Unsent

It isn't clear whether or not
you are standing there.

Sometimes your reflections
Find me in peculiar places:

On trains
In the kitchen
At the doctor's office
In the arms of another

At night I sit to
Write you letters

Unsent

Stacked upon memories
Shoved to the back of the closet behind
Old coats
And brides maids dresses
worn once in the momentary
rays of love and hope

The words don't come easy
I write and re-write
The first line
hoping that the act will find
the words I long for

But my dreams of you
fade faster than my hands
sweeping across the page
It is in this moment that
I realize I have lost you

Forever passes and I find myself
Again writing you letters left

Unsent

5 mini poems

Rise

Harvest moon shivers
into dawn
the rising sun
100,000 autumnal breaths
that usher you home

Saturday

Your face skims
the surface
devoured by hope
you are staring
unsure if the face is yours or mine

Disappearance

Black skies
hole-punched embers
dreamers swim
in the eye of the fish
eternal nourishment

Sunday

Your voice sways
in the sheets
tangled up in the
softness
of a smile

Finding

Steam rises from
your coffee mug
cream swirls into being
it is early
crawl into me

Published Poem

this is the poem that will be in Walang Hiya...Literature Taking Risks Toward Liberatory Practice (a collection of Filipino/a writers)

Prayer

she kneels upon her sins the cushion
unable to soften truth

she vibrates stillness as
she begs forgiveness

hail mary full of grace

she is the other woman
they are his secrets

invisible columns hold
the sky in place

our father who art in heaven

her fingers press
in gentle kiss

as she sits among the pews
hoping for winter

the lord is with thee

painted stories dance
in shimmering sunlight

she sits to silence
the wind

forgive me father

Great News!

I have a poem being published! exciting right? well I'm excited....

Confessions

I just need to let this out so please bear with me as I go on a rant...

Okay so as a child to cope with my overwhelming feelings I would throw myself into TV shows, books, music, movies, anything that would allow me to escape my reality, except drugs and drinking which I feared greatly. I found myself becoming obsessed with characters and wanting them to be my friends, or family, or lovers. As it turns out old habits die hard.... and I find myself at age 24 still doing the same thing. Though I will say the obsessions are few and far between but they remain...

As you can see my latest obsession has been The L word (if you didn't know read the previous post). The show had its final episode Sunday night which would normally make me a bit blue, but also consequently allow me to let it go. But the powers that be (producer Ilene Chaiken and Showtime) have decided to show un-aired clips of a series of interrogations that happened in the final episode as a means of allowing the show to continue "living" as they say. The first tape was posted on Sunday night after the final episode ended. I went home and watched it. I will say I was shocked to see the direction in which the writers had chosen to take this character (who by the way is one half of my favorite characters on the show).

Tina (the character in said clip) was being questioned by police. They asked her about her past which previous to this (in six years of a series) we as an audience had no idea about. They began with her talking about her mother and father, you know right-wing conservative politician types, who would never accept her as gay.... Seems normal pretty exciting as an audience member to be privy to something that could explain her behavior in the series. A little more than half way through the 4 minute clip Tina makes a confession that Bette her partner was not her first. Which is quite shocking to all fans of the show because in her coming out story Tina utters the line "Bette is my first, last and forever". For Bette and Tina fans this was a huge slap in the face. The confession goes on to say that Tina's first is her older sister and that her experience happened when she was a child. This sent fans of the show into a tail spin. I finished watching the clip aghast. I couldn't wrap my mind around it. Though I will say it has stuck around in my mind for the last few days ( you will understand why if you continue reading).

I am angry and sad that these writers, and producers could hurl that kind of subject at an audience without any responsibility for the repercussions it may cause. The story line of abuse is startling... if they wanted to touch on this subject they should have done so with a bit more sensitivity like actually developing a story line within the series about it. Instead they chose to reveal this at a point where there would be no hope for a resolution or revelation about the character. This is to say the reactions its received have varied from shocked sadness to just plain ignorance. I guess that is the point to cause a reaction. But Ilene Chaiken you have done all of your hard work in creating a ground breaking series a disservice. You have made a mockery out of a show that was in its conception and subsequent inception brilliant.

Okay so you're probably wondering why it matters to me? I wondered this as well trust me. I could let go of this absurd last season chalk it up to writers gone awry but this subject I could not let go of. I thought about it and I began to feel crazy, delusional to be exact that this fictional show could have such a profound affect on me. That it could send me into this world of self analysis. Well the next part of the entry explores to some extent why it has had a profound effect.

In the last 2 or 3 years I have slowly but surely tried to live my life in the most honest way possible... No longer keeping my opinions and experiences to myself. It has to say the least unleashed the person many people around me know and love today. 

In my previous life I was known as being secretive which to a certain extent was true though I prefer to think of it as being private as opposed to being secretive.... though people may say the with holding of information by conscious choice is being secretive... slippery slope when it comes to words....But I will digress and proceed with the entry now...

So, since the age of eight I had kept a secret.. one I would not reveal to anyone til about the age of eleven at which point I ended up telling my mom. I would not talk about it again til I was eighteen years old when I was encouraged to go to therapy. I spent many hours in the hot seat so to say talking about my past life and this giant secret I'd been keeping since childhood. I know what you're thinking, so what is this secret? 

There is no easy way to reveal this to any audience and as I sit here and write my natural inclination is to hide and not reveal it to you the reader... One always tries to protect him or herself from the judgement of others which is exactly what I'm doing now skirting around the subject of simply revealing... Those who are closest to me already know but the world at large does not and perhaps my writing it on this screen for essentially the whole world to see (though I realize my blog does not reach a world wide audience) is a bit nerve racking...

I am now going to rip the band aid off... When I was eight years old I was sexually abused by someone close to me. This experience coupled with my fathers death has colored my entire experience. From the age of eight on I can honestly say I began a spiraling into a dark world of shame, guilt, blame, anger, and perhaps any other negative you can imagine... fill in the blanks as you wish... As a child and consequently as a teenager I never understood that the feelings I felt were not normal, though as I found myself interacting with others I always felt that I was an outcast... this is not to say I didn't have friends, or I wasn't social because I was. To the outside world I seemed perfectly fine until the "bad" emotions bubbled over and I would have an overreaction that would cause people to wonder exactly what it was that made me behave in this way. 

When I was in therapy I talked  a lot about how I was paralyzed by my fear of not having people love me. Which in hindsight I realize is due to my  mothers reaction of telling her my secret the first time around. Don't get me wrong, I now in no way blame my mother for her reaction, I feel no anger towards her now, I worked through those feelings immediately. She like me was simply doing the thing she thought would help me most. She reacted in the only way she knew how. I don't think she's responsible for how I consequently lived my life. Because it's easy to blame someone outside of yourself in order to feel better but the reality is I had to forgive myself for a situation that was beyond my control since I was a child after all. I love my mom. I still feel guilt for even including her in this discussion but the truth is that is where a lot of my previous anger stems. 

This experience of abuse has colored the way I make decisions, the way I relate to people (men especially), the way I am able to trust. I don't dwell on it on an everyday regular basis. But its effects show up unconsciously in a myriad of situations but more often than not in dating and in relating to others. I can safely say that I have grown from this. I am more self aware, kind, understanding, stronger and open because I've had this experience, this change did not come without hard work. Without acknowledging 1. that it happened, 2. that it is not a crutch to be used in order to feel better about making choices that I know are bad for me  3. that I am no longer a victim 4. that I can get past it and 5. that people will still love me despite this experience. I've been asked "if you can change your past would you?" by the people who know of my past and my answer is always a resounding NO. I would not change my experience because I wouldn't be me. I believe everything in life happens because it is meant to. It had to happen to me, the reasons why I'm never really sure of but would I change my past, no, never. I was in therapy for two years but it's effects did not profoundly kick in until I moved here. It literally saved my life and for that I am eternally grateful. 

Wow let's take a breather shall we....

I don't want to shock you at the casualness that I am able to write about my experience... because it is by no means a casual subject. I have just learned to separate myself from it a bit because I have on my own worked through the anger and sadness it caused in my life. The experience remains I've just learned to forgive and live my life the best way I know how.

I guess having encountered it in a character on a TV show that I love has made me rethink or to a certain extent relive my experience. Reading fan reactions most especially the reactions in which people say "it's absurd Tina was abused she seems so put together." or the ones in which they say  Tina as a child was supposed to know the difference between right and wrong really pressed my buttons. The insensitivity and the irresponsibility of the writers and producers most especially Ilene Chaiken have caused me to have this reaction. A reaction I have really no control over because there is seemingly nothing I can do to curb the feelings. There is no means of expelling them so i took to my blog and wrote about them....

I take great offense to the fact that people don't think victims of abuse can grow from the experience and become survivors. I am a living breathing example of such change. There are I'm sure millions of people around the world who share my experience or even worse that live very successful lives ( I mean seriously look at Oprah). I feel disgusted by Ilene and the way she chose to handle this without any culpability. The LGBT community is already so misunderstood by society, people could easily see this and assume  the reason Tina is a lesbian is because she was abused.... talk about throwing another huge misunderstanding into the mix. 

That in order to be a gay you must have a sordid history of abuse or of negativity.

So I realize that was quite a long rant. Thank you for following me to the end. I feel better having shared a bit of myself with you blog world. I hope that you can take something from this rant. I know that it's made me breathe a bit easier. Knowing that I can be honest and share myself even the darker parts of myself has proved to be a great relief

thank you! <3

 

Good Bye!

So, last night I said good bye to one of my favorite tv shows, The L Word. I began watching the series based on my friend Andrea's recommendation and boy am I glad I listened. I remember finding the series online and watching all of the episodes I could in a matter of a few days. I was completely engrossed by the stories and characters, which I will be frank in saying surprised me. I was surprised because I found myself connecting to a group of lesbian characters. 

You see lesbian subject matter has been a bit of a sore spot for me in the past because of a rumor that went around about me being a lesbian... the rumor caused me to have a strained relationship with my mom and also had effects on my friendship with the woman who was allegedly my "girlfriend" (she by the way was not). It wasn't the fact that the rumor was about me being a lesbian because if I identified myself as a lesbian then I would be proud of that. The soreness came really from the lack of understanding the people around me have of the gay community. I felt as if there was something wrong with me and that should never be the case. Plus the fact that my mom became slightly estranged... that saddens me the most because she is literally my best friend. I had to then deal with the hurdle of making amends for something I had no control over. Which I can imagine is similar to the experience of someone who is actually gay.

Anyway... I began watching the series and it opened me up in a way I never thought possible. I became uniquely aware of how much we as a whole have in common with one another. The gay community faces the same challenges that society at large must face except they must face those challenges without the acceptance of society.  The L Word became for me an entry into a realization that a gay couple and a heterosexual couple face the same challenges. It became a way for me to see that love is alive in all of us no matter the shape or form it takes. That friendship and honor and loyalty is truly universal. It became a way for me to see the lesbian community as human instead of a concept.

I am so grateful to have found a TV show that could encompass everything that I think is important in story telling (as a writer this idea was the biggest draw). The characters were well rounded, developed and to a certain extent real.  For the first  five seasons of the show I felt there would be a point where I could encounter these characters in real life, from the ideal couple (Bette and Tina) who as it turns out weren't as perfect as they seemed, to the broken soul (Shane) who made mistakes but remained merciful or kind in the judging of others. Or to the comedic levity (Alice). They are alive in our lives. We can throw a stone and hit one of them in our own circle of friends.

Season Six left for me little to be desired, which happens often when a tv series is reaching its end. I think at some point the writers and producers of the show lose track of the initial excitement that comes in the creation of a story. I am sad that this show had to end in such a trite and contrived way. Nevertheless I am still grateful to have been part of the experience of a truly ground breaking series. 

It's changed me and my perception. I've grown from simply watching a television show which is not a sentiment you often hear about media and entertainment as a whole. This series has helped me to see the possibility in everything. That nothing is ever only as it seems. I am more aware and more open which to me has been the most amazing lesson. 

I hope that all of you find yourselves wanting to watch the series! It's meant alot to me as well as millions of other people world wide. Open yourselves up and discover something new

.... keep love close!

<3