you know what,
at one point
he probably did
love you back
but he was just
a boy
lacking courage,
inferior to pride,
silent of words,
and
stagnant with change,
both too afraid
to embark on opportunity,
to embrace life.
so life flew by
and together you died
while alone
you lived.

I feel borrowed from water, earth, air and fire.
my roots spread in the way of the plow. ruin follow stem, corolla and perfume.
whirlwind of murderous steel will come upon.
skeletons of tomorrow will carry my pale colours on their shoulders, as crows carry on their plumage the last grains of day into the night.
there's a marble garden waiting, stained with the faeces of time.
there's no time for tears. only the rain is so kind as to refresh the countenance of solitary graves.

(Luis R Santos)

dating a writer
is like guessing the weather.
you think you know what you'll get,
but you never do.

you never know
because

she'll create a hero
from your weaknesses

and she'll write a great character,
from every last flaw.

she'll create a thousand plots  
from your worst nightmares.

she'll take every last thing you hate
and create something you'll love.

she'll turn your anger
into confessions of adoration,

and she'll make you,
everything you're not.

but worst of all,
she'll leave you wondering-
is it you she's in love with,
or things she's created from you?

but here's the beauty of it:

if you date a writer,
you'll never die.

Rooms are sort of a sanctuary---
especially for a teenager,
a place to build your own world
even though you feel sort of stuck there.

I took down everything in my room
before I left for college 4 years ago
and now it’s not so much my room
but a room that I stay in sometimes.

There are still remnants of clear tape
that held up posters and photos
and other teenage memorabilia
I surrounded myself with.

When things got boring or lonely
it meant sneaking out of the house
to wander around the neighborhood
with friends or headphones
and then eventually back in my bed
staring up at the stringy lights on my ceiling.

The time I snuck out and smoked my first joint
I didn’t know whether to cry or to laugh
at the fact that I could almost see
the community center I took swim lessons at as a kid
just beyond the end of the lighter.

I think I needed someone to talk to because things got bad,
but all of my feelings and energy went into obsessively building
a world for myself that I could survive in
despite the fact that it was hurting me.

I rearranged my reality into something bearable
but destructive at the same time,
because the only freedom I felt like I had then
was choosing what I wanted to see.

I felt closer to these things than anything in my life;
it was a world made up of memories with friends,
hours and hours of music,
and following some sort of fandom.

Leaving it all behind was like
killing a part of myself that helped me keep going.

Somewhere down that road
I realized that happiness was a choice,
even though my world made of things I depended on
was gone and my problems were still there.

I’m building a different world for myself elsewhere now
but sometimes I end up back in this room
and it feels a little empty
but also the right kind of nostalgic.

i’ve never moved houses
but it’s the classic “it never felt like home,”
so i built one in myself i built a home
and i take it everywhere i go.