The world is Jaded and Numb,
It takes work,
To stop it from Hollowing you.

Dear Basketball,

Why am I not six foot six.

If I could reach just a little higher,
I would score you with ease.

We’d make a winning team.

You’d be my world
spinning on the tip of my finger.
We’d shoot for the moon
night-in and night-out,
with no fear of falling
because your gravity
is the force that
grounds me.

We’d have a bounce to our step:
you striking the pavement
like a war drum and me
walking on air
with my head in the clouds
of Southern California.

We'd turn soaring
over expectations
into a high art.

Imagine this: the first
sub-six-foot Asian minority
in the NBA
wins the MVP!

And they would pay us!  
Never mind the money.
We'll earn a wealth of respect.
We'll command conundrums.
Coaches across the league would
call us a problem and
scratch their heads drawing
up defensive formulas on white boards
named after us.

I realize that’s a long shot.
I'm taking it.

You won’t even see me flinch

even if you did hit me
between the eyes
and broke my nose
on that inbound play,
I’d grin
in the face of the opponent

like how my four-year-old girl
handled pneumonia in a hospital bed,
I will emerge from any cold spell
with child-like hope
and a Gigi-like game face,
jaws jutting out

Because adversity
is what brings out greatness
and struggle
is what proves you
are still alive.

I could be trailing
by 20 for an entire game

I could have zero points,
but no doubts
that the next shot is going in.

I'm taking it.

Even if it means
fading away
into the darkness
over multiple hands
outstretched with
our goal that is the basket
nowhere to be seen

I'd throw my hopes and fears
into the wind for you,
regardless of what the defense throws back.

If basketball is a religion,
then I am a devout practitioner,
putting up prayers from behind the arc

And when things don't bounce our way,
I won't blame you.

Defeat reveals what you're
fundamentally made of,
so I will work on my form:
fingers along your grooves,
toes pointed ahead,
follow through.

I will work on my endurance:
hustle beats skill any day

I will work on passing you
and the wisdom you bring
to the next generation,
so they can score whatever it is
they dream

I will work to give my daughter
the best possible shot

I will lead by example.

Championships come and go:
what we are working towards
will last forever

And guess what, Basketball?
I will still be far from six foot six,
making it very hard to play you well.

That’s no excuse.
That just means I will practice dribbling low
to the ground and moving
like a shadow beneath their feet.

No one can guard
what they can't see coming:
we'll fly under the radar.

I'd give you the best of me
to let you bring out
the beast in me:
an apex predator
with a forked tongue
through bared fangs
and black skin thick as
battle armor

No amount of hisses and boos
can block our shot.

We'd go the distance,
crossing over
into the unknown and
through whatever
physical and emotional
contact comes next

I will hit the floor for you,
rise up
and sink my free throws
on a limp.

If I needed 81 points
to win you over,
I’d bring back each one
in an autographed bucket,
even if it takes 82 games to do it.

We could spend a long,
loosing season together,
and I would still wake up at 4 a.m.
to see you
in an empty gym,
while dawn turns the sky
from purple into gold.  

I’d savor every drop
of sweat the comes from
running back and forth
for miles in your shoes
between your two bottomless baskets.

I don't care how tall I am.
We are chasing the footsteps of
immortal giants,
if only to write our own legends
that will never die.

Even if I had just 24 seconds
to do it,
I’d spend every last one
believing in miracles.

It’s a long shot,
but together,
we can’t miss.

Long Live You,
Your Number One Fan

I have not felt like myself in a very long time.

Instead of a human being, I feel like
a mass of molasses the color of tar,
swinging with old creaky bones
over the edge of a bed that never gets made;
where the sheets pull over the sides
and there's a dip in the middle,
like a hole that was pre-dug in the ground,
waiting for a body to fill the void.

Instead of a student, I feel like
an imposter, walking around in
shoes that are much too big,
typing in notes and little reminders
with fingers that are far too fat and fast;
every click of a button is
ten times too loud, twenty times too disturbing,
and the only thing
that's keeping my senses overloading
from my own **** noise
are my headphones, which die
far too quickly, as if it has also
given up on me.

Instead of a friend, I feel like
a nuisance -- a ratty old thing
that's clinging to whatever affection
is thrown to my general direction;
like a *****, old ragdoll that's just
collecting dust on the shelf,
but no one really wants to throw it out.
Not out of sentimental purposes;
more like they don't want to even touch it,
don't want to have anything to do with it.

Instead of an accomplishment, I feel like
a failure; because all I ever do is start a race
but give up halfway; all I ever say are
affirmatives, never following-through.
I feel like I always just
create more problems the longer I stay,
and even an act of love
rings hollow in my chest,
like the bells of an ancient, empty cathedral
in an abandoned rural town
that has preached of safety and refuge,
but bars the doors closed at the end of every service.

My mother once called me
as beautiful as the moon,
and as radiant as the stars.
But when I look up into the night,
all I can see myself in
is in the black expanse of the empty sky,
and all I want to do is disappear
into that vast nothingness.

Nowhere is better than anywhere I've been.

Dum dum dum
The dreaded sound of drum comes.

My corpse is painted, full coverage of red
How can a body be alive while the soul is dead?
Words,  words are knives that aims to ****

Killing is no fun without suffering
Pleasure grows when pain last longer
Break the victim slowly
Just one at a time and don't forget to help them up
Bring them hope and see them stand up to their knees
Now, time to throw more knives until they fall
Let the crumbling hope be their last straw

Do you feel more pleasure?
Watching the hope crumbles as life disappear

In martyrdom I suffer
Yes, such idiocracy still exist
While my identity is gone
no more hope for this unknown entity
But in the same fate, you should not fall.

Dum dum dum
The dreaded sound of drum is gone.

I choose not to talk for I have nothing to say,
I choose not to converse as I have lost my way,
I am scared of what you think, I am scared of what they say.
My plight is in my head and from this I can't escape.
I choose not to see you,
Sometimes i'd rather be alone,
I've no need for existence,
When we exist behind a phone.

Another lap around this body,
Downing the tail like a snake.
I can not seem to find the end,
Is this karma or is this fate?

Creeped up on me,
Like lichen up a tree.
Spread like frost,
Over a bedroom window.
The pain came fast,
And the death is coming slow.

I enter out and exit in,
Downing the tail like a snake.
I am going back in again,
Is this karma or is this fate?

I stared too far into the abyss,
Dived too deep into it’s depths.
It burnt a crater in my mind,
Making a home in the space inside.

I turn my inner eye to see the trail you left behind,
Searching for the beginning and the end.
I can’t tell the distance you will take from me,
But I know it is a poison that is killing me.

I’ve wasted too much time,
Hating you,
When I should have been,
Embracing you.
I pull the tail a little out my throat,
Every time I step towards forgiving you.