We give too much
You and me
And lose ourselves
In the service of others.
We give everyone
A piece of our hearts
Leaving us an empty shell,
Where loneliness kills us slowly
And no one can tell.

another january rain above us,
same month, same city, same conflict,
a different ‘you’ in my poems.

i wonder what you really felt
when you slung my arm over yours,
when you relentlessly chased my hand,
those hard, seasoned fingers on mine.

i try to fight you off, but i wind up
linking our arms in a chain,
rubbing your back until i’m sore,
hearing you ramble in that car ride,
as you asked about my bruises and
searched for my hand before i cut you off,
knowing we cannot be more than this,
at least not now.

that night
when the sky sobbed watching us,
i wished you were drunk every day
and regretted that i was completely sober.

I feel loved
When a handshake
Somehow turned into a hug

I feel loved
When we talk over
Coffee and massages

I feel loved
When we put our warm hands
On each other’s arms and backs

I feel loved
When this nightmare looms,
But we have found a place to say
“Welcome home”.

We sat on the stairs and watched it all,
Our own personal illegal space.
Slow, mellow strums, our hearts beat
Silently, curbing words we’ll never say.

Our cameras stared and captured it all,
The stage from the same ledge, same lens,
You left first because I couldn't speak your tense.

you and i are just like mirrors of each other,
or like two parallel lines that run together that never intersect.

we are both lights. we are too bright.
that is why we are not made for each other.

we are made for the darkness.
we are chained to pain and heaven has clipped our wings.

now it is your turn to be wrapped in shadows,
and all i can do is hold your hand,
saying all the things you wished to hear,
cautiously calling out your name,
hoping that you can hear me from the depths of your abyss…

I'm retracing the steps you once took,
The remnant of sepia shadows that was once here,
To understand what this art really means to you.

In front of me, a random grass patch where you once lay
Now lies abandoned for puppies to roll and tourists to pose
I am sitting here seven years too late,
Born too late to meet him, who now sleeps in the soil,
But not too late to breathe the same air as you.

So let’s dance and create our own footprints,
I promise I'll immortalize our shadows,
Engrave your words in my heart,
Etch your name like these memorials on the stone.

Now that I'm here, I promise you that
Nothing shall be erased by the wind,
Nobody will say that “it is forgotten”.

All magic disappears
When the truth settles in
I dreamt of something fleeting
But forgot it shattered a long time ago.

I can see it in your gray eyes that we are not the same,
You have heavier steps, darker shadows, a sadder smile,
While I am benched on the sidelines, a few years too late,
And a billion lightyears away.