As school comes to an end, I decide to
spend the summertime with my instrument.
I read music theory for two hours,
but my hands yearn for the touch of six strings.
Fingers position themselves to stroke bliss.
But my phone’s troubled with recurring rings.

****, it was mom telling me I have class!
I raced for my backpack, and I told her:
I will not slack. Papers grew so lonely
without their folder to cuddle them close.
I couldn’t care to organize them cause
usually, I’d lay in my seat repose.

Ionic bonds? What do they even mean?
And what the heck is “double replacement”?
Okay, I should start paying attention.
I grasp the pen. I notice the tension.
As soon as I write, my hands start to shake.
I start over. Now hands begin to ache.

What in the world is happening to me?
Two words: I scream. Head jerks, and my legs shake.
It has to be a dream. It has to be!
Don’t want to move, but I have to take notes.
Why are random words bursting out my throat?  
I’ma be real. I need my mommy!

Class is over. I exclaim to mother:
my fingers refuse to stop tremoring.
And I’m getting these tics. What set it off?
First thing I do is reach for my guitar.
I can’t hold it. I can’t ******* grab it.
Eyes of terror stay written on my face.

The next day I was in a wheelchair.
I cannot look straight- straight up to the sky
or look in front and into people’s eyes.
My right-hand curves to the left. A tendon
sinks into my flesh, and my left fingers
cramp up from being intertwined like vines.

They are stiff. Hideous. These are not mine.
But it does get much better with some time.
I can walk again, talk again, and write.
But all good things come with downfalls, don’t they?
My brain disease will come at me with might.
And I refuse to give up on this fight.

There will be a time when I reach stage five.
And I know it won’t be a pretty sight.
I’m ready for what will happen to me.
Dearest guitar, please know you’re my heaven.
Why bother to fret? Cause’ when the time comes
I’ll see you again in a few seconds.

In the reserved room built with teenage angst
sat a guitar waiting for a dear friend.
My quick fingers were tentative to touch.
I listened to the chords I brought about—
played a tangle labyrinth. I wish to quit.

Was that a G sharp or a B flat note?
Frustration brews like a furious storm.
I wanted to toss everything away.
This instrument? Not mine. And that is that.
Too embarrassed by my ineptitude.

I loathe guitars! I cannot play them right.
That riff was supposed to be heavy metal.
Not math rock, but it’s enough to settle.
That might change if I use guitar pedals.
Cmon, keep your head high. Let it stay bright.

A friendship with my guitar has begun.
There are bounds I’m still trying not to reach.
And one day, I’ll be good enough to teach
or possess an audience at the beach.
Hey, the guitar is becoming quite fun!

****, metal. I’m a stoner rock artist.
I can play bends, solos, and vibrato.
Look, I even came up with a motto:
to thrive, start with anger in a bottle.
With my advice, you will go the farthest.

My fingers’ pink blush irritates my skin.
Still eager to play. I ignore the sore.
It doesn’t feel like a chore anymore.
This instrument? It’s mine. It led to doors.
It helped me find heaven and become kin.

Forgot what I searched for to find heaven.
But I know that at the age of seven
I seized my mother’s phone and found a god.
He led me to an arresting world with strings.

Strings that swept your hair the way the wind does
when your ego would reach the sparkling skies.
They touched your heart no matter how heartless.

I refused to blink because if I did
I would miss a second of his gentle
fingers gliding across the maple fretboard.
And no sane person would want to miss that!

Strings danced back and forth as he played a chord.
Oh, his fingers grew sore, but calluses
helped desensitize them from aches and pain.

The instrument he mastered was waiting
to call him master cause’ guitars love how
he manipulates and makes them his slave.
Strings begged for his touch, for sounds they could make.

My eyes felt heavier than dense gym weights.
I mustn’t stop gazing if I want to
stay lost in heaven. So **** riveting!

“School is tomorrow.” “******, I forgot.”
“Give the phone back. Hmm, what are you watching?”
“Heaven.” “What did you say?” “I said heaven.”
Mom didn’t say anything afterward.

A few hours came, she asked for the phone.
I gave it to her, prepared my backpack.
Maybe in a different universe.
I would have proclaimed, “Don’t take the phone back.”

The sound of fingers
The string of hearts
Pressed wood hallowed out
Digging, digging
Digging, digging
Breathe in breathe out.
It takes courage
Just to exist.
I've tied my heart to a steel string
And lost them around the cuticles
of your fingers.
Of all the cruel things in life
I am glad that you're not one of them.
I've tuned my lips
& Twisted my hips toward you.
You never once laughed
When I mentioned
I am still learning how to dance

For once
he asked the sun to set
to bring his own

For once,
He strummed her heartstrings
and turned her into a hymn

For once,
He dawned on her with
new colors, she couldn’t believe existed

For once,
She melted at the sight
Of a smile … a specific smile
Too beautiful for poets to describe

For once... this might turn
into
“a while”

“I think there’s something wrong with you and that’s okay,” she sings with all her heart
and strums the guitar with my pick.
I’m in charge of the chords,
holding the guitar so
she can reach it where she sits.
We dream it up together, but
I phone it in
I admit.

A, D, E - 1, 4, 5 -
arbitrarily chose.
She keeps it alive with her prose
Just 5 years old
A poet with her eyes closed.

You can be anything you want to be, and that’s okay as long as you’re happy.

Like she knows
The greatest longings of the whole of humanity,

Like she’s peered into the depths of the vast ocean of broken hearts,
And know this is the best place to start…

Like it’s easy.

“It’s okay”, she sings with closed eyes,
and strums the guitar in musical bliss.

And it is. For that moment. For a heartbeat.

It is.

It slowly continues to argue with me day in and day out.
Like a creep following in the shadows,
it decides to elude me no matter how I feel.

As the mandolin plays its sad tune,
and the guitar only remembers the sound of minor chords,
the melancholy erodes the wall that has protected the people since birth.

Taking its time to analyze and devise,
making plans and biding its time.
The edge defines the lie that it says is inside.

Maybe the next ship will take me along.
Maybe it will sail farther away than the last one.
Maybe its anchor will drop on more pleasant shores.

As I scream at the city that has been my home for so long,
As I stare into its ugly face,
I no longer know which way to go.

Do I go to the harbor and board the boat?
Do I search for my creeper in the alleys and roads?
Or do I stay where I am and take heart to the fact that I am still taking breath?

Why are you staying by my side?
You should go.
Why are you still waiting with me in line?
Don't you have better places to be?

When the night is angry and the clouds block out the moon,
I wonder if it will find me?
When the weather is sour and the day looks like the night,
I wonder if it will find me?

Anyway, I choose you, stay by my side.
Any path I take you have loved me despite the tide.
Any time I wept you were there with me and you cried.

Why do you stay when I am in the fray,
When my anxiety shoots you like a gun,
or when my anger manifests and stabs you like a knife?

I look over my shoulder and the creeper is there.
Always ten paces behind no matter which way I twist and I turn.

I look over my shoulder and I see you coming up beside.
You're reaching for my hand and telling me to trust.

I close my eyes and let you guide me to where I should go.
I release any semblance of control.

The sun finally breaks the clouds and the creeper steps aside.
Still, ten paces behind but comfort are by my side.
The sun brightens my face and I begin to cry.
For the night was long and the day has finally come.

The day is finally the day,
and I can see the bay.
The boat is right where I left it.
I look to you and you say it's okay.
So we take our steps and board the boat looking for better shores where we can play.

What does it matter,
When I sit stiff in the dark
Music pricking through my eardrums;
Every single little strum
of guitar string
or a piano note;
Swimming along through the bass clef lines
The bassist, often undiscovered
No person hearing his low, warm notes.
His name is not on any
Cover
Not even in the 'artists' thoughts.
But his every strum gets through
Accompanied by a yelp
from my throat
The swirling snail in my ear
Curls up tighter as the waves near,
Fear. Paralyzed.
in fear.
The surge. Surge of thought
No time to breathe No time to stop
No time to think No time to drop
No single remaining train of thought
To listen to the bassists' notes.
Instead, it's the dreaded screech;
Singers voice racing through
my head is too loud
But my vocal cords never loud
enough to make a pleasing sound
A belching hound.

in the land of ten
fingers the twelve fingered man
is the guitar king