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I don’t believe in God but I pray to shampoo bottles like rosaries made of plastic and despair.

The love of my life has gone. I told him so. He smiled like a guillotine falling in slow motion.

Day one: I wash you out with water hot as molten copper, the bottle heavy as a collapsed star in my trembling constellation of callused fingers.

Day fourteen: half empty, a dried hourglass where time bleeds backwards into the drain like liquid archaeology.

Day thirty: I pour the last into a candle’s hungry mouth and strike a match like lightning divorcing from the sky.

You burn strawberry-sweet, smoke rising like prayers, a crematorium of memory.

Your pillow exhales ghosts thick as opium dreams.

I sleep with my face pressed into cotton that tastes like the underside of thunder.

I find your sock behind the radiator—

a small suicide note written in wool and abandonment.

The receipt crumples in my coat: £47.83, our last supper itemised like evidence at love’s autopsy.

Strawberries

New shampoo, alien scent.

Each wash feels like drowning the last cathedral in an ocean of amnesia, like baptising myself in the wrong god’s tears.

Did he cry for me?

I can’t remember if your eyes were amber or autumn dying, if your laugh sounded like glass breaking beautifully or wind through cemetery gates.

Then:

the 8:15 train, a metal serpent swallowing distance. You, three seats away, still breathing in colours I’ve forgotten how to see.

I touch my scalp—

hair like wheat after wildfire—

and smell strawberries burning, remember the candle ceremony…

how I thought flame could divorce us from gravity.

But here you are, turning pages like prayer wheels, alive as an opened wound,

whilst I’ve been measuring grief in millilitres, drowning in bottles that hold more than

soap—

Amber-warm, yet forgotten,
like the last snow before March marches in…
I don’t think of it too often,
for it might carry me away with the wind.
It lies there,
feather-light,
in a drawer—
the last memory of us.
Lullaby-sweet,
yet forgotten,
like the first poem I penned.

I sit quietly at the board,
My pieces arranged with care,
Though my moves feel uncertain,
As if another were pulling the strings.

Every glance a pawn,
Each word a knight,
Rotating, moving too quickly,
Then moving too slow,
The game never still enough,
To know if it’s real or not.

I use to play fiercely,
Always a queen’s gambit,
Always a trap laid beneath
The smooth surface of a smile.

But here with you,
I feel myself waiting for the check,
Anticipating the sharpness of betrayal.
I know the rules;
The quiet betrayals,
The subtle pushes.
There is no exchange of words but everything hurts.

Is it just another round of calculated moves,
Or are we building something,
Something where I can let my guard down?

You say your heart is open,
But i’ve seen hearts open,
Only to be crushed,
Squeezed until the blood drips dry,
Turned over on the board
Like a forgotten piece.

So don’t blame me,
As I question each step,
Wondering if this is the beginning of a game,
Or the end of another loss.
I wonder, is love really this fragile?
Or am I simply playing with ghosts,
Afraid to breathe too deep,
In case it all slips away.

I’ll call cheque,
But will you meet me at chequemate?

The road ahead is long for me,
Yet I trust what lies beyond it.
And I won’t impede your path,
As you continue on your own journey.

You’re free to follow your path;
I now choose to follow mine.
Because at the end of the day,
Isn’t that what this is all about?

I was swept away by deep emotions,
Feelings I surrendered to.
Too much optimism, too much desire—
But now I see with newfound clarity.

I gave the best of me,
Without question, without hesitation.
I shared my victories, my wounds, my truths,
Parts of myself that were long concealed.

The ground beneath me has given way,
Crumbling and collapsing.
I’ve fallen into that void
Where your colors cease to be.

And while I go through the motions,
However long it takes,
I’ll take my time surveying the aftermath,
Learning what I can from the fragments left behind.

In time, I know I’ll heal.
I’ll recover and rise again.
I honor what was real,
As I release what’s no longer mine.

I release all those dreams,
The future I once imagined.
Like ashes spread in the sea,
I watch them drift away with love.

I won’t vanish and I won’t fade.
I’ll rise again, better than before.
I’m still rebuilding, but I’m becoming,
Because the universe is receiving me.

You’ll never know the depths of my grief,
Or how I suffered in silence.
But I’m thankful for all of it,
For it made me wiser, and I remain open to love.

I let go of this heartbreak, return it to the stars—
Without bitterness, without resentment.
I keep my hope, I keep my belief,
That the universe is receiving me.

And perhaps one day,
All of this may reach you in some mysterious way.
But that’s not my intent—
Because my purpose is to heal and keep moving forward.

As this chapter ends and the page is turned,
I look forward to what the future holds.
Because deep down I hold onto this conviction:
The universe is receiving me.

And sometimes—
The universe sends something back.

I would let you eat me alive,
Devour me whole, and
Digest me completely.

I would let you set me ablaze-
Bright lights engulfing me;
I’d burn to a crisp.

You could carry me to sea,
Drag me down, drown me,
And I’d still thank you.

You took her first,
So far away…
If I went next, from here
to Her,
I’d go.

Oh, wrath of Death,
My body’s yours.
Take me- your plaything –
Don’t hold back now!

Swallow, sink or smolder,
Just stop my sorrow.

Swiftly send me to my heart.

So predictable like the rain but
love doesn’t make it storm any less.

Your sadness, so beautiful,
your brokenness sings me to you—
fragile like the waves you
break on the shore,
while I try to hold you
in my hands, fading into shells,
a place we try to make home too.

How could I have known
there were really twelve of you,
and one night you would find another
seat at a table where there would be more
food to be peeled, shucked, devoured?

Bleed my hands to wood and play me,
puppet master, string me to life—
animate my heart, cartoon red and ghoulish pink—
but what was worse,
we loved each other most.

I started at five,
morphed into ten.
Crisis overflow—
Why am I sleeping with so many men?

Made a promise.
Repent.
Born again.
No more men.

Then I do it again,
again,
and again.

This ain’t how Mama raised me.
To sin
has become my religion.

How could I ever be somebody’s wife
With all of these ghosts
Hiding away in my closet?

A new one comes—
The counter ticks again.
This ain’t for pleasure,
No, not at all.

Just need skin to skin
to feel
something.

Make a vow:
I’ll be good.
I’ll do right.
Try celibacy.
Quit – cold turkey.
No more ghosts lurking—
Just stay in the light.

Weeks pass.
Months.
I can even do years.

But another comes.
The ache begins.
She throbs below.

Can’t stay a good girl for too long.
Need a fix.
I dive back in.

Why am I such a whore?
Why must I scratch an itch
that’s never satisfied?

He can’t please me,
So I go to the next guy,
And then there’s that one over there.

It was ten a few years ago.
Now I don’t even try to pretend.

Don’t ask God for forgiveness.
Skip the church altar on Sunday.
There’s no need to ask for salvation.
Why?

A ho gon’ be a ho.
And I’m just gon’ do it again anyway.

how we took down the economy in the first decade of the century

We bit into the century
like strawberries in June—

each one a bond,
dressed in sugared red—

sacks of pulp
with seeds of risk.

We said:
*slice it,*
*package it,*
*rate it triple-A.*

Call it fruit
when it’s barely jam.

The men in suits
didn’t build anything.

They conjured glass towers
from bundled lies,

paper pyramids
stacked in fog.

They sold dreams
disguised as data—

and the data—
*doctored—danced.*

Greed grew a mouth
too big to chew.

It gorged—
it gasped—
it gnashed.

What began as hunger
turned to *frenzy*:

hedge fund sharks
in Armani,

mortgages flung like glitter
onto the backs
of the barely solvent.

Oh, the credit agencies—
*sacred oracles*—

told us the storm
was sunshine.

We taxed their names
with hearings,
with headlines—

but no stars were stripped.
No shrines dismantled.

And the economy—
that brittle
*glass god*—

shattered on impact
when the music
stopped.

They called it
*correction.*

We called it
*collapse.*

And somewhere,
the last ripe strawberry
was picked clean

by someone
who bet against
the harvest—

and won

My heart is held by the tiny prints from your hands.
The curls of your little fingers,
Entwined between the strands of my hair
Latched to comfort with a familiar scent.
My eyes are blessed to see you grow
A tiny and fragile soul
Blooming, like a wildflower
Infectious and beautiful,
Where does the time go?
Gorgeous blue eyes radiate,
The way the light sparks within
Glowing and spreading.
My selfless tribute to,
The incision from where you entered this world.
Where grooved stripes allowed you to grow and gave comfort.
In beauty too, they honor you
When night falls,
And after we’ve laughed and learned
I cherish each and every moment,
My precious little one.
The laughter, the tears and
Everything in between
Forever and every moment after.

I keep dreaming of hope,
As my wake – unyielding –
Keeps whispering,
And it grumbles – silently,
As her arms surround me,
Hopelessly,
I wonder,
Does hope love me?
If she does,
She does so – tenderly,
For when time travels,
I can feel her –
No longer,
I can smell her –
No sweeter,
As this love –
Turns into yearning
For me.