Kash Baloch — Poetry on Identity, Love, and Survival

As the first fleecy snowflakes fall to the ground,  then disappear, in winter,  it floats through the skies on the gentlest breeze,  as quiet as a whisper.  Blink and you will miss it—it  is smaller than a sliver.  Delicate as crystal and nearly twice as brittle, one misstep and it will shatter; decorating the ground like shrapnel.  Feeble as a fleece slipper  sliding across a cotton floor; it has become as frail as origami made of candy floss, sold by the seashore.   Programmed to roar although  all it can muster is a single pathetic mew,  striving to be bold  but it is only the lightest hues.  Dainty like the breaking dawn  and its glistening, gossamer dew,  it secretly dreams of being steel  but is soft  as stained glass over pews.  Society is to blame  for this fragile masculinity,  that brainwashes boys into  becoming men who are afraid to feel.  This mis...

Wolf of wall street types, with slicked back hair, stole the stained ceramic tiles right out from underneath my single mother's sweet, aching feet. She saved every penny that she earned, to buy this house– her pride and joy– only to be evicted by sharks disguised as sheep who dragged her out between their teeth. Immediately painting over offending graffiti with signs that read, 'Starbucks: coming soon' like the kiss of death, with another five within twenty feet, where my b-boy crew and I once breakdanced to the Beastie Boys and Run DMC. Ma was relocated forcefully to some suburban scene, that might as well have been called Hell, instead of Parish Street. She stuck out like an alien, an unwelcome stranger in this neighbourhood, where whiney women wined and dined on weekdays, then attended church on Sunday evenings. Still, they locked their cars from the inside when mom had the audacity to step foot outside her door. This com...

When we strive to become better than we are,  the world around us gets better, too.  The universe hears the aching uncertainty in our hearts so, be patient as it clears a path for us to pursue.  Whether through prayer or wishes made in wells,  the stars will align to light our way. If it is written, only time will tell,  until then find delight in every blessed day.  If you should encounter calamity  upon your soul's quest,  hold tightly to your faith  and keep marching on.  Even if you fall seven times  before you pass the test,  the secret of life is to keep  getting up until all fear is gone.  Do not forget the universe exists inside of you.  L ike alchemy– you are the winds, deserts,  oceans, and even the moon.   The denial of your own self-worth  is just like blasphemy. Love yourself so brightly that  your dreams are drawn to you. If it is written, take a deep breath,...

Nearly four years to the day  since I first saw your pretty face,  funny how life works that way. It's like you vanished in thin air without a trace,  left me replaying all the things you used to say, like, "Baby, you're my favourite member of the human race"  and that you'd always be right here to stay. Now you've got me falling from grace, cancelled all my colours, and you left me gray. Stuck here missing you, addicted to the chase, but I can't keep at these games you wanna play, in the hopes of one day feeling your embrace. You're still the sculptor and I am your clay. Brighter than all the stars in outer space,  now all that's left to do is pray, 'til I accept you're really gone and not just misplaced.

A paper bridge under attack by razor winds,  I was as fragile as a baseball bat made out of glass.  Naive as a child sheltered from the outside world,  I fell for your sparkling words.  Left in a mess,  a heap of soiled linens on the floor,  I drowned repeatedly in my tear-filled bath  until I returned to stone.  I will go back to the warrior that I was before.

A single silver dagger, rims plated with chrome, cracked wooden doors, and a rust-covered stove.  Sirens are the soundtrack, bass vibrates under feet, drowning out the screams as bullets echo in the streets. Blood stains the sidewalk, silence fills the empty halls, mothers say silent prayers because of silenced calls. Innercity fairy tales,  storybooks from the hood, thickened skin on children, from growing up too soon.

You send me reeling through the streets of Seville,  a siesta from my regular routine,  flamenco dancing in the sun,  my heart beats to the rhythm of the Spanish guitar. You send me blasting through the skies,  up, up and away into outer space.  I sail beyond the stars, and dance beside the moon.  Looking down at the clouds, I save a picture in my mind. You send me scorching into the Sahara heat,  with only your kiss to hydrate me, as we melt into the sand.  Your every wish is my command, let me be your caravan.  You send me streaming through the ancient seven seas,  bathing in the Atlantic ocean,  before we dive deeper into the blue.  Floating in the coral. let me tickle you with kelp.  Let this moment last forever, you are my wishing well.

Like the kettle that comes to a boil without heat, there is no joy in riding a bicycle without a seat. Unless your own reflection makes you smile bearing teeth, another human won't be able to make you feel complete.

The days where our love eclipsed all else are gone,  so do not ask me to feel the same again. Although there was a time when the sun  solely rose and slept against the horizon of your eyes. We cannot expect broken glass to ever be the same.  You're right, my life, that the memories remain.  But just like a chemical reaction can't be reversed,  they cannot be changed. Sure, we could attempt to start anew,  although you should already know  how deep my love runs for you.  And I never thought I'd see the day  when I placed anything before us.  But now that I have seen the world's  true face and all it's ugliness,  I fear that I have been exposed  to hatred and mistrust.  Yes, it's true that the sun still appears  first in the east before disappearing in the west,  but that does not mean that the tragedies I've seen  are ones I can easily forget.

Society seems dead set  on causing its single citizens distress,  unable to process that self-love c ould also be a path that leads to happiness. Placated, and often patronized for being  on one's own and not one-half of a pair,  as though dining alone is pitiful, and  is a fate worse than illnesses that are rare. One is the loneliest number— our relatives and coworkers remind us like clockwork every day, as  they poke, prod then pry,  and ask questions why "great guys like us" wake up alone, i nstead of with some babe. Despite my attempts to explain that I've  finally reconnected with the boy who I lost long ago, their  eyes go blank, and they stare open-mouthed,  convinced that  I've run out of hope. After desperately dating for fifteen years,  and regularly being reduced to tears, I  honestly enjoy my own company, for once,  and no longer fear the absence of my peers.  Still, we are programmed to chase u nreal...

Chewed up, spit out and cut down to the quick from too many false starts,  I'm sick and tired of repeatedly being tricked and then torn apart. Just because of my training, you deny me my heart,  as though soldiers were only created to finish wars that you start. I've been blamed too many times that I keep losing count, stepped on landmines, and had to stop myself from bleeding out. Treated like another weapon in your artillery,  you better get the hell away from me, and my periphery. You ripped open my chest without warning and carved out my organs,  replaced all that made me human,  with worthless purple hearts that were nothing but useless.  And now all because I'm ruthless you pretend to act all surprised,  as you let your jaw drop to the ground and you widen your evil eyes.  Come a little closer, let me show you what I gained from this war,  aside from this stop-loss syndrome, and a marriage that ended in divorce.  All the tim...

I'd rather be  penniless but happy, than overflowing with  riches but miserable. Much better off alone, than surrounded by sharks in a sea of bad company. I'd rather be a starving artist,  with no money for his next meal, than withering away in a career  where my disappointment  cannot be concealed. Better to be grateful  with the little I have, instead of blessed  but oblivious; no other outcome could be quite as sad.

Conceived on the back of a whisper,  as soft as maternal breath on infant neck.  Rooted in the innocence of schoolyard crushes,  as devastating as grade school heartbreak and shipwrecks.  It was the dew that dotted fragrant blooms at dawn,  the gentle breeze that blessed the leaves with song.  It started as a simple murmur, a tickle underneath my skin,  then grew until it could not be contained in the house it was raised in.  Four walls where it was nurtured, and took its very first steps,  quickly became a prison that kept it repressed.  Once it escaped, it outgrew its shackles,  and set out for total world domination.  No longer a speck, but closer to a splatter;  a stubborn stain that would not be erased.  It echoed through the mountains, reverberating from every cliff,  then clapped with the thunder in the sky,  nothing was quite as deafening. It blared through the streets in loud speakers, ...

When life gave me playgrounds,  I turned them into cemetaries gray,  sentencing all signs of life to eternal decay.  Trampled on flowers, then willed them to wilt,  buried my brilliance beneath blankets of guilt.  I poisoned myself until I was numb,  safe from the specter that I'd become.  Set myself on fires started by sorrow, tortured by the terror of unknown tomorrows.  Afraid of accepting that I am to blame, averting my gaze as my future's swallowed by flames. The inevitable can only be deterred for so long, until it returns with a vengeance and robs my spirit of song. The thought of progress makes my wrinkled heart race, anxiety steals the smile right from my face. My calm is replaced with crippling doubt, as destiny derails turning silence to shouts. Carnivals from my past reveal the cancer they masked,  rotten from asbestos and littered with empty flasks. This wasteland cannot sustain oxygen, so I bury my head in the sand, concealing ...