I, a woman of letters, have been waiting for you, a man of numbers. I’ve been fantasizing of the day when you would deliver at the porch of my heart your algebraic equation. The x’s and y’s merged systematically with all the symbols, forming an indelibly inked pattern that would finally make sense. I have been waiting and hoping and praying, but all I’ve got so far are your invalid equations, the confusion, the uncertainties, the unsolvable mathematical sentence that I want so desperately unscrambled. How can you not, in your genius, find the right equation, even as I now try to draft a coherent verse?

for j.e.
*013115

panahon nang sumulat…
muli…
hubaran ang puso’t
bulatlatin ang mga alaala.

para saan pa’t
sa maraming tao’y
inimbak
ang luha
ng nakaraan,
kung ito’y kailanma’y
hindi mapapakinabangan?

kaya’t patawad, puso,
sa aking sayo’y pagpapaluhang muli.
salamat, isip,
sa iyong pagpapaunlak
sa hiling
na paminsan pa’y
isatitik silang kapagdaka’y
lumisan din.

*060915

I have not grown accustomed
to the sound of your messages.
Their presence did little to assure,
nor did their absence cause unsettling.
Today, however,
I must admit
that I have waited for that bell.
My heart salivated
at the sound of passing bicycles,
hoping finally it was you
remembering the love
you have left waiting.
I wonder:
How could you have conditioned me
to anticipate something
that has never been constant anyway?

for j.e.
*013115

you are the aftertaste of coffee.
after the jumpstart,
the palpitation,
here you are,
sadly bittersweet.

you are the persisting vision
of a falling star.
its trail of light
remain before me
even after it’s long been gone.
i’ve tried to catch it
with my feeble hands,
only to grasp nothingness.

you are the aftermath
of an earthquake,
of which i found myself
at its epicenter.
even after rebuilding,
i found
that nothing is
as it was.

you are the tune
that keeps playing
over and over again
inside my head.
i’ve being lss-ing
over your memories,
singing a song
i’m not sure
if i’ll ever hear again.

you are an aftertaste,
a persisting vision,
an aftermath,
an lss
that i wrap around myself,
holding me together,
keeping me from falling apart.

for j.e.
*100314

The heart breaks every so often
at the sound of closing doors.
The unstaying
(or even the uncoming)
drives its point
that maybe
it isn’t an option to settle.
One wonders
why yet again
love,
in essence,
is not enough
to bar life’s egress?
It’s a classic tale of hurting,
really,
where there are no heroes
or heroines,
only adversaries,
these hearts despairing,
accustomed to vacationing affections
that leave after the season’s end.


091615
*for c.d.

you, to me, are not an option.

you are not one of the many shirts
in my wardrobe.
you are not a favorite pair
amongst my shoe collection.
neither are you a preference,
a comfort food i run to
when i am not feeling well.
you do not belong to a constellation,
where you are but one of the billions
of masses bursting forth light.

no, baby, you are the only choice
i choose to have.

you are that one song i play over and over again,
never tiring of the melody,
always finding something new in the lyrics.
you are the waters i dive into
until my strength is worn out
and i am but flotsam.
you are that puzzle i bring out time and time again,
putting together, scrambling apart.
i know how you look like,
but i always get thrilled at piecing you together anew.

oh, baby, know this:
i am not her.
i am not waiting till no one comes
and everyone’s left
before i attend to you.
i am here,
waiting for you,
choosing you.
just you.

for j.e.
*111614

what i find so
fascinating about you is that
you never seem to start or
end where you are supposed
to. no, you have your own
pauses and stops, and the
more i try to follow
you, the more confused i
get. is there any pattern or
sequence to you that i can
decipher? is there
a glitch in your equation which i
could probably unscramble? believe me. i find
that you are more beautiful in your
insistence not to be understood. i liked that
about you, as that tells me i don’t
have to struggle so hard. but, baby,
i still want to try. let me still
get my paper and pencil out to attempt
to solve you, like that algebraic equation
i can’t seem to ever get right. honey, i am
not giving up on you, the same
way i got headaches over those questions that
tested the logic out of me, eventually leading
me to ask whether i was really intelligent enough to
figure something out. but even then, even when
i am out of my zone and completely
uncertain, i will still follow this
fascination through. who
knows, perhaps, eventually
i will find the right spot, the precise
timing, the exact
variable needed to complete the solution to
us.


for j.e.
*111814

Do not speak, love.
Hold your peace.
Keep your silence.

Listen.
Listen.
Listen.

Do you hear it –
The lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub?
Tell me.
Do you hear it?

I’ve been trying
To silence it,
Muffle it with poetry,
But it is there.

Lub-dub, lub dub, lub-dub.

It won’t stop.
It won’t stop…
It won’t stop!

It’s right here.
Right here!
in my center,
at my core!

Lub-dub, lub dub, lub-dub.
It won’t keep quiet!
Lub-dub, lub dub, lub-dub.
It won’t be still!

Lub-dub, lub dub, lub-dub.
Lub-dub, lub dub, lub-dub.
Lub-dub, lub dub, lub-dub.

Be still, love,
Be still.
Be still!

Do not speak, love.
Hold your peace.
Keep your silence.
Listen.
Listen.
Listen.

Do you hear it –
The lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub?
Tell me.
Do you hear it?
Listen!
Why won't you hear?

for j.e.
*100114

you and me, mem’ries
i can’t even begin to
decipher. i sigh.

for j,e.
*081514

certain moving ons
do not require goodbyes.

sort of our case - - -

with both of us
needing to let go
without us having to part.

for a.c.
*051215

Halcyon days gone.
I wonder for how long.
Days, weeks?

Perhaps only until tomorrow,
then you come with the new sun?
Or later before the sun bids farewell,
and you'll be as you've always been?

But the space between us
drives the point of longer.
How much longer?
Hours drag on the longest.

What do I know now really
except that I cannot know.
What now?
Why. Why. Why.

In a universe of parallels,
you are an alternate,
not an alternative,
a constantly inconsistent presence,
now, sadly, merely a thought,

albeit

persisting...
persisting...
resisting.

022217

My heart
is a landmine
and your footprints
are
all
over
the
place.

021217

Where you are concerned,
less
is
more.

Less words,
more meaning.

Less actions,
more meaningful.

One time.

Silence.
Me: It feels like you’re afraid to lose me.
Silence.
You: I am.

Another time.

Me: Do you want me to let go now?
Is this let go?
Silence.
You: A long hug.
Silence.
Me: What does this mean?
Silence.
You: I don’t know...
I don’t know what this means.
Silence.

And then some other day.

You: Take care.
Pause.
Me: Yes. Thank u.
Pause.
You: Love love.
Pause.
Pause.
Pause.
Me: Love u.
Us: Silence.

March 19, 2017
**for j.e.

Please don't log in here.
Our walls are our heart's war zones.
No casualties, please.

You are a doll,
too pretty, too arresting.
But you are mass
that demands shaping,
and my fingers are not accustomed
to one such as you.

I press too hard
and sculpt too much.
You are too soft
for my fervid hands.
My own prints roughen you up.
I am anxious.
You should be
as you are.
You are an unshaped doll,
demanding familiarity.

I draw back.
I don't know how to draw back.
My fervid hands are arrested.
Too soft, too much, too hard.
You are pretty but I am anxious.

I can't sculpt you.
My prints are too rough
to be familiar.
I am too unaccustomed.
You should be as you are,
without my prints.
I am not a doll.

for l.r.
*091718

can't fathom how this could be:
our conversations, your fascination.
never have I ever.
friends, I think,
unless really not.
say no more, please.
enamored though you be,
dare we not any further.

020617

the world tilted
and i find
that i am exactly
at the opposite end
of where i was yesterday.

there was silence
between us
and spaces
and gaps
and infinities
yet to be realized.

now,
i am here somersaulting
with the sound
of your voice
as i drift off to sleep,
and again waking up
to the sweet sound
of promises unspoken.

when yesterday
i cannot find
where my spot is
in the map
of your heart,
here i am
at the x
marking exactly
where your whole being
is held together.

you have brought me
to various peaks and depths
of euphoria and melancholy,
and i am sure
i can only be called crazy
for wanting to be where i am.

when you come home,
remember:
x marks this spot, baby.
i am here,
exactly where i
have chosen to be.

for j.e.
*102514

i picked the scabs off my wounds
and made them bleed anew,
never allowing them to heal so easily.
i watched in amazement as new blood
drips and smears my skin.
i watched abrasions,
particularly the deep ones,
fascinated at how they can hurt.
i loved the pain that comes
with the cut.
i never cried at my gashes.
i still have scars from all the carelessness
of my life,
and i wear them proud,
like a veteran
who survived the war.
i come home to my waiting bed,
my mother’s pillow
my comfort through all the tears,
as i hide the pain in gauze of bravery.
i have been courageous.
i have never chosen my battles,
because i have always believed
that every single one of them is worth the ache.
here i am now, choosing yet again
the ecstasy of pain.
here i am, choosing the beautiful agony
of choosing to love you.

for j.e.
*111614

it be a fraction
of a moment,
the pause,
the struggle.
it is but a speck
in a spreading white canvas.
but it is there.
now, we are losing momentum,
and i don't know why.

020617

conversations
realizations
you
please
this
i
can't

for j.a.
012917

dregs of untruth catches on,
endangering trust.
nandemonaiya.
distraction, destruction.
erring thoughts and emotions.
nevermind.

020617

there must be an infinite space beside you,
because in my unboundedness,
i found my place at your side.
right there in the crook of your arm,
i fit perfectly,
as if a spoon
that is firmly held in place
at the corner of a bowl,
as if the very hollow
around you
was meant exactly for me.

i never believed in destiny,
for i am a firm advocate
of choice, of free will.
but somehow,
with me snuggled
close to your heart,
i can somehow believe
i am fated to choose you.

they would ask
where my decisiveness comes from,
where my certainty about you
is rooted on,
and i would look up
and ask the stars the same question.

perhaps it’s in the curls of your mane
that i loved to rustle
with my fingers,
or your hands
that can engulf mine so easily,
or your arms
that can envelope my being,
or your eyes
that know what i need,
or your lips
that whisper endearments so sweet.

i really can’t say,
except that i know.
i know in my heart
that i chose you,
that i value the choices i make,
and i value you
as amongst my most prized decisions.

for j.e.
*111114

your pain
wraps itself
around my heart,
a noose
surprisingly tight
for one
of letting go.

it whispers
against my ears
of tears overflowing,
drowning
what is bottled up
inside.

i empty
your words
into my palms,
allowing each memory
to filter through
my fingers,
every metaphor
to cut through,
each sick longing
to permeate.

i must admit
that i have no use
for your heartbreak,
for i have enough
of my own
to last me
through the night,
but i soak myself through
nonetheless,
allowing
what is taken
from your heart
to find its way
through mine.

each poem
leaves a ****
i dare not
stare at
for too long.
it is enough
that i feel.
it would have been
too much
if i should see,
if i should revel
at what is
unacceptable
even before your eyes.

so tonight,
let me be blind
but feeling,
sensitive
to every throbbing
wound
you've nursed,
to every cry
you've muffled.
tonight, i mourn
with you
the loss
of a love
not worth having.

i weep with you,
love,
not because
i, too, have experienced
your defeat,
but because i, too,
have loved you,
and like
everything else
that rots,
we, too,
shall find
our resurrection
in the decay.
one day soon,
we’ll find
our salvation
in surrender.


for k.c.
*053015

distance
is not so much
as space,
as it is absence.

*081415

incongruent
my heart and yours went,
with mine supposing importance
and yours subsisting in ignorance.

050915
for j.b.

i panicked when you were nowhere in sight
not before me, nor behind me.
i searched for you in my room,
but you were not in my boxes,
nor in my keepsakes.
i opened well-loved pages of poetry,
and all i found were decomposing petals
of long-lost reminiscence.
i searched and rummaged,
and all i found of you were
bits and traces of a presence
not yet even pieced together.

who you are for me
cannot be contained
by a box, a page of verses,
a tumbler, or a photograph,
but those were all i have of you.

how can someone of such gravity
be for me so limited in presence?

for a moment,
i had to fight the urge to believe
i only made you up.
the voice that lulled me to sleep
one starry night –
could it possibly be a dream?
were those big hands
that never failed to grasp mine
mere imagination?
those eyes, that smile,
are they but a compound
of so many other eyes and smiles?

oh how easily i forget,
you exist apart from my memories!
your voice, your hands
are not dependent on my ability to feel nor hear.
my verses cannot summon you,
nor can their absence limit who you are.
i do not need to remember you
for you to be there.
neither should my heart beat
for you to be loved.

you are your own,
capable of storing your own keepsakes
and pressed petals.
should you choose to,
those big hands can take hold
of any other hand.
you can choose to gift anyone
with the beauty of your smile
or of your song.
and i need not be the object
of your affection
for your own heart to beat wildly
against your chest.

you are
even if we’re not.
i am
apart from you.
you will always be you
even if i was not in the equation,
and I will always be me
even if you are not the object
of my metaphors.

for j.e.
*090514

heartbreaks are mere doors
we choose to open,
and love is but trespass
we welcome in our hearts

013117

When girls get ice cream,
you know you need to worry.
What did you do now?

022017

wrong move.
wrong move.
wrong move.
that picture.
that smile.
those hands.
those hands.
those hands.
my heart.
those memories.
those hands.
my heart.
those hands.
memories.
hands.
heart.
wrong move.
wrong move.
that picture.
wrong move.
my heart.
those memories.
that smile.
those hands.
those hands.
those hands.

for j.e.
*093014

the turning felt much
like dice a'rolling. these hearts,
the proof of needing

022017

my thoughts are always best expressed in verses,
and you are the lines
that make them up.

your name is never scribbled across the page,
but you are there in the kerning,
the sensible spaces in between.

you are the punctuation marks,
the pauses and the stops,
the stresses in my ideas.

don’t you ever get frustrated
that i have exploited your memories
into fragments of ellipsied affection?

i am guilty of making you my poetry,
of enveloping you in metaphors
and keeping you close to my heart.

out of the trickles of us,
i have spawned an infinite stream
of feels pooling into poems.

i have always wondered
if you have ever read me
and guessed that i was about you.

tell me if you have,
because if you haven’t guessed yet,
i’ll phrase my poems in equations instead.

for j.e.
*081214

i have always fancied the decrepit,
the abandoned,
the unsightly,
the imperfect,
the rough,
the dull.
i have always found refuge
in desolate places
and found company
in the derelict.
the unwanted,
the forsaken,
the forlorn,
have always held my interest.

there is something unbelievably beautiful
in sadness
that draws me,
that calls me to it.
perhaps this is the same appeal
that holds me to you.
i look at you
and touch you
and i draw back in pain,
but i desire to embrace you still,
you
and your undesirable past,
your confused present,
and your uncertain future.

i am there
touching every scar
and wanting to peer
through every crack and crevice.
i want every tear
for myself.
i shall keep every drop
in a jar inside my heart
until i, too, overflow
with every ache.

it takes one to know one,
my brother always said.
i guess he’s right.
my own weaknesses,
my blemishes,
my defects
make it easy for me
to look at you
and see that you are one
of incomparable value.

those are battle scars,
i'd always say.
nobody has a right
to disrespect
the wars
others have fought
and the losses
others have suffered.
yours are some
of the most interesting
wounds i've ever seen.

your imperfections are priceless, baby,
and i’d gladly give what’s left unscarred in me
for the benefit
of embracing
all that you are.

for j.e.
*111614

(aka Home
aka Dear Skrubs, love, your Skrubqueen)

We have made a home
in each other's oddities,
hidden our frustrations
in foreign language.
Together,
we danced Moskau
and sang worship songs
and played Red Sun.

I, for one,
have embraced my sadness
with your presence.
In your loyalty,
I found acceptance.

Dear Skrubs,
I have made a home
in your antics
and pranks
and laughter.
In shared food
and secrets,
I have known love.

We are potatoes
and potatoes are us
(or perhaps that's just me).

But you have hailed me
your Skrubqueen with the potato heart.
No power any license I earn
will ever win me that.

thoughts filling my head
set off the panic alarm
warning, warning. stop.

022017

you
you
you
.....
*why?

you have made it clear:
“let go of me.”
so let go i did.
request granted.

permit me this now -
to write you unmasked.
without coyness
nor shadow of pretense,
i scribble this about you:

once,
i have refused
to envelope
your memories
with fantasies,
not wanting
to mix them up.

now, though,
frustrated by reality
i have allowed
my imagination
to take its own course -  
your lips yielding against mine,
my hands trembling
as it seeks your chest,
my heart pulsating wildly
in tune with yours.

when once,
I have refused
to write you
in the beauty
of my dreams,
now
there is nothing left
of you
but the mirage
of hopefulness.

you are now my hero,
my muse,
the fancy
behind my poems.

you are so much more
than you used to be,
but only
because I have closed
my eyes
and allowed you
to be swallowed
by my heartbreak.

for j.e.
*100714

this poem is about you,
and the sadness that comes with the mention of your name.
this poem is about you,
regardless if i will it so, as i hoped not to.
this poem is about you,
your eyes, your voice, your hands, your hair.
this poem is about you,
and the way i almost hoped we never met, but not quite.
this poem is about you,
and i am enveloping here the silent prayer that,
somehow, wherever you are, my verse finds its way to you.

yet
this poem is also about me,
and how i still find myself smiling at your memories.
this poem is about me,
the girl who knows you and holds dear all that you are.
this poem is about me,
in as much as it is about my sleepless nights,
where you are a hero of my unhad dreams.
this poem is about me
and my strained longing to be with you.
this poem is about me,
as i lull myself into unfeeling with songs i have dedicated to you.

alas,
this poem is about us,
and our fears and doubts and misgivings.
this poem is about us,
telling of the kiss we’ve never shared.
this poem is about us,
our hands still imprinted against one another
since the last time they’ve held.
this poem is about us,
while i still have words for us.
this poem is about us,
until the next time we see each other again.

this poem is about you,
about me,
about us.
this poem is for you,
in case you’re wondering.
and this poem is for me,
in case i’m forgetting.

101815
*for j.e.

your voice drones on
through the open door,
history now melodious,
thick, resounding --
the cacophony
of an infatuation

for jj
081617

I will never stop scratching
through your rough edges
until I get in.

I’m breaking nails, baby,
and I don’t mind.

for j.e.
*110614

In my dream,
I was unlocking
you,
portion by portion.
This door
then the next.

I think I know you.
I think -- I
know you

enough

to know
what passcodes to use.
I key in pins
and scramble letters.

Yet
every time,
a new door,
a new dream.

I don't know
you.

for l.r.
040218

i only have
a few words
for your crap,
and i say this politely:
*******...
please.
grow *****,
then we'll talk.

for j.h.
*060215

your eyes are poetry.
they reflect
every rhyme,
every metaphor,
every verse
that i cannot
even begin
to write.

for j.e.
*111714

You are a freedom I dare to indulge in. You are rooftops and walks. You are explorations of old hotels and hardbound books left in shelves. You are a moment (of clouds of dust and abandon) that filled a niche in my being. I have niches far too many to count. I have walked far too many walks. I have sat on rooftops I still miss. I have explored and I have saved moments that are nothing now but accumulated dust. I have hardbound my stories in poems. In my audacity, I am keeping you now - my hopeful space, my abandon.

for l.r.
**041718

this thought, the only one,
i let loose tonight -

i want you.

123114
*for j.e.

Each hour
passes as in a day.
First,
second,
third
it began.
Now,
Saturday,
soon Friday again.
If only the dreaded days
are kinder,
less hostile
to the mind.
If only
memories fill pages - -
A trip, a nightout,
a conversation
while traversing
unknown streets at night.
But days have become
prayers uttered
with every breath,
with nights far longer
and more threatening
in one's isolation.


I think about the city lights
as souls.
Do not die out, do not die out,
I cry into the night.
My breath I lift up
as incense to the Sky.
I pray for flickers
that are not consumed.
I ask for less stars
in the heavenlies
and more hopeful
ones in the Metro.
I poke at Venus now.
I tell her:
Dispense your warmth.
Let it glow within us.
She is beauty
but she mocks.


050220

I am futile.
My words are futile.
I am little.
My words are little.
That's inappropriate,
I know.
The same way
no word
(or verse)
is appropriate enough
to describe
You.