Creative Voices

By Sufiyan Salman | Edited by Victoria Vega

I sit waiting in the fluorescence before the kitchen window 

There is a faint fermentation of your smell, the rhythm of my heart quickens against the marbled table 

Nails that dig into palms and the effervescent echo of your failing footsteps  

Hallowed hoaxes that I etch into my skin; testimonies to the tragedy of our demise 

I can sense your delinquent deviance eclipsing my misgivings outside this freshly painted door 

I can feel the air evaporating and my dread desecrating and your calm calculating 

I can feel the time titillating and my insolence insulating and your name nauseating 

I can hear you; your car pulling into the driveway, engines off and the slam of a car door 

Your keys penetrating the front lock, a shuffle of hesitant footsteps, a pause and then you enter 

I brace myself; my spinelessness suffocating in crypts dying in dungeons below 

And before I see your face, I pray for a reverent remedy to relinquish our irreverent faiths 

‘Oh, what are we doing, my love.’ 

And now, I am in my underwear on the numbing necropolis of this bathroom floor 

Where our bereavement beguiles our intertwined graves and dies over and over again 

In the name of a love that lusts for agony, in the name of wanting that craves for ecstasy 

That only comes when your claws carve cicatrices into this corpse and my pain becomes our calling 

I can taste the bitter saltiness at the back of my throat 

And I can hear you gasping as you kneel to catch your breath 

You didn’t get a promotion at work today, I believe, but I may be wrong 

Or maybe you just woke up on the wrong side of the bed, but I am not certain 

My hands fumble over the knots in my stomach and blood gushes towards my mouth 

And I can taste it; the bitterness of the grit in your teeth and the unmistakable shake in your hands 

The bitterness of the crimson rage in your eyes that makes those tears drip 

And that bitterness clogs my veins, severs sinews until my blood is the canopy for your rage  

Absolution that affords the tattooed bite-marks you’ve kissed into the callous canvas of my arm 

Forgiveness that murders melancholia on charcoal tiles tepid from your malevolent mercy 

And devotion that decrees my apology futile in the conviction of my ailing nudity 

All mirror our castrated cries as we design crime scenes in fidelity to our redemptive revenge 

‘Oh, what are we doing, my love!’ 

You stand up again, and I can feel your joints cracking, breaths speeding, soul imploding. And I start praying for death just to discover a living that lives. My breaths betray me and I bring my knees to my face, my fists tighten, my head retreats behind the cage of my arms and I hold my breath, and I wait for the floor under me to give away. When your foot finally connects with the cavity beneath my ribs, I can hear the maiming of the wind and the slight delay of sound after which my sweat becomes blood, staining the brittle skin I wear. I writhe at your feet, my body convulsing in cataclysmic cascades of carnivorous incendiaries. You yank at my hair and scream ‘Whore!’ into my face but I am burning into sticky soot at your fingertips. Later, my singed hair will clog the shower drain and indigo indentations will decorate my skin before mirrors that avert their shame. Right now, there is an accusation with no defense but suddenly for a brief moment you pause; and there is a pause of realization, a pause of estimation; 

And so there is a moment of consideration, a fracture of covenant contemplation 

And there is an ever-so-slight switch, and the devious deities hold a collective breath 

And as my eyes roll into my skull, my relics set on fire, my bones bludgeoned into besieged ruins 

I can feel your begging begin, kisses soothing runed ruminations, caresses over caverns cavalier 

And you’ll promise you didn’t mean it, you couldn’t control it, and that this will be the last time 

And I’ll return your embrace, and I know you’ll believe it, I know you’ll heed it until the next time 

Rue all the ravens that cursed the chauvinist shrines of our mutual melodious malady 

Hex the gluttonous gods that defiled in hysterics this hallowed holiness into profane putridity  

Damn the violence of my optimism, nihilism of my naivety, the sadism I save for my mortality 

And you, my lover, my sickness and my death, my unholiest ordinance,  

I’ll have you until there is nothing to hold and I’ll pledge you my irrevocable inconsolable hate 

And I’ll wait for you to ruin me once again. 

‘Oh, what are we doing, my love?’ 

15^th September, 2024