Spelling Bee

Do you find it
boring
to spell out the word
"subconscious"?

Not the way I spell it.

Many step onto the first "S"
as if it were
a dirty rain puddle,
but I'm sufficiently alert
and can see that one must dive
into the word's application,
nimbly rummage through the

annals of its history
before conducting one word
in or against its favor.

Glide downward
through the
rhythmically breathing curves
of the voluptuous prefix,
"sub-",
as you begin
dreaming
further
down
towards the comatose
of the rickety construction

that is your superego,
to the "you"
no one knows about
in clear daylight
(even the mirror).

Minor turbulence
may occur
within the rest,
"-conscious",
just a few jagged rocks
stirred into Cloud Nine
to alter your perceptions
like a face hit by a bus.

This is the meat of your matter,
the acidic ruptures
that only the most cunning
infiltrators
can identify and nudge
with their index fingers
using a painful precision,
the dirty band of undergarments
that always seem to loiter behind
in the town laundromat.

But a jagged rock
is a jagged rock,
never eternally bordering
the outline of the planet,
just lodged within the corners

of your comfort zone,
their presence

a necessary evil

for the times you must steer
through the swarms of cataracts

and endure the exrcuciating agony
of becoming a better human being.

You launch yourself
from your adolescent crutches
like the roots of teeth
erupting from the base of the jaw
and prevent single definition,

hack away the tentacles

of emotional paralysis,

by remembering to mend

the tear between

two polar halves,

"sub

conscious."

Under your false promises,
your Freudian timeline,
your ever-quivering Id...
every single one of you.

Manhattan Astronomy

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Tango, Bloody Tango

1 A.M. in Greenwich Village…something awful had to happen. Martin was walking in a shamelessly ginger fashion on the way to the apartment overlooking the vast majority of Christopher Street, eager to reach the finish line of what had been a quite marvelous day. He had told Derek that he was going to a meeting with the "stout and comical" poetry submissions editor of the New Yorker, but he was really sneaking away with his Caribbean mother to talk about a relationship that wasn't necessarily crumbling, but had a few ruptures peeking through near the core. This encounter between mother and son, spent walking through Martin's old Washington Heights neighborhood, had enough layers of significance to fit a Paul Thomas Anderson picture. There was the act of finally admitting to any human being that there, in fact, was something wrong with his seemingly perfect bond to the love of his life; the one everybody else had semi-officially deemed the "Gay Bogie and Bacall." Besides that, there was also coming to terms with a culture he was born into but never truly felt fully sheltered from, always too colorful for their frigidly accentuated gender roles. Apart from it all, though, was the thickest layer of this enjoyable piece of human drama: being able to talk to your mother about your love of a man for the very first time, with eye rolls and a grocery list of subjects to avoid a thing of the past. This ceremonial encounter is the Holy Grail for any gay man born into a once-backwards family, especially one with Dominican roots. This was the gay Lottery for the Dominican ones. After a few tepid sips of beer between the two of them, Marvin and his mother Patricia gave one last stalling glance around a local Dominican restaurant before Patricia put her left hand in her son's and, closing her eyes for a few seconds as if she were about to jump off a plane, said "Go." What followed was a series of events that were saccharine enough to create an entire month's worth of Lifetime movie plots, with Marvin burying himself in his mother's arms for the first time in years, and it still felt the same, he thought. They talked about everything, an archival recap of what's been going on in their lives, nothing terribly taboo, just things you share between the most important members of the family; it felt like 100% organic catharsis for the both of them. By the time Marvin lovingly bid his mother goodbye till next rendezvous next to a seedy portal leading to the subway system, he felt as if he were sprouting a new set of legs better suited to fit this marvelous new era in his life. It was on this sweet, savory note that Marvin rushed into his humble Greenwich apartment at one o' clock in the morning, ready to demolish the tension that had culminated in a dreadful fashion the past few months. Why did it matter if the scales of success were being tipped completely in one man's favor, nearly leaving the other with nothing to look forward to? This was a bump in the road, nothing more than that. "Nothing more than that" had become a trademark mantra by the time Marvin's mother was done giving relationship advice. He wasn't supposed to feel guilty for all the newfound career fortune but was supposed to support Derek during his time of professional hardship. It was as simple as that, and Marvin couldn't be happier at how stupidly easy the entire process of rising above the small things in a relationship could be. He closed the door quietly and, as if to make up for lost time, began almost gliding towards the bedroom, excited to talk to his beautiful mess of a man and help them both approach their early thirties (the midlife crisis issue was one of the "small things" mentioned between mother and son) with vigorous motivation and the utmost compassion and support…until he was within earshot of what was going on in the bedroom. Derek was always obnoxiously loud in this department. As his pleasant stride painfully dulled itself into a meek tiptoe at about the halfway mark of their hallway, Marvin sadly imagined himself, in the midst of this newly arisen tension, as some sort of a human slingshot, being released by the dimensions of time at the very moment him and his mother bid a temporary goodbye and moving at a speed not fueled by optimism (like he had imagined) but by fate. He had a certain feeling that this was meant to happen, and the fact that he, a grown man, had to slow himself down before entering his own bedroom helped this anxiety plenty. When the tip of his middle finger finally brushed the doorknob, Marvin aggressively grabbed it with his entire right hand and shoved the door ajar, exposing his to eyes to a tawdry snapshot of betrayal. Derek was in bed, grotesquely wasted, with another man, a disgusting little he-waif whose name he probably didn't even know. The fog of cheap lust invading the air prevented Marvin from yelling at the top of his lungs; his crushed spirit settled for a "what the fuck is going on here?" Derek didn't even know what to say; he was under such a vodka-laden stupor that remembering the basic rules of the English language was about as easy as balancing two anchors on your index fingers. Still, Marvin could tell that Derek knew he was in more trouble than he could bear, casting a glance away from the situation when Marvin kept staring at him and saying nothing but maintaining the facial structure of an abused child. The shock of the situation, however slowly it may have been traveling, finally entered Derek's mind, and in a heavily muddled slur, began trying desperately to alleviate the situation, even if he couldn't remember to finish the sentences he began. It wasn't long after Alleviation Attempt #117, better known "baby, bay, it's…it's…it's not…zzzznot," that Marvin clenched his fists like a wounded Black Panther and told Derek to "shut the ever-loving fuck up," knowing that if he listened to one more thing this unfaithful prick said, he, the prick and the (disgusting) little he-waif in bed (their bed) with him would certainly not make it out alive. It was quite strange that even amidst all of this sooty infidelity culminating on the bed, something else was to disgust Marvin even more. Through the subtle cataracts of tears, he saw what was supposed to be a token of his and Derek's…thing, tragic thing. In the outer left corner, hanging helplessly onto a mountain of discarded clothing, the scrapbook in which both men had kept all the first copies of their odes to each other (which had unanimously been referred to as a "sickeningly romantic gesture among two cynical old poets"), pages sprawled out like pairs of broken legs. "I can hear almost hear it whimper," Marvin subconsciously choked out. It was after this discovery that Marvin went from sympathetic victim of infidelity to expert in karmic retaliation. He didn't know how Derek, in his idiotic, despicable state, managed to knock it down in a fit of filthy passion, but he didn't care. Now, he was angry. As Marvin composed what was left of his good graces, he turned back toward the front door like a lieutenant leading his unit toward the front lines of combat, leaving Derek to be able to wake up alone in painful confusion. This was the first step. Marvin had to be very, very mindful of his actions now; he was much too quick to let go of his barriers before this debacle. It was time to be on the offensive, like he had planned a few weeks ago before deciding to actually work at improving this…thing, tragic thing. Derek turned around to find that his drunken lark of a one-night stand had done what any self-respecting New Yorker would attempt in this situation: use the first fire escape you see. Luckily for what's his name, the first one available was just outside the bathroom window. Even with all that going on around him, the only words Derek (the newly branded cheater) could muster were "I'm in some shit…" before collapsing under the pressure of his actions, and more than a few shots of Smirnoff. The next morning, Derek woke up from quite a night…at least, he thought it was quite a night, he couldn't really remember any of it at that moment, what with the lovely smell of napalm emanating through his morning after mind. This short spurt of memory deprivation was soon followed by a barrage of thoughts that all hit him at once like a swarm of miniature hangovers. Why the nudity, and where was Marvin? Then it all came back in the form of some disturbing grocery checklist: the face of that emaciated little man-whore that kept complimenting him the entire night, how one thing led to another and then to yet another, and Marvin's reaction…Marvin's wounded face. The image of Marvin walking in on the two friendly strangers had a merciful cloak cast upon it, all of it except Marvin's face. At that point, Derek wanted nothing more than to be passed out on a bar floor, or on a hospital stretcher being fed charcoal to prevent an alcohol-induced expiration, anything but this. Anything but feeling like disloyal, cowardly scum. He was waiting for the day he felt like this, and hitting bottom wasn't nearly as glamorous as he had imagined. A few seconds after Derek began cradling his heavyset head in his nervously quaking hands, the lock was practically ripped open by Marvin, stomping towards the room with venom tucked inside his soles. Derek looked up and almost jumped at the sight of the cheated lover, the man he sincerely loved, staring at him with eyes that were meant to castrate without the use of a blade. Marvin was wasting no time, diving right into this unfortunately significant war of words as if it were a passionate goodbye dance and bordering his words with a fire reserved for the steps of tango dancers. "Oh, you're awake. Start packing. I'll help if you want…unless you have any more starved twinks that are here to do my fucking job for me." Referring to their love for each other as a "job" would've easily gotten Derek going into yet another pent-up, passive aggressive tongue lashing in the past, but within this ever-humbling situation, he simply had to swallow his pride until it practically lodged itself inside his esophagus. "Marvin, baby…I understand completely if you don't wanna talk to me, but please, at least let me try to make it up to you-" "I was talking to my mother yesterday," Marvin interrupted brashly. "I didn't tell you because I was being mindful of your emotions, since you were so prone to snapping at anything I said that wasn't a fucking pep rally in your favor. Me being mindful of your emotions! Where the fuck is a clown with a cream pie when you need one, right?" Derek knew he was in yet another elaborately choreographed routine with his loosely-dangling boyfriend, but unlike the other steps, there was no way to return the favor. He must simply take it all like a deserving pack mule, feigning two left feet because those were the rules. Marvin continued, subconsciously then almost obviously relishing in being able to commit verbal manslaughter with no one questioning his sanity. It was his place to yell at this bastard. "She told me to keep trying, that it was just a few road bumps in the way." A short pause. "Leave it to yourself to go play in traffic." The dominant partner was luring the animal out of the following partner, no longer Marvin, now Martha singing Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf at the top of her lungs. He wanted to wound Derek as badly as he was wounded, and he wanted Derek involved in the process. Derek, even through the avant-garde fuckfest infiltrating his cranium, managed to dance circles around Marvin with a routine amount of excuses. "I love you so much and I really don't even remember what happened, I barely remember what he looked like. Please don't hate me. You can torture me, but I'll take it, I deserve it, I love you, just, just…" He began sobbing in that stifled, staccato fashion, the kind that always looked real no matter how theatrical the application involved was. "I just made a mistake, the usual one when you feel tension in the relationship…I know we had our problems, but I really couldn't feel, like…I could talk to you about them, but that's no excuse for what I did. I should've just acted my age and taken my aggression out in a positive manner, but I'm just a pig when I don't watch myself. If you let me make it up to you, I'll be so grateful. I love you." Marvin was as impressed as an arts critic of the New York Times at this presentation, the raw intensity with the crying; it was indeed quite a lovely show from the man he once held so high in his existence. A slow Tori Amos ballad would have probably fit as the background music. It's too bad for Derek, though; that was just what Marvin needed to add yet another barb to his kicks as he kept the two moving in jagged unison. "Our fathers were right about you." It was with this remark that the deck of cards became a lexicon of weaponry, their disheveled bedroom the new Hiroshima. Derek immediately closed his mouth shut and stopped crying in an alarmingly quick rate, looking straight at Marvin's cunning brown eyes with craven shock. "I know I did something terrible, and I deserve your worst…but who the hell are you to bring him up?" "The whole nation looks at us like we're smut peddling, cum guzzling perverts who can't call themselves real men, and while I've never had a perfect track record, I've never been able to prove them right. Thank you for making our fathers right about our kind, faggot. Thank you so much. You've made it easy." Derek couldn't take it anymore. His eyes were beginning to fill with as much hatred as Marvin's. Yes, he had gone into a self-indulgent drinking binge the evening before; yes, he committed what could be the worst sin in the realm of kinship; but he never enjoyed saying "faggot" so much, nor did he bring up anyone's abusive childhood; that was always unofficial off-limits material, no matter the situation. Once the thoughts of his father pushing him into corners and yelling to "get the fuck up and fight back" entered the already broken down scenery, the scales were finally even in Derek's eyes. This was to be a lover's dance with two leads, and all that's ever led towards was a bloody, bloody tango. "So you act like a rigid fucking cunt for months now, get a goddamn poem published in the New Yorker, act like I don't even deserve to stand next to you everywhere we go, need a bit of encouragement when the fucking publishing company lets me go, and when I have yet another cry for help that goes too far, so fucking sue me, this lets you talk to me that way? You're not that goddamn powerful." All that, and Derek didn't realize he was the one being dipped by the lead. All it managed was a smirk from Marvin, one plastered on his face to represent some sort of personal victory, a knockout solidified in Marvin's next remark: "Like I said, sweetheart…thanks for making it easy. Oh, and another thanks for bringing my mother and I together in my woes about this…thing, this flimsy, tragic thing. I'll at least have a support system for when I go through inevitable little withdrawals from your codependent ass." With that, Marvin walked in a shamelessly ginger fashion out of the humble and now violated Christopher Street apartment, leaving Derek to helplessly dangle around, looking for a remedy to his two left feet. Marvin was sure that this was only the beginning of the situation; that he wouldn't be able to live with himself if it just ended like this. For now, he enjoyed the sadistic side of his psyche, watching the man he (regretfully) still loved climbing arduously to regain his affection, frustratingly eager to find the rhythm.

Salad Bar

Melting pots are for racists.

The USA is a salad bowl.

The student lounge features

the veggies at their ripest,

collecting oxygen amongst themselves,

for the corn cannot exist

with the broccoli,

and so on

and so forth.

Don't even mention

fruits

to the potatoes.

And the tomatoes,

they're just weird, man,

don't even know

what they are.

We are all at our most

savory and nutritious,

our youthful wisdom

emanating through our

concrete set of hues.

The chili peppers emanate a color

as red as the blood

of their ancestral martyrdom,

no other color,

just red.

Same for the cucumbers

with hearts so coolly refrigerated,

taking forest green,

taking pastel green

with just a few drops

of ivory-scented beige

tucked neatly behind

walls of bamboo-level peels.

The voices of the onions

thud onto the floor

as if being catapulted

from cumulonimbus peaks,

causing the Iceberg lettuce

to almost drown in its own

dressing.

Lady Liberty,

a series of

produce section fragments

sitting much too sternly

with no regard for sprawling.

In the same bowl, though!

Small Recollection of my Day

I wrote the words.

And it felt
like I was making love
to the air.

Silence

Silence is a lake
resting equilibrium
before the shock waves.

El Borracho

Lo necesito
lo necesito
lo necesito,
cualquier cabrón caminando
entre las planetas de mi mente
sin cara,
con un intento
de matarme
antes que veo
su realidad.

Lo necesito
necesito
necesito,
el hombre
que puedes calmar
el infierno de mis
sentimientos
sobre todos los hombres
de mi vida.

Yo soy el borracho,
caminando
(bueno, tratando)
en las líneas flacas
del campo,
con una problema
diferente
pero bastante similar
en su aplicación.

Soledad
es mi vino
es mi cerveza
es mi vodka,
entrando mi mente
hasta que mis palabras
no son mías,
mis acciones
no son mías,
tu tampoco,

fantasma maravillosa,
idiota sin voz
que no aparece,
y hasta que es un conocido,
ojos con color,
me quedo caminando
en líneas equivocado
de lado a lado
con el borracho.

Stagnant Waves

It's yet another virginal autumn
sliding through the
core of my esophagus,
the most bitter medication,
and the healthiest
to some "He" I've never met.

Let us all take a gander
at the undersexed ice queen,
turning his moans
into a frostbitten cackle
heard far past his grave
crafted with the polarizing
limestone of unintentional cynicism.

He sits at the bumper
of your public transportation system,
perfectly positioned in the middle,
so he can play God,
he jokes!

But it's because he loves people watching.
People watching
is not
people knowing;
people watching
is not
people loving.

Judgmental
is a barrier
same as those
elementary PSAs
about saying no to
strangers, also known as
creepy men with toupees
in decades-old station wagons;
these filthy humans,
all know that man,
all are his children,
all his faithful followers,
his filthy, faithful followers,
no sensual thoughts
will creep into my untouched oats
this grimy morning!

I will never
have dreams
in warm Equator-creeping nights
of making friction with their flesh,
even the boy,
the beautiful boy
standing savagely
on this public bus,
making the waves
pumping through this contraption
that makes up my frame
no longer stagnant,
rabid with the saliva
begging to drop
to commemorate
my loss for words
and my panting
need
for action.

His body is eternally dripping
with the juice of a hard man's labor
luminous vibrance through the skin,
the power of the Latin sun
in the drops of salt running
all the way
down his body

and I feel myself
recording his existence,
no name needed,
just his face
and body
in this rhythmic Orlando morning.

Ultimatum

Give me a man
who will wrap his fingers
around my waist,
treating his life like
a flexible toothpick
to prevent my caving in
towards the stained harmony
of celibacy

and I will provide the cure for cancer.

Provide me with a man
who will take these
drapes of solitude
hanging upon each shoulder
(all corners weighed down
by the lead of self-ambivalence)
and toss them as if they were
patches of cloudy fabric
waiting to be shooed away
like a mosquito with thoughts

and I will hide you all from
the surgical hands of Fate.

I've already wasted to null
the charm of an Annie Hall,
already raped
the carnal camaraderie
of the girl next dorm,
and now the last resort is
quid pro quo, world...

Quid pro quo.

Creative Writing, Chapter One

For our first assignment, I chose the one with this objective: take a sentence from a textbook, pamphlet, etc. (basically any piece of writing meant to be purely informal and have absolutely no imagination to it) and turn it into an image that provokes the human senses. You were supposed to do three. I chose these:

1. "There are infinitely many normal distributions, each with its own mean and standard deviation."
IMAGE:
The chaotic pitch of
the All-American babies
of your average neighborhood
is a seemingly infinite bell toll,
with each bundle of joy
compiling individual
windows broken per day
and standard aim for adults' eardrums.

2. "Charlotte Busch is a chemist."
IMAGE:
Charlotte Busch,
I said MISS Charlotte Busch,
dons her lab coat every sunny morning,
her idea of a white linen dream,
pouring her preciously concocted acids and bases
as if they were the second to last
glass of champagne
in a career-long honeymoon.

She needs no man.

The name of her vocation speaks for itself.

3. "Please note: you CANNOT pick up any mail/packages for another resident."
IMAGE:
Every formal letter
that I carry out of the typhoons
of supermarket catalogs
seems to always reek
of the same
post-apocalyptic diction
chilling my bones until
I'm back in this
George Orwell mind fuck.

That ice pick of a voice
speaks into the town intercom:
'You can
NOT <-- underline
pick up mail for
any
other
inmate.'"

Answer the question, mothafucka

So I'm sittin in the back of a
C H R Y S L E R
smokin some
GOOD ass weed
with my...man
...the love of my life
...my boyyyyy toyyyy

see, cause I used to feel like a million tonight
(but I'd take em two at a time)
until he came up and saw me sometime
and I soon realized
that it's not the men in ya life,
it's the LIFE! in ya MEN!

(so to move away from
what the inner gay circles call
QUEENING OUT)

I was smokin some
GOOD ass weed
in the back of a chrysler
with my BOY. TOY.
and i remembered smokin some
GOOD ass weed
in the back of his house...
WITH THE PARENTS STILL IN THERE

and my love for him just overcame me,
love beating out the THC
for the territory of the blood in my veins,
and I got the courage
the balls
to say "HELLO...BOY. TOY."

and I thought he was perfect,
until that very moment
when I let myself go
and the good for nothing jackass
opened his mouth
and had the courage
the balls to say:
"Yo, pfft haha, you such a queen, yo."

...HA. HA. HA
What the hell do you mean by that?

"Nah, baby, don't get offended,
but you lookin like Joan Crawford right now"

...
MOTHA
FUCKA.
DO YOU WANT ME TO KILL YO FAMILY?
WHO THE FUCK
HAS THE NERVE
TO BRING JOAN UP IN THIS CONVERSATION?

Who has the chutzpah to bring up
the Queen of Hollywood in this dialogue
of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Monkey's hide?!
What has she ever done
except beat a few children
and make Trog her last movie?!

Who do you want me to be,
Clark motherfuckin Gable?!

Oh...I get it...
classic actresses ain't REAL MEN.

They haven't been torn apart
like a feature film starring Elizabeth Taylor
(after the weight gain)
by their uncles
and their drunken failures of a father
who beat into them
the drone-like chantings of
"I wanna be just like
Al Pacino!
Clint Eastwood!
Cary Grant!"

They weren't real men
like
Rock Hudson
like
James Dean
like
evn Marlon Brando

all men who slammed
and debonaired
and fought in the street
until the layers just flowed
into their souls
like the Benjamin Franklins
sifting aimlessly onto their laps
because the forbidden fruit-flavored
sun-kissed lilacs of success
blinded their terror
over being
DIFFERENT.

but let me tell ya somethin honey.

Mr. Cary Grant
would have sold his
testicles
fake wife
3rd boat called The True Love
for a chance
to wear that Bette Davis dress
in All About Eve

where she's
stomping
down
the stairs
and she says
FAAAAAAAASTEN YO SEAT! BELTS!
IT"S GOIIIING TO BEEEE A
BUUUUUUUUM!
PY NIGHT!

and sashaying away
cigarette in hand
waving it from left to right
left
to
right
making acrobats
out of all the stomachs
in that ballroom

but still elegant!
and classy!
and over the top
because she knew
the greatest role of one's life
was LIFE
and the boy watching her knew too,
practically grabbing onto her leg
like the son of a mother he never had

because he had one
that took him to doctor's appointments
and was an absolute joy
when her son remembered
to don his designated censor bar

but not one so
FAH-BYOO-LUSS

who had the REAL
courage
the real
BALLS
to tear up a fuckin room
all because
OF A WIRRRRRE HANGER!!!!

"WHAT'S WIRE HANGERS
DOING
IN THIS
CLOSET!"

And THAT
Mr. Paul Newman
is why I
have a poster
of MISS! BETTE! DA! VISSSSS!
right in front of my bed
so it can be the last thing i say good night to
with the word "GOD" taped right above it

and I pray!
"In the name of
BUT YA ARRRRRE
BLANCHE
YA ARRRRRRRRE
IN THAT CHAIR...."

A Poem A Day

I'm setting myself up
on a dietary regimen
of mass proportion!

A poem a day
starting today
until every page
of this 33 cent notebook
reeks of the Holy Trinity
of salty excretions.

Documentation
of all this unseen footage
right as the celluloid
has treaded the limits
of my powder keg mind
and they really do send me
to lick my wounds and name them
after fellow inmates.

Maybe by the end
I won't be a one-trick pony
Won't be so
redundant
redundant
redundant,
like that rhetoric,

like those times that you caught me
with my fist in my mouth,
sliding it further down my esophagus
with sandpaper-laced knuckles
and a smile with a hellfire-lit joy.

I will not be a manufactured
product of your ancestry!
I will rise from this
"Misery loves company" gimmick,
landing feet upon places
you probably couldn't even spell at my age...
let alone now.

It's the labor pains
of hearing your eyes seethe with rage,
the hunger pains
of never realizing my full human worth
that will subside when I
grab these reins you've been
tightening my neck with for almost two decades.

So it's a poem a day,
starting today,
and lasting long after
you say
"It'll fail."

Two Weeks Notice From A Hispanic Rebel

What is the versatile autobiography
of this bountiful of rice
boiling in my American kitchen?

This crop of microscopic slabs of grain
that was the one edible source
of preventing my ancestors' emaciation

One of such few things
connecting me
to my roots,
those things I can't help but bleach
in whitewashed and rebellious peroxide.

I will valiantly hang my head down low in shame
at the examples of my flesh and earth,
"those National Geographic cavemen,"
all the time being the zoo animal,
being blindfolded and caged by
these "secular, American liberals."

I love this food
that I consume like a vacuum,
this merengue and bachata
that I so happily shake my ass to;
but nowhere did I sign up
for these commandments
that I was appointed
based on the location
that I popped out onto.

Saturation of Contrast

I hear the thunder meddling
its way among the raindrops
that permeate through sunlight
and realize
that the weather is a motif
for God's emotional prognosis.

God is but a seaman;
he and I stammer upon the same boat.

Our existence makes a pair
of helplessly hanging doppelgangers,
orbs of confusion that contract
whiplash with every turn they make.

Two repressed housewives
that put all their hopes and dreams
in a shit-stained smile.

This collision of light and malevolance
is but His way of symbolizing
my shame-patronized indecision
in a way that makes people tear up
at the joy of beauty.

What I would use as my personal ad.

Pedro

19/M/ Florida


Sometimes I find myself to look so grotesque in real life that I feel like I would be the perfect candidate for those medical reality shows on TLC and maybe even Discovery Health Channel about people with a debilitating facial, bone, skin, etc. disorder that's almost impossible to look at.

You have to make me not feel that way more often.

Untitled.

I am the greatest anomaly of my generation,
nimbly rummaging through the annals of my wit
with a current of charm running through my teeth,
inspiring all to transcend their surroundings
with the utmost sophistication and pathos.

Three seconds pass, and this identity scurries
quicker than a cheating lover in a Bessie Smith tune,
and I am once again just another
sheet within the reams of paper thin souls,
giving any prick the role of impaler.

They shall write this on my tombstone.
Magic marker epitaph sliding down damp cardboard
as the rain makes wooden chips from my bones,
the last time I lie here
with eyelids unlocked.

The Greatest Parody

Look at me, I'm so legit!
My threats to you are full of shit!
I'll make you feel so goddamn small!
At five feet, I am standing tall!

Na na na na, boo boo boo boo
That is what I say to you you
My skewed wisdom takes me back to junior high
But ask me if I care, cause I just made you cry

Worship me
I'm a parody
The kind of thing that's tailor made for South Park
And I've built up
Enough chutzpah
To get the cunning of a plastic shark

Honey, let me tell you
I redid the whole word "stereotype"-AND
I know your teenage little brother's
Little sister's
Distant cousin's
Ugly girlfriend's
Pet dog's
Favorite BAND

I'm better than you
Simply because
I dance reggaeton
UNTIL
I hump the floor
And then the floor
Calls me a whore
And then I get AIDS
Even though
The floor told me
It got tested
No worries, though
I'm still the best

And I'm still better than you, my friend
I'm still better than you, my friend
I'm still better than you, bitch

Better than you, cause I'm so damn cool
Better than you, cause I ruled high school
With an iron fist
Don't enter my clique
I'll beat your ass with my magic stick

OH...
And one last thing
As I'm almost done singing...

If I were famous, my name would be Mocha
So you better get your caffeine fixes ready


Because you know I'll be famous
Once I'm out of this wet box
In the middle of New York City
And the pigeons stop eating my money.

Excitement of Secrecy

Dotted lines prance in the middle of their beds at home.
They always seem to say the same things
while conversing on the corner of Easy Street.
"Nothing is satisfying.
Especially at home!"
Their wives don't know how to please a man.
They still remember the first day
when both came out running
and each made their first move.
The excitement of secrecy.

They position themselves inside a box-sized cubicle
and get ready to purify themselves from the chains of shame.
Morals make no barriers within the marrow of their bones;
they just flow like the core of a stumbling landslide.

And when one stands up,
perfectly pressed shirts crumbled on the floor,
burning through cigarettes like Margo Channing,
He feels fulfilled.
He's had his fix.
At least another person knows

the excitement that lies in secrecy.

Chocolate Porcelain Caramel Skin

Please pull your pants towards the floor, my dear.
Let me handle that meat lying on the full-size bed.
Don't be timid-we're all premature adulteresses in this room.
Johnny, come quickly towards my sighing need.
Making me want to scream your entire name by these seas of flame,
especially when your sweat seeps through the ridges of my bliss!

Your lips make my throat two walls of dried sin.
I live to take hold of your
Chocolate
Porcelain
Caramel skin.

I can spend hours looking at your full lips.
It's the feature that separates boys from men.
Force me down, prove me wrong with those promising threats.
Hold onto that climax until it borders on violation.

While I could maintain an appalled expression at my reflection,
you prevent this with your numbing erection.
Wading in a murky puddle of lust is fresh air moving with you
and the tongues slithering all the way up to my shivering legs!
Keep on whispering while you make me speechless!
Keep on getting stronger while you make me melt!

You strip me of my innocence with a devilish grin.
That must be why I love your
Chocolate Porcelain Caramel skin...

Riot Call II

I have sent a request
to all the white cone clad
twiddling their thumbs with menace
and hunting for their latest scapegoat
to mask their feelings of inadequacy...

As the smut on my garage door
slithers your hatred along
in the form of the word "FAGGOT"
and the last three men who shook me to the core
have been reduced to front page casualties,
I beg to finally join this league of humankind.

Please, ladies and cavemen, do as I ask
or I might just lead myself to
break
your double standard neck into thousands
of desperate times that surpass desperate measures.

You see, you've eliminated all the other options,
as I will no longer be reduced
to another strange fruit hanging
on the swastika tree, for I've seen
the cracks from the stones
colliding into your precious glass houses.

Preaching your "manhood" and your "sanctity"
on your altars as the color of your
wife's eyes seem to slip your busy mind,
giving us yet another juxtaposition
to lock with these once worn chains
onto your Stone Age door.

It must stop.
Those sounds of you slinging
your fists and your speech
towards all, including your own flesh and blood.

Our palms can't stay nailed to the wooden floor,
our lips can't stay sewn shut anymore,
angels writhing in their graves,
your time has run out!
Here my friend...is your riot call.

Everything That's Meant To Happen Does

Again and again and again and again,
yet another "etc." sealed onto the end
of a line I was sure would cut off continuation
someday.

The walls are much more pale these days,
letting out yawns of feigned animosity
with a knowledge that they need not close in
to provoke exasperation--
a slight and aging slant provides sufficient
spiraling.

Outside, baking in the sun, the unfinished sentences
drag their soles along the pebble-ridden concrete,
stomachs slouching over their pants so far
as if to cascade all the way down to the sidewalk.
They can only toss parades for handfuls of newborns
that seem to multiply in handfuls of
seconds.

It's been a glaring shade of winter.
Standard procedure,
with the exception of eyes drooping,
and the desire to escape from oneself
seething.

Obvious Differences

I am one of the modest folk mote,
walking lethargically in curvy circles,
shuffling my feet in a small English town,
pulling the charcoal wool over my bloodshot eyes.

And the difference between us is
I'd much rather keep it that way.
There's no point in fighting today.

I am a fashionable mannequin
with a limp wrist and a lazy hip,
lithping all my thtereotypth
for the unisex scientists to hear.

And the difference between us is
I'm high on life and sleeping pills.
My stability is Fed-Ex'd and I'm sitting still.

I am a starving artist.
My white knuckles show just how strongly these knockdowns can pull.
Even rolling thunder cannot knock down the establishment
of transparency and an elephant's memory.

The difference between us is:
you see the point in the stiff upper lip.
It's hard enough for me to maintain this grip.

And I'd much rather keep it that way.
There's no point in fighting today.

Ma, I'm Gay

I can't stand the restlessness any longer!
If I were wearing a 19th century hairdo,
it would look like a haystack by now!

It sickens me, how they avoid me.
It's because I'm not fabulous enough, girrrl.
I don't don't emanate ferocity like those glowing sequins...
I mean, seriously, if you're gonna
rob this country of its morals,
you must do it like a diva all the way through--

So you're not a flighty Nancy Boy.
A maricon.
That's not how your Dominican father raised you!

You were expected to ripen and rot as qucikly
as the ideals we so cautiously laid upon you,
and you look like you've basically entered adulthood,
that nice stage where you're your own mortified audience.
"He's a filthy motherfucker"
turns to
"I would make a horrid boyfriend,"
"I'm unique" becomes "I'm hideous,"
and your cuts for pain release
are now for your hatred at the flesh gawking lazily below you.

This, my child, is opening the doors to your heart.
Never thought it'd be such a pigsty, that's for sure.
When it reaches years of pretending not to have one,
it's bound to happen.

Done with freshman year at college,
and you've finally reached puberty!

On Turning Nineteen

I can't wait to be 19,
the age where hipsters become hipsters
and your cosmopolitan side begins to
radiate from your body.

You begin saying things like "I've been there, man,"
and flaunting your newfound cynic realism
as if it were an accessory from the Velvet Underground's tour bus,
because anything is better than 18.

Anything towers over that collection of 365 salt grains
that consists of taking a dive in the real world,
with your feet meeting the Jaws of America.

I am turning 19.
Alas, the beginning of repression,
where it's no longer chic to tremble with honesty,
so you begin storing it and saving it
for the hibernation of your Alvy Singer neurosis.
Goodness gracious, that's in fashion.

It's not you in the mirror.
It's you that's become deformed
by the mask that was pushed onto your face,
or maybe it was you flew into it,
I can't remember at the moment.

Anyway...your blood has had its last curdle,
and the car crash could be so obvious--
the engine would zoom past all their noses--
without the lack of humanity for medication.
You don't know what exists, and you're cold fucking sober.

But damn, it makes a great poem.

Two short ones

I wrote these senior year in my English class for little assignments, and I actually liked the results.

One is a haiku:

The Day After Tomorrow
In desolate lands,
the jagged nails of branches
scathe the earth's ego

And ze other one is a tongue twister

Roar
Roses ride
'round the running romance
of resonance and rhythm,
reducing rulers
to a ripened rage.

The Happy Train Caboose...or Writer's Block

The last drop of fuel
has vanquished within the fog
of vacuous steam,
and the words are asphyxiated
by the author's incompetence
before his toes even tap
upon the starting line.

It's even a hassle
scribing these simple words
without grinding my teeth,
headbutting defeat,
and fixing the channel
with which I once could
transform the bulging of veins
into the unraveling of stanzas.

With a pitter-patter here
and a tick and tock there,
the hourglass spins itself towards nausea
and still no denouement
from a muse that replaced burning passion
with a scalding charcoal mind.

How could I let them get to me?
How could I let them make mockery
and triviality of the art
held with the greatest sincerity,
leaving me a pigpen
of unanswered questions
tinged with urgent frustration?

Did I really just end this with a question?

Strands in Space

I've been thinking about this one for a long time...well, there was a big space of time in which I didn't, but with my sister's 22nd birthday around the corner, I decided to finish it. In this poem, I am foreshadowing when we are both of old age and on the last leg of our lives, and we are both saying goodbye to each other for the last time (let the "awwww"s commence). So, here it is...

It was that wide screen sort of moment,
where the night sky stretched like navy blue silk
and the stars bedazzled through the atmosphere,
the perfect scene to begin the end.

With leather hands upon wooden handles,
the tense preparation rocked to and fro,
and each sibling knew they needed to state their vows
before there were no hands, big or small, to follow.

Like she had all the decades of her life,
the sister sprinted head-first through the pack
and began the ceremonial encounter,
tears already rimming the outlines the eyes.

"My warrior growl would have simply dwindled,
my loving strength would have never surfaced,
were it not for the development
of my watchful eye towards you.

I give you a thanks that spans across galaxies
for making me realize that the woman running in this heart
could delve much deeper than her surroundings,
and form a bond that gives much too pride for one lifetime."

With a breathless exhale tinged in red excitement,
the brother nearly jumped from his rocker,
more than ready to begin his greatest wordplay
and make them both depart with a bang.

"I don't know how my life span would have thrived
if you had not looked me straight in the eyes
and made me realize that layers are nothing
but barriers for the tangled lands of your cock-eyed innocence.

You were not just a pillar of strength;
you were a carrier who made the human spirit contagious.
If they could not quiet you as a mortal,
Lord knows how they'll try in Heaven."

So each said their piece,
and with the peaceful fog
clouding both of their minds,
they realized it was time.

It was a quiet disintegration,
with each participant smiling, eyes slowly closing,
freeing themselves from their bodies like stardust
towards their own constellation in the sky.

Standardized Centralized Assessment Aptitude Test Quiz Exam

I wrote this one during my 12th grade AP exam a bit less than a year ago; almost forgot about it completely. Thought I'd post it here.

"My my, how scholastic!"
Thought the token poet
as he watched the other aspiring white-collar donning
skim through their standardized papers
and sharpen their No.2 pencils
as lazily as possible.

Meanwhile, he sat there, puzzled,
with a certain question constantly battering his mind:
"What the fuck is the point?"

Angelou and Dickinson were not born for concrete philosophy.
They did not form a flourishing union with the pen just to become
some mathematical code to be deciphered
by the future lawyers of America.

The art of writing...
Once again, the art of writing
Is exactly what it is:
An art!

It is meant to seep through the skin
and challenge its taker for more than 40 minutes on the dot;
meant to be more than just a crossword puzzle;
meant to be more than a just a chance for multiple choice questions
to pounce on their puberty-stricken prey
with inferences on tone, subject, and syllogisms in between

They are the speaker.
You are the audience.
That's the beginning of the journey,
and the end should never be the same

A few months later, token poet gets great news:
FAIL WITH FLYING COLORS.

Perks of Desolation

I wish I could drive a fossilized Cadillac
right through an arid desert
in the middle of Arizona
so my desolation can have its own landscape.

I’ll ask the grains of sand
rocketing in swirls around the wind
if it’s seen my talent running by;
I’ve been calling it for months now.

The citizens of Earth are not cold.
It was just my eyes that gave them frostbite,
my mind that morphed their faces
to resemble the hideous change within.

I’m not sure if that’s a truth
that fate has put on layaway since birth,
or perhaps a rumor that’s been force fed
like wart-ridden frogs to the purest of tongues.

All I want at this point
is to be a center of a desert’s mushroom cloud,
leaving with a new look at the sky
and a bit of dry skin.

Psychosomatic Slavery

I stood there like a drop of water
as you savagely tore my very last shred
of ill-fated dignity,
as you so cunningly blared through
my symphony of thoughts
with your out of tune foghorn.

There’s not a thing left to say.

I’ve already let every scathing insult,
every hideously imaged simile
escape from my yellow-tinted lips
just when I could find your eyes and ears
turn their attention towards another victim.

It makes my stomach turn and flare
to even try to find a reason
for the way you so menacingly throw
my existence through the gutter of your misery.

It seems like I was meant to live
for just a moment, in a follicle of time
before I signed my soul away
to the dictators, vermin, and snakes of today.

Nothing Is Nothing

Without the love of poetry,
were it not for the words ricocheting
from the nests in my soul
to the white paper sky,
nothing happens.

Absolutely nothing.

No planets will crash in the middle of space.
No ocean will swallow a village of saints.
Children will not start falling like dominoes
in a center for terminal illness.

Nothing will happen.
Absolutely nothing.

Earth that once flourished would now turn to stone.
Dust would be born from the stars that once shone.
All homes would be painted the same drab gray,
reeking worthlessly of tension and words unsaid.

All because of nothing.
Absolutely nothing,
which is not death itself,
but might as well be the nickname,
as he who does nothingis nothing,
and I might as well fill the air
I so constantly breathe.

Cheap Biology

I am utterly convinced
that my spirit is a ten-cent whore,
letting any passing nemesis
fuck it in the mind
with almost no tension.

It must enjoy the sensation
as its host clearly shows
in the streams of tears
that flow through the eyes,
the spirit's ejaculation.

It must become the sadist
at the viewing of torture,
as its host sits in an icy stupor,
with the times of bawling on the floor
and penetration of the flesh
the only times of breathing.

My spirit must have stolen all the charm it takes
to captivate the enemy into arousal,
as the host stumbles awkwardly in public,
pushing all potentials away with vehemence
and convincing itself of its inferior quality
to even the vermin of the sewer.

My spirit has made me the loathing host
to the parasite of my own existence,
with my mind as the main casualty,
ridden with smut from outer villainy
and decay from Casanova-esque traumas.

I hope it's happy.

Organ Music

As the exhaust spewed its mourning glum
onto the whimpering porcelain snow,
the chauffeur looked up and desperately prayed
for an Academy Award winner.

"Novelty tears shall spout at all times!"
And the thespian will charge through those double doors,
beginning his craft from the moment he hears the bawdy organ
singing the deceased's pleas towards the golden gate of Heaven
and crunching through an audience of bawling admirers
of a man he barely knew.

He was chosen to give the eulogy.
Designated to speak on the behalf
of man he never thought to glance at twice,
besides the intervals of days spent
despising the realization of his existence,
resenting the scars created in surplus quantities,
stomping down the darkest layers still oozing from the coffin.

For a handful of hours, it must all become a waning spark for the
method actor giving the most crowd-pleasing breakdown of his life,
delivering a perfectly tailored recital
cloaked to all the front-pew viewers
as a heartfelt elegy.

"Just a few hours," he thought as the double doors creaked,
and the scene will end with him sliding into his car,
a dead weight off his shoulders,
driving victoriously into the sunset.

A new set of tears rolled with the end credits,
along the face of the son,
liquidating the thespian with their bleak sincerity.
They were drops of remorse
for a bond that was never born,
with an abortion in a wood encasing
for all those people out there in the dark.

Royal Blue Abrasions

The elegant madwoman with a golden valor.
Louder than the falling trees
stumbling everywhere around her feet!
The spiritual mother, everyone's empress,
a concrete rose blooming over every obstacle
as if she were a one-woman, 21st century dynasty
with no malfunctions in its empire.

But, there's something writhing its way out
from the cellar reserved for her scathing history.
Past the cobwebs and futile pretensions of valiance
lies this warrior queen's greatest desire:
shrouded in shame, the need for love still haunts.
But it won't some accessory amid the ninth cloud!

Hard work and minimum wage flow much more smoothly.
She's known this since she discovered the world,
since she entered a home full of broken furniture
and reeking of alcoholic breath and stagnant, bitter tensions
that were released when father's fist met daughter's face,
and her bruise-soaked body became the symbol of her innocence.

That must be why she spends so much time
in the darkest Brooklyn alleys, selling her self-respect
to any man feeling particularly kind that night,
and letting any detrimental cycle resurface
for just one rush of vulnerability.

This contemporary queen dons a crown bejeweled with more grit
than the streets of three New York boroughs,
yet all she requires of the world that she holds in her hand
like a ruler deciding the fate of her people
is someone to transform adoration from myth to reality.
Will she ever find light from the alley?

Fly In My Drink

There
Is
A
Fly in my drink
And I'm starting to think
That my luck's on the brink
Ever since you told me
That one half of the bed
Seemed a bit more cozy

I soon realize
That I'm not drinking anything
And the poor old fly
Is drowning
In my
Pity party

My gloom made it nauseous
I've become so obnoxious
Since you sucked the life right out of me

I
Hope
You
Choke on the words you said
And the shallow waters that you tread
Are infested with piranhas
That's how it goes if you're not gonna
Live in the presence
Of someone
As holy as me...

I sucked your toes
I Folded your clothes
I made you stand on top of the world with the utmost grace
I told myself "Problems jump the ledge just by looking at his face"

I
Tell
The
Leeches hovering around me
That I badmouth you
Just to give Revenge a smile on her face
But here's the simple fact:
Your departure wasn't that bad

It's just that you hurt me
For Christ's sake, you hurt me
I can't believe you hurt me
Can someone stop this hurting?

There
Was
A
Fly in my drink
When I started to wonder
If this entire thing was starting to go under...

All Remains Illuminated

Life is a French movie scene
With characters skipping down the street
Passing pastry shop after pastry shop
And whistling to their own beat

There are no caricatures
There are no addictions to artifice
There are no hypocrites lying on the street
Yelling all our sins into the concrete

Even with an explosion on the set nearby
And as the ending credits descend from the sky
As the undertones of horror make all of us cry
All remains illuminated

Life is a vintage record store
That stretches past the horizon
Curious minds introduced to rapture
As the first notes begin rising

Although the wearing of the discs may show
A scratch in each song's strand
The music still plays as clearly
As diamond dust on dry land

Even with the CD skipping now
And you wanna be a star, but you don't know how
Even as Rolling Stone destroys your sound
All remains illuminated

Even with America straddling on all fours
Even as fire ants invade your shoes' holes
Even as life takes a toll on your lightweight soul
All remains illuminated
All remains illuminated
All remains illuminated NOW.

Our Hearts Shift With The Seasons

First days of autumn
Cascading tranquility
Love stands at its peak

You're the whistling wind
My heart flies along smoothly
Like a chipped red leaf

Winter approaches
Daggers in its icy hand
To stint our love's growth

Thankfully, for us
We see no signs of frost bite
Ignorance is bliss.

Timeline

I don't know when I became a one man island,
isolated even from the best of me.
All I remember is a need to touch society.
I yearn to hear a voice soothe my mind.

I don't remember when nostalgia charged through the door.
The only reminders are the gray follicles on the floor.
They were never recreation, but now they latch on with a vengeance.
I'm under siege to the dictator of the past.

The future never had the face of a hungry rapist.
Tomorrow's hands never moved at maniacal speeds.
The light at the end of the tunnel is glaring into my eyes.
I start to even pray this isn't my designated freight train.

I keep trying to make a calendar of sedatives.
I keep trying to take it one day at a time.
But with my sparks running for another place to glow,
and a time line of grudges preventing my blood from even tiptoeing,
this mess I must clean up
can no longer fit in a wave past its crashing time.

Still

Are you listening, God?!
Are you ready for the satisfaction of this moment?
Well, get ready for me to say this...I'm done fighting
I'm more scathed than the chip on an extremist's shoulder
I blame everyone else yet my reflection is made of crystal
I'm not of legal age and I've already lost my youthful spark
I shift with public opinion, even if they advocate murder
My hatred controls me all the way to my fingertips
While my adoration stays locked inside my ribs
I reserve gifts for those who taint me the deepest
I am an exact replica of the dots in my radar
Every kindred spirit has turned to the opposite side once they were informed of me
I still plot the downfall of the girl who pointed at me over two years ago
I feel the need to purge pitch black during times of carefree happiness
The sun must rise right in front of my face for me to feel the power of beauty
It takes one thousand tears each day to sail my dreams

Last night, along with the tears
I found myself with two capsules too many.

But hey...I'm still here.
Can someone make my stomach still again?

Riot Call

It's such a tragic statistic
when the last thing on earth
that approaches your face
is a patch of brown grass,
pale and dry from age,
dead from poor nourishment,
just like your need for acceptance.

And it’s even more destructive
when the scarlet blood
hanging onto the tip
was pulled from your bone marrow,
all the way through your thick, coarse skin,
by the dense and moldy wooden plank,
swung in the hands of the town’s valiant savior.

Yes, there are rapists and fascists
living in each corner of the street,
pillaging their families of their dignity,
ejaculating on the very words they glorify,
but the filthy path in which you tread
might as well be a bull’s eye on your forehead.

The tides of holy water did not burn an inch,
did not smother your facet of human nature,
did not blindly agree with our fright-ridden hatred,
so the only and easy way out
is to induct you into our slaughterhouse,
all because you loved.

Can love be executed so poorly
that it awaits a death penalty?
In a Utopian ideal, anything can die.

And they wonder,
with our dying breath,
and the dirt being shoved
against our battered faces,
why we declare a riot call.

Welcome All!

This is going to be my new, more efficient way of posting poetry to show everyone instead of having it all over the damn place. I'll usually be posting poetry from the past and that I've just finished, but I'll also occasionally write about music and movies as well, since those are two lovers I can also never quit. I'm trying to work on this list of the 50 most influential women in modern music history, so sometimes features on those lovely ladies will show up, though only sporadically since I'm a megalomaniac and I don't want the features to overshadow my legendary pieces of writing ;)

So, I hope you visit frequently and I hope my words impact your life in a positive manner. =)