Prerogative

We were smoking on the corner of the street, while I was watching him remember the words to his favorite piece. He said, “I was crushed the night you left, but I bleed more for the first night you chose to stay.” He then asked me, “Guess you’ve never felt that kind of pain yet, huh?”

I wanted to deny it. I want to have that problem too. I was envious that he knows exactly how it feels to be left brokenhearted by someone he’s offered more than his everything. That he knows how it is to cry yourself to sleep just to numb the growing pains caused by one’s selfless undertaking.

I want it too, even if it’s just for a fleeting moment. I want to forget, just for a while, the truth that I’m so far from being successful, unlike all the people I’ve graduated with during senior high. That I’m so far deep in debt, and the thought of finance destroys my ego. That my mom could be gone at any given moment, and I still don’t have the means to raise my siblings when she does go. That I’m never gonna be as good-looking as the guy from her favorite magazine. That I’m not as good a musician as the boy who plays the guitar from the other class in 8th grade. That I’m stuck in this body which will never work its ass off at 6 in the morning to get as physically fit like those people surrendering to their daily routines, and that I’m never gonna be as talented as him, or her, or them, or you, and all I have right now are these words, but “poetry won’t get you anywhere.”

Can I just, for a moment, forget that I still hate myself for all the things that could happen, or will never happen? Forget all the reasons why I hate myself and hate someone else for destroying me. Forget who I wanted to be, but could never become, and be engulfed whole by the “lasting” torture that loves brings for a little while? Please, can I?

Maybe I can’t.

People are so obsessed with the idea of falling in love these days because maybe, their future holds much promise. But for us who’s never had a glance of ourselves in fast forward, I guess we won’t be, and we can’t. Maybe we shouldn’t?

Because as long as the future’s too vague for us, love will never feed our families for a whole month.