stranger

I walked with you to the coast
We sat on a bench and watched the city on the other side
It caught on fire
One house at a time
You weren't alarmed though.

I walked with you to the coast
There were purple wildflowers on the sidewalks
I bent to pick them up and my eyes made pitiful demands
So you plucked them too and gave them to me
Your heart wasn't in it though.

I walked with you to the coast
We sat silently in front of the burning
The fiery stroked a line across the river
Its tongues licked up the horizon
I might have left then
You kept on asking questions though.

**

dance

These will never be the last lines I write for you
Because I have never had you
Never tasted you
Never known your salty, never known your sweet
Because you elude me
And I am not worth you

Yet these are not the last lines I write for you
And this is not the last tango I dance with you
So listen!
Because Hope has sang her song in me
I stand still as her lullaby sways in me
As empty swallows the heart in me.

**

carry

I am going to carry New York City into my bed tonight.
Carry its sirens and silences and pretenses,
Carry the empire state building and things littered on its sidewalks,
Carry its lovers and their fingers which find each other.

I am going to carry New York City into my bed tonight.
Carry its weight and its weightlessness,
Carry its soft smoke so fragile so light,
That even the city cannot crush.

I am going to carry New York City into my bed tonight.
Inhale the city the smoke the lovers,
Inhale the littered people on the streets,
Inhale the silence and sirens and let nothing escape.

And nothing shall leave my lips tonight.
Until I breathe in the city's last breath,
Until everything else flees from my pores,
Until the city is so full in me -- that my heart is out of me.

**

post-war spoils

I wrote a few weeks about Hope. I was right about its power over me. About its inevitable invasion, its inevitable defeat. At the final moment before it bursts through my last line of defense and into the final chamber, I always have this epiphany, that what I had gambled on winning was rarer than I had realized. I think the rarity is what what drew me to the cards table in the first place. Deep down we all know the exact chances of these lotteries, but deep down we also know our uniqueness better than anyone else, and we think we deserve these prizes. Sometimes I think there's too much deserving in this world and not enough things to be deserved.

So we carry this consolation prize with us as we hand over the white flag. A second-tier product of Hope, cheap and empty, with a reassurance of quality trusted by neither the buyer nor the seller. The bitterness in the war-ravaged room thickens the air, so much so every air particle is forced to stand still. Maybe the bitterness is petty. But armed with the inadequacy of the consolation prize, I must make up for the difference somehow. And bitterness, regardless of its origin, always repairs my pierced armor better than anything else.

**

dorian's mistakes

I don't want this blog to be paused so long on such a negative note, especially since that chapter of my life has thankfully reached a satisfying period. What has taken its place are more frivolous problems instead. I savor the pettiness of these new worries, knowing deep down that it's a sign that the big picture is quite rosy. Rosy hardly ever breeds inspiration though, which is why this blog has stalled and sputtered. Still, I can't bear to leave it in so desolate a place anymore. It had escalated to a positively alarming note, and I want to rescue it. And to rescue myself from sinking back into that time whenever I come back here.

More or less, this blog is the mirror to my dorian gray -- it soaks up the hideousness of my life and is hidden away -- and I don't think this is a bad thing. Everyone should have a place to pour their darkness into, whether it's another human heart or just a blank page. Dorian's downfall is not in the mirror's existence but in his refusal to look at its reflection. Still, I need my reflection with a little bit of milk. So this post is nothing but an update, a reassurance that a particular reflection has been painted with too-sharp strokes, an attempt to round out the edges, a pledge to learn from Dorian's mistakes.

**