Who Decides?

Tell me,

When you look into his eyes,

do you see storms brewing

like the ones that tore your home to shreds?

When you hear his voice,

do you hear the rumble of thunder

deep and unyielding

accompanied by that flash of smirk-lightning?

Child,

he was not made

to be handled by soft hands

and dewy eyes

He was not made for gentle hearts

and forgiving minds

He was made to

level cities

decimate countries

raze the world to the ground

— Yushan C.

Love and despair are drawn from the same well.

I cannot always tell which is the poison,

And which is the cure.

— y.c.

They’d been lulled into a false sense of security with this gentle, quiet version of him. But gentle didn’t mean safe, and quiet didn’t mean meek. The same terrifying fire burned in him still, an intense mix of unpredictability and unyielding.

— Yushan C.

(I will never forget this—)

.

They brought siege engines to your town, 

Armies to the valleys of your body and the plains of your skin. 

They brought mercenaries to carve the sword off your arm. 

The fires are lit; the people

.

are afright. They run akimbo, packing what little they have to hide in 

       the citadel, 

Protected by cranial bones and a mouth barred shut like a gate. 

We are hidden, but we are not. 

Your eyes are windows

.

To your castle—see the servants rushing to prepare, prepare

For siege, prepare

For battle, prepare

For death. 

We bear scars from the last skirmish, 

Blast marks from the last catapults to try and bring down these walls. 

.

Yes. That is where these bruises are from. That is where these fears 

           are from. 

.

They light their catapults. 

.

(—I will never forgive this)

.

—knight in broken armour (y.c.)

Chivalry isn’t just dead.

We beat it out of us with a stick

(society)

and carved it from our souls with a scalpel

(normalization)

and now

We don’t know any different.

— y.c.

I don’t love you anymore. 

-

I don’t love you anymore, 

But

-

There are days I wake up and I think I feel your arms around me 

And my lungs

Ache like I haven’t taken in enough air. 

-

There are days where I turn

with your name on my lips 

And there is nothing there, only empty air,

Dust motes and smoke. 

-

I don’t love you anymore, 

but

-

It’s been so long since I was alone, 

I’d forgotten the way loneliness tastes like regret 

when you’ve drunk enough of it. 

-

—y.c.

Harsh, but something to keep in mind We so often get caught up in our own worlds. Sometimes while we’re busy basking in the glory of our achievements, we forget to share that joy and pride. Sometimes we just need to step back and remember that we’re not the centre of the universe.

A friend of mine wants flowers for her room, she says. 

She wants to make it beautiful and vibrant and fresh, but

Blossoms fade and petals mold, she says,

Clutching her falsified flowers, 

Petals carefully crafted—

A forgery,

hundreds of days in the making in factories where they make 

          hundreds of petals that never die.

Immortality is the prize, beauty a side effect, and yet

How many of us choose both as a goal?

-

—Immortality comes with plastic petals (y.c.)