Nubilous (Word of the day)

I stand in the aisle with the spices on one side and the pasta and noodles

On the other and I turn around once and then again

And look at the list that is in my left hand along with my

Wallet and phone that then beeps and it's about what

A protest march, another death in a queue, gas shortages

I don't even know anymore if anything more could go wrong in this

Country that they've burnt to the ground with their corrupt

Incompetent don't-give-a-fuck leadership such a joke

But wait why am I in this aisle with the spices, do I need spices

I don't think so

A trolley first and a person follows, turning into this same aisle

He stops near the sauces, ah yes, I needed a can of mushroom

Canned food is safe, you can keep them for much longer

The canned food is in front of the sauces, mostly a luxury now

We mostly buy essentials, even though we can afford a few luxuries

There is so much guilt when so many can't eat or feed their families

When we are looking at an uncertain future where we may have nothing

To eat ourselves

Just money printed, valueless, the soil on land inherited

My mother walks up to me, complains about the price of fish

A kilo of something or the other

Almost what therapy cost two years ago

I need to go back, have the slime and fog and dust and cobwebs

In my head cleaned and removed

But for now, we walk away with our can of mushrooms

Some vegetables and a loaf of bread

She asks me about dinner and I shrug because talking

Is more than I can manage right now

souvenir

I keep things, this is why my room is a mess

Train tickets I bought to get to work

Pieces of paper on which grocery lists are written

Receipts from restaurants, movie tickets

Cards from friends and family

Coins from countries once visited

Envelopes with birthday wishes scrawled on them

Bo leaves, once green, now brown

Stones and seashells

I keep things, they clutter every surface in my room

And in boxes are all the things my grandmother made for me

Little crochet hearts and bags and pigs and squares

Orange, red, blue, purple, pink and green

Every chain so carefully stitched

I kept them all because these are things she left me

But today, I threw one away that had a stain on it

Burnt it before I could change my mind

A month ago, perhaps, I would have kept it

But today, out it went with a bag full of

Receipts and cards and pieces of paper and train tickets

Years ago, I threw away that one gift you gave me

I kept it with me, long after it stopped being of any use

But one day, when I was cleaning my room

I put it in with some other things in a garbage bag

It meant nothing to me, it has been so long since we last spoke

Recently, I was sorting through a box full of notebooks

Collected over the years, one of the perks of the job

They were taking up space and one has to be stingy with space

And love and happiness and other things

I flipped through the books in case there was something of value

And found myself looking for things I remember you writing

Doodles and words

All I could find was my own writing, barely legible, large, ugly, messy

I remember your writing being neat and small

But perhaps I'm wrong about this

I'm wrong about a lot of things these days

But in the trash those book too, went

And now, I feel like I'm one step closer to fully cleansing myself of you

There are journals I kept during those times

And truth be told, you make an appearance or two

But I can't seem to part with them

They remind me of times, not necessarily better

But definitely different

Strange because journals from more recent times

Notes taken down during therapy

They've all been thrown away

Funny, isn't it, how much distance there is between us

And yet how tied this memory of you is to me

Seven years (Coronach)

Word of the day: Coronach

In four days time it'll be seven long years since you passed

Waking me up at a quarter to midnight on the last Sunday of the month

To tell me you couldn't breathe and it didn't take long for you to take your final breath

And then that was it, you were dead

This is selfish, I know, but what I hated the most about your death

Besides your sudden absence from my life after having you by my side

Since the day I was born

Was the way everyone expected me to be strong

I'd just lost you and it felt like my world was collapsing around me

And people told me that I would get through it because

I'd had that final day with you, unlike grandkids who, by choice,

Had moved to countries that were oceans away from you

And I looked at that wooden casket you were in, closed, so I never had to see

What you looked like when you were no longer alive

And later, you were smoke and ashes, dust

Surrounded by people, I watched you go, never having felt so alone in my life

And now, seven long years later, I still want you here

Talk to the photograph we have of you in the living room

I tell you things and sometimes, let myself cry

Whisper that I wish I could join you in the afterlife

Red, white and rose

Word of the day: Oenology

Reds fill my stomach too quickly

Sitting there, heavy

Staining glass and lips

Weighing my heart down

I focus on my breath

Inhale and exhale

Force myself to remain in the present

Whites are the perfect buzz

Clean going down my throat

Everything looks so surreal

Like I'm surrounded by

Fairy lights and fireflies

In those moments the world

Is just so fucking beautiful

A rare treat, a rose is

Bubbles bursting against my tongue

A little dance of joy

Merriment, good things

Being transported to a different life

For a short while

Sitting on a beach

Sharing a bottle with

Someone I love

freak

skin on skin

naked

no longer reminding me of

raw fish

repulsive

an improvement

perhaps

my brain has surrendered

to the endless questions from

friends and first dates

never been in a relationship

body count, zero?

how and why?

i let you touch me

and pretend it feels good because

the panic that used to set in with

intimacy

has now been replaced by

indifference

but you don't need to know that

just give me what i need

so people will stop looking at me

like i'm a freak

keloid

never the smartest

when it came to the sciences

i only recently learnt about keloids

"so basically your brain keeps signaling that

scar tissue needs to be made long after

the wound has healed"

the layers that keep forming around my heart

ever since you threw it on the ground

stomped on it like it was a rubber toy

layers of tissue, skin, whatever it is

protecting me from the hurt that can so

easily be caused

what are they called?

single pringle

it hit me, when i least expected it,

that it was the oldest -my grandmother-

and the youngest -myself-

who were without partners

she lost her husband years ago

and perhaps thought of him often with a fondness

that didn't surface until after he had passed

everyone else - dating, about to be married

just married, married for a while -

and beyond our little group

most seemed to have found someone

the woman carrying a baby, waiting for her husband

to return from a shop with a toy

the young man reaching for the young girl's hand

blushing slightly

the elderly couple, seated on a bench

resting before the day's activities resume

the man telling his wife to hurry

before the train leaves

everyone had met someone they had

fallen in love with, found a sense of

compatibility with, had a child with

everyone had met someone they had shaped their lives around

accommodating new needs and displays of affection

and there i was

alone

and it hit me that i had never had this

despite being at the very end of

marriageable age

i had never had someone to love and care for

worry about, say a silent prayer for

even though i didn't even believe in the power of it

i had never known what someone's favourite dish was and

learned to perfect it

or instantly know what to get them for a birthday

to seek their warmth when i wake up in the middle of the night

the life i had trudged through

had given me joy and happiness

good memories

and bad

regrets and tears and grief

so many different types of love

but it had never given me this one thing

everyone else seemed to get

sometimes multiple times

in a lifetime

So unfair

You get to fix yourself

And I don't

But then again,

You never thought I needed fixing

Because the heaviness in my voice

Escaped your ears

The tears I fought back

Went unnoticed

When I could barely get a word out

You filled the silence with nonsense

"You're okay"

"You're okay"

"You're okay"

You kept saying

Even when I screamed

"I'm not"

"I'm not"

"I'm not"

Dirty thoughts

the first time you reached across the table

to hold my hand, i noticed your fingers

and wondered how good they would feel in me

while we sipped coffee and laughed about life

these were the thoughts that ran through

my mind

but when we eventually progressed from coffee shop

to room with a bed, closed doors

you clumsily fumbled your way around my body

while i had to grab on to the faintest sensations

to feel some satisfaction

if this is what it was going to be like, i thought

i'd rather it just be me, myself and i

Nothing to offer

I used to think I was no good for you

I had nothing to offer, not really

A body I hated seeing in the mirror

A belly too big, thighs too fat, a face too ordinary

Anxiety that made it impossible to leave the house sometimes

Or breathe with ease

Depression that left me exhausted

I needed to go for therapy

But instead I remained a burden on my friends

When I drank too much and couldn't stop my thoughts

From spiraling out of control and throwing me

Against one wall and another

I feared commitment, demanded affection

Wanted more than I could ever give

And so I thought I was no good for you

You were too good for me

But now, I take it all back

You only seemed too good for me

In pictures where filters hid your flaws

Carefully worded sentences that made you sound smart

Stories you spun so that you were the hero

Made yourself a cape out of made up trauma

But behind closed doors

Naked to me, you had nothing to offer

You were just another guy

So fucking ordinary

Couldn't pick you in a police lineup

Wouldn't notice you in a crowd