Writing

Mandooks, haunter of libraries, buyer of books. I wrote this poem just before I went to see Little Women, which made me cry my literal heart out. Jo March owns my soul, Amy March is perfect. (Timothée Chalamet kinda looks like a dumpster rat, but in a good way.)

Gleaming, smooth,
Unscathed, perfect.
I yearn to reach out
Stroke, touch,
Parse as I lean in
Your most hidden secrets.
You are the only sin
I can’t resist,
The one beauty
My eyes keep searching.
But my pockets are empty
And my home is full
Of the likes of you,
Waiting, forgotten,
For a second glance.
Nevertheless,
I pine.

I wrote this poem on my lunch break at work in six minutes. I’ve turned it around in my brain for a few weeks afterwards, but here it is, almost completely unedited.

I grow scales, hooks
Talons and claws
Painful, gnarly scars
Blood-stained fangs
I survive

I grow anger, will
Anxieties and coping mechanisms
The ability to speak
My opinionated mind
I fight

I grow wings, wandering legs
Lines around my eyes
Laughter from my throat
A voracious heart
I live

This poem was written in a bookstore in Amsterdam (I only bought four books in that bookstore, someone give me an award), right after I learned how it felt to pronounce a word I hadn’t used in years.

Words are boulders
Heavy and rough on my tongue
Dislodging from my throat
They break my teeth on the way out

Too many languages
Are fighting through my vocal chords:
My thoughts a constant landslide
Of multicolored pebbles

My fingers move faster with a pen
Than my lips to strangers’ ears

But patiently you wait
For the jumble of sounds to disentangle
As I clumsily articulate
How grateful I am
For you

The actual title of this poem is “I Cower Away from Sparks but I’m Already Burning / Matches”. (And the award for emo-est title goes to…) This poem got started in Japan and was finished somewhere between Amsterdam and Brussels a few weeks later.

I bite at the splinters under my nails
My calloused fingers chafing against
This piece of tinder, trying to make it
Burn

Hand me a knife: I’ll carve these twigs
Sharp enough to puncture a lung
I strike them on the rough edge of my thoughts
But I don’t know how to make you
Burn

I’ve made fire from a single spark before
Dug my blistered palms through embers
Kindled away their charcoal death
Pushing helplessly, hoping for diamonds

You shiver under my stare
I never thought myself cold
And I don’t know how to weave
Cotton into blankets
Words into warmth

But I can break my hands
Trying without knowledge
Skill or belief
To turn this dead wood
Into matches