Most of the time, when the end of the year comes through, I get nostalgic. Sometimes it’s a blessing, mostly it’s a curse. Do you ever just sit there, and ponder “what if I had done things differently?”? (Is that how you write that sentence?) This looming thought, that maybe if I said something, spoke up, challenged someone, anyone, I’d be somewhere completely different. A true curse, because of the infinite threads all being pulled at the same time in different directions.

Is trauma inherited? Does it really take seven generations to end the suffering? Seven generations ago… Half my family was in Europe, and half of them were in Sinaloa, Mexico. What did they go through to make such a nostalgic child? What did they yearn for? For this? For me?

I don’t know.

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October

The world is too warm for October
There are no fallen leaves on the ground
No crisp air
Just heat that does not end
Sweat and desire melted into one
An intense hotness
Desire threatens to consume me
Much like my past lives
A kamikaze pilot
A nuclear disaster clean up crew member
A production assistant on the set of “Stalker”
The first person to die during a slave rebellion
Maybe in this life
When the revolution comes
I will be taken to the firing squad and asked:
“How many iPhones did you purchase?”
One too many
Not that the answer matters
Because the trigger will be pulled
And my blood will stain the concrete
And some poor soul will clean it up
And I will revive
to continue the never ending
Desire to desire more and more
Until one day
At the base of the Chocolate Mountains
I see my friends be cruel to themselves
And animals, I am fighting back tears
Remembering it was my idea to go out there
In the first place
I cannot go back now
To tell them
That cruelty leads to more cruelty
And that manhood is not about
Kicking dogs, and fist fighting your friends
But about giving water to a stray animal and being a refuge
For your friend whose father’s fists land across his body
And having patience to plant a seed and tend to it
and watch it grow
So that one day
It may give shade to our great-great-grandkids
And that a planet on fire is now how the world ends

How many of our wounds still need tending today?
How many times, have I died, in this lifetime?
Being reborn anew requires us to have small deaths
How many times have I bit my tongue to protect a man’s ego?
Held back tears, when all I wanted to do was to become an ocean?
Ignored the suffering of others?
Only to further the ideology
That boys will boys

So I give birth on this page
My father still kissing me on the cheek
A hug from my best friend
A tender touch
That lets me know:
You are safe
To be yourself
To surrender
To the violence that is loving yourself
And let it rip you to shred
A beating heart exposed
Battered and bruised
Of having a good life
A hearty laugh
Delicious wine
The morning’s first sip of coffee
Love stained, blood dripping

This is why it is called a heartbeat