The Poorest Promise

The delicate voice of conscience called,
As I listened in the quietness of my soul;
There where secrets began to seep and overflow,
There where answers began to unfold;
Deep and damaging,
I had them received.

The serpent bit. I was his prey.
Wading through erroneous emotions;
Years wasted on a festering foundation;
Shaken by truth,
Awakened by the poorest promise.

It’s a place I never wanted to revisit,
But the fire burnt through,
And built an entrapping hedge;
I could no longer breathe;
Arrested in the heat of all the blank spaces,
And everything else in between.

It manifested like a man-sized,
Mannequin beast;
Hurled careless words
that cut deeper than a knife;
Like fighters in the rain,
Raw, lethal and exposed.

The power of an undivided heart;
In the thickness of the night;
Such a priceless theft,
Of the cheapest known vow;
Retreating to advance,
But never to be visited again.

We invented love

me you two; we invented love
we were the first; we invented love.
before they entwined it with lust and made it rust
before they fell easy and made it clumsy.

We named it love it graced as dove
before they made it cliché, they made it curse and burst
before they made it weary, and made it bleed.

me, you two; we invented love.
I loved you so… I kissed you so
Before they sold her in the streets and made her old
before they gave it cost and made it lost

You me two; we invented love
but now my love… how can I be proud?

Ringtone Identity

Evolving possibilities
That’s the tone for Maria

This one is a firebrand
Perpetual forward motion, nothing bland
She ticks me off, but only in good ways
The frustrating challenge of a maze
defeated only by the satisfaction of overcoming it
I like her, I like her very much
Maybe more

Spirit
That’s the tone for Dominique

This one is beyond mystical
Emitting radiance, nothing prototypical
She broadens my mental horizons, in stunning ways
The head-scratching riddle
overcome only by the satisfaction of solving it
I like her, I like her very much
Maybe more

Classic phone remix
That’s the tone for Esther

This one is just there
My default girlfriend for the past five years
She puts up with me
Accepts the mood swings
Stays out of my vivid dreams
She helps me solve the problems
But she frustrates me with her ordinariness
She’s OK, yes…just OK
Maybe more

Marcus, he’s my boy by Esther
He’s about five
I’ll teach him to survive
When he grows up
He’ll be just like me
A man who knows how to stand on his own two feet
He is mine
I made him

The ringtones help me keep the arrangement organised
I have a different phone for all my official business
Everything is in line
I am in complete control
Everyone knows their place, although they don’t know about each other
As long as the different strands don’t tangle
no one needs to get hurt or bothered

A man has needs
My happiness comes in threes
A different woman for each facet of my multi-layered personality
The excitement, the mystery, the routine
All accounted for in my impeccable choices
I like it, I like it very much

Maria POV:

I met this guy three months ago
He’s just so-so
I had just ended a serious relationship
Was looking for nothing more than casual friendship
He just sorta came out of nowhere
Decent listener
Funny-ish
I call him up sometimes when I’m bored
But he tries too hard
This?
Us?
David is just a friend, nothing more

When he calls me, it’s my default ringtone…

Dominique POV:

I can’t remember
Seven months, somewhere in November
He helped me when my car broke down
We began chatting
Daniel is a nice guy
I told him about my mystical devotion
He enjoyed that very much
I call him sometimes, to hear how he’s doing
Mostly he just listens
I’d prefer if he opened up some more
In fact, I don’t really know that much about him
He’s like a notch above an acquaintance but a notch below a friend
I don’t see him in THAT way

When he calls me, it’s my default ringtone…

Esther POV:

I was very young when we met
Wasn’t even sure of who I was yet
I didn’t have experience with boyfriends
He was the first
I guess, I guess I loved him at one time
Right in the beginning
Or maybe that’s just what I thought I felt
I don’t know
I guess I’m still with him because of Marcus
My boy
I don’t want him growing up without a dad
You know?

Donny is a very quiet person
He doesn’t really tell you how he feels about anything
He has a few friends
Goes out sometimes
Gets some calls
But at least he provides for us
He is a good father
I think Marcus is the only one he really talks to
The only one he really cares about

No
I don’t want to marry him
It wouldn’t work
I don’t think we love each other enough anyway
It’s just a routine
And before you know it, five years have past
And everything is still exactly the same

Yes
I’ll focus on Marcus
I only want what’s best for him
I just wish we could love each other more
For the boy’s sake

When he calls me, the ringtone is “Take my heart away”
Johnny Clegg and Savuka
That’s my favourite song

I love Marcus
I love Maria
I love Dominique
I love Esther

I love them all and I know they all love me
I’m singing

Wait…
My phone’s ringing…

Love Story Template

Unrepentant scars trail along a nuanced cheek
Violence couldn’t help but settle on this delicate face
Times and troublesome vibes
Delirium substitutes for something like genuine happiness
Cold shoulders writhe together
A spark results from this putrid friction
It threatens, this spark
It threatens to set everything ablaze
Seconds are counted
Every single one of billions
Billions of filthy seconds, suiciding themselves away
The bed where warmth is supposed to shelter
It has become the pit where insides tangle and swelter

Home
Built so long ago, in other lifetimes
It was supposed to be the inside of a womb
The certain safety of an eternal tomb
It was supposed to be
The place where hearts and heads melted into one
Little ones shrieking with delight
Leaving their tiny footprints on sands and blades of pristine grass
Yet, it never amounted to any of that
Years disappeared and expectations began to erase
This abomination managed to swell and become a giant
Trudging along, engorged on routine and the numb sensation

The wounds were self-made
Made together
Made to each other
Just a simple way to remind these hearts
To keep beating, keep eating
Keep kneeling, keep being

Lovers inhabit coated shells
They bounce along a stream towards certain doom
Devoid of knowing
Wanting the connection to sever
Never knowing how to justify the endeavour
Two souls drift alone
Together forever

The Red Pill

If my fingers could –
Reach
Down
Past the thickness that is your guard
Beneath your very earth
Where you hold the fertilized scars
Between the thorns surrounding your bosom
Concealing the warm spot
Where these arms may find rest
As the blood trickles down my palms

If this organ would –
Learn to continue beating
With the knife still firmly in its place
I know it may not look the same
But please believe the love that’s
Tried to course through these egotistical veins
For these arteries have become the –
– mezzanine –
Between all that I’ve lost
And the heart
That I’m trying to put back together again

Your very own should
See my detachment –
as the equivalence
To the things you do too
To cope with the heartbreak
For we have always been the same
Two hypocrites connected
By the subtle absence in my ribcage

With

You – simply distracted
By the forked tongues of men
In the same careless phase

I – simply attached
To every lust-coloured apple an
Eve seemed to bring my way

We – simply an act
Of our perception that these emotions
Are all that have remained

All I wanted was a name
Back when all I had,
Was the shallow attraction that
Kept my gaze at your face
Your eyes instead thought me to be the
Reincarnated demons of men who only
Craved the secrets below your waist
When the truth is that greater ecstasy
Comes from looking upon a naked soul
While undressing the
Intellect of
her
brain.

But then comes those games
Dictated socially;
You and I jump awkwardly between
Prejudiced views of how Love should be
Evidently, I could sit in a group
And preach the paraphrased truth
Only to live the sinner’s story

Hoping to see a compromise
Built from the self-imposed guilt
And the glory –
Curing your conscience
With the right words on a Sunday morning;
A game of halos hanging from horns we grew
The moment distortion
Became this society’s calling

And as we dance the same dance
Of broken lovers trying to find
The missed step
Recollecting the memories;
That feeling of anxiety when that which
Left – you in sorrow comes back with regret
“I am nothing like the last tenant”;

Conversations where
Our hearts try to connect,
Kick off the dust and
Let a new soul into our mess-
Messages of communicating a desire
For the universe to grant you the best
In this stranger you’ve now put to
The oh-so-familiar test

Because you and I live in a world where
My fractured trust
Cannot accept your sincere attempts
And your regrets
Keep me out of the bruised parts of you
Lost in another man’s conquest

So what is left?

Fragile boy with a heart that
Thought it once knew gold
Meets insecure girl who
Now thinks the world to be cold
So Stereotype meets Assumption
At a party and their drunken selves
Are as honest as they’ll ever come to know

You and I
We are tied by the same tragedy
Of meeting Love and seeing the wolf
Behind the sheep-skinned fallacy
“The Matrix is just a fantasy”,
She said, swallowed the red pill
And walked back to her reality

A song of love

If ladies be but young and fair,
If men show mirth and trust their dears;
And love is true to guide them right;
What can make love, not Waugh awhile?

Love is good but lovers spoil,
It’s meant for joy and not dispute;
For both mast love and none regret,
That is love the right way now.

They are that think that love is blind,
If lovers see, then love is true;
Whereon does the jest depend?
It’s just because they’re fools in love;
Their love is false, and guides them wrong;

Oh! Love the peace of earth,
What is there on land or sea?
To make a love without dispute,
For oh! We want a love in gay,
Without offence, and no distress;