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You are the world after the rain has drenched the sidewalks into grey.
I am sun-kissed heat that floods inside lilac drapes on an August morning.

You carry the weight of your decisions, schedules, goals, and worries on your back like its a snowflake stuck on your sweater.
I let my cares and wonders and memories and experiences float around me like bubbles blown from my baby sister’s toy gun.

You are subtle and quiet with your affection, but you are a loud roar with your good intentions and the truth–cold or sweet.
I am an open chest of sweet nothings and loving you, but I stay meek and mild when the presence of honesty and the future pervades us, surrounding us.

You are the real world, eating cynicism for breakfast and using a microscope to magnify your view of humanity,
while I am a fairytale who believes in the goodness of the human spirit, putting on rose-colored glasses before leaving to work in the morning.

You are not me.
I am not you.

And still…

we stay dancing on eggshells together
we can laugh and touch and kiss with purity and grace
we are still here in each other’s unknown, unfamiliar universes

I daresay,
we complete each other

to Khaled Hosseini, who may never read this:

About a year ago–give or take–I read The Kite Runner. I was knocked off my feet. Today, I finished A Thousand Splendid Suns after about five days of rigorous, incessant binge-reading. And I fell in deep, relentless love.

Your novels are celebrated to such a high extent that there is no need for a simple fanatic like me to tell you how crafty, imploring, daring, and passionate your writing is. You are a superb writer. But my intent is not to bore you with appraisal (well, is it really praise coming from a child like me?)

After finishing your second novel, I have been overcome with a fierce desire to tell you how much your writing has done for me.

You make me rediscover the power of words every time I turn a new page. Your writing style forced my eyes to leak out sympathetic tears for the characters alive in the stories–I’m convinced they are real, no matter how much I know they are fictional fabrications. The interwoven beauty of The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns are crafted in perfect syncopation that it’s as if Dat So La Lee herself took your words and made the most seamless and envied basket of her lifetime. I loved every bit, every sadness, every plot twist, every tragedy, every regret, every sacrifice, and every beautiful example of love. I can’t remember the last time I cried so deeply than when I wept for Mariam as Laila read Jalil Khan’s final letter.

I’ve tried writing this letter in many forms that would express perfectly how much I enjoyed and cherished the stories you have masterfully shared with us. It’s difficult for me to choose words that describe exactly the amount of admiration and gratitude I have for your novels, as well as your refreshing writing capabilities. Not all of us can have an immaculate ability to write like you do.

Your stories are magic. I thank you deeply for making me feel again.

Reading from your novels remind me why I am in college studying English, and why I will always pursue my dreams of someday being a published author. I want to touch lives and minds the way you have forever grasped mine. The power of words, to me, is a great and noble weapon that I work to sharpen daily. I am in debt to you for inspiring me to wield it.

Admirably, gratuitously, and sincerely yours,

P.

For those art critiques/lovers/snobs/egoists:

Quote unquote real art
does not require the ear of Mozart

or the hand of Matisse
let alone the ethereal worth of St. Pete

No, friends; art is all the consumers’
judged by the heart of the viewers.

More often than not

we forget that those that are “real”
are purposed solely on making us

feel.

Longing Distance

Such a lovely day, such a lonely day.

Two strangers as in love as sight allows them to be
found meaning through one another’s hands,
one another’s heads,
one another’s hearts.

Ineffable, tyrannical, undeniable love.

Alas, the devil that is distance
clouds the space
between their beating souls
between their loving touch
between their minds afloat.

Here’s the reality:
Some people can do it, others simply can’t.
I applaud both parties.

But isn’t it the worse pain,
agony,
desperation,
when longing for someone is
not someone who wants to be longed after all?

At least those who love afar,
are loving.

What kind of long distance relationship
is one where there’s no willingness on the other end?

Our revolution, my revelation

Three hours and forty-seven minutes into the day
I pondered of the Earth’s crusade,
If fresh white sheets of the blank page
of the year
really serves us–moving colors of beige.

Like a servant, my mind obeys
but
this precious life is merely staged
us drones incapable of utmost rage
against
the status quo and manners tamed.

Perhaps I fall under ill-placed grace,
for I believe every day is unnamed
regardless of a “fresh blank page.”

Perhaps it’s you
that corporate has paid.

Last post of the year

So here we are.

No more excusing my slack
to inexperience and lack
because I have actually started college
and learned
that there are
many things that rhyme with orange.

Please cease fire
of shame and remorse
shot at the edge of desire

My feelings on “new year’s resolutions” are fickle
not at all to my fancy
not even a slight tickle
because change can happen anywhere
any time, to anyone
it’s just that humans are scared.

Raise a red solo cup to two-thousand fifteen
in my case, sparkling cider
since I’m not fond of morphine
and I live on the side of milder.

Happy year to all, happy wishes to the forthcoming.

So, here we are
Here we all are
What do we now?

Dear Future Self:

Desires, desires, the desire
to turn the clock backwards
for us to return to young Us
and warn against the terrible, terrific future.

“What superpower would you have?”
Control time
so I can tell my 6 year-old self
never show your tears to the nasty kids
on the playground.
Darling, you’re so valuable.

To my 14 year-old naive self
that love exist in more ways than kisses, sex, and lovers
just look at your brilliant father and careful, kind mother
and your friends who give you packs of gum
for your birthday because they are sentimental
rather than materialistic

To my 18 year-old soul
that success is measured by self-worth and acceptance and happiness.
To please reread the previous sentence
until its ingrained in your heart
and etched in the goosebumps of your skin
that success is yours.
Please don’t drink the poison.

But I think it’s interesting
that none of us realize
we can talk to our future selves
every time we write ourselves a reminder
or scar our skins with ink

So hello, future Me,
I’m so proud of what you’ve become

Published!!

My first article for the University’s newspaper, Nevada Sagebrush, was published today! I can’t wait to improve and grow as a writer as my first year in college unfolds. I’m feeling accomplished today, and just thought I’d share with you lovely fellow writers.

Here’s to the start of a great journalistic career!

Happy writing, all!!

-P

Noisy

Dogs barking at ten-thirty at night before your job interview in the morning. Feedback from the speakers at the open mic you went to. Three year-olds whining on the subway as you try to listen to your headphones. The voices in your head.

That’s noise.

The humming of your coffeemaker in the morning. Footsteps at night of your little sibling sneaking a peek of presents saved for Christmas morning. Hearing the shower on in the morning, with last night’s lover’s clothes spread on the floor. The song stuck in your head.

That’s noise.

The winning sound that carnival games make when your horse makes it to the other end of the board first. Fireworks marking a brand new cycle of Earth’s orbit one late December night, early January morning. Seeing “I do” spoken by your new life partner’s lips, hearing the fuzziness in your brain, as church bells gracefully ding in the temporal lobes of your mind. Holiday music playing while you sip hot cocoa and listen to the unwrapping paper sound of gifts touching light. Cheering from strangers in a crowd as you cross the finish line of your track meet. Uproar of ideas in your mind.

That’s noise.

Noise carries the negative connotation of irritation. But noise is defined by “a sound that causes disturbance.” Our lives are moved everyday with things that are terrifying, pleasant, tragic, soothing, arbitrary, and monumental. You are shaped by the sounds around you. You need the bad ones to chisel away at the rocks in your heart. You need the good ones to warm up the waters of your veins. To excite the nerves of your limbs. To lift those goosebumps hidden in your skin. To move you.

Noise is music. The type of music it is depends on what vinyl you put on the record player.

Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder

Blue eyes and soft skin
with sure smiles and hidden sins
as if to-night we were all in.

You sat next to me
and it took all I had
to keep my shirt on and take my eyes off.

The drive home felt so short
my wild heart could not sort
how a-live, it’s no more
I guess
c’est la vie and c’est la mort.

“Good night,” I say, as I thought “stay some more”
with you, I’ve never been more sure
you are alight with your allure
and I need not to stay pure
do all you want, I’ve decided I’m yours.

They say “beauty lies with the beholder”
because we all have opinions
but God, you are so ravishing, so so beautiful;
they’d be crazy to not behold you.