the slow art of breathing bitter

Sleepwalking on Sugar Crumbs

This got to be better, I promise.

The sky's yawning blue;

The bluebirds squeak through the azure flames.

Cities and streets blur in black and yellow.

Just hang with my heart and the sky—

Tuck the little sunshine in your pocket,

and whistle low about crushing worlds.

No pressure, friend, we've got time.

A Fleetwood Mac rolls down the window;

Flecks of snow glittering your eyes— I can't see

herbal tea evenings and rosebud scars anymore.

Time runs away like another morning wave;

but I could see your face again and again.

All the ways lead me nowhere; I know them better than anyone else.

We were young in our little worlds,

Sewing dreams and stars on green carpets—

Painting the solar system on our palms

and opening our hands to catch the wind,

Until our fingers caught nothing but

pain that tasted like metal and blood,

and went away 'til everything was blank and gone.

The air's salty against my lips; 

Give me morphine paved with paradise.

Mum once told me this world's made of sugar crumbs.

But I couldn't taste most of them,

for I wasn't sure I could be afloat anymore.

The sand's slipping through my little fingers.

The cigarette's burning high in the paper memories.

And I'm falling, falling, falling.

We've got through this shit, and we'll drive back home soon.

The chances are slim, like your punctured bicycle tire,

But the sunshine can hold longer than that.

Hold my hand a little long, darling; 

I don't want to leave—blunt and young.

The sand's cold beneath my jeans, and so are the stars

dotted on the blue cheeks above.

Don't go too hard, dear.

We get haunted at times when time sings off-key.

Our hearts fall on the floor,

hard like that wine bottle, and shatter.

You walk upon them, screaming and sobbing,

till you can feel nothing but space.

Don't tear that away; breathe the stars before

they melt into your eyes.

I've seen you at your best and your worst.

It's like napping in the sunshine at some point,

and dancing in a rainstorm at others.

I wanted to be that fresh air that makes your lungs

want to feel how the air tastes again and again;

I wanted to shower you with the sunshine I had caught

at times when rain fell hard against your skin.

I wanted to be your everything I couldn't have in my life.

And no matter how many times the land cracks,

I'll wait in the garden of thorns and plastic flowers for you.

But look what it made us—insane people with sane thoughts.

We couldn't grip each other, for we're too weak.

Our fingers groan against the razor,

and our veins bleed cold liquor.

We mold poetry into things we don't know how to not say to each other.

We've got another home, not inside of us this time.

Separate. Clean. Empty.

After a long time, I've realized how words could empty things.

Those cursed words now mean nothing but a shout in the void.

A broken mirror that asks you to love yourself when

you don't know how to.

A house on fire where you could do nothing but watch.

A wrong way that led to the right place at the wrong time,

and bang! Loving was like swimming in the ocean

with hands stretched further and further.

It was never coloring paper hearts and flying them away.

But hey, friend, look—the towns and masks are crumbling.

Stick your tongue out and taste them before they're gone.

Tuck your mistakes under your bedsheet and dance in wine.

Stop searching for "home" when it's right in front of you.

It's no more movies; it's no more blood and metaphors—

only skin and bones. Flesh and scars. Veins and tangled nerves.

It's just life, stranger; not always can gravity win here.

At times, you need to find another way and go against it.

All that remains is our penciled sketch and bloodless streams fading

in the opaque blue air of mistaken autumns. 

(And all the wrong strokes would look beautiful.)

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A/N: A quick vote before you go? Thanks!

© April 28, 2023. Sreeja Naskar.