My Poem ‘Where do I begin?’

I can’t tell you what just happened;
I can’t say with complete certainty
what everything all means;
I can’t make sense why things are the way they are,
because none of what occurred was in no way planned.
I can’t forget what was said, because it meant so much-
it still does;
I can’t be someone I am not-
no matter how hard I try, no matter what direction I try to go in,
I feel in limbo, stuck in quick sand, frozen in-between,
and no one can understand how hard it is for me to not think
about the fractured mirror of my memories
that can’t ever be reformed whole in the same way again-
because there are shards and pieces missing,
and the glass will now always be covered in cracks.

It’s raining outside today.
I am crying a monsoon of tears inside.
The weather is symbolic and an expression of how I am feeling-
cold, clouded, grey, uncertain, depressing;
I can’t help but question what people have said to me in the past
and rethink their sentiments,
and I wish I could restore so easily what I have lost
and what has been taken away, because I can’t take back and collect
all the tears that I have cried.

I just want the sun to come out and burn away the clouds
and make things how they were again;
I just want to know without any doubt that I am not going mad,
that I didn’t just imagine the world that I saw
and thought I knew;
I just don’t want to be told what I want to hear-
I want what I have always wanted:
a life to share with someone, inspiration, friends, family, love,
and a happy new year.

The future feels more uncertain now than it has ever been-
there is still hope, light, energy, holding on to me,
sustaining me, reminding me that not all that we lose is lost forever,
and right now that is what I need.

I wont walk away.
I wont forget.
I wont delete anyone from my life.
I wont retouch or alter the picture emblazoned in my head.
I wont stop hoping.
I wont stop believing.
I wont tear up anything and throw it in the bin.
I will come to understand what has happened one day, I am sure,
but until then I will remember everything,
and go back and figure out what has changed and why,
and perhaps what I could have and should have seen and done something about,
but the question is: where do I begin?

1/1/2014,
Starbucks, Coventry

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My Poem ‘My N.Y.’

I have been thinking a lot about New York recently,
actually I haven’t stopped thinking about
the city of my dreams since I left.
I still remember the taxi ride that I took to the airport
when I knew I was leaving, and actually becoming teary-eyed,
and incredibly sad to leave-
I felt like I was leaving a part of me behind,
I felt lost, I felt bereft.

As I watched the skyscrapers disappear in the distance over my shoulder,
I remembered every extraordinary moment that I had
in the best city and my favourite city in the world;
I remembered the friends that I had met for the first time,
who I cannot wait to meet again;
I remembered the places that I visited,
and even now can still remember every detail of every moment-
from the faces that I saw, to the sounds and the noises
and the voices that I heard-
I still feel I am reliving every overwhelming and inspiring moment,
as if I can easily jump backwards and forwards in time
from the now to the then, and back again.

Being in New York City was one of the best times of my life.
While I was there my entire destiny came into focus,
and I realized where I was and where I wanted to be.
Being in New York City, feeling the energy of everything
and everybody inside of me made it possible for the first time
to connect me to a higher knowledge of purpose,
and I felt unbelievable wherever I was-
whether I was standing in Times Square being bathed in colour
by the giant screens or the flashing lights,
or standing at the top of one of the tallest buildings in the world-
and I even remember closing my eyes and reaching above me,
as if I could literally touch the sky.

I can still remember the smiling face of my friend,
the fantastic street-performer Natalia Paruz
playing her musical saw in the subway,
I can still feel the elation that I felt every second
I was standing in front of her hearing her completely hypnotized
and in-awe of her, watching her, talking to her,
telling her how I couldn’t wait to come back to New York
even though I hadn’t yet left, seeing her again,
maybe even collaborating with her someday,
and being a part of her music that truly moves me like no other,
and of course hear her and watch her play.

I can still remember standing in Grand Central Station,
being surrounded by what seemed like thousands of people
all in transition to somewhere else;
I can still remember waiting for my amazing and awesome friend Kyle
to arrive and for us to share a meal and a meet-up together
that was epic on every level,
and added on an extra level of magic to my time there-
and the Umami burger that we had was to die for, I can tell you,
and it tasted like nothing else.

I feel like I am still sitting in Central Park sometimes,
on my favourite bench in the shadow of a statue of William Shakespeare,
in the incredible and beautiful golden light of the early morning sun-
every morning at seven I would wake up, get dressed,
walk out of my hotel, go to my favourite coffee shop, Starbucks,
and then walk through Central Park,
and then just sit there and take in everything that I saw, heard, and felt,
and feel like I left my own impression there, my own shadow there
for me to one day return to and find and relive again the incredible experience
that it is to be a part of the place that makes your heart beat like a drum.

I don’t want to forget anything that happened while I was in New York City.
I don’t want to replace the memories that I made there,
and I don’t want to forget the joy that I felt taking every step
down every avenue and street on every sidewalk.
I want to go back as soon as I can.
I want to go there and share everything that I know
and will always love about this city,
and what it will always mean to me.
I want to go to the crown of the Statue of Liberty,
look back at the city, and stare, and say out-loud
the thing that I have been repeating in my mind and in my heart
from the second I left and longed to return:
and that is that I love this city so much,
I love my New York.

My Poem ‘I cry alone’

The snow is still falling.
The world outside my window looks and feels as if it is frozen in time.
The death of my friend is like a shard of glass impaled within my heart,
the pain of which there is never any fore-warning.
I have been trying to talk about what has happened with others,
but what is on my mind I cannot express
until I am all on my own and I begin to cry.

Overwhelming grief consumes me and has cocooned me.
I think about my friend,
and as I do I am reminded of the times that we shared,
the things that we said-
discussing our mutual likes and dislikes, and opinions.
I am trying to recall as much as I can about my friend,
before the waves of time come into shore
and wash away the impressions that my friend made
on the sands of my mind, and all that I remember of him
is carried out to sea.

Death touches us when we least expect it.
We don’t know what it feels like to lose someone until we do.
I feel like something is missing in the world now,
and the universe is unsympathetic.
I can’t begin to imagine what my friend’s family is going through.

I am writing now to try and make sense of my confusion,
to reconcile my belief in reason, necessity, my philosophy on life;
however, I am finding it hard to do so-
death to the living and to the grief-stricken
is like being stabbed with a knife.

When you hear that someone has died that you know so well,
it almost feels unreal, at first,
it feels like you are stuck in a dream-
it’s like having a fog around you,
or like being imprisoned in a glass cage,
and to free yourself you feel like you have to shout and scream.

Writing is like therapy.
Writing is helping me to say what is inside me,
and what better way to express anything than through poetry.
It is still hard for me to believe that my friend is gone.
I keep thinking about all the books that he will never read,
the films that he will never see,
the things that he will never own.
Then I think to myself how my friend came into this world with nothing,
and how he left it with so much.

Saying goodbye, accepting someone’s passing,
is something that you ultimately have to deal with by yourself,
in your own time.
I am coming to terms with my friends death as best as I can.
And that is why I must cry alone.

My Poem ‘Seeing My Father Cry’

The first time I saw my father cry
was heart-breaking and world shattering to me-
I think I was about eight years old,
the night that our dog Jess died,
the night that everyone in our house came together
and cried with my Dad as we said goodbye to a part of our family.
Thinking back to that night is like trying to remember a dream,
but what is still real in my mind, and what has stayed with me,
is seeing my Dad overcome with so much sadness,
because it was something that I had never seen.
I cried on that night because Jess was my dog,
but the reason I cried and could not stop crying
was because to me my Dad was a God,
and seeing the most powerful
and one of the most influential people in my life powerless,
as he appeared,
it taught me from an early age that everything comes to an end
and that even the god that was my father had limits to his magic
that he was forced to adhere.

Whenever I see my father cry
I feel every tear of sadness, and joy, as if they were my own;
whenever I see my fathers tears well-up in front of his mesmerizing blue eyes,
I always take him by the hand and tell that he is not alone.
My Dad feels the world more so than anyone I have ever known,
my Dad is a lover and a genius of all things-
as would be more than apparent if you were to talk to him
and if you were lucky enough to visit him at his home.
There is nothing that hurt my heart more,
and there is nothing else that to this day brings more tears to my eyes,
than to see the powerhouse who is my Dad overcome with emotion,
and the sight of seeing my father cry.

My Poem ‘Music of the Tears’

Rain drops on a window pane, a teardrop on a face-
the landmarks of our memory that we can never erase.
Waves of emotion; tears of the Earth-
like waves crashing on a beach; like the feeling of rebirth.
When we cry is there more to be found than at first appears?
When we cry is there a melody to be heard to rival the music of the spheres?
Do tears still remain long after being first shed?
Does the music of our tears still continue to play in our head?
Just as our tears, like raindrops, fall silently until they make contact,
our tears, like the stars of the night sky, are only interpreted in the abstract.
The tears of a memory- both of joy, and of pain-
are more akin to the galaxies of the universe than I could possibly explain:
when a star reaches the end of its life it explodes into a new state of being-
just as when an emotion reaches its peak it can be seen and felt fleeing.
When an emotion becomes too deafening for us to not let it be heard, and cry out,
our tears is the melody that we play, and the music that we could never live without.