I was sinking to the bottom of the ocean
I hoped you hadn't pushed me
I looked at you with tears in my eyes
I hoped you didn't see

I was waiting for you
Waiting for you to return
I was waiting for you to call
I hope one day I'll learn

I saw you choose your friends over me
But did I cross the line?
And I saw blood on your hands
I just hoped it wasn't mine

I see some kids heading home from school,
bent over from the weight on their backpack.
In Palestine, children bear the politician’s schemes on their backs.
And bend further down,
grieving their parents’ lifeless forms.
Children, who used to be whole,
have their limbs torn off,
skin hanging from their faces and hands.

On my visit to the shop,
I see a kid throwing a tantrum over not getting sweets.
In Palestine, children hear cries of the wounded,
screaming for help.
While the world stands silent, aid delayed.
Red capes, a stone in their hands and a imaginary knife in their
teeth, they die as martyrs.

Politicians, no way you’d wield ruthless might,
If they were white children in your sight.

another wasted battlefield.
ground smoking,
haze-choked.
bright afternoon zenith
crowning the only victor—
war.

sunlight skates
across the maze of bodies,
dried blood,
dreams ripped open like unsent letters.
it glints from the angle of death
and dances a shuffle
to music from a silent plane.

what am I to you
now that the wind
carries this stench?

a promise wrapped in vengeance.
a rotten kiss
pressed to your lips
passed down the bloodline.

the crowd roars with laughter.
ghosts foot the bill.

the water table rises
to meet the candle flame—
a younger sibling
finally getting their growth spurt.

I am weightless in the flooding,
drowning in fire,
burning in the afterglow
of a thousand dying engines
cooling to the rhythm
of hell-soaked hearts
spent on passion.

I am you
in the longest shadow
of the face you hide.

I am the violence of survival
strutting its stuff,
proud as the blood-soaked mane
of a lion.

I am the beast
that preys.

ahh,  men.

i was born and on fire. my skin, open flesh words that bled onto anyone in a close vicinity. my face, a cloud of black dust. i knew that i had love in my heart to share with the world, but no one could see past the mold on my skin that would spread to them if they got too close. i was born into two things: a fruit that appeared ripe on the outside but leaked out a decayed, rotten mess, and the hands that opened said fruit with blood that held on. i watch the destruction i've made, that i didn't mean to make, but i believed that it was justified. i wait for someone to understand these words, not to pity me, but to find a part of themselves in me. i have found nobody. i fear that as of now, i am a walking, moldy model of decaying flesh and raw meat. i did not want to be this way. i did not want to be the black sheep. i did not want to be bad. i am a sculpture of wet clay that they could mold with their pure hands, and despite all that creativity in their alive and well minds, they have carved the word "rotten" in my flesh.

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Does it though?
because friends
have never
belittled or
cut me down
quite like you have.

Nobody has ever made me
want to jump off the edge
from pain and hurt,
yet still scream words of gratitude,
because I know
how much
you sacrificed
for me.

You may not have been perfect,
but it’s everybody’s first time
at life
and I know
even if everybody
leaves my side
you’ll still be there
because blood
runs thicker
than water.

We are in the night
Each behind doors shut
And marked with blood

Innocent blood spilt on the grounds
That it would give protection.
And protection it did give but

The cries of pain that laid over our city
And rattled in my room, filled me with regret.
I pray if it was necessary with no divine response.

So we let the ghost of loss pass over our home,
feeling it, yet letting it take nothing
And when the sun rises on the new day and

Brings us our deliverance of love—
For us there will be
A future.