And maybe I shouldn't have.

What lights up London, Paris and Tokyo?

Who walks upon their neon-lit pavements?

What magazines do passengers in whirring subway trains read?

How many people watch their dreams dissolve in these Big Cities?

How many people find Love there?

Who lives life like we never will?

Poem

My mind will become like an open book,
Where the chains of thought will all unhook.
The words are black, The pages are white.
Gray shall find his place soon beside.

One question still, I don't exactly know,
Will he want to read all he's read before?

Turn

The lazy June evening sun awaits.
Tiptoeing across sandstone pavements and grass that's ever so cool. Heat clings to skin like a mask and we stir things up. It is summer.
Pools of cold water offer refuge to our flammable hearts and we spiral deep into them. But when we come out, fighting the weight of the water, we find ourselves dyed in hues of purple and turqoise and magenta.
When we stand before each other, recognition fails to appear in our eyes.

His Heart?

There is a heart beneath layers of skin. There is a heart behind his habits, his behavior. A heart maybe not of gold, but silver so pure and so very soft. This heart that keeps him alive, keeps her alive too. It's the same heart that beat when he wrote her fifty songs for their fifty days. And he lives for her almond-scented skin. He lives for her sound.
He's seen the world and the world's seen him.
I write this because I know he will never read it. He's far away.
In my eyes he's forever blue.

Plans

It's five minutes past twelve and your phone rings. We're both so bored and unable to sleep. Besides it's summer, we need this. Thirty minutes to get ready and we're out. I can't believe I'm finally going to do this. Stuff the keys in my pocket and head out the kitchen door. Be extra careful to walk slow, don't want to wake them up.
It's not funny. Have you ever tried jumping over a six feet high wall, bitch? I think not.
So anyway, where are we going? Do you know? I don't. We're supposed to remember this night for a long time. No pressure though.
This car smells like...Mangoes? We're at the park before we know it but the gates are closed. Damn, did I have to wear skinny pants? I can't climb over this fence and you're laughing again. Did you just step in a cactus and get pricked all over your pretty legs, darling? It's dark except for the single light out on the road. It filters through the gaps in the leaves, casting thousands of slivered beams upon us. Bubbles? You have got to be kidding me! Do you really carry those around with you or did you bring them specially because tonight is supposed to be like the movies? Look at that brilliant sky and you'll soon know you've seen nothing like it. Each star sparkles stronger, a little more fiercely as it hangs between blackness. No, I'm not being cliched, it's like this every night, you just haven't been noticing.
You want to see your friends and I want to see mine but we're too lazy so we're going to stop at this tiny store and get ourselves something to drink. Orange juice? Fuck you. But you brought ice lollies so it's all cool. Mine is dripping all over my kameez and you're licking your fingers clean. It's actually thirty five degrees out here. We have strawberry stained lips now. That'd look sexy in pictures. Lucky for us though, 'cause I brought a camera, baby cakes.
Did we waste so much time already? Damn.
You're swearing really loud. I think your eyelash went into your eye. Stupid you. Now I'm telling jokes that really aren't funny but you're still doubling over and laughing like you're crazy. You're singing songs from the 60s and you sound actually very beautiful. We should sing together, you and I. We could call ourselves The You and I. That'd be so absolutely retarded and obvious.
I'm trying to keep you awake by tickling you. Maybe you just keep falling over onto my shoulder to annoy me. Either way, stop it. Fuck. The stars are disappearing already! But we get to watch morning happen.
Look, it's not the rise of the sun, but the change of sky.

Run Away

Walk a little closer to the edge and leave your hand.
There are oceans waiting to be breathed. There are sands waiting to burn. There are seashells to be heard. And there are lives to begin.
My throat is so dry from all the songs I've been singing. To the world but just not to you. Years from now will I be doing the same thing? Will I be thinking as endlessly of someone else as I do of you now?
I'm disappointed in myself. Do you know what that feels like?
I have so much to say. So much to explain. Yet it's unexplained in my head. It's like china that breaks over and over again. It's cyclic and it's fragile.
I sit and trace words to their roots when I know I'm not supposed to. Wouldn't it be easy if we could choose what we thought?
I know I'm not enough. I wonder if I'll ever be? For you or for anyone else. Will I? You tell me.
Fragmented and unwhole. Seeping cracks and this wound that heals and unheals. This infected cut.
Weak. Very weak. Worthless.
I go to that place. I see those people. I don't see you. And I'm so afraid that I want to run away.

The Planets Bend Between Us

You are divided. In pieces, in puzzles, in fractions. Everything about you is disconnected. Yet when you come together, like the planets and the stars and everything else that's out there, you make up my universe.

The smell of fabric softener. Your socks and my Sesame Street yellow t-shirt lying scattered on the black and white checkerboard linoleum floor. The memories of you and I, with our backs to the cabinets, in this very room. The laundry - Our little hideout. The place sounds like comfort. It feels like us. Our scent in our clothes.

I look out the window. The bougainvillaea I forced you to plant years ago. It's still overflowing with the same papery red flowers, do you see it? The corner of the backyard where we buried those parts of ourselves. You'd walk out in the middle of the night to go check on them, return with tears. The birds that we used to feed together.

The fears I overcame while I told you stories. The mud we used to play in, the insects that fell in our hair while your elbows gently collided with mine. The day I got my nose pierced. The invisibility of time, of worry, of everyone else. Brand new and special.

The gun in the back of your closet has been crossing my mind. It sits there unused. Brand new and special. We are weak and selfish people. We've closed all doors. Closed our hearts. We've conveniently lost faith. Dismissed hope.

The floor is wet. My hands smell like detergent. No matter how many times I wash these things, they stay the same. I guess it's impossible to lose some things.

I once knew a boy. In the first conversation we ever had, he told me stop living in the past.

It's Not Just Dogs She Likes, It's Your Shoes Too

Hot tears. Stinging words. And the conversation's replaying, the time turner's spinning and I've landed amidst your drama Shiny Girl. Your drama is my misery.
You've taught me many lessons. You've been so selfless and forgiving. All those times I called you a whore, you forgave me. Oh forgive me now too, I'm having a little difficulty understanding why the world seems to be stopping in its tracks just to get a glimpse of you. Just to hear your melodic tunes, just to play one little round with you. So they can tell the others when they recover and get back that they once knew you too. Had the chance to see you shine. Bask in your glory. Your magnificence. Your astounding existance. I'm so, so sorry though, I fail to see it.
Sometimes she'll shine so bright, she'll blind you. Be careful there. She's that girl. The one that really shines.

Jasmine Around the Wrist

Mirrors, lately, have been my worst enemy. A constant reminder of lack of symmetry.
I'm just going to avoid them too. Easier said than done, though.

When we fall in love, we're just falling in love with ourselves.
We're spiraling.

I Love You, Even More Than The Phone Bills

I like how you sound restless. Even when you've just gotten out of bed. You should just let me hear more of you.