echo never is a promise
By: Kyra
i don’t know what to believe, or who for that matter.
time passes like a solar eclipse and i’m frozen here relying on you.
cirque atop your head, you adorn a false crown,
depriving me of oxygen and leaving me to drown
in accusations, allegations, assumptions.
with you, i’d want to nurture, savour,
but our candle burns at both ends, it will not last the night,
so i live in a mirage and choose to be oblivious to how you
‘quit me like a cigarette, played me like a clarinet’,
but it’s tiring, even for history, to be this repetitive.
strike a chord and sever this cord coiled around my neck,
for i’m an awoken dreamer, struggling to understand the many stars of possibility;
should i fall with you endlessly? or pick up Norwegian Wood again?
i cry to God because He is the only one who will shelter me
from the irreparable pieces of us.
lies stacked to the heavens like the Tower of Babel,
but what do you know? you’ve probably never seen a Bible in your life.
so i’ve folded my sorrows into the mantle of a summer night and
never felt more lucid in search of something which isn’t of this world,
but who is the fool at the end of the day, manipulated or manipulator,
me or you?
i can’t trust myself when i exclaim, “i’m never having a crush again”
when limerence gets the better of me every few months
and my life ends up in turmoil once again, all by my own hand.
protecting my peace seems to attract vermins
that lack basic decency, common knowledge, and conversational skills.
so i remain with no expectations or exceptions,
but left in dire need of divine intervention
or the ability to lock myself in a dream where there is
more than love, less than heartbreak, and just enough of like
to restore my faith in humanity and distract myself from
a friendship so coloured by romance.
Pulau
By: Leya
You for whom I have created Heaven and meanings,
I ask you still for a clearer definition of what it’s like to
Love—I am a writer, but dear God, I am still just a liar,
And who am I to question somebody’s will when I may
Do nothing with mine; all I can do is write till I know,
And lie till it disappears or comes true, I rob
Each and every letter of any feeling, because
You and I are separate islands, and I sail along aimlessly
Without a guide, only a strong yet worthless gut feeling.
You are good in theory but not so much in practice,
I keep trying to hide behind my words because my mouth
Abstains from affection and is reserved for criticism, so
Suddenly this feeling, though it’s given the same label as
So many others, is new and foreign—I would like to be
Shipwrecked on your island, lost like a forgotten rock,
I dream myself back into red dust and yellow bricks,
I know I should occupy myself with better realities than
This, but this is what I know so far, so far more than just us.
You, if there is a “you”, and you’re not my illusion,
I wonder if you are just a volleyball I’ve befriended,
Someone to occupy my thoughts while I remind myself
Of my faith; but you keep reminding me of yours and I
Want to push it out of the way, but it is the island I’ve
Knowingly maundered to, just to stay, so let me
Occupy your thoughts, just this once, just twice more,
But goodbye, Wilson, next time I’ll remember that
There are still talking heads and solace in seclusion.
I wonder if you could pardon my ignorant words, for
There is nothing I want more than to swat it away from
The memories of my day, but who’s to say I can’t live?
So punish me if you may, if you find truth in my lies,
Let me go, leave me so you love me in this moment best,
I’ll light another stick of incense and pray it away, so it’s
Too unfair, too soon, too late, too early, too anything, to
Be everything to someone, to be myself in somebody’s
skin, to be yours in my words, somebody and more.
not a lot, just forever
By: Kyra
there is something so unconventional about leaving, breaking off and replanting sporadically;
forging a new network of connections that would channel air to my lungs and blood to my heart.
only the ghostly tether of the past keeps us from forgetting who we are, who we were.
strengthened by the ebb and flow of love, the sea can’t be tamed; the stream will carve its path,
it needs not to be explained; both reflect the same sky.
there is love in you and me, a tacit love. it came without prelude or preamble.
it was in our laughter, in the sense of wonder we found each other,
and if we had doubts then, time, though too short, has told us otherwise.
“goodbye” falls short from my lips, to admit that we may only grow apart from here on out.
but when our tears have evaporated, condensed, and rained over us, hold my hands together and
pray that we find a love that grows and thrives through the bitter cold and unrelenting rays,
that it will last to see the trees adopt their auburn coats and petals pressed between pages.
no matter the twist of fate’s quill, i hope to hear more than a murmur from you,
and i’m not just a name you bring up in conversations reminiscing the past.
even when you find your constant, someone to think about, shout at, age with,
if not each other; a body of warmth to replace the absence of mine and embrace your icy one,
as snow drifts giving into spring, i will hold your hand for as long as i can.
i pray that i’m reminded of you every day, that you won’t exist just as a memory;
a blurred picture of us together, young and vulnerable, stored in the back of my mind, but
through all things tangible, ever-existing in the present, future, and forever;
the soft strums of a guitar, the tart taste of a mango, the striking prints on fabric.
i hope a piece of my heart will always belong to you, so you never walk alone.
instead, we’ll walk in step, arms linked together, to the train station, home, or to love.
I Met You (on a Thursday)
By: Leya
Crazy is the one who calls me, and you are the girl for whom my phone rings,
Even in the stillness of a silent May night, I may see you through my tears, and
I beg and plead with you to make him come back, and you remind me still that he’s not
All that, he’s not worth it, and he never was– I smile at you so believingly yet I
Collapse back into my sheets, wailing like a banshee for all these reasons I
Can’t even recall or remember, and for all the times you’ve been there by my side,
I cherish so dearly until it becomes another memory, another timeless blur,
Let me hold it all in my palms in the privacy of a palpable summer breeze,
In the merriment of goodbyes during winter, and the new beginnings that are too bittersweet in spring.
You know me best, maybe a little too well, if we may,
You know what I’m thinking even when there are tears in my eyes and jokes on my lips,
Every date I go on, you always have something to say, he’s too ugly or too dumb, or both,
And I want to pull your ear and remind you of the men you’ve lost your mind over, but
Who are we kidding here? The both of us are a united lost cause,
Two lovelorn writers who have found sisters in each other, yet all we
Seek are empty souls within loud vessels or oblivious and impractical senses,
Who are we kidding here? The both of us are more than a little messed up,
But you still let me love you regardless of it all, till the end of our days.
Time will dry my eyes as you have, but it will bring me back to you,
For if you have ever wondered that I might flee farther and faster, my
Mind resides with you so very comfortably, and you will remember my name
Even if it lies faded at the back of a photograph, or a muted memory,
I hope you will spare a thought for me if we are apart, or if I’m only happily
On my honeymoon with my [REDACTED] husband, please remember
That you made me happiest most of all, that you were the shoulder I very much needed,
And in my mind I will always want your arm to hold, your face to see at the end of class,
Even if the domino falls, let it come into place, don’t pretend it’s a newfound breakthrough.
POST-SCRIPT:
crisp are the leaves that fall in autumn, as we shed off the fervour of summer,
and back and forth we fling from one terminal to another,
but it sits so still, like the smell of common wood and countryside winds,
we are city girls, we remind ourselves,
here, in the thrill and danger of a junction,
we find ourselves frozen at nineteen and eighteen,
no need for goodbyes, a ‘see you later’ will suffice,
together or apart, understand my mind to become my eyes,
we are, and always will be, just girls together.
Written by: Leya and Kyra
Edited by: Ryan
