Poems - Cristian's Café

You’re the first person I thought of

“You’re the first person I thought of”

is generally the type of plaudit I’d hope to hear after phrases like:

“funniest person ever,”

“most creative individual you know,”

I’ve spent an embarrassing amount of time woolgathering — daydreaming over would-be encomiums about who I wish to become someday. I didn’t wish those words to be used in grief. Didn’t want someone to think of me when someone died.

Luckily, by the mercy of a god somewhere, I wasn’t uniquely tied to the tragic incident itself. Even though it wasn’t me, I still feel the weight of the world spinning forward. I feel like those beasts tied down to a tree that suddenly get yanked back when they stray beyond the limits of their rope — I am stricken by this immortalization of time that is a mammoth-sized portion of me.

I find myself adjusting the language about what happened. I am being gentle with myself in ways I didn’t know I could,whispering to myself,

“Who reminds you of those sunsets God seemed to spend extra brushstrokes on?”

“It’s OK, Cris.” (Only she’d call me Cris – it seems like a natural nickname, but I am not Cris to anyone. No one calls me Cris. She did. Nancy called me Cris.)

Looking at the ground and telling her about my day — really telling her. At times I catch myself almost responding for her. The phraseology is ever evolving. I am – with letters & words – coming to terms by customizing the convoluted emotions surrounding it. Like, sometimes I’ll warmly describe a gilded stairway with this blinding pure light leading into Elysium.

Where she’s gently taken by hand. Winged seraphs assisting her in a peaceful transfer — she’s smiling back at me. In other variations, teeth grinding, the whites of my eyes stained in scarlet. Throbbing in anger. Hands pallid white because the fist I make drains them of blood. Followed by a stern

“I WAS ROBBED.”

If you’ve ever been mugged before, the feeling that comes with it is startling. Choosing between something of intrinsic value and what may possibly be your life may seem elementary, but hanging in the outskirts of that choice comes with a flurry of emotions in the briefest of moments. I know what it is to have a gun pointed at me. No matter who’s wielding it, or how far from you they are, it feels as if they have this starving impetus in their hands. The sound it makes is crushing, defeating, pusillanimous. When it is over you will go through a period of questioning; what I call the “what if” trials. These trials are vexatious, as they are guilt shaming. As humans, we’re hardwired to revisit things that didn’t go in our favor and use hindsight to further dampen the already fragile version of ourselves that has gone through this trauma. That is how I feel about mental illness: mental illness is a bad guy, for all intents and purposes. Anyone who has ever held a gun at me was a guy, except for this one police officer who was actually a woman, but resembled a guy. So, in this story a mental illness is a he. Mental illness marks down the criteria of a typical mugger: he comes around when you least expect it, takes something from you suddenly, doesn’t announce himself, leaves you questioning “why me?” You soon become a champion for the less fortunate, advocate for gun control, a patron for the feeling of freedom, indemnity and providence. You may even take some self defense classes, arm your keychain with pepper spray, equip your home with motion detecting cameras. However you choose to respond, there’s action to be taken . What’s so puzzling about this is that I wasn’t typically robbed – there wasn’t something of intrinsic value aimed for in this invasion. Yet I do feel like someone is holding a gun to my head, though of course nobody is. I want to do something about it, but what can I do? There is nothing to be (properly) furious about. Does this stopping me from being furious? Absolutely not. I am seething.

After the “what if” stage comes the finger pointing stage, where you search for who to blame. The only reasonable thing to do after contemplating the trillion reasons of your unreasonable what ifs would be to point fingers. This is parallel to becoming the reformist for gun safety. So if you were robbed after your subway stop, you would call for more security at subway stop x, y, z. The lack of security was to blame, you think, so you point the finger. Of course, these fingers may very well point towards yourself, but (spoiler alert) everything traumatic or “bad” that happens to you isn’t your fault – we have to accept that things just happen because they do. While you may have been the target, or important, it isn’t because of you. You just happened to be at the right spot at the wrong time, or in Nancy’s life at one time. Inversely, acceptance is exigent as it is something I’m avoidant towards. I feel these rules are conditional, as if I’m still being held at gunpoint. That’s what he is doing to me. I also struggle with mental illness, so to accept what has happened is unnerving. It is as much a wake up call as it is an agonizing truth, tormenting gospel, a song that is contingent upon whatever exact stage of grief and trauma I am floating towards. To tell you the truth, I hate this. Every day is a home invasion. Every day I suffocate. Every day I relive this trauma.

On my nightstand, there’s a book about trauma. It talks about how trauma lives in the body. It takes refuge, and the means of escape is blocked off, it becomes trapped in there until you do something about it. It isn’t two meditation sessions, drinking water in the morning and monthly sermons. It is a lifelong commitment of interventions, hard truths and healthy routines that carve a path for this poison to leave the body. I feel robbed because I was held down and forced to accept it. Mental illness has robbed me of so many good moments, and painted the pictures in my head with clumped up, gray blobs of nothingness, used its serpent tongue to sputter acid on my canvas, set my garden ablaze. He has robbed me, and many others, I want the reader to understand that this is painful. They are picking up pieces of my diamond-studded heart and walking out the fucking door. This is a daily occurrence. I’m being robbed as I’m writing this.

It doesn’t stop.

I feel like a part of me is rotting. What’s the medical term for when I grab my lower abdomen and check if there’s a gaping hole through my body? There is a black-hole mass taking over me like a cancer. I am sure of it. Whenever I scream I feel things escaping me. I scream ‘why’ until my ears ring and the room world gets put on mute. When I get like this I’d rather be sedated. I fucking hate this godamn feeling.

Occasionally, I’m poetic with the way that I express this feeling, reciting Warm Summer Sun by Mark Twain.

Warm summer sun,

Shine kindly here,

Warm southern wind,

Blow softly here.

Green sod above,

Lie light, lie light.

Good night, dear heart,

Good night, good night.

“She passed” is another one I use. It has such a gentle ring to it, but the truth remains–

I am in denial. I wake up from dreams nightmares where she texts me “just kidding.” She wants to meet somewhere to explain everything. I am happy she’s alive, but I am fucking furious because she made me feel this unbearable pain. I wake up around 3:39 AM with my heart spilling out of my chest, checking my phone only to find that my brain is doing its thing again.

“I didn’t want to wake up. I was having a much better time asleep. And that’s really sad. It was almost like a reverse nightmare, like when you wake up from a nightmare you’re so relieved. I woke up into a nightmare.”
― Ned Vizzini, It’s Kind of a Funny Story

Slowly falling asleep amidst scream-cries (sometimes my neighbors check on me) and my pillow soaked in my own sadness. Three nights in a row now – it currently occupies one of the top three feelings I don’t want anyone else to ever feel in this life, or the next.

———————————————

“She succumbed to mental illness.”

I use this in a variety of languages because I think it is doing the most to raise desperately needed awareness. Someone once told me taking your own life isn’t a commitment you make –you don’t commit suicide, you are a victim of suicide. Suicide is what happens at the end of mental illness if you succumb to it. If it engulfs you. Same way cancer shuts your body down. It’s the same fucking thing. The same way COVID draws your last breath. This is how I interpret it. This is what brings me solace. I will continue to script it like this until the language changes. Until the stigma dwindles into nothing. I need to. You don’t just commit to things like that.

“She’s not with us anymore.”

I use this as a way to end whatever I’m saying. It is not my duty to inform anyone of anything at any time. It is something I do on my own accord. If I want to explain, I will. And if I elect not to, then that should be respected.

The day I found out, it had been a week since it happened. I had lived an entire week without knowing anything at all. On the day of, I searched on what happened. I was told what happened. I read a shoddy-looking news article on facebook that told me the details of the suicide. I gloss entirely over the article if I happen to see it, as if I’m ignoring it altogether. Einstein once said he isn’t smarter than the average person, he is simply more curious. It wasn’t his intelligence, more precisely a relentless intent to know why.

Admittedly, I read the facebook comments on the post itself.

Things like “this is what young hollywood does” even in the warmest intention seemed callous, at the very fucking least. At the worst it seemed sickening. I felt the powder of my teeth when I clenched my jaw reading that.

It was just a sea of “rest in peace” and “oh wow, I loved her in (insert show/series here)”. I don’t know what changed, but for the first time my curiosity had hit a wall. I wasn’t eager for information. I was analyzing. For years I’ve been extremely careful on how I ‘offer condolences’. I don’t offer condolences – I offer delicately selected words and honest vulnerability. I want to relay a feeling of intent so honest that the person grieving feels at least a fractional share of support.

I wanted answers on why. I wanted strangers’ perspectives to fill the void. But, I didn’t get that. I got an ocean of what seemed like butter-knife dullness and quizzical tone-deaf monologue. I calmed an overwhelming urge to yell at everybody on the post. I didn’t even fucking know if the post was true or not. I wanted to hurt people’s feelings. I wanted it taken down — to have everybody’s recollection of even reading it wiped from their memories.

I remember a lot of times where I’d cradle her in my arms – almost like a baby. She’d let me, and I wanted to. I didn’t feel forced or awkward – I felt needed and at the same time I wanted to be there. Where she would be vulnerable, and I was willing to listen and selectably safeguard. She’d tell me things and panic, I’d tell her “It’s ok, I’m here, don’t worry.”

We’d both cry.

We’d both fall asleep crying.

I wanted, now, to protect her even if she wasn’t in my arms.

I started a new job last week, to end what has been a tumultuous last year of being in between jobs and having a head injury that no one seems to understand how it’s affecting me. It has been (to say the very fucking least) extremely difficult. Furthermore, starting this new job has been hard. I would have to set aside time for my grieving. Siri, set an alarm for 8:30 labeled grieving, then another alarm for 9 labeled tea time. The world is veering forward. It doesn’t fucking stop. At the time of this writing the planet has moved 444,939 miles. That is length of Earth all around almost nineteen times.

Since then, there has been half a million miles of space travel. The length of twenty Earths have passed. Time isn’t stopping – time isn’t grieving or having moments of silence – and that is fucking scary. Things are still burning, hearts are still breaking. New events keep happening; good, happenstance, tragic events too. There’s an irrepressible buoyancy that exists; we hostage to it. At least I am. I am witnessing events unfolding; events I have to adapt to. I am meeting new people, doing new things. My life is literally traveling past a certain point in time.

——-

To this point, every person I’ve ever met had at least one connection of degree to Nancy. Now, they don’t. At best they’ll have me tell them memories, flaunt pictures, read badly chronicled poetry of what happened between us. It is to say the least, heart-wrenching, or bewitching, however which way you look at it. I am continuing to build the story of my life, and I feel guilty. I come home to newly presented things. In time those things will become commonplace. Yet she won’t ever know these things. People I meet will remind me of her; the other day I walked in our favorite hole-in-the-wall to eat. Ordered the same thing she always ate. Small tasks veer off into dissociation – I’ve burned 4 wooden spoons, broken 3 coffee mugs and have forgotten to eat every day since. There are blood stains on the calendar of the day she passed. Sometimes when I go to sleep crying I can feel someone holding my hand, cradling me, saying “It’s okay, I’m here, don’t worry.”

to whom could I put this question (with any hope of an answer)? does being able to live without someone you loved mean you loved her less than you thought…?”
Roland Barthes.

I had just come back from an interview. The past two years have been hell, even without the pandemic. I have had work injuries that have decommissioned me to a point where I’m wondering if I’ll ever hold my (nonexistent) baby in my hands – each detail accentuated by the contrast of my (nonexistent) wife’s blurred visage in the background, teeth smiling and all.

Mild-traumatic brain injury, with a diagnosis of post-concussion syndrome. It takes months to feel even semi-normal again (and I’m still going to vestibular therapy). The way it was delineated to me was that my brain’s neurons had bridges that were damaged. And ever since I had my head injury, those bridges were under siege. Because of that, these normal bridges I usually take to “work” (me pouring a bowl of cereal, or doing more intensive tasks like working out) every day weren’t there. They’d have to be rebuilt. My personality would change. My mood would shift, hormones, the way I see, perceive light and sound. The way I’d perceive an individual’s actions would take on new meaning. I felt people wanted me to die. I’d tell my doctors,

“I think my friends want me to fucking die.”

All I’d draw was a bewildered “Why?”

“I don’t know. I feel like they want me to die and they’re tired of me. Not even that, maybe they’d be sad for a day. Not even that! OK, a month, but they’d probably be happier. They’d justify my death to move on and gain strength from it. They’d use the roses that grew from my grave as fuel. They’d eat the fruit that grows from my ribs and feed it to their children and they’d become strong. They might even give my name as one of their kids’ middle names, or something. It would be a great story, but I’d be dead. I feel my family doesn’t care if I die. I feel like YOU want me to die. I feel like my brain wants me to go black.

“But I don’t want to die.”

I’d say to break the dense air with a life-saving get out psych-ward-free card. Feeling that they’d lock me up somewhere if I didn’t say I didn’t want to, or didn’t love myself the way they want me to love myself. Or any fucking distinction of a distinguishable human being they had a rubric on with a scorecard to deem one mentally fit or not. Just projecting it enough as a feeling would hopefully warrant some sort of sympathy I needed but didn’t know how to ask for. I wanted people to feel bad for me, to cater to my weakened state. And in that, I thought of Nancy. She would openly talk about death with me. Disclose details with me. Shared what she was going through. Even in my weakness, I found strength in not feeling alone, because I had been on the other side. I had been the doctor that just didn’t understand.

Late at whatever the fuck-o-clock I’d run to the bathroom and dry-heave into the toilet. I’d stop myself from throwing up to trick myself to believe I was getting better. I’d get indignant at the whole fucking ordeal. Anger was harder to control. I got banned from a chess app I’ve used since I was 13 for cursing the opponent out for not responding in time.

Games I played for years banned me for my outbursts. My sex drive would change – I didn’t feel like I had a grasp on myself. Intrusive thoughts – really bizarre ones. I’d fantasize about technological advances that would be made once I was gone from this Earth, I’d try to think of new inventions to supersede the reality of that even happening.

Headaches. Real bad ones. The kind where you hold your head and close your eyes so hard that all you see is complete darkness. My eyes would twitch (they still do). Something about the nerves being overworked. There was a point where the sound of the garbage truck would bring me to my knees – the clanking metal would feel like a jet engine was going off in my living room. During one of my episodes, the weight of the world triturated me into stardust. Life slingshotted me with Jupiter’s gravity into oblivion. I felt like I couldn’t turn to no one. It sounds like such a common thing. We hear it all the time.

I’d curl up into a ball, and say a prayer while falling asleep, drool and pen journals with scribbles about my dark thoughts. I was certain I was dying. There were times where my hands would quite literally seize up, just how her hands did. She would tell me that she couldn’t text much, so we didn’t. She’d abbreviate words and sentences, to the point it looked like code. It was one of the cutest yet saddest things, and I cherished every moment of it because it became this practiced form of morse-affection unique to us. I practiced this gentleness on myself. The one I’d always so easily and readily give to her. I loved Nancy so much – she was delicate to me. I’d nuzzle and caress her, with broken, awkward hugs, embraces that remind me of crackling firewood. I’d tell everyone who had ears about her – and to those that didn’t I’d show my poetry about her. Strangers were my favorite because they seemed the proudest. They’d be so happy that another stanger could discuss such a wonderful person so openly. Their eyes would open up and I’d show pictures of her too, of us, and they’d say,

“Really? No way.”

Irony has a way to be a son of a bitch. One of my best friends- in breaking the news to me received the same text from me:

“really? no way”

“no way”

There were times my speech slurred. My doctors said that it was a double-sided blade meant to be wielded wrong. It was one of those mornings where I could hear the fog getting denser, and the grass growing. I could see the sunlight bend where otherwise it would feel warm on my skin. And the only person I felt that would listen was Nancy.

There were times where I felt so heavily drawn to her. Even after holding back, trying to postpone that connection we had because I couldn’t fathom ever being vulnerable enough that I would feel like I had to sacrifice something deep within myself. And now it is insufferable. I hear myself crying and it hurts to hear the agony violently ripping out of me. The weight of my inaction has made my eyes heavier than lead. They are nuclear core dense. What could I have done? Why is this happening to me? Why was I afraid to speak up? Why did I feel like I couldn’t find the words when words are exactly the thing I always find?

“I waste at least an hour every day lying in bed. Then I waste time pacing. I waste time thinking. I waste time being quiet and not saying anything because I’m afraid I’ll stutter.”
― Ned Vizzini, It’s Kind of a Funny Story

I can feel my mana separating piece by piece, string by string. Individual strands dissipate into immeasurable emptiness. I am a detective with the sole purpose of finding details of this being a hoax. I want it to be untrue. I want a knock at my door and the view from the eyehole to meet that silly smile. I am foregoing a process of repudiation, living through conspiracy theory. Every day I feel her slowly slipping away. That’s the kind of grief I wish nobody to ever feel. She didn’t just die. She’s still dying to me. I am losing Nancy day by day. I am building a registry of remnants, stockpiling jpeg, .mov, gifs of her. Every day I am losing a piece of Nancy. Maybe I’ll forget something about her, like the exact carrot-stained vermillion we saw in the most charming sunset together over this Ganymede-sized horizon right before she left for Los Angeles.

Perhaps, I’ll move and the red-striped tank-top she used to wear from Old Navy will get lost during the trip. Fall into a thrift shop along the way. Maybe I will sell the car we spent so much time in. Little by little, fragments of my life become a mausoleum of lost and founds.

“There should be a statute of limitation on grief. A rulebook that says it is all right to wake up crying, but only for a month. That after 42 days you will no longer turn with your heart racing, certain you have heard her call out your name. That there will be no fine imposed if you feel the need to clean out her desk; take down her artwork from the refrigerator; turn over a school portrait as you pass – if only because it cuts you fresh again to see it. That it’s okay to measure the time she has been gone, the way we once measured her birthdays.”
― Jodi Picoult, My Sister’s Keeper

I remember one time she hurt my feelings really badly and I just hugged her really hard, I crimped up with her and told her I loved her. There were so many times we’d fall asleep after conversations and these tenderhearted nights of passion. Where five plus five equaled a million and we’d sit far away from each other purposefully and she’d text me, “I could feel you from over here.”

It was this eerily foggy morning and kids were on the bus. Some kids had those 90s jackets on (still). And everyone had some sort of blue hue adjusted into it somehow. I was a boy who kept to himself, especially around girls. I kept a sort of strong demeanor – not intimidating, but I was stoic enough where I felt I wasn’t inviting, even as a sixth grader. It was one of those mornings where the school bus seemed to take about twelve seconds to pick you up and drop you off. I felt a tap on my shoulder –

I looked over and saw this blue jacket worn by a girl.

“Hey. Can I sit here?” She pointed directly to an exact spot on the seat, as if I would’ve said no, or as if she hadn’t taken the stars from my eyes and crushed them in her palm.

“Uh, yeah.”

I responded shockingly, I also thought I was being tested, or pranked. Something.

“OK, I will!” and she sat. Not hesitant at all. Almost like that was the spot she had wanted exactly, almost like the narrator of my life had started the story of Nancy and Cristian.

“Hi, I’m Nancy. you’re … crrr-?”

“Cristian, yeah.”

It’s not often the prettiest girl you’ve ever seen sits next to you. I’m not entirely sure but I think we had been introduced before, by her friend. The whole interaction seemed planned, I mean there were so many other seats. I still remember trying to sit alone to recreate the scenario. It never really happened again. Either I missed the bus and had to walk, or I think she would get rides from and to school, so my budding friendship was short lived. In any case, we became great friends. When I was 17 I professed my love for her via text on my razor. She went off to college and I went off to work. We started dating in our early twenties, off and on into our mid twenties. We went through a lot. Right before we started dating we snuck into a public pool at 1 in the morning. We stripped down naked, laughed and swam together. It was the best, because it involved trespassing, getting naked, and swimming. The fence was ridiculously high but we found a perfectly balanced construction pallet on top of other bits of discarded building materials and were able to climb over. Nancy in all her humor got stuck on the slightly-barbed public pool fence. “Cris, help, my cooch is stuck,” she laughed, but was worried, because well, her cooch was stuck. Of course, I climbed over, made a perfect landing spot, and pushed her ass and told her to step on my shoulders to climb over. When we got out she looked at me and said, “I knew this would eventually happen.” I looked at her and said, “I’ve wanted it to happen.” It is one of my most cherished memories. My favorite was when she sat next to me. She knew I loved when people sat close to me. Especially if I really love you, sitting uncomfortably close is just so intimate to me (I’m weird, I know, and don’t care). Perhaps if I sit alone, and it’s foggy, and I recreate everything just right, I can feel like she’ll sit next to me again. Perhaps she’ll hold my hand again. Maybe, if I go to our favorite spots, or get the N16 black pepper chow udon noodle special, or set up a picnic in that park where we saw the giant sunset. Maybe I could hear her laugh again. Maybe she’d come back for just a second, enough time for me to say everything I’ve ever wanted to say.

Please check on your friends. Your family. People you love. Please. Please. I’m begging you. I miss her so much.

Thank you.

“You ask everybody you know: How long does it usually take to get over it? There are many formulas. One year for every year you dated. Two years for every year you dated. It’s just a matter of will power: The day you decide it’s over, it’s over. You never get over it.”
– Junot Díaz

my goodness.

goodness. 

my heart. 

words i never want to repeat. i didn't know this is how it would be. you're an anomaly in nature, you're silence when the sound is on. you're a cherry stem, marfa lights, the escapist nature of the taos hum. you ever hear yourself
laugh and catch yourself falling in love? i've never 
been here before. definitely didn't think it would be 
this lenitive - i feel like a hundred spring  suns are all pointed at me in every direction. i feel that if i wanted too, i could jump and catch a cloud, and win you some sort of carnival gift because of it. . i want to be honest with you. in the most
inopportune times i uncomfortably get captivated/get swallowed into an entirely different dimension
into your eyes and there's a glimmer that shines/think combining luciferase and photoproteins
and i activate it by telling you i love you, and it has
to be past 10pm and we both have to be exhausted
and the most vulnerable versions of ourselves. it's a field of bioluminescent bulbs each bursting...innately.
it rips away at me. it violently wrestled away at the parts infiltrated by ghosts. that inhabit houses i was too scared to evict them from. it's a hurricane that washes it all away. 0

liability issue

there's a point that i'm reaching 
metal-stained depression that questions my poise 
Soy Sauce and Som Tam alleviate my diseases
Witherspoon street, right off of Des Moines
i'm better off. leave me- said in telekinesis
park my car in dimmed city streets seemed so adroit 
as a meditative escape- to break free and avoid the 
culture clinic. social sipping soak my inner 
peaces
i'm always 5 seconds away from decadent noise
a dollop of pain, cured by laying in bed just to waste 
better today. better today. i'm better today 
my hearts national anthem never displayed
harlequinade. awkward delay, fault and dismay
darkness, decay, harvesting pain. hop on the train 
there's a billion souls unlike me not trying to rot 
how am i supposed to decide to just stop?
contractual silence. contrast, brightness and sharpness
liability issue. my investors predict a crash in my stock 
there's no return in peace if i happen to drop 
you speak a dialect that only i could embark 
i'm a poacher with a penchant for a lioness heart
i need sunlight and you seem to smile a lot
you give me culture when art forms die on the spot
super setting. filter mode, neutral touches interwoven
two excedrins in my throat, you can barely sense the hope
ibuprofens. miss you poems. 
i miss you

The kid inside us

Transcribed short story. Enjoy.

coffee stains

i feel like an addict.
i whispered..
as i fell asleep by myself
waking up in shivers and 0 responses to my pleading for help 
i'm normal, i'm honest 
sitting beside a 2 week headache and a toilet of vomit 
telling my tylenol i'll be back before dawn. another broken statement soaking in promise 
my minds a loitering bomb, the hopeless subconscious
my most genuine curse is never being sorely immodest 
you make me trust, and make me love

you.
wrap your arms around my kudzu 
my battle armor cast in blood, the vagabond of listless lust
you're the
art of war to my sun tzu
dragging on, my past is gone. just catacomb the ambiance 
grabbing on to massive oars to run across the transient
summers dawn is halcyon. a cup of coffee.
allocate the demitasse, and pillow talk your champion 
touching softly. rugged often, my flesh peels off when i'm around 

you.

come with trigger warnings, and oxytocin 
purple-flavored dulcet moans, coach 
your climax until you're gone
we left our mantras and conscious open
erotica, the constant dosage
our jupiter's and venus forged 
carbon copy, and common stories
almost called derogatory 
hear the demons speaking for me
we want peace, and peace and glory 
but what brought peace is knowing 
thieves only steal things worth hoarding
the mana source. the chakra pouring
muladhara. i want more 
kehlani to your body. roar 
growling and the sounds explored
you look good on paper, and good in person 
my only failure is mine alone. 
flushing out the ill-behavior. 
to amputate and cut off the source. 
this faucet drain pumps blood no more

it's just
stained

those little tiny voices

I don’t think i’ll ever understand

all in all, as a man cusping his 30s, i’m a man (or something like that) that has been plagued, traumatized, beset by the majority of relationships. the definition becomes loose here, convoluted almost- only emboldened by my continuing, gross amount of overthinking i complete in a day. and the micro-aggressionist vibes i get from misunderstanding people i’m supposedly building this relationship with.

by relationships, i include intimate ones, platonic ones, familial, and even ones i consider “lesser” on the scale, like work relationships, or whatever.

before I became a young adult delving deep into his late twenties, I was a whippersnapper, wide-eyed, naive, wnd somewhat of an assimilating conformist. I refused to believe i was sensitive. i wanted to have things that other people seemed to have under control (and probably did) and acted as if it were a part of life

family members – like the ones where cousins are siblings, uncles and aunts are second parents, your grandparents’ aging connects with you on an interpersonal level. as if the realization of the proverbial finish line gives you a sense of meaning and unity.

close friends with quirky, funny, personal, inside jokes. the one that breeds envy from others with friendships nowhere near in the same stratosphere of awesome. not-so close friends, but close-enough to share witty exchanges, bigger-than-small-talk jargon, and the ability ro head-nod each other afar from the local small town bar were visiting with our significant others. stuff like that.

the act of being so ensconced into a traditionalist mindset was a reachable goal to me, not because of this head-on-straight collision with conformity- but rather the normalcy it promised had given life to a series of necrotizing relationships i’ve experienced thus far in life.

Of course this was enticing to me. i craved having my family happy because i’ve obtained something.

i think this is part due to immigrant child syndrome.

i don’t know if it exists, but it’s definition to me right now is- to want to make your parents happy who sacrificed leaving their home country to give you a better life. in theory, and in reality, the prospect of giving that gift to your parents not only extends the martyrdom of the syndrome, but it imprisons your flexibility into providing what’s right for you.

as muddled as my relationships with everyone got, the more I chalked it up to there being a problem with me- or everybody else.

because of this i went into a highly engrossing apathy stage in my life.

i personally feel every would-be philosopher entrenching themselves in existentialist dogmas at a early enough age, comes to experience a slither of what true apathy is. whether or not that’s true or close to the truth can only be compared to what i actually went through.

for me, i experienced it head-on, bracing its hellish ice against the warmth of my heart. and during these seasons of apathetic perpetuity?? i, sort of lost track of everything i wanted to accomplish. so i didn’t accomplish anything.

and it wasn’t because i didn’t care- entirely. it was because i didn’t know. i didn’t know what i wanted, who i wanted or what i wanted to be, think or demonstrate. my apathy was interestingly fucked up. i’ve had traumas of not eating and,for lack of triggering a picture of incertitude and depression- pretty much living as a kid who didn’t know the outcome of the next day- for many, many days, weeks. years.

my sensitivity

was something that i didn’t know impacted me till’ recently. i didn’t know i had to stand up for myself.

i didn’t know i could without puffing out my chest.

i didn’t know i was supposed too, or if doing so would awaken the powers that be that prohibit you from exhibiting any emotion at all other than a stoic, serious demeanor.

i mean that in all senses of the word.

i wasn’t allowed to show emotion. I couldn’t be upset, i couldn’t be sad. hell, if i were happy it would be too much.

for reasons connected to the the destructiveness of overarching masculinity, i still haven’t rightfully seeked serious help, or even help with identifying whatever i may be feeling.

the reasons are irony, but being a latino, and also, a man for that matter in this atmosphere doesn’t seem to latch onto itself. not only do i fear of what i have to say- but deep down there’s a voice that tells me nobody cares.

i know it isn’t true

but there’s a literal crippling ghost that grabs my windpipe anytime i think or want to act otherwise.

i didn’t think i’d make it to thirty- truth be told i’ve written a myriad of posthumous poems about myself in my late twenties. the fact that i’m here defies the voice i’ve heard for what seems like my whole life. when i made it to thirty i wanted to call a younger version of me and just cry with them onthe phone. when i turned 30, i wanted to celebrate it.

the real celebration took place in my head. it wasn’t a celebration. it was a million i-told-you-so’s from another voice that was championing my defiance for so long. it was every time i got myself up from utter defeat. lifeless nights spent on my bedroom floor with tears unobstructed by anything but the hardwood floor, and substantiated by gravity and depression.

what got me through it sometimes was some sort of new-age breathwork.

id put my headphones in and listen to this somber, muffled versino of myself over classical melodys. my nose clogging due to drive-by scenes of lacrimation only exasperated by the sound of my deep breathing, which in turn made everything much more impactful. besides my confused dog nestling up to its owner to provide comfort, the only thing that i felt stood in my way was myself

in a way, we all stand in our own way.

but i had stories. excuses. truth tied to it.

i had, sadness and depth attached to it. in a tiny impermeable knot.

i had things other people in my situation never experienced. like i said, my situation was unique, singular, and hyper-focused. i felt any therapist or doctor couldn’t relate. as if my personal disease was too new to be diagnosed under the veil of their books and degrees.

sometimes it was true. sometimes, i didn’t make sense.

sometimes people would tell me i was probably stressed.

and i sometimes believed them.

i sometimes wanted to end my own life. and i sometimes almost went through with it.

i consider myself a very smart person. a rational person. i man with endless patience, but who takes shit from no one for a certain length of time. so it struck me. why did i want to hurt myself? so stressed people really hurt themselves or want to go through with it? it was only intensified by the looks of horror from friends of the relationships i feel i wasn’t worthy enough for.

in my early twenties

i was engaged. i got engaged to someone, or something? it was odd. the very basics of it was intoxicatingly confusing. i think i felt the need to take such a big step, honestly, just to feel.

at the time

i didn’t feel anything. this was the perfect recipe for someone to fall into the depths of the world so that they could feel. i could’ve easily fell into gangs, drugs, and more.

the world was open to me. morally, my apathy was obstructed by disinterest. i somehow thank, that voice that cheered me on. muffled and battered deep into my psyche.

i knew i cared for her. but she never gave off anything more than surface level affection. and it was limited. i thought me playing chess and tip toeing was what love was. i thought i had to hide myself in order to achieve that sense of normalcy. that desirability to achieve what others were was, for me, intoxicating. i had to have it. i didn’t know why. i wanted to achieve something and have feel-good chemical reactions in my brain. the ones i remember from when i was a child. but, she didn’t afford me that privilege. the distance she kept me at and the distance i healthily craved were lost in a sea of depression.

i didn’t know any better- to me that was the basis and epitome of love and companionship. but, i’m oft to hard on myself, i had zero examples growing up, and from what i’ve heard, anything in television was exaggerated. so i took those two precedents and gauged what love was to myself. being a human was hard. my blueprint was given to me at a young age. i had to hold in my emotions a lot. i couldn’t be sensitive. or react. side note: IM EXTREMELY SENSITIVE. sometimes, the point of my sensitivity is white-hot intense, but i’ve safeguarded it’s exposing with layers of personality traits disguised as my actual personality. yippee.

i’ve come very far.

that’s me giving myself a pat on the back. even now, any relationship i encounter is given a scope of eyes and scrutiny. i try not to question everything. but, the two voices sometimes agree. the one that was telling me mean things tells me that i should be more careful. it’s cynical. it doubts everything, and almost feels like it cares about me. my other championing voice tells me i should slow down, that this is good, but i’m much too inexperienced.

when they agree it becomes a battle for me to talk. to speak. why listen to decade old child-genius ghosts of myself? why not ask the person i’m dealing with for more clarity? why not communicate? why am i googling what makes a narcissist?

“A NARCISSIST?” i frighteningly exclaim

“i’m not a damn narcissist. i’m the nicest person i know. i truly mean that.”

i walk away … and whisper

“that’s probably what a narcissist would say...”.

i’ve silenced my inner critic. i’ve done the work. i’ve tried to heal many aspects of myself wounded in battle. in life.

sometimes the voices win. sometimes i can feel one trying to choke me and another hand fighting it off. i literally feel it. sometimes, i just want it to stop. not me, but the world. time. i want to stick a gigantic rod into earth and stop it from spinning. just fucking stop it all.

the split

when me and my ex-kinda-fiancé-friend split, it was dirty.

there was an entire monologue given by me. i poured out my entire heart. it was excruciating. it was one of the most painful things ever. it was done in the dark, light lightly dimmed. sitting in chairs across the room from each other. tears and mucus dripped all over. it was messy. i spoke for what seemed like a few hours. zero interruptions. i let everything out. i gutted myself. i was so fucking chaotic and loud i didn’t hear my voices anymore. when they interrupted i told them to shut the fuck up. i told her to shut the fuck up too. everyone in the room had to shut the fuck up, because i had something to say. she, was indifferent. the blow that had to my entire being was deafening. but crucial in how i ended up developing and identifying how i felt what i did. how i wanted to change it

i never felt something like that. i’ve never felt like i defended myself until that day. i’ve done so more since that day. and i feel everytime i write about my past and my demons, that i do so again, and again. the fact that i’ve been thinking about writing this before i even turned 30 speaks to the complexity of time and how often things in your head can give off a time-warp. i want to continue defying voices. norms, standards and traditions that plagued me. traumatized the beginnings of everything i’ve wanted to fight for. i want to be honest with myself and the next person i’m vulnerable with. i want to be able to communicate that inexplicably. i want just me and that soul in the room.

no norms,

no traditions,

no rejection

no apathy

no indifference

no doubt

no indecision

no more little tiny voices.

grief, and other small victories.

the title of this post is the title of Paul Neilans book of a almost similar name “Apathy and other small victories”. It’s one of my favorite books. dark humor, and satire fill it’s pages to the brim, and i’d like to think this is what i aim this post to be-

but failed.

i’ve more or less, for what seems like forever, have had this silent dance with grief. and although inaudible, each footstep, as graceful as it was, was haunting.

before my memories were indefinitely cemented, my first memory (although fragmented) was of my grandma getting in a taxi in front of the apartments where I lived, and waving goodbye. in her little old lady jacket. although the validity of this can be argued between my mother and I, who claims one or the other — but whatever. anytime I see anybody old in a jacket where they seem to be extremely cozy and content, it reminds me of this one moment. whether or not that brings joy or unearths unnerving memories is completely at random.

it was dusky that day- and it has been ever since. (i, a small toddler, was sobbing uncontrollably). the next few years I barely remember anything. it’s as if the grief of my grandmother leaving took years off my memory. for me, at least–memory and life are two variables, distinctly apart but invariably and contiguously interlinked.

i felt as though the grief was temporarily absolved with remnants of other areas of my life that acted as a band-aid. the environment was too wet. too harsh– the band aid kept falling off. the wound never really got better- i just learned to live with it.

i do remember playing video games with my dad, who would then leave for a stretch period of time, then return. it was something that brought me happiness, temporarily. this random man just laughing with me, showing me how to do things, where a small version of me could enjoy watching them. i was learning- and it felt like a team project. as competitive as i was–(still am), everytime it was my turn i would expend a lot of energy trying to beat the game, namely mario.

i’d continue playing video games with him– like a ritual. a ritual that’s sole goal was to be the ibuprofen in human form. just a dosage of it so i’d forget what the root cause of whatever i was taking ibuprofen for, was. i didn’t question it. at this point, the idea of coming and going seemed normal. but, what it was doing to me was erasing memories and moments, of me. it was taking away my life.

my grandmother has alzheimers. tulita, barely remembers a thing. she’s still alive, but barely.

at what cost? sometimes she’ll blurt out a series of events that happen and from one moment to the next, those memories turn into incoherent strands of spanish that connect themselves with little to no context. it doesn’t make sense, not only literally, but figuratively. like, why?

i’ve always wondered how family members were able to keep talking to her. for me, it’s one of the most terrifying things -perhaps because i see myself in her sometimes. perhaps, it’s because of what i remember from her. whatever the reason, i try to keep my memories close. one of my nightmares is being caught in the chaos of the illness and not being able to remember. i want to be able to answer questions to my grandchildren’s children. i want to be around to remember for them. as a vessel into the past that exists to them.

I distinctly remember certain areas of my life, then just absence of thought shortly thereafter. this has been the precedent ever since- nothing has taken priority of trying to remember what is happening to me as it’s happening. i’ve lost control of trying to take things as they come, and i’m still feeling the remnants of what ive lost, and continue to lose to this day. sometimes as the cause of what has happened to me. the process of healing and trying to interpret my grief has become a task so daunting, that i’ve been putting off writing about this for years.

sometimes, i’ll feel okay, and then as quickly as it comes, it dissipates– the monstrosity of life takes over. it’s chaotic when the waves of grief get together in droves, and seem to drown you in your own tears. i once wrote:

‘i know, as morbid as it sounds, that i know i’m healing when i choke on the salt my eyes make.’

I think- that’s where it started.

recently, one of my close friends brought to my attention how one of my other friends passed away. i’ve to this point, have made a point and refused any and all contact and information to anything or anyone that was close to me (in terms of them passing away) particularly for the fact that my brain would create a subatomic multiverse of a million transmogrifying reasons explaining why. it was one of unhealthy, (continues to be) ways that i dealt with this.

i’ve had too many family members leave my life, too many friends dying. too many remnants of what i was connected to, pass away, or simply fade into the darkness. i’ve come to the conclusion that if i were to delve deep into the reasons of why, that i’d just hurt myself even more. part of that comes from my father.

his propensity to wade himself back and forth into my life at his discretion, regardless of any outlying factors has given me an elevated state of cynicism. cynicism turned almost-paranoia.

it has also unfairly given people who were close to me and passed away some sort of unwavering disconnect. for the fear of being hurt, or finding out more of the ‘why’ – i’ve knowingly stayed away from any information that may have been useful in finding out why. it was my method of protecting myself and keeping my inner voice ‘quiet’. whether or not they passed away from a regular, more socially ‘acceptable’, yet still unfortunate death (physical illness, accident) opposed to the more socially “unacceptable” form (suicide -which is in result to illness, but to spare the introduction of another topic you shouldn’t be ignorant about, i won’t delve further) – or drugs, gang/police violence, prison etc.

i’ve publically only grieved about kobe bryant. i felt the stigma was uplifted to grieve about someone because of the figure that he was. especially to me. in the absence of so many people that were paramount to the molding of my being, a young boy would look to someone that lived their life in highlights and interview soundbites that were filled with genuinity, confidence, and just overall stellar attitude that would soon be marketed and trademarked as ‘mamba mentality’

i think i needed that. i don’t think i have ever properly grieved before.

i remember my mother telling be the man of the house when my father wasnt around. although i had no example.

i remember being told that things happen for a reason. although i never knew those reasons.

i remember being told by a school dean that i needed serious therapy, and my mother brushing it off. i remember agreeing with her. men need to be stronger than their emotions.

i remember being told to stop crying in class by a teacher after finding out that my friend had been a victim of suicide.

i also remember the face of (what seemed like) disgust by my mother when she picked me up from school because i couldn’t function from the news of my friend

i remember handling the venting of my friends to me about their own mental battles with grief being more helpful than the ones i provided myself. sometimes i even feel like i’m grieving myself posthumously. i miss who i wished i was. who i wanted to be in moments of weakness.

i remember carrying this luggage with me into each newer facet and phase of my life. as damning as this few decades of time have been to me, i still find myself trying to evade these nostalgic pockets of time filled to the brim with grief. so, ever so often i contemptuously drink from it’s inundating chalice to keep it from drowning this very safeguarded temple i enshroud myself in. the exact temple that’ll crush me once the walls and it’s foundations are soaked in blood.

so as safe as i think i am, i am actively avoiding a scenario that’ll fuel what i perceive as protection. for while i’m in a boat during a storm, there is no fish underneath to feed me, for they have fled. and no fresh water, as those rivers have run dry.

the list of things that i grieve and have grieved about vary.

my dog max.

my bird, ‘bird’

my ex-girlfriends

family

friends

myself.

one notable instance, happens to be recently where my aunt talked about my dog dying. who is still alive.

i steadily and absolutely scolded her telling her how would she like it if someone told someone she loves they were going to die “soon”. NAMELY MY GRANDMOTHER, HER MOTHER, who is close to a century year old.

while the example was heavy, it needed to be said. my grieving process or a process that i might have to endure in the future isn’t something i toy about or just toss around in regular conversation. it is a private and very tedious but necessary process. and bringing it up casually is without a doubt one of the most insanely insensitive things you can do in a world that is already thoughtless with one instruction to the next.

i’m learning to grieve ‘better’

to let myself feel. to understand why i feel the way that i do, and to process the inner workings of my heart.

to not constantly- as a first and last resort, internalize all the grief and emotional instability into the seemingly impermeable temple of masculinity i was forced to create as a child.

i hope to create a safe-haven for myself for when i ultimately feel the need to grieve. for the child version of me that still exists, looking to emotionally insulate themselves in a zone where they could properly govern themselves and the inhabitants that also have to deal with the same processes that dictate your life as you do.

even as i type this, i have to learn to grieve living family members that were never there for me in the way that i needed them to be. i have to grieve certain versions of me. certain individuals that played the preeminent role in the timeline of cristian’s life.

hopefully, for all intents and purposes, i can create a safe-haven for the intricacies of human grief. planning discrete distractions for when my crying spells magically appear. start a new tradition based off the loss of my creations. hoping to steer clear of reawakening the swarming colossal of grief. hopefully, instead of avoiding, i can reminisce, as in a serene trance, where my focuses are more present-minded and real, rather than a fluttering chaos of what-ifs and the broken timeline of my past-lives.

hopefully, through all of this grief, and all of this pain

i can find other small victories.

Mental Health

For me, as long as I could remember, I’ve always avoided mental health. I felt ashamed. I feel this is the main reason for a ton of people out there- nobody wants to feel like a burden.

To feel less than, or to feel like they need help in their head. Help in your head is synonymous to a crazy person, and crazy persons aren’t you, are they?!

(they’re all of us)

So, when I first ventured out into writing, divulging my emotions and the very cusp of my being onto pen and paper… it would always be, vague. Supremely vague. So fucking vague you wouldn’t even know it was a fucking poem, rather a bunch of words that may or may not have been a crazy persons’ journal.

Maybe.

But they (poems) were (poems) I remember, my first time, to all intents and purposes, writing about something close to my heart, and actually using words to recount what was close to my heart WITHOUT meticulously dancing around the very real, transparent, bona fide, topic with unrealistic scenarios, pretty words, and daunting metaphors that warmly wrapped around the true meaning, confident in not giving out any detail that would expose me. That would give others a reason to even suspect that I’m weak, or troubled. I knew I couldn’t seem weak, or troubled or anything negative in-front of my friends, (NOT INFRONT OF MY FRIENDS MOM YOURE EMBARRASSING ME! —in this metaphor my mom is mental health.) because I’m a fucking tank. I’m tough and fuck you I don’t need help. Right? I was socrates with my shit,

i know that i know nothing, except i don’t want to be seen as a weak little bitch

or even worse

crazy 😱😱

(i just used an emoji, yes)

I don’t know exactly where that feeling went to waste. But, I’m glad that it did. Somewhere in between wanting to not exist, and/or sleep forever. And the support of my friends, my dog, family, and most importantly myself – I think i got comfortable with the fact that I don’t give a shit about how I’m helping myself, and how whatever that may be, looks to others. I just knew I didn’t want to feel the way that I did. I guess awareness was the first step, and with it, I leaped onto more freely talking about my feelings.

One of my favorite lines came from a verse where I dealt with one of the most difficult times in my life.

I may have disguised it a little bit, because I was deathly terrified at the reception I might receive, from friends, family, or anybody that read it and knew who I was, even if it was just on the internet. With that being said, and my entire existence at the tip of my pen, I talked about an instance where I called the suicide hotline, in a drunken stupor, and they (i guess the suicide hotline people?) didn’t answer for hours. When they finally did, (moreso, told me someone was coming: spoiler, they didn’t) I hung up and proceeded to talk to the *other* person on the other side of the bathroom door, who ironically, was the primary cause of this phone call that went awry in the first place. Other things took place like, melancholic showers in the cold, white-boyedly punching a hole in the wall, and chugging an entire bottle of whiskey. These things, were so real, so very intense for me, that writing out a poetic version of it years later was one of the most nirvana feelings ever. ( i use nirvana feelings as an adjective to outline the douchebaggery I felt)

the iconic (ha!) scene I talk about is right here. The ambiguous nature I give off is reminiscent to my ‘younger’ writing. Where, I would purposely give the story a narrator that wasn’t me. I lied, though. It was always me. I would just carefully curate pronouns and other literary items alike to give off the feel that it wasn’t. It was me protecting myself, but still giving me the freedom to be expressive, as if telling a story from another persons POV. Well, without further delay, here it is! This golden branded piece gives me a nostalgic buzz that still gives me chills and brings these little tears to my eyes!

*clears throat*

showered with my clothes on, alone in the stall
emptied the heaven hill, and put a hole in the wall
called the dont do it lifeline and was put on hold for an hour
wrote a letter to my parents, and choked on the vowels
bit on my tongue til the blood diluted the taste of the bourbon
put a slit through my bandage. put a blade to my churches
said a prayer so nervous. layed still for eternity
the shower ran through 6am. i heard knocks on the door
answered with an imaginary gun that held me hostage. its more
than what i made it out to be. told them i fell and i slipped
told a joke and laughed it off. told her hell is a bitch
denim has a subtle smell when drenched in whiskey and slaughter
waded as anonymous caller. speakerphone the rain of the water
looked to the sky, dissolute, dissuaded, demise
cried, laughed and told the operator i had already died
asked me if i was alright. i know id be never the same
desolate rage. i wonder where my crucifix lays.
if they could talk, what would these broken walls say
you only remember me when i start to walk away
thanks

I honestly don’t know what my goal is with this page. (but, now that I’m editing this, I do!) Whether it is to help people reconnect with themselves, help myself, eventually monetize, or just have a site where people can sift through one of my many journals while meeting some pretty cool folks along the way- I don’t know. I really don’t fucking know. But, what I do know is, that I love writing. So much. At this point I don’t even “write” I just fucking do a thing and people call it a writing. It’s not something I do. It’s just in me, like breathing. Or eating. Or kissing someone I really want to kiss. I don’t know.

I just know, I want to help.

thanks.

4:05

i have so much to say, and nothings suffice
the honest truth is, i just want to cry
enough violence of my energy marks being assaulted
my silence comes from expecting nothing less than the obvious
misunderstanding. awkwardness. overall shyness.
i acquiesce solely out of exhaustion.
closed captions underneath both of our eyelids
touch my cheek with your hands as i squeeze them as tight
as me clinching onto my blade, cause’ paranoia has taught me to fight
slightly understand the plight of women walking at night
i want to enjoy the things that so many like
tired of looking into your eyes without me inside
of you
i drift off into codependency, where i’m rarely absolved
connected. i disassociate and stare off into space
finding it odd – an atheist when i’m alone in the dark
interrogations with god. asking them who sent you
my disposition to avoid pain has rendered me recluse
my character arc is a biblical miscue
noah memory thoughts. flooded with pairs of ‘i love yous’ & ‘miss yous’
we’re barely a speck. a floating rock in oblivion
we’re literally looking for something on the cusp of existence
most of what my therapist says, i think is a trick
when i’m writing in my journal i can feel you touching my wrist
i don’t know if i’m supposed to be thinking like this
my first poem titled:
my last healthy relationship doesn’t exist

i met somebody. (meeting someone who has a significant other, and you think there’s a connection they’re avoiding)

i met somebody

i’m not sure if i was supposed too though
not sure if she was a’pproachable
anxious and mellow.
standing with my hand on my elbow
studied her curves with the
glance from my hello

but, i’m sure, you’re unreachable
and as
a ~~man~~ (boy) wrapped his arms around her
as to slowly suggest a inflection
and grabbed her by the waist as they left
i was sunken by her destructive impression
stroking napalm into my battleship eyes
and, swim across the nebula in the reflection of my iris
pools of black pearls. pirate my last glance into yours
raid my souls sunk ships, with your davy jones dutchman’s
bathe in rainbows.
dunked in your ratio sun rays
your maybe so’s, some days.
stormy nights, to say hello.
rain checked and barely spoken
alienated. very broken
soft spoke. can’t stay alone like this
want to lay. with no bias.

spellbound hellhound. (a latino man’s overarching poem turned unfinished short-story detailed in excruciating sentiment and honesty)

spellbinding

is the term used to describe when you’re holding complete attention of someone, almost as if it were something magical; indescribably intoxicating. have you ever felt light brown eyes lock into your soul, eyes surrounded by the most perfectly tailored bronze skin, like if you crushed up jupiter and sprinkled the dust over an empty canvas, took neptune and it’s many moons & melted it into paint -used brush strokes like rembrandt. rolled out the red carpet entrance to ones soul, these…windows surrounded by a sandy visage, grainy complexion smoothed out. camera obscura but in imax- such a vicious assessment. have you ever broke silence with a moan? altered time with a touch? felt a butterfly turn into a lion right in your stomach? why are you such a force to be reckoned with, when your heart beat writes me morse code for the hell of it, dot dot, dot dit dot dot. tell me why breaking down to tears right before conquering your neck with my tongue felt like an arrow splicing my heart at the seams, landed in your lap and decided to live there. when i tried to get it back, it growled at me. why defocusing in and out on the most delicate image, at the utmost devastating angle–lighting that gives off a entrenching hue, like light cascading off a twinkling lake before sundown, glimmers of what ifs and perhaps. failing to derail raw passion. encapsulating one of the worlds most hypnotic views, hourglass, pinot van gris, pink, poisonous ceramic lacing around sober throats & tongues. dripping flirty undertone, guarding carnal tenacity. hints of strawberry oak & rosewood packed in alcohol, & telling times. turbo charged & blood blissful. ignorant to the storm about to hit chemical beach, where endorphins masqueraded as hurricanes rush to wrap around your lips

It’s funny. I spend the entire day thinking about you. I’ll daydream. Spend tiny instances, pockets of time, between breathing, and making coffee… just thinking about you. And yet, while I’m falling asleep, after a long day – soft linen beneath me, lids heavy, parallel to the floor. Dim light from another room providing the only discernible ray of bloom. I think about you. I wake up, concerned about god knows what, only to think about you. To check if you’re okay. My bed empty, vessel unoccupied. A silhouette of where you should be now takes reign. There’s a faint smell coming from a blanket you had. It smells like an amalgamation of me, you, sweat, and lingering lust. If it were to seem strange to me, i would be the most anxious individual on the face of the planet. Preparing a doomsday kit, but for forgetfulness. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mindesque, but with a hint of panic and dishevelment. I never thought i’d be so at ease thinking about your smile. There’s so many things I want to do with you, and i want to open myself up to you completely. I’m dreaming about future instances I have where we’re laughing, and the constellations in the background light up our night, and your skin absorbs all the moonlight perfectly. radiant, laser show; pores perfect in size. Stunning, really. I think this is the first time ever where i’ve been completely captured. enraptured by the stills of every dialect that fill your body language. caught up by the negative photo solutions, where tiny secrets and code magically appear. that white dress turns into a sepia-blue toned spaceship, and suddenly the picture is an adventure, rather than just an admiration of your beauty. This didn’t particularly happen — yet. But, i feel anything is possible with you. I’m slowly opening myself up. A crab, in his armor, feeling the warmth of a star permeate through the rock hard shell. Slowly, surely, intensely, moving at this frenetically awesome self sustained pace. You’re the sun. I’m the crab. Constellations. It’s all too perfect. i can’t stop thinking about you, and it doesn’t even look like it’ll ever stop. I can’t wait. I’m so deep into you, i can’t look back. Thanks for this

not finished:

where to begin

where to start. i didn’t expect this. take away my heart and make it objective. like if its some sort of malleable metal. main mission, arms on the clock ticking away. but let’s not start there, let’s deconstruct the chronology of the deconstruction of my expectation, oxidizing the steel surrounding my bloodbox. laid eyes on you, what seems like a mile away. dance floor alcohol. tiles arranged, into this zone of paint. flickering club colors, lighting the way. i’ll tell you now, gazing at you from what seems about a football fields length, was something- at the time- i couldn’t describe (i still can’t, but I understand it better). reporters (random club goers who have unknowingly taken the task of as sports journalists and photographers) on the sidelines ordering mixed drink and routinely ordered imported beers over mainstream domestic craft, set the tone for the night. but, there was something about the luminosity you brought that I couldn’t put my finger on. luminosity, is a word I’ve always known, but to describe you, it seems as if I kidnapped the word from the dictionary and put it beside your name. oceans eleven adaptation with a much more romantic, symbiotic flare. your name; carved into a tree, that tree being my spine. there’s a handful of metaphors here, but i promise you they eventually line up into a grand scale acid matte forest picture that is hung across an enormous gallery, in a bio-rich environment (also probably the size of a football field). i always wanted to take you to a gallery. i ALWAYS pictured you in the same clothes i first saw you in. perhaps, this is reflexive because that’s when i first fell in love with you. swishy, flowing flower dance pants that had little flowers move every time you moved in ways, that made me admire the time you seemed to put in, to be able to move like that, and uncomfortably made me wonder if anybody was watching my voyeuristic daydream. you also sported a navy blue top. oh, yes, when i first fell in love with you. I skipped over that. for good reason. can i interrupt this story with a guttural roar? thinking about what i’m going to continually write, and how i’m dealing with this right now is fucking terrifying.

i remember the first time i got the flu. I felt like absolute garbage. I didn’t’ know it was the flu, and for quite some time my invincibility got the best of me. I just thought I was having an off day. Until a trip to the doctors confirmed that I was fucking dying. (not really, but i was able to take a deep breath because I knew my feeling like shit was indubitably justifiable). That’s what it was like falling in love. It wasn’t love at first sight, either. I felt I had seen you before. I definitely prayed that you existed. For a world in which you don’t exist, isn’t really a world where I want to be writing love poems, at all. I magnified everything about you and tried to find a flaw. Too short, maybe? Too good at dancing? Maybe her fashion sense isn’t great? Those flowers do look great on her. I wonder if she likes flowers? What type of flowers? Gardenias. Fast forward to me plucking off petals in a panicking sweat, like Alfalfa. ‘she loves me, she loves me not, she loves me, she loves me not, she lov..” Until, I mentioned alfalfa and you would, without hesitation rehearse the little rascals, in, what would be your impersonation of alfalfa

” Dear Darla, I hate your stinking guts. You make me vomit. You’re scum between my toes! Love, Alfalfa.”

I fucking melted. If it wasn’t this, it was another movie quote, or another saying, or another obscure gesticulation, or body movement, eye twitch, hand movement, that only someone who is my age could even fathom of knowing. Literally. No one, in no time ever again on earth will be able to naturally grow up in the same culture that I did, the same climate, the same rhythm, blues, patriarchy pettiness, matriarchal madness, nothing will ever be what it is now. Latino American, We can get smidgens of what is it; mutations, descendants, meshes, clones, but we will, as a collective species embrace this again, we can pass down as many things to our children but time will erode things to its liking. They won’t understand the same things we do: neither will their kids to them, and so forth. We just have words, memories erased when we die. Rhymes, poems, love stories, imaginations that could never quite picasso the same abstract unique quarrel that is my life. our lives. east coast united states, first gen, denizens, half pop culture, mestizo, indigenous, african, half salsa, tumbado. food, the smell of beans, sudado, only to venture outside the safety of those prison walls to be met with xenophobia, racism, doubt and overarching theme of resistance, rebellion, anarchy, unpleasant prejudice, ignorance, naivety of people like me, expansion of my role in colonialism. by merit, by force. he best pizza on the planet, the culture. the arroz con frijole types, hojas, plátano, maíz, flor. deconstructed into twisted, warped family structures we build on whatever beam we can find. poverty stains and opportunity. chameleon dna. i’ll metamorph into anything my ego finds suitable. anything that will save me. we save ourselves. we find safety in this- this latinidad. this obscure robust sanctity, this sanctuary, of sanguine, saliva and saline tears. it will almost never happen again. no matter how many constellations, no matter the lining of planets with god names. no matter what trillionth our chance falls on. that’s the real gem. the real diamond in the abyss. the rough. those odds are quite literally, towers, leaning over. they’re staggering. Not just staggering – theyre fucking improbable. It shouldn’t exist. they’re literally impossible. if you do the math. I could get struck by lightning four hundred times. IN AN HOUR. That’s literally 6 times a minute. So, well, all right. I might’ve made that statistic up, but i’m sure you want to believe it. im sure it could be true somehow. and that’s all that matters. Almost. it’s almost what almost matter. believing. i believed the furrows, the creases your skin made when you mouthed word, i recognized them, they were only formed when something impossible was being said. Also, the football field club metaphor, and that my spine is a tree she carved her name into. Let’s not forget those. those are crucial. and, to the story, it’s almost mind-blowing to even think of it in such a manner. But, to think, I’m writing this at 2.a.m. The earth spins, it’s on its beyond trillionth rotation. time doesn’t stop. it’s the ticking that’s maddening. My emotions that continue that rebel against the madness. I’m sure we think about each other at the same time, sometimes. (you’d just have to think of me once, though.) and, i’ve heard when you think about someone for more than 5 seconds, that, they’re thinking of you too. You make, or made me feel… so many perfectly balanced, diversely distributed, good things. good as in being subjective. that I personally, feel selfish for personally, exclusively taking time to be grateful to be able to feel it at all. Random moments during the day my eyes well up with water, like plants with condensation, a prick when you get your shot, or river banks when the earths crust becomes saturated with a long awaited storm. I’m happy that I could feel this. I didn’t think things I wrote about so passionately would be true, or could become true, or even be scribbled onto paper. Imagine a fantasy writer finally being able to cast a spell, to have his inner desires devalue reality. to be able to spawn trees, or water without having to deal with nature, or time and space. it’s godlike, immeasurable scale of truth. it feels forbidden, like walking into cerberus’s playpen in the dark, or remove the shell from our hearts. or move mountains, that have made home on a tectonic plate, and years of erosion. you made a poet into a fantasy writer, in one fell swoop, just by being yourself. by breathing. moved mountains I didn’t think could move, and you have me so spellbound, hell-hound.

syrup pt. 2 (2nd volume to syrup- a follow-up on intimacy)

she’s smiling cheek to cheek, wide veneer cheshire
feel my eyes tether through your bed side
this that pressurized, bend-her-over sex drive
the entry to her treasure room, legs wide
find you in the vestibule, whisper at your back side
cause vigors’ just a side effect to when i imbibe
if pleasures just a mental boost
i take pleasure in these mental boosts every damn time
every touch explodes, fingers foot soldiers on a land-mine
something better be boiling on the inside
finger trace narcotic curves. im on a daze
can’t i? concentrate on what God unfurled?
my pussy.
you love it when i commentate on what i deserve
but you hate when i try to say that im unheard
undulating hyper-wave has gone berserk
now i’m insane cause you dont fuck the same from what i observed
im hard headed. my heart is soft centered
call center worker spun into withdrawal shivers
jewel spheres spawn light into these dark whispers
calm flickers, palm slipping, annihilation
we’d drop zippers. soft whimpers, dilating raw rhythm
you and i, condone this
kaleidoscopic, eye scoping, slight hypnosis.
caution warning message is sent
60mg oxytocin shower the flesh of your lips
hypnotic dosage
her butterfly journal. no reason to flutter
like a field i discovered, where i trace over patterns left by previous lovers
mind boggled, too.
reading diaries on how they failed to conquer you
chapters left blank, with nothing but a pencil and time
hand drawing rainbows with watercolor pigmenting dye
the arc of your back, with melted oil enzymes
frozen moment in time, where we coil inside
tongue ready to taste sweat that delicately falls up
like summer tree leaves in the depths of this autumn
or syrup filling places inbetween bark on a maple
sitting in the hilly banks swaddled in hazel
how are we able? despite our armor
so frigid. both thinking twice as harder
fragile, frosted crystallizing water
budding with pheromones to visualize our partner
bubbling over seas of red & rosy, slow touchings, moans buzzing, and get to know mes
blanket passion. the kiss me slowlys
turn sound off. let me go, please
enshrouded with fervor
can we hear you in a forest of trees when you shout and you murmur?

Michelangeloesque signatures on your crafted marble cheekbones
carnal loopholes, my caramel tease show
full figured, bloodshot, pouty lips
dark hair, gun shy rowdiness
mirroring oblivion, tongue tied drowsiness
unruly temptation. come into my arms
soul treks along spacetime and elation
unknowingly engulfing night stars
black holes and coffee stained eyeballs (mine)
rose petals and footprints to the daybed
colors in every conceivable wavelength
every nerve burdened, creates a spark
swallowed by the permeating darkness
of uncertainty and foregoing attraction
swerving clean into this moment collapsing
where the present flowing meets passion
seagoer calls for all hands back up on deck
capitans’ calloused hands meet the back of her neck