You tell me what it’s like to trace scars,
the stories you learn under trained fingertips.

I wonder what you read of me
in those liminal spaces,
as your breath dusts over closed eyes.

There is a hush between your hands and mine —
but still, something flickers:
a glance too long, 
a pause too full of meaning. 

An admission that I sit somewhere between 
what shouldn’t be, 
and what is already becoming. 

The air between us holds
the echo of undone things —
how your voice softens when you say my name,
how I don’t ask why.

But I know better 
than to catch the butterfly
that didn’t come to stay.

This version of us 
can only exist in maybes —
and I think you know the same. 

So let us soak in the warmth
then fold it into memory’s sleeve —
a tribute to the kind of closeness
that only distance allows to breathe.

For my darling friend, Gigi

There are people who walk into your life and fill the space with noise,
and then there are the ones who bring the softest silences.

With you, it’s never been about constant presence.
It’s the knowing.
The quiet tether stretched across geographic zones,
busyness and the small storms of life.
The sense that even when we don’t speak, you’re still there.
And I am too.

We’ve spoken about everything.
The ache of not being chosen, the courage to walk away.
The metaphors we live by and the patterns we try to unlearn.
Love, death, soul paths, healing, sex, longing and what it means to live well.

No topic too strange.
No feeling too much.
No silence ever mistaken for absence.

You are one of the few who can hold the weight of my thoughts without flinching.
You meet me there in the messy, the indescribable, the mundane.
And when life stretches us thin, we don’t have to explain.
We simply resurface when we can with softness, stories and snacks.

You’re not just a friend.
You’re a place.
A quiet I trust.
A mirror that doesn’t distort.
A reminder that being seen doesn’t have to feel like being exposed.

In a world of conditional closeness, thank you for being my safety in the quiet.

I reached for a coloured pencil
ready to sketch the shadows,
to blend soft blues of memory
with gold where the light once fell.

But you’d already drawn the outlines
bold in their silence,
as if your hands had traced
every story I’d only half-whispered
into the spaces between us.

I didn’t have to start from the beginning.
You remembered
my brother’s name,
the way I speak with my hands,
how my laughter stumbles
when it catches me by surprise.

So I painted within the lines
with a steady, hopeful brush,
letting the colours bloom
where you’d left them blank.
And when your sketch missed a corner,
I let the pigments spill softly beyond,
as if to say, I trust you anyway.

For a moment,
it felt like you’d read the script
before I’d spoken the lines,
like you’d met the girl in the margins
and decided to stay awhile.

And even now,
with the outlines blurred by time,
there is one page I keep
creased at the edges.
Unfinished.
Beautiful.

Where we almost painted something whole.

Your hair is longer,
Your face covered in new lines
Unfamiliar to my touch.

I thought for sure
You’d remain a ghost,
Locked in a timeless past.

But there you were,
Smiling in a photo
Beyond what I knew of us.

For a second, my heart smiled.

But then it began to beat loudly,
Struck with shock from seeing
Somebody that I used to know.

Someone who promised me the world,
But spread his love like the tide,
Pulling me in, and pushing me away.

I saw your light in glimpses,
Just as I watched you cast thick shadows
To stave off those that could hurt you.

How unfair it was that that you
Enveloped me in darkness.
I was never the sum of your past.

Nor were you mine.

How much we both must have changed,
Over a period that seems shorter
Than time would otherwise suggest.

You look happy,
Leo is much older.
I hope the reality is just as sweet.

I’m still fascinated by how the Universe
Delivers its messages.
Sometimes I’m not sure what they mean.

Though I will never understand you,
Or know a version of our story
Through different directorial eyes,

I’ve decided it’s okay.

We were always so different,
Yet the dreams we so desperately
Willed to be real were remarkedly similar.

I tried for a final time,
Knowing it may fall on deaf ears.
It did.

I don’t regret a thing though,
Because at the end of the day,
I can say I stayed true to myself.

Can you?

I knew four versions of you.
In Mandarin, that is phonetically similar
To death.

Nate the dreamer,
Nate the fearful avoidant,
Nate the caring lover,
And Nate the cold.

The last one damn near killed me.

So I’ll take the lessons I can
From our time together,
Short but incommensurately impactful.

I hope to learn more about myself,
Scattered across parts of the world
I am soon to glimpse.

I am blocked. That’s all there is to know.

I will never get the chance to create
My diptych-style poem series, or
Hear the second perspective.

Even if I did, would you be honest with me?

I can speculate your whys,
But they linger in a space
That holds no answers.

So perhaps I’ll start searching
In places where my questions
Are met with more than silence.

Perhaps I’ll start seeking love
In hearts that have the capacity
To take a leap of faith.

To try, in spite of whatever we may have gone through previously.

Let us be the sum of our present decisions.

Regardless, I will always remember
The person that first convinced me
That magic could exist.

Who co-wrote and brought to life
The conversations of romantic wonder
That lived inside my imagination.

But what I know to be true is,
There is someone out there for me.
But it was never meant to be you.

“Romanticizing and missing a relationship that previously emotionally destroyed you is a trauma response, not love.” – Anna Aslanian

When I was little,
I would stuff my dreams into duffel bags,
Lay them flat under my bed
And wish for them all to come true,
So I could make space for more.

In time I ran out of bags,
And eventually floorspace too.
Mum told me to be more realistic,
But I guess I never did like
Being told what to do.

So I made friends with my imagination
And marvelled at her breadth;
An infinite sanctum of intrigue
That I could have sworn was tangible
Across the ridges of my fingertips.

The future I saw was make-belief,
A story designed only to inspire action.
Until I felt your arms around me that first time.
I’d been warned of your reputation,
Of being full of empty promises.

Yet to me, you felt warm and comfortable.

I’d known the looks of curious eyes
Reflected off the panes of yours.
But that day, I saw straight past you,
To a place where oceans of blue and
Gentle curves of green beckoned.

I was mesmerised.

I’ve heard that eyes are windows to the soul.
But no one ever told me that
Windows open your eyes to new souls.
They reveal an endless horizon of the things
I never thought possible for myself.

Prufrock once pondered to himself,
Do I dare disturb the universe?
So I decided to do the same.
You gave me a way to say yes.
Now the only question I ask is ‘how?’

I know your name has slid scathingly
Off the bitter tongues of battered buskers.
They said you stole happiness from tomorrow.
But when tomorrow did come,
You brought in blooms of indescribable beauty.

I am not the only one that has seen you,
Aching and worn from endless journeys,
Nor will I be the last.
And I will choose to remember you
For all your enduring triumphs.

I don’t care that you’re a little turbulent
Under the weight of uncertain skies.
Or that sometimes my breath catches
When you kiss the world roughly
To invite me somewhere new.

And though time will distance us,
As we move onto different things,
The places we knew no longer being ours alone,
I will always remember the way you held me,
Stiff but undeniably warm that first time. 

So thank you Jetstar.

One day I’ll learn to knock down bricks
To make space for a door,
For I don’t remember how it feels
To let someone in anymore.

My halls they seem so plentiful,
My love it knows no bounds.
Yet I guard my deepest secrets
In a place that makes no sound.

Few see the sensitive me,
Barely held together.
They only know calm, confident Es
Who still believes in forever.

I’m told that I can be too giving
Of time and my affection
“Protect yourself,” they say with worry
But that is not my lesson.

I’d rather risk failure again and again
Than to never try at all.
Because the best things only show themselves
When you’re not afraid to fall.

Impulsive and brave, she loves the risk
But her mind leads her astray.
To faraway worlds of wonderland
In dreams she’d rather stay.

I met you with a hopeful cheer,
With you I felt at ease.
Your kindness and your warmth it seemed,
Could melt away my fears.

A lakeside walk was all it took
To start this chapter of bliss.
You made me laugh, caressed my cheek
And leaned in for a kiss.

You weren’t my usual type I thought,
My friends said this was best.
In four days you showed yourself
And I lost interest in the rest.

What wasn’t there to like
About a man with British charm?
Relationships were all you knew,
Surely you meant no harm.

In time I felt our connection grow,
Your energy was infectious.
You stayed consistent despite the distance,
It really was quite precious.

But innocence and inexperience
Don’t always go hand in hand.
By chance I ended up the fool,
It wasn’t what I’d planned.

I’m sorry that I ran away,
When reality began to sting.
I never meant to let this happen,
But there’s no reset on this thing.

I hope you’ll find a girl one day
That treats you just as kind.
Who won’t want you to sift through words
While telling you she’s fine.

You popped into my head last Sunday
As I snorkelled through seagrass.
I lost the group through panicked breath,
Scared it would be my last.

In that moment I heard your voice.
It made me think of how
You comforted me once as a stranger.
And continue to calm me now.

These days I wonder,
What is ‘type’ other than
Boxing yourself into a black hole
Of repeated mistakes?

For a moment there,
I could have sworn
That our souls were made
Of the same stuff.

How else would I have known
Exactly what your voice sounded like?
A velvety soft baritone,
Designed to sing my own, personal lullaby.

We must have known each other once before.

I fell for you one balmy night in Bali,
Somewhere between ‘Jolene’
And excited sleeps.
We danced to a hopeful tune of forever,
The naive fools we were.

But our cocktail pasts
Mixed into a batch of bitter brew,
Impossible to drink,
Without the threat of poison spreading.

Sometimes your sediment memory would sink,
Replaced by layers of new wonder,
Momentarily forgotten,
Until agitated into the foreground.

Damn those triggers.

You spoke the language of computers,
But never understood the human processor,
Operating in murmured blurs of grey.
Often without instruction.

We latched onto fears that weren’t our own.
Two frightened birds,
Tethered to one another,
Incapable of flight.

I promised I wouldn’t run from your scars,
And that I’d hold gently
The warmth of your histories
In the palms of my hands.

But these small hands can only carry so much,
And baby believe me when I say I tried.

I still send letters into the void,
Hoping some unseen mailman
Will translate my message into code
That your heart can understand.

Because the real ones I’ve sent
Do not reach you anymore.
I do not reach you anymore.
And yet, this girl doesn’t know how not to write you.

Between us,
There is now only silence,
In its most devastating form.
The kind between strangers.

All the same,
I will always hold dear
The cherished memory
Of a time with you.

I will shelve you quietly into
The libraries of my mind,
Where this chapter can collect dust,
And find a home in the past.

It’s where you belong now.

I am an artist, born not for the world to see.

But to share sprinkles of my inner world,

With those that dare to leave a footprint,

However deep, however small, however faded.

I used to shut close the libraries of my mind,

Each chapter in succession.

Until I realised the book of life continues,

Unapologetic like the river stream before me.

And when the scabs from thirty pages ago

Graduate to scars, I will no longer pick at them.

No longer revisit them, apart from in moments of fondness.

The colours of its spine fill with the brilliant shades

Of my memories.

And they will continue to glow,

Even in the darkest of light.

It’s recently dawned on me that I have found the roadmap to life. I have found the real meaning: and that is, to chase what makes you happy. However that may evolve, so long as you stay true to what you value in the moment, then there won’t be space for regrets or hesitation. I walked through our campsite at dawn today, the Autumn leaves spread among the entire valley that sits within Mount Beauty. A fitting name indeed.

And I had a thought: One day, I will have someone to share this with, someone to sit idly by the river with, whose company I am so comfortable in that I have found home in a person. Wouldn’t that be magical?

I didn’t want you to be just another lesson.
I thought I’d learned enough for this time to be the last time.

In the beginning, I was excited to know you,
And in time, I became scared to lose you.
“Even if you’re just a future memory,” you’d said,
And that’s exactly what became of us.

Lord Huron said it right.
I really did have all and then most of you,
Some and now none of you.

I’m struggling to get over you because
What happened in Bali had to amount to something special right?
At least that’s what I tell myself.

I knew you’d gone through a lot in life,
And I took your comments personally anyway.

I miss the feeling of your arms around me,
The way your lips found a home in mine.

I know one day the pain will stop, and you will become a distant memory,
But for now, it still hurts like hell.
I think about you every morning,
And most nights before I fall asleep.

I don’t know how we became strangers,
But some part of me wishes you were still here by my side.

I’d never known a connection like this,
You’d said the same.
I was naive to your promises of a future,
Captivated by the allure of an imaginary you.

Maybe my standards in love were too high,
And I never really took the time to get to know you.
All of you.
For that, I am truly sorry.

Regret isn’t a feeling I’m well accustomed to, and
I hope I don’t have to taste loss like this again.

I will always be proud of myself for daring to try,
And I will continue to do so until the day I learn to fly.

Maybe next time will be the final time.
For now, I will write until I have nothing left to say.

You should have been a part of this photo.