One up

it feels good to run solo without worry
without the picture of your face invading visions in my head
and your name in my stories

my tongue free of storytelling regrets
speaking words without bitter tones
and uncertainty in my emotions

priorities finally in tact
doing nothing but thinking bout myself for once
and only concerned with what my own body's doing

neglecting it all
not trying to fix what happened
feeling indifferent
erasing the memories we made
numbing my feelings
using each new day for healing

recognizing that I can’t dwell anymore
but live the life I intended to before I met you

No wordsmith could cure me (draft #1)

see this is unhealthy
to read your poetry
as cynicism bleeds down my cheeks
in alignment
to each line you’ve composed

because cautiously
i’ve come to learn
you in my he(art)
is non-existent

ICU Smile

Oh hail, iTunes shuffle for helping me rediscover this song I once had on repeat:

14kt - "ICU Smile"
This track always knew how to make me feel better when I was goin' through some rough shit. Initially upon my first listen the beats are what had me hooked. But then along came the words, the poetry and then the message that collectively put off an overall feelgood vibe that had me leaving this track on for days. When you listen to it Karla Crawford recites a poem by Christian D. Larson at the end.

"I Promise Myself" by. Christian D. Larson

To be so strong that nothing can disturb my peace of mind.
To talk health, happiness, and prosperity to every person I meet.
To make all my friends feel that there is something worthwhile in them.
To look at the sunny side of everything and make my optimism come true.
To think only of the best, to work only for the best and to expect only the best.
To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as I am about my own.
To forget the mistakes of the past and press on to the greater achievements of the future.
To wear a cheerful expression at all times and give a smile to every living creature I meet.
To give so much time to improving myself that I have no time to criticize others.
To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear, and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.
To think well of myself and to proclaim this fact to the world, not in loud words, but in great deeds.
To live in the faith that the whole world is on my side, so long as I am true to the best that is in me.
---

If this isn't some empowering/uplifting shit then I don't know what is. This shit cures me every time.

Clockworks - throwback

I was looking through my old notebooks and my old blogposts and I came across this piece I wrote about time. If you read my previous post, you'd realize I've been battling my "time with my freemind" lately so it was fitting to come across this post I'm about to share with you.

I wrote the following piece at the beginning of my sophomore year in college. I remember that night pretty clearly. It was probably my first week back at USF chillin' in my Phelan dorm room with Lib. We were both super hardcore Greys Anatomy fans way back when the shows were still on Sundays (ha! see how OG i was?) and I was so into the show that almost every monologue they recited, I wrote down or looked up after the episode. I was THAT faithful to the show (and kinda still wish I were). Anyway to my point... I can't remember exactly what happened in this episode that I watched, but all I can remember is that this was a season premiere episode where Meredith ends the scene with a monologue talking about the daily affect Time can have on us. She said:

Time flies.
Time waits for no man.
Time heals all wounds.
All any of us wants is more time.
Time to stand up.
Time to grow up.
Time to let go.
Time.

- Grey's Anatomy

And this is what I wrote immediately after hearing it.

(*FYI-sidenote: The following is probably one of my most favorite pieces I've EVER written. Can someone please inspire me to write this way again? I miss free-flowing words.)

I know most of us, if not all of us know that they can relate to this monologue. Folks have been telling me since I got back to the city that they wish they could turn back time. Others have been telling me that they wish they could instead speed up time. And as for myself, all I wish is to freeze time. Truly, I think we've all come to a point in our lives where timing means everything. There are moments in our lives we wish to relive, people we wish we still had in our lives, and changes that we wish never changed those moments. So we blame time. We blame time and say we want it to speed up. We want to get over it. As if time wasn't on our side. We blame time for all the wrong reasons. When all we want is that self reassurance that everything will get better so we wish that time never existed. We begin to wish specific moments or specific people in our lives didn't affect the being we've become today. It's as if we often find ourselves at a stand-still when times get rough. We wish times were better, never wanting to face what's in front of us. Leaving us to look in the past for comfort never wanting to distance ourselves away from the familiar. Never allowing ourselves to move forward towards the future. So we stay still. Never wanting anything to harm us, touch us, or affect us. Leaving us to hold onto what's comfortable and blaming what's not.

I admit it, I'm learning. I'm learning the hard way that with all the time in the world, there's only one thing I can do for myself and that is to accept the changes that are taking place. I have to live my life regardless of those times I wish never happened and live off of those that did. I have to let go. Because with all the time in the world there's no time for that. We just gotta live, adapt, and cherish what time we do have.

- "Clockworks," September 24, 2006

Now imagine me re-reading this now... it's like my wake up call. I wrote this almost four years ago and time is still very much relevant to me as it was back than it is to me now. Reading this piece has just reminded me that I just need to embrace this free time and allow myself to heal within this time I do have.

No more wasting it.

Grumpy woke up on the wrong side of the bed

I hate waking up grumpy
I hate it even more when I stay grumpy
The feeling sucks
It sucks even more when the feeling stays with me throughout the day

Following me
Shadowing me
Haunting me
Like a bad horror film
Starring me and this passive aggressive anger
That just won't leave me

Closed doors my stubborn mind persists
As if nothing can shake off this feeling
Tea, music, human connection
Nor verbal sympathy could cure me
(Cause I'm fucking grumpy)

My mind made a decision to stay this way for the day
To embrace this mix of negative emotions
That I never knew I felt
Till I woke up this way

Blame it on the nightmare last night
The nightmare that seeped through my reality
Awakening my fears in the middle of the night
Then greeting me when the sun rose
With a lingering message attached with a remembrance
Of all I've been avoiding

Focusing attention
On worries I've kept refrained when my eyes are kept wide open
Only reminding me being awake is just as scary
Especially when dreams are replaced by a cycle of disconnect
Among elation lost amidst translation
Into a world that's supposed to keep me
At peace
At balance

But instead today I am left fighting
Fighting the fears and emotions kept hidden
In response to this urgent tone
This mind manifested through trance
Reminding me
Never allowing me to forget
To rid the identical worries I dream asleep
To those same worries I face awake

She took the words (write) out of my mouth.

The following is a stanza off a Ruby Veridiano-Ching poem titled, "For All The Wars Inside Me" taken from her book, Miss Universe.


"Truth one.

I'm not always confident
I never know how to begin any of my poems
Wonder if I know how to use these words
Like I'm supposed to
Worry that I'm not able
Uncomfortable under pressure
Have trouble believing I'll live up to expectation
Can't even write anything for myself anymore
I've flung myself to the mercy of an audience
Attack myself as my own worst critic-
I think these days
I want to stop calling myself an artist
Just human
With faults and feelings
Like anyone
And these testaments serve as peace treaties
For all the wars
Inside me"

---

And that my friends is why she is my FAVORITE.

Free My Writers Block

I manifest the power of my words
Reinventing every sound and syllable I create
With my lips ripped open
Freed of silence
To speak my mind
To verbalize
To write

To utilize the language given to me
Placed upon me to create
Those complex into simple existence

Here I communicate
Reverberate the sounds of language
Piecing together lines and lines of emotions once kept inside
Released into paragraphs of positive expression

Here I imagine
I imagine the world instead filtered in translation
With beings embracing tongues
With the power of conversation

In collaboration of minds ensuing positive action
Exchanging knowledge
Articulating what's left unspoken

Here I write
Here I manifest my words for the sake of them becoming
Exercising my right to free my mind
In a society where the root of our words are often forgotten

So I fight
I fight to give life to our words
Through thoughts triggering my fingertips
From fine pen dripping on paper
I finally allow my mind to flow in liberation

Giving myself that self power to create
And kill the fear hidden behind each word I've felt
In order to keep my writing alive
And my mind sane