✯ Promises ✯
“Promise me you’ll stay”
Maybe I should have promised that
But I hate making promises
That I cannot keep
“Promise me you’ll try”
I would’ve promised that
But sometimes I lose control
And forget all my promises as I sink away
“Promise me you’ll never give up”
I told you, sometimes there’s no self-control in me
And how can I not give up
When it feels like the right thing to do?
But...
If I ever meet someone
Who is more than just a friend,
As is the case with you,
I will:
♦ Promise to stay ♦
Ignoring the urges to run
♣ Promise to try ♣
Even when the battle isn’t possible to be won
♠ Promise to never give up ♠
No matter how bleak the future looks ahead
I will:
♥ Make thousands of promises ♥
Just to hold on to that extra-special someone
Home
There is a field of summer grasses behind the house, yellowed by morning frost and autumn sun, littered with the rusting corpses of old farm machinery, its purpose long forgotten.
Down the street there is a crumbling garage that smells of oil and gasoline, all dust and aging radio, some country singer nobody remembers rasping about a place that once was home.
The forest across the highway is silent in the heart of winter, a lone set of boot prints sentenced to obscurity as snowfall erases each impression.
It’s pretty here, mama,
away from the noise.
but I can’t stay.
I don’t want to be forgotten, too.
promise me you’ll stay
i don’t ask you to promise me non-existent goodbyes,
for i know even souls have a due date.
neither do i ask of you to give me a warning
when your time is about to expire.
humans are vessels of complex emotions,
you, darling, showed me just as much,
i saw your features fade in the hospital,
and i saw your eyes glow when you named me.
humans, then, are ephemeral,
they come and go at the impetus of a God,
a God so egotistical and foreboding that when he called you home,
he never bothered to let me know.
you, a human in all its splendor and majesty,
i loved every atom of your body,
from your arterioles to your nerves
and all that stood in between.
and see, i knew you forever,
in that lingering space called the nothing,
where a soul was originated and perfected,
and later, that soul was born.
your daughter being me, i learnt from the best,
but i also took a knack at your tantrums,
your senseless battle-fighting,
your lovely picking-and-prodding.
and of course, memories are ever-lasting,
and i made sure they’re perpetual, writing them on the walls,
secret journals and bathroom stalls.
i keep your essence ever-flowing, away from vanishing.
do you remember, angel, when we went down to south texas,
how you broke down when you thought your brother had left,
and the nervous laughter when we got lost nowhere?
or, maybe you recall that evening in march
where we appointed our calendars for the lunar eclipse,
and we stood by the balcony, hand in hand,
but i couldn’t concentrate on the bodies of mass dispersed in the galaxy
when you were right there, next to me.
souls and bodies, from ashes to ashes,
you remain ingrained in my being,
from a mother to a star, from the earth to the sky and beyond,
if such thing exists,
when i meet you there i’ll dare to say ‘i’m home’.
so, i’ll never ask you to promise me you’ll stay
for i know not even i can attain to such promise.
instead, i’ll rest glad, knowing somewhere our fates are bigger than the stars,
and you, my darling, will greet me with open arms.
someday.
You Are My Light
You are light
You are the color that washes the earth when the sun rises in the morning
You are the first star to grace the sky when the day transforms to darkness
You are the first raindrop to grace the earth at the end of a long drought when every form of life had shriveled up into nothingness
From the moment you fell to earth from the universe above your light shown and grew into a blinding force powerful enough to stop people in their tracks and move them to places they never thought they could go
Your light has shown people the way and blazed through their life when they had only darkness
You are the first thing that glows in minds when the day starts and the last thing lingering when the day ends
You are light in a way that cannot be only seen but has to be felt because it has the power to warm a world turned cold as there is no force stronger than the energy radiating from you
Your light cannot be contained or extinguished by those who are confused and don’t understand why a living creature can radiate in the way you do
You are light
You are a living light to the world and to me
This means war-- tug of war
her brown eyes shined
through her growl as we played
they seemed to say "this is mine"
and her tail wagged on full display
in my hands the toy was twined
but she too had a fair say
for her teeth were of design
to catch what she wanted, even her prey
of retreat there was no sign
and so the final tug I did not delay
victorously, I held up the toy and she reclined
"promise me" I said to her "you'll stay"
like the good girl she was, she stayed as assigned
though her will started to decay
the promise could not be long kept without a whine
and so she lunged at the toy and did not obey