Happy birthday Sam.

I´m sorry I couldn´t translate more. It was harder than I expected. I´ll keep on though. Meanwhile, I hope these suffice.

This is for you.

This is for the ones who are tied up to reality by the string of a balloon which burst as soon as they stopped being children. For the ones who built their bridge to this world with such fragile Lego pieces that time didn´t care they were made of plastic, he rusted them anyway. For the ones who grew up wondering when would they be shoved into that machine which would make them grownups, which would trade their dreams for things they´ve wished they´ve done, their smiles for greeting cards, their eyes which wouldn´t cease to be amazed for the tired looks in their parents face. Parents who told them they would understand it when they grew up. Understand why sometimes they bow their heads a little too much, drop their arms rather too soon, give up far too often. Or why at some point they stopped dreaming, when their ideals crashed against reality, and learned how to draw a line dividing reality from fantasy. Maybe they only learned to fear the sound hope makes when it gets crushed.

This is for all of those who were about to give in, who were about to let someone paint them gray, but were saved at the last moment. They discovered that there were people who not only read books, but also lived them, as if the pages were not mere cages of words trying to shout something at us. They found that some not only listened to music, but felt it on their bones and when they closed their eyes there were violins instead of silence, and the world mattered a little less. People who walked different and didn´t look away from what they saw in a mirror. People who never kept their dreams in one drawer and their day to day in another, who acted as if there was no line dividing reality from fantasy, as if Don Quixote had been right. And we realized we wanted to believe the same. We wanted to believe there was no such line.

This is for the ones who always knew that the most real things are the ones who can´t be grasped, but could never quite explain it. For the ones who nevertheless tried to, with their own words, never cowering behind big phrases like “What is essential is invisible to the eye” as if saying that would suffice. For the ones who knew that truth wouldn´t fit in a sentence, couldn´t be trapped into a can, or squeezed into a slogan. As if seven words could cleanse our soul, elevate us over something, or fill an empty space by themselves.

We had the impression that this life was far too predictable, far too tangible to expect from it something more than eating, sleeping and staying alive. It was then that I found out that if I piled up stones I could make a house, but if I piled up words I could make worlds. I wasn´t the only one, but we were the exception to the rule. And if you ever paid attention you must have seen us. We were the ones who read Twenty thousand leagues under the seas while the other kids learned to play football; the ones who admired Tom Sawyer´s wit while our classmates laughed with each new curse word they learned; the ones who searched for treasure maps buried in our backyards while the other girls dreamt of prom, and the other boys dreamt of hanging those girls as trophies on their walls.

In this way we raised ourselves, detached from everything which surrounded us. As we watched everyone else desperately cover the cracks made by souls which are trapped too tight inside our bodies, we expanded them till they became caverns, and without fear of exploring them we found out that to know who we were we just needed to hear the echo they gave back to us. But this left its mark on us, living in the shadows made us pale and afraid of too much sun. We wanted to believe that our days as outcasts would be repaid, that this was but a test, that we were doing the right thing, that we were martyrs. But then we grew up.

We entered adolescence, and laughed at our naiveness. Of course no one was paying attention, no one was interested in our story, and if there was some god watching over us it didn´t matter, because he never came down to comfort you. The only thing that brought us comfort was that sentence that we tried to carve on the back of our minds, “there is no such line”. It had to be true. As a gambler who thinks himself lost and goes all in, as a man who jumps from a moving train for he knows where the train is heading, as a lawyer who stands up to shout “Objection!” right before the judge´s hammer strikes the wood sealing someone´s fate, we had to believe it was true.

But the odds were against us. We realized there were no dragons to slay, for Saint George had taken care of that, nor islands to discover because NASA´s satellites saved us the trouble and with that the glory. But that couldn´t stop us, our dreams grew up with us. They became more humble, more rebellious, and they appealed to us more than ever. We learned that an adventure could consist of a shitty car, a road disappearing into the horizon and a stranger that at the end of our journey we could call “brother”.

We changed our fantasy books for stories of people who seemed to look something to hold on to, because just like us, they had trouble finding something worth grasping in this world with more stones than words. Our ghosts changed from flying white sheets to tormenting memories, and knights in shining armor to anyone who dared help us fight them. We sold all our hot wheels plastic cars and with the few coins we got in exchange we bought a poster of light blue Ford convertible of the ´60, as a monument to nostalgia. We liked that poster. We liked to think some boy had put together that car piece by piece saving it from oblivion, using sweat instead of oil, heart instead of discontinued spare parts, with that abstraction that can only experience a teenager who feels he´s doing something greater than himself.

The movies showed us people lost looking for a place where the ground wouldn´t burn their feet, letting the wind carry them like paper dolls with broken wings, crashing with others once in a while. When that happened, the friction of their frayed wings intertwining made sparks, casting flashes of light over the imperfections of each other. And they only found beauty in them. They laughed at their flaws, and the more cracked they were the harder they laughed, to make it clear they didn´t care.

We know that nowadays there are few roads disappearing into the horizon, because of the buildings growing from the ground like prison bars. We also know that there are not many light blue Ford convertibles of the ´60 out there either, because nostalgia is old fashioned. And we also know that there are every time less people who let the wind carry them. Perhaps a life with no surprises managed to seduce them at last.

But I want to believe it´s not like that. I want to believe there people sitting at the edge of the road waiting for a car to pass to stick their thumb up in the air, for one of us to shoot a flare into the sky so that none is left in the shadows, for an air current to throw us all in the same direction. Let´s keep our wings open just in case. And when that night arrives, like vigilantes dressed up as vandals, we will abuse of the innocent amount of caffeine in the cans of Coca-Cola, brandish our spray cans as broadswords, and wield them against the prison bars which once kept us captive. While everyone sleeps, we will go back to our rooms, pale and tired but smiling.

The next day I will laugh when I see all the men in suits wondering what does that sentence written on every brick wall mean.

“There´s no such line”.

Statues.

The thing with statues is that they are perfect, but they fall.

We admire, idealize and immortalize them. We look over every single flaw, o even worst, translate it into a virtue. If they are scratched we say it´s a scar telling us a story, if it´s in ruins we treat it with the solemnity we´d treat a martyr. We interpret every turn as a sublime cadence, every gesture as a message shouting to be deciphered, every chisel as the lair of a truth which is bigger than us. Amidst this urge to worship it we forget it´s made of stone. It cracks like every floor tile we´ve ever stepped on, collapses like the asphalt on our streets. It doesn´t matter how much we wish for it, we can´t rise them above other stones, we can´t make them the exception.

I'm not really talking about statues, or stones, or even less perfection, but movies have taught me to talk in metaphors whenever it´s possible. I'm actually talking about your boyfriend. I'm talking about your dad. I'm talking about that English teacher you had in highschool, about Gandalf as well as Dumbledore, about Albert Einstein, about the Knights of the Round Table, about that musician that seemed to write all of his lyrics in your name and you do nothing but watch how they grow like forests in your soul. You will be tempted to love without return, to obey without questioning, to believe in all the answers they give you, to follow a wizard into the battle as if he was a banner, to obey a moral code because the one who enforces it is noble, to rise your heart into the air with your fist hoping that it will fuse to that man who sings over the crowd, wishing that the wind could rip out your voice and take it wherever he goes.

Don´t.

None of them is incorruptible, nor as special as we wish they were. They weren´t with Dante when he visited hell, nor had a chat with Saint Peter at the doors of heaven. They are so alike us that we are afraid to even think about it. So far from being rustless, so close to being made of plaster, so perfect but crackable. But words… words never rust. We fall for them without even realizing it. We feel enlightened when we let the lyric of that song trespass our defenses and fit so easily on our insides, it´s chorus finding shelter in our folds; when we listen to a Gandalf´s speech under the gates of our castle which is about to fall, bending already upon the blows of those who are coming for us, and we believe there's a reason worth dying for wielding a sword; when we read a sentence, a single sentence that shakes us so deeply that we can´t rest until we spray paint it over every gray wall on this word, until we shout it onto the ears of every man leaving their lives behind on office cubicles, if only to go to sleep knowing that at least we tried to wake them up.

It´s okay to believe blindly, but believe in the concept, not in the man. If you are going to love without return, love an ideal, and not someone made of flesh and bone. If you are willing to give up your life, to jump into battle without thinking it twice, let it be for the cause, for the words written on that frayed banner waving in the wind, but never for the king that holds it up from his throne. Not because the king was corrupt, or a tyrant, but because he´s a man and nothing more.

As every other man who seemed indispensable for the earth to keep spinning and taught that the earth keeps spinning without them; as every other who owned the world but let it slip between his fingers, simply because they couldn´t with it´s weight; as every gargoyle that protected the gloomy cathedrals from imaginary enemies than only the could see, making their sacrifice even more noble; he will fall one day. He´ll fall because just like statues, it´s a matter of time before we become ashes again, regardless of how high we get.

But the words we say… they are perfect, and they never fall.

4/30: Little sailboat.

There´s a small sailboat on my wall

it lingers at the edge of the frame

the walls in my room are blue

I think it wants to sail through them

I rip out the frame, but gently

it didn´t wish to be born a prison

I shake the painting a bit

the boat trembles with fear and joy

it jumps of the ledge

falls to the ground slowly like a crumbled paper

gasps like a fish taken out of a fish-bowl

like a bird, flaps his sails which are wings which are broken

I pick him up softly

my hands are lighter when I hold him

my palms are weightless when I lift him up

I tell him to be more careful

then I drop it on the wall

he falls right in through the paint

stops midway to the bricks

but stays motionless as if stuck

making small wave rings

I try to give him a push but I can´t touch him anymore

I blow towards him, he moves an inch

he needs more wind, I reach for the window

feel him come to life

His sails swell up clumsily like a pidgeon

testing it´s wet feathers for the first time

he´s a tree that can´t grow leaves anymore

he´s a kid afraid of the dark outrunning a storm

he´s a sailor looking for a cove to name, to go there

every time he feels like casting roots

takes off without saying goodbye

I wish to step into it and fall asleep inside it´s wooden heart

it´s humid planks bending with my weight and the waves to rock me

But i´m too big to fit

I wave a handkerchief

he soars through the walls doing anything

but a straight line

goes out the window

doesn´t even have a shadow to hold him back

i´m glad he came with no anchor

Sometimes when I lay in bed and can´t sleep

he comes back

sails up to my roof where I can see him

and traces constellations of wakes for me

until I drift off to sleep

he´s there as well

never says thank you

but lets me lay on his planks and rocks me until I fall asleep again.

3/30: My Milos.

Let us take stones from a brick wall to make a pond

where kids can throw pennies

and learn that they sink

let us take down barbed wires from the trenches

knit them into butterflies, then let them go

knowing that no one will dare

kill them with their hands

let us feed the animals in the zoo

and make a bonfire

with the signs that tell us not to

take them out of their cages with me

watch them take over whatever is theirs

Put your face on the ground

help the ants carry their leafs

and when they try to bite us we´ll let them

if that´s what it takes to make them happy

carve words of tolerance over a church

rip out their doors made of gold

and hold them up

so that they reflect the sun

and lets it flood where it´s always dark

when night falls upon us

steal the light out of a street lamppost

put it into a bottle

and throw it where it´s needed the most

And when they call our names

trying to make us write them down

and hand them over

when you start to hear big words like

redemption

or salvation

take my hand

and run fast

we won´t ask for shelter

nor cry for help

because we never expected anything from anyone

and we won´t start now

when we are about to end

So when the sirens tell us

they outnumber us

when they command us to give in

start laughing with me

laugh like a mad man, with a grin in your face

so that they tremble when they hold us down

let it echo through the buildings

so others have time to escape

and when they strap our limbs

and cover our mouths with duct tape

tell them with your eyes

we´ve had their sanity

but we threw it away

and watched it sink like pennies on a pond.

1/30: School taught me to hate poetry.

School taught me to hate poetry

taught me to measure it

in tea spoons

because it was rude

to drink too much of it

teachers too afraid

to take a poem with their bare hands

and eat it raw

they would pick knife and fork

disect it like a corpse

until they felt brave enough to face it

then they would taste it´s dead flesh

nodding as if they had the right to approve

then forcing us to do the same

while Bukowsky and Frost weep

because kids are learning to fear them

while the dust settles over the stars

and the mountains

and the shadow of the trees

because we are forgetting

how to pronounce their names.

They thought that was love.

Everyone saw two people holding hands, except me. I saw a young man with a wide grin who thought himself ready to carry the weight of the world over his shoulders. Next to him, I saw a beautiful girl who couldn´t wait to be someone´s miss´s. But they weren´t actually holding hands, they weren´t reaching out. Between them there was a distance, a rupture. They couldn´t understand that the other one was a whole world by himself, and that ignorance kept them slightly, but crucially, apart.

Standard questions were asked as to make sure not that they knew what they were doing, but that they would follow the path so many others took. Everything was so beautiful, and it felt so right. “Yes” they answered, as a boy beaming with pride when he knows the answer in an exam, and the priest nodded like a teacher who feels he taught his students well. And of course, they thought that was love. Nobody asked him which movie could make her cry the most, or when was the last time she had dreamt with him. They didn´t care to know if he would take her in his arms by surprise and jump into the pool with their clothes on for her birthday; or if she would play with his hair while he slept, whispering in his year how much she liked him. No, nobody thought that mattered. They only knew they were both innocent and would never hurt anyone. They would use them as rag dolls and strike them together to make sparks out of each other, to keep these fires burning, to keep this whole charade running and the gears of this machine fed with the smoke that rose from their minds and bodies toasting from the friction. They didn´t have to be in love for that.

I felt the panic crept slowly through my body as I realized how many times had this happened before, and looked around in panic as if expecting to find a flaw to my argument among these people, inside these walls. But all I saw were faces urging them to keep on walking forward, to keep this snowball moving fearing it might fall apart if it stopped for a second to think why is it rolling . I wanted to stand up and tell them that they didn´t know what they were doing, to ask shouting how was everyone okay with this. But I didn´t dare, I knew they wouldn´t understand, I knew they would treat me as a madman. Between the flowers, the “You are doing the right thing, son” or the “I´m proud of you” engraved in their heads, of course this felt as the right thing to do.

But later, when the balloons are all bouncing half empty on the floor, and the champagne bottles have longed been popped, and they turned around and realize it´s only them and a janitor cleaning the floor for the next couple waiting by the door; when they went back to their brand new house, and opened all of their presents smiling to each other at each new surprise and every “Oh, how thoughtful of his part”, when the wrappings of the gifts had been torn apart leaving everything exposed, and when time went by and their own wrappings started to fall off like they always do, and they were left standing face to face with their ribcages wide open without anything else to distract them from one another… well. I wonder if they will be able to hold hands then.

When someone young dies.

You might remember this one.


Someone once told me how horrible it is when a teenager dies. From my bubble of cold logic I glanced at him, “Isn´t it horrible when anyone dies?” Apparently he felt the need to defend himself for he answered “Of course every death is cried, but when someone young dies… it´s so much worse.” For the way he said it I knew it was one of those things you can´t explain with words, so I didn´t ask him anything else. He wasn´t going to give me the answer I wanted, and I strolled away thinking “That´s stupid, all deaths are equally terrible”.

But today I realize that´s not true, and I´d like to know why. I want to be able to explain that, which is only felt, and when tried to pronounce results in muttered fragments of something in between incomprehension and indignation, an attempt to give a shape to what we all feel, a longing to name it. Some break into tears, grief, and so many other things; or they translate it into eloquent speeches about mankind and society, fantastically spoken, but used to cover what they can´t speak out loud. Others, we remain in silence, and seek to understand.

Understand… understand what makes it so terrible. Is it the innocence they snatched from him, how in his few years of existence he couldn´t have done anything that bad as to deserve death? Or is it because at this age we are so moldable and undefined, with so much to learn and so many decisions to make that such an irrevocable sentence makes us stand up before the jury and claim for justice, for benevolence? Maybe it was the years thiey stole from him, all the road he left untraveled, the lives he could have touched, the times he would have gone around the world. That´s because when we are young we are unlimited potential, unrestrained energy, ourselves in our purest state, and we still have so many shapes to assume. I think that´s why it´s so terrible, because someone dares to stop this machine when it´s starting to build up momentum, because they tell us we can´t go on even before we decided which way to go, because they extinguish us when we should be more alive than ever.

Maybe you will cry him a little without having known him, when you are alone in your room and you finally realize what happened. No, you wouldn´t be a hypocrite, because when someone young dies we all die. I didn’t know him, and here I am. Writing this.

Indulgence.

A hermit hears the cry of a newborn through the woods and among the trees finds the infant on the floor. He hastily prepares a fire to keep him warm, and backs away into the shadows to watch him sleep. He fears that his hands, rough and insensitive as they are, can hurt such a fragile creature. Days go by, when the sun is up the hermit hides and watches him play, when the sun goes down he creates a shelter around him. The sleepless nights become evident in recurrent dark circles which refuse to abandon the hermit´s eyes. He intimidates, hurts, and even kills those who attempt to harm the baby, and in doing so he becomes corrupted. Remorse and guilt dominate a man who was until now at peace with himself.

The little one grows cheerfully, as he feels that a caring and benevolent entity takes care of him. The hermit ages pale and tired from living in the shadows and working at night, and his back bends with the burden of those who commit atrocities. The child wakes up every day among fresh flowers and harmless forest creatures. The old man goes to sleep covered in dirt and surrounded by nothing else than corpses of the beasts who threatened the kid.

When the little boy grows into a young man he feels ready to meet the one who hides among the shadows. Shouting, he begs the man to reveal himself, assuring he has nothing to worry about. While describing the unconditional love he feels for him he even calls him “father”. Beaming with pride and happiness, the old man enters the clearing with tears in his eyes. His arms stretched in front of him are not trying to hide the numerous scars; they all bare the boy´s name. His tattered clothes fail to hide his thin, battered figure. His mouth twisted in an atrocious grin, as he has forgotten how to smile.

The young man who was never before seen such a horrific sight feels the terror a child would experience should a monster appear in his dreams and runs away screaming for his father. The old man, unable to catch up to him, falls to the ground, with tears in his face. Maybe of joy, or maybe of sorrow. Either way, he knows himself condemned but does not regret anything he has done and dies on the spot with the weight of the years crushing over his shoulders, but the cleanest conscience a man could have.

But then, I wonder, who would have been innocent.

We all have a second star to the right.

This is a really old one.


-Are you coming with me?

Interrupting her thoughts and thinking she had heard wrong, she looked at him surprised. How dared he break the silence? Strangely enough, she couldn’t find a single shadow in his eyes, as he smiled expectantly reaching out with his hand towards her. It was an absurd move, were she to say no, he would be left in ridicule. He must have been plotting something, perhaps he´d take away his hand in the last moment and laugh at her naivety. She was still trying to decipher his strategy when the mechanical and rusty music began to rise in the air. At the same time, hundreds of colored light bulbs turned on to bright up the night following the rhythm of the engines coming to life around them. Only then she realized where were they standing, took him by the hand without hesitating and got on that ferris wheel which they only remembered from old photographs.

-How easier it was when we didn´t turn everything into a chess game… wasn´t it? –He said looking over the rail, wondering where could he find two red balloons, if not ninety nine.

-I forgot when we ended at different sides of the board –She said, knowing there was nothing to pretend.

-We don´t have much time, do we? –Though he didn´t feel the rush to spend it with words either.

-We have all the time in the world, we just can´t realize it –And she laughed with a wide grin, like the times in which her gestures didn´t hide an attempt of seduction.

-A shooting star! -He exclaimed with an effusiveness any adult would have been ashamed of- Shall we wish for something?

-It´s weird how if you don’t pay attention it just goes by without you even noticing… and you wish you could just go back in time -She spoke as if not expecting a response, while leaning her head over his shoulder

-What, the star?

She lifted her head to look at him and found his accomplice smile in the dark. Somehow, she could not remember the times in which she believed in shooting stars. When had she started to blame them? When to ignore them? She regretted the years lost with what she had taken for maturity as she realized how the important things seemed more like empty concepts when you looked at them from the top of a ferris wheel, and how things like shooting stars appeared worth chasing.

-Of course, the star –She said, displaying the same smile all across her face

-Then…

-Yes, come on. Let´s make a wish. But don´t tell me what it is, or it won’t come true…

Strayed

This is one of the first things I ever wrote, like... 2 years ago maybe.

Some filed document gone missing, a typo mistake, or even a crooked seven that´s confused with a one. Such trivial mistakes are enough for a soul to end up on the wrong place, at the wrong time, like a package whose directions have been misread by the mail man. These souls will always try to fit in, and sometimes they will even appear to belong to where they are, but deep down they know they shouldn´t be there. Knights who were destined to wield spears on battle horses will be pierced with anguish when they grab their suit cases and ride their bicycles. Indians who were engineered to run with the wind will bite the asphalt with their bare feet, and will frown without quite knowing why. Magnanimous, wise men who would deserve a golden throne will be confined to a cubicle on an office.

Maybe the ones who control the traffic of souls are, ironically, soul-less beings. If that was the case, a slight change in directions, or maybe years, would suffice for them to laugh mischievously. To do this even more interesting they probably start working more efficiently immediately, so that the highest amount of souls go to the right place and time, making the outcast´s soul even more alienated. After all, there are many who go to the beach seeking crowds, only a few looking for sea shells.

The strayed souls will soon realize they are different. First, they will suspect there´s something wrong with them. They will probably spend most of their childhood, and if they are unlucky their adolescence, punishing themselves for being strange, trying to cut off their weird edges and polish themselves so that they fit through this slim door called acceptance, because of the stories they´ve heard of what lays on the other side. But then, sooner or later, they´ll realize it´s fucked up. Everything is. When a boy stands up to give a lady his seat and is looked upon with resentment, he will wonder when did chivalry turn into chauvinism. When a young man is surprised by the corrupt gears which make the world turn he will be called gullible, and will want to know when did innocence become the same thing as naivety. When a high-schooler walks barefoot for fear of hurting the grass he will be mocked by his classmates, and will apologize to the trees in their names. And if that wasn´t enough, they will whisper behind his back “He´s crazy, don´t talk to him”.

They will realize though, that they are not the only ones like that, and they will find shade in the monuments erected by other souls just as lost as them. Musicians, writers, artists of any kind, they all feed on the sense of strangeness that this world generates on them. The worlds they create will make much more sense that this one, even though they exist only on paper.

Fictitious characters will be more real than the people that ride the bus with us. They´ll find more truth on the lyrics of a song that on any article of the constitution, and the verses of some book will become their law. They´ll never feel lonely again, because they will know that all of these stories were made for them.