Quiet Night 

The night is a voodoo doll

asking to be pricked.

Streetlights don invisibility 

cloaks while playing dungeons 

and dragons,

foxes re-enact memories 

of a malnourished youth.

Every street is a scarf

unknitting itself.

The bus moves like a thread 

searching for a needle;

your kiss a voicemail on repeat,

jolting me with some undefinable

electricity.

My Father's Love as Jurassic Park 

Prone to disaster, unexpected failures.

Every kind gesture like one of Spielberg’s

dinosaurs: astonishing to look at 

from a distance, but, up close, all smoke 

and mirrors. Animatronic wizardry 

for gas-lighted children. The electric fence 

of his heart sabotaged by alcoholism

and bitterness. Out poured raptors 

to devour my happiness. I rarely slept 

when he was in the house — the T-Rex 

of his shadow flooding my room 

like an unwanted nightmare. Rain lashing 

for added drama. None of his relatives 

ever saw it, always picturing him 

as the grandfatherly Doctor Hammond 

who escaped his own creations;

while I always ran towards the amber,

hoping to be sealed away. That it all might pass.

“Is this love?” I ask the group chat

The moon dissolves like biscotti

in cappuccino froth when your name 

pings. 

Every syllable leaves a satisfying 

aftertaste, caramelising on the tongue.

Whatever hits isn't caffeine.