Zoom, roar, cars honking, Jeepneys
Racketing, plying the flooded streets
of suburban Manila

How I miss your dreadful and depressing sight
Hauntingly beautiful to the
Glass-eyed hipster romantic, romanticizing
Poverty and banality - what a good use of privilege

Sulu, you are a stench to my sight
I can hear your wounds screaming
And I can taste the bitter sound of your helpless cries

Yet, you cradled me and my drunkenness,
You danced with me under the moonless night
Along with the rowdy bottles of San Miguel
The bottles occupying the floor
Signified our comradeship
You had my back when I sleep
And you are my eyes in the morning
Before I wake up

How I will miss listening to jazz
Inside your deceptively-fragile looking walls
How I will miss puking on your floors
I will miss that part of my youth that I
Have left when I closed the front door.