While I return and slow down
to the classics;
the film analog cameras,
vinyl records,
typewriters,
silent movies,
worn-out pocketbooks,
and other novelties
of the old world charm...

I also enjoy the convenience
of the contemporary;
my phone's one-click camera,
spotify premium,
notes app,
netflix,
kindle,
and other niceties
that the here and now has to offer...

And while I rev back
to the retro and vintage,
I also race forward
to the excitement and danger
brought about by the internet,
of chatting with a familiar stranger.
of exchanging laughters in electronic.
of feeling emotions from a vague, distant, technical, difficult source.

Oh, the thrill and tragedy of technology!

For an instance, we would meet and exchange passive glances
on the metro station for the very first time,
we're going to be looking at the same advertisement or propaganda poster,
knowing of each other's presence
but never acknowledging...
then we would ride the same train.
Perhaps we're holding on to the same railing but our fingers are never touching.
How I wish that was a busy monday morning instead of an easygoing
sunday evening,
so then I would've been smashed against you the moment I stepped foot in the train
or should've felt your body heat around me
at the very least.
Just like in the movies.

For an instance,
we would see each other for the first time
in a lazy corner coffee shop,
there are going to be about fourteen to twenty-seven people in.
There's you, me, the baristas, the harmony of your voice among the chatters of others.
Sadly, you were sitting with your back turned from me and fairly enoughㅡI am too, because we both hate looking at people's faces or being looked at while sipping our coffee.
Or maybe I'll choose one of the high stools for the time being, forgetting the fact that my back would hurt after half an hour.
I'll pretend to be productive while you're in one of those couches, and God knows what you're trying to pretend about?
That you didn't notice me as I walked by?
When you know so well that your whole atmosphere and realm just shifted for good?
Oh, this is why I like you in the first place,
you're a bit funny, too.

But what if we'd first talk on a record store?
You're rummaging through alternative rock while I slowly feel the new wave record sleeves run through my already dusty fingers, slightly tapping them too with the beat of the store's background music.
Not knowing of each other's presence,
I'll turn to the isle and see you there.
You check me out, you're preoccupied but you still paid me a glance,
before giving me a faint, subtle smile.
I'll smile back at you sweetly and my heart will then have to faint a bit, too.
Or we might both be looking for the exact same album, how idealistic.
But unlike the movies, we'll talk about it instead of fighting over who saw it first.
And who should get to bring it home.
We would both be surprised of each other's preference in music, possibly amazed.
Or perhaps a little in love already,
one foot down in the grave.
Either way, I would know right away we would touch and create melodies, just like needle to record grooves.

It could be on a mountain trail,
a near-death experience, on a hospital, on a beach or in the middle of the ocean,
a museum, my birthday, the airport, EDSA, your grandpa's death anniversary;
any location and any scenario,
there would be no better place
and no better moment.
Because the very moment and time
we would meet for the very first time
Would be the best way right away.
However.
Wherever.
Whenever?
No I wish, pray and beg it to be sooner.

I want to open my ports like never before
I want to welcome you into my shores
I spent months bending my trees
I spent weeks without sun or sleep
Until you came, my summer sky
I forgot about the heavy rains of December
I forgot about all the damages from November
I feel like I could even grow mountains
Like I'm brand new
I feel like an unnamed island again
Because of you

My new season
My summer sun
My rebirth
My new earth

Sweet envy,
I'm envious of how she was blessed by the gods to have looked into your eyes, eye to eye. To study their color and watch how they look when you lie.
She knows the way you blink and how you close them when you sleep at night.
I hate thinking how you've both spent some nights.
The thought of her taking granted of breathing the same air as you boils my blood.
I'm jealous of how she was able to graze her fingers upon your skin, let them travel across your back
and how her hand once held yours... only to foolishly, finally and thankfully let them go.
I curse and bless the day she broke your heart.
I curse each day that I have to live with this jealousy.

Holy jealousy,
I'm jealous of the kind of jealousy you've made her feel, like when you would glance at another girl when you're together.
Or how you'd talk to a girl in a cafe or bookstore when you thought she wasn't looking over her shoulder.
Or how you'd talk to anyone about anything at all without uttering her name.
I'm jealous of how you two probably used to stand across each other in a room and throw blames.
I could imagine countless of scenarios but then
I also imagine I'm the one feeling that too.
I can take that any day, as long as we're together too.
Because the only jealousy I feel is jealousy of your past. This fiery envy towards your history.

****** history,
I'm reading into every words you said like memoirs and piecing every excerpt trying to look for answers. Answer as to how and whyㅡhow she broke your heart and why she did it.
Would you change a thing about everything you did?
I ask and scream these questions to the moonlight.
Yet if you tell me and show me the answers yourself, there's not a single battle that I would win and fight.
Yet I search for clues in every old photo, in every message and through my sly, secret ways.
Must I scour every corner and highway?
So I can come up with answers to my own 'how and why'? How can I mend your broken heart?
Why do I love you this much?

Because above all, I am a revolutionary.
I acknowledge my envy, work through my jealousy and respect your history.
But then again, with every dark history comes the need for revolution and change.
And I am the catalyst who will spearhead that game.
I am your new age.
I am your renaissance.
I am your vengeance, nirvana, revolution and everything at once.

Do not listen to the preachers.
Do not listen to the non-believers either.
Here's a piece of advice from a revolutionary,
a soldier and a slave for love;
Don't say you're in love,
unless you want to wage a war against every doubt, every dread on your lover's racing and raging heart,
wielding your sword against their anxiety,
never minding your own worries,
unless you are in dire passion with changing the course of their history,
spilling your blood or covering it with art,
forgetting about your own sob stories,
unless you aren't having sleepless nights from planning for strategies and fine-tuning your tactics so you can put your best foot forward and your Achilles heel before them,
unless you aren't willing
to die for their peace,
unless you aren't willing
to live to see their freedom,
don't proclaim yourself
to be someone who's in love.
If you're enthusiastic for the worst,
When words doesn't make sense anymore,
come and be my land forevermore.

Here's a piece of advice
from a lover who has gone through madness and back;
Don't say you're in love,
unless you are screaming for their name in the middle of the night like a madman,
writing sonnets with your blood; unless you are dreaming for death to take you together in the heat of the high noon,
unless you cried until your tears bring forth end to their drought,
unless you aren't singing for their pain until you get thrown out to the gutter, howling louder than the wolf who cried for the moon.
Unless you're willing to wreck what's "better",
don't proclaim yourself to be someone who's in love.
If you can still think straight,
if you think your words still make sense, come and be my guest.

My love, I will be here.
I will be here on nights that all you wanna do is cry and all I wanna do is watch you because I enjoy seeing you in pain.
If I could only take more pain possible and let it wreck you from the inside out every night, I would.
I will be with you on days that feels like weeks
and I will try to make the days feel like years instead.
If I could only shove the sun aside and bring forth darkness to your daylight, I would.
I will stay and sit with you through the dark
so I can make sure that you wouldn't find the switch before I do. The only light you'll ever need is the one you'll see in the end of my wrath's tunnel.
I will protect you until the end
from finding your happiness. You are safe enough inside the cage of my pain,
I will not let go of you,
where do you think you'll go other than here in our bed of daggers made from your remorse and my resentment?
I will hold you closer with the strongest grip of my now unable hand everytime.

There's nothing you can ever do to lose me,
as much as there's nothing I can ever do to love and trust you again.
Being with you, I knew I've brought this upon myself.
Messing with me, you never knew you're gonna see this coming, knocking you from your senses.

Through the gloom and in bloom,
for worse and for the worst,
for richer and for poorer
In sickness and in madness,
to hate and wait for you to perish
everyday we'll crush each other's hearts
I promise even death won't keep us apart.

💍