beneath my fingers: smooth, polished wood, a breath. and they long to make their way to the still beating of your heart.

                                                    there,

                                                              there,

almost as if unseeing you look past me to flip a page, to paint color over words you must remember,
yet unremembering---

i am here. sometimes i think you remember me. sometimes, like a shade of crayon appearing randomly in your hand, a soft hushed word. silence. no talk of fleeting butterflies today. no sound of your leavetaking.

there, the long silence of an empty hallway.

(for A)

(in collaboration with jacob dominguez)

it rained without warning
the world outside
a gray, unhappy look.

night
continued to fall.
she, telling herself
not to lose her way
that night of confusion.

wind had began again.
whipping in eaves
above her head.

a man’s voice sounded
at her shoulders.

all at once,
alone with the world.
this man---
wildly against her.

her ruffles wet and wilted,
she turned to him

fallen.

(words from Kerima Polotan’s “The ******”)

I have always been friends with the rain.
I want to feel it on my skin
and dance with it.
The rain dances, you know.
And I want it's freedom.

today, i stalked
a stranger
on the sidewalk.

(or rather
he walked,
into me).

from a distance, i followed
his footsteps –
footfalls:
gravity,
gentle on the ground.

a rhythm, i follow –
a sound.
we dance.
footfall after footfall –

he walks away
from me.

The world’s eyes own her now.

We stare
at her ocean
foam body
to crash.
To
crash.

I see my eyes
speak back
as I
look
into hers.

You would
think
she’d
cover
herself.

She
a
play
thing ----

soft
brown
clay.
How I am
asked
to pose
too,
she teaches
me,

at
the
edge

of
the world’s
eye,

every time.

These days, I am all over the place.
In a daze.
Half asleep, half awake.
Walking,
sleep-walking.
Waking.
Sick-ly, and sick
with mind-noise.
And then,

quiet.

TWO-LINE RENGA

by Cezar Ruis Aquino in collaboration with Sooey Valencia

For the longest time I have always thought that the most beautiful thing in the world is a blank page.
Perhaps next to a page where some words, innocent as birds, have found their way to.