Wind in my face
                                   The Amihan
Squeeze of my buttocks to my soft chair
                           An airline chair
              A dog flowing through the meadow
    Was that my garden rooster
                                  Or is it another's?
      I wiggle my toes
           Outbreath; Air blowing
                                          Out my mouth
        Did Rizal meditate?
                          Fried chicken in my nose
         My nose is in that restaurant in Pampanga
              Did Jesus meditate?
        What is the purpose of a flower?
                                Is the scar on my leg my death?
Telescoping ache from my spine
                     Ticklish pressure in my bladder
                                   More wind; The Habagat
          In Tagaytay with friends. The white fog
              Am I being mindful now?
              Watch your breath!
                                My forearm is empty
                                          It doesn't exist
                                          It doesn't exist

I don't want the world illuminated
Give me scars, games of hide and seek
And badly lit roads. Show me distance
Unworldliness, the color of the paranormal.
I want the world as a dream
Hidden in an owl's nest

Let me write a poem for you
Yes, for you only
Let nobody else read it
Hide it from the world
I shall write it on the wall
In blue chalk and let the rain
Wash it away
I shall write it with invisible ink
To be seen only
With ultraviolet light
I want to tell you something
Something that will save you
Here and in the afterlife
I want to ruin your garden
Let your trees grow recklessly
And your flowers grow wild
I want to break you
Turn you into a useless machine
And finally rebuild you
I want to purify your heart
Change the outlines of your soul
And please God
I want to give you a nightmare
Something that will almost **** you
As you try to break free
I want to give you a simple gift
A little thing to cherish
To play with through the night
I don't want recognition
This is more important than that
I want you to learn to be human
So please read my poem
And keep it to yourself
This is for you and for you only
Not for anyone else.

I'd rather live in my daydreams
Than live anywhere else
In my daydreams
I am loved fully
In my daydreams
I see the real me

If I could not daydream
I would be lonely
The rapture of love
Would not reach me
Time would ruin my soul
And leave me naked

I will make new daydreams
And soak myself in them
Forget my failures
My ruined promises
And repeat life again
Repeat and repeat and repeat

I will make new daydreams
And truth shall be in them
Not the lies of the crowd
Masquerading as divinity
And I shall live in this truth
Live and live and live

(Dear reader
You will be in my daydreams
As a lover, a monk, or a poet
Or maybe not, it doesn't matter
What matters is the play
Play and play and play)

My love, like the moon
Is tired of poets singing
Tired metaphors, sounds
Of desperate longing, glow
In the dark music.
"Let's play a new game", she says
"A game for the moon"
"Should I begin?" I ask her
"Or should we ask the moon first?"

All I really want
Is to make someone write
That somebody, somewhere
May find in my poems
A hopeful thought
A new reality
A special swagger

Or simply to make someone smile
Halfway around the world
With eyes on the screen
A tiny jewel to take through the day
To help navigate this pandemic
Lifting up someone's mood
Just for a little while

But my deep desire
Is to be remembered by the universe
That my poems will touch
Another human permanently
And that touch like perfume
Will spread outward
Across time and space forever

It is a selfish ambition
And reality sends me to tears
To know I am nobody
That my poems will be thrown
Into the dustbin of infinity
And shall be dissolved into atoms
Never to be read ever again

Let death find me
Planting cabbages,
Cooking dinner with a smile,
Drying clothes on a line.

Let death find me
Naked in the cold,
Glowing in the woods,
Talking to bears

Let death find me
Writing poetry,
Dancing on the sun,
Singing to a crowd

Let death find me
magnanimous
Like a saint