Let us meet…

…in her room- the forsaken, darkest room I have ever been in my whole life.

At the place where our worlds collide, where we could finally understand each other after months of throwing punches. The bruises, bruises and scars I have got from those fights. It was endless and nobody raises the white flag yet until now. You will hear me say that it’s all fine.  This rendevous would be short-lived, I reassured you. Like a lighted match extinguishing itself after seconds of lighting it up.
    Let us meet wearing our work clothes. The dirt from the outside dimension still clings on the corners of our clavicles. Let us meet even if I could still smell myself bearing the rancid scent of antibiotics and isopropyl alcohol. Your breath smelled like blueberry fields from all the artificial smoke you were inhaling. You still smelled the same- you smelled like you. How I wish you were still the same to my eyes because you secretly died and the cemetery is my mind.

  You probably didn’t know I had a new tattoo on my inner arm. You didn’t know I lost tremendous amount of weight. Heck, I didn’t even  know you still wear the shirt I gave you before I left. We are once again strangers sharing the same bed for a short while. 

  I asked myself if I still loved you. In all honesty, all those butterflies died a long time ago. I don’t feel what I felt the first time we shared a room. Love? I don’t want to feel love anymore. I probably don’t deserve it, you are probably not worthy of my time anymore. 

 I don’t even care if you touched other woman. All I need is the temporary adrenaline. When all of this is over, I will go home and will forget I ever knew you again. 

  We’re the only ones who knew we meet. What scandal it would be if anybody knew we are meeting at Sofia’s place. She didn’t even know, nobody knows. Nobody will know.

You’re The Flag of China…

… when I thought you’re just the flag of Japan.

I should’ve noticed all the jeopardy that would come my way; I should have not let you in my life.

All these years, I have helped you. My piffle mind self-incinerated itself because of you but I managed to wake up and survive… barely.

I succumb to episodes and bouts of death, pitying myself and living with sadness every waking day. I couldn’t even lift my feet from my slumber; I often told you I was exhausted, you ignored it. I am deeply sorry if I didn’t make yourself heard or seen because all that was in front of me was darkness, like swimming in a dark, deep abyss of loneliness that all of my energy was focused on me, myself, and I.

I couldn’t blame you, I wouldn’t blame you if you left. But you shouldn’t blame me either if I begged and cried because I was saving what was good that was left. I endured all the harsh words, all the disgusting things you have told me to salvage everything- to save us. During the denouement, it was my last energy. I broke down and wanted to jump from the 3rd floor of the very building I was working because I had no hope, my lifeline left me broken and torn into pieces. My head couldn’t digest the fact that a flawed human could tolerate himself finding another lover in just a day of wanting space. You should have told me you wanted the galaxy instead of space because the gap between us now is astoundingly panoramic, nothing can reach the you to me… not even a space shuttle can do that.

I previously loved every piece of you- your hair, your lips, your voice. I could still remember the pieces of whites you have on your hair, like a firework in a dark, starless night. Your broad back which I loved the most when you hugged me. That hug was all that I needed when I was having a bad day. Now, all that you have left me is the stale bitterness of anger and revenge hanging inside my mouth that I wanted to spit out but I can’t. I wanted to remember all the good days but you made me mad like a rabig dog salivating for revenge.

I told you not to hold grudges against the world, I taught you how to forgive. Meanwhile, you taught me how to hold on to madness to survive.

You made me mad but that’s how love’s supposed to be. Maybe on the other side of the moon, in the alternate universe, there is you and me that works but I hope there’s no other you and me anymore. We are the glitch of the system, the by-product of trauma.

I still cry all the time, each night I go to slumber when I happen to think of you. Last time, it was because of sadness. Now, it’s because of uttermost anger that I couldn’t project.

“Que sera, sera”

Whatever will be, will be.

Evermind

I still write about trivial things, the peculiar ones especially. One thing’s for sure: I don’t write when I feel elated. I must be devastated as hell.

Evermind, evermind- my simbelmyn̈e.

Ever wondered why flowers grow on tombs? Do they grow there because of the abundance of vital things they need? Or do they grow there to feed on the memories of the dead?

Simbelmyn̈e, simbelmyn̈e.

All of the memories you left, I’m still watering them, letting them take over my room.

They crawl- the vines creep against the walls of my very room. Dehydrating and drinking the moisture from the concrete. My sorry self is very much aware that the walls of my room will soon crumble as the twines devour the entirety of the cement palisade but I am too pre- occupied, entertaining your ghost.

The snowy colored blossoms dangling from each vine die each time I try to disregard them but they bloom too fast that if it happens that they will imbibe even just a single tear from the orifice of my tear duct, they will flourish.

Alas! The reason you cannot die lies within me, under my very nose literally.

My heart, my mind is a simbelmyn̈e– feeding upon the dead, the rotten leftovers. Enjoying tombs, the skeletons of the past.

You cannot die, you will never die. As long as somebody preys upon your bequeathal, as long as someone is still tending the memories you have left behind.

Simbelmyn̈e, simbelmyn̈e, evermind.

Oblivion

I could build a whole museum full of pictures of you when I didn’t even have a single photo of me saved in your phone gallery.

I could build a library full of poetry pieces about you when you barely even talk to me about your feelings.

Oblivion. Did your foggy brain forget me too? The unappreciated, the undervalued?

My name scribbled upon the insides of your fourth finger faded. Did you fade along with it too?

My therapist told me that my amygdala- the tiny vessel in my brain which holds the miniscule butterflies responsible for my feelings, needed to be watered because mine is so arrid, the desert will be jealous. But how can I revive it if you kept on starving me for the love I needed?

Oblivion. Did you forget all I did for you?

Oblivion. Did you forget I have feelings, too?

Oblivion. Forget the old me. Forget me. Forget.

I remember the time that we first kissed…

… under the starless city skies of New York; drank two bottles of Sapporo and probably smoked one or too many packs of Marlboro. It was a year ago but your umbrageous face behind the smoke was hovering in the spaces of my memories too vividly. We ended up in an empty parking lot talking about trivial things that was currently happening to our lives that time. The breeze was freezing but our lonely hearts kept us warm; our burning cigarette sticks kept us fuzzy. But as the smoke dissipate, you slowly evaporated in my life, too. I wonder where you went.

Five hundred sixty days later, I am still here; longing to see your vague silhouette again; longing to see you again. I heard you moved out of your murky apartment. I also heard you went to another country. All honesty, I don’t have any idea where you in the world you are right now. 
You were the moon, I am the sun. The moment I rise up, you disappear. We will never, ever, meet again.

“I’m sorry, I must’ve been mistaken you for someone else…”

‘Lo and behold the time that I first met you. You were the vast moonless sky, thirsty for some moonlight. I met you at the corner of the pavement between forgotten streets where strangers meet and lovers leave. You were blowing gray smoke wearing charcoal band shirt and jeans. You were striking, quite familiar actually. In the deepest parts of my amygdala, a feeling of nostalgia kept on running inside my skull; Like a previous love that was never mine. When we were slowly approaching each other, our eyes met; Our souls melted together. My blabbermouth accidentally uttered: “I’m sorry. Have we met before?” Hopeful that I could get a positive response. 

“I’m sorry but I don’t remember  you.” You quickly responded.

“Oh.” I gulped. ” I’m sorry. I must’ve mistaken you for someone else.”

That encounter created a spark and started a fire between two lost souls seeking for comfort in the middle of nowhere. Soon, the fire started spreading everywhere, warming my cold, steel heart. That fire was uncontrollable, burning anything at stake. Although it was good at the start, it was slowly turning into a fiery chasm, devouring me and my sane being. It was not long until the fire was extinguished; Ending everything in fragile ashes. 

One year later, I saw you again at the same pavement; In the same month; during the same time. I could no longer call you my love. Maybe I was right at first- you will be forever the love that was, is, and never will be mine. 

Our eyes met but our soul were repelling from each other. Your gray smoke escaped from your mouth, along with your sighs. I smiled sheepishly. Your quick response was “Hey.” Your eyes were blank, not the eyes that I knew before. 

“You look familiar, have I met you before?” I said wrinkling my forehead. That was intentionally said with a little bit of sarcasm. 

With a soft smirk, I added. “I’m sorry. I must’ve been mistaken you for someone else.”

Through the haziness of the room…

… saturated with lavender scented smoke suspended through the thin air, I looked into your eyes and wondered why everyday I wake up beside you everything is slowly turning into a 1960’s movie.
Monochrome.
Black and white.
Your presence leaves a tar and cotton colored residue in between the spaces of my freshly washed comforter each time you leave my bed. I peacefully followed your trails with my eyes as you head to the bathroom carrying your two month old toothbrush you bought from a random convenient store on your way home. The sound of the water splashing against the tiled walls made my heart and soul sulk, reminding me about the fact that you’re leaving me again.
Coming back after a week.
No assurance that you will.
My body summons the past-night-shenanigans tremors, forbidding me to move an inch from the bed that I am laying in. You went out of the bathroom like a soaked fluffy toy bearing a sly face that you always do whenever you leave. You gracefully tiptoe like the ballet man that you are across the room to open the closet and change into your go-to clothes.
Spray your Jo Malone Orange Blossom perfume.
Sit upon the mini sofa.
Wait for your bleached blonde hair to dry.
“Please don’t leave. Can you stay for a couple more days?”
“Darling, I can’t. I will come back to you, I promise.” You look down and pat a clean towel against your feet.
I understand, I completely do. My heart crumples as you look at me with scrunched nose, trying to hold back the tears you have been depositing in the back of your sclera for a long, long time.
Wanting to stay.
Wanting to stop the ticking of my old desktop clock.
After minutes, alas. You stood up, slowly shoved the blue tinted curtain aside to open my windows. You always told me to open them every morning to let my room breath. Yes, you better do because your scent circulates around the room and I can’t bare it. It feels like I will still breath your being even though your physical self is not around anymore. You meticulously check your bag one last time, pretending to arrange your already neat bag just to buy another minute.
“I guess I’ll go. I’m late for my flight.”
“Yeah.”
You begin approaching me to kiss my forehead, my cheek, my lips. You kiss me one last time as the taxi cab that was supposed to get you to the airport honk repeatedly. Frustratingly, you let go of a subtle “tch” between your breaths.
“Please wait for me. I will come back.”
“Yeah…”

Who would have thought…

… that my ill-fated, forsaken Bonnie self finally found my long time missing Clyde after lurking under my nose for years… and years?
Who would have thought that a simple greeting could change everything that was in between the two old acquaintances? After going home late from the bar, drinking several vodka shots, and kissing each other goodbye, we often ask ourselves where have we been throughout these lonely painstaking years. Honestly and seriously… did fate intentionally played the both of us by traumatizing the fuck out of our emotions and involving us to people who would eventually end up being strangers to us again?
Fate. That’s it. I have no other words for this unexpected union between two lost people. Fate- the foolish unwinding but never breaking red string tangled up and I pray and swear to the vast heavens above me that this would be the last one.  Screw Romeo and Juliet; they got nothing from this peculiar love story.
Baby… I never wrote a happy poetry piece ever in my life but ever since you came, my brain keeps on thinking happy thoughts and keeps on screaming that I needed to write before I go crazy from this overwhelming mix of emotions hiding between the bones of my ribcage. You’re my miracle; an oasis in the middle of a desert. You’re the flower that blooms in my dreams, my dear Smeraldo. I can never imagine my life without spending my late Friday nights without you; never in the deepest parts of my amygdala would have wished that we remained acquaintances after we talked and talked over cheap sticks of cigarette watching the sun goes down at 6pm.
My love, I hope you’re happy as I am right now. Thank you for arriving into my life in such a bizarre time of the year.

 

When will My Summers End?

January 27, 2018
5:24 am

Approximately twenty four minutes after five in the morning, here I am still awake. I took a night bath, cleaned my room, did my nightly skin routine, and dimmed the lights at eleven in the evening but look who’s wide awake and drowning herself from the darkness? Yes, it’s me. The mighty queen of the insomniacs: Rinzeki. Well, that should be a good epitaph when I die.
Elders always say that if you can’t sleep at night, you might be in love or at least thinking of somebody special to you. In my case, I clearly don’t think about anything else before I sleep but the future. I lie there like an idiot, holding my phone, and reading some unnecessary fanfiction/flashfiction/ drabble for 5 hours but none of them penetrates in my imaginations. I have been a huge procrastinating machine this whole time and no matter how I wanted to do something I usually loved to do (like street photography, writing poetry, roaming around the suburbs) I always say alibis to myself. For example, my laundry has been sitting inside my room for 3 days now. If those were allowed to talk, they’d be complaining to me and would tell me that they wanted to move out and find someone who could actually fold them nicely after drying them up. In addition to that, I am frequently seeing my friends now having their dream jobs while me… I’m just here swooning over seven Korean men and ignoring the two job offerings I had. The jobs were wonderful but of course, the idiot me refused to work in Manila because I don’t want to rent a room and spend another buck for staying there.
Jokes aside, I’m actually loving my current routine everyday: wake up, clean my room, do laundry, eat breakfast, take a bath, read books, try doing poetry which would eventually fail, blame myself for having an IQ of a rat, cry over a Korean man whom will never notice me, do 10 rounds of jogging, repeat. Okay, that was sarcastic but I’m actually getting used to it.
Can I also vent how much I hated seeing couples these days? Not to be that kind of a bitch but please for goodness sake, don’t come near me you dirty people. I suck at love, I would never be good at it and I don’t think that will ever change. Look, I lost three wonderful guys in my life and all of them eventually became Summer Finn. If you don’t know Summer Finn, she’s the girl in the “500 Days of Summer” and ever since I watched that movie, my love life has been shitty. In the story, she just had a short love affair to Tom (who was a big asshole to me, by the way) and left him out of the blue. After that, she became engaged to someone else and never told Tom. Just look it up because I am currently wasting my time explaining a damn movie in my poetry but it actually feels good because I am guessing that this would be the longest poetry piece that I will make.
Anyways, where was I? Oh, goodness! It was the Summer Finn thing! The three boys became Summer Finn and I remained as a foolish Tom Hansen- the alcoholic, depressed, self loathing Tom Hansen. As I am writing this, I am thinking… when will my summers end? When can I actually live my life properly as an adult? Sometimes, I wished I didn’t grow up because being an adult hurts so much. A piece of advice to young teens/college students who are currently reading this, please don’t be excited to graduate and be an adult. You’ll be regretting it later.
Well, too much for a 5 am thought. The sun is currently peeking from my windowsill and that`s the signal that I should get some sleep and think about other things than my future and boys… boys. Ha, boys.
When will my summers end? I wonder…
But what if it will never end and my autumn is apparently just a speck of dust, a fragment of my imaginations? What if my autumn will never come?

At that place…

…in between Morayta and Recto will forever be inscribed in the deepest part of my brain, in the depths of my memory.
I couldn’t wait for the time that my thumbprints on the metal pole of LRT line 1 will disappear like a mere bubble just like you did. I couldn’t wait, I couldn’t wait.
Months and months have passed, all the thoughts of writing about you that has been bottled up inside my chest finally exploded all over the place. In all honesty, I couldn’t even write about you for the following reasons. 1.) Each time I think about you, I felt like I was a foolish person falling from the tallest building I saw while I was walking in Taguig; like those people who read fiction in the noisiest corners of Santa Mesa. Each time I think about you, it seems like all the words that I have been saving up in my vocabulary would always, always fly out of my petty head. For that, I apologize because I knew I promised to write something about you. I just simply couldn’t. 2.) You were the perfect inspiration for people who had a “the one that got away”… literally. For that reason, I didn’t want to believe that you were because I am a person who doesn’t believe in trivial things like that. I honestly do believe that everybody you meet in your life would eventually become  your the-one-that-got-away because that’s what people who are too good to be true are like- they meet you, you meet them; they leave and it’s the end of the story. And; 3.) It’s hard to make a poetry out of a poet like you. Your mere presence always shouts dark poetry and I always write about it but when it comes to you, I am and forever will be dumbfounded.
It has been a long time, my lost light. You didn’t have to come back and tell me that you dreamed about me. It hurts the tendons inside my heart; it hurts the memories that I had from the streets of Sampaloc. Everytime I see the mighty arch of Mendiola, I also see you. The other half of me wishes that Manila can just go burn itself into ashes because Manila reminds me of you.
I am writing this at 3 am in a plain white sheet of bond paper using the pen I bought back in Quiapo, summoning my long time running insomnia. This is the last time that I will ever think about you; treat this as a moving on letter.
So long, Manila boy. We’ll meet each other again soon but I guarantee you that I will not be the same goody-goody girl.

-Rinzeki