I am waiting for them to call me out,
Pull off my disguises,
Sabotage my every route.
All they do is stop speaking as the moon rises,
And I escape into the sunset,
Shrinking a few sizes.
It is almost like they do not see it,
My faux confidence and its lure,
And all the blades beneath it.
There is no science behind this, no cure,
So, I run away with the winds,
Headed towards the shore,
Ready for the cliffs to kill my sins.
-JW
My time froze around you, blessing your mind to stay forever young,
It encapsulated every second your name got caught up in my lungs.
I still look back with the hopefulness I had the day we first met,
Before the words rolling off your tongue sounded like cruel threats.
The tears I spilled fell on the ground and fell apart like dominoes,
A chain reaction caused by your heavy guilt growing comatose.
But I keep your icy gaze in a wooden frame by my kitchen door,
I think about all the roads I did not take because I had you to adore.
My time froze around you, killing everything that once kept me warm.
No matter how hard I tried to build a fire, I did not brave the storm.
I am still hopeful, I know one day the sun will smile upon my tears,
But for now, they form icicles so smooth they reflect all my greatest fears.
-JW
My loneliness was climbing the walls, threatening to break open the white ceiling,
Then you flew in through the window and set yourself ablaze like a fleeting feeling.
You knocked over the scented candles and wrapped yourself in the dusty curtains.
“All that has happened and lived through us will never again lie before us.”
My consciousness tripped over itself, it snuck under the bed like a frightened spider.
You spread the fire everywhere and it dripped poison, deadlier than that of a viper.
I dance the waltz of terror, looking for an escape, a single hope in this mayhem,
But my left eye gave out under the pressure, the blood was lost, all hope was faded.
There was no way out of that flaming hell, I could only choose to walk right through.
The faces of everyone I had ever met flew past me, except the one, except you.
So, I laid my wounded body on the floor as the room around me became amorphous.
“All that has happened and lived through us will never again lie before us.”
-JW
The tall grass lightly brushes against my bare ankles
As I walk the graveyard like glass,
Careful not to tip over the white candles.
Your soul stumbles behind me like a lost tourist,
It growls and it mumbles,
And you get lost in the first spring mist.
This is a celebration, yes, this is a true love story.
I might have lost my patience,
The lipstick stains might have turned gory,
But I promise that I can barely feel those bruises.
Do not call St. Thomas,
Do not ask around about the nooses.
We were once so promising, so mesmerizing –
Until you tasted your own medicine
And the bitterness was terrifying.
You threw our lives away, but I tried to retrieve them.
I looked night and day,
Not knowing you were no longer a believer.
Now the tall grass cuts open my pale and freezing feet
As I walk the graveyard like glass,
Careful not to step into the defeat.
No, this cannot be over, just keep following me,
Hold onto my shoulder,
Let me push aside all the debris.
This is a celebration, yes, this is what we needed,
Love without any hesitation,
Trapping the hunger to feed it.
Walk the graveyard like glass, do not fall or break.
Let’s skip the mass,
Let’s swim to the middle of the lake
And put an end to what you so heedlessly started,
Saying I have gone around the bend,
Saying I was coldhearted.
-JW
You always knew how to make me tick, you were a machine taking me back in time.
You swore me to secrecy in dark alleys, then covered yourself up like a gory crime.
You spoke at them with the roaring conviction of someone who has not been doing fine.
Despite my reality collapsing like an ivory tower, I still stayed loyally by your right side.
I put my hair up before I left the apartment to defend you and your barely scraped knees,
I walked the roads of shame with your name on my sleeve, carrying it like a past due fee.
I did not know the dry skeletons in your closet have not known one moment of peace.
Despite all their sticks and stones breaking my limbs, I held onto you like Achilles.
They watched as I spilled blood and guts over the pavement, they rolled their eyes.
They knew I was just another one of your toys, lost in love, completely hypnotized.
They let me fight off your nemesis, they did not even try to cut your ropes and ties.
Despite knowing that, I let them have their laughs, just like the last couple hundred times.
-JW
I walked you home every day for over a year,
Wishing I did not have to carry your fear.
And you never followed, not even near.
Still, you blushed when I called you “dear”.
Now you live two streets away from me,
And I walk by your house occasionally.
Maybe I am just checking in to see
Whether you can hear my guilty pleas.
My lips taste like blood on your street,
The love still stains my snow-white sheets.
Our memories, they tend to fleet.
You are the worst of my defeats.
I wonder what we could have been
If we were not filled to the brim.
I promise, caring is not a sin,
It is not a fight that you must always win.
Now you drive by my house on Sundays,
Memories biting you like fresh honey.
We used to hide from rain in cafés,
Now your life is always sunny.
-JW
There are whispers under the floorboards if you listen closely.
You can ignore them or drown them out,
They will still give you no sleep.
You notice their eyes peeking out of cracks in the white ceiling,
They burn like charcoal in the dark,
They rob you of warm and fuzzy feelings.
You loved this house once, now you see grey faces in doorways.
Truth be told, you want to leave,
But the ghouls do not give you dog days.
Their lips press against the wallpaper as you close your eyes.
You can ignore them or drown them out,
Still, you are alone and paralyzed.
The fear hangs above your crooked neck like a rusty guillotine.
You avoid the darkest of corners,
Yet you can never ever flee this scene.
This house was your new beginning, it was your ticket out.
Too bad your sins got trapped in the walls
To become your only crowd.
We watch you pack your things, we let you walk these halls.
You are not leaving this place unscathed.
Be brave, this is your last fall.
-JW
I was too young when I met you, almost like in that song.
You called me a kid to my face, and all I knew was to play along.
The looks we sneakily exchanged blossomed into blue irises,
But they rotted before I fell and built you grand dream palaces.
At least that was what I thought, I was never good at predictions.
You held me like a burning match as you stated your convictions.
I laughed when I first heard them, I thought you were just joking.
The silence in that room served as the loudest of tokens.
When I returned home, I cried and swore to let you go,
But the seasons changed my mind as leaves hid under the snow.
We were left alone, and my grey dependency got saturated.
I saw us growing closer, we were electric and infatuated.
Maybe it was me growing older, but maybe I let you shred me.
You picked me up like a draft, tore me before you even read me.
We argued about bad movies and other childish inconveniences.
All this time you did not see me, even when I gave you my lenses.
Because I was too young when I met you, way too easy to drown,
And you called me an ice-cold killer when I was only a clown.
Just like in that song, you were looking at the picture upside down,
You were wrong all along, but I still feel heavy when I see you around.
-JW
We tend to erase our greatest shames,
We switch up the narratives until they are blank,
No addresses and no names.
And we play tug of war with destiny,
Frantically trying to climb the ranks,
Turning a blind eye to scarcity.
We are greedy without having skin in the game.
Dreaming about taking down banks,
Always finding someone else to blame.
While I admit all my shortfalls,
It is you I must thank,
You made me this frail and small.
Every day I must think of you, it is a burden.
You turned my ideas into your think tank,
And I did not matter if I was hurting.
While the others try to outsmart time,
You watch, sipping sauvignon blanc,
Bathing in stolen limelight.
And we tend to erase our greatest regrets,
But your slate has always been blank,
Free of unlucky bets,
Protected by a steady riverbank
Like a damn movie set.
-JW
Shiny bugs crawl under my white bedsheets each time I drift off to sleep,
They bite my thumbs and suck my blood, they scratch my aching feet.
Their wings buzz in cacophony when they circle my lifeless form.
I am surrounded by their haunting songs, I am trapped in a cage of orbs.
No, I cannot leave the dream unfinished, I cannot make myself wake up.
The bugs crawl up my chest and arms, their legs feel strange, so sharp and rough.
My thoughts twirl in-between the winds, begging for a middleman,
A single soul that could assist me with crossing these two burning lands.
But I end up trapped in this frozen silence, alone in my infested bed.
Bugs climb my hair like stairways, hissing like they have not been fed.
I cannot move, I cannot kill them, I watch them claiming my dark soul.
Their night terrors turn me into a pale illusion of someone whole.
-JW
The Daily Writing of Jackie Wright 