All original poems written by Precious Alfaro
I have been trying to reach you
A Plethora of;
tangled telephones lines
Telekinesis.
Timid thoughts; tickle
the tip of my tongue,
but go nowhere.
-Precious Alfaro
Thoughts on life
Is it too late?
I wonder if
you know when you're going to die.
If it's an,
all too familiar
Sensation of cold
Streaming.
Over you.
If sounds mutes.
On its own.
Leaving only reverberations,
echos of moments.
Memories.
Flaking away
like skin.
Then, spread out.
Over some random beach,
you visited.
That one time.
Can you feel it?
Rolling over you
All at once?
A Restless sleep.
Thoughts of,
Cutting off your own arms.
Shaking off your Legs.
Sinking in:
the bed,
the cement,
the dirt.
Pulling slowly like,
elastic.
Refusing to let go
Like spit off your lips.
When you know,
Is it too late?
Exits/Accidents
I'm constantly comparing
life
to one thing
one
outstretched highway.
Running parallel,
All along pink and purple.
Cotton candy skies.
Hot, pressed cement
reflecting icy blue,
Cools.
Looking forward,
looking up,
looking idly.
To try to remember
every single
Color,
every cloud.
Diverting my eyes
From what's ahead.
Wishing every moment would last forever
Trying always to remember.
Telling yourself
you will
Remember,
What's forgotten in an instant.
But surely as
Icy blues turn to
Indigos.
eventually,
to
Black
There are also
Golden clementines.
Warm feelings.
connecting us all
Exits/Accidents
Language.
Language is pointless.
We dance around words like cavemen,
seeing fire.
Neanderthals.
Words with no meaning pirouette
Around our heads.
spinning, endless.
As if they were,
close enough
to pick up and kiss
before an explanation is needed.
Shared glances
take shape of
vowel sounds.
How do I fill this space?
With words?
When there is
only a moment.
But,
A moment to language/
Words to silence?
How to articulate this
When I only feel it.
Don't you?
Alzheimer's
Walking through a wandering mind.
Everything looks familiar,
but nothing feels
quite right.
beaten shoes
walk beaten paths
walking eternally in a circle.
As I search for
Well,
I don't dunno?
All roads end,
when
looking for home?
I can no longer see
the house
Just the yard.
Just the motion of
swing sets, softly;
carrying you away.
Time is just time here.
You can not do anything,
But sit on it.
Tired wheels turn.
Slowly.
offering a rhythmic squeak,
Replacing the ticks and tocks
that fill your day.
Rubber soles
melt
on black hot pavement
leaving just a
subtle
reminder
I was there at all.
Where do I go
when
Nothing is where I left it.
This place is a mess.
All houses, faces, places
blend.
like a single white shirt
washed in colors.
this shirt is a mess.
Nothing looks the same.
Do I?
Treading lightly,
tip-toeing onto tedious days upon days.
always much of the same.
Trudging through mud or shit?
It quickly becomes quicksand
I can't tell which.
Trekking to this treacherous peak.
where am I again?
The end?
Love
Tender
No other's
words
Season me
So tender.
Falls
Straight
from
the
bone.
Marinates
In its own
Blood
Only
Churned
to cold.
Put to freeze,
Always
put to
Freeze.
A moment trapped
In space.
Defrosting
In fake
Time.
Soil
I would take up smoking to hold you in
but,
you would never ask.
If you were water I would drink you,
store you like, like a camel.
months on end,
In the bloodstream.
Somehow,
you flow through me.
If I was a parent I would hold you,
or hug you as a friend would do.
Carry you with me.
Scoop you up like sand,
watch it fall through my fingers.
Back into the earth, some type of dirt.
to plant a seed.
Watch it grow on its own.
Some enchanted bean.
Until a stock-like vine towers over me.
The roots of the giving tree.
Otherworldly, and galaxy-like,
blooming in its own time.
Write me
I want to be
your
pen to paper.
The text,
underlined
in your book.
Full of nuance.
Meaning.
A handwritten
dedication
on the front page.
The sensation of history.
Quote that gives you
goosebumps.
But you still paraphrase
every time.
At the back of
your throat.
Words you swallow.
A thought that
is..
not to be
articulated.
Surface
Why does love linger on
a surface level?
A hug or kiss.
The flatness of bodies,
is never enough.
I would never tell you
I would like to kiss you.
No,
I would tell you.
How I long
to be inside your skin.
That section between
the physical and material world.
Feel all your senses.
Palm on the cheek.
softness
of any given thing.
Aline our lips
from the inside,
and experience
your words
as they flowed out.
Outline
each syllable with my tongue
Feel
what those words mean to you.
Taste,
all the foods you love,
or hate.
The salt of your sweat,
tears.
Drink the finest wines.
Just for the experience.
Be your retinas,
see how light reflects off.
How sure am I
That the colors I see now
are
frankly dull.
I want to see what you see
when eyes are closed.
Patterns in the darkness.
Hear your favorite songs,
your father's voice.
Your voice,
in its truest form.
How you hear yourself/
Want to be heard
Try to smell something
as sweet as you.
Breath in your air.
Live in any space as you.
No,
I wouldn't tell you
how much I'd like to
kiss you.
or hug you.
I would tell you,
I want to understand you.
Maybe you could
understand me too.
Sex
HANDS
It all started
with the hands.
The curves.
The nerves.
How vain?
You can feel anywhere
With anything
but no other
place.
associates
it as well.
Hands,
so unknowingly,
unintentionally
sexy.
In fact,
If you had
touched me.
You'd leave
only muscle
where skin should be.
HANDS 2
You can
feel
just as much,
with the
tongue
and lips;
but I.
Well, I,
can't stop
thinking about
your
finger-
tips.
Three thousand
touch
receptors.
waiting,
wanting to
respond to,
pressure.
in fact,
All I'd need to see
is
just how;
tightly,
roughly..
Or maybe
even, gently?
Show me
The gaps
In -
between.
How
you could/
would
touch
any
given
thing,
but
me.
Skin
Skin to
skin
Sends tension
Right through me
Sticks like a palm to
hot ice.
A stitch
in my
Jeans.
I almost forgot
I had legs
In the first
place.
I almost forgot
my heart could
race?
Every single hair
stood tall.
Every
alarm.
The way it felt
to just be held.
It's
never left.
where could it go?
But
Live inside
my head.
A Bruise
The older I get
the more my bruises grow.
Pointed out by
half-dressed,
partners
sitting on the bed.
The older I get
the more all my marks
show.
pointed out
again,
and again, and again
by lovers,
surprised I didn't know.
How I got them?
where they came from?
The night goes on
and lights go off,
Time goes by
They forget,
Or they never cared
Did I?
Closeness
I don't know what closeness is.
The thought alone
Fills me with a certain
Empty.
I don't know what closeness is.
Intimacy/ proximity
If we look for purpose In
it’s meaning.
Is it the thought of touching?
The atoms between
any two given things?
I don't know what closeness is.
Could you tell me
Explain to me the
Feeling?
Sensations of warmth, Cold.
Tenderness of
Both?
Soft like fur/ Full of hurt?
I don't know what closeness is.
words?
so that where ever you are
you are heard.
Random highs of affections:
you, asking about me?
Or wiping
tears from my face.
I don't know what closeness is.
So how can I
rediscover it?
Hugs in secret
Or, Public.
Maybe,
something else very generic.
No,
I don't know what closeness is.
In fact,
I’ve never felt it
Reconciliation
SMOKE
I used to watch you smoke
Get lost in the flame
as you
lit one up.
The smoke never left you.
Just lingered
above you.
A black mass.
Cumulonimbus cloud.
You stick your tongue
to
catch the ash,
Let it fall all over
your
lips,
mouth.
The stench of stale smoke,
stuck to you.
Sucked the nicotine
off
your fingers,
until shriveled.
Until you gagged.
You just let it
trial you,
stay on your course.
And when it was done,
filling up
every nook
inside you.
Poured out your nose
and through the room.
Filled the house.
We all
burnt out.
You lit another.
Roses
You always hated roses,
A waste of money.
I still got them,
every time.
For each
Apology.
You would put them in
a vase.
Throw them out
a week later.
Until you didn't.
We left that vase.
Untouched for weeks.
After it died.
Rotted.
We never threw them out.
They stayed,
Bedside.
A gentle
reminder of
how dead
beautiful
things could be.
You never lived there
I built you a home.
in my head.
perfectly,
suitable
for you.
Architect of dreams.
Brick by brick
every tired thought,
word you said.
Painted scarlet.
Room for
your books,
records.
Designed for you.
Walls filled with
your dreams.
Where you were safe.
Where I
Could scoop you up.
Hold you close.
You never stayed.
Days,
upon days.
I waited.
You hated;
the draft,
how light hit,
the way
the house was
angled.
Construction crews came
bulldozed the burdened building.
I slept on the rubble
Realizing,
You
never
lived
there at all.
Reflections
Every night
Every night
I close my eyes
and Imagine myself
being dissected by you.
like an insect
cut from
end to end.
Or,
Gutted like a fish.
Cold metal
table.
Operating theatre.
Lecture hall.
Familiar faces
behind glass.
All there to see,
marvel at this
medical,
anomaly?
When the blood dissipates,
and you look
inside,
There is nothing.
No one is surprised.
There's nothing.
limbs held with string.
A body
No means.
Scalpel slits deep.
There is nothing.
A gaping black hole
where things should be.
There's nothing.
Picked off the same tree
I still remember the taste
pomegranates playfully picked
before ripened.
So tender, My fingers
would squish, squeeze, and split
them wide open.
Immature and green
stolen straight from trees.
swallowed the seeds
and it planted one inside me.
Thought I’d build a shelter
for.
My mother's dreams.
For all that preconceived.
Who she thought
I should be.
But when it's done.
There is no room for me.
And I am shackled to my father,
like his father before.
Living in shadows,
Never seen as much more.
High hopes, hang, from ropes
a noose
No one is expected to loosen
A prisoner conceived;
And whenbonds break the branches
and the tree finally collapses
who is left to clear the ashes
but me.
For some reason,
Trying to regrow
the same trees.
Empty
I'm still searching for those moments.
The flash of lights,
some spark.
Bursts of warm
to fill me
with some sort of
hope
I am where I should be.
But,
I don't feel anything.
Though often,
I feel as if
I may be,
on the cusp of some
feeling..
That never sticks.
So how does one know
what that feeling is?
I'm still waiting
for my skin to slip off.
A jolt of life.
A Titillating split-
second;
to be anything.
But time remains
mostly empty.
A product of space.
When I was born
I inhaled a
galaxy.
With that first sigh
I,
Filled my lungs
with space For the first time.
And cried.
And cried.
I still cry.
It would stay.
Suffocating.
Infinitely consuming me.
Big, voluminous, empty.
I drank the fluids
From my mother's womb.
swallowed the sea.
Inside.
36,000
Feet of deep In me.
I absorbed all my mothers
Pain.
Passed through Placentia.
Like she and her mother had
before.
Like my father's.
I wonder if I ever had a chance at all.
Brittle bones break, like bonds
All the lovers I could never know.
Severed umbilical cord.
I wonder If my Vernix
Actually
Protected me.
Or if That outer,
layer of skin
Was already Flaking, and dead.
A remnant of dust.
Generational curse.
A trail of tears
takes shape of veins.
But my heart keeps pumping it through me
Only, to be swallowed
By space.
I suppose,
Small sparks, bright things,
look best in dark places.
When you can see it from miles away.
Suppose, that's transcendence.
Light traveling, seemly endless.
If only someone else could see it.
Maybe the light at the end of the tunnel is me
maybe I could be it.
“Slap on the knee.”
Written by: Precious Alfaro