I shouldn't love you like this. I shouldn't remember the thoughts running through my head during our first kiss. But I do. I remember how nervous I was, but how I couldn't seem to pull away when you hugged me and kissed my neck. How cute it was when you laid your head in my lap and watched tv. Like it was normal.

I won't become addicted to the feel of you. The way you try to kiss me when I'm mad. When your breaths become deeper and I hear the faintest moan when I know you're ready for me. 

I can't leave like this. It's only been 4 months and i wake up with my head in the clouds. And to some that's crazy, young, temporary, unreasonable, and a million other negative adjectives calling me stupid. But to me it's love because love is unexpected. You trade in the "I shouldnts" the "I wonts" the "I cants" for the we wills, the we shoulds and the we cans. 

I don't know if we ever will, if we'll ever be able to, if we'll ever get our chance. But I can't regret anything because you taught me that you find the most perfect things when you stop looking.

I'll tell my children about my frozen toes.
How I paced for thirty minutes to bring life back to them.
How I wished it was easy enough to bring back life to those that died in vain
to bring warmth to bigoted hearts

I was cemented on a mixture of grass and ice as we stood in solidarity, in silence.
I prayed as tears welled in my eyes, but I would not let them fall out of fear they would freeze on my skin.

In that silence I heard the sadness, the confusion, the frustration.
I wondered "What are we waiting for?"
I spoke too soon because just as the doors opened, the ridicule began.

We don't have too much faith in our justice system do we?
Follow the laws!
Get a clue, ******' idiots!

Tears stung my ears as I felt my feet dig deeper and by body tighten with shock and anger.
The ignorance that laws define if we stay alive or not.

Ha! Pants up, don't loot!
Racist *******.

I knew in that moment I was supposed to experience those comments. I didn't feel cold, I didn't want to go home. I wanted to show that I am not invisible. All lives matter, and we stood together on that field showing that to some, they do.

Brown, pink, white, tan, yellow.

I watched the hands slowly rise as the people thickened.
We matter.
our silence spoke as it triggered so much anger in so many individuals

*Why am I here?
Then I looked around and was reminded.

Anything worth having is worth fighting for.
I fought to get here,
I have to fight to stay
Living a life that's so extraña
Smelling air I'll soon olvido
So I'll have to learn to take mental pictures as I camino por las calles
Como yo espero para el colectivo
For the first time I knew where I was going and it started to become a habit
Home becoming more and more this city where I know very little
Like a niña in kindergarten again
Starting over
Recomenzar
Mama parece more and more unlike my face
But heart just the same
Language different but she's mastered estreno in all languages
An expert in ayúdame
I'm so small in this big city
Wide eyed and afraid
But I knew where I was going for the primera vez
God brought me here quedar.

Black bodies
The most hated body
The most athletic body
Because we are taught to run
Before we are born
Born into lives
That are only safe if white

Fingers stuck in time grazing complexions similar to cinnamon.
Feeling sweetness not too unlike the cinnamon that melts to create your skin.
My host mother hands me cinnamon to sprinkle lightly over softened apples.
I can't help but think of you.

I'm starting to think Saturday's are supposed to be late mornings because breakfast lasts longer that way. Leaving around 4 to catch a settled sun. Hundreds of merchants in the park as the live music goes from the close bluegrass bop to the distant rock drums. Saturday's have become ears filled with Spanish noises you've learned to ignore because the pain of dancing still in your toes from your night of bachata speak louder. Walking to the ferria as the sun settles and since you're alone you finally get to listen and watch without being interrupted bites of alfajores sweeter with the solitude. Finding your love in each couples palms as they hold hands, remembering how much you miss your boyfriend as you walk in the direction of the sun. So settled and strong it looks as if it's rising like your hips used to do as you felt loved. Steps feel lighter and your shirt blows with the wind and for once you start to think this is what You always wanted out of this. Finding your face in the rips of a passerbys jeans, feeling your muscles as you wonder where the stairs lead to. Today you had time. Watching backflips that demanded applause and handcrafts that merchants hope you'll take off their hands. All the while it's only 6 o clock on a Saturday and you feel as if the day won't be as perfect as it is right then. Feeling like the first kiss on the Friday night, you waited and it finally came. Saturdaze.

Two am.
Irritation swelled all day I couldn't help but throw it all at him. Giving up so much claiming exasperation and nothing left to give. He stopped and asked why are you so angry, this isn't like you...he broke the flood gates to all I had pent up. Emotions I didn't know were there. He sailed through my floodgates to the root of my anger and saved me from drowning. Baby, love is a life vest and you gave me a chance. CPR, breathing the girl you knew back into the body she had abandoned. Baby, you are every friend, every man, everything I have ever loved and God doesn't make mistakes so I stopped questioning why and how and just cried as I prayed. Thank you, thank you. I don't deserve the love you give, but God doesn't make mistakes. I asked for a man in his image and he sent me you.

Stumbled across the ocean. Always wondered where the first place I'd find it would be. Stumbled into Argentina where the black girls are scarce, I wonder how many have seen the ocean? Up until now it was just blue space on the map. 20 years old and never seen the ocean, have you even lived? Who deprived you of such a simple thing? 70% of this earth you never touched or seen. Stumbled into argentina and I finally saw the ocean. South America granted a long lost dream.

Who wants that perfect love story anyway?*
This all feels as if it never left.
And I hate myself for loving every moment of it.
Knowing I can't expect forever,
so i breathe in the right now as our eyes set as the sun rises.
if i could make time stand still…

I don't even think it's fair.

I've loved him since I was 14.
Before I knew what love was
Or what *** felt like
He was my friend first
That dropped names such as
Beautiful lovely and gorgeous
That made me feel like more than a silly freshman.
He loved me before anyone really cared to know me.
Before my mind body and soul began to mature.
He cared enough to be patient
To let me know he was in it for my heart.
We always came back to each other
no matter how long
So I know he'll be back in December,
And I'll be loving him like I did when I was 14 as the days glide.

You taught her how to not fear the future, I've learned to open up to forever. Timeless.

They ask how we deal with distance, I say we just grow closer. Love of my life, he's my friend.

And if they ask, I'll smile and let them know I've never known this kind of love before.

Dear
Brown colored boy,
Mine
Shining in all your melanin filled armor I salute you.
The soldier you are as tall as the tree that bore the wood of the cross they burned on martins lawn.
You burn brighter than those flames
You ignite something in me that wants to melt into your melanin crossing legs and arms and becoming tangled in ligaments that look more like trees before they were torn apart to become those burning crosses.
Mine
Eye closed I imagine you holding a brown boy bore from my trees,
Laying him on your bare chest
Loving him because he's your own.
Not just mine anymore,
I'll look at you both in fear seeing those burning crosses become shining badges and sirens in the distance
Not just mine anymore

Aching
It eats away at you and starves you hungry
You guard it, store it for winter or a rainy day
But eventually
You're convinced more will never come
Once this is all gone
And you're more afraid of the not knowing
Then the waiting
So you go over and over and over in your mind
Wondering and doubting and trembling
Pretty soon it'll have eaten all you have and you were so busy worrying you didn't taste what was in front of you
You ached with hunger all those years trying to preserve the it
But it dwindled despite all your guarding and storing for those rainy days
You wanted it so long, so bad, you sacrificed not having it so you could have it longer
Except now it's gone
And you never got what you really ached for
Out of fear of losing it all some day
You were cautious and careful and strategic and a planner and a realist
All the things not needed in love.

And they would never know that somedays I went hungry
Spreading out snacks
Not being able to spare anything because it would be less to get me by
Choosing between toothpaste or a pack of ramen because my mom "could" only give me $175 in the course of almost 4 months.

I'd hate people, half because of who they are half because of what they had. Security. Infinite meals. No worries. They'd never know when my buzz wore off that I awoke from my dreams in a panic. Ashamed that I finally let myself EAT, have a drink, and a laugh carelessly. Something that wasn't plain white rice or stolen toast or cereal because my host mom was away for the weekend.

It's scary really being that close to starving all the time because you know if you really EAT you'll have nothing left. So you convince yourself that you could stand for a diet and lose all that EATING you were doing when your drawer still had money in it.

for the first time in your life, you have to depend on people other than mom and dad because what they have just wasn't enough. You became that relative or friend. The one carefree in her photos or status, but anxiety filled in direct messages and phone calls.

You're jealous because they don't have to worry about their family being irritable with them because they just had to EAT. And when you come back home you'll have souvenirs and a few pounds gone too. Smiling because this is what you wanted.

Just keep praying
You're allowed to cry
Be frustrated
Demand answers
But just keep praying

I wish I could write you a love song
Singing a broken melody that never could find fluidity
until
you.
A compilation of complications.

And once he got it right, I rose along with the sun. Exhale.

This is melanin and love and you can't fake this.
Mixing shades of ancestry and bloodlines and pigments that stick to the core.
Somewhere someone peeked in a black woman's ear, straight through to her mind,
Saw a village dancing in her head!
Fires lit, drummers surrounding, same steps synchronized because they were born like this
Nothing but magic how
all the time these drums sounded off in her head
so of course her walk holds steady as a drum
Of course her hips swing with the beat as she steps with the villagers.
Her life becomes syncopated with rhythm
Dancing in all her movements
Never missing a beat

Black born
Black careless
Black die

Black boy
Black born
Black queer
Black love
Black die

Black born
Black careless
Black born
Black love
Black poor
Black die
Black cry
Black guilty
Black spring
Black forget
Black content
Black die
Repeat

Black girl
Black born
Black love
Black beat
Black die

Black born
Black girl
Black hair
Black lip
Black body
Black hate
Black die

Black born
White world
Black
Careless boy girl queer
Black
Self loathing
Black
Born
Die black

Black breathe
Black finally breathe

Repeat

Media naranja

When we were walking through the streets trying to find souvenirs, there was a store named la media naranja. *"Do you know what that means?"

"Orange middle? Half orange?"

He laughed.
"It's when you find the one for you.
Your girl, your boy. And you just fit. You find your other half. The other half to your orange."

*"Like a soulmate."

32,000 feet off the ground
I've never been closer to the stars
They always told me to reach
I never knew how long my arms could go
Black girl magic

*midnight on a flight back home

tears of love and happiness
creeps in my soul, and swells my heart.
In the flesh.
He's real.

Open letter


Dear B

It overwhelms me to write this because this week I've been speechless. So speechless. You've witnessed this as my eyes suddenly watered because staring into your eyes showed me something I had never seen. I always knew, but after five months apart, and seeing that stare through a screen, I forgot the magic that lies behind it and the feelings it stirs in me. That stare alone reminds me of everything I've always wanted and never knew how to get, never knew what it was worth if I ever did. I've been searching for this thing forever. Anxious and needy and impatient. So I apologize to the men I never loved, because I thought maybe "love" was something you speak out loud when you crave their body or just want someone to stay around just a little longer. I mistook all of them for something only you could be, hoping that they could fill the gap I never knew was always going to be empty until you came along. But I never knew until I knew.

Loving you gives me a new life that is lighter, easier, yet fuller at the same time. Being with you, holding your hand, knowing that I am yours and you are fully mine, it cements a feeling of peace, finally. And I just never would have thought as we crossed paths that summer 2013 during soar, I'd fall so in love with that brown boy from California wearing a tank top so boastful of his LA roots. But I did, and each day you allow me to be yours still feels brand new. Five months without you can be described as "it literally knocked her down at night, and raised her up in the morning, for when she dragged herself off to bed, having spent another day without his presence, her heart beat like a gloved fist against her ribs." Well, I'm not Hagar nor you Milkman, and my love is not affliction, but I ached those months to be next to you long enough for pecks to turn to passionate kisses that excluded the world. Waters rushing through me strong enough to erase anyone that is not you from my body, and force my mouth to  refute those who ever visited. "You never had me, I am not who I was then. I am only his, all of his."

Celebrating something you briefly learned and you expect a few dozen people in the plaza, calm and content celebrating the May revolution that happened over 200 years ago.

You step off the subway, walk up the stairs to the sidewalk and it's foggy from firecrackers and grills filled with chorizo. Banderas waving with Eva and Peron's faces. Drums pounded as the people sing VIVA LA PATRIA.

You're alone, but somehow not afraid because even though this holiday isn't yours, you recognize the nationalism they sing of. A nationalism only a porteno could possibly know and love and understand and feel and celebrate. But for that day, you overcame your extranjero and smiled at the kids waving their flags, your friend using two hands to eat choripan, the hunt for locro, and the mosh pit that was trying to get the closest view of the concerts and firecrackers.

When you return to the states they'll remember it as Memorial Day, but you have learned how to celebrate 25 de mayo.

We're the same person, in two bodies
Going through the motions
Of emotions

So we dance
Showing the room what our exes missed out on
So they'll assure us that we're worth something

we lay in beds just wanting to be held
Only when it's too dreadful to go back
Home alone
Or we're too drunk to face our issues

We preach about self empowerment
But secretly we feel helpless when the sun goes down

We reach for our goals
But always wallow in the one goal that we obtained and lost

Best friends. Both going through heartbreaks.

"No questions.
You ain't gotta a-s-k."

They strive to know what we already do. Leave 'em out there wondering.

Like honey to tea
You sweeten me
Thickening my love, soothing
Repairing me in ways I never knew needed fixing.
Like honey to tea

Came across a photo of you with your face buried in my neck and chest, resting so soundly. made me miss nothing more than getting lost in your black boy magic, finding powers in good morning kisses and gold in everything you do.

& at 5 am we argued about when we'll see each other next. Privileged to say he wanted to see me earlier, longer, over and over again. Willing to pay the cost just to touch my face again.
but I have a job
*but I have you

I am so thankful.

Jesus I'll never forget what you've done for me.
Jesus I'll never forget how you set me free.
Jesus I'll never forget how you brought me out.
Jesus I'll never forget. No never.

I am living proof that his love is unconditional.

In the bishops sermon he preached of inspiration in various things.
I found it in a Cali boy that was hesitant in loving me.
He taught me patience.
I taught him not to be afraid.
Inspired that even the girl that couldn't be tamed can find love with a straight and narrow.
And he can love her for all she's done
And she can love him for all he doesn't
*you don't need no one else

Day 4
And I missed you painfully.
Laying in bed missing all the times I came home to your face(times).
It became my favorite time of the day.

Then I have to remember that guy on those facetimes isn't who stands before me now.

In love with someone I haven't seen in a while.

Noches como estas son las razones me encanta estar a mi casa. No gritando ni discutiendo, no.  La calma de una rutina que ha sido la misma por años, hasta que ser una niña. Necesité esto antes de yo salir para argentina. Necesito noches como estos para recordarme de todas las personas y qué bendiciones ofrecen el mundo. Para darme inspiración y fuerza a hacerme la persona soy destinada volver. Una pieza de la casa siempre en mi mente.

Forty-two percent.
Forty-two percent of us.
Black women, never married.
42% of us laying alone in our beds
On our sides with no one gazing back at us
42% of us staring at our phones wondering if that ******* is our last chance at love
Almost half of our Nubian glow fading
Almost half of us never finding that legitimate other half
42% of us scared of being lonely
What are the ages of the women that make up this 42 percent?
Is there a cut off age to finding eternal love and happiness?
42% of us...they said 42% never did, but they never said that 42% of us never would.

For a few minutes he just stares in silence, I stare back.
Wondering what he's thinking
As I think and overthink about the eagerness that swells in my belly when he stares into my heart. Hoping he won't read what I'm writing in my head. Don't stop staring.

i really don't feel like talking to anyone but you.
Just make that stare last forever.

Idk if that's a good thing or bad thing, but we gone make every day count when we're together when I get back. Promise*

It's scary that after a month I get so anxious to not be next to you. What's worse is a month is going to turn to five. Can we make these days count forever? Love me as if you never knew how to love someone else. As if waiting is the only possible option you have because nothing else feels quite the same,

...because that's how I feel about you.

So if you ever feel like you're in this alone, remember there's someone in South America that feels just as alone as you.

Breaths heavy like the rocks that plummet in your gut.
Unfaltering, uncompromising
Hard like difficulty like it is loving someone like it is letting go like it is digesting rocks
Because rocks aren't meant for your gut
So it's hard
Loving someone isn't meant for letting go
So it's never easy.
Let's be easy like apples pies, no, bean pies because those are more rare
Easy like falling without fear because you have someone to hold on to.

Love people whose names you aren't afraid to speak at high volumes.
Names that can stain your teeth with melancholy as they paint over laugh lines of euphoria.
Love a name that tells you a story as it rolls off your tongue, syllables as sweet as children in summertime.
What is in a name?
Mothers, fathers, lovers, wanderers.
Love a name worth remembering.

If this is what love feels like, I will never fault someone for chasing it, being addicted, constantly in a rush to get back.
Once you know it, you can't forget it. When you know it you'll realize how wrong you were about every mediocre feeling that came before it.

This is
Something I've never known, but always knew the answers were within my reach. Somewhere. I never thought I'd find them in you.

Met this boy when I was 18 years old,
Standing in a line
I'd never forget how he appeared in my dream
I didn't know then that soon enough I'd fall all at once
Fall through the ups downs in betweens
Never forgetting
Even when I prayed to do so
Now I pray to never lose sight
Because you told me you love me like the real kind.
And I knew I could love you too.
Even if it means forever.

Together we feel like the color yellow
Just as bright as can be
Happy to just be together doing nothing
Rather than being bored doing nothing
Separately

&Although; they had met a year ago,
In that moment it seemed for the first time she really knew him.
And when she knew him, she could only love him for all he was and could be.

class in 3 hours meaning I have to wake up in 2, but I woke up suddenly.
The way you do when there's a streak of lightning or rumble of thunder that catches you off guard. Well, I must've dreamt of you, because I awoke asking Is this really happening? Trying to deny the words soon as they left his mouth. Sitting there with a smile just so he wouldn't think I hated him because he knew the words were going to hurt. Him avoiding eye contact as if that'd lessen the blow. There's nothing that's changed about the way I feel about our friendship. I can't say the same. Because it's 6:02am and I had to leave the room so my roommate wouldn't wake up to me crying, blowing my nose. Just like I had to leave the room and cry in a stairwell last night. I tried reading Warsan Shire, tried listening to Jhene Aiko, I tried, but as I watch the sky looking for something, anything, there's nothing. I'm sick of nothing. I'm so sick of men reeling me in just to drop me off before we make the destination. Sick of me being someone to pass the time with. Something's wrong with me. The tear that just nipped my right ear verified that. I am no ones lover, maybe I'll never be.
I just thought he was different.

*whats wrong love? you look like you've lost your best friend...

What is it when you can talk to someone straight for 9 hours?

How do you explain it?

I woke up dreading coming back to a place where we can't be who we are in those long conversations.
A place that brings out the worst in us.
Was it you that I told that I love so much?
No,maybe it was someone you could see yourself falling in love with.
hm, I thought it was you.
it was. I just didn't want you to take it back.
A break from everything. No one to tell me what's best for me and my heart. No resentment, no pain.
How do you explain knowing you can only love in one moment?

Waiting is for the weak hearted
The desperate
The uncertain
But in the rare case waiting is love
It is the most painful of them all

There's something in you that intrigues me, but it's overpowered by an urge to pull away. I don't even have to pull anymore because it feels like a push. I've always wondered what it'd be like, being yours. But it always seemed like one of those lifelong crushes that just aren't meant to be cemented, not meant to be permanent.

It gets confusing though because you're the only person that can make me smile so fast when this heart is so angry. It's just that sixth grade girl in me all over again He noticed me, he noticed me

In reality anyone can be noticed, few remembered. I just wanted to be remembered, even if it wasn't as yours. It's always so easy when it's just the two of us in our own worlds. So easy to pretend that i matter so much. you're gonna make a great man out of someone one day waiting for this man I'm supposedly going to force to change his ways for me.

I never wanted that though. I wanted someone that I didn't have to worry about. Mine. A person that I can openly love without feeling ashamed, disloyal, secretive, or left out. mine

They've all had you.
And maybe they've all had me too.

In love like the real kind
The kind you see in movies where people are crying because they are so moved by what another person can make them feel.
The kind you find in silence when you hear their voice and you respond by whispering I love you.
The real when you can ask anything say anything unapologetically
The real when you fall asleep and wake up in love one of the few consistent feelings you experience on the daily
The kind that makes you run to touch them when asked if anyone has changed you as a person.
They'd find my fingerprints all over you baby.

I know your mouth
Because I learned it
Paced your breaths with your movements
The flicker of your eyelashes with the intensity of your heartbeat.

I know your mouth
Because I yearned it
Missed the rampages you'd create all over me
Forcing me to use muscles I didn't know I had
Craving a mouth I never knew I'd want

I know your mouth
Because I earned it
Patience
I'm more comfortable with you than i am by myself sometimes

I used to dream about the day our mouths would meet.