my love,
you've no reason to fear you'll fade out.
your presence will echo through mountains,
your laughter is a song i'll sing for years,
your light will always guide
city dwellers as they make their way
to their little coffee shops and offices,
your dance will live in the way flowers sway,
your doe eyes will live in the wonders of the stars

and when the world turns to ashes
i promise
your golden heart will remain intact
and the words you wrote will never die
because how could i
ever forget a face like yours?

of all the lives i could have lived,
i am glad i happen
to be in the same lifetime as yours.

but again here comes the world,
with all its silly ironies—
its vastness that sets people apart
miles and miles;
our paths crossing
is quite out of the picture.

i know this.
you don't.
i think of you.
you don't.

but why do i keep waiting for you
as if i'd suddenly find you outside,
standing by my door
and waiting for me too?

Alone.
By September until who knows when, that is how I will start and end my days.
Calm mornings will no longer begin with the sound of your chatter.
Dead silence will fill the air as I eat my dinner all alone.
Every empty chair will be a reminder that you are not home.
From spending almost every waking hour together, we will only exchange brief messages each day.
Growing up has led us to this—one of you in Manila and the other one in Tokyo.
I’ll feel stuck in the four corners of my little room while you’re both someplace else.
Just the thought of not having both of you around makes me feel like a deer caught in the headlights.
Kisses, embraces, and affectionate teasing only older sisters could ever give will become less frequent…
Loneliness is something I have never known.
Mom and Dad will still be here, but they will be busy too, and I would not want to bother them.
Nothing will fill in the spaces of the house the way they’re occupied while you’re here—
One of you painting in watercolor by the windowsill, the other one listening to music until the wee hours of the morning.
Please always tell me about your day while you’re away, no matter how ordinary or great it may be.
Q¬uiet the noises that will shout in the head of a younger sister who is all alone.
Rise and live the way you have always wanted, but don’t forget about me.
Shine to the world the way you shine in my eyes.
Think of me as I think of you.
Ultimately, all I will do will come down to waiting for you to come back home.
Vinyls we share will rarely spin, the books we borrow from one another will be left to dust on the shelves.
What was once a house filled to the brim with voices and love only sisters could have will feel spacious and empty.
Xylophone clanging and the strumming of the guitar from the childhood we shared will seem so distant, but I will do all I can to make it feel like you are not far away—
Your favorite song will come up on the radio on some nights and I will sing along as we would sing together:
*“Ziggy played guitar, jamming good with Weird and Gilly, and the spiders from Mars….”

it's a resounding voice in my head,
"be more. be more. be more. be more. be more. be more."
there's a fire in my heart and
i can never feel enough in my own skin.
the world feels bigger than ever
and i feel smaller in the four walls of my bedroom,
and i want to do more
see more
feel more
be more
but i don't know how to.

this life tells me i have never known you before,
but your face is already an image i have seen,
your voice is a resounding song in my head,
your speech and your thoughts feel so familiar
as if i have already spent time talking to you
until the wee hours of the morning,
and our thoughts seem to connect and weave into fabric
as warm as the blankets that cover me at night.

it is strange, isn't it?
the way a stranger could feel so familiar?
i do not know why,
but i believe that we have met at some point in the past,
perhaps we already knew each other
when we were living previous lives
we cannot call ours at present.

but whether it is fate or coincidence,
i am glad our paths have crossed again.

there's a certain way some parts of the city
are covered in graffiti that's impossible to erase.
there's a certain way my parents never forget
to kiss my forehead at least once a day.
there's a certain way some gardener in the countryside
remembers to water his rosebeds every morning.
there's a certain way the waves
never leave the shore for any of the ocean's secrets.

and in those same ways,
i want you to never forget me.

The morning after is when the heart is at its heaviest.
Remnants of the night before are broken in fragments,
barely alive but still breathing, like wilting flowers—
Neon lights, stolen glances, cups of coffee, roaring laughter, moments when you feel like you're in love—
They turn to memories left in a time
that isn't far away just yet,
But the distance of just a few hours
makes you feel lonelier than ever.
*(The past within your reach, yet impossible to grasp once again.)

my boy's got me tongue tied in two different languages
he's calling me baby on mondays and sinta 'til sundays
he's got me looking for him in between eskinitas
and cathedrals from quezon avenue to intramuros
all i see are his eyes
and 7,107 islands in the palms of his hands
and i never knew love could be so hard
when your words ran faster than your heart
makata is what they call you
a master of poetry and performance
you called me your greatest work
and you are a master of fiction
manileño is what you are
my boy's got manila's grime and glory
pulsing through his makata veins
he's got makati's lights burning through his irises
he's got the danger of manila beating in his chest
he's got the cries of san juan lodged in his throat
he's got the rhythm of the city in every step
my boy's still a boy
hijo is what you think you aren't
he's got three stars on his back
and he thinks he's the sun
he thinks he can change the world
himagsikan is what he wants
a revolution beginning with him
but tell me makata, manileño, hijo,
my boy
how are you going to save me?
how are you going to love this country?
my boy's tongue tied in two different faiths
my boy forgot to save himself

i am a silent soul,
forget about me, if you must.

but one day you'll wake up
to find my bed made, but empty.
i will be off to nowhere,
but i will get everywhere.

i'll scatter myself from the sky like ashes,
i'll fall like the rains of July,
i'll kiss mountain tops like the snow of December,
i'll drift around like the golden leaves of October,
and i will be left to the wind.

i will no longer be a soul
trapped in this cage of flesh and bones,
i will run through the world,
writing post cards about all i will see and do,
but sending them to nobody.

your stars hung in pairs against the
accustomed singularity of celestial bodies
your stars held the promise of enlightenment
and i sought you the way kings did
hunting you down in the endeavor of navigation
pinned down and ****** until
man left the stars for devices of their own
and when the stars followed humanity
stardust resurrecting in the arrangement of atoms
constellations manifesting in wombs
nebulae shattering for the genesis
the universe destroyed itself for you

oh gemini boy

the cosmos are not kind
to boys who are destined to be halves
on an eternal voyage for missing fragments
in a lover's touch and a child's laugh
the world is not kind
to boys who look into your eyes
and only see their reflection
but you were kind to me

oh gemini boy

this is an apology
to a mortal born from the immortality
of twins whose love bore the gods' mercy
to rest among the stars
not knowing that stars die just as
the children born from them do
just as you

oh gemini boy

maybe i should have known better than
to love a boy always searching for himself
i mistook you for a cosmic collision
meant for the dawn of a new heaven
and maybe i fell in love with your destruction
as i navigated you the way ancients looked
to your stars for salvation

oh gemini boy

my stars hang in the silhouette of the unknown
isolated from the promise of deliverance
man was once told
we are born from different stars
our fates moving in parallel precision
never meeting again after our stardust
once laid prints upon our astral anatomy
and because we are not stars
but the echoes of seraphic wars
meant to traverse desolate lands
in search for completion

oh gemini boy

i forgive you
you just wanted to be whole