Decay

If our bodies didn’t force us to cry, we’d keep everything inside. Every happy day I remember makes me sadder. Our chat history gathering digital dust.

I spend days in the space behind my eyelids, cycling through reasons to dislike myself. Neural pathways of everything I've done wrong all screaming at once.

Everywhere I go, there I am, Yet I never find you anywhere. My eyes are dry of tears and yet, I can taste blood in my mouth.

Laying on the train tracks, the city lights a distant blur. My breath curls into the night. No one knows I’m here.

Our love guided the way we hurt each other, now it controls how I hurt myself. The thoughts of you collide and annihilate, decaying into nothing.

Café Noire

Black coffee and black tears.

We’re out of milk, and I’m running late.

I was supposed to buy some yesterday,

but I was working overtime again,

when Mum called asking if I was okay.

For the third time that day.

Yes, uh-huh. Yes, yes. Okay.

Yes, I miss him too.

We all do.

I ate cold Chinese and collapsed into bed,

before waking to familiar dread.

Took ten minutes to find my head and

then my shoes, hey wait a sec.

They’re already on, along

with yesterday’s outfit.

Mascara running down my face.

No need to change, I’ve been ready since the start.

Life hack: let your life fall apart,

until your sanity’s razor-thin.

Cut to me dialling his number, in a daze.

My coffee cold, the empty milk carton flung

across the room in sudden rage.

A rage filled with regret, bitter and sticky,

wrapped in emptiness and dipped in self-pity.

It clicks through to voicemail, his voice in my head:

‘Hi, I’m not here, leave a message instead’.

The following beep demands that I speak,

torturing me with a false chance I don’t have

and haven’t had in a while.

The tears reach my smile.

No point in asking if you might

be a dear and grab a pint.

The stores are all closed. They always will be.

No milk, no you, there's only me.

My silent message over, another beep, telling me

it's over. He can’t ever call you back.

Get used to drinking your coffee black.

Between the words

I can hardly read a book

without finding you

between the words,

between the worlds

of fantasy and fiction.

were you ever really here?

the silence between the chords

of the songs you adored.

I’m trapped here, in the reverberating air,

hoping you’ll echo into existence.

the pencil twists in the old cassette

turning back space, turning back time.

parity is broken, but clarity conserved.

I see exactly how we got here,

yet cannot see where we’re headed.

where we’re headed.

we.

we?

you, I, us, me.

her, him, them, he.

one, one, two, one.

a recurring zero to infinity.

I asymptote closer to forgetting you,

a neon sign in the rainy distance

as I drive away.

nothing but silence, and the sound of rain.

that’s juxtoposition right? Maybe irony?

I can hardly focus

on the words,

without finding you

in between.