Poetic Doses: His 1st Angelversary

 I see echoes
Always echoes
Reverberating
Back and forth
In small moments
Magnifying
Pulsing
And then bursting.

***

ISANG TAON

(ONE YEAR)

Isang taon.

Takot tumigil

(afraid to stop)
Kailangan magtrabaho

(I need to work)
Kahit ano.

(anything)

Katahimika'y kaaway

(silence is the enemy)
Ng isipang pasaway

(of the stubborn mind)
At pusong nalulumbay.

(and the lonely heart)

Isang taon.

Sakit na di nagbabago

(pain that is unchanging)

Pangungulilang di naiibsan

(longing that does not diminish)

Katahimikang sumisigaw

(silence that screams)

Nagsusumamo pusong pagal

(a weary heart pleading)

Patuloy na lumulutang

(endlessly floating)

Sa gitna ng kawalan.

(in a vast void)

Isang taon.

Ayaw umusad

(I don't want to move forward)

Di kaya

(I can't)

Ngunit kailangan

(but I need to)

Paano na

(how)

Saan pa paroroon

(where will I go)

Ngayong wala ka na?

(now that you're gone?)

***

Love surrounds me.

Yet, each night - just before dawn, 

I surrender to half-healed wounds

peeling back open

into another layer

of deeper fresh wounds.