echo early-july
there’s an organ,
full and begging,
it bellows.
you can’t hear it, or you can,
but choose not to.
so all i hear is static, whirring, thumping.
tell me every terrible thing
you ever did, and
let me love you anyway.
surely, this heavy interlude
can’t be a poetical
foreshadowing of my fate,
not after i’m left with nothing,
but a shred of dignity.
resuscitate me.
words, trinkets, acts
have no meaning,
if they don’t come from you.
you are a force;
an impetus, that stirs
the depths of my soul,
home to an ardent desire,
to be yours.
mid-july
the day we met,
i was alive,
a whole body,
oiled and freshly squeezed tears of
a new birth.
the brightest glow shone from you,
layers with pores,
imperfections i ignored,
as you lured me in with
sweet nothings.
a poison had diffused
through my veins,
intoxicating,
or just toxic,
but you were different.
you should’ve been different.
but, after all, we are the fruit of man,
who spoil their seeds, and
rot the other’s flesh,
and i’m here, rind bare and
stained red.
late-july
you are slowly becoming the reason why i journal,
this isn’t a good thing.
instead of flowery poetry,
lately, all i’ve been writing are
hate speeches.
i stop for a few days,
because you’ve been, dare i say,
behaving.
but i was wrong to think we could have
something good
for more than a day or two.
sometimes you mess up so bad,
i contemplate if i should listen to what
everyone is telling me about you.
then, the guilt sets in;
if i leave, i’m just like them.
i create excuses when my friends
tell me to block you,
but it’s getting embarrassing,
so please do better,
i’m begging.
even though i shouldn’t have to.
early-august
i no longer look at women and wonder
how they’ve been blessed with gorgeous features,
an illuminating aura, brimming with radiance;
my first thought is why they settle for less,
for a man who (occasionally) does the bare minimum.
then i catch myself doing the same,
and hate isn’t a strong enough word to describe
this rushing feeling.
i don’t hate myself though,
i hate him.
or at least i do for the next few days…
and the cycle repeats, again and again,
because i lose my marbles whenever i see him.
my friends say he looks like the most [REDACTED],
and i question myself if i really do have bad taste.
you could say i’m passionate about him,
there is a fine line between love and hate, however,
and i tend to hop between the lines every few hours;
one moment i’m gushing to my best friend
about how he might be the one,
and the next, we strategically plan his murder.
(jokes! but if he…)
it’s exhausting and i can’t do it anymore,
or it’s more that i don’t want to do it anymore,
a public apology to everyone who witnessed every delusional rant;
present me sympathises,
future me would check herself into a psych ward.
mid-august
the cup is running dry,
i am down to my last drops of
self-respect;
my best friend is on the verge of filing a
restraining order against you to ensure
you’re out of my life for good.
i truly am trying my best not to
break ‘no contact’, or whatever it is,
but the voices (me) are telling me otherwise.
i’ve already forgotten my reason for hating you,
but the people around me never fail to remind me!
my head tells me to listen to them,
my heart can’t help but admit they’re right,
but there’s a secret third option
which stands in the way of
all logical thinking.
one would think it’s love,
but i know i’m not in love with you;
i don’t think i’m even in like with you.
perhaps this has been platonic all along,
or merely must end up that way,
perhaps we’ve both been playing each other
because that’s what psychology students do,
or people who don’t know what they want,
and what they deserve.
late-august
i spend hours deciphering
what your words really mean,
as if it were a literature assignment,
asking others their opinions because
i don’t want to, or can’t, trust myself.
i’d rather you ChatGPT an apology instead
so i have a reason to stay mad at you,
so my friends can be put out of their misery,
so i can go about my day without
remembering, desiring, missing.
to think there was
a sliver of hope, one might say faith,
that we had something,
maybe we did, and you weren’t aware,
or you just didn’t care.
but for now,
we remain acquainted, ‘friends’ even.
if only i could remove u from the alphabet,
then perhaps, it wouldn’t be this
complicated.
Written by: Kyra
Edited by: Ryan
