If you were to become sand,
I would not be just some hands.
Not even another mortal homeland.
I will become time, I will weather and stand.
But if you were to become an island,
I would not be just some beach or sands.
Not even a firefly or a wasp that lands.
I will become a tree that withstands.
Or if you will be the time, I will be a tree.
Together in our tiny little island,
we will be gleaming and free,
we will be holding hands.

When I say my words are powerful,
I mean it could both be
for the worse or for better.
When I say my words are heavy,
I meant it for hurting, rolling punches
or for lifting and helping hands.
When I say my words could ****, I mean it.
No wordplays or metaphors needed.
If I say my words feels like kiss, I mean it.
I know how to wield them in battlefield,
I know how to write with them for poetry.
So when I say my words are powerful,
I mean it could both be
for the worst or for the best.
So for you my darling lover,
or prospective enemy,
what’s it gonna be?
So here’s to you, my chosen, my love,
or potential slave and loyal servant,
who do you want to be for me?

I can carve your name among the stars
with my paper, pen, acrylics, and art.
I can turn you into a museum
through my own pain, sadness, and gloom.
I can display you like a gallery,
with my lips and hips seared onto your skin.
I can raise your name into immortality
through my songs and poetry.
I can give you eternity
with my madness and mercy.
I can make you a living God
through my beauty and love.

Find me if you dare, then leave me.
Leave me how you found me, I dare you.
Mind you, I do not care, believe me.
Care for me but I won’t mind, mind you.
Take this skin, score, and sear it,
it’s yours for burning and breaking.
Take these eyes, watch how they ablaze,
stare at them as you would a sandstorm.
Take this body, bring and burn it,
or take it as a trophy to new civilizations.
Take these hands, lock and never lose them,
clasp them shut so they may never be lethal.
Take this heart, see how it resurrects,
look how you made it golden and eternal.

I handpicked you,
with these hands that clawed their way out
of death and then back to your inner city.
More carefully than finding shells
on a beach, on an island down south.

I handpicked you,
with these hands that engraved stones
and carved runes from the walls.
More desperately than ancient men learning
how to write and draw for the first time.

I handpicked you,
with these hands that shook with the devil
and in the same manner, greeted saints with.
More intentionally than touching artifacts
in a museum, within a country of colonizers.

I handpicked you,
with these hands that wrote law, poems,
and stabbed enemies lurking in the tombs.
More defiantly than a monster experiencing
how it feels to be betrayed for the last time.

𝘚𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘱𝘢-𝘪,
My chosen,
you have no choice but to give in.
My love,
it is now my heart that you live in.
My destiny,
it is my body that you will be buried in.

How softly you unearthed this heart,
dusted off the sand from my hands...
How tenderly you knew exactly what to do,
take me away off the west to my rescue...
How you paced my tomb that burns,
dug deep enough skin from the earth...
How painstakingly you wrapped me warm,
blanketed me from pain of eternity's harm...
It seems like you have seen me beyond
these shards and sands of time.
It feels as though I am a secret you kept
since the antiquities of light.
It seems like you have touched me before
the very invention of the word skin.
It feels as though you have built me long ago
brick by brick, in your buried cities within.

You expect me to curtsy,
but what I do is bend and break my bones.
You expect me to be soft-spoken,
I am raised on curses in three languages,
I have five deities and I write poetry!
You expect me to act refined,
but I am a woman dulled by violence.
And when you expect me to be dull,
I'll be as sharp as a stick up your *******.
You expect me to act sweet,
I am raised in Manila, you little *****!
You expect me to be quiet or sophisticated,
but I am a ******* Filipina, you ditz!
So no,
I cannotㅡand will not curtsy.
Nor will I bend and break either.
I will not be soft-spoken.
The last thing I will be is refined.
I will be sharp and smart as a whip.
To hell with acting sweet!
Asking a girl silenced by time to be quiet?
And a true Manileña to be sophisticated?
𝘏𝘢𝘺𝘰𝘱 𝘬𝘢! I’ll make you wish you’re dead.