FUCKBOYS: FUCK OFF

this is why i stopped fucking with guys: the misogyny got way too much for me. i am not a cumsock nor a fuck hole for you to unload your ego into. i am not here to pick up your fragile masculinity or to stitch it back together. i am not here to blow on the wounds of your bruised ego. i have stayed silent for far too long about the way your knees brush against my front or the way your hands linger on my ass. every fling i’ve ever had had one thing in common: there was a guy who wanted to feel superior, but this was a chick who was too aggressive and too loud, so she got dumped. for years i have preened when i am described as fiery, but now i am tired of it. why is it that the guy who spoke over me during our feminism debate not fiery or aggressive? why is it that the boy who speaks passionately about screwing girls any less /radical/ than i am? why am i held up to double standards? when a guy touched me today i turned to glare at him, but he smiled before scowling. you lie under the euphemism of fuckboy when you are a sexual predator. society has made you an acceptable aesthetic. you embrace the name fuckboy but when i call you a predator you bare your teeth at me and i remember what a privilege it is to be angry and not afraid.

this is why i scream: men are T R A S H

hail ye: an ode to feminism

i keep us in my wallet (not my mind)

these are grainy moments burned into pixels: your laugh, brilliant as i steal a glance; my face, blemished but radiant, even as my hair falls over my face; our nights, your fingers curled loosely around mine, my lips on your shoulder. these are our souls burned and made tangible, lying solidly against my crinkled bedsheets when they slip out of of my treasure trove. but why is it that i cannot remember what exactly we were? these are grainy moments, not in my mind: your laugh, muted; my face, blurred; our nights, ebbed.

this love is why i live

this was just like every other camp: the-night-before-anxiety hit me full on like twenty textbooks, i dragged myself and tried to cheer up, butter cup, made one friend, changed my mind about how god awful this was supposed to be, fell in love with the warmth of everyone, blinked back the tears when the goodbyes came, and made my way home.

this is just like every other camp: the people were so different from the last, but i loved them anyway. i loved the way we’d have our nightly feasts, calories be damned. i loved the ways we’d play cat and mouse, bated breaths and flushed cheeks pressed against closet doors when someone was rapping, rapping at our chamber door. i loved the way we’d banter with one another, exasperated laughter and poker faces meeting the most awful jokes ever. i loved the way we’d have each other’s back, you telling me to sleep even if i hadn’t done enough, or the way we’d give our all even if exhaustion made itself home on our eyelids.

this might just be like every other camp, when we drift apart because we’re all so busy, and live across the country from each other. maybe your faces will start to blur a little in my mind and maybe your names won’t curl as comfortably around my tongue, but this is enough. you made me happy these for days, and i don’t think i’ll forget the taste of this love on my tongue, not ever.

it made me want to live, even if just for a while. and i’m thankful enough.

babes, this love will never end: my heart will always love you

will you grant my dying wish?

of all the things i have lost i miss my fucking sanity the most.

this fever is lawless the way it siezes my brain hostage, shoving degree celsius after degree celsius at me and i am screaming screaming screaming limbs too weak to flail and the words that fall out of my parched lips are tearful prayers to gods i do not believe in. this is what desperation tastes like: the way my sweat ransom is not enough to set me fucking free, the way my body crumples and falls to ground when the cool water i used to frolick in bites against my skin, no longer gentle kisses running away the magma mount in my head. desperation is the way i wear my thickest jacket in singapore’s fucking weather ot the way i force myself to sweat till i am blind or the way i force myself to cry. women earn 79 cents to every dollar a man earns, my vision is barbercue hazed while my stomach sloshes, a sick sound that threatens to let itself be heard and i wish i was dead. they say everyone is afraid of death and i want to laugh because i crave death the way you crave life.

why dont you kill yourself then? they whisper and i am buzzed.

i fear pain. i would rather be dead than writhing in bed, ghostly images telling me that have me thrashing in bed like the wild animal i am.

WHEN SUMMER WENT ASKEW

there is a dull pounding against my head, thud thud thud until it bounces off the hollow of my sky, ringing like the crow’s cry on summer’s evening. there is a judge with a gavel in his hand and with every thought of /i must give up/ he strikes a wooden mark, /this is where the world does not wait for you/, his gavel whispers, husky crackle amplifying until my head is flooded with sound waves.

there is a lava trail down my cheek.

and the sea will swallow you whole

my heart is as heavy as my schoolbag and the guilt from yet-to-be-forged test papers. these days slipping into my depression is as easy as sleeping into my problems. look on the bright side they say, so i do. my australian friend sleeps six hours on a regular basis but here in singapore i sleep four hours. (three in the morning and one in lectures because my eyes are weighed down by the weariness bore from days of juggling a test every other day. my stomach churns like the sea deranged, slosh slosh slosh and i have to press my lips together lest oceans pour out of my eyes and rivers up my parched throat.) dreaming is a foreign concept but when i do i see quiet, hear the way the sky is blue and the grass, green, and i can feel the sweetness in the air and taste the joy in my heart.

when i come to, my pillow is damp.

i plunge headfirst into schoolwork.

Protected: what i learn from school

tonight the covers will kiss you asleep

home / warmth / raw / uncensored / familiarity / muted / soft / sighs / wisps / curl / steady / darkness / solitude / silence / forgetting / ignorance / bliss / o v e r /

–

if this is what you want: i’ll kiss you as many times as you need

inside my heart (a wind called you)

yesterday i loved you for the way your body grooved to the beat, lithe and steady and so goddamn alluring. your body cut the daintiest silhouettes against the bright lights and i wanted more of the way your hips pushed forward, gaze burning on me like a fire licking up my body, primal but intimate. i lusted for your attention, dreamed of being your close binary star so i could chase after your lips.

today i love you for the way your eyes crinkle when they’re tired and the way you look at everything like they mean the world. when you cradle a book in your arm my heart skips a beat because i never knew that this is what it means to love. love is embracing a book for the tune it hums and not for the name of its composer nor the suit it wears. when your fingers curl quietly around the plants you grow in your garden, the seedlings in my heart are sprouting. it’s enough watching you love, even if i’m not the object of your affection. i’m content with loving a soul as beautiful as yours.

tomorrow i will still love you. i don’t know exactly how i will do that, but i do know that my heart will always burst when i watch the way your lips quirk or the way your voice is a purr when you mumble through the haze of sleep. you are lighthouses beaming in the dark when the sea whirls up its pointed pines and i know that i will dock safely when i follow your trail. you do you, babe, and remember: the world is yours. i love you.

listen to the whirl of the wind: it’s kissing my cheek tonight

inspo: there is a mars for every venus

title: my heart is full again

Tag: poetry