Erode

If I called would you answer?

Would you pick up the phone and ask;

“What can I do to help you?”

Or will you tell me a story about yourself?

If I gave you my silence would you be happy?

If I broke my back and my tongue for you?

If I said I was unhappy what would you tell me?

I often wondered what would you do.

Cause lately I've done a lot of thinking. 

About the past that was you and me.

Well mostly it was a lot of you, dear,

And little space to exist as me.

So many years to not exist in.

So many times I made sure I was erased.

So many ways to be unhappy. 

So much I compartmentalised away

I won't call and I won't answer.

I won't pick up because I don't need to know

How life has been treating you.

I am healing the me you tried to erode.

Past

We always want more time.

A repeat of a history where it didn't run out.

Like family dinners or vacations 

When we felt unbothered and loud.

We are always left with things undone.

All we can feel is that void.

Everything we wish we said on repeat.

Memories that only us now hold.

The past is becoming stories only I now tell.

I am so afraid that I won't tell them well.

Look away

It's easy to claim you don't see it,

To keep painting your world as idyllic,

To see your friend as all harmless

Your enemies and hate remain separate.

This way the pain becomes nothing 

That you need to reflect on.

Your conscience cleared from wrong doing. 

The earth righted so it keeps spinning.

If I don't speak up that's the issue.

If I use my voice it's too loud,

You want me to leave it festering,

Let me deal with the fall out.

Cause it feels like not your hurdle

Just a bridge that I now burned.

My name made things curdle. 

Doesn't matter if I am hurt.

It's easier to tell me that I'm a problem,

Then to see what I say.

The only action you now have to take,

Is to push me away.

Tell me I am too demanding,

Tell me I am too harsh.

It's the best way to ignore

The breaking of my heart.

Isn't the truth of the matter this?

You don't want to hear the truth or any of it.

You don't want to know what is wrong.

So you can continue on.

The way I always run my mouth

To the sound of an applause

When the spotlight is ways away 

Of being shone on their face,

Feels in hindsight hypocritical, 

The way my sermon is seen as spiritual

Until I call out your name.

Then I'm the one to blame.

Gaza is nog niet vrij

Ze verwachten blikken 

Naar de hemel of de grond

Maar niet richting de aarde 

Of gefocussed op de ruines.

En dat we door gaan met onze levens.

En dat iedereen denkt dat het over is,

Dat deze tijd begon 2 jaar terug 

En enkel maar tijdelijk was.

Achter gesloten deuren

Kunnen bommen nog steeds landen

Met precisie, accuraat, 

En de stilte van vermoorde journalisten. 

Achter gesloten deuren

Speelt het meeste van dit verhaal af.

Niet enkel gesloten door hun keuzes,

Maar omdat we alleen kijken

Wanneer wegkijken niet meer kan.

neighbours

I dislike you.

I don't care that you're new.

Your existence has me reeling

And it's more than just a feeling.

I know you are stranger but I recognise

Who you are by the look in your eyes.

By the way you lick your teeth ready to bite.

By the hate set in your face that you can't hide.

There's a taste to you even from afar. 

Like nicotine patches, spit and tar.

I smell your fists on the wall that separates us.

I bet you tell people that's the way you love.

I can feel your existence viscerally

In my bones, my stomach, and knocking knees.

In the expectation of sounds and anger.

In the expectation of you shifting like the weather.

Any moment of silence has me holding tight,

Waiting for the moment that you alight.

And there on cue comes the storm

That triggers another trauma response.

The yelping noise 

And violence in your voice.

The sound of landing blows.

You reaching a new low.

That definining moment.

The end of innocence.

You getting your rocks off.

The harm that you cause.

I just want you to know that I hear.

And I want you to know that I am here.

And I want you to know I won't stay silent.

I never promised you obedience, my man.

You might think this is fine. 

It is not and you crossed a line.

My fear won't hold me down.

This is my stand and I won't bow out.

Night

Midnight darkness should end the scene.

But here I am, losing sleep.

The seconds ticking in my head

And I can't feel 

my skin or anything at all. 

Emptiness fills my space.

I'm expecting silence but my thoughts race

with a fear that holds me down.

I want to scream

but I don't want to be heard. 

I am afraid to fall asleep all the time 

and to stay awake and watch hours pass me by.

I'm afraid I forgot how to rest. 

And what if you died,

and what if I'm next?

I don't know what to do.

Dichter

Ooit droomde ik dat ik een dichter was.

Mijn inkt vloeide op het papier als

een veer op de wind, zachte krullen en 

onverwachte bewegingen. Ik kan de

bewegingen van de pen nog steeds in mijn 

oren horen. Een schrap, een kras, en 

duidelijk nooit stil.

Ik voel mij allang geen dichter meer, maar

een persoon die soms dicht (als ik mij

überhaupt al een persoon voel).

Hoe anders moet je het noemen als je

je ideeën en gedachten verlies terwijl je

ze opschrijft. Halverwege de zin stoot ik 

tegen leegte. Mijn rijmen heb ik allang 

aan het universum teruggegeven. 

Ze zeggen dat je alles kan leren als

je jezelf de tijd geeft het te doen maar niet

iedereen heeft dezelfde tijd. Mijn tijd drijft 

in stilte op een zee van duisternis, weg 

van mijn handen en de opties 

die het ooit omarmde. 

Mijn jaren, ooit klei, nu verhard en 

opgedroogd, in dezelfde vorm dat ik het kocht.

Onaangeraakt en ongebruikt.

Ik probeer nu donkere kamers en

slapeloze nachten in interessante zinnen 

te vouwen, maar op hoeveel manieren kan

je hetzelfde verhaal op nieuwe manieren

vertellen? Het is niet alsof mijn leven 

verandert of opeens wat anders betekent.

Je kan een som maken van symptomen,

van rotdokters en misdiagnoses, maar 

wiskunde mist poezie. We hebben 

meer woorden nodig die rijmen op

uitputting.