Coffee Cup 

The aroma from my coffee

greeted me like the song

that flowed out from your lips.

Promising always certain.

Perhaps, it was years ago

 When you sang them to me,

as you craved to empty your coffee cup

and fill them with tune:

 It used to tell of your yearnings

To see the neon lights Of  Las Vegas

 dazzled on towering buildings and heights.

Of snows cupped on bare hands.

You promised you’d send them in bottles,

with postcards of trees in Massachussetts

shedding golden leaves.

And you’d come home and touch

my skin with the coldness of America

Which is different from ours.

 And left your cup, 

empty. 

ROMANTIC STORIES

 

everytime,you whisper

romantic stories

i feel the warmth of

your words

like robe

enveloping my silence.

M E S S

 

 

 

At our room,

I squat on tiled floor

staring at the cluttering

memories you have left last night:

 

cigarette butts

               bottles of whiskey

       lighters

smudged shirt

               wrinkled blanket,

pillow stuffs

and

             crumpled photographs

 

I hated to see litters on the floor.

They stained emptiness.

 

 

 

I

could

have

cleaned

 

the room.
However, I do not know

how to sweep littered memories.

LAST NIGHT

 

The last night I saw him

was at a movie house.

He was gazing at the young woman

stripping off crimson dress

on a big screen.

 

 

But I was haunted by the

sadness on his face.

He was holding back tears

men kept in mugs

or wineglasses. Perhaps

he remembered

his daughter

savage and naked

in the eyes

of many men.

 

COUNTING

 

This afternoon, I ride in a bus.

From this creased window

I count small houses beside

cemented roads.

 

I count them to measure

the distance wheels have trod

from your home.

 

To me, counting also cleaves

the space between our seats.

VEX

 

the shelf I kept for years

never complained about

the hundred books I piled

but you who I kept for days

complained about my words

you said, sound like screeches.

SPILLED WATER

 

I spilled some water

on the last letter you sent me:

I have blotched your lies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

COUNTING

 

This afternoon, I ride in a bus.

From this creased window

I count small houses beside

cemented roads.

 

I count them to measure

the distance wheels have trod

from your home.

 

To me, counting also cleaves

the spaces between our seats.

My 3rd poem ( still needs editing)

‘Barang’

Squatting on the bamboo floor

I held the photograph

I stole from the pocket

of your old polo smudged with dirt

stained like the piece of paper

that binds us.

Your arms fastened around her trim waist

and you broadly smiled.

Gritting my teeth, I stood up

and opened my drawer to reach

for my lola’s doll and a silver needle.

I knelt before a lighted candle

recalling how I loved Satan’s game

thinking of roaches and scorpions

creeping from her scabs.

RAGE

( An Imitation of Michael Bonghanoy’s Fire)

 

 

I held the trigger

and

shot your skull.

 

 

In the eerie light,

I saw

shattered brain

on red tiles

 

 

and I tasted

the bitterness

of its thoughts that cursed

my name.

 

 

But through the eyes

of the crowd,

I have touched

 

 

Fear

that was gone

in my fingers.

 

I just imitated the structure of Michael’s poem but the theme and aura is different.

 

 

FIRE

By Michael N.R. Bonghanoy

 

You hide my eyes

behind

your hands.

 

 

 

In the darkness,

I smell

the slow flowering

of your lilacs

 

 

 

and I hear

the perfume

of your voice that says

my name

 

 

 

But through the spaces

between your fingers,

I see

 

 

 

God

ablaze and deathless

in the woodpile.

 

 

 

Catharsis

CATHARSIS

Cup of Coffee
Oil Painting by Emily Marshall

The cup of coffee

I placed on the table

was now as cold as

the words that escaped

from your lips.

The aroma was gone

as your old promises

breathed its last smoke

from the cup of our memories.

Perhaps the warmth was trapped

in the years of your absence

And the sweetness

has melted in my bitter longing

until they died in the empty days

you have left.

I must not grieve

for the fleeting moments

I failed to seize,

or sob for the years

we could have held

in our passionate hands

as you try to cleave

the distance

that loomed your place of forgetting.

But your photograph

lingered in my head

It was like the taste of capuccino

I first sipped

remained on my tongue.

I wish I could lie under the heave of petals

where you can only see me

through the glass of my box.

And you would poke your eyes

till they bleed sham tears

as I try to forget

the affection

you could no longer remember.