SOMBER ALLURE

Author’s Note

It took me almost two years. Somber Allure is a 29 degree Taurus Sun, and it precisely has that anaretic degree feel. Yet, it’s not as bleak as Lessons and it’s nowhere near the rollercoaster of that was a mistake. I reached emotional regulation, but that doesn’t take away the messy, conflicting, difficult truth. This project has everything but a somber allure. It’s exactly somber.

However, it is unlike any project I have written. Its anaretic identity makes me excited for what’s to come. “Prettier” had several rewrites and was going to be something completely different until the last minute. “Prettier” is only a sliver of a truth from my only (debatable) relationship. With that, I would like to formally thank my ex it’s based on because he was the foreshadowing of my writing career: thank you for the sonnets I kept and the love letters I burned in my childhood home’s terrace. Thank you to the men who inspired tracks 6 and 7. You won’t catch me thanking my dad for track 10.

Intro

I'm not afraid to be alone.
I just want to be chosen.

The emptiness is not a lack of companionship.
It's a lack of acceptance: 
Difficult to fulfill when I keep loving people who don't want me.
And, at some point, it would be insane not to look internally.

I tried believing that none of the feelings were real.
I tried believing I just liked feeling avoided.
And I realize it might sound ridiculous,
but I genuinely saw a future with every person I wanted to be with.

I can't lie. There were certain ones where the fantasies felt more aligned.
They weren't scared of what I've been through. 
They cared to defend me as I do. 
And there were others with an effort to efface the past. 
I’d gladly get on board, 
as long as they knew mine, 
and theirs was far behind. 

There's no mystery to me.
I answer everything honestly. 
But, even if I embody the bittersweet,
I wish I had a somber allure to meet it.

I don't. 
It's all very jester-like and cognitive:
the way I express the pain.

You Were Everything

across the screen
across the street
there you are
just not in my dreams

before i sleep
i feel the breeze
my heart is hollow
because i let it cease

i stopped feeling. 

sometimes i overflow. 
when i'm reminded you exist,
i fall to the floor.

my heavy breathing is a fever dream.
i can't access it because it’s lost its meaning.
you show up but i don't have any memory. 
you and i, nothing but the remnants.
it's far from haunting, even if you regret it.

for 8 nights, you opened timelines to a different life.

i erased you completely,
mentally.
and i don't think I’d cry if you left me.
i left you on the ceiling.
your image morphed into my daily reality, staring into nothing. 

you've become a fact
with no impact.
i've felt it all because of you. 

i can't say when i see you on the street 
that i don't look again.
i can't say, when i think of love,
i don’t think of what i felt then.

what i can say is that it changed me:
something i don't even remember
because you broke me. 
and i wish you nothing but ignorance
because Lord knows you're not innocent.

Prettier

I don’t want to linger.
But, back then, I was prettier.

You fell so fast.
I thought I held your heart in my hands.
Reckless yet apologetic,
I didn't know you kept falling until you landed
in her second chances.

I wanted to run from every form of your touch.
In agony, I begged God
to tell me what was wrong
because I craved that intimacy
only for you to leave.

I don’t want to linger
But back then I was prettier 

The charm of my repression. 
I knew I wasn’t authentic.
Ignorance was my beauty.
The sadness used to be just for my viewing
until it became my image
because you opened the awareness
of what would be my life’s abrasion.

To this day, I wonder what I cried for.
A part of me still feels like yours.
But, I wonder if I hurt you or myself more.

I’ll live if I never talk to you again.
But the desire’s still there to imagine
what could’ve been.

And, I don’t want to linger.
But, back then, I was so much prettier.

Light of my life, at the time.
You told me my dark eyes glimmered in the sunlight.
Exposing my shadow,
you still thought I was so bright.

Actress

The way I shut down:
My voice soft to the ground. 
My facial expressions intentional. 
I'm directing in performative intervals.

Every quote precise, 
I look into your eyes
because I don't feel a connection. 
I’m staring into a wall.
Delivering my lines,
serving my sentence.

In the night,
I practice in the mirror.
I could be smaller but never in your light.
My caricature is already defined.

The image I’ve bared,
The awareness to what I am often compared.
And, I'd rather be anywhere
than in this body as I stare.

I was there when it collapsed.
I was there when it was desired.
Left for demise from
secretive or stolen touches and
misery in its confine.

You don’t know me in my right senses.
We laid in the same bed
but let's not pretend we are friends.

11:11 (Interlude)

11:11 has turned into a game
of what I should beg for that day.
My wishes are ignored until I ask for more.
I wish for crumbs and scraps:
An acknowledgment of my existence, 
as I float in peripheral visions.

And I see myself just fine.
In the eyes of others, I’m terrifying.
By myself, I enjoy the time.
Life is a stage.
Behind the scenes is not the same.

11:11 please revive them
11:11 dress the set for illusion
11:11 let them be kind
11:11 go to intermission, no more light 
11:11 applause, acknowledgement, anything to be alive

I Could’ve Loved You

For once, I believe
in not meant to be.

And maybe I'm just a reflection
of the mess in your own head. 
Every day, similar pain. 
You were never meant to stay.

Maybe you liked how I couldn't hide it.
Maybe you liked how I let your hints slide.
Unraveling that she was gone.
I let you slip up.
I never judged. 

I kept a count though.
When we spoke, we never missed a beat.
You kept me clever, faster than I could breathe.
When I entered the room, did you feel pity?
Every time we locked eyes, I gave everything just to keep my heart beating.
  
I could've loved you. 
And to reduce you to an invasion of privacy, I could never do.
Because even if you knew me before I ever gave you the right to, 
I know that it made you kinder. 
I know that it lowered your guard. 
You may think I’m psychic but you did it to yourself. 
And deep down inside, I know you liked how it felt.

You Know I Love You

my heart was open all weekend
because you were nearby.
24 full hours of your presence
and i still wonder why
i could go on years 
and i'm fine.
but i see you for a day,
and i want to die.

other artists are better with the euphemism.
i went through hell to get to emotional regulation.
and you trigger every alarm,
every ache 
in my heart.

i fall asleep to the jaded pain
at the universe's mercy for a rewrite.

under the streetlights, 
i slipped into your hands.
but, it was all a choreographed dance
hidden in an alcoholic trance.
for seven years, I loved you in advanced
just for it to culminate so fast. 

jarring for a quiet love. 
a silent tug that I might be more than you thought.
but your reciprocation felt like a deflection.
you're warmer than me but i can tell when you're faking interest.

and your kiss on my head
will replay in my loneliest moments. 
what could've been means nothing
in the grand scheme of things,
but my heart 
can’t tell the difference.

Nine (Interlude)

it’s healing to be insane
losing my mind in my own space

too many faces to the overwhelming feeling that i can't shake off
the rejection isn't personal
different tones, same image
a familiar normal 

the attachment issues don't wane
I can't change not being good enough for them
and i can never convince myself they're not good enough for me. 

because they were.

nine different moments
I chose the truth instead of ignorance
the truth that i wouldn't be chosen
the truth that my feelings don't matter
and i have to get over them
or i'm the problem

It Didn’t Make Me Stronger

most of the time, i feel like life is a punishment
and i have yet to learn what else i'm paying for.

i know i've hurt a few.
to stop equating happiness with euphoria, 
i don’t know how to.
because stability is where i settle.
i've already tried the volatile.

i tell myself I’m missing purpose
as if i don't try my best with every person.
i'm missing the passion,
constantly feeling the past.  
i can't seem to make sense of what happened.

i wonder what perspective i’m missing 
because the positive feels like an act i'm directing.
tell me why i chose the human experience
with all of the pain i was destined to see clearly.
is the objective to forget?
is the objective to find its opposite?
i just want peace
even if it's in the mundane.

but pain is never far away 
regaining consciousness throughout the day.

i have so much lost potential. 
i got through the mess,
but i wish i had the opportunity to try my best.

and i'll keep growing,
hoping that one day it'll click.

kicking out space so i feel less trapped.
i don't report to anyone,
but I'm far from detached.
my daily life unaccounted for:
does a single soul know
what I do to be more?

I’m Your Karma

Sorry to notify.
You have some debt from your past life.
And you think I'm angelic, but I can't lie.
I’m your karma before I die

I’ve played this role so many times.
I need someone to run my lines.
The minute you sob, I'll exit stage right.

And once I’m gone, 
you'll learn your lesson,
be better off,
and I'll still have no one. 

Can someone please end the cycle?
Can someone give me a plot beyond your character arc? 
Because I've built gardens I've never lounged.
Grown flowers, my name nowhere to be found. 
Can someone please stop me as I'm walking out?
Tell me they want me to stay,
and my presence doesn't symbolize shame.

And even if I'm your day of reckoning,
there's more to me than what I'm teaching. 
I’m more than my past.

Please, let me play a role that lasts.