do you ever wonder how many stars there are
do you try to count the hair on your head
will we ever know why people stop falling in love
what happened to amelia earhart
what lies in the bottom of the ocean
was atlantis ever real
is there life on the moon

perhaps we'll never know,
but i believe that if anyone could find the answers
it would most definitely be you.

An hour before the clock strikes 12
The city’s full of screaming we can’t escape
You pick me up in your rickety car
The engine starts, and so does my midnight dreaming

We drive around, eyes closing but we're awake
The night is as cold as it gets
And our chests feel heavy and we don’t know why
So on and on, we drive to forget

The wheels go round and round,
So do our thoughts, the sorrows bottled up inside of us
We spoke to each other, we listened
We cried together then laughed then cried again

It’s funny, the world’s deceiving
The colors in all the people we once loved faded
Yet you are the only one who’s golden
Bright in the night like all the lights

And we were vulnerable, so volatile
But those windows, side view mirrors, windshield wipers
Turned out to armour us from the coldness of the world
And nothing else mattered, as long as we were in your little car.

**I sat in the passenger seat
You stepped on the pedal, we sped away
Just to feel alive.

he laughs without a care,
knee slaps and applauds in boyish fashion
he speaks only the truth
with an electric presence you'd keep your eye on
he lives life in technicolor
and you'll never get rid of him—
'cause the boy's got rhythm,
the boy's got soul
a beautiful one at that, enough to make me whole

the enchantress is on the hunt tonight—
behind her veil hides a porcelain doll's face.
when you smell the fragrance of dreams and death,
you know she is coming.

be wary, you are doomed:
take her spell,
be dizzy in her love like moonlight
let her song deafen you
let her magic have you dumbfounded
let her poison seep into your veins;
"honey, you don't need necromancy to know i'm your fate, your future" she says,
as she brews her poison
to be sipped like wine.

the enchantress is on the hunt tonight
she's out to get you,
there's no way out except in,
into the twisted world of the strange occult queen who always wins.

a tropical soul
in winter for the first time—
happy with a heart so warm

i want to know you enough
to know how you like your coffee
i want to see you enough
to watch your face light up at the little things
i want to hear you enough
to listen to the words you'd say when nobody's around
i  want to feel you enough
to know how it is to intertwine my fingers in yours
i want to be around you enough
to understand your being, so beautiful and complex

but as silly as it is,
although we're lifetimes apart,
i still seem to find you everywhere:
in sunsets, in flower beds, in the rain,
in the things i love
for you make me feel the same way they do—
yet this isn't quite enough.

here
i am
floating
not on a cloud
not carried by space dust
but floating on my own
caught in between
two sides:
i'm not happy and i'm not sad
i'm growing older but i want to stay young
i want to be foolish but wise
and soon i have to go
but i don't want to leave yet

is it so hard for time to slow down?

on one fine morning i found you sprouting from the ground,
a burst of pastel among wilted leaves and tree stumps,
i could not understand how you came
to grow in such barren lands.

i spent days sitting by you to study you—
the way you'd respond to my touch, to the sun,
i was never used to such beauty in my life.

i fell in love with the flowers on your fingertips,
the petals that fall from your eyelids
when you cry as the sun sets,
the way your hands are gentle and soft
when they rest on the small of my back,
and the lingering fragrance you leave behind
to cast a child of nature's spell on me.

and i promise,
i will do anything to keep you beautiful and alive,
i will water the lands around you
and protect you from the crushing steps of people
and the drought of this world's ways,
just please promise
you will never wilt and fade away.

you're the silly lover
picking flowers for another,
don't you see the thorns that ***** you
when you love like no other?

i've always wondered:
how did a pretty soul like yours
grow in the confines of concrete walls?
are you sure you did not grow
under the kind light of the sun,
amidst fields in the breeze?
are you sure you did not grow
among the sea under blue skies?
are you sure you grew up
being mistreated for the way you looked?
are you sure you spent your youth,
working all too hard from dusk to dawn?
are you sure you were not trampled on
by the world and all its cheaters?

how could you, such a pretty soul,
have grown with all you have endured?

The entire city could be asleep
All cars gone, no longer speeding by
The ghosts of strangers in a hurry
The sound of night wind howling
All the little apartments still in the dark
A few drunken people stumbling here and there
And still, I would wait for you on the sidewalk.

i watched you dance
in the middle of the neon lit room
and as much as i loved you
i could not help but feel envious.
there was jealousy i could have sworn would **** me
jealousy for the way you could
move your body to the beats of youthfulness
jealousy for the way you could
smile and laugh with slightly drunken people
you didn't even know
jealousy for your confidence in the restless crowds
jealousy for the way you acted so carelessly on friday nights
the way i wish i could

honest boy
your words are written in the sky
whenever you love
it's cross the heart, hope to die

look at you darling
silly boy, bright mind
always speaking in rhythm and rhyme
everyone listens, you're one of a kind

always the muse,
sadness obscured under lights when you shine
(does it get lonely?)
i only hope your heart always soars, too,
the same way you make mine

Get tired of me like it always goes.
Tired of me and my ways
Of pretending you truly care for
Me, me, the one who's too dull, too plain for anyone
Like a faded dream, a dead star.
It always happens, these words and stories don't matter to anyone.
Always just wishing for more, and all I'll never have
Goes past me as a reminder that I am not enough.

Naive boy of summer,
you are golden—
your hands have reached places
I could never begin to imagine,
the world is handed to you
so you toss it and turn it
without ever meaning to hurt anybody.
You’ve got kingdoms at your feet
and your name is sung like a tender praise,
a sweet taste in the mouths of boys and girl alike,
that is how you are loved so.

The world has hurt you,
and still the light in your eyes has never gone out—
a light that is enough to illuminate the darkest cities.
You live as if you have never been
wounded,
broken,
bruised.
You walk into a room
so nonchalantly, with a smile on your face
and suddenly there is a change of pulse;
a kind regard for everyone you come across shines through
that people would just love to be around you.
Without ever meaning to,
You have us wide-eyed,
in awe of who you are
and one could only dream to have their own time with you.

Yet here you are, in the night,
hanging by a thread,
you seek momentary bliss from a cigarette under the bridge
or from the bottom of a bottle;
in your beauty and stupor
you call this being alive.

And in your pain, in your adventure, in your life,
you have learned so well to love,
your heart has only grown so big
it takes all the joys and pain it can take...
but silly boy,
have you ever learned to love yourself?

you've had a long day,
you are bone-tired,
your heart has been emptied
of its feelings,
your mind has thought
all it could ever think,
your soul is no longer glimmering
like the stars overhead.

so darling
tuck yourself into bed,
exhale the weight you carry in your chest,
close your eyes...
*rest well,
sleep easy.

i cut my hair to my shoulders
and things began to change
i thought that i looked much better
but everything turned strange

if i had kept my hair so long
would things all be the same?
would my long locks have saved it all
or am i the one to blame?

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. he is a dancer,
he moves with such grace
he's spent his youth
dancing in front of mirrors,
he knows the way his body moves
as much as he is sure of himself

ii. he is starlight
he has seen the cosmos
and through his smile
he shares the wonders of the world
i could never see for myself

iii. he is a gentleman
he regards everyone sincerely
chivalrous in his beauty,
he walks with kindness
and acts with heart

iv. he is a storyteller
after his past of good and bad,
he is what he says
words stream from his mind
like rain drops on windows
he speaks with purpose
without ever intending to hurt anyone
but only wanting to love

v. he is my lionheart,
he braves the flashing lights
he does not mind being himself
raw and out in the open
he carries his books around
and can be silly without a care

vi. he is a wonder
shining among the chaos of his world,
and even king midas could not
conjure a heart as golden as his.

adam and eve took the forbidden fruit
and were banished from the light of heaven,
the great warrior achilles was defeated
in his pride and grief on the grounds of troy,
mount vesuvius erupted and at once pompeii fell to ashes,
joan of arc was burnt at the stake in the name of her battles,
rome plunged to its failure upon the arrival of vanquishers

these are some of the greatest falls from grace,
and although time is filled to the brim with such,
the world had never seen an undoing quite as great as hers—

**she saw his face,
she heard his song,
and the rest became history.

I hear your lyre cries
I hear your grief and sorrow
I hear your love for me.

You refuse to listen as they tell you
That I am too far beneath the surface
Trapped in the clutches of death's flames.

My beautiful minstrel, no longer incandescent
Do you think Apollo would be proud of what you've come to?
You roam around with your lyre of gold,
Yet you have killed your flame for love lost.

I miss the way you enchanted all of Greece with your melodies
You now make the gods and goddesses weep in pity;
You make the flowers wilt and die of sadness,
You make even the sirens wail of broken heartedness as
they drive away the sailors who were once enchanted by them.

Do you see the beautiful might of the songs you sing?

O Orpheus, listen to me when I tell you to stop searching for me:
Do not enter the caves and traverse the darkness once more
A darkness you are not meant to be in,
Darkness you are too precious for.

I hear your lyre cries
I hear your grief and sorrow
I hear your love for me
And I am sorry I could not come back with you...

But listen now, my love
Although you long for me still
I am now the only thing in your world
That your music cannot bring back to life.

i belong to the daybreak
when humans with sleepy eyes
and mousy morning hearts
are brave enough to face
the scarily mundane world once again.

i belong to nature
to the hidden wonders of the world
there's unknown modern hanging gardens of babylon
and the secret sanctuaries
where the teenagers of the megalopolis
go to rest.

i belong to the ocean
in the deepest trenches
no man has seen
where it is quiet and still
and darkness reigns supreme.

i belong to outer space
in the galaxies who are
strangers we'd like to know
there's dark matter that swirls
space dust coalesces
and stars are born to die all over again.

i belong to the rain
when the sky cries and
the typhoons turn to drizzle
the water runs through
empty houses and thrift stores in the gutters
and on and on, to underground,
to God knows where.

i belong to the night
to the time when the busiest people
submit to slumber
but a few who are not
bothered by lightyears
sit by their windowsills
to watch the stars.

*i belong to the world
and the world belongs to me.

my love,
you've no reason to fear you'll fade out.
your presence will echo through mountains,
your laughter is a song i'll sing for years,
your light will always guide
city dwellers as they make their way
to their little coffee shops and offices,
your dance will live in the way flowers sway,
your doe eyes will live in the wonders of the stars

and when the world turns to ashes
i promise
your golden heart will remain intact
and the words you wrote will never die
because how could i
ever forget a face like yours?

please do not look at me
so the butterflies in my stomach stop fluttering so achingly
please do not laugh with me
so your boyish grin does not find its way to my twilight dreams
please do not speak to me
so your winsome words are not all i hear in the summer daze
please do not care for me
so i do not believe you'll be there when i need someone in the dark of night
but instead,
please walk away from me
so i will get used to how it feels when you leave
please ignore me
so i forget the beautiful mind of yours that enthrals me
please be truthful to me, show me you don't care
so i know i am of no significance among the people in your life
please, break my heart already
so i have a reason to believe you will never be mine

i love you in your glory
i love you in your silly pajamas
i love you when you're happy
i love you when you hurt
i love you when you talk about the things you love
i love you when you are angry
i love you when you are lost
i love you in your morning drowsiness
i love you in your evening verve
i love you in your beauty
i love you in your mess
i love you, i love you, i love you.

here's to the glam rock messiah of outsiders and misfits,
the androgynous man of the stars with the music.

born in brixton,
he traveled the universe by spaceships and soundwaves
with wild hair and one eye dilated.
book-loving and queer,
in love with the thought of turning 50.
the world had never seen a man
living different lives at once,
but here the starman came reinventing himself:
ziggy stardust, thin white duke, aladdin sane, major tom—
all different selves tied together by his heart.

he lived his earthly mission, rightfully so
that even the gravity of the world could not keep him put.
so on and on he strummed his guitar and crawled on stage,
in spaceboots and dresses, in porcelain doll makeup,
reaching out to all the nobody and somebody people

but one day his cosmic vessel
was taken down by a secret sickness
and halted his mission here on earth,
and so the streets and little bars smelling of cigars
were flooded by the ones who mourned,
who looked up to the stars,
wondering where their starman went.
the world had never seen such an electric creature,
but here the star man came in music and dance,
saying it was alright to be weird—
to embrace strangeness
in a world where every earthling wanted to be the same.

and perhaps, he isn't really long gone:
his time here may have ended
but now he is out there, somewhere,
on some distant star,
watching over the Earth as he always has.

at times, i wish i hadn't learned to love so much.

there is always a lingering weight in my chest;
my heart, already fragile enough,
fights to carry it through every waking moment.

hellos are my favorite things, but they're merely precursors
to the poison of goodbyes, to the sickness of loneliness
and the yearning to be elsewhere
in other places, with certain people.  

tears fall as quickly as grins go from ear to ear,
roaring laughter easily fades into deafening silence,
and this wishy-washy soul is one i could never get a hold of.

but what would i be without love,
without the burden of feeling?
what would i be without the days spent day dreaming,
the moments i run out of breath
from gushing about people and moments,
the nights spent crying all alone,
and being vulnerable to the world,
but feeling the best of it anyway?

i love, but i hurt.
i hurt, but i love.
and that is all that matters.

manila, a home forever in my heart
tokyo's* electric soul on my mind
bangkok's heat and energy in my bones
seoul's autumn breeze in my thoughts
hong kong's thrill in the pulse of my veins
shanghai's mystique in the way i feel
san francisco's color in my dreams,
i keep with me all the places i've seen.

loveliness in all you do
rhyme and rhythm in every move
a heart of gold, a heart so true
the universe lives in you

i love you more, each day goes by
and there are countless reasons why
i'll never let them pin your wings
so i can watch you fly

perhaps it is a curse when you feel too deeply
there's no way to pluck your chest from your heart
so it weighs you down completely

and so the stories are true: life is not all magic
when you're eighteen it's easy to forget

but what is life if we don't let ourselves feel?
being lovesick, feeling heartache
is what reminds us we're real

i'm sorry the world has hurt you
you are broken
you are tired
i understand this, dear.
you've been used
you've been hurt
and your colors have faded out.
you're not as alive
as shining, as wondrous
as you used to be, i suppose?
and i wish i could lift the world for you
and hush the voices in your head
bring back the life to your dying heart
and let you know
i would do anything for you

in baler where the sun shines and the waves visit
is where freedom bathes under the blue skies
in the seaside realm of surfing

simple hotels line the shore
where you can run to the beach fronts
after settling in little white rooms,
and in the blue water
wait tanned, youthful surfing instructors--
local boys of the province who've grown up
with the salt water as their playground.

get on your surfboard and
join the waters,
"mag-timing ka sa alon,"—
"wait for the waves", the instructors say
and lie down on your stomach on the surfboard,
and when you do get the waves you ride them fearlessly,
you are lifted, invincible,
by the hands of the philippine sea.

and if you don't surf,
the smooth sands are there,
calling you to lie around
under the seaside sun.

and when night falls
and the waves are reckless,
you can sit on the sand
with a bonfire and some drinks—
watch the stars
with the sound of the tides as your music
and do not fear;
for in the morning
the waves will come rushing
back to the shores of Balers
to give anyone freedom
as they always do.

i feel the size of my heart
growing bigger and bigger
yet i feel still feel so small
in this sea of people
in this world
with trees as tall as buildings
and people as lovely as the rain

i only knew i loved the stars
on that night in Batangas—
my sisters and i rested our tired bones
on the dewy grass of a cliff,
we rested where the sea met the sky.

we looked at the stars.
"look, you can see the milky way right there,"
my oldest sisters said
as they traced the sky for me,
i saw it for the first time, in the dark
and i felt so big yet so small,
i learned to read the skies
from two people who knew how to
watch the world.

and i only knew i loved the stars
when i came to learn to see them
as i watched them
with the people i loved
beside me.

i entered a room i haven't been to since forever
suddenly it was smaller than i had remembered it to be—
wasn't it just yesterday when i was ten years old,
neck painful from looking up at the ceiling that was too tall for me to reach
and wishing i could swing from the chandeliers that hung from them like vines?
and now i'm suddenly seventeen,
caught between here and there
the rooms i know seem much smaller
and suddenly i don't need help
in reaching for things from the cupboard
in fact, i no longer need help for a lot of things
but why do i feel more helpless than before?
why do i just want to go back to when
rooms seemed much bigger
and i could easily hide in closets
whenever i wanted to be alone?
now i'm seventeen
and i can't ever be alone when i want to;
i'm caught in between here and there
but the problem is
i don't know what "here" and "there" is anymore

when you love you have always done it with a fire unlike any other.
it blazes, the flame reaches such great heights and
grows taller than the buildings and trees you climbed
to get a glimpse of beyond,
a fire that has fueled your heart to light up the world
but eventually eats it all up.
this love in the end is no longer a phenomenon
but just a tragedy, a fall of ash rain on a city burnt to the ground,
the pieces of your heart shattered on the floor
reflecting the fool that you are,
you're just consumed by the flames of the way you love—
silly girl, you're gone.

i've picked up the pace
i've seen the beauty of the world once again
in the faces of strangers
and in the grittiest places
i feel alive,
and i wonder how i could have possibly
stopped seeing life through rose colored glasses.
time and time again i fall in love with the world
when i feel it loving me,
and what a splendid feeling
to be young and alive,
what a wonder it is
to be alive!

i feel like i'm calling out to you,
banging on a thick wall of glass
which conceals me somehow,
silences my cries
and stops me from reaching out to you.

this love in my heart has to go somewhere,
its spaces dying to be filled
by the pieces of who you are,
and to be there for you.

i want to love you
but i don't know how,

show me how to.

seventeen should be the age of learning and falling in love
but here we have a boy
whose life was taken
whose call for help was loud with all the might
that the wild heart of a 17 year old could ever have
tama na po!
may test pa po ako bukas!
and these calls ended
in gunshots
in fabrication
in ignorance
as if there had never been anybody like him who dreamt of a tomorrow.

and it is hard to silence anybody who's seventeen and just about to thrive
but here they pinned his wings
shot him dead and cold
never stopping to think that they were not the authors of his story
that they had not one right to end what could have been a beautiful story right there and then,
only a decade and seven.

seventeen should be the age of learning and falling in love
but not anymore;
it is the year he called out for his life
only to have it taken by the hands of the merciless
of those who do not know better—
all his wild dreams ending in silence.

the moon is beaming in the dark
with tiny stars as little sparks
it shines with pride, in graceful hues
when night time falls and starts anew

but the moon is kind,
it does not boast
it shines so brightly
to guide, at most

and the moon loves greatly,
it loves the stars
because it lets them shine too
so they are seen from afar

lone moon up in the sky
perfect and whole
nurturing and silently watching
with many faces to show
you have always glowed in your own right,
but it's quite amusing—
your light has never been
dazzling enough to outshine other stars
and you have never forgotten
to let the sun have its time.
you give so much of yourself
to let things run its course
(and perhaps there are never enough rivers
to let you see your own, bright reflection)
but don't you know that
in the dark of night
you shine to everyone else?

i'll pick the blues that you carry
in your heart like flowers.

let's crawl up trees like Morning Glory vines
so we can watch the world, just us two.

let's make our hearts burst into petals
with all the love we can give to each other.

let's sway with the wind like fields of Dandelions,
let's dance the pain away
even though i have two left feet.

let's be flowers,
let's love tenderly and beautifully,
and heal our torn leaves
under the light of the sun.

My old friend, you've done it again.

You turn the lights out when I can finally see,
You stain my fingers with ink you use to write me letters so cruel,
You scream at me deafening words of hatred,
You let tears flow from my eyes without a sense of pity,
You point out my wrongs the way you like to pick the prettiest flowers,
You push me into the smouldering flames then you're in awe of the way I glow,
You slit me with a blade and watch the blood flow, you say it's as beautiful as waves dancing.  
And you do it, over and over again.

Believe me, I wish I could let you go.

I try to run away in the dead of night
To get rid of you, to forget you

You never seem to leave.
You follow me like shadows on asphalt,
You leave your traces in my favorite blouses,
You vandalize my bedroom walls,
You lurk in the corners I confine myself to,
You're in each window I pass by,
You hide under the sheets I sleep in,
Your sobs echo through my ears in the middle of the night,
You're in the mirrors I look away from,
You're in me.

You are me.

i. when we die,
do our bodies become lighter?
do our souls fly away,
taking with it the weight our lives have carried
and leaving our skin and bones to drift in the wind?

ii. the other day i held you in my arms,
your eyes hollow and your voice a whisper;
you said it was just as a bad day,
i knew better than to believe you and i was afraid—
then suddenly, you were as light as a feather

what if we could write on the stars
the way we write with paper and pen?
in that case,
i would be writing love letters every night
for a pretty soul too far away.
i'd point my finger at the sky
and trace it delicately,
then you would go outside at night
the evening breeze would whisper "look up!"
and the constellations would tell of the love
an admirer sends to you by cosmic delivery
across distances of time and reality,
from a world much different from yours.

i could love the world
and all its places
i could kiss the skies
and nature's different faces

i could fall in love with people
and the little things they do
i would give my heart to anyone
and even strangers too

i could love the sounds of life
and the songs of the sea
i sing to the night's silence
and the beats of the city

but i am quite worried
aside from fondness and such,
that perhaps nobody
could love me as much.

i. He says he'll embrace me through the night
And so I allow him to
Then I feel his arms tangle around me
Strangling me gently with his thoughts
About neverending things I'd rather not ponder on.

ii. He tells me to get up from my bed
Leads me to a mirror
I look at my own reflection
And instead of seeing myself, I gaze upon broken shards of glass
A distorted image, I am disgusted; I can't look anymore.

iii. He hands me a blade
Touches my wrists softly, guiding me:
"Let it run along your skin.
Let the blood dance."
He said it would make me forget for a while.

iv. He whispered sweet nothings
Which turned out to be haunting words once he disappeared
And I sat up in the cold, hours on end
Waiting for nothing: eyes tired but never closing
Because I felt so alone
And there was nobody to phone.

v. And even as the stars were shining
The night grew on longer
Coldness so bitter, darkness beyond jet black
Because he ordered me to stay there
And I did so, accordingly.
I no longer felt like fighting.

vi. Then, I remembered:
I closed my eyes, pulled my blanket over me
Shut my mind off and stopped thinking, stopped breathing
Counted a few numbers
And opened my eyes to the sun rising
To find that he was finally gone.

how could all these masters
of art and vision
of poetry and of prose
of love and of passion
of life and of death
create so seamlessly,
create things that matter to others?
how could they have ideas
streaming from their minds,
and translated into beautiful things
that need not ask to be noticed?
i'd like to think it was because
they worked with heart
but why is it that even if my heart is screams
with all the things i want to share
i try to paint
i try to sketch
to write
to sing little songs
they never come out quite right
or matter to anyone else?
why is it that my heart
with all its storms and whirlwinds
never seems to be enough
to create something beautiful?