Young Writers Society

a poem a day
30 days

let's roll

2016
2015
2014

1.

differentiation

mathematics was your trade
every day at 6:25am you would chart the way sunlight danced over the curves of my shoulder blade
plot the perspiration that form between our lips as you kiss me awake

magic was my trade
but you could never understand
the appeal of masquerading logic in the flutter of dove wings, or the quick intake of breathe when the curtain is drawn apart (and there is nothing there)
(darling, it is because illusions are honey-coated whispers to those wounded by reality)

you taught me differentiation, how two points on a graph could be so infinitesimally close yet never be the same
(because there always had to be something between the two)
that night when you were asleep, i wanted to peel back the skin above our heart like a grape
i want to undefine us, until all that exists is
the sound of our b r e a t h i n g
weaving the fabric of reality

Who knew mathematics and poetry were a match made in heaven? I loved this, the voice is unique and the point of view refreshing. Plus, like...that differentiation metaphor ..!! ? <3

pt 1 of 2.


somedays, even the sun is tired

i.
the sky is tired today
her electric lines are pecked out by migratory birds
searching for a home;

ii.
the sun becomes a graveyard,
for the static calls from worn-out hearts in the depth of their
hibernation

iii.
down-below
smoke rings from our cigarettes settle like
half-collapsed wishes on a pavement, black as the tar on our lungs

iv.
and every once in a while
you hands would reach for the instrument
that coaxed crimson flowers to blossom on your skin

v.
but the flowers that bloom in adversity are the most beautiful of all, right?

pt 2 of 2.

亲爱的,حبيبي, ダーリン, ma chérie, cariño -
show me kaleidoscope eyes, how funnels of gas form at retinas blinding the lens with glass bubbles the size of a late-stage tumour


i'm sure you knew, when i offered the rim of the cup to your lips;
you drank it like the way people dive off cliffs - with the force of gravity obliterating everything
muscles, bones, plasma into the obscure configuration of tea leaves
at the bottom of a literomancer's cup.

we're residues
dust borne,
we're littered
destined to be discarded

but at least we have tasted the salt on our wounds
the searing of winds against open flesh - at least
we have lived.
fiercely.
boldly.
even if it was just temporary

3.

the act of tea-brewing

it is,
sunlight strained through a mesh of twilight
to settle on your skin;
chiaroscuro pattern of our past flirt like tarot cards
on the entelechy of a revelation
nestled in your rascetas
i trail my hands over the plateaus and ridges in your heart, realising that
you're a puzzle that does not begged to be solved

on cold days, when my eyes turn to cerulean blue
(because the future is a borderless pool of fears)
the sun you’ve swallowed in spring
efflorescence into nascent buds of love against my
cheeks

4.
snapshots from a carnival

In a carnival
a bird is a fish is a cat is a bird
neon lights light up my breath (can you hear the way it staccatos with each step you take)
of course you can't, you're too busy looking at everything else

i don't want to be here.
where acrobats dance
i see the way air skates off the wall of my larynx when i wake up in the morning
and you aren't
there.
the wheels break my diaphragm, now winter whistles through the chinks in my armour

we walk through an alleyway where the bricks glowed neon
andi saw the entire history of us written in spitball gums and grounded cigarettes between mortars,
they're servicing catharsis up ahead, you tilt my head back and sealed my lips with whiskey
it burns,
we are both burning
but the brighter one always leave a mark and i was never good at self-defence

i don't want to be here, where everything hangs in precarious balance, oxygen is a liquified entity, memories are diced into caviar served on a cushion of freak show in the form of words

but we paid 60 dollars for this and the tickets are
non-refundable.

5.
another sort of metamorphosis

i used to watch the rain in my childhood
the way scents unfurled beneath its touch, how the earth yields and cracks
in the most gentle form of submission
-
the twilight of childhood is different
melted lollipops and 50 cent chocolates, cloudy knees and scraped skies
but there were no heartbreaks in crimson clouds, or the inflammation of badly stitched wounds the first time we ever had to do it
-
history is always tinged with a fairy-tale edge
candy-floss embroidery to soften the blade of time, now
i can no longer recall the fragrance of my grandmother’s tea
was it jasmine or assam?
it is a tapestry to which the individual strands are no longer discernible to me
-
i watch the rain now too
from train windows and sidewalks
my heart is a fishbowl and the rain gives it
life

the way scents unfurled beneath its touch

Part poet, part beast.

6.

i see snow in april
when did the sun
fall
from its almighty throne?

Your poetry cannot be described as anything less of lovely.

I am burning. your poetry charms me into worlds and then I can't get out.

6.i

let’s play cards all night long
you say, and so we did beneath
parachute of stars, did you see how
i lay my heart out on the landing, palpitations brewing (acid) rain
because you were the boy with the sun for a voice
and the sky demanded your presence

7.

hospital records

parachute of stars, did you see how
i lay my heart out on the landing, palpitations brewing (acid) rain
because you were the boy with the sun for a voice
and the sky demanded your presence

This is so good.