Finding Home

The back of  one's hand one's palm  kneading mine The graze made on The right side Corner of  My spine against  my better sensibilities One cradling  the back of my feet As if they were my heart How could I forget? And yet why do I feel like I'm a  business deal something one knows all too well Like secret sonnets of past loves memorized eyes wide shut Unspoken Truths Like Scars and veins that protrude and that which I know too well Like the back Of my hand. 

Some stories will  Stay that way. There is no beauty in finality. The pen shouldn't have to be thrown away. Words don't have to run out.   As if they ever will.  "I will have  Poetry in my life."   You just have to pick just one   piece of memory that particular fragment that stoked the embers of what was once called fire.  That pinpoint of a Life where  You allowed yourself to break, crack heal, become  beautiful, alive. "...and love..." If I were to choose  between  happy endings and  open ones, "...and adventure." Eternally unfinished is where I want  to be.

                Shall I love you like I love the sunrise Embracing all that Breathe life? Or As I do with sunsets Letting go of all That ends must end One way or the other? Or Should I love you as I love both? With its fickle moods Transforming by the hour, Minute and second Even nanosecond? One, or the latter I cannot choose How could I? As if it is life And death when Even death is a friend. Tell me, How should I love you then?    

Come see what I see.  Leaves that turn into blades  piercing the skies full of air,  knocking the wind off my lungs  until all that is left  is the piercing  which is only nothing  and everything.

Awake at midnight And yet there is no night Only the middle of nowhere Grasping air Questioning the dark, Berating the silence, "How can you put Your faith in something So deciduous, So ephemeral, so human?"

9-21-13 A weaving of Half taken breaths Hurried, urgent Deep, resonant Slow, deliberate Tasting the sun Or the wind if you will Filling the lungs With air but better To immortalize youth To feel life Running through Your veins To hear the beast That's your heart Pulsate To weep as eyes need When they're full Of everything To hold another When words Fall short... To kiss.

Are some things  not meant to be forgiven?  Such as leaves  that fall from grace  and yet emanate  a kind of beauty  never before seen  as when it hung green  on the branches of a certain tree?  Maybe there are things  only meant to be loved  and nothing more or less than that...

To fling oneself angrily  onto something  like waves crashing  on stones seemingly  immovable, stoic.  And yet in time  disarrayed, moved,  chipped away.

Sea foam on shores  speaking in hushed tones  even when we're all alone  as if each word  is too precious  to waste on unnecessary decibels  and our ears strain  to hear all the stories  that are hidden underneath  the very few that are being said.

     Bird call piercing through The air declaring Night has fallen The sun rests Quiet your heart now Remember what is important Be done with all the rest. 

Morning Daylight  Daybreak Sunlight Sunrise Birdsong Birdcall Bird speak Day breaking Birds breaking into song Everything must break  To become more beautiful. 

Ripples Comb running through Tangled strands Rake sweeping Away leaves Finger tips tracing In the sand Quiet vibrating, resounding In concentric echoes Be still. Be still.

If you listen close enough you'll hear them utter a cry as they burst open in full glory. And even as they wither and die, songs of lament will fill the skies. Drown out all the noise and hear the hushed tones. Look with your ears. Listen with your heart. The earth speaks. The earth speaks. 

The thing that cradles  the glory of yellow for all to see The thing that holds it  like fingers gathering  a clump of colored leaves. What do you call that thing that is often forgotten? That strength that holds  one creation of terrible beauty, if you will. That thing. I choose to See that thing.  Quiet, unmoving. That which holds it together Even when the yellow withers Into brown We all want that, don't we? Prefer that even. Sepal.  Such an unobtrusive Name for a thing that  allows other things to flourish. But maybe the things that Hold the most value are just That-  silent, still,  hidden,  forgotten. 

Things Cramped Locked away in A drab gray Closet My mascara Lipstick Underthings Secrets On Blouses With Buttons Torn open Handkerchiefs Washed rewashed So the stains Will come off An attempt To forget Tears that tell Their own story Running down In places One can never Reach That's what The mascara Is for Waterproof So that when What must Fall falls, No trace can Be seen That's what The lipstick A brilliant red Is for A clever Distraction From the Dark lines Underneath Tired eyes Underthings For some nuance Of decency and Self respect Left That's what Blouses are For with Numerous Extra buttons Sewn on the Underside to hide The scars of the best-kept secret Thing of all Still Beating Despite Relentless Beatings.

At the height of loss, When words disappear And poetry leaves, All that is left is faith.

Perhaps the lesson is in the aftermath,  when one sees how everything  is stripped bare and there is nothing left  to do but fall on one's knees, make amends and make peace.

Fireflies Miniscule Lights Skies At dusk Night Hushed Tones Conversations Silence Stories Thousands Of them Come Alive Telling of Solace And Weeping Rain Falling The wind On our Tired skin Illuminated By Moonlight On The Open Seas No past Or future Just this. To hold You like This. To have You Like This.

Can you hear it?  The sun softly whispering in dew drops,  "Wake up, wake up..."

Close your eyes. Open your arms. Take it all in. The wind. Let it take you where it will.

Hold out your palms  and feel it.  All of it.  The roughness,  sharp edges,  the imperfections  telling a story  only you know.  Listen to the story.  Now tell it.

Rough, gentle, smooth, sharp-edged The soles of Your feet Takes it All in Now try it With your Palms wide Open. Everything Is Necessary. Pain for Pleasure To be buried Deep as if A fist is Twisting your Lungs in So you Can finally Truly Absolutely Breathe.

Words roll off my tongue But i forget what they were All i can remember Is what yours tasted like As they inked my skin Like dew drops In the morning Or was it like Piercing needles With every prick Telling me Risk it Risk all Of it?

To hold the one true thing in life,  to hold it with a vise grip,  even when your arms are weak,  even when your knees are shaking,  and even with voice breaking, to say, "This, you will not take away from me."

To know life  in every sun ray,  in every shadow cast,  in every wind gust,  in every grain of sand. To embrace everything.  To breathe it all in and  To say to the Universe,  "Yes. I am yours for the taking."

Throw it to the wind.  Throw rocks  in place of your heart.  Because you cannot  lose your heart.  Remember that.

Change is illusory We are who we are.

Seeing this and  realizing All I really am  Is dust In this great  Big Universe.

"That is the nature of endings, it seems. They never end. When all the missing pieces of your life are found, put together with the glue of memory and reason, there are more pieces to be found." - Amy Tan, Saving Fish from Drowning-

Fiction. Its purpose is to find personal truth. The process of writing itself is an attempt to find truth that expresses human experience, which is always amorphous and changing. -Amy Tan  

To walk And know every muscle Contract, every square inch Of my skin react to the wind Kissing it To feel Each trickle of sweat As clearly as if I can see it Trace the dots from the temples of my forehead Down to the hollowed spaces To hear My breath, go in and out In and out, constant Steady, sifting Through all the noise Rubble, chaos, debris To see what is left When all is said and done To take and carry only What matters To leave behind what does not.

To lose a wink of sleep Is to see this...

Coffee shops. College professors And their lesson "plans" Students Flirting in And out of The classroom Lawyers And their cases In and out Of courtrooms Med Reps And their quotas In and out Of their Endorsements Sales Reps And their merchandise In and out Of their marketplaces Business Owners And their, well Businesses No business Like showbusiness Ordinary Citizens Just trying To make it Through the Day. Coffee Latte Capuccino Italiano Cake Blueberry Cheese Cigarettes Smartphones Wifi Thank God there wasn't any. Talk to each other. What to talk about? Plenty. How are you's Good, thank you's Tell me your story. How is life treating you? Questions, answers Inside Glass doors Windows Conversations Outside Iron chairs And tables Cold drinks Sweat beading Labels peeling Warm caffeine Smoke rising Hours passing Like fingers Snapping Tell me again. Tell you what? Your truth And I say We only hear

Out here,  the sun tells you  what time of day it is.  And each time, she says,  "Time to be in awe at life."

Unfetterred.  Bare.  Stripped.  The sea shying away.  Low tide.

The clouds hovered over The mountains shading  Some parts and leaving out  others basking under the  Florescent-like sun And so it was like this Light, dark, light and dark Your hands, my hands Reaching, grasping, covering Revealing, Holding,  unclasping, clasping Shadowed, hollowed Bare, clothed  Unclothed Light, dark, light, dark, And the light was just beautiful But the darkness is what I love,  what I always loved.

I left. You left. What's left? Fringes Fragments And the sun? It burns. Burned them all. What's there to burn? Nothing. Just words Unearthed, now Buried again. Just nothing. Poetry if you will. Yours mine Everything. Something. What was it? I forget. And what are these? Stunted phrases That claim to be Poetic. Pretend to be Poetic. Maybe it'll Come again. Maybe. For your sake Or mine Or February's. 

Shadows cast by  scant light showing  scars by wounds past Yet this is what makes You beautiful.  This is what  makes you undeniably worth it.

Rain Drops One By One From A Single Strand Of Nipa.

And when you look Beyond you find There are other places To go, other seas To traverse Other answers Maybe not the ones You are searching for Maybe it's not important. Maybe it's the questions Or exclamations Of awe, of wonder Of gratitude That matter more.

To find secret places,  nooks, crannies  and passageways,  for a few hours' respite  from all that is noise,  where one could lose  and find oneself,  where one could just... be.

Remember  even when you feel  you are not  important enough,  even when you think  you aren't interesting enough,  even when you are tattered,  bruised and broken,  you are still  so much worth it.  You. Are. Worth it.

Did you see the skies today?  Did you see the sun burst  through the clouds  her rays falling like rain?  And if you did,  did you realize  how loved you are  by the Universe  for having witnessed  all this even once  in the brevity of your life? 

Remind me again. I've forgotten the sound  of your light on my skin. Remind me lest I bury you with the rest of My forgotten things-- Journals tattered, How do I love thee's Mary Oliver's  Wild Geese Semblances of Poetry, Volumes of stories Waiting to be told Never told What else? My heart.

Find me  in the lines  that blur  watercolor  shades of  dusk  and night.

Strip away. Tear apart. Devastate. Break one's heart. Lose yourself. Change. Yourself. Mend. The holes. Find Your soul. Recreate. Today is The first Day of Your life. 

Not the colors In the sky Nor the setting Of the Sun But the breath That catches with Every sprint And the question One simply cannot Run away from-- Can you forgive? Who? What? Yourself. Life.

I'll enumerate all the things that make you beautiful. Everyday. Each piece of perfection. Each crack of imperfection. One, two, three...as a child does learning numbers on the wooden abacus, only with you the beads disappear as soon as my forefinger touches them, transforming into a fragment of a thought, a memory that you will hopefully unearth again and again until you believe it yourself.

Light. Shadows. Nipa. Bamboo. Nylon. Typhoon. Wind. Rain. Stripped away. All that is replaceable.

All in one day. A sunset that makes you breathe deeply Or just breathe For that matter. A forgotten poem Now remembered-- "Shall I see the Sun and skies With its fiery hues? Shall I? Can I See it all with you? " All in one day And then no more. Some doors Must be closed.

And then there's this nagging of sorts, a fierce undertow fighting my better sensibilities to grab on to you as if you were my life vest only to remember you were also the tumultuous sea that caused my ship to wreck and still to drink that liquid willfully forgetting the utter dehydration it might cause, caused me. And now I am Merely recycling words To remember Or maybe to forget.

I wonder Am I the only one who notices the blue? Or the calm? Or the mirror-like surface? Or the blatant beauty of This ship with all Its rust and wear And dusty cargo Yet still proud and grand as it Stands like a queen On the silent sea?

Thoughts While I sip My coffee Black Dark As Dusk Turns Into night And rum cake On my Tongue Bitter Sweet But how I love Not the Sugar Thoughts Such as What if's Surface Everytime You do But I know You ask Them too The what if's Like an Interrupted Kiss That we both Stop Where The Question mark Ends. What if ? Yes. In another Life, Maybe. But no, not This.

Write until your fingers bleed. Put it all out there for All the world to see Everything you've ever Believed to be true And sacred has just Been desecrated Ripped away Not unlike the furious Winds of Four months ago Not just once Or twice but Over and over and Over again And now you ask Yourself what must Be learned? What must be forgotten? And what misgivings Were you able to Forgive or claim to And above all who? All this ranting Brings you no Peace, only momentary Relief. A few minutes? Compared to a life-long Sentence? No periods or commas Or even question marks. Only words that blur Said in breaths that Come in gasps. And no amount Of inhaling air And expeling its remnants Thereof could Ever be enough. Who could save you? You wonder And do you even need Saving? You cannot answer. Or you don't know how. But you do know this-- Inhale, exhale Breathe Just breathe. And this--

Channel me As the sea does With the light Of the tired sun Over and over And over again.

One can never Measure up If one is not enough To Outrun Outspeak Outforgive Outgive Outfeel To Outlove. So how do You deal? You invent Words like These and You simply Learn To be Who You are In the Order Of Things.

The truth will hurt But it will have to No one has ever Broken free Of binds that Never did. Photo taken at Lake Danao, Brgy. Lake Danao, Ormoc, Leyte