers through my veins, and i feel flooded. i make absolutes about me, but i only have absolute control over my thoughts — but my body and my heart are beyond my control. i still cannot put into words how i fell for you, but here i am, fallen for you. this can’t be a mistake if i am still thinking about you. i am dying to do something, but to do something would be pretty reckless, but hell, i’m pretty and i’m reckless. though any progress feels lost in blackout memories. i barely know you at all, i know nothing of what you think of me, but whatever it is, it’s not good, and if it’s good, it’s not good enough for me. boys try to fuck until they run out of luck, but in the end, they are all the same. they blur into a conglomeration of not-you, not-you. sometimes i wish i was not as ludicrous as this, either loving passionately and unconditionally — or not at all. i am begging my-

self to not love you at all. it was never something you earned.

Like

Social media strikes hard, slaps you in the face with the real-ity that people can move on without a second thought. Check ins and selfies destroy your hopeful illusion that everyone else is wal-lowing in despair as much as you are. The lachrymose waters run risks, as you tether between drowning in knowledge and swimming into ignorance. You swallow the emojis when you ache for oxy-gen, fresh air that removes the loneliness that settles in off gold’s envy. Comments on pictures that could just easily be graffiti on the

ocean floor, saying “quite frankly, no one gives a damn.”

Peer

i will search through all the envelopes, and use a slightly sharp-ened knife to slice away the wax seal that refused to let go of the paper. i will open the letter and let the crinkles echo and echo. i will find it empty and i will crash to the ground, while it only falls. i might cry, but i am not sure yet. i haven’t have had enough time to make all my decisions. but i know i will do something grand, something full of gesture, of gusto, of bravery. i will no longer be the hospice, sought in the rain but abandoned in the sun. i will be the tyrant, and i will destroy the dictators with all my will. i will, i

will, i say with the resolution of bleeding red ink.

1:1:1

Untitled bones rake in the new year with wishes and kisses. With sovereign hopes, they battle the flesh. What do we remember more? The skin or the skeleton? Dawn waxes the bullet, and the shot takes a lightspeed approach to encircling the world. What do we regret more? The past or the future? The war cries for a surrender, bleaching flags white in the hopes that its suicide would be of some use. Alas, the body burned in more ways than one, as the charred marrow kindled the pores into leather. In that moment, war realized why all the hotlines said that was never the answer, never the solution. What do we want more? To live or to

be never wrong?

Severed I know I must not matter much to you. Which is odd considering…well I guess it must not be a surprise that you do not matter much to me either. You claim all these lofty titles, yet you can’t hold a candle to your words. I have let coal burn me for so long, but no longer. I have been a chameleon, and I have blended my colors to suit your mixture. I am not a secret, god damn you. Slaves hold higher priv-ilege than me, but I will reclaim dignity and aloof my beings. Once more, I will uproot myself and find promise somewhere else. This is just heathen. You are Death, stealing time, but I will be Life, making more. Do not act as if I call treason. My barred gates have grown block after block, slowly. Easily torn down, if noticed early enough. So be gone, and take your manners to the streets. Leave me be, hiding

beneath the curtains of torn sheets.

Flicker

What were we? It feels like a flash of a memory. If I was a bit more lucid, I’d think I made you up in my insanity. That era was one of chaos. I was breaking apart, so forgive me if I can’t believe you saw me whole. You had my curiosity; I had your attention. We talked about the world, but how come it felt like I nev-er knew you? I had your lips under the oak tree on a summer picnic blending with autumn leaves. Your friends pressed themselves against the hotel room door until you dispersed them. We lit our matches, winking away the difference of age, and it still brings a smile at the absurdity of distance, when those mo-ments were the opposite of. But this fire ended too soon; the rush to blow out the candle and scurry up three floors before curfew hit is the wind to me now. We flitted between business casual and casual business like nobody’s business. I have been avoiding your consciousness of late; you know I’m leaving, you know you’re staying. Everything ends, but this flicker didn’t just blow away, it burned your name into me. So accept this lighter, and I’ll take the air away on

a paper leaf.

Salvagery

You are my adversity; you are everywhere, all the time. You are my disaster. You have brought me to life. You lit fireworks in my heart, and I am still burning. I am still in the sky, and it is so far from you. I did not believe in love at first sight, but maybe now I do. Maybe I just didn’t believe in living, because I was asleep before I met you. You became an addiction, and I was a user that was just pulled closer. It wasn’t happy, it was everything. It was anger, and sadness, and faith, and despair, and depression, and joy, and frustration. It was love, wasn’t it? With you, I am on that high. I am alive with you. Without you, everything is less. No wonder I became addicted. You were hero of my heroin. I put myself in rehab, but the system is cor-rupt, and we ran to each other over and over again. I ruined my world when you weren’t there to illuminate it. I am trying to be better now, but you make it so hard for anything to be neutral. I need to make my own fireworks, you can’t always be the fuel to set me ablaze. But I have learned so much from you. I am a better person because of you. The world is more vivid and worth living in. I will make my peace with your existence; I just don’t know if you still will be there in that balancing act.

RepetitionAnxiety gets thrown out reckless, proven in social science to be nothing but a lie. Yet, I find myself jittery on every level, all my electrons are spinning in the wrong direction. This is what I have become from you. I walked down every street, giving away walkie talkies to anyone with eyes and a heartbeat, leaving with promises of quick calls. They all said they would let me know if they saw you. My stresses turn to paranoia, and I’ve have taken to wrapping gauze on the folds of my eyelids. When I was warned that it would keep me from seeing the sunset, I, instead, mummified every path in my way. To keep you at a distance, I have learned to remove myself from the crowds. I only leave the safety of my bedroom when someone calls me and lets me know you walked by. I can only live in the places you just visited — being your shadow keeps you from being mine. I try not to reek of double exposure, but I can’t help but notice that my passport has been stamped at all our memories, as you take her where you took me. I never found you to be original, in the way artists are original — not at all, but at least, not pretending to — but this, this threw me over the lines of sanity. I swam towards moving on, and got lost at how; I missed the exit of get over it, and kept returning to the dead end that didn’t even announce itself as

that. Instead, it just said, happily ever after: this way here.

Fall

I used my heartbeat as a countdown as I waited with frozen breath for the freefall. I felt like everyone was watching with me — waiting for the world to collapse on it-self and let us out, like air out of a bag. I grew up afraid of vertigo as much as I was afraid of heights; I caught flies in my fears and never felt as alone as I did looking up at the clouds. They all jumped up there — the dancing dreamers and the kids who could make shapes out of nothing. I shuddered at the incessant whispers and I prom-ised myself to make evanescence out of permanence. People fall like it’s nothing, but I have been so used to traversing sideways, the person who never knew anything but the horizon. They thrown down ropes and they tease me with their swinging, but I could never leave the ground. And now they’re breaking barriers and now they’re visiting the moon and now I am addicted to loathing my fears. They’re pulling me like crisp leaves, painting metaphors of a sort of autumn in my mind. I wanted to look up so badly but my eyes seek the ground. Oh how I hate the voices in my head. The world watches me with frozen heartbeats and I let go of my last breath and I let go

of the ropes and I became the dancing dreamer that never woke up.

Messiah

I thought the world fantasized about me. I thought the world was waiting for its Messiah. I thought it stood at the edge of the curb, next to the bus stop, looking at the passengers stepping off, waiting eagerly for my arrival. For the savior, for their savior. I knew not my journey but I recognized my destiny. Arrive — and be loved. Save them — and be immortalized. Strike — strike them before they ache in their bones and tell themselves that you do not exist. Contrary to fact, there is no context for this. I have been sent, and I have been beckoned. Wait for me! Wait for me when love has no name, wait for me when you’re alone in this world, and wait for me when you’re about to step off the cliff. Be my echo, and I will find you tolerable, I will find you pleasant. Noise will creak and silence will commit suicide. And I will be all alone: the Messiah eternal, the Messiah of the Gods, the Messiah unavenged. They will try to flee, but they will fall, and they will miss the one

who could have saved them all.

Coincidence

Like a lottery, I am stuck on numbers, I am struck by perfection. I could count the stars, I could count the waves, I could count the leaves, but for some reason, I choose to count you. My first number your smile, the second your tears, the third your wishes, the fourth your promises, the fifth your laugh, the sixth your love. And if I win, please let me win, it would be no coincidence. You are the stars, you are the waves, the leaves, the heavens, the truth. If I should be stuck on numbers, may it be you, if I am struck by perfection, I know it to be you. Like a lottery, I am betting against chance, I am playing with luck. What are the odds of winning you? I could close my eyes and spin on the wheel of for-tune. I could pick, the blind girl wishing on perfection. I never was good at probability, I never was good as being good, so why am I betting on this? Why am I making mistakes on rising stakes? Maybe this is useless, maybe this is silly, but I have nothing else, I have nothing to lose, like I said, I am still stuck on numbers. I don’t have you, I don’t have you. But I have a chance, I have a lottery ticket, I have six numbers and I have the hopes of everything, from your smile to your love. This could work, this could fail. Lke a bottle at sea, I wasn’t sure yet if I believed in coincidence, but I knew that in the end, fate was

perfection, and you, you were always perfect.