DAUGHTER

The way your lips wrinkle
when you are mad,
they become drawstrings
tugging at my heart
and pulling my insides out
through my throat,
choking my airway
with the density of the package
that leaves my body.

The way your eyes crease
and vacate their sockets
empties my chest
like a plug drawn from its bath
while the water gorges upon itself
through a hole so tight
that if not already liquid,
it would soon,
thusly,
pressurised,
become.

The way your ears deafen
and your back turns
is like running a marathon facing a wall:
the distance
expanding between us a window
that not even light could escape
– a black hole
within which I am steadily descending,
yet,
my pinpoint of focus
remains only on you.

The way your feet bury themselves
into the floor as you leave
is like the tick-tock-tick
of an urge
to counterbalance those thuds
by breaking into pieces
to fall everywhere you are not
for fear you might walk deep an ocean
and sink
– perhaps I can be your everywhere raft
and build myself around you.

The sound of your smothered crying
finds its way into the cavity of my ears,
into the bones of my chest,
and into the lungs
that as autopilots,
empty,
only to fill like oceans for your tears
in fear they rise
and you drown
and I drown
before I reach out my hand
in time to save you.

The hours you burn alone in your room
is like fighting your fires inside me
only to self-char on the outer
like an over-engraved parent
carrying flesh coloured wishes
of how I might take your flames
and turn them into flowers
that bring colour into your
otherwise
darkening
facade.