An Interview With My Neighbor

N.J.R.

please don't be another mistake. or another regret. or another memory i would want to erase.

(eusie.)

i exist

you ask me if i’m fine. i say i’m fine. you look at me with one eyebrow raised, but you didn’t do anything after that. all these nights when you feel like shit, i swear i can feel your soul tearing apart with just one look at you. and you give your heart out as if you’re making love to me. but i know it’s only your sadness flowing out. and it’s not about the fact that you’re actually falling for me, or that you actually like talking to me. i ask myself what did i ever do wrong to be treated and feel this way. i ask myself what would i give for you to at least show that you care even for a damn minute, or a damn second. i just want you to know, i really need you to know... i exist; this heart inside of mine is beating. and it used to scream your name, but now it only stutters out each letter with so much pain as if with every one, one of my heartstrings break. i exist; the love i feel for you is real and it’s not made up. i exist; yes, you acknowledge that. but not entirely, only when you need someone when the one you actually need doesn’t want you. and yeah, i only exist during those times. am i fine? no, i’m not. but you wouldn’t know, because you wouldn’t care. i exist; i am human, and i have feelings. don’t break these pieces of my heart and shutter them more than they already are. i exist; can’t you see? (eusie.)

the thing is, we’re screw-ups. i don’t even know why we still stick with each other. maybe because we know that no one else will, for the very reason that we’re monsters.

juicy (eusie.)

Probably not a poem

Saying what I feel isn’t easy as breathing but every day, I would want to express it to you as I need to breathe. The first gasp of air I make every morning when I wake up is like a whisper of your name that reminds me that my heart is alive to love you again. Then, the whole day just smells like you, like your scent lingers on the walls of our house and everything that surrounds me wherever I go. This just makes me miss you. While a few minutes later, I'll miss you more than how I missed you moments ago until I just start to yearn for you… until I just yearn for your eyes to look into mine again; for your voice to show off its magic as all of me feels tingly; for your lips to say my name or to make me feel loved; for your hands to touch me and make me shiver… or for you to just hug me so I can feel your warmth that assures me that you won’t leave me. Please, please don’t leave me even if there’s a thousand reasons why you should. I know sometimes (or more often) my words are daggers — my actions too, or even just my silence — and that I probably make you bleed every day. I know that I can never be enough (and I’m sorry for this), and that I can never love you the way you love me (but please know that I love you very much). But keep on loving me because I would want to soak under the rain of your love forever. I love you. I love you so much that sometimes it hurts deep inside that my tears don’t come out of my eyes but they pop out of my blood veins and contaminate me like they’re toxic. But I’m okay, I can still breathe. And you probably feel the same way, hiding all pieces of you that I have shattered every now and then  — hiding them instead of throwing them at me to wound me. But you always say that you’re okay, that you can still breathe. Our love for each other (or our relationship) may not be perfect, maybe all just wounds that turned into scars, or maybe just all bruises that cannot disappear, but I hope… I really hope we can survive it like a ship that succeeded to pass through a lightning storm in the ocean. Let’s remind the world that people can live because of love. So let’s make it through everything with our hands entangled and our hearts connected to every heartstrings of the other. Let’s keep on loving each other... loving all the flaws and pieces of the other all the same.

(eusie.)

i think the reason why we we're still with each other is that we're afraid of being alone again. and we know that finding love again would take time

“Will you still love me in the morning?”

a.k.a. She says, “Yes,” while he answers, “No.”

She arrives at home a few minutes after five, clutching her heart tightly with her fingers. She looks around for a certain display of messy dark hair, her knuckles turning white every passing second. When her eyes couldn’t see what it sought out but meet a pair of amber orbs, she lunges forward onto its beholder.

He’s wearing his favorite navy blue shirt with gray linings on its sleeves, both of his hands clasping a book. His eyes turns back to it, she presumes, as she settles down in a leathered sofa in front of him. He’s seated on the loveseat, half lying on it even; his back resting on one rolled arm, his feet relaxing on the other.

She looks at his face and straightforwardly asks, “Why did you do it?”

He — who understood the question right away without any needed explanation from her to clear what could be a misinterpreted query — simply supplies, “I don’t like the way you look at it, or the way your fingers last a little more unnecessary than it should when you trace it through. I wanted it off right away the moment I couldn’t take it anymore.”

But you love it, she almost whispers. He used to, her mind takes in on account. “Are you okay?” she chooses to inquire.

He only looks at her, his amber eyes slowly mirroring an ember fire. He stands up and closes the material he was reading. She can hear her fingers tapping on her knees. Or maybe it’s the walls pleading in soft creaks. Or it’s her heart, with its great desire to come off of her chest and run away.

She wants to run away from the burning heat of her lover’s stare.

After a few minutes, she finds herself lost in a blurry surrounding. She focuses her vision and sees herself in the same sofa, her hands bleeding from how tight she was holding the end of her dress. Like how she’s holding her pieces together, just for it to not clutter and break into smaller ones.

But when she raises her gaze and find him at the edge of the stairs, she finally lets go.

And when he quietly murmurs an “I’m okay,” she decides she didn’t want to pick herself up. Her wounds will only cut deeper.

He didn’t even ask if I was, she thinks. Later, she stops thinking.

(eusie.)

Unexpectedly

too many poems too many unrequited love too many broken hearts and too many bruises and unwanted scars

too many persons oblivious to what they did

to gain existence in another world

a world called poetry

(eusie.)

I say to him, "I want your sparkly eyes each time you say love me. I hope it won't disappear." He responds with his eyes crinkling at its end, "It won't." After a while, he asks, "Why? Did you do something wrong?" I grin at him. "I fell in love with someone else." He looks at me, and I can see his eyes sparkling, "Huh, okay."

He thought it was a joke, a.k.a. “One day, in November” (eusie.)

Love like yours will surely come my way

Louis T., 2013. “Always” (p. 28, para. 9)

a.k.a. This is actually about the day after we got married

An aftertaste remains permanent on my tongue like the kiss stains on my hair. The curtains keep calling out for the sun to get out of the room, and you notice I do the same. But you still travel your fingers on my naked skin. The night before shines on your eyes and I already miss your moans. You get up and scare off the sunlight, scolding it that it’s hurting me. I hold out my hand and caress your shadow dancing on the bed sheet. I hear you whisper, “I’ll make breakfast.” You make your way to me and pass the stars on your lips to the skies deep down my throat. But you didn’t move at all after that. We keep on tracing the constellations on our mouths. The bed creaks loudly, but I can hear the smile forming on your face as you fix yourself beside me again. “Have me instead,” I mumble, then I grin. I’m happy. You’re happy. We’re blissfully staring at each other’s eyes, knowing that finally, we won. But today is another day, and so is tomorrow. There will be mountains to climb again, and I know we both need each other to keep our feet chained on the ground. I wouldn’t let you sail off without me. You wouldn’t let me drown without you. “I love you,” you sing to me. And I hum, “Always.”

(eusie.)