woman
we have fought this war before
do you remember this feeling
in the absence of dawn
our swords shaped like crescent moons
and our fists clenching into pond water
thin Lilly pads healing old soars
lovers spinning around the orbit
of a woman's thigh
spine trembling like the
promised a child I told long ago
I will not give up
because I have shared too many shades of indigo to be the other woman
I have given too much silk and lavender air to be a bedtime story
a midnight call
borrowed time
an option
a lie

woman
I have fought this war
limbs bending into someone who can win affection
If there ever was a way
I have given my palms to him
the curve of my body
the backs of my ears
my opposable thumbs
my sweet tooth
I have given him not everything
but the choice to take
anything

because fighting and war are two different things
one is of passion, unexpected,
the other are waves of the loudest ocean
a never ending grudge of today's and tomorrow's
a tug of war in the infinite universe
rooted from centuries of ancestors who have lost
a battle destined before birth
fighting and war are two different things
one will pass
the other won't
and that's when I know I have won

the road looks like two aisles of Christmas lights
all turning their sides into the dim night
asleep in the comfort of sheets
bought by people who love them
the dogs homed to the fences of my neighbors are all asleep
the mice and the raccoons are walking back home
the birds have whispered their prayers
the stray cats are done for the day
all in the tug of night
ready to sleep
but the ants
and the cockroaches
the flies
and spiders
are all out
restless
passing by sleeping children
and drunk men
lining up the instruments
setting up the dance
free and safe
words on a soldier's tongue before
residue and ripped cloth are hung by their guns and boots
I am awake in perfect harmony
a balance of night and day
of an agreement the moon and sun had in the beginning of time
I am a pest
reincarnated from a man who's days and nights
were whiskey and the smell of a ******'s breath
luck and karma spelled on the bents of my body
I was not a good man
and now
I am nothing more than a spec of darkness in your vast blue sky
nothing more than stains on pearl walls
in the mornings I wake
dreaming of my body being shaped back into a pulse of a mans
promising to be better
I wake to a toddler staring down at me
step on me
hit me with your storybook or
hide me
release me to the corners I belong
I am nothing more but the ripped spine of a leaf
I am nothing more than the roughest patch of a child's palm
I have always been nothing more
I am nothing more
I am nothing
and yet I have
been given
time to
be

have I been here before
lying under sheets I have covered our bodies with
when the midnights have been chills
our naked feet relying on the warmth of corners and limbs
listening to airplane skies
and the echoes of infomercials sending radio waves through my thin walls
the sound of you breathing
as trees sway along my blinds
if I compared you sleeping to music
will it be harder to let go

the nights have always been the same
airport schedules have always followed routine
the trees and the cars passing by will always be stuck between my shades

all has happened
before and after you
and my poetry will never save me

frosted upon my bed
I am gazing the ceiling
an absence of stars
nothing but sky

and I think of a time
when inside your arms
it way okay

my mind is a football stadium
filled with sports anchors
hallowing our conversation
in class
the other day

did I say this right?
did you mean your laugh?

i am nothing but a child!
mazed by a fable or
some sort of
fairy book story

i imagine the other day in
class, wanting it to be
all days
all moments
in different aisles of hallways
different shades of walls

i am still a child

picking on my mind
like a sunflower on valentines day
"will he like me"
"will he not"

and you have nothing to do with this
but you are everything to blame

my poems are just passive voices
asking you questions without saying your name
indirectly

it is 10:03 I am
lying between the covers of my bed
pondering when you told me you like music

i am listening to the
same song
over and over
each time,
thinking of you
differently

i keep finding myself
a few inches away from the
finish line

always a smile too crooked
a laugh too loud
a few answers off
a couple of minutes too late
my age engraved in some
never enough
era

and somewhere in the months
i have mistaken every mistake
from "couldn't" to "didn't try"
efforts shaping into thoughts
effortlessly because of the fear
of rejection

i have let the best of me
get to me

--
while walking home yesterday
I saw a neighbor's cat on a window still
"here kitty, come down"
she waved her paw toward me
as if she understood "hello"
like she has done this a million times
she looked down at the ground
unable to jump
she froze
timid

and I figured
I am not
alone

i know a boy
who sits behind me
always tapping his pen
tapping
and tapping
fingertips spelling

i am anxious

i know a boy
who walks me to class
looks at me before I leave
his foot keeps
tapping
and tapping
and I keep waiting

for him to tell me goodbye
so I can go to class

i know a boy
who cannot stop

like a car alarm on
christmas morning

like police sirens
underwater

a boy
afraid of the pause
the rest, the wait, the halt
the slow motion of eyes meeting,
elbows accidentally touching
words becoming deep breaths,
hesitating instead

I know a boy
who is still a child

and over and over,
i loved him "still"

age extending by the severity of my mistakes
i am nothing but the hours I stay awake
everyone seems to know who they are
cutting jagged outlines of their personality with
cardboard boxes
friends afraid of waking up, diplomas in hand, graduating
but I am worried of staying up, stuck in this timeframe
watching lovers and childhood friends growing into
unrecognizable bodies
days becoming strange hellos and
short conversations

I imagine trees swaying
as if they are dancing to the sound of cars passing by
and I imagine looking at stars is a two way street
wishes being made from both sides of the cosmos
I imagine hope to be universal
and I imagine stray cats holding as much freedom
as the uncaged birds they gaze upon
both, hoping to be found

will I ever know the struggles of a man?
the loneliness of a stray?
the burden of a clock?
will I ever find my place in the Red Sea?
I sit unable to ask anyone this question,
no one understands.
--
it is 4:43 am
I am waiting to grow into an age I can look back at my life
and explain everything by saying
"I was a child"

and everyone will nod.