TW: intrusive thoughts

How can I be good

when I close my eyes

and see branches in the water?

Blood billowing brazenly

from her chest, where her heart

is hot and exposed,

flesh dug out and

skin peeled back

like a grapefruit, but the

pith makes me vomit and the tree

is branching and blooming,

blooming and bleeding

and her eyes are still wide open.

There's rust in the sky,

on the knife and my han...

Well, you were eighteen and choking

and _whatwasIsupposedtodo_

but shoot, blindly, into the blackhole

with my kind words that you cried for

then drenched in your inescapable darkness.

Weekly, I'd find you hanging,

tightening the noose, on that old

oak tree round the back

and I'd hack at the rope, fists and axe

sharp and heavy with dread.

You'd beg me to tie you back up.

But what a girl you were....

On a different Tuesday,

my wings work, and so do your eyes.

You catch me in the periphery

of those gleaming trophies,

and you crane your neck to see me:

my straight teeth and small waist,

soft eyes, a girl's face,

smooth legs and clean wrists,

and, for one day, I exist.

You flash your good-guy smile,

make me pink and dizzy,

and I like it, somehow.

I'm stumbling now.

Instead, you catch me

on th...

He watches the sky and

does not watch the boats

that bask like beetles

on this liquid land,

because his eyes are

shut and seeing — his

hands, clasped like

tree roots, clinging

to the earth and each other.

He sees cliffs, with no houses

perched upon their rocks _(some_

_wild and jagged adolescence)_,

and how the waves crash

like paper planes against them,

untamed, but not evil.

A tuna's satin bel...

I'm drowning — but, then, how could I complain?

These waters are still clean; the dirt below

Will never dare contaminate my view,

As we prepare our comfortable descent.

They slit our throats with golden knives (our own),

While we're still suckling from bright silver spoons

Filled with a formula of ignorance:

Cheap gratitude for granted gifts of God.

We watch those children scream on live TV,

Then...

I soldered my hands

Onto the motherboard of my face,

Like this might drive away the charges.

Tell me, does this mask make me a hero

Or a criminal? Does this skin

Burn like a searing poker

Into my bruised and yellow potential?

These metal heartstrings

Rust and thicken,

Then flake like dust from bone,

Orange as the sun,

and bright as fungus,

Until my lungs are sick with heaving.

I hid behind iron...

That prideless lion with the severed mane

Beat his smashed–up paws into the earth,

But his mangled face and

Blood–soaked fur

Stayed numb.

He dug his teeth into his cold, sick flesh,

All trapped in his throat,

Dry, hollow lungs —

No return

No return

No return from drowning.

Bare desert sand,

Reach out a hand

So bloody.

If he bites the hand that feeds him,

Maybe he does not wish to be fed.

He b...

Tenderly,

Shoulders curved, neck arched

Over the glistening surface of a toilet bowl

Like a lily of the valley,

Your silent blossom,

Silent wilting.

Where are the others?

You suppose it's not the season;

Something must be wrong with you.

Nectar spills from your irises.

He takes his pick,

Tells you how sweet you are.

It soaks in;

For a moment he softens.

He is in love

With your body.

The bruises...

It's hard to go unnoticed when you're hanging upside down,

The suited girl, the boy trapped in his mother's wedding gown,

The kid obsessed with numbers and the walking sad, sad song,

The ones in ear defenders who could hear you all along.

The girl without an appetite, the boy without a voice,

The trembling hands and rubber bands that snap without a choice,

The boy who don't speak English, in the ...

You've gotten sloppy;

Your poems don't read like they used to.

Hand sanitiser, drying up.

What use have you for being clean?

Or maybe you should down it.

Tell me why

You only write when your lungs are

Asbestos and dynamite.

So you can spill onto a screen

Your godless coughing, and

Un-literary prowess?

Whispered screams

And puppy eyes,

You're barking mad.

When did you forget what poetry is?

Why...