I never told my mother I love her until my senior year,
and I have been scheduled lately to care for a dying woman,
struggling, gasping for dry misty air. Few weeks ago, I leaned
over a newborn to monitor his extrauterine adaptation, his cry for life.
I first learned from my psychiatric nursing class that recognition
is a form of therapy, an ephemeral touch to the soul, the kind that
gifts me little snacks as reward for small talks with a patient. I guess it is the
words that turn into charms. I once asked an irritable elderly woman
if she had eaten and she also asked me in return. I was liquified. My house
has never had picture frames hung up on the walls. Crumbles of loss,
torn wedding album, heartbreak in my larva years.
I feel so privileged to be saved by the sick or I may say, to view
nursing as a means of holding on to life.
Some time in my senior year, I encountered a woman, same age
as my mother, with brain aneurysm and every movement of
her head, limb, and torso hurt her. I assisted her to the bathroom,
then I introduced myself again.
Apr 6, 2023
Apr 6, 2023 at 8:24 AM UTC
your heart will not fail in space
it will be an object of its own mass
and gravity
no longer will there be a throttle in its vessels
and asynchronicity in its rhythms—
the beats, oh, the beats
your heart, when it is in space, will only wait
for an entity
to be jettisoned from a shuttle
my oxygen is running low
i love you to your heart and never back
Jan 17, 2022
Jan 17, 2022 at 12:01 AM UTC
As though I can only show up when
the sun peeks and a ray touches me,
and I bleed
ink from my desolate spaces
It absorbs the gush to feel it is worthy
of my parts that I tend to
forget, to give away
I keep on refilling myself
just to be empty in pleasure with you later
It drains me and then brims me
and then drains me once again
Oh I like it so I let it,
and I burn
from those diurnal peeks and touches
You then hide and I return to feigned flashes
Tell me how I can function
when you know that all I do is
love the sunset
and bleed for you
Nov 20, 2021
Nov 20, 2021 at 12:55 AM UTC
i don't see myself
loving
any other man but you
so i let the stars align
to take me as soon
as i am forty for
you
desire not of me
41 and alone
51 and alone
61 and alone
i do not want to grow old alone
i foresee myself growing old alone
so i ask the stars to take me when i am forty
or younger
my dust to be encrypted
when you close your eyes at night
tells you that
i could've grown old with you
you are too late
you are too late
Sep 1, 2021
Sep 1, 2021 at 12:54 PM UTC
If I shall sit alone again,
I will not think of
the wind as my companion,
for I always feel more
than the blow and touch it gives
that still i yield from afar
a less expelling air -
a warm and sensuous breath from thee.
And so for every time
I will sit alone,
pleasing is the wind that,
although from a different byland,
gets to indulge my insides
as if near we already are.
Here again I sit alone
not feeling so alone,
for I think now until close we come
the breeze that
gusts a tingling sense
is thy breath
that catches me.
Aug 25, 2021
Aug 25, 2021 at 11:09 PM UTC
on this day, i write
tunes and voices coming in one ear
playing your message as i pause the music
playing the music as i leave your message
thought to resurge but a tough palm stood
to release the string from my opposite drum
attached is my depth from a pit, yelling
with you, we lost the bucket to save it
for this day i shut
so my fading code unbars
scripts i thought i'd never again crack
since my inclination to yours for me to be a part
from now and when i hear you
again will play the music that turns me than up
uncertain, but to neighbor by far is to keep you
from living in my lines
Jun 9, 2021
Jun 9, 2021 at 3:55 AM UTC
Recalling that time when you left
was a Sunday afternoon in a city
driving along a known boulevard
there was I
from the inside of the car window
looking through
The atmosphere from within was a crowd
to hear my family's arguments
slowly fade like it was some background music
it all shifted
when I thought of you
Five o'clock and everything outside was orange
cars would pass from the opposite road
and a light would strike
imagining it was your eyes sharply looking at mine
Resisting it
never have I thought nor planned
a streak of ignition
in the absence of you
Average traffic ahead
watching over the orange sunset
staring at it with awe as I felt this sudden stimulus
straight to my nerves from my phone
05: 06 - a vibration, a message from you
Started with a hello
typical it wasn't
for it moistened my eyes as I stared at the sun
and pulled me
into a void of nothingness
as I finished reading
it was goodbye
Green light
cars started moving to an extent
seeing my reflection through the window
two tears dropped as the sun was going down
From my right eye was the first
causing it to drop earlier than the other
it had the heavier pain and depth
spreading down my face
From my left eye
the next teardrop came
Those teardrops were us
but who were we
from each one of them
From dark blue to light yellow
the gradient of the sky was visible
a while to finally have thought of you
as the first teardrop who left
and the next was I
as the one who was left behind
Frigid air from the inside
dried my tears hurriedly
to look at every airplane
and make me wonder
if you were there
Recalling that time when you left
was a Sunday afternoon in a city
driving along a known boulevard
there was I
waiting for you to say
goodbye
Dec 29, 2017
Dec 29, 2017 at 6:09 AM UTC
Mangawit man ang aking leeg sa pagtingala,
palibutan man ako ng mga lamok at gamu-gamo,
manigas man ako sa lamig ng simoy ng hangin,
maabutan man ako ng unang bahid ng liwanag ng bungang liwayway,
ako ay mananatili;
dahil minsan na nga lang
kayo lumabas sa inyong pinagtataguan,
minsan ko nalang kayo masulyapan
at sa tinagal-tagal kong nagmamasid
ay ngayon ko nalang kayo muling natagpuan.
Kaya aking susulitin ang gabi.
Aking gagawin ang lahat ng pagtitiis
para lamang kayo'y masilaya't mapagmasdan,
mga bituin.
Aug 31, 2017
Aug 31, 2017 at 10:03 AM UTC
I remember the days
when everything is just so innocent.
When I need to get some breast milk,
I cry.
When someone makes funny faces
and stick their tongue out their mouth,
I laugh.
Everything is as simple.
Not a word meant another.
It is as it is.
It just so happened that as I grow up,
everything turned out to be so complicated.
When I was a kid,
***** meant cat.
And now I see cat faces printed in front of ******* in women’s lingerie, in bikinis.
I see it being sold online as I scroll in my twitter account.
If ***** was a tourist attraction, it would probably be much visited than Disneyland.
When I was a kid,
***** was a female dog.
And now, everyone turns out to be one.
Go on! Laugh out loudly!
Instead of saying “Hi!”, we say, “Hey ***** Wassup?”
Not that it is meant literally,
it just seems to be a part of our language now;
an expression.
When I was a kid,
**** was a name and BJ was a nickname.
Oh come on, you already know what that means.
But for those who don’t, just look at your seatmate’s…
Uhhh… nevermind.
When I was a kid,
***** was a nut.
And now, it is censored when it is said in movies.
Toot you!
And it was just ***** you!”
When I was a kid,
Bang was a sound,
Rubber was like plastic,
*** was an animal,
*** was a snack.
All of which sounds so pervy now.
I work with words all day.
Is it the words or us who change?
Words seem so nasty now.
Inappropriate to say.
And I wouldn’t be shocked to know that during a Mathematics class in a 4-walled room at the 2nd floor of that building next to us,
The teacher asked, “What are sets?”
S-E-T-S
A student, a 7th grader undoubtedly raised his hand, stood up and answered, *********** po.”
And I knew that even the wrong meaning fits the wrong word.
That even the youngsters are already exposed to those words.
When I was in 7th grade,
sets meant a collection of elements.
When I was a kid,
*** meant gender.
Jul 12, 2017
Jul 12, 2017 at 7:41 AM UTC
beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder,
but sometimes it lies behind the eyes,
hidden and unseen,
but it's for you to define.
maybe beauty is a bit of sense.
a touch on your skin
or a tickle from your throat;
a scent of a flower
or a taste of your own.
maybe beauty is a feeling,
just flattering around.
waiting to be expressed,
from the moment it was found.
maybe beauty is in the mind,
a very definable one.
other times, it seems obvious,
but you can't spit it out.
maybe beauty is vague.
maybe beauty is shy.
let it grow upon you.
let it get out.
for it is for the world to see
to feel or think
that beauty is beauty
and it is beautiful
just as it is.
May 30, 2017
May 30, 2017 at 2:51 AM UTC