"You're still young and fresh."
I'm trying my best
to feel so
As i rub cream on my flesh

"Go out and live son.
The world won't wait"
But I am, a few more month,
Circled the date

This ways not ideal
I don't advise
I want to change
"Should I shut or open my eyes?"

Flashes of youth
Times an illusion
"Where's the proof?"
Just builds confusion

Beat the Force
Fell to the Travel
It doesn't add up
And the numbers unravel

if the world before us were a binary search tree—
you and i can't carry on.
parent to nothing;
we were born leaves,
we stay leaves.
}

Even though I had lied many times
and there was nothing which you could offer my youth
to make it take you back—
we still both agreed:
for the first of March,
it was a cold day
with colder air—
the freshest kind of close.

king of the sea,
with a rigorous exoskeleton peeling away
moulting causes such distress,
exposed to the thrashing undertow of the sea
and enemies

who protects you?
a callow arthropod poised on fractured shells

it isn’t your father,
balancing a bottle of brandy between his lips
or your confidant,
skidding his tires across your mind

a starfish tried,
she threw her arms round your shell
as you added new muscles underneath
she stuck her tube feet in her claws
as you brittled her skin
she said I love you
and you retreated

when you are 70
and clamouring the floor
put your arms behind your back to beckon her to you
try –
she is the sea and no one owns her.