Spellbinding is the term used to describe when you’re holding someone’s complete attention, 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 its many moons and melted them into paint – used brush strokes like Rembrandt? Rolled out the red-carpet entrance to one’s soul, these… windows surrounded by a sandy visage, grainy complexion smoothed out. Camera obscura but in IMAX – such a vicious assessment. Have you ever broken 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 heartbeat 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 an 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 world’s most hypnotic views, hourglass, Pinot van Gris, pink, poisonous ceramic lacing around sober throats and tongues. Dripping flirty undertone, guarding carnal tenacity. Hints of strawberry oak and rosewood packed in alcohol and telling times. Turbo charged and 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 whole day thinking about you. I’ll daydream. Spend brief moments, 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 light. 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 a mixture of me, you, sweat, and lingering lust. If it were to seem strange to me, I would be the most anxious person on the face of the planet. Preparing a doomsday kit, but for forgetfulness. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind-esque, but with a hint of panic and dishevelment. I never thought I’d be so at ease thinking about your smile. There are 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 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. This is the first time ever where I’ve been completely captivated. 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.

This is how it happened. You stole my heart and shaped it as you pleased. I want to tell you the story of how you changed my life, how you broke down the barriers around my emotions. I saw you from a distance, on the dance floor of a club. You were surrounded by lights and music, but you stood out from the crowd. You had a glow that I couldn’t explain, that I couldn’t resist. Glow is a word that I associate with you, that I use to describe your beauty and your energy. You were the reason I came closer, the reason I wanted to know you. Your name; engraved on my soul, like a tree that bears witness to our love. There are many images that come to my mind when I think of you, but they all lead to the same picture: a stunning portrait of you and me, in a place where we belong. I always wanted to take you to a place like that. I ALWAYS imagined you in the same clothes I first saw you in. Maybe, because that’s when I first fell in love with you. You wore floral pants that moved with your graceful steps, and a navy blue top that matched your eyes. Oh, yes, when I first fell in love with you. I didn’t mention that before. For good reason. Can I pause this story for a moment? Writing about what happened next, and how I’m feeling right now is very hard.

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 doctor confirmed that I was seriously ill. (not really, but I was able to take a deep breath because I knew my feeling like crap was undeniably 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, recite 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.”

The moment was unforgettable. It was one of those rare instances when we shared a cultural connection that transcended time and space. We grew up in a unique era, a blend of Latino American influences, pop culture references, musical genres, and culinary delights. We faced challenges and opportunities as first-generation immigrants, adapting to a new environment while preserving our roots. We were part of a generation that will never be replicated, that will fade away with the passage of time. Our memories, our stories, our expressions, our creativity, are all precious and irreplaceable. They are the result of a cosmic coincidence, a one-in-a-trillion chance, that brought us together in this place and time. I was amazed by how you understood me, how you could relate to me, how you could make me laugh and cry with a simple gesture or a quote from a movie. You carved your name into my soul, like a tree that bears witness to our love. You were the metaphor that gave meaning to my life. You were the impossible made possible.

I wrote this at 2 a.m., as the earth kept spinning and time kept ticking. I wondered if you ever thought of me, if you ever felt the same way I did. I heard a rumor that if you think of someone for more than five seconds, they are thinking of you too. You made me feel so many things, so many good things, that I felt grateful and selfish at the same time. Grateful for having experienced them, selfish for wanting to keep them. Sometimes, my eyes would fill with tears, like dew drops on a flower, like rain on a river bank, like a needle in my vein. I was happy that I could feel this. I never thought I would find someone like you in this world.

You inspired me to write with passion, to express my deepest emotions and fantasies. You made me feel like a fantasy writer who could create magic with words, who could defy the laws of nature and reality. You gave me the power to imagine trees and water without depending on the environment, or to manipulate time and space without any limits. You were like a miracle, a rare and precious phenomenon. You challenged me to face my fears, to expose my vulnerability, to move mountains that seemed immovable. You captivated me with your presence, your breath, your essence. You were the fantasy that became my reality.