Ben Jones

“things to say
This endless unhappiness, there’s nothing to say
These silent tears of distress, there’s nothing to say
These poems, worn out, confused, repetitious,
Aches that are remediless, there’s nothing to say
That I missed someone so much . . . and still do
A feeling of amorphousness, there’s nothing to say
In the night, the heart-stopping creak of your bones
It’s the nearness of death they express, there’s nothing to say
When there’s nowhere to go but away, believe me,
With a fistful of words that are substanceless, there’s nothing to say
In the autumn he wouldn’t let me love him still
It’s February forever more or less, there’s nothing to say
It’s cold, the bed and table and plate and . . . the ground is cold
Not a breath of change nonetheless, there’s nothing to say
Sir! I love . . . no! I can’t anymore – I . . . you . . .
About our broken bodies I guess, there’s nothing to say”
― Fatemeh Shams, When They Broke Down The Door: Poems

“IT TAKES A HELL OF A LOT MORE MUSCLE
TO STAY
THAN TO GO.”
― Andrea Gibson, Take Me With You

“w for war (1)
I
wasn’t a helmet
I wasn’t a boot
I wasn’t a mortar-shell
I wasn’t a tank
I
wasn’t a commander
I wasn’t a soldier
a minefield
barbed wire
an embankment, not me
I was a bit of a photograph, small, with no corners
in the left-hand breast pocket
over the smashed heart of a conscript.”
― Fatemeh Shams, When They Broke Down The Door: Poems

“if we must
both
be right.
we will
lose
each other.”
― Nayyirah Waheed