I used to think the safest place on Earth was the Internet -

that crackling pulse of electric words,
QWERTY sparks fizzing with liquid innocence

or the blood of the innocent

many nights, I’ve sat on my porch
(or what was once a porch before smoke and splintered bones
stitched it into something else)

and compared that cyber space to my world

here, we cube pain between our fingers
& keep it frozen for years
because of two things:

1. pain is foreign:

our skins were sewn with threads of laughter,
that’s why we bursted out of wombs with wiggling toes


2. pain is familiar:

our mothers slapped our buttocks at birth to provoke tears,
teaching us to waltz to the rhythm of tears in the land..

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Cleave : brown skin stretched over the Caribbean


Sink: dolphin limbs shaped into clasped hands


Pause: a dance across time,

the effects of an eclipse,
the stain of strawberries,
cocktail seconds that melt into bruises


Oil: overturned tank of psalms

purpose wrapped in chaos

-

I don't want to feel this way.

Words of Affirmation are certainly not my primary love language, but this time,

I need to hear you say it and let me know

If I don't need to be scared any longer.

I love you, Praise.

And sometimes, Love should get too bubbly for the rigidity of rhymes -
too wild for the confines of Shakespearean rules.

And that's a good thing, I guess.

To love, and be loved, wild.

-

I miss you, Praise.

I miss your "Rizz"
I miss our soft "Goodnights"

I miss your tenderness.

And if this sounds like something the headstrong 21st Century Woman shouldn't say, it doesn't matter:

I'm scared of losing you.

A part of me is scared that I do not measure up to the conversationalist you want.

A part of me is scared because recently, I keep gauging our talks with those you've had in the past with exes and crushes..

And..

A part of me is scared that even when I fully let go, and throw all reservations to the wind,

I won't be enough for you.

-

But I do want to love you totally.

Or scratch that.

I do want to be able to show you that I love you totally.

I want to be able to pick up the phone and tell you everything that's on my mind,

every single time.

I want to hold conversations with you that won't drill a void in your heart -

the type of void you'd want to fill by listening to another woman.

And if we're back to rhymes,

I want to be able to look into your eyes every moment

and tell you how glad I am that you're mine.

-

I owe you hundreds of poems.

A poem is my release - not just a tip into the water, but a complete whoosh of vulnerabilities pouring in ink.

If I was to tilt towards suggestive language, I'd say a poem is like orgasm,
like pointed bullets coursing through my veins with a speed Physics cannot explain.

But let's stay on course, no tilting.

Simply speaking: to write you a poem is to let go.

And I've been wary of doing that.

Call it self-consciousness, call it ignorance
Call it being reserved, call it being strange.

Call it the idea of not loving totally.

-

This is not a poem.

It doesn't have fancy lines and rhymes,
at least not in the stanzas that would unroll over time.

Sometimes, Love can get too bubbly for the rigidity of rhymes -
too wild for the confines of Shakespearean rules.

And that's a good thing, I guess.

To love, and be loved, wild.

To sit in a garden and throw off your head in laughter at the joke of a lover,
a laughter so loud it makes the lilies curl in envy.

And the garden could be anything.
An ice cream shop, a car park, a University terrace.. Anything.

Love doesn't remember the surroundings as much as it remembers the feeling.

And Praise, you make me feel.

-

Can you hear the war beats
trailing down the town like a lover’s kiss?

Faith is coming
and there’s no place to hide.

-

in the end, we know it's true
when the clouds billow with black fury
and bones seem to find their owner
we know it's true
when a robber glides through redemption gates
we know it's true
in the middle of a centurion's confession
we know it's true
when mourning gives way to morning
we know it's true

we know it's the first day

and we know that on the third day, we'll be on repeat
just that this time, the story ends with a rumbling
with an empty tomb
with a disappearance
with an appearance
with several appearances
with an Hallelujah tune

we know it's true

-

The wind has carried the news of our love from city to city
& now, the universe has handed us exam sheets.

No, these are not thorns
but black-petalled flowers walking backwards
testing our love
like reckless winds circling the Atlantic
pushing, pushing
waiting to see if the waters would have a fit
and spill over their boundaries.

But our love is not one that foams like an epileptic
- kicking without caution & crashing with drained momentum.

Our love is gentle. Our love is smooth.
Our love is the type you can roll between your fingers
between my lips;
in the crevice of your shoulders
in the bridge of my hips.

Our love is wild. Our love is sizzling.
Our love is not the type you can pocket in a storm.
Our love is the type that wears the storm out.

So even when dusk draws like a curtain
we're still writing
we're still answering questions
we're still on the list of the universe's lovers.
For he that drops his pen is one whose flowers
have taken the skin of smiling thorns.

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