HOMESICK • DANDELIONS & FIREFLIES

HOMESICK

Can the mind grow so immune to pain 
That it constantly searches for wounds 
To rip 
So it can get some sense of consistency or feeling that it’s functioning properly?

Mine’s been too hazy for the past few days// if I’m not lying couple of years

I keep running back to the same old wound digging my nails deep within
Hoping maybe if I claw a little deeper than the previous time I’ll find a new way to cope with what I have been through already 

It’s nearly turned purple
as the night falls
And the trash can fills with bloodstained tissues
Which nearly aren’t red as the anger I have for myself

My fingers are tired and I’m thinking of leaving this incomplete 
But my brain wants to flush out the emotions my body isn’t capable of 
Storing/it knows my heart is tired just like my fingers 

And my arms long for a belonging in any form of recognition/ be it love/death/appreciation 

They want to belong somewhere not in pain/not in black and white/not in colors/words/ they are incompetent/ they can’t fight the yearning of my arms 

There a growing madness within my lungs grasping my throat like flames 
How can I say that I’m home when my body feels like it belongs elsewhere 
Home in form of another person 

How I have stained papers with ink describing what home feels like in countless metaphors 
Only to realize it’s a sense of belonging I have never had/ until I tasted it/& now my neurology is panting for more 

How do I tell it? Every time I try to make love/ his face is the only that plays on loop in mind 
How do I stop my fingers from trembling and stop lying to myself calling it love?

I’m homesick of a home
I have never lived in
Homesick of eyes those have
Never met mine
Reminiscent of a belonging
That I have never felt before.


DANDELIONS & FIREFLIES

It’s winter 
I want to write about 
The dandelions 
The fireflies
And the rusty fire escapes

The gloomy nights
Escaping into 
Rushing tail lights 
Into blithering smoke
Grey kisses 
And your raspy crimson tongue 

There’s a certain 
Sadness to the cold
That I have missed
And have somewhat 
A special bond with

It isn’t the hot chocolate
It’s the wind
Collusively talking 
Me into considering
Lies as memories

Like a deer pledging allegiance
For being hunted
Calling for his own death

I have missed the cold
Touching me beside my ribs
I have missed the smoke 
From burning wood
Making its way inside my body
Calling it home.   

Similarly I have missed
Your cold finger 
Entraining their way in circles
Behind my back 

It felt cold yet warm
a paradox

Your fingers unsure
And
My back
So certain 
Like they were
Awaiting for your arrival 
The winter has come
And the sadness too
But all I feel now
Is just

Absence

______
TEXT:
MOHAMMED HUSSNAIN
KUWAIT