Matters

of the Heart

Z I N E B E L B O U K I L I

P O E T R Y

Matters of the Heart

To all the lovers who were never lovers,

I spent my life running and catching my breath.

Falling hard and breaking my bones,

Collecting notes that said :

"Don't you ever fall again"

Some words are stuck in my throat, like seraphs borrowed from heaven.

And I keep trying to breathe, suffocating on syllables I cannot speak,

Feeling my skin shivering at the sight of you, my eyes blinded by lust,

Seeking joy in lonesome fleeting thoughts borrowed from the fires of hell.

The relentless need to see you in countless daydreams is taking over me.

The never-ending longing for the sound of your heartbeat is haunting me.

All I can hear are these endless echoes of your voice surrounding me,

Pulling me into tortuous reverie, and from them I will never be free.

Sorrow is hiding in this late night kiss, swallowing the rest of my words.

Unspoken and unwritten, they're stuck inside my chest like a broken love song.

What sense shall this make, if all I can see now is my heart beating in your hands?

What will this be, if not a treacherous symphony my heart will be singing at night?

This nonsense is the only truth I can find, anthems my soul will be singing.

With these breathless lungs, and these bleeding knees, I will keep running,

For love will soon catch me, and for this is all I have ever known to do.

And all I have ever been is this, this fear of the pain that will follow.

I keep trying to make sense of the insanity that is this obsession, for I know

This is the kind of love that destroys hearts from the inside out, and I know

My castles will collapse, my words will die, and I will bury my golden ashes

In the depths of a poem so faded, as if any of this could be made into rhymes.

When everything I am melts away to meet you, and our broken souls come together,

Every single breath of mine becomes yours, and all of me is lost inside this moment.

For no love letter can paint the beauty I see in what will be the coldest of heartaches,

Hidden shadows only I can feel, creeping on the madness that this heart is becoming.

I want to disappear inside your soul for that is where I belong,

I want to be the air that you breathe and the words to your song.

I cannot help this feeling in my bones and this longing still remains

For your blue eyes against my skin, and for your love in my blue veins,

Like sweet poison running through my blood, and all of me in now fainting.

This is it, this is what love feels like, the absolute inevitabilty of falling.

I can taste it right now, your love against my lips so bittersweet.

I can feel it right now, this tear of mine slowly dying in your arms.

Bleeding from my body are these memories of you slowly smothering me,

Burning all the stories I have so carefully written to your broken heart.

With crippling thoughts gathering around me, I will look for you in a stranger's face.

With illusions forever blinding me, I will stay there, staring at the stars,

And you will be there too, looking for me, seeking the moon in the light of the sun.

We will find each other, but blind we will be; I will not see you, and you will not see me.

I have become that girl now, the girl who stares at love and doesn't even see it,

The girl who steals hearts at night and puts them in closets when the morning comes.

I have disappeared in the very dark depths of something that does not even exist,

And lost everything that I ever was, only to become what I never thought I would be.

I cannot be hurt no more for I cannot feel a thing, and there's nothing left to break.

I have lost myself to Doherty's broken love song and I have lost myself in the love.

Cold is this blood, and numb is this heart that time has burnt with tears and ache.

I'm standing here, looking at it, and all is now broken, and all is now dead.

I looked into your eyes and found myself again, in the midst of trembles,

Reminding me that this is not it, and this is not how the story will end.

I was staring into your soul, and wished that moment could last forever,

Because that was all I wanted, and that was all the story has ever been.

I have been there before, and have killed myself with a love like this.

I looked at death in the eyes, and had to bring myself back to life.

The tenderness of your words will turn into memories beautifully carved

Into my skin, and time will turn my tired heart into old stone.

I have fallen, and have fallen so hard that I forgot who I was.

Every fiber of my being is longing for the sweet agony that this love is,

Looking for your eyes in every move I make and every breath I take,

And for the words that your voice utters at night when the lights are out.

The thought of you will always come running back to me, and I cannot forget

How cold shivers were running down my spine when you were looking at me,

And how the warmth of your body was filling my lungs with chaos,

Pulling me closer to you, for I will always be missing you.

This is not a love song, this is not a love letter, this is not a love story.

This is a hopeless eulogy for a love that was more than love,

And for a beauty that was more than beauty,

And for the stories that will never be told.

I'm left with scars I try to hide underneath my words, and memories

I try to find, to never forget how it felt to fall so ungraciously

In the arms of a love so pure, and maybe this is all I will ever have.

A gathering of countless aching words, failing to create that love again.

I have lost you forever, and cannot go back in time to tell you,

How much you mean to me, and how much I want you to remember me,

For the last time our eyes met was not the last time I thought of you,

And I wish I could have told you that I forgive you for ripping my heart out.

And all of my poems are bleeding

shattered pain scattered all around,

to make verses that I once wrote,

finally yours.