no, I don't like to share

I don't know what I'd do with this blog if you ever leave

I just picked up the smell of your inclination on my bolster and

Before I know it I'll taste you in my sleep
God, I'm tired, I'm so worn out from a rest without escapism
I need a life with lucidity
Please, not a love with certain vacancies
I need more permanence than dime sized bruises on my hipbones
We grow entirely new cells in 7 years and hell,
I just read somewhere you'll have new lungs in 6 weeks,
New tastebuds in 10 days,

Fuck, when I have you all to myself at last are you even you anymore?

Are you even mine anymore?

So, leave the guarding to the dogs and the loving to the lost,
he's mine.

Tell me you don't, tell me you do

Love me not because it's convenient

Love me not because you think it will save you 

Love me not because you value presence above companionship

Worse still, contact above conversation

Love me because every time we kiss

I am paying disservice to your teeth

Obsessed with your lip between mine

Love me not because I fit in the coffin you bought her

Sometimes I taste splinters on my tongue from the hole she tore through with her fist

Love me not because I'm good with words

For I can only write free-verse

Love me because I can but I can't stop stuttering when I try to tell you 

How I get dizzy when your breath tunnels through my ear like incense into my nose

Love me because I was a lifeless drone until you walked into my life, 

Your pulse my metronome 

Love me not because I fit in your hands 

Love me because I don't

I never will

Love me because you've never loved the feeling of something slipping between your fingers, ever, until now.

The cracks in his palm give me just enough room to slip into them

Waist deep

Sandwiched between hot flesh 

And oxygenated blood

From all the breaths he stole from my lungs

We love with open mouths and open limbs

What we do is more than just a fist slamming against a palm

It is not dirt I gather under my fingernails

But the primal way we learnt to stake our claim 

I am digging into muscle

You are drilling into bone

You and I, we're cars speeding towards each other

And you kiss me as we collide

“At 19, I read a sentence that re-terraformed my head: “The level of matter in the universe has been constant since the Big Bang.”
In all the aeons we have lost nothing, we have gained nothing - not a speck, not a grain, not a breath. The universe is simply a sealed, twisting kaleidoscope that has reordered itself a trillion trillion trillion times over.
Each baby, then, is a unique collision - a cocktail, a remix - of all that has come before: made from molecules of Napoleon and stardust and comets and whale tooth; colloidal mercury and Cleopatra’s breath: and with the same darkness that is between the stars between, and inside, our own atoms.
 When you know this, you suddenly see the crowded top deck of the bus, in the rain, as a miracle: this collection of people is by way of a starburst constellation. Families are bright, irregular-shaped nebulae. Finding a person you love is like galaxies colliding. We are all peculiar, unrepeatable, perambulating micro-universes - we have never been before and we will never be again. Oh God, the sheer exuberant, unlikely fact of our existences. The honour of being alive. They will never be able to make you again. Don’t you dare waste a second of it thinking something better will happen when it ends. Don’t you dare.”

Caitlin Moran

The Three Things I Discovered This Week And Will Always Remember

1. Be thankful for the two people who gave you life. Your bones are the very product of their union, your breath a reminder they succeeded. Your body is a map of cells, your moral compass; inherited. Till this day, true north is a sharp point of a finger in your direction, saying no to a tattoo, but swallow your pride although it is really just the DNA you share and be grateful. You never know relief like the kind that washes over you when you're safe within the confines of your father's car, succumbing to slumber as you lie slumped, cheek pressed against a seatbelt, drool staining the herringbone webbing a muddy brown. He insisted he send you despite being 8 in the morning on a Saturday; mind you, his only day to sleep in. And mind you, trains begin operations at 6am where you live. Some days, you'll lose patience at your mother for the gravel in her voice. You've barely said four words and the asphalt is bitter on your tongue. Swallow it nonetheless, because she is always trying. Always trying to look past her daughter's insistence on spending a night at a club in the midst of people who are really just buzzed-out boys but they're a pack of wolves to her, always trying to look past her husband's inability to maintain a proper conversation, always trying to lend a spark to a burnt-out flame of a 30 year old marriage. And we all try to a certain extent and then we fail. In that event, stroke her hair and hold her as she shakes. She was the one who taught you that even the strongest fall sometimes. She was the one who taught you how to walk in the highest stilettos and then over all the men who tried to wrench you to your knees, but if you looked closely, there were tears in her eyes as she spoke.

2. Always remember that friends aren't only your friends when you're hanging out with them. If you have time to think of a way to squeeze your daily and not to mention trivial woes into a 140-character tweet, you have more than enough to drop a quick text to an old friend, or even one you caught up with last week. Friends are more than just faces to crowd your timeline with. Friends are your lifeline. When was the last time you said how are you? and meant it, when it wasn't just a prelude to your onslaught of complaints about your life and problems. Friends form a support system, not an assembly line. They listen and they say some of the smartest things sometimes. They're not just there to inhale all your dirty carbon dioxide. Today's weather is partly cloudy with an air of fake camaraderie.

3. Keep in mind that nothing lasts forever. Forever is the 21st century form of pixie dust which is really just gold glitter. It's pretty when it's dancing in the air, just an idea bouncing around in our heads, and then it settles and it gets all over our hair, in our eyes, matted on our fingertips. You really don't want anything to last forever, anyone with sparkle in their samosa would tell you that. Nights when you find yourself in pugilistic position from the scathing words of somebody, balling your fingers into tight fists because then, only then could you hide the trembling, remember that the fire subsides in the end. Ash can only harm what was once ash for so long. Whatever conspires between two people, the searing heat of two tongues swirling together, under or above the influence, the whiskey wears off eventually. Live in the moment. Each goodbye is only a means to a new hello. Tell your lover you don't love him forever, you love him for as long as it is possible. For as long as you are able to have it course through your veins for what it is. That is the longest forever you could ever give somebody. Just make sure it isn't to somebody hell-bent on reducing a heartfelt declaration to an ily, just make sure you remember you cannot measure every life-altering phenomenon against a scale of 1 to infinity.

"Leonardo's Mona Lisa is just a thousand thousand smears of paint. Michelangelo's David is just a million hits with a hammer. We're all of us a million bits put together the right way."

Diary by Chuck Palahniuk

“Ten Women I Have Been Warned Against Becoming:

1. The Girl Who Takes Up Too Much Space, always, her shoulders too wide in stairwells, her hips too big in doorways, her voice too loud in classes. This woman does not understand the art of crumbling, of curling herself tight like the spiral of a fern, soft, delicate, unwilling to reach out the ivy of her fingers to grasp onto what should rightfully be hers. This is a beast, an elephant, a moving mountain and she is capable of flattening you, she is capable of ruining you, she is capable of making you feel as small and insignificant in her life as she is supposed to be. You are this woman’s footnote to history, you are her side note in song lyrics, you are constantly interrupted by her with a witty joke you wish you thought of. I asked what the problem was with being a steamroller instead of a sunflower and I was laughed down.

2. The Beautiful One, the long hair or the slim waist or the pretty eyes or the lips like bowstrings. This woman looks good in everything because she’s confident in whatever you put her in. She’ll cut her hair short on you no matter how you like it, she’ll wear high heels and step on your opinions, she’ll look hot as hell no matter what size she is. See, the reason you can’t trust her is because women like this don’t need your permission, they’ll do as they please and get away with it. They’ll say no to you, over and over. Teach your daughters that beautiful means dangerous, teach them to distrust women who love themselves. Equate beautiful with vapid, equate pretty with stupid, take their power from them. Say they’re vain for their makeup, refuse to see them without it. These women are snakes, they are serpents. I said maybe the problem lies with you being unable to control yourself and was told to get off my pedestal.

3. A Bitch. Women are supposed to be ladies in the street but will tear skin under sheets. I’m told: Never raise your voice. Speak gently. Submit. Hold your opinion against your lips and when you admit to it, make sure it comes out as a butterfly wing suggestion. Don’t disagree. Don’t undermine someone else’s authority, regardless of whether or not they deserve your respect. Someone touches you, just move away from them. Don’t hit. Don’t talk back. Be like the ruins of Rome, only beautiful if you can’t hear your quiet death.

4. The Needy One. I have heard how others spit when they talk about how she gave you everything and you shoved it back down her throat until she choked on it, until she came back crawling and asked you what she did, until her palms and knees were scraped for want of just a little affection - never be this woman, I’m told, because she’s a joke and the joke is that she dared to have more emotion than you did. The truth is, I’m told, the one who cares less in a partnership is the one who wins. I didn’t know this was a competition.

5. The Cock Tease, certified stripper, how dare that girl look like that and not want me to sleep with her. Lust is always personified as a lady in red with a dress slit up her thigh. Lust is sinful because it’s power, it’s not asking for attention - it’s demanding it. I’m told she is the worst kind of woman, that looking good is supposed to be some kind of shame on her kin. I’m told not to leave the house in such a short skirt, not with a shirt so low, not with a lace back, not with high heels, not dressed like that. My lipstick can’t be too red, my hair can’t be too mussed, I can’t just “turn someone on like that and then leave them wanting.” I mentioned that instant gratification actually ruins our psyche and was told that being led on was “exhausting.” I said that there was a difference between purposefully tricking someone into liking you and just being attractive or friendly. I was told there’s also a difference between coffee and tea but both result in caffeine. I said, “I’ve been turned on in class by the girls I talk to but I didn’t expect anything from them,” and they said, “It’s different, you’re not a man,” but couldn’t explain where that difference was.

6. A Slut, obviously ruined by another person’s touch. It doesn’t matter how many people she’s actually been with, it’s all about the rumors she carries with her. Easy. Harlot. You’ll still try to get with her, you’ll still take her into your bed and kiss her and say things you don’t mean - but you’ll defame her name when you talk to your buddies. My father used to say “A slut is fine for the night, but the virgin is who you take home and marry.” Maybe he didn’t know he was teaching his daughter to hate her sexuality. Maybe he didn’t know that every time she’d be kissed, her whole system would shake until she felt ready to combust, shame and self-hatred shivering against her spine. Maybe he didn’t know she’d disconnect emotions and sex because he always told her, “Boys are different, they won’t care about you.” Nobody said to her that it was okay to experiment. See, the funny thing is, I’m a dancer so I know exactly where my center of gravity is. I know how hard I’ll fall in each direction. Yet out of fear of getting hurt, I won’t let a single person inside of my bed.

7. The Soulmate. Never love romance more than you love being cynical. Never show weakness, never like pink, never think maybe you might find someone nice and settle down with them. Someone will find you, I was told, And if you’re lucky, he’ll put up with you when you start getting old. Never be the woman who believes in happily ever after, never be dumb enough to think maybe someone could love you after all of your mistakes. It has nothing to do with whether or not a family is important to you and you’re in a good place where a relationship would make your life better - you’re not a princess. You don’t get married, you settle.

8. The Girl With Strength, who can outrun everyone and who is stronger than her boyfriend. “See the thing about boys,” says my daddy, “Is that you have to let them win.” I sat at home and read stories about Artemis and wanted to become the huntress, too. I wanted to howl at the moon, I wanted to slay the beasts that bested me, I wanted to rule my kingdom with bloody fists. But girls are never athletes, never supposed to be “built,” regardless of the fact civilizations were constructed on our spines and we made homes in war by the steel of our ribs. Never be strong. We are supposed to wilt.

9. The Lady CEO: because if you choose work over family, are you really a girl? How dare you fight your way to the top through every pair of eyes that bore through your blouse, through every meeting where you were hushed by the sound of someone else talking, through every time someone called you “sweetie,” how dare you yearn for something. Is your husband the stay-at-home one? I can’t imagine how that is going. He’s not a real man, after all. I don’t give it long before the divorce. How dare you decide you’re happy being single. Don’t you know you’re supposed to bear children. Where is your honor? Where is your wisdom? Who cares if you are the leader, the best suited for your position, the quickest-thinking, the one who makes the hardest clients come back again. Don’t you see? Across history, women have been terrible at success. They always lose their man in the end. (When I said, “I would rather be a famous author than a mediocre mother,” I was told, “No, don’t worry, you’ll be a fine mommy.”)

10. THE GIRL I AM: FIRECRACKER AND DON’T YOU FUCKING FORGET IT I’LL RIP YOU TO SHREDS AND I WON’T FUCKING REGRET IT I’M NOT YOUR PRETTY GIRL I’M NOT YOUR ANYTHING I’M PERFECT, MOTHERFUCKER, AND I’M NOT GOING TO GIVE UP WHAT I’M DOING. I DON’T WANT TO BE “LADYLIKE” THAT LITERALLY MEANS NOTHING I’M NOT GOING TO STOP STANDING UP AND DEMANDING WHAT’S COMING TO ME. I’M GONNA BE SOMEBODY. I’M GONNA MAKE THEM REMEMBER ME. I REFUSE TO BE OVERSHADOWED IN HISTORY. I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU WERE TRYING TO CREATE BUT YOU MADE ME A DRAGON YOU PUT ME IN THE FIRE AND WHEN I STOPPED BURNING I LEARNED HOW TO GLOW DON’T THINK YOU CAN STOP ME YOU CAN’T TAME A TORNADO.”

In respectful response to a poem tilted, “Ten men women have warned me against becoming." /// r.i.d