Desperate little debutant
Dressed in his Sundays best
Hoping To impress
Gotta get off his chest

Oh no what a mess
Another bottle down
Liver shot to death
Yellow sight like his spine
Fear grips in his neck.

What would the sane man say
If the insane was publicized in his domain?
What would the recluse say
When ***** deeds are shown any way?

Run further away
But the truth catches up,
And the noose tightens like knots in your throat
Stalker thought he was predator
Turn around and pray,
In praise try to find absolution in his name
But grace, alludes the lewd cruelity of this creature

Can’t rely on you to play the game
Or abide by the rules,
Confined in four walls spinning tales
Roll the dice always landing on boardwalk
And I own the blue.

The only sucker in the mirror looking back
Is this kangaroo jack, yeah this is you.
Desperate little debutant ,
The walls closing in a world that will never remember you.

I have tried to leave my mark–
Pressed my name into the trees,
only for the bark to scar
and swallow my touch.
Spoken into open air,
only for the words to fade
and sink into wind.
Let ink bleed into paper,
only for the page to thin
and crumble to dust.

The world is good at forgetting–
The rivers scatter my reflection,
the mountains shed my step in landslides,
even stars do not pause to mark my loss.
It has watched as I have swirled away
until nothing remained of my shape,
as if to whisper:
you were never really here.

Time is a slow and gentle thief–
Not cruel, not kind,
only certain.

And yet–
Somewhere, the laughter I gave
finds its way back in memory.
Somewhere, the kindness I gave
lives in the hands of another.
And somewhere, the love I gave
spreads unseen beneath the surface–
Like a stone slipping through water,
its ripples never truly gone.

you don’t talk
to me

you make it
hard to see

it takes
two to tango

and i’m tired
of playing
guesswork

that’s got me
all tangled up
and confused.

so when you
showed up

the last time
at my door

and told me
it wasn’t meant
to be

i was certain,
for sure,
that nothing was
wrong.

but you led me
on,

and said it was
only for
your benefit

and nothing more.

now i’m ripping
the pages from this
book

because i’m
just sick of it all,

sick of writing
chapters and

sick of falling
in love.

i don’t wanna
be lonely forever

but if that’s what
it takes to heal,

then i’m so
over it—

and this time,
i want something
real.

I hate pools, oceans, lakes, rivers.
I hate the feeling of the current against my body.
The fight to stay in one spot when the water wants me to go with it.

I hate how it whispers let go,
Like surrender is serenity
As if I haven’t fought too long to be here,
On my own terms

The chill that wraps around my limbs
Not gentle, not kind
But insistent —
Pulling me into depths I never chose

I hate the weightlessness,
Not the freedom, but the absence of ground,
The loss of edges,
Of lines I can hold onto

And I remember the diving board —
Toes curled over the edge,
The sky too big
The drop too deep

The water below dares me to jump,
Like it knows I don’t belong in the air,
Like it can’t wait
To swallow me whole.

I hate the silence before the splash,
That breathless second of doubt,
When the world holds still
And I almost believe I can be free,
Free to fall.

But I never am.
I step back.
The plunge is not worth the drowning.

In water, I am always unrooted,
Always drifting,
Always one breath away
From vanishing

They enter my home,
Cheap suits, bad cologne.

We talk, endlessly
Needing to break for water,
Laughter and short jokes
But the tone never truly shifts.

I hand them the keys
So they can open the doors
Chat histories explored,
Timelines secured,
Screenshots validated

They ask me if I feel threatened,
I protest that while I do the focus should remain on kids
They offer information not yet known,
I take in the aroma of such sweet tea
And drink it down with a knowing nod.

They show me things not yet seen,
And I confirm the rhetoric used to abuse this barely teen.

They thank me for my time,
And I am greeted by another offensive word
Of cheap cologne.

The walls get smaller for a predator
When they become the prey
You can fool yourself into finding Jesus
But the law won't let you get away if you pray

The walls close in on a cyber-stalker
See the news has broken all over the place,
And you took the liberty to threaten me while they were over the shoulder
How do you feel knowing that it's almost over?

The walls are closing in
And the arms are breaking through,
Soon you'll smell the scent of cheap perfume and cologne
And once the dark shadows rip you from your skin
Know that the monster you chase is the one in the mirror
If truly sober, homer, d'oh yourself while tyring to see clearer.

The wheels of justice move slowly.

forever grateful for you and every little thing that you do.
kindness shapes every little part of you—
makes your heart malleable,
like the dough kneaded by ami
to make me her crispy wale parathas
every day when i wake up at zohr time,
when the world has already started for everyone.

but for me—
the world drops dead when you close your eyes,
and the universe becomes tangible
only when you open them.
at the same time as me.

your voice,
woven in gossamer threads,
wraps me into a cocoon
and then slowly, slowly unwraps me
until i’m a blue morpho butterfly
on her desk,
with a 10-hour mark on her baby pink timer—
matching his white one.

make sure you do one thing at least a day:
either the pre-med questions
or the anki flashcards.

i agree.
we’ll make the chat too spicy in discord—
with firing neurons,
and “i’m so proud of you”s,
and w’s.

i’ll make sure you understand the concept of resonance energy
by making you feel it.

so when i am electrocuted by the d key,
the numbness in my hand
turns into this debilitating blue numbness
in my baby’s malleable, precious heart—
and then we fix it.

together.
with all the scotch tapes
and the double-sided ones,
and the cardboard pieces from your drawers—
piece by piece.

a 4-hour call;
of crocheting,
moving in and out
of the seams of us.

we really did become a mosaic
of all the people that we love.
maybe talking about the teachers
in your khala's school,
knitting sweaters in the kitchen
for their loved ones—
made you feel like you could do anything.

resonance energy.
you carry the same energy
of all the people in your stories—
and with your gossamer threads
pull me back inside the cocoon
when you miss me
(when i miss you)
and fall back to sleep, holding me.

so close—
we're not even a heartbeat away now.

love,
i will find a way back to you in my dreams—
where you are in my lap,
and nothing has ever hurt you before,
and nothing will hurt you again.

call out to me,
and i will be up at 6:24
to get you off your desk.
no more apex without me.

we only play apex
when i’m in your lap as you play,
tracing my fingers
along the canvas of your face,
and kissing you stupidly—
until you are senseless.