#filipino poets

when you asked me back
i thought this time
wecould be better

but what i failed to remember
was how we fell apart
in the first place.

and this time, was no different
we fell, and then again,
once more, we fell apart.

it was a love revived
just so it could die a final death
the second time around.

when art was supposed to mean freedom,
you wore it on your wrist like shackles.
writing with the burden of metal weighing you down;
making a bloody mess out of a clean slate.

when art was supposed to be spontaneous,
you chained your legs on time-ticking bombs.
forcing emotions out of your hollow chest;
breaking your insides, but defusing the blow.

when art was supposed to make you feel alive,
you drained yourself of chasing after endless lines.
exceeding limits, cracking bones, straining souls.
enslaving your body to your own work of art;
master it! and turn it into a glaring masterpiece.

it’s not right for you to be just fallen in love with. i will take the whole damn gravity out of the equation if it means i can love you without ever falling out. without limits. without spaces. without ever reaching the ground.

it’s not right to just say i love you in words. i will spell it in constellations. i will carve it in gold. i will drip it in blood. i will sing it even if my lungs give out. and i will never tire of telling you the depth of my love for you, even if it’s the last of my breath. i promise.

it’s not right for you to settle less than what you deserve. i can’t give you the world but i can give you my life. i can give you other people’s lives. i will die in a heartbeat for you. i will kill for you. i’m a slave at your disposal. make me a criminal. make me yours. i will do everything and i will follow you to the edge of the earth or to the bottom of it; to hell, fuck it. i’ll follow you still. if you will have me.

how have revolutions
been merely reduced
from strongly taking a stand
to suddenly standing on our own graves?

how have we been silenced
by the very set of people
whose only duties were supposed to be
making the voices of the masses heard?

how are we to fight back
as a patronizing nation
if our very own opressor
is the one seated in power?

how are we to turn this around?
if in breaking the wheel of the tyrants,
the power must lie within the people.

but the people doesn’t know;
and the people refuses to see
that every revolution has begun
with the people’s plea.

it’s getting harder for me to only touch the tip of your fingers when all i want is to hold your hand and to pull you in closer to my skin. it’s harder especially when you’re this close, moving towards me, at a pace a little too fast for my breath to catch up on. my thoughts, that are forbidden to ever even reach the tip of my tongue, are getting harder to supress. especially when you speak first, about art and the future, with a gentleness in your voice that sounds a little too sweet for my ears to stifle.

you’re making it harder for me not to fall for you love, because how am i to do that when you’re this close? when i can see you this close, in macro lenses, in all of your imperfect glory. how am i to ever get enough of you when i could just reach you if i tried? and lord knows how much i’m clenching my fists to stop myself from ever even trying.

must blood water the streets first
before you draw open the curtains
to the roaring commotion of the people
beneath the tall glass windows?

must the sky ooze red
from the loss of so much innocence
and must the thunders howl
the painful screams of the slain poor
before the cold harsh winds of truth
force its way into the tall glass windows
of you, privileged few?

need a hurricane shatter your fragile ideals
so you can smell the reek of death and utter decay?
need a storm flood your sheltered morals
so you can feel entrapped in the jaws of your own cruelty?

for although you can run, you cannot outrun
the blood that has been left dry on your tender hands
the night you closed your gates and went to sleep
while the streets fought to keep its eyes open.