Unfinished Exit

I keep thinking

about the time in high school

when you drew

me

a map of the city,

I still have it somewhere.

It was so easy

to get lost

in a place where all the trees

look the same.

And now

every time I see

a missing person's poster

stapled to a pole,

all I can think is

that could have been me.

Missing,

disappeared.

But there are no

posters for people

who just never came back

from vacation, from college,

from life.

You haven't killed yourself

because you'd have to commit to a

single exit.

What you wouldn't give to be your cousin Catherine,

who you watched

twice in one weekend get strangled nude

in a bathtub onstage

by the actor who once

filled your mouth with quarters at

your mother's funeral.

The curtains closed and opened again.

We applauded until

our hands were sore.

But you couldn't shake the image of

her lifeless body,

the way she hung there like a

marionette with cut strings.

And now every time you try to write a poem,

it feels like a

eulogy.

So even though you haven't

found the perfect ending yet,

you keep writing.

For Catherine, for yourself, for all the lost

souls

who never got their own

missing person's poster.

Because as long as there are words on a page,

there is still hope for an unfinished exit

to find its proper

ending.

Claudia Wysocky, a Polish writer and poet based in New York, is known for her diverse literary creations, including fiction and poetry. Her poems, such as "Stargazing Love" and "Heaven and Hell," reflect her ability to capture the beauty of life through rich descriptions. Besides poetry, she authored "All Up in Smoke," published by "Anxiety Press." With over five years of writing experience, Claudia's work has been featured in local newspapers, magazines, and even literary journals like WordCityLit and Lothlorien Poetry Journal. Her writing is powered by her belief in art's potential to inspire positive change. Claudia also shares her personal journey and love for writing on her own blog, and she expresses her literary talent as an immigrant raised in post-communism Poland.

Intentionally Cruel

Trigger Warnings: Trauma, Mentions of Sex, Gore Imagery, Profanity, Suicidal Ideations 

1 

I will always ponder the fact that trauma remains in the body for years and years and years. Decades will pass, and I will no longer remember the shape of your shadow, but my back will still ache with the weight of you. My skin will wallow at the ghost of your touch. Trauma remains in the body for years and years and years. What lingers will keep haunting me. What does not linger is the thing that I called ‘love’ in spite of. I could call you a liar and a thief and a whore—I will never call you mine. Your love was only reserved for those who do not deserve it. Did I deserve it? All the bloodlust and grief—was he worth it? Do you ever cross his mind when he looks at the paintings perched upon the walls that you built so that nobody but I could ever come as close as knowing you? The betrayal of the truth rests beneath a handful of lies carved upon every inch of you. There and here and there, where else did he touch you? Has his fingertip laid on the broken parts of you? Did he ever try to know you beyond the glory and the sex? Was he worth it? Is the heat of his skin against yours warmer than the burning castle I built for you? You will add his name to the long list of the men you have fucked—in bed and in your head—where will you keep mine? Will my existence live under the canopy of lost souls, waiting for the right time to crawl upon the hardwood door and jump at you when you are most vulnerable? When are you ever going to learn that love will never be as glorious as you paint it to be? Love will always leave you hanging and leave you seeking a feeling you cannot name. They will leave you, no matter how hard you try to make them stay. Perhaps your biggest punishment is who you are and who you will ever be. Your incapacity to cross oceans for people who have paved seas for you. 

2

Loving you makes me want to die. There, I said it. Into the harsh bite of the wind and the heat of the re rattling through my bones. Into the tall green grass, nearly touching the bluest of skies amidst the darkest of our days. It is not tall enough to reach the stars, but it is enough to obscure the view of a better tomorrow. Is there even a better tomorrow? It seems all the days stretch among themselves and circle back to my damnation with you. Scratch that; maybe I do not want a tomorrow at all. I can barely stomach the weight of today. Loving you makes my skin crawl on itself. I thought I had enough patience to watch you crumble under your own abominations. I thought I had the capacity to carry both of our burdens, and yet you made me carry all of yours. Tell me, what else is there to carry? Cry me a river and a sea and a lake where I have drowned all of our sins. Bury me in the playground where we used to laugh at our misfortunes. The soil echoes the past’s corpses. Loving you makes me a sinner. Cross my heart and hope to die on the hill perched upon the tombstones of our false fantasies. You cannot build a home out of people. I cannot make this house a home if all that exists is my resentment of you. The kitchen reeks of rotten tangerines. Coffee spilt from glass cups, and shards of glass pierced through what used to be a picture-perfect image of you. Loving you kills me. I have lived long enough to lie to myself and say that I dreamt of being with you. If only I knew sooner that breathing the same air knocks the ecstasy of being alive out of me. I have thought of death every single day since committing myself to the liability that is you. 

3 

The most haunting of your ghosts reside in the corner of the attic where you have betrayed yourself. A man in sheep’s clothing knocks on the door; you let him in with a sinister smile. He touches you by your neck, and you hold him through the darkness of the night. Have you ever loved someone into ruins? He has. Perhaps it was not love—it could not have been. You do not cross the people that you love. You do not light an arsonist’s match and blame someone else for the fire. All of my dead ends lead to the ashes of our lost destiny. Have you ever loved someone to their death? This is not the end, but it feels like it. You peer over my grave, dead poppies by your feet. I can no longer fathom your name beyond the shadows lingering around you. Where have you been, my Ciara? Where have you gone now that you have tried someone else’s life on? Does it fit you well to pretend to be someone you are not? Perhaps I have never known you at all. Perhaps I have loved the enigmatic facade you have woven with your bare hands. I no longer recognise the face of someone who has intentionally carved their goodbye deep into my burning chest. You do not blame someone else for homicide when you are holding the knife. 

Let me say goodbye for the last time. Stand by my door and hover over me one last time. Fill our bedroom with your lies—perhaps I shall believe you this time.

Alistair Gaunt is an emerging 22 year old Filipino queer writer from the Philippines. I am self-taught, with English being my third language. My writing contemplates the queer experience, violent desires, peculiar dreams, death, grief, and catharsis. When not writing, I spend the rest of my free time painting, reading, making coffee, traveling, and watching sunsets collapse into dawn. I am currently a full time university student taking up Bachelor of Science in Psychology.

A Secret

Blurring via train across

across the northern tip of Ireland,

The woman with

The white hair

Strokes the hands of

Her grandson

Swaths of ocean blues and forest greens

Occupy the eyes in hard flashes

And the boy nearly drifts

To something of a slumber

Placing his head on her lap

But, before his lids

Fully drop

He says

That he had

A good time

And the grandmother

Pats his cheek

And tells him

That

that

is the secret

Always have something

To look forward to

No matter how mundane

Or simple, or misunderstood

Always have it

Just beyond the bridge

Anything will do:

The soft crumble of a meringue,

A letter to write, a dog to pet,

Someone with whom

To sit

And deliver,

Even receive,

A “good boy”

Mathieu Cailler is the author of seven books: a novel, two short story collections, two volumes of poetry, and two children’s titles. His stories, poems, and essays have been featured in over one hundred publications such as Wigleaf, the Saturday Evening Post, and the Los Angeles Times. Cailler has garnered numerous awards for his writing, including a Pushcart Prize; a Readers’ Favorite Award; and accolades from the Paris, Los Angeles, and New England Book Festivals. Connect with him on social media @writesfromla or visit mathieucailler.com.