Vigil

On a white bed, someone is sleeping dear

deep to a dreamland of no return but only

strangers and lovers peering translucent

appearing sad as if they were caged

 

by someone whose scythe has killed

and slit the necks of flowers too eager.

And push them into garland and vases

as if sudden death is a beautiful thing.

 

And  the twin blood-red moon gave birth-

two distant runners racing past each other

galloping silken terrain but their footsteps

leave no traces- only their colorless ordeal.

 

They call them tears.

 

Like lamentations of loss, a dirge, a song

wailed and escaped through cracks

and crevices of consciousness. A proof

that breath is extinguished like candles.

 

Whose spirit wafts the room to shake

and pound the doors with its fists

while the priest can no longer hear

the trite confessions of a sinner.

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Push

Why flipping a page from the book  is necessary

to pass time and you know that the hands of the clock

won’t turn back the hours that have been.

And you sit there on a corner

endlessly stare in silence,

writhing in the cold naked

without a soul breathing-

you shut them out of your world.

 

Why talking within your mind in monologues nags you

with guilt as if your life is a mess and you are helpless

about the future and guessing how it will ever end.

And nobody knows that there is a deep cavern

that you can’t escape. While you live the days

carrying the weight of an imaginary prison-

you wish that death is the only freedom.

 

Why people come and go as soon as the door opens

and later you close them. Never wanting them to stay

nor understand you like you always did before.

You said they deserve to be happy with the ones

who can fulfill their happiness and you are sorry-

that you are not going to be the person

who can be able to give the expectation.

 

Why does sleep won’t come as peacefully

like words that overflowed within you but won’t be heard

and you think that anyone would not be ready

to listen to any of it. Because they will feel the

vastness of the deep ocean and they can get drown

and won’t survive alive. And even they-  will feel

the same death that you have wished for yourself.

 

Why darkness is a fearful thing and yet you thrive in it

as if you allowed atonement for something or for someone

you have failed in the process. And honesty is priceless

but you keep on hiding that sad face within a mask

and wishing that this masquerade won’t last.

You go home alone again in the knowing

that you have not pretended to be accepted

for who you are. That is. Liars will go to hell.

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For The Ones We Left Behind

Think about the pen and the fingerprints

romancing in the glistening dust against the sunlight.

The faded photographs with watermarks

of remembrances salvaged from the past.

Brittle to touch and slowly turning to ashes.

 

Think about the bookmarks of dried rose petals

and the faint smell imprinted to the pages,

rescued from the years of forgetting the ones

that mattered most. And the dreams that never

meant to be owned like the earth where I stand.

 

If the promise of coming back becomes a distant memory-

counting each sunrises and every new moons. Let hope

travel its feet while I sit beside by the window waiting.

For innocence will turn my graying hairs to white

and youth will leave me like the wilted leaves of autumn.

 

The season changes and they say time heals every wound.

But the scars of our love-thorned lives remains relived

in our book of days. I wish the summer winds will carry

the ashes until forgetting. I wish sleep will banish the things

which I failed to tell you when you left me. I moved on.

 

I have written letters with the pen until it dried out of ink

I have recorded our memories for fear that it will be lost too.

And my waning mind gave birth to words I have bookmarked

with fresh flowers that blooms from the same earth I will lay

with my dreams. I am not afraid anymore of the longest night

 

until tomorrow.

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Come

You see, light can be a scary thing.

 

It reveals something you won’t confront

by the mirror. You won’t by your shadows.

This ceiling, will you know how far

I have travelled without moving?

Beyond which my eyes can see.

The mind wanders alone. Come

closer by my bedside.

I’ll whisper something, a story.

Like a baby crying at mother’s

giving birth. Hear the sound

of the first rain after a drought

and how it falls on the parched

earth. A seed hibernates too long

through the darkness, alive.

Set free with its fragile arms

embracing the sky.

 

Will you tell me the truth?

Have you seen the surging ocean

drowning you out of the blue.

Have you felt something taking

root beneath you, peace.

Lullabye of the mermaid

lulling you to sleep

and believe in love

like the shooting stars.

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The Story

Don’t upset the mainstream, he’d say.

Art for art’s sake, I think out loud.

 

Unless I end up whoring

at the art house

with rusted springs

at cushioned seat poking

scooped up gossips.

Eavesdropping 

some private lives.

 

I let his copulation of idea

with tried and tested formula

stink like the stench of urine

of those who had chewed

and vomited yesterday’s

mulch of cinematic nostalgia.

 

And feces too. And fetuses

aborted prematurely

at the conference table.

That goddamn scriptwriter!

 

He wants a Truman show

for peeping Toms’ and Marilyns’

who think life can fit in a box. Squared

wrapped in a gift, 24/7 in public

with the world half sleeping

and half awake. Eyes wide shut.

 

Well, everybody wants to be

porn stars. And millionaires too.

Sixty seconds to fame. Or shame.

 

I twist fate and turn some coincidence.

Making them laugh. Making them cry.

People love some happy ending

but of course, I knew the bitter score.

I’ll reveal on a one-on-one interview.

 

Facts gyrate around a pole dance.

Truth hides in darkness, so dim the lights.

 

I clip a scene here and there,

sanitized some bits

like clean sequences of plot

I trim into fairytales-

reality cloaked in dreams.

 

Then, there’s the director’s cut.

I have hidden something

here in a draft, unpublished.

I create an imaginary character

of the self I would never be.

I plagiarize someone else’s life.

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Weather’s To Blame

It won’t be as black

as my umbrella I forgot

the weather I carried around me.

My eye bags were  like cumulus cloud

hanging low, grey and heavy

moving slow hovering thoughts

you won’t know what I am trying

to get over underneath. I expect

 

rain showers drop down its pellets.

And the prevailing wind will keep

nagging my peace of thunderstorms

and lightning, intermittently

piercing montages of grief

into the continuity of my sleep.

 

I had lost track where the wind vane

points a direction towards depression.

I forgot how to regulate the flow

of the emotional flash flood I contain.

And here I am with my lonely forecasts.

The weather disturbance I blame

when the sun won’t smile up

on me, again.

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Vacuum

This man’s bohemian

and the weird symphonies-

the whining of fan blades;

the sharp screams of children

vibrating on the window pane;

and the crackling sound of

my bones tired of standing up,

shuffling back and forth

turning to see the bed

tempting me to lay down,

get lazy and do nothing.

 

And the sight of garbage can

nudging me about the litter

which keeps on piling up

and the sink flowing over

of soiled dishes. The hour

and the minute hand,

my body clock’s monotony

winding around the disc.

I wait and wait

when the light changes

from blue to augur yellow.

My head’s been heavy

and sleep won’t come.

 

It feels strange. Someone

speaks in a muffled voice

and you float being chased

around in dreams. Awake,

its bitter after-taste linger,

through the drab grey day.

The eerie whisper of shadows

on the white-washed wall

bouncing like myriad echoes

slower than the speed of sound.

And I can see vague visions-

on this mind’s glass screen

etching tattoos bleeds

the insomniac in me.

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