2-in-1, The You in Me.

I sleep in my day clothes sometimes. Because my body needs to collapse, and I absolutely love when my body talks to me, tells me what it needs. I sit on the throne for hours every night, letting out my stomach, but also letting words fly out my mind. Behind a locked door, whether in silence or with Lana Del Rey, Buddhist beats, or Arabian symphonies playing, I love staring. Sometimes I stare at myself and try to examine what I can fix tomorrow, but tomorrow is already here. My colors will change, I am only just a young brown girl committing myself to Beatles' version of love, an ideal life, and wishful thinking over top a thin page. Like I said, tomorrow is here. You are here. I love sleeping naked with you because I could never share with someone how much I love my own skin, and being in it. I'm comfortable to be a confident that was taken from me when I was a child. I spend hours each day reflecting on how I can infuse all that was lost into my brother. He is worthy. Above all, we are worthy. Although I don't have the courage to raise the phone to my ear and listen to his voice, I pray he feels me sending him all the energy I am trying to collect for myself, and for the people around who enjoy my light. I feel the pressure weighing down at my knee caps each time I see someone suffer, and it is all too often. There are too many broken hearts and half-invested spirits. If it ever seems like I am too "open", it's because I want to be everyone's bridge and dab of holy water. I want to sprinkle a little bit of my heart everywhere I go to ensure everyone I come across gets all the love I never received myself. My father told me the same thing after sharing a story of how he was beaten in Salvador by his blood, explaining the dead bodies he saw walking to school, 8 years old. War. Destruction. Holes in his blujeans and space for his toes to creep outside of his shoes. He had nothing. We own nothing. Entitlement means nothing. The cliche phrase "you cannot change the world until you, first, change yourself" sits on the throne with me, which is why I am clay. I easily sacrifice and adapt to shifting myself for other people. Of course, I am strong. If I don't feel like a shift needs to be made in me, I won't put effort into doing so. I am my own project building, an in-sterile complex. Sometimes I piss on my walls and throw cigarette buds on the sandpaper floor of my elevators. I spray paint the hallways of my heart so all the dark edges can share some pastels. Mema always told me those colors look best on me anyway, why not inside of me? You reward me by helping me recognize all of this. And even though I speak faulty spanglish, love to pick my boogers, panic at the sight of darkness, and let my eyes leak for wilting flowers...you love the inches of me. I cannot be filled up with anymore humility. I am bowing at my knees, I face the floor in constant child's pose. I won't stop until I can look up in sivassana and cry blood pumped from my arteries. This is my stomach coiling for you, tonight.

"I am going to get a water, do you want anything?"
You.