For You

For you, a thousand times over.

For you, I’d buy a sober man’s revolver

And blow the piece of his heart that made you part

With your reflection in the mirror.

For you, I’d carry the caucasian’s concoction of what he thinks

Your colour paints, push it against the wall

And point a pistol at Doubt’s temple.

I’d even propose a deal with the devil

So I can twist the turbulent feeling you feel

So you could feel nothing but good about yourself.

I’d make sure your father never finds out

About the day you had an American wedding, annulment and a divorce.

I felt no remorse about the time you made me

Exit your ego to make room for your new found secret libido.

I’d roll up at Death Row with a sewn patchwork of your foe’s fables

Slip the guard five fifties, tip him the location of your enemies

Watch the rabid dogs go crazy at the sight of fresh meat.

Slip into cell 24, to shake hands with the criminal

Who knows how to work the Source Code

I slip him more than just five fifties

Because he shows me

How to save you

From that one moment in time

Time after time after time.

She’s in her living room, watching brightly coloured cartoons.

She’s not of age, blood had not yet left her body.

Her chest was not heavy

And her thoughts still innocent.

Her blood uncle slipped in through the door

Her first experience of thumping rage, imitating Cujo in a cage.

Her blood boiled when he slipped his hand

Where the soil had not yet been turned.

He picked and tasted her ripened fruits

At such a tender stage in Life’s play.

She looked over his broad shoulders

Her underwear on the floor is now lingerie.

She is, for that moment in time, a slave

For each breath he takes.

He breathes heavy, breathing cold air

Breathing on to the shaking veins of her legs.

He plays with her hair

His warm hands wipes away her tears

Wipes away the blood smeared

On his favourite pin stripe trousers

“Which…” he whispers in her ears,

“I paid fifty pounds to repair.”

This is when

I walk in

and yell

that the debt we’ve struggled to pay him

Has now

Been paid.

I keep coming back to this moment of our past

Time after time after time.

Thinking of ways I can save you

From being another one of his lab rats of Project Concubine.

Thinking of ways I can barricade

The death from your eyes.

Ways I can place a knife into his thighs.

Ways I can steal a homeless man’s hope for you.

A lover’s lair for you

A paralysed man’s heart for you

A holy man’s prayer for you

A blind man’s touch for you

A Sultan’s pride for you

A troubadour’s song for you

And push away all those who are wrong for you.

I promised you that I’d save you

from the pain the outsider’s reign with

And the pain the insider’s claim they don’t play with.

For you I’d buy a drunk man’s revolver

And blow the heart that made you part

With the person you are now

From the person you were from the start.

I promise you.

For you, a thousand times over.