Rain Song


It's okay, you say,
as I lift the umbrella over your head.

I like the rain, you said,
your curvaceous body taking space beside me
as we walked, overcast clouds overhead.

I put the umbrella away, watching the sky
sink into gray seas: the trees
the seaweed and you and I
no greater creatures than fish
awash near a concrete Katipunan Avenue coast.

It is near dusk, and the drizzle
doesn't let up, and we
are closely walking.

Rain calls people closer, I say,
watching everything - friends and lovers
under umbrellas.
But since we didn't use one, what were we?

You ignored me, pointing instead
to oil-slick rainbows on streets,
with your small slippers under your feet like the pot of gold -
little things I notice not right away.
We walked and you were near,

and your soft hair smelled like earth,
like soil that will one day
cover you, cover me,
cover our bodies on our deep descent down.
It's true:
your hair smells of death, of endings, of destiny.

Then and there, watching little things,
I watch water wash over our cheeks, necks, backs,

and my hands want to do the same,
my fingers like falling fire,
your breath the hearth I will call home,
your skin sanctified like a last supper
my mouth craves to consume.

But it is raining,
you walk forward to shade, and I
am always, always
a few steps slower,
a few steps behind you.


current music: True Faith - Bukas Liligaya Din Ako

Seven Candles


I lit seven candles at church today
and laid them out in a little row,
tiny lights burning single file
and silently recited seven Hail Marys for you.

But if you were here, you'd say
don't believe in that stuff
like you'd say it's just bread, it's just wine
or how Mary was a girl, not divine
how I'd look at my hands ,
I'd say "map," you'd say "lines",
how I'd shuffle cards,
I'd say "path", you'd roll eyes and sigh.

It's the river, this faith, this soft wave,
the Holy Ghost and its Holy See,
that sails me slowly out to sea and so
you say
I'm but fish not good enough to pull a net up and catch
because of kind of water I breathe in, believe in.

Or was it you
who wanted
to lift her hands
and soar away upwards
to places I can't reach, with song I can't hear,
and unfit to sing?

All I know is I lit seven candles,
and sang in me a small hymn
watching them burn slow,
tiny stars that might lead you back to me.


current music: Get Here - as sung by Camil Labog