Tangerine Dreams

Welcome to Australia.

The first time I had silence spitting at me
instead of poetry, I sat in that chair, right there,
folded in a digital box that held me back from handing
alcoholic lines to strangers, trying to make poetic friends.

The first time I came to Australia
I could've fit in a kangaroo's pouch.

Now I'm 21 and lonely and the kangaroos
aren't as exciting as they told me.
Australia was a canvas of desert sand
despite living in a city of concrete and beach
because the ocean washed me ashore
and I got lost following the stars.

The first time my eyes adjusted to the Australian sun,
I thought I could survive eating art for breakfast
and solitude for dinner.

But every time I stare at the walls I realise
that my poetry is dying,
all poetry is dying at the insides of our ribs
until we dig up the past from heartbreak
and start spilling ink again.

But who writes anyway, I'm still here
folded in my digital box like an uninteresting flyer.
I feel like life is pushing me into the hands of strangers
with promises of discount, but nobody wants to read me
because we all know that flyers are meant for trash cans,
except that Australia makes you think twice
due to their attempt at recycling.

So here I am, asking, someone, to recycle me.
I'm hiding my poetry in my phone and everyone thinks
I'm a social snob, but all I wish is to clutch
to pen and paper again, without heartbreak.

I wish to nag. I wish to nag
about shorts and dark skin
while standing, right there, right here,
head upright, rejecting my phone.

I wish to spit poetry at the crowd
like tangerine seeds, and make you,
make me, gleam in disgust
without a care in the world.

25/08/2015
7:12 PM

A poem I wrote during my first experience at a poetry slam, which was quite disappointing because I was one out of very few listeners. The room was a sad scene of poets on stage speaking to empty chairs. This poem was scribbled on my phone during that moment, and it is mixed up with the feelings I had felt during my first months of exchange to Australia.