Momentary

What belongs to you is like moisture amidst a fiery pit.

Fleeting.

Disposed to the transience integrated at the core of life itself.

It’s like liquid nitrogen as it kisses the surface of a warm pan.

Short-lived.

Subject to the impermanence etched in the backbone of consciousness.

I’ve learned this the hard way,

As I witness the idea of who I thought I was whither with each passing day.

So, I want to resemble the surface of a mirror,

And sprinkle its reflective power within the processes of my cognition.

I want to master its inability to absorb energy,

And remain untouched, unattached, untethered like meteors in the Milky Way.

j.w

Butterflies

My heart rate still quickens when my phone vibrates.

My stomach tickled by migrating butterflies.

Muscle to muscle they proceed.

As gut-churning as a pile of sick.

But of course it won’t be you on my screen.

it never is.

Wasted heebie-jeebies.

jw

Granny

Your laughter still lingers in my brain,

Like a tropical cyclone with a nonexistent wind-shear

Like a hurricane with a ceaseless reservoir of latent heat 

It still lingers like 

A puzzle with all pieces intact, every detail still clear

Like the base note of a fragrance and I only fear that

One day, it’ll start fading like a liquid gas smear

Forever loved grandma.

j.w

Parasite

 

Inspired by “Comeback” – Ella Erye

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I felt you slipping through my hands like silt.

Radiating from my skin like heat. 

I thought I had you when I pounced, 

but now it’s clear.

You are the forbidden fruit 

my stretched arm can never reach. 

You’ve never sought the warmth my hands bear, 

although you say you do.

So now my head soars like a dust devil, 

Into the dark skies of un-lived hours 

when even the city is fast asleep.

Retracing foot prints my thoughts left scattered in their making.

Collecting pieces of emotions you made me strip. 

Longing to break the instant I let my tongue slip.

j.w

No Actions, Just Words

It must have been the hundredth time of you saying it

That your face began twisting into a mangled mess of unkept promises

That the honey in your words began metamorphosing into a simmering bitterness

That I finally realized you never once intended on doing any of it

 

j.w

Chaos and Calm

Chaos is dancing within me in synchronized steps

Proof — the havoc of meaningless words in its wake

Its trail has forced me down the lobes of my brain

Chasing the triggers of what keeps me sane

But what daunts me is the rushing blood in my veins

The tumult leaving the cusps of my heart astray

What haunts me is the mayhem echoing in the marrow of my frame

The anger rumbling in the fissures of my brain

But regardless, I choose to fight for the peace whispering my name

 

j.w

Letting go

Resting here, entwined with the sheer darkness of midnight, my eyes can only see our limbs. They lie in an ungainly sprawl, enmeshed like vines of a wall shrub. My fingers are quivering as they venture out to trace the hairs of a chest that isn’t there. My head is overwhelmed, harassed by vehement thoughts and words that were never said but still, here I am, fluidifying its frontier, pondering on how you managed to break my walls; how your charm cut through me like a disemboweling knife and left me spellbound, craving your company like a coke addict fancies his fine dust of cocaine. I doubt you’ll ever understand how your grip felt like home to me. Nestled between your arm and chest, head tucked beneath chin, listening to the tender processes of our bodies, I was unbreakable. The hairs on my arms are jutting into the night like an ambushed flock of birds, recalling how flawlessly the ridges of my lips mingled with the grooves of yours —  in palpable adoration — as though made for each other. How the softness of your eyes blinded me to the hour glass hovering before us, haunting us indefatigably, one that we both chose to ignore. But now that the sand is fixed, motionless as the trunk of a full-grown baobab tree, and you have vanished like a half-starved hologram devoid of electrical energy, I can only describe how my heart danced in different rhythms watching the little things you would do; how effortlessly you brought words to me despite a creative slowdown of months on end. And now, listening to the fine murmurs of a lonely thursday night, cradled in a blanket I ought to burn, I can only hope I was more than a transient encounter to you. To me, you were so much more.

 

j.w

Emotions

At times I am a shattered piece.

Misconstrued. Bits of my brokenness

Scattered stunningly to my foes.

Weakened. Unable to end dreams girdled

By the ever-expanding aftermath of rotten feelings.

Discarded. Yet they still turn up uninvited;

Like new invoices seeKing to join an ever-growing

Stack of overdue bills.

Imperfect. Fighting a me version that

SpriNgs streams of ungodly passions.

Helpless.

 

Last night when I saw you…

The warm glow beneath your skin shriveled

Like a plum becoming a prune or like skin losing its grace

A dire fluorescence began cruising within your veins

That left me on edge, facing doom that looms ahead

Just last night when I saw you.

Craving to break away

Like a bird caged for days on end.

 

j.w

Dad

Your existence is nothing but a mere imagination.

A broken image that surfaces in my head rarely.

A fleeting thought mostly disregarded in ignorance,

But in rare occasions resists the force that churns,

My thoughts and instead harassingly haunts me.

 

j.w