I hate miss hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss  hate miss you.

Stop it with all the absence already. 

This is neither beautiful nor poetic. Ugh. 

Something a lot of people would spend a lifetime searching for

Our worlds collide
Become one in the starlight
Forget perfect endings
Let's dare and live for the day
Today
Today's like no other

Words come alive
In the story of our time
Let's all quit pretending
Let's dare and live for the day
Today
Today's like no other
-Bamboo, Carousel
--------------------------------

She was apprehensive but only because she put her walls up high.

He was smitten by how firm she stood her ground, it made him push and pull. 

They wanted to go against the mad dictates of this world, but refused to be each other's excuse.
"You are not my scapegoat," she wanted to say to him who believed otherwise.
"You are not and will never be another passing," could probably be the best words that could work their magic for her.

They found madness even in their slightest encounters, but interlaced fingers, detours and kisses along the avenue can only do so much.
They were together, then not again, the inconsistency almost all too uncertain.
They lost it once, twice, and probably this time again. But who cares?

They were swinging through the ocean, making the crashing waves bearable.

They were each other's forces and little things.
For a moment right there, for nights that seemed like infinite, each one had the other.

And theirs was a beautiful thing. 

Or better yet.

Date a girl who reads. Date a girl who spends her money on books instead of clothes. She has problems with closet space because she has too many books. Date a girl who has a list of books she wants to read, who has had a library care since she was twelve.

Find a girl who reads. You'll know that she does because she will always have an unread book in her bag. She's the one lovingly looking over the shelves in the bookstore, the one who quietly cries out when she finds the book she wants. You see the weird chick sniffing the pages of an old book in a second-hand book shop? That's the reader. They can never resist smelling the pages, especially when they are yellow.

She's the girl reading while waiting in that coffee shop down the street. If you take a peek at her mug, the non-dairy creamer is floating on top because she's kind of engrossed already. Lost in a world of the author's making. Sit down. She might give you a glare, as most girls who read do not like to be interrupted. Ask her if she like the book. Buy her another cup of coffee. 
(Or, her favorite signature hot chocolate fix. )

Let her know what you really think of Murakami. See if she got through the first chapter of Fellowship. Understand that if she says she understood James Joyce's Ulysses she just saying that to sound intelligent. Ask her if she loves Alice or if she would like to be Alice.

It's easy to date a girl who reads. Give her books for her birthday, for Christmas and for Anniversaries. Give her the gift of words, in poetry, in song. Give her Neruda, Pound, Sexton, Cummings. Let her know that you understand that words are love. Understand that she knows the difference between books and reality but she's going to try to make her life a little like her favorite book. It will never be your fault if she does.

Lie to her. If she understand syntax, she will understand your need to lie. Behind words are other things: motivation, value, nuance, dialogue. It will not be the end of the world.

Fail her. Because a girl who reads knows that failure always leads up to the climax. Because girls who understand that all things will come to end. That you can always write a sequel. That you can begin again and again, keep the love, and still be the hero. That life is meant to have a villain or two.

Why be frightened of everything that you are not? Girls who read understand that people, like characters, develop. Except in the Twilight series.

If you find a girl who reads, keep her close. When you find her up at 2 AM clutching a book to her chest and weeping, make her a cup of tea and hold her. You may lose her for a couple of hours but she will always come back to you. She'll talk as if the characters in the book are real, because for a while, they always are.

You will propose on a hot air balloon. Or during a concert. Or very casually next time she's sick. Over Skype.

You will smile so hard you will wonder why your heart hasn't burst and bled out all over your chest yet. You will write the story of your lives, have kids with strange names and even stranger tastes. She will introduce your children to the Cat in the Hat and Aslan, and let them keep hamster pets, maybe in the same day. You will walk the winters of your old age together and she will recite Keats under her breath while you shake the snow off your boots.

Date a girl who reads because you deserve it. You deserve a girl who can give you the most colorful life imaginable. If you can only give her monotony, and stale hours and half-baked proposals, then you're better off alone. If you want the world and the worlds beyond it, date a girl who reads.

Or better yet, date a girl who writes. :)

Disclaimer:  If this may break or reveal anything, let the pieces stay where they should be. 

Why We Went Down the Drain
I always thought we had everything easy. I wasn't a prize you worked sweat and blood for. I was a mere side step, the already-there, the convenient one you already had the moment you realized you needed to have someone. Since then, there never was a chase. 

Maybe because I wanted you to be more of him. I wanted you to quote me poetry, and write me notes like he did. Maybe because I wanted you to show up right at my doorstep whenever something came up. Maybe because I wanted you to see through all my cracks and flaws, all the littlest details -- from how I love for my hands to be held no matter what, to how I prefer hidden personalized post-its than ready made Hallmarks. Maybe because despite all the bold gestures, I still longed for the little things. Of knowing the right noise to my silence. Of knowing my sense of urgency. Of knowing when to come in between my daydreams. Maybe because I wanted you to love me the way he did. Relentless. Incessant. Deep. And after all these years of wanting and wishing to be loved more than you ever could, your strings finally broke.  

I was not surprised. I was not surprised at all. I knew it was coming, or at least my instinct knew we were reaching the end. I only prayed that it come sooner before all the hurt could come in, too. Of course, I was distraught to see something I have nurtured for years fall apart, and then can't do anything. It needed a lot of saving, but I didn't see the point of having to do it myself. All those time, you were my prayer. I prayed that even after all the rules I violated in your men's rule book, you'd make a decision that was for us. But you chose yourself. And I knew it was time to go. 


A couple months forward and slightly a  few moons back, the story pivots. Let me now shift this to you. Yes, you. 

Back in your arms, you asked me how I was. I cannot begin to tell how comforting it was to hear you say those words because for the longest time, no one has asked me that. I was thankful you did. And it took three words. Just three words for me to realize that maybe you never left. Right then and there, I wanted to tell you how much I missed the girl who didn't care what others would say as long as she gave it her all; of how much I missed the girl I was when I was with you; and of how much I missed you, too. I wanted to tell you that when I said it terribly hurt me every time I refused another chance of us, I meant it. 

I'm sorry to have kept you on the sidelines when you could have deserved the best. 

How will I contain encounters, physical and otherwise, with you? Perhaps in bite-sized snippets of sublime after sublime;
in paragraphs, yet they won't be enough
in photographs, however, not too powerful to immortalize
in memories, 95% sober, 5% inebriated, but happy

-- the kind of "happy" I have been perpetually chasing, finally found. 
So this is it for laying down all my cards, in black and white. 

Bit by bit.

It's like watching a snowstorm.
You see the flakes falling but you don't realize they're adding up. Then suddenly, your whole lawn is covered.
All these little things have added up, and you're my snowstorm, baby.

She doesn't.

She doesn't say "i love you" like a normal person. Instead, she'll shake her head, give you a little smile, and say.. "you're an idiot."

If she tells you that, you're a lucky man.