See

I see her from time to time
walking on those streets
either morning or night

We live in the same vicinity
So visual bumping is bound to occur
She’s covered in colors
a reflection of her thoughts or
a result of a hungover morning?
I wonder

I have walked back and forth
with the mornings and sunsets
I have replayed the same songs in my head
I have counted my steps
and yes I have seen her 
from the corner of my eye
the jumble of colors 
walking to the rhythms of the beats
in my ears
She smiles, I am curious and 
clueless as to the reason 
but it suits her

Mornings and sunsets,

Suddenly you find yourself
having drinks during the week
with your comfort group

the table was covered
with filled ashtrays. colorful
drinks, to each his own 

I was there, with my drink in front of me
I saw her come in, making her way

She had her own group
But I as intoxicated as I was
I let down my guard 
to my thoughts that is
I unchained them, 
and let them loose
since my body was catatonic

However at the end
I abdicated to my mind,
I gathered my limbs and walked towards her

She looked messy but it’s beautiful
she portrayed a mosaic of pulchritude
different pieces of different colors

“I see you pass by everyday
Hi!”
She giggled, “you do?” As she took a drag
from her cigarette
I felt she was examining me
Her eyes scanned my face,
stripped me to the bone
but the beauty of it is that she did it
so innocently

She raped me innocently
Fuck who can say that!
Anyways

Then I found myself at a loss for words
Her vision scan has erased my vocabulary
my mental capacity to engage in small talk
“wtf is small talk anyways”
As I tried to articulate something worthwhile
to give value to my presence next to her
I found myself frozen

“What do you do?”
I used those four words as an excuse
for her to look at me and talk,
giving me the chance to feast
my eyes at her, I do know her

Her hand gestures
her giggles
Her candy wrapping truly does hide
a lot,
hard candy with a soft chewy core
I just figured
that this confident person
with no care in the world
shields herself from the bullshit
around
She has fortified her being
by ingesting every bullshit factor
and morphing it into something beautiful
no matter what

Every time she took a drag from her cigarette
Her eyes would divert from me and into the crowd
She would just look at them
I could see the gears in her head twisting
I could see what her eyes were doing
she didn’t say much, she listened
but she also listened with her eyes
she watched every woman and every man
She OBSERVED
It gave a her rush, they seemed to be the strings
to which she would weave stories about
they seemed to be characters and her joy
was to read, strip, create, generate, replace,

I could see that,
As she exhaled her smoke
She smirked
For smiling to her
was too precious to give away
so easily she diverted her

minute attention to me
She grabbed my hand
got closer to me
My heart…

Got closer to my ear
she whispered

“I see you too”

Those 4 words sent
ripples of
insecurities
it’s like I’ve been stripped
of the last tiny bit
of sober confidence I had

I have
never
felt
so
naked
and infected
with her colors

Masked

It darkened the sky
with a blanket of stars

Some ready themselves
to dive into deep slumber

Others feel that flame
that burns and yearns
for the adventures to come
with the darkness

They ready themselves
Oblivious to their own actions
They grab those masks
The ones they have in their closets
Way in the back
to welcome
the night!

Yes, the ones
that clothe them
injects them with mystery
Poisons them with illusions
and readies them
to roam the streets
of the city

As you walk past these people
You tend to fall into
a diverse vortex
of identities

All these masks
are looking back at you
with a scanning blank stare
accompanied with a fake smile
You seat yourself
on a wobbly table
and an ancient bar stool
barely stuck together
with rusty nails
a show is about to start
“Welcome to the Masquerade
You’re lucky you’ve got the front seat”

You sit there,
you narrate the play in your head
you generate the script
the actors are there
performing unknowingly
They stand next to each other
drinks in hand
Laughter

Those masks are still on
Blank eyes
Then as your brain
starts to dissect each character
in this play
You generate a theory
No matter how close those actors are
Those masks mask a lot more

Remember, they are masked for the night, or for a while maybe? Who knows?

But as you look deeper
You wonder
How well do they truly know each other?
They both have those “faces” on
They seem to engage in
such deep conversations
Yet, they both know
They have secrets
in the deepest
abyss of their soul
and their mask
seems to act
as a gate
forbidding it from leaving

Then you divert your sight
to yourself
You are clothed
similarly
You too have a drink in hand
you raise your hand panic-sticken
you touch your face

You feel that porcelain texture
soft, pasty and smooth

You get up, leave your seat
you just want to see a reflection
the bathroom line, was limitless
lovers disguised, kissing on one side
on the other, a woman smoking a cigarette
her mask was beautiful, she was eye-ing you

But you just need to get a glimpse
of that face of yours

You leave the place
you go outside
you look at the glass
and realize
that you too
are masked
for the night!

Masked Love

Facade

She, like an untamed lioness
wildly welcomes the night
by licking her lips
aching to taste that
strong vodka flavor

She, with a tornado of emotions
inside of her, is lead to the
next pub, on that dingy looking street

The smell of fermented vomit,
mixed drinks, cigarettes
fake laughter, unheard cries
all conglomerate on that street
that she passes everyday
to get to her destination

Tonight, she with
ravishing confidence,
with every stomp,
felt different
She ran her fingers through her messy hair
She just felt like it, she knew what she wanted
She is aching for the drink

She arrived, the dimmed light
made it hard for her to see
but she, spotted familiar shadows
She locked her vision on them
and cat-walked her way through
the blurry images.

Her perfume left a trail
of seduction, that lead to her
porcelain white neck

Her messy hair
inhibited the wildness
that she unleashes with the
murky feeling of the night

She sat with her crowd
“one vodka cranberry please, strong”
She lit her cigarette
so as to summon the beginning
of a great night
She knows it and she feels it

As she indulged in mindless
recitation of her day to the gang
She grabbed that bloody looking drink
She smells it,
“Ahhhh”
She readied her lips
to taste the first flavor of sin
for the night

She rested the cup on her lips
ready to tilt for taste
The alcohol, slid slowly
“mmm, that’s good”

Her craving was quickly satiated
As the night progressed, it got darker
and the drinks got stronger
and the cigarettes were much more

With every sip she intakes
a feeling inhibits her
an alter ego you might say
She becomes tougher
She becomes eloquent about her wants
Dammit, she does what she feels like
and brushes off the clinging claws of society
with the simple sentence

“I am tipsy”
Is she? or are we all part of her little game?
Does she conspire with the night
to unleash her true self?
Has her daytime facade fooled us all?

She stretched back,
and twisted her head
so as to massage that silly twisted ache
Her head became lighter
She secretly likes that feeling
but no one has to know
She sat up straight

She crossed her legs
and grinned!
For the whole world in her head
has a completely different view to her
and everyone is
clueless of hers!