sit down and listen to the sounds of the world.

the gun shots and explosions echo through continents
and you hear the pleas of the hurt and murdered.
the night's music fades to white noise and screams in the ears of men who loved men,
the black woman is trapped in the passenger seat after watching her black lover get shot by a cop for a headlight,
a thousand muslims are hurt and killed in the midst of a holy celebration,
young boys and girls no longer laugh but cry in desperation.

people are killing in the name of faith, and color, and love they deem wrong,
the body count gets higher and higher
as the tears cried and the blood shed
form a well the world is drowning in.

the sweet smell of life turns to death and grieving,
and in times like these, we stand for the threatened, we heal the hurt and broken.

with your voice, tell stories of the murdered and their kind that show they're human too.
with your arms, fight for rights and understanding the oppressed deserve.
with your hands, help and guide the ones who are now afraid.
and with your heart, love radically
until love is enough to put the pieces of this world back together.

times like these
i find myself short of words
to express how i feel for the wonder that you are
there's nothing else to say, but in the simplest of terms:

i miss you

I sat at the Lighthouse and looked at the sky
feeling the breeze caressing my spine
little did I know this would be the last time
that I would sit on these rocks in the early july

I felt like an oyster on the half shell
hearing the wind in the trees casting their spell
The bouy rocking and ringing its bell
the sunrise is effortless painted pastel

life was so easy then

he's got slits for eyes,
they wander about, in search for something
to satiate his bustling curiosity.

he's got a thirst for life,
he is attracted to painted alleyways,
he listens keenly to anyone who speaks in the hopes of gathering a story to tell.

he's constantly moving around, speaking in tongues,
his breath smells like summer, his eyelids are heavy ,
his hands are ink stained and he is desperate to create.

and i'm not one to draw or paint; but to me,
there is artistry in the swing of his hands,
there is poetry in his stride, his kindness, in his mousy speech,
there is a story in his sunlit bedroom, his drafts and scribbles,
the type of spectacle worth capturing in a photograph.

his art is merely a reflection
of the beauty contained in his being.

i speed through a new freeway,
i think about the last one we just exited

i walk along provincial sidewalks lined with pine trees,
i miss the pedestrian lanes of a glaring city we left behind

i drink a hot cup of coffee in the morning cold,
i dream of feeling california's sunlight on my skin

i come across new faces and places,
i think only of the people i miss

i am faced with chances to make stories to tell,
i dwell on the moments i wasted instead

you come to places then leave,
that's just how life goes,
however, detachment is something i've never known

Bit by bit the debris of my being will dilapidate
My arms of cement will be tied and pulled to pieces by ropes
My windows shall be crashed and shattered by the indestructible cranes
The walls that contained the stories I kept will be torn down ceaselessly
The pillars that once made me stand tall will crumble to pieces and dust
My tower will fall apart amongst all the people and placed I've come to love
The ground beneath me will give in as I sink into the hollow Earth to disappear.

And as this may appear as a catastrophe, it most certainly is not.
In fact, it is satisfaction -
Satisfaction for the people
Who ordered for the nuisance I was
To be taken down and demolished for their own reasons.

needless to say, you were an anomaly to me
nights and nights i scrutinized the case of your being
you were the stuff of high school dreams, wishes made in lonely desperation
and suddenly here you were, so close i could see you

i had thought i cracked the code and you were no longer a mystery
you had become a book i read a million times over
but no matter how many words you wrote down just for me
i could never comprehend the meaning between the lines of who you were

for days and days i longed to listen to what went on in your mind
but it turns out you had always been the one listening to what went on in mine