I breathe
In your presence, my breath is ignored, lost, forgotten
It skips, slows, speeds up
My heartbeat thunders, goes quiet
It drifts, it crashes
I breathe
In your presence, my breath never matters
It is an idle watcher on the sidelines
I chase it, come back I say
Come back.
I’ll hold still, I can manage, I can do it but I try
Grasping with my arms, it is lost to me.
I breathe
In your presence, I forget how. I forget why.
But even so
Even so
My breath running, running, hiding,
Escaping
Losing, wandering –
Even then
My breath goes completely silent at the thought that yours, one day, will
Stop.

You say you love
But do you even know what this word is?
You say you love
But do you know what this word does?
It is a shield for you
To hide behind
A safe place for you to draw weapons
To aim
To fire
Because love isn’t just a word you say
To appease
To mollify
To use
To defend
To hurt
It is standing with your nails dug in your open chest
Holding your heart in all its dripping frailty
With no cover.
It is no limbs, no skin, no bones
No eyes or hair
No sharp teeth, or nails
It is no I or you

It is raw openness
You need, I give
You touch, I take
You break, I fall
I hold
It is strength, it is power
Love is a fight you can’t turn away from
No matter how ugly the sides
Love is not saying “for now”
“until then” or “don’t push”
It is ugly, it is in the middle of the night screaming moments
Right before you bathe moments
Before I even wake up moments
It is standing up when the other can’t
So when you say you love
I don’t hear fight, or courage or truth
I hear cowardice, easy words
And a war lost.

Client Poem: Little Black Dress – by Sonam Hajela

You want me to zip it up
Blend me in
And close me out
All those straight lines
And perfect seams
You see numbers,
Fake smiles and handshakes
Status quos and authority
All I see is a disappeared spirit
I want fire
Orange, red
Painted against the sky
Like the sun leaking
Pouring out its heart
Dripping in flames
Too hot to the touch
I want to be ablaze
Not the tepid little doll
That holds true to the mold
You don’t understand the burn
Of an artist, the hunger of a creation
I want a revolution, not a following
I want gasps, the trees to bend
The sky to tilt
And the grass to turn blue
The chaos painting me divine
In all my humanity
The Gods smiling down at me
Knowing I’m just that much closer.
I wish
just once
You had said
Go set the world on fire
And leave the rest in black.

I write
Behind my eyes
The broken lines
And the broken yesterdays
And all tomorrows
Given away
Before I had any purchase
Something snaps
Something fragile
The dust and smoke rise up
From the fragmented pieces
Swirling in the sunlit spaces
Rising higher
Away from me
Just like everything I ever
Reached for
In vain
And can’t say
For they’re bigger than me and my
Fruitless words
Tripping in their power
Wanting that which has no name
Needing that which can’t be had
Locked away behind doors
To which I have no keys
Only windows to reveal
They tease and taunt
Close but no cigar,
They say.
That which does not kill you
Makes you stronger,
They say.
Well, every new thought
Is like a gun aimed at my heart
With my finger on the trigger
My heart bleeds
Leaking from my fingertips
From my eyes,
Down my face
The eyes that I can’t face in the mirror
The eyes that ask how much longer
I’m running out of air.

Either you will
go through this door
or you will not go through

If you go through
there is always the risk
of remembering your name

Either I will awake
one day
to see my face and know
thine eyes
Either my fingers will buzz with the electric
Feel of my creations
Either I will behold the planes of my face with
Absolution
Either I will sink into my skin
And finally
Finally
See a true version of what was intended
In grace
In beauty

This I will know
“Gifted, fortunate one”
my name
will know
in truth
what it was meant to be

Or I will die
before I die
And know not what will be
All beauty lost on
Doubt
Fear
And paths uncharted
My luck shriveling up
Counting its dimming stars
And half lived moons