he told me to do what i did best, to stain pages with ink, to give chances to my words, to write as if i had never ceased to write for a year, after my creativity burst because i was enveloped in a world of warmth and his skin.
the only art i created was in chaos and newfound feelings of love, art was only there when i began with infatuations, and when the blinds were shut to block out the light of love.
i wouldn't know when was the next time i could spew out words, forming sentences that rolled off fingers and into my tongue, sending shivers of emotion down the spine i bend forward in times of burning fires, flames from peoples mouths sending your head into sparks and melting my being. trying to shield myself from the ashes of others, sticking onto my skin, clinging on. ashes of rumors and past words, ashes of mistrust and judgement, ashes of the thoughts people had when the saw me for the first time.
there was one thing that stopped the pain that caused writing to happen, and it was consistency with you.

These spills of ink tore the sheets of fantasy which wrapped my eyes from seeing reality. Splotches of heavy ink drops created pieces and problems I wish I could sew back together, repairing everything from the past. What I’ve come to realize is that each spill brought awareness into my life, giving me a new-found appreciation for things I would have never seen or discovered before. My life begins to form an impressionist painting, each dot coming together to form a beautiful life. Some pieces may not be pretty or meaningful on their own, but they each bring along a dot or more around to build a significant part of the painting. I am still under construction.

It always happened around two am, with the illumination of the moonlight seeping through the cracks of the blinds that could seemingly cover the sunlight but never the moonlight. The feeling of wanting to stitch tears back together. Tears falling, his sleepy voice questioning motives for crying. My reply, always “I don’t know.” It was everything all at once. A flipbook exposing every possibility of problem or memory, every significant, stitch able event. It was reality staining the once blank muslin pages with black ink, seeping into the fibers. Fantasy kicking, screaming, denying, tearing pages into pieces that would take eternities to sew.

in fifth grade, they taught us about slavery.
associating it with fields of cotton and colored skin scorching in the heat of the sun.
in eighth grade, we revisited the topic,
furthering it to studying the end of slavery, making us believe it never existed again.

no one taught us about what was happening in our backyards in present time,
because we were always too young,
or the topic too sensitive,
although we were the age target of this tragedy.

we were never informed about the thieves of innocence,
the ones who covered each square inch of skin with impurity,
while we sat in classrooms reading fairy-tales.
we were never informed on the serial killer of dreams,
the ones who indulged in corrupted fantasies,
shattering identities into nightmares that will keep them awake for years,
keep them trembling,
keep them flinching when hands reach out,
keep them fearing the ones who fall in love with them.
we were never aware of the slaves victims were made into,
applying definitions,
when they were more that just mere words,
more than just a collection of bones built to prize and conquer,
more than just a babe,
more than just a pretty face and a pair of legs,
more than just someone to quench satisfaction.

the moon could never keep his hands off the ocean.
for millions of years,
(at least that is what it seemed to be)
the ocean and the moon were in a very entangled relationship.
many couldn't comprehend it,
because their bond was so abstract,
and some appeared to derive the right answers,
with scientific reasonings to every complication .

the ocean never really had it figured out either,
she never planned for someone so distinct to make an entrance.
in the beginning, the moon was exciting, extravagant, exclusive,
and caused her to feel something new, which was a tide.
the ocean loved the movements of the tide,
they formed her once slow heartbeat into a melody,
the ups and downs, her constant change,
a dance with the moon was a thrill.

the moon enjoyed finally having a partner,
for he was alone, visited by only a few a year,
now he had the ocean,
the one he could twist and turn,
wrap around his fingers,
make her heart beat for him,
and only him, her obsession with new-found life,
of zigs and zags,
it was so different from her stagnant past.  

the moon saw the oceans vulnerable eyes,
falling in love with him and his assets,
his magnificence and glamour,
he began to take advantage, shaping her
into a sea of emotions,
a puddle of once shallow water,
creating depths of mile long darkness,
and the ocean proclaimed her love to the moon,
everyday praises and promises,
but tides began to be reckless,
trying to escape the moon was the hardest for her,
without him she'd be completely still,
a girl with no owner,
but they came from two different worlds,
differences that were incompatible,
polar opposites,
the moon receiving few visitors,
the reckless ocean, once safe,
year after year,
they choose to stay.

one hundred and ninety two hours
one hundred and ninety two hours where all i wanted to do was sleep
because in those moments,
you never existed in my dreams
you were not there to make my knees knock into each other
or my anxiety to pulse higher and higher
or worry of you becoming a screeching tea kettle over the phone
but also to make me feel like the butterfly that just opened her cocoon
and the little girl hugging her prized stuffed animal
or the core of your world

one hundred and ninety two hours
every single hour thinking about when is the next time
i can see emptiness
you're all around
and you still remain in my skin.

at age thirteen,
Picasso could surpass the talent of his teacher,
drawing at the level of Raphael, the prince of painters.
at age sixteen,
Picasso skipped his classes to explore gypsies,beggars, and prostitutes,
and at eighteen,
became exposed to anarchists and radicals who were artists and intellectuals
when his eyes were unveiled to a world of color, pinwheels of ideas, and a milky-way of lifestyles,
he unleashed a new form of art.
abstract, colorful, broken up into chunks, scribbles and slashes,
a child's coloring book,
from the five year old who couldn't seem to find the lines.

in this chapter of his life,
Picasso said:
It took him no time to paint like the prince of painters,
but decades to learn how to paint like the children.

one hundred and sixteen years later
i sit in the whirling emotions,
of the "i don't know yet"
and the "i have no idea"
and the "what am i going to do"
and the "why am i even doing this"
and the "who did i become"
and the "what will i be"
and the "who will i disappoint"
and the "honey you can't please everybody"
and the "what am i here for"
and the "is anybody out there waiting for me"
and "what capacity do i have to connect the constellations that form my dreams?"
and "what amount of this enormous world will i see with these mere two eyes and one small body?"
and "will i be the radical or the anarchist, or the artist or the intellectual, or the beggar or best of all,
the Picasso?"

and i can't seem to find the lines anymore
and everything is becoming a muddled mess of colors,
there is no symmetry, there is no balance,
there is not one face to a person,
there is not one specific meaning,
not one correct answer or distinction,
not a single definition.
and all though there are periods,
and I've been through the blue,
and I'm on the pursuit of the rose,
all i see is commas,
and as time goes on,
i understand more and more,
exposure to this world,
brings more questions and more blurs,
more pigments, and edges,
and adds miles from the distance,
of the lines.