i etch your name

into every church

or mosque

or temple

that i find.

the walls warn me

that blasphemy doesn’t fare well

for foolish girls

with scrawny arms and jittery hands.

i tell them their god is cruel;

they tell me that mine is dead.

(i’d rather the embrace of a dead man

than the mercy of a cruel one.)

I tell this dream where you strip me bare

and your mouth latches onto my neck.

I tell them how blood pools around your tongue,

and my head swirls like a tornado

as the metallic twang drips into your throat.

I tell them how my skin ignites

and desire coils inside of me

like a serpent.

This starts to sound like a nightmare;

they wince when I tell them that,

in this dream,

you strike my cheek and only then

am I brought to life.

I tell this dream with an abashed glint in my eyes

but when they turn their faces,

I shake with the force of my revulsion.

Is it easier to pretend I am wanton than wanted?

In the dream I don't tell,

I sob into your chest —

heaving like some ugly, reproachable beast.

The worst part is that you cradle my flailing body

and I erupt into something else entirely.

In the dream I don't tell,

I know how it is like to be touched

with feather-light strokes.

Somehow, that is harder to convey than meaty hands grabbing bruised flesh.

you say you hate happy endings and that a tragedy is all the more interesting yet they all see you sob in the theatre when the lovers part ways. the curtain closes and everyone has left because your wailing body is not a comfortable sight to behold. truthfully, you have lived this tragedy and it has made your heart weak and scared to ask for anything other than jagged edges or scraped knees. there is no light in this tunnel you've been living in and, when the water comes flushing in, you say you don't mind drowning when you're just too nervous to swim. you are ok with tragedy and that's the most tragic part of it all; you can't fathom another ending nor are you ready to embrace this miserable one. i hope, for your sake, you end in tragedy. after all, no matter how many bandages you wrap around the wing, a wounded bird will always seek the stone because there is no mercy in a flightless fight.

the bullet is devoured and my throat collapses. my ribs split open and a child, bare and bathed in blood, crawls out as i watch from the vents in the bathroom fan. the child is crawling out of the crimson coloured scene and i project myself out of the vents so my naked feet can follow it's clammy handprints.

the child makes it's way to the kitchen. i hear a curse and a wail; my father is dying on the second-hand sofa and the baby is clutching the dagger.

i sob into my father's chest because i need him to wake up so i can finally play baseball with him like he'd always ask. the baby is gone and i run to find it again.

the baby is standing in the garden with my sister and i smile because she looks so lovely when she laughs. when i blink, her head is severed apart and the baby throws aside the shovel.

i scream her name until the syllables tear my tonsils. i scream it because i'd never said it since she left town and i'm howling because she thinks i never cared.

next, we are walking together down the street and the baby knocks on a door. emily jane from 9th grade opens it and i gasp because i'd forgotten how beautiful her eyes really were. i feel like im a boy, savage and scrawny and shy, picking her up for the movies again. the baby leaps into the air and strikes her cheek until the flesh dissolves. my knees buckle and i stroke her raven hair, willing her to breathe, willing her to tell me she forgives me for the night i joked about her friend's cleft lip.

the baby takes my hand and, suddenly, i'm at the pub with the boys and mark has his arm around carl because he's had a rough night. the others chuckle at something he says and i wish i could remember what the joke was. i smile anyways because mark was always funny even when i'd tell him to shut his trap. the baby smashes the beer bottle against mark's head and blood pools from his mouth and i feel like i'm going to be sick because his warm hands turn cold and his eyes won't move anymore.

the baby runs out of the bar and i don't even realise i am shrieking as i follow it. we are at the church and my brother is kissing his bride. the baby is running towards the altar and the axe is splitting both their bodies in half — one by one. i can't breathe at this point and my fists shake as i watch the blood curl around the birthmark on her clavicle. my mind swirls like a tornado as it hurls image after image at me; parking a car by the motel, unbuttoning my pinstriped shirt, tracing the lines of a birthmark, icy blonde hair wrapped around my fingers, my brother punching me in the face, his wife begging him to stop. i can't feel the air in my lungs. i can't feel my hands, my tongue, my knees, my nose, my gut. i open my mouth to tell my brother i'm sorry but there are no words because i remember deleting his number from my phone and i can't recall the digits anymore. what were they? what were they? please...what were they?

they baby drags me along to the hospital and — oh, god. please, please, please, no! the baby sits me down next to my mother's frail body and a lone tear falls down her cheek. the nurse is consoling her; she's telling her that sons are just like that and it'll be okay. i wish i could just crawl back into the vent in that grubby fucking bathroom. my mother's voice is croaky when she tells the nurse that, "no, my boy is sick of caring for me; cancer's not an easy thing to be around." i'm so ashamed i feel as if the hospital ground could swallow me whole with a clinical, corrosive chop. i want to jump into her arms and tell her i love her. i love her so dearly and i'm sorry for the fight earlier, ma, i'm not sick of you, i was just having a bad day.

when the baby holds the revolver to her head, i don't even have the courage to stop him and i see her bleak stare so i close my eyes when the PANG echoes.

when i open my eyes i am in the vent again and the baby is on the bathroom floor. it's body convulses and the bones snap. the flesh expands to wrap around the lengthening limbs and it's jaw opens to welcome a fresh set of teeth. i'm banging my fists against the vent because i recognise my hair, my hands, and my face. i want to lurch out and kill this disfigured man-child. i want to tear him apart for what he's done but suddenly, he looks into my eyes and only then am i purged of my rage.

this is what i've done. i've ruined and ransacked ever memory, every person, every relationship i had. my hands have walked around the earth like the grim reaper's scythe and all this agony sired by me has no reverse. my soul is diseased and when there is a disease, you kill the bacteria to save the body. i have nothing to show for my pain except the bruised belief of everyone who ever loved me; that thought is so haunting that when the me on the floor picks up the gun, i exhale for the first time in my life. i taste the metallic snout of the metal and my last meal is appetized by the memory of my mother's sallow face.

you torment me

in this house of stone

where the ceiling turns

into blades

and the hinges on the door

slice my shins.

i fucking hate you,

so i grovel by your leather smoked shoes

to see my reflection

in the snarling crocodile's mouth.

the sight burns me more

than the purgatorial clutch

of your arms,

and i bite my lip

to taste the porky flesh

of this degraded denouement.

if this hollowness

eclipses

into rage,

will i love my own bones?

i cascade down the staircase

and the mahogany railing grates

my hand

so the bone pokes out.

i rip it apart and

swallow the splinters;

it tears up every inch

of my esophagus

on the way down.

im running

down

ㅤ‎‎‎‎down

ㅤㅤdown —

out of this mansion of morbidity—

yet your skeletal fingers haunt

my backside until i turn back because i'd never truly leave you.

when i look next to me,

there is no you.

i face the ceiling

and my reflection wails into life

so it's pale lips can kiss

the stained glass chandelier.

my hands are holding

your leather shoes;

i splinter my mind when they fit my feet tonight, father.

and if you tried to kill me,

i'd lick the blood off the dagger.

you are lucifer;

i am christ's wayward daughter.

It is often said that the rose represents the eternal bond of love. However, the tragedy is that even the eternal rose will wilt and shed it's petals only to be replaced by the lily, daisy, and whatever else basks in the glass vase atop the kitchen sink.

You see, long, long, long ago, the beautiful rose lived in a haven of peace and prosperity; she was admired by many and known to be the fairest flower that ever did live, yet the rose was unwilling to yield her love to any such orchid, hydrangea, or iris that begged for her hand. She was waiting for the first flower to see her for her thorns as well as just her petals.

One day, the black dahlia stumbled into the rose's field. The black dahlia was immediately transfixed by the beautiful rose and, in a fit of passion, entangled his stem on the rose's prickled thorn. The rose gasped when she saw the black dahlia lying beside her with his stem split open. She asked him why he would do such a thing to which the dahlia replied, "I wished to know if pain by your thorns is as beautiful as the embrace by your petals, and I now find that I would prick myself a thousand times to feel such bliss." The rose was speechless and, inevitably, she fell hopelessly in love with the black dahlia who, with time, healed from his wound.

Months after the pair's first meeting, a new flower moved into the field. The white dahlia. The rose welcomed the white dahlia with open arms, thankful to have a new friend. However, as the days went by, the black dahlia grew distant from the rose and would often leave the rose feeling insecure and upset, wondering if she'd hurt him without knowing. The poor, sweet rose was unaware that the black dahlia had fallen for the white dahlia. The white dahlia was jealous of the rose's timeless beauty and she wished to covet it for herself. She told the black dahlia that, if he truly loved her, he would steal one of the rose's petals for her.

So, one night, as the rose slept, the black dahlia swiped one of her petals to give it to the envious flower who, upon receiving the petal, fixed it to her own white ones.

When the rose awoke to find her petal, and her two companions missing, she wept in anguish. The rose was in disbelief that her goodwill had been taken advantage of like this andthe heartbreak of having her love taken from her was too much for her to bear. The rose started losing all but one of her petals as the days went by and years later, the black dahlia returned to that very field.

He was sheepish and regretful when explaining that the white dahlia had turned into a magnificent purple soon after wearing the rose's petal, and that she had left him for another flower. The black dahlia begged the rose to take him back, and that he couldn't believe he betrayed her as he did.

The rose told him that she was no longer beautiful and her petals were long gone; she asked him if he could still love her. He said yes. The rose, however, could not forgive his betrayal and told him she could no longer be with him. The black dahlia, unable to live with the pain he had caused the rose, flung himself onto her thorns until his stem ripped all the way down; he fell amidst the field in an eternal slumber. The rose tore her remaining petal and laid it across the dahlia's broken stem. As time went on, the rose soon passed and newer flowers occupied the field. However, the petal that was once on the black dahlia's body remained vibrant and alive.

Henceforth, all flowers began to lose their petals eventually as a reminder of how impermanent love can be, but also how withstanding it is. The rose loved the black dahlia enough to forsake her last petal for him despite the betrayal and anguish. So, regardless of how love will end or continue, it's presence and memory are reflected in the wilting petals that signify the inevitability of death but the transcendence of love.