ila.

hi! I have a soft spot for poetry, dark academia, and history. the only people I like are ones that don’t physically exist. dms are always open if u wanna be friends. :) • 21 • she/her • original poems •

[poisoned-dagger]

hi. after a 2 year disappearance, I wanna get back to posting more here. tumblr’s always felt like a safe-space compared to other social media. I wanna be more active here and interact. I post poems and enjoy everything literature-related. I also have a sh!tpost account but this is more sophisticated.

interact if you have similar interests

[poisoned-dagger]

maybe one day I’ll learn to say your name without a lump in my throat. someone will talk about you and I’ll smile, listen, and carry on. maybe one day I’ll be able to articulate what we were and weren’t. I won’t think of you for days on end, maybe weeks if I’m lucky enough. the moon won’t have your name written on it and a game of connect four will be just that. tiramisu will smell of coffee and not your arms comforting me. maybe one day my voice won’t give out when I talk about the boy I gave everything to. but today is not that day and neither is tomorrow. so for now, and for tomorrow, and for all the days it feels right, I’ll only write about you. you’ll be alive in my pen’s ink and nowhere else. until my maybe comes, you’ll be a phantom that’s never quite real but always painful.

[poisoned-dagger]

I pick at the wound you left. there’s never a scab to break through, I don’t let it breathe for long enough. I take the skin apart until blood dribbles out. I soak in every bit of pain it has to offer. this is all that’s left of you. let me revel in the desecration of my heart. this is the only way I can hold you near. the wound can never close. I don’t know what to do once the maroon starts seeping through the scar. I grasp at veins to make you stay for a little longer. I don’t feel much except an ache of emptiness. the void you left is fitted to your silhouette. I try cramming nicotine over it as balm. I’ve burned away memories of all your happiness. there’s misery in every stitch upon my heart. I can’t breathe if this bleeding stops.

[poisoned-dagger]

there will never be a final act of love for you. they’ll trace your name in the dirt on my grave and still it shall not be my final act of love, for my decaying body will have no smell but yours.

there will never be a final act of love for you. it’ll never end, not my love, not for you. there is love in every ache my heart endures. there is love in every dream you grace. there is love in every curse I bestow upon your name. with no heart to inhabit, this love turns poisonous to my soul. yet it perseveres, changing and twisting but never lessening. is my love any less worthy if it never wants to gaze upon your smile again? does its anguish lay waste to its passion? it has shed its beauty and halo, or rather had it desecrated by your betrayal, yet it’s love. an ugly colour and even uglier disposition but yours is the name it chants as a mantra. you forbid it from being gentle and nurturing, so it hisses and bites. they’ll trace your name in the dirt on my grave and still it shall not be my final act of love, for my decaying body will have no smell but yours.

[poisoned-dagger]

the cassette player you gave me stopped working.

•••

the cassette player you gave me stopped working. the mixtapes with your voice won’t play anymore. I’m sure I broke the mixtapes somehow, mishandled them the way I always do the things I love; people, too.

I’m now deprived even of the escape of your sweet sweet voice speaking to me. back when it spoke with honey dripping and gentleness enough to put roses to shame. before the coldness and apathy took hold of your soul.

I look for proof of the beauty of us that haunts my nightmares still after countless days. I try and stumble to rewind the tape back to the moment it all went wrong, like I can pinpoint the moment your heart showed hesitance.

[poisoned-dagger]

he loved me for a year, now I must love him for all of mine.

I spent a year being loved by him. it was passion and tenderness. razor tight grip in a cloud like dream. it was the light of heaven reaching down to the darkest pit to raise me up. the year I was loved by him was holy in its nature and sin in execution. it was love from faery myths and siren tales. the prayer that was answered left a curse in its wake. the price to pay was all my years. in the debt I owed for the year he loved, I had to love him for all of mine. forlorn but hardly furious, if ever, the fervour of this love only increases. time rolled its dice with my life in its bargain. I remember not what I struggle for, only that it was love. every painful step forward took from my memory pieces of him. the colour of his eyes has greyed and the spark of his smile dimmed. it’s been long enough that I forget how it felt to be loved. I pay still for a miracle that’s long lost.

[poisoned-dagger]

but it wasn’t supposed to be you. it was never supposed to be you. you were never supposed to break my heart and scatter the pieces over the desert you reside in. you took my from myself. you stole every part I held dear. you were a toxin. you spread to every little crevice of my heart, of my soul. I gave more than I should have, more than I had, because it was never supposed to be you. because it was supposed to always be you. by my side, in my arms, in my prayers, in myself. you still are within me, maybe that’s why I’m ripping the skin off my hands and sitting at 2 AM with bloody fingernails whispering your name as the mantra that grounds me. it was never supposed to be you. the king of my underworld, my hades, the one who killed me with no remorse, without so much as a glance back. it was never supposed to be you I mourn with blood choking my lungs. it was never supposed to be you walking away even still as my heart begins to die down. it was supposed to always be you. always you. you.

[poisoned-dagger]

hope is not a thing with feathers,

it’s one with claws and talons,

ripping the very hands that hold onto it.

it doesnt flutter from one branch to the next,

light; untethered

it bangs on the walls of your heart screaming

the weight crushing and the pain excruciating

hope demands sacrifices,

blood dripping and bones breaking,

to sustain hope is to subject yourself to its arbitrary mercy

come, hope, make me your abode

even as you destroy what harbours you

come, hope, my parasitic refuge,

make me unlearn how to let go

[poisoned-dagger]

what's a poet without her quill?

I sit screaming my throat hoarse,

the strength enough to humble a mountain,

incongruous with the serene desert around me.

what's a writer without her words?

the monotony of this sublunary world drawls on,

I spare a glance of derision at those whose gift is interminable,

mine seems to elude me in delicate hide and seek.

what's a girl without her passion?

the rivers have run dry and changed their course,

I stand obstinate, willing poetry to weave itself together,

what I once commanded with confidence only slips farther away.

what's a poet without her poems?

they come at their own leisure,

these verses of peace, to grip them with violence yields no result,

come seek me again, my words, this time I'll be gentle.

[poisoned-dagger]

they called him the space between feeling and not,

the space where a home of stolen comfort is built,

the in-between hollow darkness that yearns to take you,

and you, too, long to give in.

you stumble upon him in the middle of a lonely night,

a hooded figure that seemed to have always been there,

blurred around the edges--not quite whole,

and nothing gleams but his wicked smile.

I wouldn't say he's nothingness,

he is violent grief and muted screams,

he is every tear you wiped away,

he is a friend who promises you no more pain.

roughened by sadness and taunted by vulnerability,

out of that is anger born,

an ugly being forcing itself into existence,

a wretched creature made of hurt.

but emptiness? no, he's different.

he comes after the passion of hatred is gone,

and only a deeper loathing remains,

each time you cross paths with him, you offer your soul.

[poisoned-dagger]

Emptiness creeps in as slow and excruciating as winter,

and then swirls around me like a thick fog,

burrowing itself deep inside my heart,

and flowing through my icy veins.

Completely shielded from the world I stand,

less than a mere observer,

as still as a rock watching the seasons pass by.

But deep inside blooms a light so bright it blinds,

a warmth cozy like a kindling fireplace in snow.

Peace; it passed through me like a dagger,

a happiness so foreign it seems fabricated.

And just outside, the tiniest of saplings peeks from under the unforgiving snow,

its pale green almost indistinguishable from the stark white snow.

Yet a reminder enough—

that as the clouds of gloominess are chased by the shining sun—

Persephone returns,

and with her,

a new hope.

[poisoned-dagger]

Boys with pretty eyes and rapid heartbeats,

silver tongued and wits sharper than the

sword you know they can bear with ease,

the ones with dimpled cheeks,

and smiles that send butterflies fluttering in your stomach.

They’re the ones to watch out for,

their words laced with poison,

existence all but screaming manipulation and heartache,

minds forever calculating,

and eyes that hold a glint that is evil personified,

wreaking havoc wherever they go.

it’s ironic how a being so beautiful leaves ruin in its wake.

[teeekki]

We are writers, my love.

We don't cry.

We bleed on paper.

[poisoned-dagger]

Cut me open and take my heart,

handle it with gentleness or cruelty,

the choice I leave to you.

I’ll spill the darkest of secrets in the presence of the crescent moon,

grasping your hand in mine.

I’ll lay my soul to you naked,

no charades and no facades.

Vulnerability doesn’t come easy,

but for you an exception I will make.

Cut me open and take my heart,

it belongs to you anyway.

Etched upon it are the promises you made,

and scarred it is with the games you played.

With every beat it takes your name and longs to be seen by you,

go ahead, love, take a look.

[poisoned-dagger]

hand me the medicine,

or shove it down my throat,

let it flow through my veins,

settle in my mind,

and reprogram my body.

let it change every part of myself,

and reboot my heart,

adjust my breathing to the accepted rhythm

until the ghost in the mirror,

is damaged beyond repair.

let it strip away my personality,

and leave a broken shell,

as hollow as its thoughts,

but still haunted by its mind.

hand me the medicine,

or shove it down my throat.

[poisoned-dagger]

“maybe in death he’ll want me,”

I said as I plunged the dagger into his chest,

for how could I let that heart beat,

if it wasn’t for me?

Maybe now, as his chiselled face starts to rot,

he’ll let his ego down,

and welcome me into his heart,

the very one I ruined.

Don’t misunderstand,

this is a tale of love,

every word written with the pool of blood,

that rests beneath his hand.

Muffling his dying screams with my hand,

I let a single tear drop,

“soon, my love, I’ll be with you,”

the last words he’ll ever hear.

The kerosene engulfed every inch of my body,

a maniacal grin coming to my face,

as I lit up the lighter in my hand,

“together now and forevermore,” I whispered.

[poisoned-dagger]

I went through my most prized collection this night,

the letters you wrote to the love of your life,

protected from the outer world in a battered envelope,

fraying at the edges,

a dirty white.

Horribly faded and slightly indecipherable,

I scanned to the ones that seem still quite fresh,

it smelt like you do when you visit me in my dreams,

a bit blurred in my memory but still just as sweet.

Your handwriting I traced with the nib of my pen,

to bring to life your words if not you,

each curve and each line I handled with delicacy,

not daring to mess up a single dot,

not allowing the tears to stain.

My mind could have sworn I heard your voice,

clear as day and addressed to me,

speaking in soothing tones and whispering loving words,

as you wrote to a world in which I was still unborn.

I went through my most prized collection this night,

the letters you wrote to the love of your life.