𝑷𝑶𝑶𝑳 𝑶𝑭 𝑪𝑹𝑬𝑨𝑻𝑰𝑶𝑵𝑺.

otherwise known as Deanne's late-night ramblings.

[tilatala]

𝟗. 𝐌𝐀𝐘𝐁𝐄, 𝐖𝐇𝐀𝐓 𝐈𝐅.

I promise I tried, but could it have been helped?

I’ve started thinking of what ifs again. It’s toxic, I know -- a habit I’ve desperately tried to drink out of my system, as though the vodka would have washed away all the hopes I had of you -- of us, of this ever happening.

I’ve started thinking of what ifs again, but mostly, because you exist. You breathe in constellations, and you laugh in stardust. You epitomize all that is good, and if Zeus could see exactly what you do to me, he would put all his lightning rods to rest. 

Nothing could ever awaken me like your touch.

It seeps deep into my bones like wildfire, and I am left in an utter state of dismay once the feel of your fingertips leaves the surface of my skin. I wonder, is this how it feels to be loved by you?

Perhaps this is a taste, like a split second of wine kissing my lips, the scarlet painting my insides and coloring what void had been left by past heartbreaks. Perhaps this is a tease, like a bone held in front of a curious puppy.

Is this how it feels to be loved by you?

I’ve promised time and again to rid myself of such questions, because life has never been kind to me, and love -- love was way, way worse. Worse than the grade school bully who spilled his milkshake on my school uniform, worse than the highschool bully who found it funny to push me against the metal lockers. Love was worse, always has been, because love found it funny to carve out name after name into my heart. It found the scars funny, the scabs a playground for lost souls and empty promises. It found the hopelessness comedic, the despair entertaining, the sadness amusing.

Love laughs at my demise, and yet, I freely stand upon the railing just to make you smile.

I wonder if fate finds this funny, too. Do you think, in another life, we could have been all we wanted? Do you think, in the grand scheme of things, there was even a miniscule space for you and me? Because in this lifetime, I know nothing awaits us. Nothing is promised to two hearts caged by destinies prewritten, not even willpower could bend its accord.

And so, I wonder if fate finds us funny. Perhaps not.

Perhaps not as funny as I am, still here.

Still falling.

[tilatala]

𝟖. 𝐏𝐎𝐈𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐄𝐃.

Candy – tooth-rotting to its core, a sweetness so intense it becomes poison as the minutes tick by. Sometimes, I think of it as a necessity, overflowing amounts of glucose tickling my taste buds the way a lover’s fingers would. It kisses me in the earliest of mornings and in the heat of the afternoon, leaving my lips sticky, and me sated. On the other hand, it becomes too much – too sweet, too overbearing, too overwhelming it has resembled poison. It leaves a bitter aftertaste in the back of my tongue, and no matter how many gulps of water I take, no matter how hard the bristles of my brush grate against my tongue, I can never get rid of the discomfort – because it is there and it clings to me like grime.

And so, I have decided I do not like candy after all. 

I do not like candy, for it reminds of all the what ifs my mind conjures at 3 in the morning. What if my taste buds have grown accustomed to the sweetness? Would I be able to stomach the saccharine taste? What if my teeth were strong enough to stand the numerous bites and nibbles I subject every piece to? Would I be able to let it sit in my mouth for as long as I wanted, let it dilute in its own essence and intensify as time goes by? Or what if I was simply ready? What if I was ready to withstand all the pain, take the risk of cavity, dismiss the need to throw up because the sweetness ( too much sweetness ) leaves me in a state of nausea, but I have always been too much of a masochist to ever really stop.

 The red strips of strawberry solidified with sugar are as red as any red flag, and I cannot afford to keep looking at the world through rose-tinted hues. Instead, everything is white – a blank canvas, seen without bias and painted without remorse. Now, candies remind me of naphthalene balls, how they look pure and appetizing, yet they choke me in a death grip, breaking my trachea with the force of its insistence. It pushes and forces until I am turned inside out, my muscle now serving as an armor, and my epidermis kissed with the blood inside my veins. I am vulnerable, too vulnerable for my own good, and I do not wish for the world to see me in such a way – bare and stripped for onlookers to see me at my weakest.

 The world has seen me many times before, and it has laughed at the woman who has bared the scars of the aftermath of every destructive sugar rush she has faced, and I would prefer to revel in my own solitude, to witness the birth of all things bitter than to force myself to swallow cotton candy teardrops and candy floss sobs.

 And so, I have decided I do not like candy after all, because liking something so good can also be destructive, and I have far too many plans for the future to welcome such demise with open arms.

[tilatala]

𝟕. 𝐏𝐋𝐀𝐂𝐄𝐇𝐎𝐋𝐃𝐄𝐑.

I do not believe I am beautiful. I do not believe I am smart, nor am I worth anyone's time. Everytime someone asks me if I have a boyfriend, I tend to laugh it off, to blush and shake my head and say, "No, I don't." Oftentimes, they ask me why, and I falter. I falter, because I have not moved on from my longest relationship. ( And no, it isn't with some guy I met in high school who fulfilled my Disney fantasies, nor was it the guy who taught me how fulfilling college was without a man breathing down your neck every now and then. )

My longest relationship, all this time, has been with my insecurities. To me, a relationship is when consistency thrives. It is stability mixed with a little bit of mystery and a lot of heartbeats spent on waiting for the unknown to unfold. It is when you feel their presence, even in the late hours of the night, staying with you even as peace prevails and slumber takes over, and I believe it is no coincidence that my insecurity flourishes as the hours tick by and the dawn welcomes me with the hollow promise of a new beginning. My insecurity is a protective lover. It shields me in its embrace, and no matter how others warn me of how poisonous its grasp seems to be, I tend to overlook their warnings, because my own insecurity warns me of other lovers. And I do not believe in the Myers-Briggs Type Inventory, but if my insecurity were to be classified, it would have the letter I in all for slots, all for instinct. It feels what I fail to notice at first glance - the scoff that passes through their lips, the second where disinterest settles in place of commitment, and when a promise spoken by bitten lips seems a little too good to be true. It holds me back from giving my all, all because it sees what lies underneath fake love. "You are a temporary fix. A rebound. The interim. You are here for now, but you are replaceable. And so, when they find someone more beautiful, someone more intelligent, someone who can offer them the galaxy when you can only give them a single star ( and they will, of course they will ), they will leave. Because they always do. That is what they always do. They will tell you they love you now, promise you they are not like others, not like the lovers you've had before, not like the fleeting love affairs who have left you with a wounded heart and tequila on the tip of your tongue. You are nothing but a placeholder -- the one they meet before they meet the one." My lullabies consist of this mantra, a whispered prayer beneath the tinkling of piano keys in the dead of the night as I surrender control to slumber, and my insecurity almost takes up the entirety of my queen-sized bed, and so I shift until I am on the edge.

I realize this is the only time I feel excitement anymore, when my body hangs from the side of my mattress, and the monster under my bed eyes me like its next meal -- and I wish for it to take me so badly, because as much as I want to, I can never move on from my longest relationship. "Do not get me wrong," I tell them, "It is not you, it is me.” It is me, because I am insecure. I am a temporary fix, a rebound, the interim. I am here for now, but I am replaceable, and so, when you find someone more beautiful, someone more intelligent, someone who can offer you the world when I can only give you a single star -- and you will, of course you will, you will leave. They always do. You love me now, and you make all these promises as though they were simple syllables thrown into the air, but you have no idea how heavy your words weigh on my shoulders. You will find someone -- hell, you might even go back to her, and I will be here, nursing a broken heart.

And once you leave, I will watch you with a hollow chest, and I will laugh, because emptiness has never felt this heavy. And my insecurity will welcome me back with open arms, whisper "I told you so" as it shelters me from the world once more. This is why I choose not to love. This is why I choose not to trust.

[tilatala]

6. 𝐔𝐍𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐃.

I coughed up my first petal when I was six. In the palm of my upturned hand, it lay - a tiny, scarlet petal that had escaped my lips as I heaved, gasping for breath as my six-year-old lungs craved for oxygen. I coughed up my first petal when I was six, and coincidentally, this was the year I learned about ironies.  At the tender age of six, with adipose clinging onto my muscles like a chain holding me to the ground, I stared at my reflection, fogged and yet, distasteful in my memory. I knew it was ironic that my petals were of red roses, the color of love, when I couldn't even begin to love myself. I coughed up my second petal at the age of eight, just as I locked myself into the bathroom stall, tears streaming down my reddened cheeks as the shouts of other eight-year-old children filled my ears. No matter how hard I tried to block out the ridiculous amount of insults, they always made their way into my mind, permeating my skin like a steam-soaked sauna flawlessly invading my senses. I could see failure, hear disappointment, smell regret, taste the blood on my tongue. I could feel inferiority laughing at me as she clung onto my back like a tiny little demon I could never pray away. I coughed up my third petal when I was thirteen, and this time, they came in a bunch. Red has always been tantalizing to me, how reddened lips always looked so divine, how cherry wine seemed to have converted me into an addict, how the thought of red nails edged me with power. How my porcelain skin dripped with red as I painted on it with a metallic brush, as if it were a canvas that needed nothing but color color color, and all I could give it was red red red, and nothing can ever amount to the beauty of having witnessed the birth of all things scarlet. My blood was as red as my petals. I coughed up my fourth petal when I was fourteen, when wandering hands crawled up my thigh without my permission, and suddenly, my epiphanies made a lot more sense. The monster under my bed, the skeletons in my closets, the demons hanging off my back, they were merely objects in which my traumatized mind projected his image, his calloused hands pinning me on the carpeted floor as his five o'clock shadow rubbed against my skin as I cried helplessly. I was six when it started. Hanahaki Disease. In an alternate universe, the atoms that make up the human body were believed to always be pulled by one gravitational force, and such atoms always made their way back to each other. Soulmates, as the world had dubbed, were merely destined to find their way back to each other in the grand scheme of things. Hanahaki Disease. Sometimes, the universe makes one believe that when the idea of a soulmate is found, love flourishes and blooms so automatically, that the yellow brick road leading to forever will pave its way like God misconstrued something and was trying to make everything right again. It doesn't always work that way. I was sixteen when I hacked up a handful of petals. As hollow as my cheeks had been, all I saw in the mirror was a body I could never accept, could never belong to. I saw different hues, lines of every harsh point and curve, layers upon layers of disappointment and failure that the scars could never ever cover up. I was eighteen when I felt the branches stinging my lungs, and it hurt like hell. They say that Hanahaki is an assassin, a silent killer that never tells you when it's time to go. But I felt it, I felt how her twisted branches strangled my bronchioles, like a possessive claim of an alpha on his omega. I felt how every breath rattled my very being, how my failures weighed me down so much that I had never grown out of the five feet and four inches I had on me. I was nineteen when I took my last breath. A suicide note, they would say, when they read this. I always thought poetry was funny. Intricate in its own way, complex in another, but oh so beautiful that it touched everyone's soul. Hanahaki Disease. It is known to develop when a soul bond is not accepted, when one of two bodies refuse the love that is naturally gifted to them. It happens when one soul refuses to love the other. There are many ways in which God can make us lonely and lead us back to ourselves. And maybe, just maybe, whatever god was out there intended for my own soul bond to start with my heart, and end with the stretchmarks on my skin and the cruel words my mother spoke to me. And maybe, just maybe, that god was up there, laughing at how I could never love my soulmate back. 

[tilatala]

5. 𝐓𝐎 𝐁𝐄 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐃 𝐁𝐘 𝐀 𝐖𝐑𝐈𝐓𝐄𝐑.

There are days where curiosity strikes me, and I cannot help but wonder just how it would feel to be loved by a writer. See, ever since I had known love -- had come to realize that the four letters that made up a single syllable encompassed much more than a single emotion, it had always been me. I have always been the one to write sonnets for lovers, to liken them to seasons, watching as every shade transitioned to another until all that’s left is the tranquility of solitude, shades of grey resonating in the afterglow. I have always been the one to hear their voices through songs that play on the radio during a late-night drive, a distant “hello” on the phone equating to the building rhythm of whatever indie pop tune fills the car. It breaks the silence, notes sitting on the passenger seat in the shape of a love so fleeting, it leaves just as the ending notes of the song fades out. Despite my wondering, he asks me, “How would you describe me, though?” And I laugh. I laugh, because although I complain about this one-sided course of action, I write about him. I write about the crinkles by his eyes when he smiles, how his laughter seems to fill every inch of his body. I write about his doe eyes and the innocence behind every gaze he sends my way. I write about how his voice never fails to silence my demons, and how our conversations that run late into the night become my only solace. I laugh, and I tell him. “You are a defibrillator to the chest, a punch in the gut. You are the first sip of coffee on the toughest mornings, and the splash of ice cold ocean water as I dive into her, breaking surface tension and dousing myself with the reality that while love is a give-and-take arrangement, I cannot simply take what I wish. You are the catalyst to my realizations; that love is a language and every mouth has a different mother-tongue. You are the first rays the sun shows to the world when she decides that darkness has stayed too long, and you are the first chords of a song I am sure I will never get tired of. Mark Twain would lay down, and Virginia Woolf would remain still on her feet. Alexandre Dumas would depend on colors to ignite his inspiration, and Dan Brown would hang upside down in order to garner every word his body could come up with, redirecting every letter onto the tip of his tongue, just so he can speak his art into life -- and me? All I need is one glance, one smile, a single tilt of your head and the words simply come to life on their own. You are my muse, the voiceless whisper that lingers behind every simile and metaphor I squeeze into excerpts of books I will never, ever finish -- because finishing them would feel like putting an end to this feeling, and I cannot afford to lose my oasis. The world is my playground, and you are my home. My words are my truth and mine alone -- and you are my muse.” This time, it is him who laughs. He laughs, because he recognizes the truth behind my cliché admission. Love is a language, a foreign dialect to every tongue and yet it resounds loud and clear through every kiss. My love language is through words, through figures of speech and comparisons to fading seasons in the hopes of rendering an emotion everlasting. My love language is through poems and novels, because my love aims to immortalize the very image of his smile, the deep laughter that bursts from his lips, the warmth in his touch and the reprieve he provides when my anxiety becomes too heavy, and I am burdened by my own existence. He is a blessing, and the world deserves to witness the becoming of a phenomenon. My love language immortalizes him, for this lifetime, and for generations to come. His love language comes in every strum of his guitar, a soft hum against the crown of my head and a faded whisper of “good night, love” before he hangs up, and I am soon welcomed by the silence of the night. His love language comes in the form of poorly executed jokes, a clear contrast to his serious admissions, and sometimes I am awestruck by how he himself has become his own polar opposite ( and normally, he would be mine -- because he is every laugh that contradicts my death glare, and how he stands at six feet and three inches is a clear contrast to the five feet and three inches that make up my physique ). His love language is understanding and compassion, affection behind every action. His love language is quiet, a contradiction to my loud proclamations, and I have come to realize that love is not measured by decibels. In the middle, we meet like constellations, chords intersecting at a certain point. We meet, and we speak, in hushed murmurs and silent promises, because despite the difference in our love language, we are one in our romance. Our love language is simply that -- ours.

[tilatala]

4. 안부

(inspired by this song.) In Korean, the word “ 안부 “ translates to “anbu”, which could either mean “regards” or “safety”. I’ve always thought of language as something amusing, how one word could mean one thing or the other, and how letters are interchangeable. How words are often ignored, and how pleas are often overlooked. Hello. How are you? If you’re reading this, I assume I’ve already left. I’m sending my regards in the form of a letter, and before your curiosity gets the best of you, let me explain. Within this letter are things I did not fail to say. Within this letter are things you failed to hear. In Korean, the word “ 안부 “ translates to “anbu”, which could either mean “regards” or “safety”, and whenever I hear it, I feel a sense of calm. See, where I am, I feel no serenity whatsoever. Everyday is a battle between my mind wanting to be productive and my body knowing full well that my heart hasn’t been beating properly in the past few years. Everyday, I open my eyes to the dead weight of loneliness resting atop my flesh, and it pins me to the bed, my mattress and my epidermis becoming one, my sheets memorizing every minuscule space between the cells that line my body. This weight knows no limits. The corners of my lips recognize just how heavy my heart has become, and they find it so hard to lift themselves up whenever I assume I’m feeling good enough to muster a smile. This weight knows no limits, and it sits on top of my chest like the demon that sleeps under my bed, and everyday it gets harder to breathe. With each inhale, my ribs crack and cave in on themselves until all I can taste is blood behind every exhale, and sometimes I think about gouging my own lungs out just for a taste of reprieve. This might be my last letter for you. I think about writing a novel sometimes. My mind fills with ideas about plots, stories I think the world would be interested to read. They range from science fiction to something related to the bible, and then, there’s this one plot I’ve always wanted to give life to. It’s about a woman in her early 20s. In the story, she walks alone inside a forest, only here, the trees talk. They talk, and they whisper stories about every traumatic experience she’s ever had. They whisper about tight fingers in her hair, yanking as a distant voice calls her “useless”. They whisper about rough, calloused hands pinning her to the carpeted floor. They whisper about comparison, about standards she’s never been able to reach, and they whisper about the disappointment that comes after. The forest is thick, lined with shrubbery that knows her weaknesses. They have every minute detail of her heartbreak memorized because, as everyone else failed to listen, the earth seemed to know about her secrets more than the humans who lived around her. I hope you’ve been well. Sometimes, I think about writing about my best friend. And, by best friend, I mean my bed. I looked up what the word “best friend” means, and it reminded me of a marriage vow. For richer and poorer, through the good and the bad. My bed knows all my secrets, my pillows having caught every tear that rolled from the corners of my eyes, and by now, my tear ducts are well-acquainted with the recipient of the sobs I let out when the world is asleep. My bed holds me close as I weep, and it may have no arms, but its embrace keeps me warm in the harshest winters. This is the only embrace I know, for it is the only place where safety exists inside these four walls. I think about giving her a name, something gentle and beautiful, like “Eden” or “Violet”, but giving her a name would mean staying long enough for her to grow comfortable with every syllable, and I can’t afford to leave any more traces of me when my very existence is the very burden that weighs me down. I have become a prisoner of my own quiddity, and the thought not only scares me. It sends me into a fit of panic. I think of the woman in my story, how her forest is a maze, her own, personal hell, and I think of how to properly end that story. To her, hope is lost the moment she realizes there is no one to help her. “I’m sending my regards to you from a place far, far away. I hope you’ve been well, I hope you stay happy.” Someone’s final words are often something deep and poetic, sometimes they pose as philosophical questions, inducing existential crises among those who know of them. Sometimes, they’re absolute rubbish, mindless ramblings. Useless words that surface to the tip of one’s tongue in a moment of adrenaline, and then - nothing. Her final words are silence, because she had said everything she needed amidst her suffering. Her final words are silence, because the world had failed to listen. Her final words are silence, because now, she no longer knows what to say.

[tilatala]

3. 𝟐𝟒/𝟕

I have never been one for cheesy pick-up lines and corny starters. To me, they are as cringe-worthy as any other generic, romantic-comedy film -- overhyped and overrated. I find nothing worth cooing over, and it seems as though irony finds me in the most convenient times, because the moment you made a home for yourself in my mind, monopolizing every bit of attention my frontal lobe could muster, I became a living contradiction of the love-hate relationship I shared with these sappy lines. In between the lined dots imprinted on the clock and behind the resounding tick tock tick tock that fills in the silence, you begin running through my mind, and I wonder if you’ve ever felt fatigued as your feet trudge on, sprinting and then lazily walking, before planting yourself head-first into what cerebrospinal fluid I have left. My brain has become a museum of your portraits, frontal lobe focused on the way your eyes crinkle whenever you would smile, parietal lobe recalling the warmth of your fingertips against my skin, the taste of your lips on mine. My occipital lobe fills my senses with the very images you’ve imprinted into the back of my eyelids, and my temporal lobe is the worst of them all -- because she remembers. She remembers, and she keeps me up at night with the memories of the hours we’ve spent together, how your laughter has replaced the do re mis on every scale, and I can never look at my sheet music without remembering the way your fingers played the piano keys as though you were mapping out the world with every tune. You have taken me on a journey all throughout the world with a simple symphony, and it monopolizes my thoughts until sleep deprivation proves to be the only solution. Writing about you is cathartic, and loving you is therapeutic.  There are twenty four hours in a day, a thousand and four-hundred forty minutes making up a single of the earth’s rotation, and yet you spend every millisecond lingering in my thoughts, but what intrigues me is why your presence feels as fervent as it does when the clock strikes five o’clock in the morning. My eyes focus on the digital image of the clock, numbers staring back at me in expectation. It is five in the morning, and suddenly, you matter more than reveling in peaceful slumber, because your smile holds every semblance of serenity my weary heart could ever long for. It is five in the morning, and suddenly, you matter more than the hours of peace my mind craves, because your laughter rings through the silence of my room, and I am reminded once again that the most beautiful angels do not merely sing. They entice. And you, my love, are not a sudden sensation, nor are you a fleeting dalliance. You have never been merely sudden, and I fell for you as though my heart already knew it was bound to happen. It knows no other love than this -- than you. And so, I begin to eat my own words up. Perhaps I do not resent pick-up lines after all, because I’ve become a living oxymoron, a contradiction between a cynic and a hopeless romantic, though I wouldn’t mind being made a fool one bit. Because it’s you, and for you, I would be a fool (every second, every minute, every hour, everyday).

[tilatala]

2. 𝐌𝐔𝐒𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐌𝐔𝐒𝐄.

I've read a myriad of works on first loves; poems, novels, short stories, hell - even magazine articles. First loves seem to become the center of a growing woman's life once, and then, it all fizzles out. The excitement, the adrenaline rush of finding someone so seemingly compatible coming to a sudden halt until all you're left with is the comfortable hum of a stable romance.

I was never one to settle. I did not grow up to learn the twists and turns of relationships. I was not made to compromise - I was a steady wall of stubbornness, an adamant woman who knew exactly what she wanted in life. And yet, whenever asked about love, I become blank.

And this is why I read about first loves. I never knew what to expect when it came to romance, because the stories I've heard about arguments leading to divorce, about obsession and apathy always tainted my view on a feeling that was supposed to be romantic. I learned about love the same way I learned about the cardiovascular system, through books and diagrams, mapping out the body's veins until they reach the ventricles. I traced my fingertips through the lines of capillaries underneath the skin, and in the same way, I had made a map of love with how it was supposed to be.

Robert Burns painted red when I asked him about love. He had brought me to a garden of roses and played me the tune of his romance, light and fleeting under the summer sun. His love was a promise, a promise to stay until the seas dry out, and even until then, he had promised his return.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning sat me down after she and I had made the world our playground. She held her fingers up, and amidst my heavy breathing, I counted with her. To her, love was a way of living, and she had listed how her heart used to beat in staccatos for her lover. In the soft lilt of her voice, she continued to count the ways her love had transcended the barriers of simply being an emotion. Her love was being, being deep, being free, being pure. Her love was being consistent, even after death has done both part.

I spend my days in the company of writers and my nights under the grasp of science. It tells me that love is a chemical reaction of neurotransmitters, a physiological reaction resulting from external interactions, and for the longest time, I became a slave to facts, ignoring the ignorant bliss in fiction. No love has ever lasted because science made me a cynic.

And yet, underneath that cynical woman was the dying poet who believed in Pablo Neruda. You see, Neruda had watched silently as I flitted from one author to another, patiently awaiting his turn to convince this wanna-be writer that love was not a mere sequence of words on paper. Neruda had shown me love, not as what it should be, but what it should not be. "I do not love you," he had repeated until the words became a mantra that haunted my dreams. To him, love was not extravagant. Love was not loud, and it was not a roaring wave from the sea of emotions the heart undergoes.

Love is this: comfort under warm blankets, thick duvets and wandering hands as lips rush to claim. Love is silence in the dark nights, yet a plethora of words louder than blaring car horns behind every longing gaze. Love knows no required word count, it knows no standard, needs no bejeweled presents, recognizes no standard nor pace of growth. Love is a bible verse awaiting to be read by the faithful, and a poetic line in a book in the hands of an atheist awaiting inspiration.

And words come alive when we put them into practice.

Love is this: the first meeting, when my eyes met yours from the other end of the room, and that single gaze has proven to be a denouement to all my problems. Love is the way you had laughed, and the world seemed to rock on its axis, the sound reverberating from your chest and right into my hypothalamus. It is the way your mere existence caused an over-production of oxytocin, and I am left confused, because they say too much is bad, but how could this much love be bad, when just a single smile from you brightens up my day? They say too much is bad, and yet, I cannot find it in me to see evil behind hazel irises. If God had taken mercy on me as I cried my eyes out last night, I would gladly recognize you as my guardian angel. Love is this, the way my heart pours in buckets of belief and blind faith, and usually my emotions do not cloud my rational thought, but when I think of you, I think of how every lobe in my brain is occupied by the simple "hello"s you say during our evening calls. I think about how you seem to pull your laughter from the bottom of your body for it to come out so loud (and I know how deep it must be, with six feet and three inches worth of laughter and poorly executed jokes). I think about how your name sounds more like a prayer when I say it, how every syllable seems to fit, and how you make my name sound like a worship song.

I think about how you had brought back every semblance of romance in my being, when my cynicism became a nagging voice in the back of my mind instead of a general commanding an army. I think about how loving you had made me love the things that set fire to my soul again; music, writing, playing -- living.

And when I think of you, I think of how Shakespeare had compared his love to a fever, and how Wilcox had compared lips to wine, how Chaucer had promised through life and death and everything in between, and how Whitman stayed contented with mere glimpses.

I think of the love they wrote of, how everything varied, and yet, the love -- this love remained. Because when I think of you, I feel the love they talk of, the kind of love that sits deep in your bones, that holds you in the coldest nights. I feel the kind of love that seems to set my heart alight with happiness, and if this is what it feels like to be in heaven, I promise never to sin again.

I think of the love they wrote of, and then...

And then, I think of you.

[tilatala]

1. 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐀𝐍𝐍𝐀

I awaken to the sound of my own breathing -- shallow, labored, as though my nightmare had just managed to follow me into the welcoming arms of consciousness.

My bed cradles my figure, frail and fragile, skin pale under the harsh sunlight filtering through the spaces of my blinds. Remnants of dried-up tears line my cheeks, smudged lipstick one of the many indications of the sleepless night I had suffered.

In the early hours of the morning, I wage war.

It is in these hours when dawn kisses the earth with serenity that I curse it, because the world seems to have its favorites, and while many would think each and everyone of us eventually gets a taste of how vicious the world could be, I often beg to differ. Like many others, I am a victim, a doll put on a pedestal for others to marvel and gawk at. I am an experiment behind bars, an insurance plan, standards weighing me down and extinguishing the flames of confidence that threaten to set the world and its flammable structures apart -- bit by bit until nothing but debris is left.

It is in these hours that I wonder why the world has never been kind enough to ask if I needed time to rest from its cruelty, but the world has never been considerate enough to schedule my demise when my heart is the strongest. She does not care for the test, she wants to see me in ruins. And so, instead I am left to wonder whether I have ever been enough -- enough for those around me to cherish, to treasure, to care for, to truly love.

Instead, I am left to wonder whether I have ever been enough for romance to cradle in her gentle grasp, for comfort to accompany in the darkest nights. I am left to wonder whether happiness looks upon me with a satisfied smile, and if success and pride converse about my achievements as though they were my proud parents, sending their daughter up on every stage and beaming with admiration in their gazes.

And, for a moment, I wonder if I have ever been enough -- truly enough -- for people to care, because this is what I have always been. I am enough for them to look at, but never enough for them to linger. They come and go in wisps, the wind carrying each person to and fro. They come like visitors, because I am enough for them to meet, but never enough for them to stay, and the truth of it hurts more than it should.

When, just when, will the cycle end?

The thought continues to haunt me during my sleepless nights, when, instead of a fleeting dalliance, the sadness would hold me close in her embrace. She would whisper empty promises, and being the fool I am, I would believe every word she’d say. Because that is what I am. I am a believer in all things the world seems to throw my way. I believe in the pain that crafts itself into art, and I believe in the power of emotions coursing through my body -- adrenaline in place of caffeine, and serotonin for cocaine. There is no definite number of nights as to how many times I’ve slept with sadness, but like any other lover I’ve bared my soul to, she begins to pull away. 

Somewhere in the back of the closet that faces my bed, I can still feel her watching, as if waiting for the right time to strike. She is a lover that hangs around the memories I desperately wish to push back, to repress until extinction eventually does her job and these memories will have become nothing but words on paper -- nothing more, nothing less.

I have grown exhausted of being constantly sad.

Blaring car horns and distant yelling disrupt the chirping of robins outside my window, and I push myself off the bed, the weight of my own musings aching to drag my limbs back into the comfort of my covers, but I know I cannot afford another day succumbing to the thoughts of surrender.

Feet padding over to my dresser, I observe my reflection, the tiniest indications of sleep and struggle intermingling with the hints of a grapple between mind and body -- and today, my mind wins.

My sadness does not know me the same way my strength does.

Today, I am majestic.

Today, I am the only one with the power to hold the totality of the world in between my fingertips.

Today, I am aware of my strength -- more than sufficient to hold the totality of me. There is no one in this world strong enough to be me, and the thought evokes a smile from my lips.

And so, I undress, body stripped bare from the fabric that clings to my body like chains, and the hardwood is cold against my feet, but I have faced harsher winters alone, and this is nothing.

I am not unpretty. In truth, there is no one in this world who could ever be "not beautiful", because beauty is unfixed, impossible to grasp between standards and ceasing to exist within a universal category. Beauty holds no restriction, and I will never be the perfect woman, but I am a fighter. I am resilience and fearlessness in the same tequila shot, unapologetic remarks as chasers for the bitter burn that comes after, and within my soul rests a glow of independence consistent with my inner turmoils. My heart speaks the language of honesty, and I shall allow all my truths to be heard without delay.

I am not unpretty, and I am not unworthy.

I am wonder and capability in one being, strength keeping her walls intact as the world attempts to break my resolve bit by bit, and this is why I am deserving.

This is why I am good enough.

Because the world only sees me as this -- a mere, flickering flame resting on the wick of a candle, a woman of faux strength and voiced opinions, heat of the moment igniting a sequence of reactions. This is not what I am.

I am a raging forest fire, a barrage of anything and everything the world deems good enough to deter, yet its efforts remain futile, because I am not only beautiful. I am not only majestic.

I am myself, without apology, without remorse, and this is what makes me enough.