when i woke up monday morning, i was feeling a little hung-over from the other night so i decided to take a long walk to sort some things out from my mind. i rummaged through my closet and found your old polo shirt. i put it on and tied a loose belt around it. i grabbed a pair of faded chucks and hang it on my shoulders as i headed to the door, barefoot.

as i went down the stairs, i noticed my parents had already left for work. i snatched an apple from the kitchen table and took a bite as i put on my shoes. i grabbed an aspirin from the cupboard and swallowed it. i flinched as i felt its bitter aftertaste on my tongue so i gulped down a glass of water.

as i jogged outside, i hummed a tune from a movie i watched a few nights ago. i didn’t even remember what it was about. i probably fell asleep before it ended. while i was mulling over the forgotten film, i passed an old playground. i went inside and sat on an abandoned swing. i was staring into space for a few seconds rocking back and forth, back and forth. the tears fell down automatically. i didn’t even realize that i was crying until my vision got blurry.

i wiped my eyes with the shirt i was wearing. your shirt. i managed a smile thinking about our memory. i suddenly remembered our first kiss. you were wearing the same shirt i’m wearing. we were riding a ferris wheel and it was like were on top of the world. everything was awkward but it felt right. it felt perfect.

you are probably a thousand miles from where i am right now. i hope you are thinking of me, too.

it’s been almost a year since your last letter. i guess it’s time for me to move on but i still miss you on days like this.

i still love you.

sunlight, how she hated it.

the way it catches her off-guard

and ruptures her dreams in mid-flight.

she wrapped the blanket around her

exposed flesh and stood up.

“i need a cigarette.” she thought

morosely to her self, longing for a

quick fix and ignoring the dead stranger

sprawled beside her on the bed.

she seized a glass on the table

and devoured what was left of the cheap

champagne in one sip.

her world was still spinning

but she didn’t care.

she put on her skimpy outfit

and didn’t bother to check her reflection

in the mirror while walking out the room

with her kitten heels and slamming

the door shut behind her.

when she arrived at her own apartment,

she took a quick hot shower and donned

a baggy shirt with matching jumper.

she turned the stereo on and

played her favorite song.

tying her hair into a loose ponytail,

she started to move her body to the

beat of the music, grabbed a paintbrush

and began to add some color to a

canvas with an unfinished sketch.

she suddenly remembered his smile.

it was a dangerous kind of beautiful,

like he knew something she didn’t.

without wings, her memories lay crucified

while they self-destructed and plummetted further

much deeper inside her lungs and into disgrace

as she inhaled the atmosphere, willing

herself to remember how to breathe.

she was god’s beautiful mistake,

uncertain like an afternoon rain

and imperfect like an

unfaithful moon.

she’s the after-burn of secondhand smoke

in your laid-back midsummer nights--

the classic black and white film noir victim

in this scripted tragedy of good girl gone bad reality tv.

she’s the prinsesa in your hardcore punk music scene,

pole-dancing like a vintage tease

and stripping to the tune of rock and roll ballads

while drenched in tequila shots.

she’s the pretty little nymph in your wildest fantasies--

your dirty little secret broadcasted in a tabloid scandal exposè.

her innocence is alluring, her smile has a double-meaning

and you tattooed her name on your left shoulder blade—

an innuendo for disaster and a pseudonym for catastrophe.

she’s a car crash type of beautiful--

a hot mess in lace.

she sips sunsets in red plastic cups

and writes suicide notes in newsprints.

she’s the rain on a sunny day and

an eclipse on a wednesday night.

she wears a rosary around her neck

and sings psalms before she sleeps.

she kisses teddy bears goodnight

and throws a tantrum before

she takes her medication.

she thinks there’s a conspiracy in psychology

and the music she listens to has subliminal messages.

she wonders why there’s a pyramid on a dollar bill

and why no one can escape this rabbit hole alive.

diamonds are just broken glass, anyway.

the rain drowned the sky like ocean waves crashing in the middle of a highway

and you can find me in my room writing you a letter

about how days blur into months

and how girls turn into ghosts

trapped between the pages of old notebooks

i tie my heart to a purple balloon,

watching it drift into the horizon

where the sun meets the moon

and the stars look like fireflies

waltzing to the tune of a fading lullaby

when i’m gone, sing me a song

about how pretty the leaves fall

when the wind blows to the east

and you can scatter my ashes

upon the lake where we used to

dip our toes in the water

in autumn, i want you to bury our memory in

the dewdrops stuck on the petals of waterlilies

and in summer, whisper my eulogy

on a thursday night when the clock strikes twelve

and in winter, light me a candle and let the wax

melt into a puddle of forget-me-nots

so you will always remember

me in spring

you loosen up the buttons of my biker jacket as we lay down beneath the skeleton moon as it buries itself behind a catacomb of clouds. and i untangle the butterfly stars from the spider web rain as it stutters in the boulevard of your ghostflower eyes, taking a sip of poetry from the torn pages of your citadel of thoughts. this night is an aftershock of whispers in the melody of sirens reverberating upon the chaos of silence.

if you want me turn back the hands of time, we could skip back to that moment when you were in the ocean of my arms and the lullaby of your breathing was the soundtrack of my mornings. and as we wake to the scent of yesterday still fresh in our heads, we jump headfirst into the waves of oblivion. scattered musings of forever linger in the debris of my ribs, cocooned like a bird’s song at dawn.

i am the midsummer daydream crawling its way into the museum of bones you built inside your head. i tattooed my epitaph upon your back and showed you a map leading towards the winding staircase of my mind. and even though you might lose your way, i’ll give you a pinky swear and we could always fast-forward to that day when you held me close and promised to kiss my tears away. we watched the sun fall from the rooftop and had conversations about where we were heading when our time was up, not knowing that even now, we couldn’t make time stop from plummeting deeper into a void where prayers were all we had left.

our smiles lay frozen in a photograph, our ashes fading faster than the dewdrops when hit by daylight. i watch our reveries sink in the river of our lost memories, hoping that one day, we can still spend lazy afternoons in the balcony of my heart while we danced to the rhythm of the wind.

The land was barren, the sky was black and all that were left of that night were ravished by wolves hidden in the shadows of old storybooks, waiting eagerly to pounce upon their unsuspecting prey when they reached a certain page. It was the same every time but the cataclysmic memory faded into a mere reverie inside her holocaust of thoughts. Darkness became a battlefield inside her mind as ghosts tend to haunt her dreams. It was in this abyss of phantoms that she learned how to fight off her own demons. Every night, she would chase crimson butterflies and end up falling deep into a rabbit hole where everything was not as it would seem.

“Tic Toc”, chimed the old grandfather clock in the living room, announcing it was already midnight. The girl had bags under her eyes since she was trying so hard to avoid sleep but to her misfortune, she eventually dozed off on the couch and butterflies materialized before her yet again, beckoning her to follow their trail. But suddenly, these colorful bugs disappeared into a haze of violet smoke and as she took a step further, she plummeted deep inside a burrow that was only small enough for a girl her size to fit in.

She was unceremoniously knocked unconscious after the fall. Weird chirping sounds brought her awake and she was surprised to see her reflection in a hall of many mirrors. These mirrors reflected her in odd shapes, some with big elfin ears and some with humungous fingers and big fish lips. She eventually found a mirror that had strange writings on it that she couldn’t quite decipher. She couldn’t find her reflection on it, only words. “Curious.” she exclaimed and tried to touch the symbols while pointing her finger towards it. And just like magic, she was sucked inside the mirror leaving her dazed and confused as ever.

Something growled from behind her and she screamed, surprised to see a small wolf limping towards her. She was afraid but instead of running away, she decided to be brave and beckoned the animal into her arms. The cub was unexpectedly docile and whimpered as she scratched its ears. She ripped the sleeves of her sweater and wrapped its left leg, bandaging the wound to stop it from bleeding. “It must be hungry.” she thought and carried the cub as she went on her journey, gathering wild berries on their way for food.

It was almost dark and the girl was glad she had the white furry animal for company. When they reached a small clearing near a riverbank filled with fruit trees and bushes with more berries, the girl also collected some twigs and rubbed them together until they sparked and flames started to appear.

“Tic Toc”, chimed the old grandfather clock in the living room, rousing her from sleep. It was almost morning but the land was barren, the sky was black. Crimson butterflies appeared in her thoughts. Darkness was her battlefield.

i. wednesday

It seems that I can't write a single thing that isn't about you. You have murdered my words and raped my thoughts with your aftertaste. And my stuttering consciousness has escaped my lips to turn into this fragmented sunshine that shatters inside my irises like sparks. And love becomes a distant memory where your ethereal face haunts my dreams and my whispers turn into screams.

I watch my fantasies fade and wither like roses in the winter and this is the end of illusions but I can't stop from wishing on a broken star and insanity defines me and my heart, it beats and it beats on and on and it doesn't stop like I want it to stop.

Your words breathe like they have a life of their own and since you have massacred mine, I would like to hang onto what's left of my reveries and die slowly.

You kill me with your cyanide tongue and as I overdose on yesterday's delusions, I smile and sink deeper into this abyss they call nirvana.

ii. friday

I see your face in between these paragraphs. I hear your voice amidst these fingers tapping on the frayed keyboard. I smell your scent in these pressed daisies that died on page two of my journal. You are still the ghost of my dreams and as I tear the sheets of my notebook into pieces, I can feel a part of you fade.

iii. sunday

I write these sunburned verses, dripping wet with satellite tears in each paragraph-- my pen resembling a syringe, injecting words to the veins of this page while I prepared a cocktail drink of rubbing alcohol and coca cola and swallowed it all in one sip. You are poison, threatening to murder my sanity with one kiss of the switchblade on my skin. Perhaps, one day, my bipolar heart will learn how to fall in and out of love without too much disgrace.

From my peripheral vision, I can see angels and demons riding paper-maché horses of a suicidal carousel, tempting me to join them. I wished them sweet dreams and declined their offer. I’d rather ride a rocket and fly to the moon because I know you’ll be there.

I’ll be your wendy and you can be my peter pan and we will build our tree house made of bubblegum and stardust. We can take turns smoking candy cigarettes and discover unnamed planets with our cardboard telescope. You will teach me how to play poker and we will mark each other’s faces with lipstick when someone loses. You’ll let me win all our pillow fights and I’ll tell you all my secret hideouts. You will keep all your promises and I’ll let you keep a piece of my heart.

iv. tuesday

It all started when you touched my fingers and it hastily ended when you let go of my hand.

We were sitting at the front porch, eating junkfood and drinking sparkle soda while watching kites pirouette above our heads.

I wish I knew what you were thinking that day.

v. thursday

There are times when I urge my heart to stop beating just so I could hear you breathe.

I suppose my bitter subconscious cannot handle yesterday because it keeps shoving memories at the back of my mind where it is difficult to touch. It's similar to watching a car crash in slow motion, every thing is a blur and like a damned butterfly, you can't do anything because your wings are ripped.

Thoughts float inside tiny bubbles within my mind and every time I try to reach them with my fingers, my fleeting assumptions burst and disappear. My skull is a blank mess, laced with inconspicuous logic. Whenever I think too much, I become lost and forget every thing else as I climb the winding staircase within my head.

I lie awake in bed, waiting for something to happen. Maybe I’m waiting for time to stop. Or maybe I am just waiting for you but I don’t know why I still hold on to something that doesn’t even exist.

Love, I’ve waited for you for a long time and now that time is dead to me, the sky is torn and I am broken.

My heart no longer screams your name.

you were glitter on the desecrated earth

that originated from dusty stars

which st-sta-stammered before collapsing to the ground

where broken bottles of vodka

lay near your grandmother’s grave.

you were always a pretty thing with a lollipop-hued mouth

and babushka doll eyes but as you hid behind

your mona lisa smile, nobody knew that you prayed the rosary

every time you wake up from a nightmare

and signed your name upside down on your diary

and wished on windblown dandelions

while smoking your step brother’s cigarette

that you managed to steal from his bathroom cabinet.

you kept your dad’s pistol hidden underneath

your pillow (empty except with only one bullet)

and played russian roulette with your reflection

on the mirror every night.

you were only fourteen when winter taught you

how to love and you gave up your dreams

to a boy that was eight years older

and as you began to realize your mistake,

it was already too late.

I saw you with him that night at the bar, drinking cold beer. You were in a purple hourglass bustier almost hidden in a kimono cardigan and cabaret high waist shorts with matching corset heels. I noticed the marks on your face where he must have hit you. Again. I could see past the make-up. Seriously, why do you keep up with the pretense?

I was playing pool with the guys but you were more worth my while. You are my very own Harlequin doll, as fragile as secondhand smoke and I’m your steampunk Lolita, dressed in pinstripe biker jeans and lace crochet top concealed in a crimson military jacket, my snowy white hair tied in mermaid tail braids. Together, we belong into the arms of midnight.

Smile, darling. What’s wrong? Why are you crying when I’m singing this song? Dance, my sweet. Come on. Don’t be shy and sing along. Let’s play slow seduction with guitar riffs and falsettos. Let’s take a sip of bordeaux moscato in mason jar mugs and capture fireflies inside tea cups.

I still remember when we used to hang around that old parking lot, learning how to do tricks with a skateboard. You were so cheerful and carefree then. Your smile picture-perfect, frozen in a time when all we had to worry about were studying for SATs and finishing our essays for English class. Our favorite was art class where we were both assigned to paint a mural to cover up all the graffiti in the school gymnasium. Even with all the paint smeared on your coveralls and your long wavy auburn hair a tangled mess, you were still beautiful.

That was before your parents’ hasty divorce, before your younger brother OD’d on heroin, before the hassle of hospital check-ups because your mom had Rai Stage II Leukemia. Before you met Damien. That summer, everything changed. You started to get really busy, even neglecting our painting class that almost without fail, we always went to.

Since you were pushing me away and ignoring my existence, I began to immerse myself with music, playing back-up vocals for the local ska band Mariposa. I would listen to reggae rock tunes and write lyrics the whole day. If only I could turn back time, I would rewind it to that moment when we were only twelve. We went to a butterfly sanctuary on a school field trip. That night, you tied a white ribbon on my finger and we made a pinky swear to be best friends forever. You suddenly gave me a kiss on the lips. It was just a smack but the feeling got buried inside my head for years.

That night, at the bar, I abandoned my band mates at the pool table and went to your side of the bar.

“Damien hit you again.”, I muttered angrily. It was more of a statement than a question.

“Cielo, it’s not what you think. I accidentally fell down a couple of steps of the stairs at home.”, Lorraine explained lamely.

I looked at Damien’s smug face, waiting for a reaction. He didn’t even acknowledge my presence.

I grabbed Lorraine’s hands and hastily went towards the exit. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

We ran in the rain and didn’t stop, laughing and crying at the same time. The heel from one of her stilettos got broken. “You should really dump Damien, Lori.” I told her when we arrived at the old parking lot. “He doesn’t deserve you.” I added. She nodded, shivering. “I know, Ci.” We were silent for a while, overwhelmed and trying to take it all in. Her face was inches from mine. She raised a finger and we made another pinky swear. “Best friends?”, she asked. “Forever.”, I answered.

Smile, darling. What’s wrong? Why are you crying when I’m singing this song? Dance, my sweet. Come on. Don’t be shy and sing along. There is something about you that I can’t quite place. Is it your angelic face that is the muse of this serenade?