Fleeting Winter Flakes

"Fleeting Winter Flakes"

The soft crunch of snow 

   beneath my feet

   feels like it did then

   only for me to remind myself

that time has gone by,

   fleeting winter flakes

fall from the sky

and I have begun

to blur the lines

of what you were

   to me,

somewhere amidst 

all this descending white

on the buildings

over the sidewalks 

    and covering 

    the tops of trees,

our past still exists for me,

a ghostly motion of us

moving

among these snowflakes

existing 

right before my eyes

for mere moments 

before disappearing

amongst 

a million other flakes of snow

remembering once more

that we were 

a lifetime ago.

-Armando Torres

All Over Again

"All Over Again"

Knock on the Devil's door 

long    enough 

and something      will      answer.

You will need    more 

than what you brought 

to exist              beyond 

that moment of confrontation.

Time will s t r e t c h infinetly backward 

and extend in w a y s 

where only the moment 

you experience in memory

as the present 

could be used to break you.

Every   memory 

will      exist 

at    the    same    time 

with every painful one 

being at the forefront.

The    suffering 

would    only    be 

the    first    thing 

you    would    know.

    The very essence of despair 

would come through 

   your own stream of time 

among the existential 

and the conscious.

You wouldn't realize 

at    first 

but   would   come 

to     know 

that this process 

is    only     nature. 

A    process As    natural 

as the birds eating  seeds 

or maggots         Feasting 

upon rotting flesh.

A system of balance 

where life 

is only a piece 

of a much larger machine.

There's nothing humane 

in the way 

it would happen;

   humanity is but only 

   a futile construct of defiance 

   to the natural order of things.

A necessary piece to the machine, 

   an illusion of struggle 

   to make 

   a more powerful connection

and nevertheless,

to never change the outcome,

to never change 

    what you will become.

The existential flesh 

of your mind 

would very precisely 

be flayed and stripped away,

leaving behind 

something different.

Leaving eyes 

coated over 

   with black 

   and no pupils,

leaving a dark sheen 

of infintie existence 

glinting with its own 

swilring galaxies 

and cosmic pillars 

of stardust and creation.

A being of purity 

that has at long last 

inside infintiy 

found its purpose,

   existing now in its final form

   to finally hear 

   the next knock on the door,

to finally reach with purpose 

and answer 

and begin this process once more.

-Armando Torres

Singularity

"Singularity"

Pull back far enough 

from this moment

and you lose all beauty 

into a single point.

   The details disappear into memory.

      All the hurt and the pain and the joy.

Every    thing shrinks 

into a single speck

that disappears 

against the backdrop 

of black         ether.

So many pale points 

of pure thought

gone and lost

among so many more.

Close your eyes 

and stretch infinetly outward

away from this moment 

and everything is lost 

to a single dot

indistinguishable to any kind of detail.

Life,    consciousness,Existence, 

all move past 

a horizon of no           return

and continue 

toward a      singularity 

that you   can     never 

move closer toward.

As you continue 

to pull back 

so far    into 

the Infiniteness of Irrelevance

immaterial becomes the observer 

and you lose 

  the   sight     that  once   saw

all those beautiful moments and details 

    to   the    infinite     black,

never to find 

your 

pale point of pure thought again,

never to venture 

toward the horizon 

to find your singularity.

As   you      just 

dissapate into nothingness 

and dissolve into the liquid

and waves of pure inconsequentiality.

-Armando Torres

That Place

"That Place"

It was night

when I finally finished cleaning.

   You had left long before now,

   weeks before me.

I packed all the boxes 

of things you left,

of things you told me 

to donate away.

I painted over 

the holes 

in the walls.

Cleaned the kitchen. 

Closed the blinds.

Walked through 

and looked at all the empty corners.

This place was what was left

and we are both leaving separately.

   All those emotions experienced here 

      are now among the walls,

among the silence and shadows.

Everything we said and felt

belongs now 

to the history of this space.

Right before I turned out the lights,

That last glimpse I took

I saw all 

the echoes of memory 

dance

through the hallways and the rooms.

Cried as I stood there 

for a second 

remembering

most our moments we spent there 

living our life together.

   But I, only stand here now 

   as a spectator 

watching it play out 

beyond the here and now,

   as only remnants of a happier time,

trying my damndest

to ignore what went wrong.

But I will take with me 

only what will hurt

and leave behind 

all the pleasant parts

because they won't come.

They belong there in the end anyway,

unspoiled,

for the silence and the walls.

We had our moments 

and now have both moved on.

I wonder every now and again 

where you are

but then the parts 

I took with me from that moment

come flooding back in 

and I choose not to remember you.

You're so far away from me now

that I don't know what you look like.

Don't know your name.

Don't even remember things you liked.

I do still remember that place, however.

Where it is. What it looks like.

   The off color of white the walls were painted.

   The stains on the carpet from the wine we spilled.

   The way the bed faced the window from the other end.

   The layout of the bathroom with the shower by the door.

The nights we took showers together 

and made love 

dripping in water.

Laid together on the couch 

as the sun dipped below the horizon.

The way the light shined 

through the kitchen window 

when we made breakfast for each other.

Oh no, There I go, remembering you again.

I can't anymore.

I choose not to think about you.

I won't remember you.

I choose not to remember you.

But 

sometimes I think 

I took too much with me from that place.

Maybe even stole some of those pleasant memories.

But I did it

Just so when I cry

I can find my reasons why.

-Armando Torres

I can't leave

"I can't leave" I close my eyes and there in the black I am distracted by the images and shapes that appear from nothing to paint stories I don't remember but somehow feel familiar. It's odd, the sensations beneath my fingertips feel real, I can feel the walls of this giant city, the grass against my palms, the scent of autumn in my nose. There's something in me that knows this is a dream and another part that seems to be real to me. I lose my sense of time if I linger in here too long then I find the waking world far more strange than when I left it before. I am becoming desensitized to the regular sensations of this real place. I'm being tempted by the unfamiliar that exists when I leave here. My ability to differentiate between you and the person I've come to know in my dream has dwindled and the foggy line between when I'm awake or asleep has all but disappeared. I feel everything from everywhere and I'm so very tired. The people here only serve to hurt. I'm more afraid of the deceit here than the lies I have created for my eyes. It all feels so real there. I'm so far removed anyway that my broken soul cannot heal here. All the reminders seem to disappear when I'm gone. I think I will make peace inside there instead of here. So I lay myself down to sleep knowing this will be the last time I see this waking world. I'm trading the sensations of the here and now for some different kind of experience where I can make what I feel into what is real. I close my eyes and I think this is my dream. However, There's something here I don't quite remember seeing. Something quite unfamiliar. A being separate from me. It's not doing what I want it to do, isn't being what I want it to be. I don't think this is my dream. This isn't my dream. This is something different. I can't feel my reality. I can't pull my mind to awaken. What have I done? I can't leave. I can't wake up. Someone. Anyone! Come find me. Please. Help me. I can't leave.

-Armando Torres

We Are Connected

"We Are Connected"

As much as I hate it,

we are connected,

when you hurt, I hurt.

When you are in pain, I feel the guilt 

and don't know where it came,

I just know 

the strands of existence 

that entwine your heart 

to this plane 

also intertwine 

with mine 

and I sometimes 

can feel 

the pull of purpose 

coming from 

a higher celestial realm 

and feel the things you feel.

I have tried to know why 

but instead now

just accept 

that we are connected 

even though 

you are the most awful thing 

I ever regret allowing 

space 

on the pages of my life. 

You will die someday 

and I expect 

the hurt and emptiness to overtake 

my being, 

allowing myself 

to become something else.

I look around 

and just know 

that no one knows 

the burden of you 

but they all see 

that we are cursed 

with connected tissue

to be one and the same. 

We are connected 

even when we  shouldn't.

 

Residual experiences 

that should have 

long bled 

into the liquid of existence 

and left me the fuck alone. 

But here I am again,

hurting again, 

and not knowing why 

but understanding, 

you are going through something

that I don't fucking care for. 

I hate it. 

I hate that we are connected.

-Armando Torres

Another Face

"Another Face"

I can't heal the hurt that I have

and it's corrosive.

   Rotting me from the inside

and growing to the healthy parts of me.

I feel it at the edges.

   Stretching around the fringes of my face,

tainting my viens, 

ripping me with pain

from tissue to bone 

   and doing it all 

   in secrecy 

as I try to smile 

to hide the hurt 

this pain has wrought.

I'm a facade.

A barely passable 

version of a human.

Just

   a writhing

   mass 

      of flesh and bone 

      with pain 

      boiling just underneath.

Just so I can exist

as just another face.

Contorting and stretching 

my skin 

so I can pass the day 

without having 

to answer 

the questions.

   Without having 

   to show 

      that I have run out of patience.

All the movements and charades

   Just so no one 

   can know 

   that I can't heal the hurt that I have endured.

-Armando Torres

You're Not Alone

"You're Not Alone" The candle flickers from across the room. The shadows it casts dance over one another as the coolness of the night settles in and that's when you begin to feel it, Even though there seems to be nothing but a lonely dark room. Lifeless of anything or any kind of movement. Just the dark reminders that creep up and over your eyes leaving the bloodshot stains of memory and pain hanging like dark bags. It's here where I see you, its here creeping up and over your shoulders from behind with my eyes that I peer into what you show without you knowing. You sit there alone because you think I'm not there but regardless of what you believe I can still see you; as I hover over your shoulders. I see you and what you do. I see your secrets kept from people, kept from everyone and everything. So don't ever forget that when alone feels just enough where you think no one knows, I do. I know. Because I can always see you. I find your hollow existence among the existential fabrics of depravity and watch you. I feel the grooves of your emptiness and glide my fingers over reality until I touch the ends of who you are. Sensing the very tips of your sanity. Just know, you are somewhere even if alone feels so alone. Don't. Because I know. I always know.

-Armando Torres

Who Am I Feeling?

"Who Am I Feeling?" Where do all those moments go once the stream of seconds have moved on, once time has left this point behind and continued on to a new one? They say time heals all wounds, they all say it'll get better with time; But Where do my feelings go Once time has erased the moments, Once memory has dissolved into the ether of reality? A cyclical motion of energy perhaps but where does this emotion go? A transference perhaps but then who is feeling my hurt now? Who's heart break am I feeling? Were these emotions ever mine? Were they ever real to begin with?

-Armando Torres

a sense of self

"a sense of self" There, just beyond the dismal glow of the computer screen one can lose a sense of identity when lingering inside misery for too long. Wandering its endless corridors, Exploring deeper than the time before. Eventually blurring the lines and feeling like this was home the entire time. One becomes misery and accepts it as a part of their identity not realizing it is but a parasite and we its host. Lingering on the fringes of light we tend to look out into the abyss letting the darkness transform for us and become the tortuous images we see about ourselves. The frail false walls of identity crumble in time as the cracks let in the drippy existence of what could have been. There, just beyond the dismal glow of the computer screen we should dare not look, because there is where the ocular point of misery stares back

-Armando Torres

it's all just a moment

"it's all just a moment" Looking back over the course of my time I find I could only ever have existed for a moment, barely a life, but never for more than a moment. None of us have been here for longer than a brief instant. We, who think time moves alongside with us have never existed longer than an insignificant blip. The relative motion of it, the seemingly endless movement of it, the grandness of time, all of it, just for it all to be a moment when it all existed. just a moment. And none of it would have ever existed if that moment never existed at all.

-Armando Torres

Just a Minute

"Just a Minute" It's never just a minute, is it? Here I am again waiting, drinking this beer alone below the dark glow of this bar room. I don't know why I keep doing this. This minute of yours has become an hour and your texts have stopped coming in. A simple reply that you forgot or that you couldn't tonight would suffice. But being left here alone looking around watching others have their laughs and convos while hoping you wanted to see me is worse than just drinking alone hoping for a conversation to appear beside me. Feels strange telling the same stories I used to share with you but to new faces. Some times they change into you and old feelings begin to burn through my veins again. That's when I usually leave, telling them it'll be just a minute But I don't come back. Alas, here I am still waiting for you to arrive soon even though I know you won't. As soon as you said it would be just a minute I knew already, But I'll have one more drink and maybe, just maybe, you'll finally be here and see me.

-Armando Torres

Wherefore

"Wherefore" Its in the darkness when it comes to visit, slithering its whispers around the night sounds, prowling among the black on the fringes of sight. The tiny hum of street lamps from outside reaches my ears as I sit and listen and wait to hear the whispers again. My eyes hang heavy deep inside my head painted with round dark rings. I can no longer see in this darkness. I'm bathed in it. It has washed all over me. The dreary midnight breeze from my opened window glides past my face and with it hanging on the edges of its air, the whispers come. I sit calmly and without worry staring forward from my heavy chair, arms hung over and head hung forward and eyes ahead. Nothing moves inside this night nothing except the spattered beauty of dripping red lines. Slowly painting a trail of absolution rolling downward unto the floor. The whispers talk amongst the shadows inside the room and outside among the trees beyond my window the glowing eyes peer in to look in at me. There's nothing for me. All I have left is this wall of defiant beauty and the body that painted it for me.

-Armando Torres

a familiar goodbye

"a familiar goodbye"

There's a saturated cry

to the false void of silence

I want to release 

   and these walls taunt me 

   with their poise 

of immovable stillness 

   to the broken display 

   I am performing before them.

A slobbering ache of pain 

and anguish 

seeping through 

my ethereal body 

releasing

as a fifth sense of some kind,

dissapating 

into the ether

leaving me,

   finally realizing 

      I am just 

      a kind of vessel 

      for 

ancient cosmic beings

      beyond the here and now.

A familiar sensaton.

A call to the void.

   

We are just sprinkles 

Of existentialism 

   for greater gods 

   trying to find 

their place of purpose, 

   their sense of emotions 

   beyond the insignificance  of time.

It leaves me 

feeling

alone with my realization.

Perhaps 

   even a discovery.

Leaves me alone

   having discovered a glimpse 

of existential dread 

and wanting to dissolve 

into the liquid of reality 

leaving me 

with a sense of urge 

pulling me through 

the window.

   Leaving me

   and my sense of being.

Leaving the residue

of the observed

only for it 

to dissolve away

among the million

and many more milions

   of experiences of life and reality.

Leaving...

Something I want to follow

from where I am sitting 

to where 

I could crash through

the window 

and fall below 

in the most visceral display 

of defiance my body could allow, 

   in the most truthful way I could paint.

I have lost my senese of identity 

and want to reclaim it.

  But only can

in losing it first.

I want to display something beyond 

what normality has for this body, 

   Something that is beyond

   what it can and cannot be.

Therefore,

A sense of urge is pulling me 

through the window again,

   something I want to follow 

   from 

   where I'm sitting 

   to where I could crash through 

and fall below 

in the most visceral display 

    of defiance my body can paint.

A familiar sensation.

A call to the void.

   Not at all empty.

   And not all 

   from nothing.

-Armando Torres

Far Beyond

"Far Beyond" Somewhere among the distant dark, Beyond where the black stars hang Exists some sort of sentience, A kind of perception with eons of existence. Treating time as a superfluous indulgence to swim through intersecting from the now to the then only peering in for a moment to take its existential breath before disappear again. Some kind of thing floating outside of time among the cosmos passing by the waterfalls of stars and the pillars of creation, Watching cosmic lights dance and flicker as supernovas gleam and glimmer against the infinite darkness. An ever changing mass of amalgamative blackness, swirling and swaying just beyond perception. Pulsating with ancient purpose existing in size on a scale we could not comprehend. Swallowing whole solar systems within and leaving them inside an eternal darkness for millennia as it moved on in what for it would be but an instant. Experiencing reality inside moments we could never understand. Oblivious to insignificant blips of life that fizzle out with no trace they were even there. This sentience lives among the blackness of infinity, never to show itself to something like us. Existing so far beyond we could never comprehend.

Lighthouse

"Lighthouse"

There in the darkness

among an endless hazy fog

shines a source of guidance

from far off in the distant dark.

Even as the sky 

is shrouded from view

with all its stars 

hidden

behind a thick murk

a lighthouse stands

parting with its light

the heavy mist 

of fear and hinderance.

An infinite sense of resignation

seems to blanket

every breath we take

as the sways of the water

   pushes and pulls

us

away 

   from our beacon

of light

   as forward 

   becomes lost 

among the endless

misty black 

   of fog.

But there 

   in the darkness

the resilient beam of light

   we have followed 

   shows us the way forward

before again 

the sways of doubt 

   tips and leans

us 

more toward 

the haze 

above these murky waters

that extend forever 

in every direction.

And yet

there,

standing tall still

is our tower of light

shining

our source of guidance,

reminding us

   which way is forward,

   which way is right.

   Which way for us to go.

-Armando Torres

For Fear

"For Fear"

I don't look 

at anyone 

in the eyes 

for fear they may 

   discover the sadness 

   I'm hiding 

   just behind 

the glossed sheen in my own.

The weight of its

slow, solemn ache 

is hidden inside my bones 

below my thin 

delicate skin 

hoping 

the shamefull sadness 

does not find a path 

up 

toward my eyes 

and release itself 

from within me 

into perfect 

crystal salt drips 

for all the world to see,

I don't look at anyone anymore, 

   let alone 

   their keen eyes. 

I'm too scared 

to even look 

into my own 

for fear 

I may see something 

I have  tried to ignore.  

I have chosen to not see 

and instead have watched 

as my thoughts 

form what I perceive 

what the world will be,

and I stay back behind

a carefully crafted

perception

that if I stay just still enough,

the world will just forget about me.

I can finally never worry

about all those eyes

looking

and I can restfully

close my own

never having to look

into them again.

-Armando Torres

Antiques

"Antiques" My words have finally seemed to dissolve away from me like fizz in water, dissipating into almost nothing, like it was never even there. My thoughts have become memory and my feelings like scars that have almost faded away into the rest of my skin. It's all safe now, all those things I used to think tucked away

undeneath

all my other things, far away and

back behind the separation of time. They are now just intricate antiques to look at, to only be placed safely back on the shelf as I move from piece to piece and aisle to aisle.

My Howling

"My Howling" A howling exists in my heart, I feel its rage, its ache, I can feel its primal, feral, existence as it sends its angry sorrowful howls to the muted walls of my heart, Where only I can hear, Where only I can feel every moment of its pain as it desparately tries to be heard outside of the prison I have kept it in. It begins its howling moans once again upon my soul as it bellows long drawn cries trying to manifest itself againsy my will, creating claws, teeth, fingers and a face, shredding at the walls, ripping and scratching to get out, roaring with gnarled rage. There's a howling that exists in my heart, and I will not let it get out, for the sake of myself, and perhaps for the sake of others.

Just Then

"Just Then" I've existed for too long, emerging from silence only to find the words I knew are all gone. I don't recognize the face I see in this mirror, there's a lifelessness to its appearance, a strangeness I'm not familiar, like another person looking back at me. Existential doubt seems to linger on the fringes of my every thought now. Am I not the person That I thought I was? Or am I just the reflection looking out to the world mimicking the words for the sounds they make. But just then, my reflection seems to have moved before I do... Just then... That thought... Terrifies. Perhaps the time I spent in silence, I began to dissolve to be lost into obscurity and forgotten. Maybe they all lost the thought of me. Perhaps I no longer exist. But there's fear in my bones, a dread That if I open my door, there will be nothing, only the empty feelings of all my actions, only the reflection of my life that already happened. And Just then, I feel my reflection move again, before I do, before I gave it its will and way. Just then, it moves without me. As if no control existed in my being. I see My head turn to the door before I do. BUT What if the world IS still there? What if all the blank stares STILL exist? I begin to feel my hand reach out to the knob without me doing so. Existential dread builds in my every bone. I hope the world is not, I hope its all not there, Just then... My reflection takes one last look at me before smiling, And Finally reaching and opening the door.

What I Was

"What I Was" There was a silence that followed me as a shape, it lingered around on the edges of most sounds creating a ghostly figure and outline of some invisible being, feeling it only through the muffling it created of the world's tones. That was yester year however, and it has been some time since I felt your silence. Then I question, what is this I feel; this presence that exists. It lingers at the edges of every room. Follows when I move. I don't know what this is but I do think I know, it is not you. I would have gone most my days without ever noticing it but today, I felt a difference in this presence. Something malevolent in its intentions. Then I felt you again just for an instant, but only as a muffled feeling. Like you had been consumed by this thing. I fear it watches me, waiting for a moment to slide its shadowy presence into my being so that I may carry it until the day I die. As it feeds on me like a parasite and I become a hollow husk of what I was. Perhaps, it is why my dreams have recently been plagued by my memories of you. You reach out to me with your energy but only for it to transform me into you. I realize now, you have been feeding on me for some time. I have no more of me to fight you off. I am just eyes looking through a window as I watch the world pass by. Seeing my life from a distance back behind the glass lenses of my eyes alone inside a dark room. I feel your presence now in the absence of me. I see you now clearer than before when you take us before a mirror. I feel you now more than I feel me. I feel you now more than every other thing.

Marked

"Marked"

A lunar gloom 

glows through

the cotton clouds above,

   illuminating an otherwise

   deathly deep black sky

   that hovers over the world

   suffocating the light

   we shine

back toward the sky.

The milky white glow

of the moon

shines

as the howls of the night

grow in strength 

from a far off distance,

    And all manners of mystery 

begin

to take shape 

among the shadows of no form.

Fears of every kind 

grow

and splinter through

the fabric of our rationality 

and the ooze of darkness

drips into even the most well lit homes this night.

Tendril fingers of malice and evil 

stretch along all surfaces

as the glow of our lunar orb 

slowly fades and gets swallowed

by the darkness of the night.

Something grows in the black

that hangs above,

Something watches 

as it floats through your windows,

   peeks into your home,

   plants its stains upon your soul,

Stretching equally in every direction,

Reaching for your fears 

as it leaves

you marked 

as it passes,

Letting you know 

   it will return again.

You are not safe from it.

Even in the most secluded of rooms 

with the most well lit lights,

You are not safe 

   as it will come and touch again.

It will find us all 

as it wanders the world

with no purpose

other than to remind us

that we are not safe

and will never be

no matter where we go

as it reminds

that it has no cure.

-Armando Torres

A Figment of My Imagination

"A Figment of My Imagination" I'm not fighting against your memory, I'm fighting against the notion that perhaps you were right about me, The pain has long since subsided but I look in the mirror sometimes and everything behind me fades to a ghostly blur where figments play out as echoes of my regrets, They overlay themselves on things that were real and I begin to believe that perhaps maybe, those awful things you said about me were perhaps true. You, the person have long since left but the figment of your presence is still felt, tempting me to believe what it says is real, It has become an ugly, terrifying amalgamation of self-doubt, regret and fear, Its horrifying face watches me from the corner hoping I catch a glimpse of it so that it may weave another tale of my past to torture me with. I don't even really remember you anymore, all I see is this echo of you, this figment of my imagination.

-Armando Torres

A ways Away

"A ways Away" I've come to realize I relish in being miserable, for I now know it is only in those moments I can find the beauty of the world; Only willing to see it from a distance rather than being among it; Just a ways away, back behind the distant and faintest of memories, existing far off becoming long and dim and almost gone to gray. Too distant to ever want to be a part of it again. However, I feel I could only ever find that beauty to see if I were a ways away, like a painting with its beautiful brushstrokes and elegant colors, standing steps back to see its whole existence open bare for me to witness. Only then would I believe in the beauty, Only then would I relish my misery just as I do; Just so the world can be beautiful to me. But only if I stand a ways away. Only then.

-Armando Torres

Just For Us

"Just For Us" There's something safe inside nostalgia, Something we all remember being, A stretch of time where we still felt the whole of our lives could still be filled with what we wanted to be. Time has a way of being full of possibilities and empty of them at the same time. Back when I was a kid something I realize now is that everyday were full of if's and when's and then's, And now so many painful what if's ; So full of happy memories and what could have been's, I remember when mornings on the weekends --first thing would be, I would lift the cordless phone because my mom loved them, and dialing from memory all my friends to try and make plans for the day. Nothing mattered as long as we each said we could hang. Lazy sundays with my sister waiting for my dad to start the barbeque. Oh yes, there is something safe inside nostalgia and the reasons why I still love going to the movie theater, Or enjoying a backyard barbeque with my friends, Grabbing snacks and watching the same shitty horror movie again and again, Listening to the same songs over and over until the last second just to repeat it again on a sony walkman. There are moments in time we all have where we find what feels safe enough to open up to nostalgia and we become us again, --if only just for us.

-Armando Torres

Only A Distance Away

"Only A Distance Away" I can't keep up, my legs won't let me keep chasing; My lungs burn as I breath in gulps of air screaming to the sky with clenched fists and the pain of your memory in my eyes, I stop and stand there now, under these ominous gray clouds looking up watching as the storm gathers above teasing me to give up, The pain and hurt have become too much and my knees buckle to the ground as the burn in my throat pushes up gasps of tears asking the heavens, why? I look for you there in those clouds, still chasing the sky, running after you somewhere in those floating cotton shapes, But I can't anymore, these are the last slobbering gasps of agony I can let you have, the very tissue of my muscles have torn away from my legs, the very air I breath hurts me, I can't anymore. I lay here now, tattered and tired eyes upward toward those ominous gray clouds looking for your face; but only find it a distance away.

-Armando Torres

Out There

"Out There" The sun sits beyond the blinds lighting the world I only peer upon, Looking from behind the glass walls of infinite shapes and gazing at all the wonder only for it to remind me life moves on. I stare out and hear an echo from far away only to question if it's from inside my mind or from the world I stay away from. Are the sounds I hear real or just spellbound thoughts there to haunt? I fade out into the black that lay between my eyes and the existence I once had, to finally come across the sound of water and the lovely buzzing of bees among the scent of pines and memory, I ponder upon that sound of water and see the swirling colors of reminiscence splashing and forming together an image I remember all for it to just evaporate into the ether and I end up forgetting all over again.

-Armando Torres

I'm Tired

"I'm Tired" I feel it at the edges of my being, that extra exhausted feeling, the weariness in my knees, the tired tug and pull of my joints, the sandy grind in my bones, It seeps in from the outer edges and saturates everything about me. I tend to forget to give tenderness to my fingers and elbows, and they become upset with me, and begin to hurt, I rub them firm, massage the ache lingering in the tissue, moving the muscles with my thumbs as the pain releases its hold if only for a second. I reach for some lotion and stretch out the tightness in my muscled knots, my eyes feel the salty burn of day as I rub the sting to the sides of my eyes, I try to find relief in bed but only make it to the couch and collapse to sleep, The wear of the day has caught up to me and nothing else matters. I'm tired and my body has let me know it needs to recover but only for it to still feel tired in the morning.

-Armando Torres

Before We Get Too Old

"Before We Get Too Old" Let's take a chance, You and I, before we get too old. To look at seconds past together and remember stories we had hand in hand, To have those walks through the neighborhood just to watch the leaves sway on the elder oak, I want to know every little thing you like and have breakfast ready in the morning because I get up early and you like to sleep in, For you to show me your garden of plants and herbs you grew in the yard we had for years, Lets have each other's backs and inspire one another, To tackle life together before enough time passes and we forget what we ever felt for each other, Let's take a chance and be bold, You and I, before we get too old.

-Armando Torres

What It Felt Like

"What It Felt Like" I remember what that felt like, when the world felt infinitely huge and yet every corner of it at any point felt within my reach just whenever I decided to move for it. Distant lands passed the silky haze laying over the distant mountains existing among the frothy clouds hundreds of miles away. A world of wonder that got me thinking that perhaps the things I read were true. Dragons and orcs and wizards existed just beyond the horizon. What it felt like to get fifty dollars for your birthday to do with it what you wanted. To be in the yard drenching sprinkler wet but yet it was actually from a thunderstorm battle among the gods settling a dispute of who should rule. To go to bed with the world within your reach. It's why I give my niece a hundred dollars and gifts on her birthday, so she can tell me tales of her adventures and I can remember what it felt like.

-Armando Torres

Secrets

"Secrets" There are so many internal battles being fought in private, ...just below the surface. Struggles no one will ever see. Emotions guarded behind an impenetrable fortress. Internal dialogues no one will ever hear. Only the hints and whispers of thoughts and fears. Only the very tips of mountainous icebergs will be seen. Nothing fully formed. Only the impression of someone's existence. And somehow those things are supposed to be accurate representations of how we feel. Somehow, my mistakes are supposed to be my identity. Somehow, the little that I show is who I am; truly. Even though, everything beneath the surface is more me than anything this reality can represent. I do find some comfort however in knowing that these strangers will never truly know me. In the end, secrets define us whether by revealing them or keeping them hidden.

-Armando Torres

There Was A Time

"There was a Time" I look down and the ground disappears, everything becomes a blur of color and sound, purely on the periphery of where my mind can exist, It is here where I usually see you again, as a thought, an essence, a boundless idea floating among the nostalgic waves of memory. I walk among the swaying trees, as the sting of the heat softens and the cool hues of every shade of blue and violet have spread up and over the horizon. The rhythmic pull of the ocean pushes the glittering embers of light of yellow and white over and back across the surface of the water toward the shores and back into the sea disappearing again in a flicker against the sandy rocks. There was a time where I could see none of this, A time where your echoes would be the only thing, but now the ground fades to blur and I find the softness of a cool summer breeze brings me a smile.

-Armando Torres

Shadow People

"Shadow People" My eyes roll forward from sleep as the skin that lay overtop pulls back revealing the room to me, but doing so doesn't wake my body from the cavernous black in which I was sleeping; I can move Nothing on my anatomy, as I push for the strength to budge even an inch, I'm just a disembodied consciousness at this point filling quickly with terror. My eyes continue to dart around the corners of the room, And then I see it, there in the corner, motionless, just staring from behind a featureless black face, A body of darkness pulled directly from the void, My whole being helpless and in complete paralysis, even the smallest parts of me cannot move, only my eyes as I watch this thing watch me from the corner. I can feel the screams building inside my throat, but they cannot escape, it's just turbulent air pushing against my windpipe, It doesn't care, it just stands there, staring, watching, a terrifying essence emanating from it, My existence begins to feel the pull, to the edges of the void, as my mind continues to tumble toward it, overwhelming panic and terror engulfs my every inch of consciousness, I cannot even think outside of the complete terror as I watch more of them come in, as I watch these shadow people glimpse into me.

-Armando Torres

I Forgot To Feel

"I forgot to feel" It lost itself somewhere behind these eyes of mine, Some kind of sorrow I forgot to feel. It's there somewhere and yet perhaps it is not... Maybe it's what I tell myself in those lonely moments where nothing exists except me and my thoughts. The darkness lingers longer than it should with the swell of all my tears brimming at the edges but I just hide it deep so far beneath these eyes of mine, that somehow it lost itself somewhere inside... Some kind of sorrow I forgot to feel, even though I know deep down; I did not.

-Armando Torres

In This Moment

"In This Moment" It is perhaps this dark and dreary night that I'm sitting here again reaching this whiskey's end. I erase my mind of you every time I take another drink. I don't want to feel you anymore. I don't want to have to think. I want to feel another night without the presence of your memory. I want to be able to dream without you finding me. To navigate through the frothy clouds to some emerald gate. To find my way through the shimmering points of pale light scattered across the night sky. To fly among them and touch them like fingers to a flowing river. To crash through one moment to find another on the other side without ever fearing your memory will find me. Somewhere among the textures of time and memory I sit waiting existing already with you as only something I left behind. However, I'm still here with the earliest memories of it and only the empty sensation of what feels real from it all left just for me in this moment.

-Armando Torres

Early Fucking Mornings

"Early Fucking Mornings"

I sit in the quiet darkness of morning; just reminiscing. The birds have begun to sing their songs, chirping their lyrics from the power lines. The dark blues above start to give way to the warm hues of sunrise. So many moments begin to swell behind my weary eyes as I drink my coffee this morning while remembering faded glimpses of my youth. Time has washed away everything of worth and has left the wreckage of a life held together barely by only memories. So many regrets, so many thoughts both happy and wretched. It's too much in the morning some days, too much to look in the mirror at my face and see my hollowed out eyes surrounded by circles of dark shades in grey skin tones. Too much to feel every ache and pain of memory in my bones. Too much to feel every ragged and worn out pull of my joints, Too much to hear every echo of thought from years gone, So I grab the bottle of vodka and serve a glass over ice, It's only half passed nine and already I can't handle life.

-Armando Torres

Everyone Says The Same Thing

Everyone says the same thing, "THIS is real, right now, this. This is reality. I'm real, you're real." But how do they know for sure? How can I be certain? It all can just be a byproduct of my mind trying to cope with the physics of a dream world. Am I dreaming right now? The last thing I remember is dying. I died. I know I did. At least I think I did. Did I? So how can this be? How can I be? This all could be memory so vividly dancing among the existential rhythms and waves of recollection. Some kind of simulation for my senses until that last bit of entropy finally flickers out and this memory becomes faded. Until it too just becomes darkness fading out into echoic whispers engulfed into an infinite black. Just a blip into the unremembered. Yet still, Everyone says the same thing. This is real. This right now.

Another Night

"Another Night" Another night of beer; of sitting here away from myself, trying to pull relevance from my day, Trying to find the guts to love, to go on, to talk about that one time, To linger at the edge of my glass only to hide behind this pint, To order another and drink it fast before I realize these stories of mine are beginning to wear thin, Oh shit, I've gone and had too much again, Now I'm here by myself and one quick look into the bathroom mirror and it's all gone, it's that sour smell again, Fuck, It's been another night, and I find I've gone and wasted another day waking up to the morning rays.

-Armando Torres

A Moment of It

"A Moment of It"

In the 

rigid rock lines

of these enormous boulders

that are vertically splitting 

the sandy layered oranges

of history

that stretch down toward

the world 

from a heavenly blue sky

holds the endless elegant worth

of what these rocks really mean.

Hues of desert blues and pulpy purples

paint a backdrop of earth 

growing

and aging

inside a time 

we will never be able to experience.

Just the faintest hints of their essence of their scale

will be felt 

and only as a moment frozen

to time;

For we are not among 

these beings

but only here to witness them

in all their grandeur.

These rocks have eroded and changed

far more and beyond anything 

we could ever parallel,

Stoney beings existing

among another river of time,

dancing and lingering

with one another,

Experiencing

the seconds of eons 

flow past them

as they continue to exist

and things seize to be,

They stay in place 

as we flicker out of existence

and they continue to play

defiant to time,

They break the sky and create

in the cracks

the scenery of centuries

only for us to ever only see

just a moment of it.

-Armando Torres

My Heart Bleeds

"My Heart Bleeds"

Seeping in 

from the edges of my perception

these dreams 

begin to tear

through my well-being,

   Ripping and shredding

      the delicate fabric

      I meticulously weaved 

to shroud me from the feelings

my heart no longer needs to feel,

These emotions bleed 

         through 

soaking the whole of the tapestry 

like blood to a towel,

         And I remain helpless;

Only able to grasp in thought 

their essence

but never really

detecting tangibly 

with any

of my other senses,

They're like ghosts existing on the periphery

of what I can comprehend 

and yet

still able to destroy 

the peace my heart seeks,

Only ever feeling them 

pour through me 

as they leave behind 

their echoes for me to reflect upon,

I stare at this tear 

sliding over the grooves 

   of my face,

wondering 

   from what ethereal plane

these elegant shimmering drips 

of sadness 

have been pulled from

to manifest 

   for the here and now,

They just delicately 

leave behind their salty stains

on my lips and cheeks,

A bittersweet taste 

to remind me

to question

if these emotions

ever existed in the first place,

Because 

these dreams are no memories

of mine 

   and yet shomehow 

   feel more real 

   than any memory 

   I have.

I wonder then,

   whose feelings 

   am I feeling 

because my heart bleeds 

out of necessity 

without ever

questioning why,

   and I feel

   everything.

-Armando Torres

No Destination

"No Destination"

Every day 

I disappear from the world a little more,

    sinking back and away 

    into a desolate landscape.

Nothing of worth

stretching in every way,

    My eyes gaze upon    

the barren reds and pulpy purples

that spread

across the sky 

in every direction.

I start walking 

hoping 

some sort of destination 

manifests out

from this oily suffocation of silence.

This journey 

takes me 

deeper and deeper

further away from here,

    leaving me only 

as an echo of who I was

to walk among you,

    A shell of sugar thin smiles and indifference,

The destitute feeling of feeling nothing

feels more and more

appealing 

than being bound by my senses,

I have come to love 

these barren reds and pulpy purples,

No longer hoping

for anywhere to be.

Just wanting to dissolve

into the collective energy

of nothing.

-Armando Torres

Only Knowing

"Only Knowing"

There are moments in my life

where what I see

and what I perceive 

are different,

     it's like seeing 

     the here and now

through a memory,

These feelings 

are the same

and yet

ever so strange,

Just different enough 

to know the difference,

Not quite 

what the moment is saying,

Feels like memory

peeking through,

Leaves one to question

     what is memory

     if not a simulation

          of reality anyway,

Like

The tip of a mountainous iceberg

on top of a summit 

that lies beneath the sea

drifting among the currents

of infinite oceans

around a planet

that is floating 

among

the waves of the cosmos

of swirling stars

and celestial bodies,

Just another sprinkle

among the trillions and trillions

of sparkling grains

glittering

their pale points of light

from just beyond our perception of time,

Inward infinitely

like moments in a dream,

falling from one reality to another,

forever,

never knowing where now is

or when where 

what we see is real,

Only knowing

what we feel;

     Is in the end,

what is reality.

-Armando Torres

I Wish I Knew...

"I Wish I Knew..." It's gone, all those days I just knew would never end. Gone...Goodbye... every time the day begins to end, remembering all over again, I remember because it's all still there just beneath my façade, it feels as if it never left. I wish we knew then how bad it would hurt because then love would likely be a game I would never have played. The taste of this bittersweet defeat lingers far longer than me never knowing. I would never know your kiss, never to feel the naked brush of your skin against mine. I would dine alone without your judgmental eyes, being glad I lived alone, I would sit on the couch by myself to watch television and laugh with the empty room, I would watch through my window as other couples passed never knowing that game they were playing, but always knowing deep down wishing really I knew what that felt like.

-Armando Torres

When The Good Started To Fade

I remember when

the good started to fade,

when your smiles became

less and less every day,

and the space

in between our words

grew so large

silence became

the only way

we communicated.

I still remember the yearning

in my heart 

to reconnect with you

while you were 

still around

and how 

for me

that eventually 

turned into 

deep internal tears.

We lived within a mold

we let grow

that stretched 

around the edges

of our connection

and let the natural decay

of our dying relationship

consume us

more each day.

We let the corrosive effects 

of resentment

kill the time we had left.

I took for granted the moments

we still had together.

Thinking naively that forever

was an option.

If I saw you today

I wouldn't even know what to say,

We became strangers so easily

that I wish too

our history would be

forgotten,

It's not that
I want to be with you anymore,

It's the lingering memory for me,

The remembering of

when the good started to fade,

And we did nothing

to save it.

-Armando Torres

Just For Us

"Just For Us"

There's something safe

inside nostagia,

something we all remember being,

     a stretch of time 

     where we still felt

     the whole of our lives 

     could still be filled 

with what we wanted to be,

Time has a way of being 

full of possibilities

and empty of them

at the same time,

Back when I was a kid

something I realize now

     is that everyday were full of

if's and when's and then's,

And now 

so many painful 

what if's ;

     So full of happy memories 

and what could have been's,

I remember when

     mornings on the weekends 

--first thing,

I would lift 

a cordless phone

because my mom loved them,

     dialing from memory 

     all my friends

trying to make plans for the day,

Nothing mattered 

as long as we each said 

we could hang, 

     Lazy sundays

with my sister 

waiting for my dad 

to start the barbeque, 

Oh, 

there's something safe 

in nostalgia 

and why

I still love going to the movie theater,

     Or enjoying a backyard barbeque

with my friends,

     Grabbing snacks 

and watching the same

shitty horror movie

again and again,

     Listening to the same songs 

over and over

until the last second 

just to repeat again

on a sony walkman,

There are moments in time 

we all have 

where we find 

what feels safe enough to open up 

--if only just for us.

-Armando Torres