Adrift in salt waves,
Closer to sea than to roots
Mountains keep still.

I didn’t want
to wake up today,
As I look
into the mirror,
I see myself,
Rugged, pieces
Here and there,
Almost handsome,
Almost there
But good enough,
I get out the door,
Jump into my car,
Notice the tags
Still say 2024
As I press
The gas pedal
And feel the machine
Alive once more,
I have to get
around that
Some day.

I find myself here
Under the sycamore rain,
Again, loving you.

I
Flamboyán whispers,
wrapped gently by the nightfall
the coquí sings true.

II
Clouds become soft quilts,
dreams live curled in the branches
under a sky full of stars.

III
The breeze calls my name,
it smells of earth and heartbeat
my soul finds its rest.

I want to believe in steady things,
but even my own reflection changes
when I look too long.
Are you here?
Do you love me?
Will you stay?
I ask without asking,
watching for the answer
in the way your hands move,
the way your breath hesitates before a word.

I know I feel too much,
ask too much,
but the silence between us is louder
than anything I could say.
So I fill it.
With words, with fear, with love—
all spilling over,
all too much,
all at once.

And still, I wonder, if it’s enough.

Use me—
whatever you need,
I’ll bend, I’ll bleed.
Take the best of me
and then the rest of me—
I won’t make a sound.

Be selfish,
be ruthless,
drain me drop by drop.
I won’t ask for kindness,
I won’t ask you to stop.

My heart is not a temple,
it’s a tool in your hand.
Worn and splintered—still,
I’ll try to understand.

You don’t owe me softness,
you don’t owe me grace.
Just don’t disappear.
Just don’t erase
me.

I don’t need love,
not even your name,
just let me exist
as a player in your game.

I’ll carry the weight,
I’ll silence the ache,
if you only let me
be something you take.

Don’t return a favor,
don’t pretend to care—
just keep me around,
just leave me there.

Use me,
bruise me,
I won’t mind.
I’d rather be broken
than left behind.

I like to pretend the storm that's been raging around me isn't man made, I like to think you're still sleeping on the other side of the bed, I always hope I wakeup to your lips instead of drunken phone calls & empty threats, I think about your hands more than I should and I think about nights in your bed more than I do anything else. I like to remember how you'd smile when you woke up & how you'd pull me closer while you were sleeping. I hope you know your steady breathing was the only thing keeping me sane. I see you in my dreams and I can feel you on my tongue. I wake up to a clenched jaw and grinding teeth, & missed calls from numbers I don't recognise with voices I don't remember. the only number I can remember is yours.

I sank one day
Deep into
A tree
Becoming
One with
The nurtured
Roots
I wished to be