Strike the right tone

It's simply the wrong volume

They say.

Got to be soft and tender

It's no longer about the words I say

Or the message I convey.

It's always the same tale.

People getting lost in the tone.

And simply without fail

I become a lesson to be learned

(But they never want to).

The way I shape my vowels 

Around my consonants 

In my mouth.

An exclamation mark too many.

Simply too loud.

The way I swallow words

Down with my spit 

Just to burn the hurt

Right out with my stomach acid

(But it never becomes delicate enough).

The way my existence is too present,

And the way silence was implied. 

Expected to be stuffed 

Back into my intestines 

To be digested 

Until I can lie

And say all is fine.

All is well.

Can't you tell?

Never meant to break 

Your image of yourself.

I'm right here, spit me back up.

I never was easy going down.

Everyone needs to be reaffirmed now 

That they are a good person.

I guess that is all that matters.

I guess this is what we care about.

It's settled.

Who cares that people can still hurt my feelings.

I'm all but stone in people's minds.

Fuck, you can still hurt my feelings. 

Especially when they get denied

(But they'll say they didn't).

Cycle

If you let them

Do unto others 

What is done unto them 

Will the cycle ever end

And not start anew?

Christmas started in Palestine

Santa Claus can't visit Gaza.

Maybe that you'll understand. 

Cause God Forbid you take a shot

At understanding the tale of death. 

No that the airspace above Gaza

Is closed to Rudolph and friends, 

That is something Western enough

To be something you might get.

But God forbid they ask for silence 

To be gifted as a present. 

And don't they dare ask to be gifted 

A future beyond the present.

Cause that would be too much empathy.

That would be too much to ask.

Iron

How can you carry a people in your heart

To keep them whole, 

To keep them safe?

How can I carry a people away from harm?

From a world that is ready to bury,

To let them bleed out for days 

And carry them off into their graves.

How can I disconnect you from your escape,

Your silly memes, and your little games?

I want to rip it all apart.

The soft soothing hole

That makes you think all is okay.

That there's no need at all to hurry.

You need to understand what's at stake.

Every life that burned away.

Every beginning that stood no chance. 

Every empty crib that no longer sways.

The red that stains the land.

~*~

The land will not recognise anyone else.

It can count the rust on their keys in years.

It wil not turn stolen lives into ownership.

Land cannot be owned, wil not listen to fear.

~*~ 

It's upside down, this world.

Exactly like it's made.

The rot settles 

And then rises to the top.

It never mixes in well.

It clots 

Then leaves a taste.

 

Always of iron. 

Always of dirt.

Always hated.

Always thinks it's undiluted 

And celebrated.

We gave life to our mistakes.

It's just not our own lives we give.

Optellen

Nooit meer betekent niets meer

Wanneer 

Nooit meer

Eigenlijk “enkel 

Voor levens die wij wel

Op waarde schatten,

Maar de rest kan

Dood vallen.” 

betekend.

Dood vallen 

Met kanonsballen 

In hun armen

En hun ziel op hun tanden

Waar ooit etensresten 

De dag zagen.

De rest van de dag

Is niet op komen dagen.

Geen rust te bekennen

De geluid van drones

Als muggen die jennen

Tot ze nachtmerries drinken.

Het is nog steeds sommige levens zijn meer waardevol dan die van anderen. 

Het zijn nog steeds ontmoetingen met de dood en niemand die iets wil veranderen.

Levens begraven onder ingestorte gebouwen zouden we niet normaal moeten vinden.

Ik tel de resten van mijn ziel in gebroken harten en verloren kinderen.

Traitor

How about you care about my experience 

Instead of making it about you?

How about you listen to what I say

Cause you never really do.

There's something about how I

Know what I want,

That makes you demand that 

I become what I'm not.

How about you take your words 

And shove it back into your mouth? 

How come everyone that's silenced

Is so obsessively loud?

There's something about how I

Live my life unbothered. 

That makes you want the space

To totally interrupt it.

So raise your glass

And take a sip!

You got them all

Listening!

Sure, It must feel

Like a win!

Sure You're not next 

On the list!

Oh raise your glass

And have that drink!

You will need it,

Don't you think.

So come here

And share a kiss.

Then chose swim

Or then chose sink.

Either way you'll drown.

Either way you too go down.

Tell you

 

I cannot tell you

How small it feels,

When life fits into one hand.

All of the moments,

From beginning to end.

I cannot tell you,

How scary it feels,

Not knowing where you stand.

Every day on a loop,

Every action is a demand.

I cannot tell you,

How choking it feels,

No longer knowing what can be bent.

Am I only the bruises

To which I now tend?

And I cannot tell you,

How scared I now am,

Because life feels already spent.

Every single second,

Borrowed and again lent.

Panic attack

I cannot do this again,

What is there left to say?

I cannot look beyond the precipice 

And take the plunge again

Just to keep you safe.

Not because the fall is too steep.

It's because I'm still falling

Deep in your dismay. 

I haven't come down yet.

Or up, whatever you like to call it.

I guess it depends on

Which angle you're looking from. 

Either way.

I'm still at nights spend too awake

With eyes that don't keep open during the day

Worrying about 

The next best thing you come up with.

I'm already made of panic.

I cannot keep doing this.

This exhausting excitement has its way.

With all the fucked up scenarios 

That lives inside my brain.

But here we go.

Oh God I need boredom

Not hands that still shake. 

I need to, want to 

Have that nothing that

Makes you want to tear your brain away.

I'm 2 ulcers 

Shaped like your face

Away from a dirty dozen.

I hardly even repeat

My favourite shows or books.

But you repeat it all every day.

You repeat it against your will.

The questions your brain can't keep up with

And the breaking of sanity.

Don't make me do this.

I think it's here to stay.

I can no longer wonder where you are.

Are you wandering?

Got lost along the way?

You repeat me every day.

Is this all that will remain?

Looping around in cycles

Never finding the way.

Just up and down,

But never ground.

Never hitting the brake. 

And I take back what I said back then.

I am a candle in the water.

I'm not build to drown to keep you safe.

I'm living in my own head

Keeping my own dark at bay.

Now pause, babe.

I'm not doing this again.

You can't do this again.

Neither of us can keep up.

No, we need to stop doing this.

It's no longer give and take.

I am not the one to take that hit.

I'm too leaky to shelter you from the rain.

Worrying about whatever you do next.

Worrying about all of it.

It's hard enough to keep myself sane.

The black eyes you create. 

I'm still fingering the bruises

Every day. 

Picking my split lips (bloody).

Forced to watch out how this will play

Out, tragedy like Shakespeare. 

I am not made

For this. 

I wish help was on the way.

Instead I got reasons for my poetry. 

And you get being failed again.

God, they failed you again.

My love

Even that one fingertips shines more

Than you used to. Smile radiant and 

Forever plastered on it seems. I am

In love with you and I want more.

You are in love with life and you want

Everything. And babe if it were up to me

I will give you the entire world. You see,

It needs a star, so it's you they want.

A shining star I gladly share if there is one

Thing I'm can keep just for me. Late night 

Whispers between sheets and twilight.

All the things that makes you the one.

Sane

 

Is being lost in memory the flavour of this season?

Because I can tell you, I do not like the taste.

I already know how they laid my youth to waste.

I do not care to get lost in their reasons.

Do I have to put my wandering mind on ice?

So I can cool the thoughts that bring me back.

I rather enjoy my life filled with things it lacks.

No more manipulation and no more lies.

You do not deserve to be remembered at all.

But those that hurt take up all the space.

Keeping the past right there in its place.

So I hope daily that they will fall.

I wish I could find where you hide yourself away.

And if I had a choice you would disappear.

But you’re stuck in my existence it appears.

And I am left wondering if I will ever be sane.

December day

Broken fingers on display,

I am spelling my misfortune out.

Something broke inside my brain 

And I lost the ability to cry.

That cold day in December,

Turned my body into a cage.

And to make sure that I remember,

Thinking is all that I can do.

I no longer know how to get through the day.

I no longer know how to find the words.

And every day stays exactly the same,

While it rains inside my head.

I think

I'm depressed. 

Power

Is my body not enough 

If it isn't touched

The way yours is touched?

Did their fingers leave a mark?

A scent I can't get rid off?

Is my body not asking

For me to dig my fingers in?

To find a way to bring

Your soul to an uprising?

I also am not free of sin,

At least according to them.

I think a lot about that.

How they say I'm not heaven send.

And you are here to tell

I can't send you to heaven

As well just of what I am.

Not the right way of Not man.

Funny that.

The only difference 

Between you and them?

Power.

severe ME day

The calendar has changed its time.

Another day passed in this consuming fire.

The planet has changed position but not I.

I'm rusted into bed watching daylight 

Slow dancing with the night. 

I wake my mind with my new desires.

Just to live another day with the same plans.

And sometimes I think I might be liar

Because I want my body to be lying.

God, it feels like slowly dying.

Ideas turn to ashes in my head,

Colours are bleeding out of my hands. 

Sometimes my mouth tastes like death 

And I'm not really living a life.

Just a very prolonged goodbye.

All the things I want snatched away.

And although I cannot abide the silence,

My mouth chews the words I want to say.

Am I truly rotting away my life?

Just existing waiting my time?

But life won't catch up to the years.

No matter how good I am at standing still

And waiting, I'm not breathing life into my fears

If it is simply the reality that I live.

I'm holding out for a wish.

Busy hands

Two busy hands

On the side walk,

Scraped.

You ask me 

About the taste

Of yours.

I just like their shape.

“While you're 

Down there, you 

Can chalk your fate.”

I already know 

It, babe.

It is other days

Spend on my knees

On the sidewalk

Praying you away.

I still remember 

The way

You looked at me

20 years too late.

I had yet to learn then

How to feel safe.

But today?

Today I'll be OK.

Fuck you, I'm ok!

I see your eyes in the porch light

Hungry to make me eat your words.

Fever struck and muscles tight

You tell me that my existence hurts. 

Hurts the world and hurts the dollar.

Hurts the children and their fathers. 

Hurts your eyes when you see me follow

Sapphic love stories right down into hell.

I might be fat but I won't swallow

Anything that you have made.

I'm spitting out whatever shallow

Opinions are drowning your life.

Does it hurt that I don't want you?

Are you so used to 

Being the main character,

That me just living my life

Makes you think you lose 

Another girl to fantasize to?

Are you hurt that girldick

Trumps a manly manhood? 

My cunt drips fire and truth.

I'm not a girl just because you need me to.

And I won't shrink because you want to

Bend me over and fuck me,

Fold me over to your will,

Tits spilling over, shaking and heavy,

You over run and ready to spill.

I am wanted and you hate it.

Because you're not wanted the same.

You watch my body as it cascaded

On to her, and you masturbated

Your hate all over your screen.

I'm a living reminder to you,

That you are not my life at all.

I'm a living reminder to you

That you can't make everyone small.

Every part of me is a big Fuck you.

My gender,

My curved spine,

My sexuality is a fuck you,

And my fatness will eat you.

As my wheels prepare to bury you away.

My cane to batter on your reign.

Mobility weapons ready to go.

I want you to remember and know:

You won't make my disabled pussy cum.

It knows how to be loved well.

Your rise and swell

Won't move my mountains,

Will never make you feel strong.

You shouldn't have let them come over.

I think that you deserved each other.

Isn't that what I shouldn't say?

People always find a way,

To make excuses for your traits.

As if you didn't do the same.

Old tears don't make a no a yes.

And the past

Won't erase the present.

You're not a rockstar babe.

Just a toxic sludge manipulator.

A vicious smile calling us haters

An old lie making excuses for him.

But both your fingers were deep 

In unwitting participants,

From beginning to the end.

You dug out the crevices to hide the other

Away into another.

And I'm not sure why you bothered.

“Don't Worry I know they love it,

Who wouldn't want to be fucked by fame?”

You say in newspaper articles.

A rite of passage is on the way.

You left them in pieces and walked away.

As long as you were left unhurt.

Guess that saved the world.

Another privileged hero supergirl

Blurring lines of consent.

Maybe you should write a song about it.

Error 404

Everyone is moving on living their life.

Heads turned up to soak up sunshine.

When will I stop feeling left behind?

When is my day to share a knowing smile? 

I'm living life like I already died.

You know how it's the darkest right outside

The edges of the light that shines? 

I made my bed right there and there I lie.

Making myself believe it will be alright.

Do you remember the sound of my smile?

Will I just wither away until I die?

I wish I could believe in a happier lie.

Outside of the walls I'm trapped inside.

Will I spend forever frozen in time?

Error 404, access denied.

Take me outside

I'm like the tree

That you need to plant. 

I need the growth,

I need the grass.

I need the air 

That still smells wet.

Like the rain

Has not left yet.

I need the leaves,

I need my breath.

Nature whispering

Inside my head.

I want my feet

Right in the land.

So I have a moment 

To just be present.

Tendency

You have a tendency

To sneak upon me.

Arms raised on a level that people mistake for a hug.

But I know you mean to hold me down.

Because you want me to erase your mistakes.

Uplift your image for society's sake.

Tell them that you are so great. 

Definitely not the reason for my broken state.

Make them believe that everything is OK.

Fuck, There's no limit to how far you have to run away

To escape the tendrils of my wrath.

You have a tendency

To sneak upon me.

My arms raised on a level that people mistake for a gun.

I'll gladly be mistaken for the bad guy.

Has anyone seen Hope?

I am grieving hope.

A lost child in a burned out park, 

The gray where flowers once stood.

A memory.

I thought humans were better.

I'm alone.

No not alone,

But lonely in that feeling 

Of care and healing done communally.

There is this western ideal.

It's called individuality.

Some have it translated to

“Only I and what I want matter;

Only I and what I approve of are alive.”

Worthy of life.

Not worthy of life.

Three letters mean a lot.

The rest of us move through life masked.

Hoping they don't recognise us.

I rather you be inconvenienced than lose my soul

How do you want them to pray without any hands, or talk without their words?

When their tongue is stuck to the roof of their mouths, and their mind is still at home?

When their stomachs rumble louder than the bombs, what do you want them to do?

How can you say they lack basic humanity, but when put on display,

Ours is the one that is found wanting, every single time?

We have killed and we have slaughtered, and we have watched them die.

When the emptiness echoes louder than bombs, what do you think we should do?

Empty our vowels onto the sidewalks, and hope silence is the key?

I rather scream and bury your opinions of me, if it means life.

Lives lived in the grave

You tell me:

No one is free until we all are free,

While spitting in my face and choking me.

Where is the care you promised me?

You keep telling me that I'm free now. 

All restraints lifted.

All my shackles have come down.

I have to say that I can't see it.

You have your freedom and I'm still bleeding.

You have your future and  I'm still locked down.

Paying the price for your breathing.

Pouring my oxygen into your smile.

I have been sacrificing myself again and again and again and again 

And for a long, good while.

You won't know that you have you joined me until the moment when

Your breath is disappearing into them. 

And you are me

And I am you

And we will never be them again.

We will never be there again. 

Where being together unfethered

Feels like a breath of fresh air.

Death sometimes knocks on my chest.

At least Death likes to greet me with a mask.

I'm not ready to die yet. 

Yes everyone dies in the end.

But I shouldn't have to be ready to die yet.

Why do you say me dying is for the best?

But what do I expect? 

The only disabled people you respect 

Are dead.

You tell me:

No one is free until we all are free,

While you live on the grave you buried for me.

While I live in the ground you dug up for me.

Is that the freedom you promised me?

Recognise

I no longer recognise my fingers.

They have fallen silent on my hands.

Their battery has emptied,

Lost connection to my head. 

I no longer recognise my thoughts. 

They're like those earbuds with a chord.

Those you put neatly into your pocket, 

Only to surface in discord.

I recognise my feelings

But too many of them are left unwrung,

Without writing about it

To put breath back into my lungs.

I recognise my heartbreak, 

I just didn't expect to be here again.

The sting hasn't come out yet

Will it happen once more then?

A body beyond repair.

A story book left open-ended.

I'm trying hard to convince myself

That the me that was me hasn't ended.

A body now left sunken

And sleeping beauty will not wake.

You chose to have me broken,

And what's broken will never unbreak.

I no longer recognise my fingers 

And you no longer recognise my face.

But if it makes you feel better,

Just lie and say that it was fate. 

Ik heb geen gender, wat nu?

Ze zeggen

De afscheiding in onderbroeken heeft een gender

En de bloed op hun lippen ook.

Een vuistgevecht op een zondagochtend

En het hout op het vuur dat rookt. 

De kleur van een pen heeft een gender

En de prijs kaart van mijn shampoo.

Vrouwen houden van prijzige dingen.

Mannen zijn nu eenmaal goedkoop.

Er zit een gender naast die mot daar.

Daar in die ouwe petticoat.

En ook al in al die blazers.

En vergeet niet de maillot!

Vergeet ook niet de hem en haar pennen,

Roze hamers, de lippenstift in Rood.

Allemaal zijn tuurlijk biologisch 

Geboren genders en helemaal gewoon.

Everyone's friend

It used to be my favourite game.

To see where I could push and pull.

But I no longer untangle like strings of wool.

I unravel in the way you wanted me too.

The urge to say that I'm fine.

The urge to say everything will be OK.

Outlined against a world burning away.

Cut in smaller pieces to digest it to the fray. 

I'm with one foot in the past.

I wish I could cut it off like I cut you off.

One last burden to remind me of 

How everyone's friend couldn't love

His daughters (Anyone but himself).

What once was

Didn't you know that by the end of it all,

You couldn't give me a second 

To recognise who I was?

Didn't you think that by the end of it all

I wouldn't need another moment 

To pick up the remaining shards?

Didn't you see that by the end of all 

I hadn't an ounce of trust left

To give and share amongst you all?

But you never understood at all

That one single sorry will do nought 

To stop this flow of blood

Out of me.

Recycle

I miss the body I lived in.

The familiarity under my fingertips. 

Old memories now buried under my skin.

I can still taste the words in my mouth. 

They taste like ashes now

But used to be so easy to write down. 

I used to create worlds within these hands 

But now they dried up and turned to sand.

And I to wounds I cannot mend.

Soft tears

10 plus 10 still makes 2

But you have made your own conclusions.

I should wear your wounds for you.

And asking for any inclusion 

Is asking too much.

All is asked from you

Is to forget to spell the word ego.

But your life seems more worth than mine.

So you asked me to let it go.

To just die in silence.

All I can do is obey.

While you live your life your own way.

Consequences that I have to pay.

And you just continue your day. 

All I can do is scream.

But it's not like you would hear me.

Lives hidden between the seams.

Waiting to live so it seems.

And then I lost.

Lost the life that I got.

Given to you to take not borrow.

You won't even allow me my sorrow.

You say my life was worthless as

You use it to fill in the gaps

Of yours.

And as you close the door

To me.

To keep illusions of normalcy. 

You race my body to a finish line

Of unsteady decline.

When will it settle in my head? 

That you have me dying before I'm dead.

(Shed my tears before I'm sad.)

When will the anger take my heart? 

Before what's whole becomes what's not.

(My grief will tear my soul apart.)

When will the dust settle around me?

I have lost the feeling in my feet.

(My limbs are made of memories.)

When will it get through to you?

You are not invincible. 

You're just a gullible fool

Racing to your death

Taking me with you.