I dream of my teeth falling out 

One by one as if to relay a prophecy 

A frozen face with a gaping mouth

Through the dead of the night I see

 

Fragments of my grandiose delusions 

Racing towards the sea

Wherein I’ve buried everything I revere in seclusion

Today, the sunk costs float unabashedly just to taunt me 

 

And I have been chasing in vain

Through gritted teeth and salt-rimmed eyes

Someone to sustain

Someone to survive 

 

I still don’t know what I’m destined to lose

Or if I’ve lost already

A part of me, my yellows and blues 

Or all of me, saccharine and sickly 

 

I know I’ve been vindictive

My vengeance lies in sparse emotions and withheld feelings

Walls so high, they make skyscrapers look pathetic 

Resentment so deep, it competes with Quranic oceans of ink

 

But through the resentment radiates 

That orb of lust, love and limerence 

And the capacity to give all that it takes 

To familiar and unfamiliar faces