Heart in Hand

There is a hole in my chest were my heart used to be. You took it with you when you left and I was never brave enough to ask for it back. Things are different now - roles reversed as the cold wind blows us towards something new and improved. Strangely enough you are wearing a hat. It is pulled down firmly which means I can't see your eyes. It doesn't really matter though; I know them by heart just as I do every delicate detail of you. As usual I feel like I am cheating death when you reach for my hand across the table. As usual I feel like there is nowhere to be but here when you lift your tired gaze and meet my eyes for the first time tonight. Your face is pale and hollow and there is a silent desperation in every breath.

Then you smile your childlike smile and I decide in an instant that I want you to hold on to my heart for just a little while longer.  

While I was dreaming

Off the Map

The streets are sleek with rain; the grey surface reflecting the streetlights as I drive on endlessly over viaducts and through tunnels – towards where my heart has been kept for a very long time, via the arteries and veins of my expansive city. The contradictory nature of this place – so incredibly heartless but also loving, so callous and cruel, yet still warm and embracing.

I am wide awake as I move into the right lane. My turn is coming up now. I have always wondered if will look back once my decision has been made and I guess I will know soon enough. It is for certain that my world is less empty since you came along and I am petrified to go back to how it was before there was you. I no longer do black or white, only shades - yours is darker than mine but with more sparkle. If we merge will the shade mirror the rain-drenched streets I am driving on?

As I take my turn (without looking back) I can feel myself start to smile.

Ironic, iconic

In between days I step away from you; finding my escape in chords, in the notes flowing endlessly from my speaker. Change is sure to follow and I am calmer these days, but if this is maturity I ask it to kindly fuck off!

A new chapter, but bringing me right back to where I started. I am not the same, not anymore; I have been reshaped and remoulded riding uncontrollable waves, always chasing new and illusive moments - I am not sure you will like me now and I do care, but very little. I close my eyes, but I still feel wide awake, like my nerves are too close to the surface. There is not a single day when I don’t think about our drive through the city - you always did hit me straight between the eyes, like a ton of bricks. Who needs new love when your heart is perpetually closed?

I am here whenever you want to ride the waves with me…

To let go

There is a new kid in town and he has golden spurs attached to pointy cowboy boots. He is larger than life in the night-time, but in the harsh daylight he thankfully gets smaller and more manageable. Most cities are too big for him, he needs the wide, vast wilderness in order to feel life properly underneath his feet; the air whipping his lungs, every breath a frenzy sucked from his body almost violently. His happiness is tied to that wind, to change and to the costal waves crashing in from the sea. He opens his hands and gives you the rainbow and he feeds you sunshine (even though he has none himself). Suddenly you feel less alone and suddenly you want your own set of spurs even though you’ve spent a lifetime making fun of them with your friends. In this moment gold is the only way to be as he softly takes your hand and asks you to just surrender.

When an outfit does not measure up

You tell me the pale lilac shirt I gave you such a long time ago is still with you, even though you are a travelling salesman who never stays long enough in one place to feel anything at all. You tell me life was richer then; months and years passing underneath our feet while we were busy hiding in the shadows in order to not get hurt. It’s a nice little alcove you have pencilled out for yourself – free of accountability so that you can stay in your play-pin a bit longer, avoiding boredom, avoiding trying to catch anything at all. How does it feel to move at speed but not at all? I would give you sterling silver/dollars/euros in order to find out and I suspect I might regret it. Your extravagant heart, your extravagant hands – I used to love them beyond words as I did you, but we are both covered in ash now.

I am afraid one lilac shirt will change nothing.