moth to aflame

This is my pain these days:

sores all over like busy little insects

lodged just beneath my skin.

My recent brush with nature

bit me to pieces itchy and aching.

I was food, a convenient feast.

But really, I am only a shell.

A moth being carried with freedom

by a mob of ants forward right

up the leg of a chair headed for

a likely colony behind the wall,

where the queen, a god in the brink

of destruction, awaits an offering.

Then they all grow wings, organize,

and with premeditation, simultaneously

attack the lamp outside the church.

And after a few minutes, fall dead

one by one out of sheer exhaustion

or become food, wings aflutter on the jaws

of an army of lizards that live there.

This is my pain these days:

the world goes on as busy little insects

make a home just beneath my skin.

Sick Feet Under

I thought to bring back a little more
than running on zero
to fire up squeal so they hear
more than flutters of hope life and a future
as opposed to none
but I lost my right foot today
which is just sad yet there's no pain
to channel I float no
soaring here just waking
up feeling empty on zero
and having a bad day.

Reclaimed Dune

mine is an island

surrounded by the sea,

which would one day kill me.

sand beneath me slips time

passing through a bottomless pit,

home suddenly vanishing while I sit.

somewhere though lies

our planet separate but the same,

slowly rebuilding itself came

the life worms we brought,

digging deep without water,

and somehow so much better.

Gods that Fray on the Edges

There was light in the middle

And for a long time, I could see.

But curiosity is a creature

that flit at the edges,

compelling me to go further

follow search reach another

at the end of the tunnel.

While Two Boys Cross the Street, Holding Hands

In the middle of the road

an hour or so before midnight,

and there's nowhere else I need to be.

Going somewhere in a hurry kept

brushing past my shoulders

while on another's, a hand, levelled

with a one-way sign mocking

the lone cigarette butt swimming

in a puddle of waiting, sending me

back from across the window

to another time of receding lines

in the middle of the road

an hour or so before midnight.

Cusped for Jigs

While freedom beneath me slips

and peace flows lapping at my feet,

rain clouds came looming shadowing

my thoughts with scenes of drowning

at the shore of one more wide shot.

So I return, changed, the way you should be.

Or maybe not. It's been too long.

I have to try or die not knowing

what it must be like to live in that sea

where I have learned not to panic.

I shall jump from the cliff with hope,

diving deep into the depths

or crashing against the rocks.

Then sleep before all the fire blew out,

knowing you knew that light dies

one by one in the nightsky.

It did not rain

I go back finding myself going that way these days

Back home when it was still there.

Now it's Stein-like: there is no there there...anymore.

Back to an April turned less arid by a profusion of tears

as I run after Tito Willy, who became as elusive

as words, as dead as death itself;

Back to a dream-like November,

Mama looking straight into my eyes from her deathbed,

calling me by her dead son's name.

I ran away only to run back only to run after her

the way I ran after Tito Willy,

whom I became in her dying eyes.

Home then became as elusive as those two deaths,

tangible only because Mommy stayed (thankfully now)

rooted there on the side of the bed

telling me,

"I can't leave.

I don't want them talking ill of me after all these years

I stayed and suffered."

I did not run this time, and like her stayed

rooted in the middle of the bed

looking straight into her eyes

telling her,

"Don't tell me about people taking ill, Mommy.

I'm gay. I eat those ill words for breakfast.

Just give me the cue and we will both leave here

together."

And maybe, those same ill words (coming from me)

killed her in the end.

And so I compel myself to go back now

to that arid December, running again

to a home that died with Mommy, after three deaths in a row,

while the skies punish me by not raining.

Now back here, drained of vitality and too tired to ask,

"When do we leave?"

Patched waiting

Strangers all walk circle eyes

averted in all directions

seeking shade from the oppression

heat pain hardship confusion

thick like mud blood on

the soles of my slippers seeing

but blind to everything the

disembodied sermon crashing

down my soul splattered on

the pavement found a resting place

until suspicion rose like smoke

from the cigarette on the hand

of a child in mid-invitation

among the roots stones leaves oils

like an offering to gods in wait

guaranteed to relieve one of the

heat pain hardship confusion

in exchange for a little bit of

my soul splattered in the

middle of Plaza Miranda while

strangers all walk circle eyes

averted and barely there surviving.

Balikbayan

One week on the streets

unanchored crashing houses

on the way to people time places

I did not think to miss

crossing old bridges in repair

and new ones that were not on

the list of faces staring

at me from every vertical

taking up space for the right

to stain a finger and a nail

a great Kafkian mass

toppling in on itself

is it even worth it

to remember a day

when it did not rain in December

so I visited lives changed

but lived the way they were meant

struggling to make sense

futile like the desperate gyrations

of eight naked men

I cannot look in the eyes

but persistent enough bombarding

my consciousness in front of me

and all around dick in hand

I forget whose while beside me

a tattoo on the arm reads

"Bulwak" aptly on my hands

and jeans and shirt and everywhere

else still trying to find the peace

leading me back to one set of eyes

my stained hands reaching over

to offer friendship grasped

instead I drown and sink further

I have nothing more to give.

Sur(u)real

Night life is sporadic

death Gumaca seconds

of vacuum slowly then

briskly looming booming

noise thunderous oncoming

trucks buses tricycles

reach an overwhelming crescendo

then nothing cycling in

mind-numbing repetition

Morning inundation of

jingles utter flagellation

timed to the barking of

bitches pigs chickens

staccato pounding haunting

consciousness breaking early

shadows piercing my sun

rising to abstractions ending

with a whimper not a bang

change is no Change at all.

Lost Dune Less (for jazz)

Ours is the desert devoid of sandworms

Yet hope is a planet undiscovered

Pregnant as we speak like the future

Dimension where we shall soon fight

Again together again secured

Minds conversing feigns behind

Every feign and solitary

In our freedom no more.

My Pants on the Table

My favorite pair, at a time like this,

lie there with much thought put into it.

The rest, strewn around and about,

were accomplished by rote --

rather automatically, rare as these

come to pass, as passes -- made or given --

never visit as often as I would like

to like not even consciously, or so I say.

At least it was comfortable.

Hipo

Strangers sleeping dream worlds apart

Does one just really need to be touched sometimes?

Not this way--pushed and shoved and groped

In the semi-darkness of an unpenetrated vacuum

Sealed frozen core dried hollow shell

With nothing left but when do we go?

Being graphic

Back is but a word for escape:

Running away from the madness

That has been consuming me from within.

Here, where time is slower,

The madness likewise slows.

But there's barely anything of me left.

Pretty soon, the howling will emerge from the depths

To deafen my consciousness

And wake me with little left to run.