funny, isn't it? how facebook displays how long it's been since a person was last active. they remind me that i was a mere three hundred seconds from catching you online, but that's okay; no, really!, it is;

because my fingers are hovering over my keyboard and the blinker's just blinking in its white little space, this Type a message... glaring at me accusingly. wait, give me a second. what do i tell you? what should i say?

hi is safe. so is hello. hey seems a little too casual, doesn't it? should i put an emoji? a heart? no, no. a smiley face. but just the normal smiley face, not the one with closed eyes and everything. or maybe i should use that instead?

but /then what/?

i guess i could ask you how your day went. that sounds well enough. i can ask you about the weather. no, ******, it's always hot. nothing interesting there. i'll just branch out after you tell me what you've done today, where you've gone. oh, you went to the movies? that's great. last movie i watched was Captain America: Civil War. are you team cap or team iron man? peachy. just peachy. perfect. i've got this. i am s--

*******, you're online. why are you online? the green circle is just staring at me and oh my god, you're typing, you're typing in to our chat box. oh my god. i liked it better when you were inactive. when you were offline. now i just wait, maybe pretend i wasn't this loser waiting for you to talk to me, this loser who had you on my mind, this loser overthinking what i should say to y--

You (12:39 PM)
Hey. I was just thinking about you. :)

his name is josh,

and he would send me selfies of his other half and babble about her until i am almost praying for the tomorrows we are not promised, all because i want to see them together years from now. on nights when his thoughts are all over the place and he does not know what to do with his emotions, i worry; but he shows me that he can conquer anything and everything, eventually, with her hand in his. that really, sometimes, love can be all you need.

his name is paolo,

and he walks me home even though he doesn't have to. in between coke floats and sidewalks, i came to know a boy who would plan a spontaneous harana because he had a guitar and formal attire; who would find in his heart patience and forgiveness when it was he who should have been receiving it. on the days i fear he is on the verge of crumbling, he keeps his chin up and begins treading the walk home by my side with nothing but stories of admiration for the girl who puts the lyrics in his music.

his name is steven,

and not a day passes that he doesn't check in on me-- to remind me that i should eat three times a day; to ask me how i'm doing; to send me links to things as forms of harmless distractions. he has proven over and over again to be ideal despite certain setbacks. he is fiercely protective and he knows how to listen, and although there is no one for him at the moment, anyone he has loved and will be loved by him is lucky, whether they realize it or not.

his name is ian,

and whenever he talks about the girl he loves, he brightens and i am sometimes left to wonder if he is talking about some other thing; like the celestial beings of the universe, or the wonders of our earth. he is as balanced as a boy can be and as fair as one could ever hope; he is so many good things in the world, and yet, love holds him captive in the best ways known to man. i will never get sick of watching him fall over, and over, and over again for the same person.

his name is niño,

and though he is what you might call a reckless romeo, there is no one in love that has ever equaled him. the things he will do in the name of that four-lettered word has driven me crazy; i have watched him struggle with it too many times. but the beauty of it all is when he still stands after being kicked to the ground, how he fills the cracks in his heart with love and nothing but that. how he willingly gives out pieces of him to complete others. how he will adore his girl until the rest of the world shies away, until he has re-defined it for everyone to come after.

you see, if you ever plan to love me, know that i have stood as witness to heartbreak and heart ache... at the same time, i have also been exposed to the most beautiful brands of love; different fights and different names of courage and different reasons and different people to fight for, but still, all the same, in the name of love.

they have taught me to be brave, and patient, and kind, and reasonable; and soft in all the right places, brutal when it comes to it; they have taught me to be what a person expects in love and they've taught me what to expect from the person i love, as well.

i refuse to settle for anything less.

she weaves through crowds with little effort. she will occupy everything there is to be stayed in; your body, your mind, your heart; she will take any space she can get. do not think you can hold on to her. she will always slip through your fingers.

she walks like she is dancing, like she is floating. she is both in your lungs and on your lips; sometimes, it will feel like she is not in either. you will tread this thin line between love and necessity. do not call her your everything. once she leaves, you will be left for dead.

she speaks with a fever that reminds you of your own. she is the girl your mother warned you not to get too close to, but there is something enticing about the way she can warm you up from the inside. don't be stupid. a flame is always a flame, and flames burn.

she has been abused for far too long and yet she remains firm, and constant. she will remind you of the flowers in your soul and the callouses on your hands, tell you that they are equally beautiful. don't be fooled. her heart is heavy, and you must be atlas to carry it.

i don't believe in ghosts (or rather, i don't want to)

but there's no other name for my first love who still haunts me, the reason why there are still times that love feels like bile in my throat;

and there's no other name for the nightmares i wake up from in the middle of the night, this echo of what i was never able to do for others;

and there's no other name for the girl i killed years ago; this version of me i murdered, this version of me who was potentially much better;  

i don't believe in ghosts,

but i have a few and i've named them so that they can keep me company when no one else can,

(my favorite ghost, her name is regret; she's often seen with what if and could have been)

and i have stories to tell, not at camp fires, no, but maybe over the phone when it's three a.m in the morning and i've had one too many to drink,

(let me tell you about how he left me; let me tell you about how many times i watched my friends die in my sleep; let me tell you about the person i was before i decided i can't be her any longer)

and i can't get rid of them, no matter how hard i try.

(i throw salt and offer prayers but it doesn't seem to be effective)

everyone has ghosts whether they believe in them or not; ghosts they want to get rid of, ghosts they can't get rid of, ghosts that only they see, ghosts everyone else can point out;

who's yours?

once upon a time, you were every story in my head. you were fantasies woven during day and prose written at 3AM. i saw so much poetry in you, in everything you did. that was a sure sign that i felt something for you, that my love ran deeper than plain infatuation and crushing.

i wrote about how your smile could light up the darkest of days; my sunshine, my flashlight. i wrote about how beautiful i thought the callouses on your hands were, i wrote about how your flaws were never imperfections to me. i wrote about the lyrics you remind me of. i wrote your name in cursive on the back of my hand along with words of promise and endearment. i scribbled you through the margins of my notebook with poetry and song.

but oh, it wasn’t all just fairy dust and wanderlust.

my pen bled ugly words, rage and heartbreak and jealousy. prose after prose of how you’d leave me in the rain, how you always made me feel like i was either too much or not enough. they were angry taps to the keyboard. pens tearing in to paper. the horrors of them made e.e cummings turn in his grave, the curses of young love would have made shakespeare proud.

you knew about that. you knew about how i meticulously wove words together for you, words that would have made other people fall in love. and not once did you appreciate them; you threw aside my gifts of poetry and prose like they weren’t about you. like they didn’t mean a thing.

if you read them, you would’ve seen how much i adored you. if you read them, you would’ve recognized a love so unprecedented, unrivaled, untouchable. but you didn’t. you never got past the first stanza, the first paragraph, the first three words before giving me a half-hearted thanks and changing the topic.

and so i started to write about you less. my words began to lose it’s substance, my phrases got shorter, my metaphors making less sense. and you didn’t notice. you never noticed how you slowly faded from the thing the one thing that mattered more to me than anything in the whole world.

you faded, then you were gone completely.

i no longer write about you. wait, no, that’s a lie: i no longer want to write about you. i hope this is the last time i do, the last set of words i’d dare to pull together for you. you don’t deserve to know how i feel about you, you don’t deserve my poems or my words anymore. god knows my words are all i have, and i can’t love you if you don’t learn to love them. i’m sorry; call it selfish, or unfair. but these words, these words, my words. how can i write about you if you don’t– if you never– valued the best gift i had to offer?

you’re now just some left-over papers that i keep under my bed, one day to open and read with tinges of nostalgia, but never to re-write again.

we are always asked
to understand the other person's
viewpoint
no matter how
out-dated
foolish or
obnoxious.
one is asked
to view
their total error
their life-waste
with
kindliness,
especially if they are
aged.
but age is the total of
our doing.
they have aged
badly
because they have
lived
out of focus,
they have refused to
see.
not their fault?
whose fault?
mine?
I am asked to hide
my viewpoint
from them
for fear of their
fear.
age is no crime
but the shame
of a deliberately
wasted
life
among so many
deliberately
wasted
lives
is.

To give life you must take life,
and as our grief falls flat and hollow
upon the billion-blooded sea
I pass upon serious inward-breaking shoals rimmed
with white-legged, white-bellied rotting creatures
lengthily dead and rioting against surrounding scenes.
Dear child, I only did to you what the sparrow
did to you; I am old when it is fashionable to be
young; I cry when it is fashionable to laugh.
I hated you when it would have taken less courage
to love.