Kupo9089

I have psalms    tucked in the hollow of my bones    where I still      cannot find God

i am still learning how to exist without you pressed against my body

i. effervescent across sunsets, my body is the canvas where his hands create landmarks. ii. he can hear the way my breath hitches, builds hurricane behind tongue, i am a child again telling him that i am afraid of storms. my body curls against his, finding shelter within his warmth. embracing my quivering body, he tells me that he is sorry for not listening to the tornado sirens iii. he teaches me that beneath his bedsheets we find sparks in lines drawn between chest and lips and back, he is flint against my tinder body. i have never learned the definition of smoulder until now iv. i can hear the way his breath becomes the tide, rumble

My history is written on your collarbone in teardrops at night

i have made pockmarks in your palms where i am anchored. finding my history scrawled across the crest of your collarbone i want to forget that your lips used to be someone else’s find battles that you’ve forgotten beneath your skin: kiss the color of your dreams onto my lips until I can taste sunsets. forget how many casualties you made when silver pierced skin, On your hip i can feel where landmines have been planted, how many times bombs have broken your chest, your ribs tell me that they sound like violin strings, if not more fragile, give me a bow, I just want to hear what your melody sounds like, to make you shiver, give me

I walked over to your grave, marked with a rose, and poppies. I forget, that in this movement, we are just ghosts, too silent to be heard, too invisible to be noticed, your body is riddled with bulletholes and I wondered how long it would be until mine is too. you took me to the Mekong river where you crossed, we floated to the make-shift dock, before you went over, I lit a lantern, and tied it onto the mast of your ship, and prayed you said you didn’t have an anchor; you weren’t talking to me we both knew that you didn’t need one, you would greet the tides as a friend anyway I told you, as you sailed away, to never look

effervescent across summer sunsets, his body is the canvas where my hands create landmarks.

i. When you wake up: Breathe.   Inhale everything that you see and hold between your fingertips. Acknowledge the fact that it is too fragile. When your co-worker asks to walk you home at night, say no. When your friend asks you if anything’s wrong, say no. When you realize that you cannot control everything in your life, say no. Remember what that denial feels like. ii. When you watch the news: Breathe.   Believe what your heart tells you. Know that you are promised freedom. When they ask you if you knew your attacker, say yes. When they ask you if you were threatened, say yes. When they ask you if you whether or not you were unarmed,

Dear Father, I played at your funeral today. His fingers are so cold. It’s your favorite song… Brushing them against the piano keys, he played a melody that he could no longer hear, songs from a grave knowing that silence was never something he took for granted. “Come up to meet you, tell you I’m sorry, you don’t know how lovely you are” he played until his body started shaking, the words rose from his lips, almost holy, asking God how to shatter a glass house from the inside without getting cut “Nobody said it was easy, it’s such a shame for us to part. Nobody said it was easy, no one e

Mirrors are a two way street in  your reflection, there are more crevasses in your jawbone than you think your brow is a canyon, you are an easle-mounted landspace canvas where brushmarks of fingers, hands, and nails have all been too familiar, where bruises are too delicate to be called purple, yet you cannot see the places you are wounded too easily, nothing that you can call beautiful within your own right. You’ve never been taught how to live without being wanted, never taught your hands how to go steady and build bridges out of notebook paper so you can detail the journey across the flooding river, know that the ink will not fad