“to be a poet means
to live
with a permanent wound

forever
susceptible
to either

the shade
of the sky

or someone’s eyes.” 
~ Sanober Khan

The last time someone told me, “You are too sensitive, act tough or else you’ll lose,” I opened the windows of my heart wide open and let that person leave.

That’s the very day when my vulnerability became my best friend.

Growing up not being able to recognize the beauty of my sensitive soul, I had to wear many masks. I thought something was wrong. In a society where strong is highly-praised, I felt I had no space.

Life happened and as my body and soul acquired more bruises and scars, a special kind of magic found me when I became so in tune with my inner poet. Now, I marvel at the roughest of edges and find grandeur in them.

I fall in love with people not because they are perfect but because they are charmingly flawed.

Every time I watch the world intently, beauty makes my heart cave in. Yes, beauty even in the darkest, the most painful times and visage. When my eyes well with tears, when I get goosebumps, when I go “Awwwwww,” I just feel that somewhere somehow other spirits are with me, treading the softer world and heeding the music of their inner poets.

It’s in these little moments of vulnerability that I feel most human, most alive. So I ache, I feel, I suck the marrow and I write…oftentimes, fearlessly.

Once, I sat by the bus window heading to the city, marveling the blurring trees and the transition of the slow rural life to the busy urban jungle, and out of nowhere, I wondered: What if one day, I have my own son and he’ll also have this super sensitive soul of mine, how would he deal with it? Will he be scared to let the world see the softest parts of his heart and mind? How could I help him nurture such gift despite of all the shadows and the scars that it would cause?

To my future son, if he wants to be a poet:

Sure, go ahead.

But please don’t call me when you wake up
to melancholia at 2 AM.
Don’t tell me that this immense loneliness
makes you want to go to the ocean.

I might tell you,
Get off the phone dear, get off the phone,
clear your throat and clear your bed!
Spread a blue blanket and remember this,
stand before it, spread your arms,
and throw your entire weight
to its softness.

“Sure, go ahead,” I tell you.

But don’t you ever lie to me that you’re
not in love with her.
Don’t give me excuses that her breasts remind
you of pomelos or her dark underarms
are a major turn-off.
For I do know that you love imperfections,
and that, you’d bruise your knees for a woman
who
can
fly.

Don’t cry to me when you hear magic from
the air and nobody else around you can.
No, don’t hide that you see stardust made of morning dew
from the tips of rice plants.

And please, never be afraid to speak about:

one, sins
two, the government
three, spirituality
four, concealers
fifth, your truth

Dear son, have no fear to bare it all—
your chest hair and even your scars
outside;
in.

If you ask me why, I’d answer you in
silence—for the spectrum is actually
wordless my love…
our true language is is wordless.

It is the dialect we share with Osho
and Rumi…

(sighs)

Yes, my love, time is a lie.

~

Author: Kristine Buenavista

Editor: Katarina Tavčar

Photo: Florian Klauer/unsplash