searching for reasons

and while i was going through this book i was reading, my lifetime asked me:

why do you love me?

i know there's a reason, i know that i have an answer.

but for a brief moment, i was dumbstruck. i was tongue-tied. i didn't know where to begin.

i simply motioned to her, kissed the screen (as we were on skype), and told her: i do not know why, i just know that i do.

i mean i thought i knew everything, but a specific answer escaped me - for a question as deep as the one that she has asked.

again, i do not know why. i only know that i do love you. and it is something that i hope i am able to show you truthfully, audaciously, selflessly. i do not know if i could ever gather all the reasons why i would like to wake up to you and with you, why your voice was the one thing i would like to hear before i head to slumber, why your touch would calm me instantly - i only know that you are the reason.

i love you because it is you - just like what i said - i love you for the truly extraordinary person you are - the way you love your family, the way you love my family, the fact that you never give up on me even when you have to repeat yourself. i love you for all these beautiful things, and even those little idiosyncrasies of yours that drive me nuts. i just know that living has been quite an adventure, especially the last couple of years. i just know that i do not want to imagine a world without you.

i am unsure how to simplify an answer to such a grand question - but i guess as long as we stick together i can show you everyday why i love you, and why i deserve you. and this just goes to show that it is because of you this journey has meant so much and will always mean so much - not just you and i being apart but our relationship - it is a journey, it is evolving, it is made of discoveries - minute or otherwise.

don't worry, even when i fumble when you asked me that question - you can go ahead and ask me that everyday, and i am sure that it will evoke but one feeling in my soul: you are the reason i am certain, and you are the certainty in my reason.

sonnet eighty five

i find you in the middle of
the night tiptoeing through
my own darkness, and loving
the webbed thoughts you

find in there, gathering the
nightmares that tainted
my sleep and putting them
underneath what you called

beautiful, telling me again
and again - in a whisper
or a scream, that you

deem my flaws that which
make me perfect, all that
which make me yours.

sonnet eighty four

we trace a place, a space
and it leads us back to
the onset, when my silence
meant yes and your sudden

curiosity spoke volumes -
of stories at length, or meanings
i should have seen past
curtains and layers,

we waited for gravity to
find its way through
thoughts we have kept

and smiles that furrowed
through our minds like
ellipsis, an unending punctuation.

sonnet eighty three

seeking letters and lines,
rhyme and meter in this
secret language when all
i wanted was a translation

of your stares, your mannerisms,
your touch, your possession,
we fumble and let these
thoughts fall apart,

only to be resurrected by
your naked and pure
laughter, or something

i have never heard of
before - prior, without,
needless, spiraling toward desire.

sonnet eighty two

no room for errors, they said
but i know we will always
make an exemption,
attracted to destinies more

than destinations, we are
marred and mangled by
a thousand words we thought
to ourselves sacred and

infallible by actions committed
through your gaze or the pristine
way you mouth your words,

when our souls fall silent
as we carve infinite moments
with finite hands.

sonnet eighty one

armored by notes meant
only for your silence,
i offer the decadence of
my thoughts in your loneliness,

these tragic hands resurrecting
themselves in this poet's heart,
surviving through ink and pain,
carrying the flesh and scars

of your resonating hallow,
the bangs go louder as the
minutes hasten to tomorrows

stumbling upon a desire
that unfurls and decreates
itself in your sight.

sonnet eighty

do you attempt to put
out the fire that exists
only in your imagination
or do you fan it until

it bursts and consumes you,
or do you wait until
all the light you know
emanates from one distant

flame, carving heat and
incandescence in your eyes
until you remember nothing

save the dance of ember,
the prancing, scorching
fragment of you widowed by air.

sonnet seventy nine

dismantling, disengaging
little by little, piece by piece,
the guarded symphony
of your secrets and certain

eyes, uncovering what
you have long hidden
to stare at the naked truth
and know there is nothing

i would not touch or
seek to understand, then
the hours unfold into

timid nights, clinging
helplessly to the threads
that wrap you delicately.

sonnet seventy eight

moments trembling at
the sight of flames,
gauging the gravity
of an epiphany -

a notion, a thought,
a mark, a stigma,
an unending, unfleeting,
dawning of things we

we wish to embrace, of truths
we wish to cage, of virtues
we wish to defy

holding ourselves up against
an upheaval, a separation,
a frantic conundrum.

sonnet seventy seven

inexhaustible, inexorable
tireless, relentless
juxtapositions, without the
curiosity to conclude

before we arrive to this
black-marked day
hunted until it becomes
red like a curse, bright

like being blinded, until
this hand shakes as my
thought struggles to put

your infiniteness within
five minutes of these words
you breathe life to.

sonnet seventy six

break me open, like the
daylight would rupture the
silence of clouds, dance
with me in this trance

of transitory beings and
transient whereabouts,
of wars made holy by
our own heedless desire

to hymn pieces of you
and i together - to be
what it is, what it should

- a calligraphy destined
to unveil our intimacy,
our synapses, our moments.