Annual Questionnaire #5

What was 2013 for you? 1. What did you do in 2013 that you’d never done before? I became fully financially independent. I tried anti-depressants. I bought a Christmas tree. I became a master of the raw brownie. 2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year? Last Year’s Happiness

Bitch, I Don’t Ask for Help & Other Charming Lashings

It’s raining. This is not unusual for Melbourne. I’m crying. This is not unusual for me. I don’t know when it happened, when I stopped being someone who had pain and when I started believing I was pain personified, but I am a person that is harnessed by heartbreak. I used to own my cracks;

Annual Questionnaire 2012

What was 2012 for you? 1. What did you do in 2012 that you’d never done before? I went vegan…ish. I had a holiday romance. I wasn’t afraid to say NO. I decided I liked dates. The fruit. AND EVEN FIGS. DRIED ONLY. 2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make

See

I turned the tap and asked him his temperature preferences. This man has been inside me but I don’t know how he takes his showers. ‘Cold,’ he said. ‘Always cold showers in Bali.’ I like my cold showers during summer time too but not on this day. He stood in the corner. He didn’t want

Lighthouse

I can smell it in the wind. The air gets heavy and tight. The sky bruises. The first fat drops fall. A storm is coming. I know this storm too well. That’s why I start sinking as soon as I smell it. I am overwhelmed. Life is fantastically neon after months years of sepia. But

This is the Only Way.

He asks me what I’m thinking and all I can think of is how every time I have worn this dress in the past two years, I have been having some variation of this conversation. I say, ‘I am so bored of this.’ Because it all sounds the same when someone doesn’t want you. As far

Letter to my Sixteen Year Old Self

Dear Me at Sixteen, Stop running away. You are so much more than you think you are. Eat. I’m not going to tell you not to start smoking. I am going to tell you that you are not ugly. Not even a little bit. Over the years, many boys will tell you how crazy they were

KEEP YOUR OWN LIGHT SHINING

Her mother grips my hand and gives me a pale smile. “Alexia. You came.” I hug her. Of course I came. “This is Twiggy. Look at that face.” I am shot back a dozen years. I am a scrawny, awkward precocious adolescent with unripened rebellious ideas. At home I am a princess. At school I am

midnight in athens

my hair doesn’t glow gold and my eyelashes aren’t thick enough and my nail polish has chipped and my triceps aren’t tight enough. my thoughts are fuzzy and my skin isn’t clean enough and my smile is too small and being busy and alone all day is tough. today my soul felt moth-eaten for the first

Friday, August 12th 2011

The ferry is tilting. I am terrified. I am alone and I am terrified. I stand on the deck. I smoke because there’s nothing else to do. The sky glows gold until it bleeds into blue. The seagulls swoop in origami lines as they chase us, their wings bending like sideways apostrophes, quoting a language I

Alexia’s Eleven Commandments

During another epic psychoanalytic conversation with Eleni, I had this epiphany: I am not Superwoman. I will not learn a dance in one day that everyone else has been studying for one year. I do not need to write something brilliant every time my pen touches the paper. Not every single guy I meet will

Whore

The day you realise you’re a whore is an ugly one. The shame washes over you as you realise that somewhere along the way, you stopped being a prize-winning cow and became spoilt milk. You have become the girl they just want to fuck. You let them fuck you because they fill a hole in

Nothing Special

I pull my mouth away from his and fall back into the passenger seat. He strokes my face and then he smiles. I think, That smile would have made me melt out of hope and anticipation before, but actually it just makes my heart beat all sad-sweet like broken lollipops. He is smiling now and

Two-hundred and Seventy-nine: itcouldhavebeenaversary

i like to play around with the letters of their names, pretending that the ghosts of their broken hearts do not haunt me.  they banded together to make a boomerang of his single rejection. i never knew my ribcage was so fucking useless. we add -aversaries to everything; to celebrate pain is to give it

It’s Not You, It’s Me

Letter to The Universe My Uterus Dear Uterus, Fuck you. Because of you I am swollen and sore and too full of cheese. My clothes are a bit too tight. I’m too hormonal to write. Fuck you every month. You know, on the one hand, your perseverance is admirable. Every month you are rendered useless

Journal Excerpt: Even My Breathing Keeps Them at a Distance

I am riding a train. They are being boys, boisterous, knocking on windows. The rapid rap, rap, rap makes my heart beat, beat, beat at the same pace. My chest feels full of air. My ribcage feels literal. My heaving is impeccable. I panic delicately. Everything is too loud. I’m afraid the train’s shaking will

Last night I didn’t sparkle but that doesn’t mean I’m not always glowing.

I collect compliments like stamps. I glue them into a book I keep for my soul’s rainy days. Last night I felt ordinary so that’s what I was. I hate it when I don’t sparkle but I must remember that nothing can sparkle all the time. We talk about boys. About the way they look

To-do List: Be Legendary, Appear Complex, Prove Real etc…

  I highly doubt that I look famous. I have awesome Jackie O sunglasses though. I intend to be legendary. Sometimes I’m told I’m a legend; does that count? I don’t need to appear complex. I am complex. Much to my chagrin sometimes. I don’t think I act easy. Wait, what ‘easy’ do they mean?

He Said, She Said

He said, ‘You were like superwoman. You astounded us. I mean it. The way you dealt with your accident was incredible. So fuck him. You are so much stronger than him. Don’t let small men bring you down.” She said, ‘I did what anyone would have done. You do what you have to do.’ He

A Review of the Decade

2000 This was the year I convinced myself that everybody hated me. This is because this is the year I started hating myself. I ran away for the first time. I stopped eating very little and started eating nothing. I sang Sounds of Silence. And sounded good. I surprised everyone by taking a drag from

Annual Questionnaire 2010

1. What did you do in 2010 that you’d never done before? I set myself on fire. I went to America. I drank gin voluntarily. 2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year? Last year I broke my resolutions so fast I can’t even remember if I

Two-hundred and Ninety-two: Skin

I am not Casanova smooth. My skin does not fold gently into the good light. There is braille between my breasts, a purple Pollock on my leg. I have a swollen starfish beneath each wing, a pink snake sailing across my belly and a brown palm print on my hip. I have a pale river

Fell Asleep On Someone’s Couch. Came Home and… Slept? Hell No. Wrote. ‘Cos That’s How I Roll.

I’m sitting there with a little limp mouth and sad jelly eyes and I think, I should smile before someone worries. So I do. The corners of my lips begin to creep upwards. This way I can pretend that I, in quiet contentment, am watching everyone laugh, live, but, actually, smiling is too straining. In

Inside, I Go On Forever

Look at the way the sky slides through the clouds! When the sun shines gold like that, it makes you believe in magic, doesn’t it? I wonder what my future friends and lovers are doing right now; I wonder whether they’ve ever thought of me. That crack in the pavement is shaped like a broken heart;

Two-hundred and Seventy-six: Third-grade Tulips

In my dreams I wrestle third-grade tulips and scrawl midget graffiti on opaque walls while thistle down falls on Blyton mornings. I strangle amaranth guilt, stroking cats that aren’t mine, decapitating dolls I know I’ll only lose.  I braid hopes, folding in shadows like ribbons as maroon lace simmers on the cliffs of my id.

“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

“I’ve learned that no matter what happens, or how bad it seems today, life does go on, and it will be better tomorrow. I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he/she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights. I’ve learned that regardless of your relationship

“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

“I’ve learned that no matter what happens, or how bad it seems today, life does go on, and it will be better tomorrow. I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he/she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights. I’ve learned that regardless of your relationship

Two-hundred and Sixty-nine: strike

black anemone hair post-traumatic goggles fogging sharp mouth not shouting hide harp-playing heart loneliness is an art drip drip drip love is a pollock wait, they sing don’t fade blank lines tighten the night suspend winter thighs strike matches thin and out kiss mirrors tease like a feather shiver like an orgasm

Two-hundred and Fifty-One: My Experiment

For 333 weeks I have dropped question marks like bombs, sewn seeds of jealousy into lapels just to see a tree of mystery sprout out around their eyes. I have thrown glances, faked a good hand, pirouetted empty promises like oases. I am not proud of what I have done. Their broken hearts are not

A Good Spanking

Brushing my hair makes me cry sometimes, because it’s just me and the mirror, and nothing to hide behind except maybe my hand. But then I can read the fine print of my palm, the ancient lines I’m too young to have, so really I’m not hiding at all. I sit on the toilet and

Two-hundred and Forty-six: Let’s Undo What They Did To Us

My daddy taught me not to think and love. When I stopped being a child, I started drinking. I waited for trains every night, throwing my weight (what weight?) on the track marks on my arms. Constructive assholes sheep-whistled at my wolf-heart. They taught me everything else: Do not indicate when turning left. It’s not like

Two-hundred and Forty-three: Foolish Games

You fell like a piano from a rooftop party while he sang for every hooker/ waitress there. Your machism was charming, truly. And it was amusing to watch you twist into yourself, hard as a rubix cube, tripping over mixed signals like a colour-blind dog at a traffic light. Then you drifted into strangers’ beds, playing solitaire while

Two-hundred and Forty-one: I Have Been Wrong

I have risen like oil in water. Blue eyes soaked in too much gin. Such deep roots for such a young oak. I have broken promises like mirrors, sinned easily as ABC. Now I breeze through evenings: karma’s spoilt daughter. I have sighed. And the earth has rumbled. Good luck has tumbled out in the