Life's Too Short for Pettiness and Too Precious for Miserliness

by Roger B. Rueda

Let us be brutally frank, like that one friend who doesn’t sugarcoat your questionable life choices. Envy is as pointless as trying to argue with a toddler. It drains your soul, wrinkles your forehead, and worst of all, makes you look like you just swallowed a spoonful of ampalaya. Instead of wasting time peeking over the fence at someone else’s greener grass, why not water your own patch? Or better yet, plant something useful—like humility.

 

Tolerance, on the other hand, is like wearing comfortable shoes. You don’t always need to agree with everyone, but it helps if you don’t step on their toes. Besides, enduring life’s minor annoyances with grace is far better than turning into that perpetually irritated person whose blood pressure is higher than the cost of onions.

 

Generosity is not just a virtue; it’s your ticket to heavenly VIP status. God, in His infinite wisdom, blesses the giver—especially those who give without the expectation of a five-minute standing ovation. Give with a heart as open as the EDSA traffic jam—generous, unending, and occasionally exasperating—but never like you’re surrendering the last slice of lechon at a barangay fiesta. That’s not generosity, that’s emotional martyrdom.

 

And please, for the sake of world peace—and my sanity—stop hyperventilating over trivial matters. The random human who cuts the line at the grocery? Let them have their moment of fleeting triumph. Trust me, their karma is already stuck in an eternal ‘loading’ loop. Focus on the bigger battles—like safeguarding your mental health from being hijacked by life’s daily annoyances. After all, if we reacted to every little irritation, I would’ve declared war on half the Philippine bureaucracy by now.

 

Also, minding your own business is free, and yet so few can afford it. Other people’s lives are not episodes of a teleserye for you to binge-watch. Concentrate on your own plot twists; trust me, you have enough drama to keep you occupied.

 

Rejoice when others succeed! If someone gets a promotion, don’t roll your eyes like they stole your dream job. Clap genuinely. Celebrate their win. After all, life isn’t a zero-sum game—their success doesn’t deduct from your potential.

Life is short. Too short to be wicked, bitter, or perpetually stressed. Relax. Breathe. Enjoy that cup of coffee, that sunset, or even that turo-turo special. Savor everything with gratitude, because no one gets out of here alive. And when the end credits of your life's telenovela roll—hopefully not with me delivering the eulogy—you’d want to be remembered as someone who lived with joy, kindness, and the rare, almost mythical wisdom to let go of nonsense. Trust me, no one wants their legacy to be, ‘Here lies insert your name, whose greatest achievement was holding grudges longer than a teleserye plot twist.’

So, go forth! Be generous like a politician during election season (minus the ulterior motives), be happy like a Filipino spotting balikbayan boxes at the airport, and for heaven’s sake—don’t be a walking bad mood. The world already has enough problems without you adding ‘human version of a traffic jam’ to the list.

 

In the Game of Life, Hustling is Your Strongest Move

by Roger B. Rueda

Let’s dispense with the sugarcoating, shall we? Life is not some whimsical Disney fairy tale where butterflies flit about like they’re auditioning for Bambi 2. No, life is a brutal coliseum where the lazy are trampled faster than you can say “procrastination.” In this merciless arena, hustling isn’t just a lifestyle choice—it’s your Excalibur, your grenade launcher, and your last packet of instant noodles during a midnight existential crisis.

To hustle means to defy inertia. It means waking up every morning with a fire in your belly that not even the strongest black coffee can rival. It is to labor, to persevere, and to outwit circumstances, no matter how bleak. Hustling is the art of making things happen when all the odds are against you, when the world conspires to see you fail. And let me be brutally frank – if you are not hustling, you are rusting.

The hustler does not wait for opportunities to fall from the sky like manna from heaven. No! The hustler creates opportunities, even when they do not exist. He kicks down doors that are stubbornly closed, dismantles walls that block his path, and if need be, builds his own empire brick by backbreaking brick.

To hustle is to refuse mediocrity, that insidious disease that turns dreams into dust. Hustling isn’t merely about ambition; it’s about having the sheer nerve—the kapal ng mukha—to chase that ambition with the tenacity of a teleserye villain who just won’t die. It’s about boldly declaring, “Over my dead body!” even when failure is lurking like a nosy neighbor peeking through the curtains, waiting for you to slip.

Let me make this crystal clear—hustling is not a euphemism for swindling, scamming, or pulling off a budol-budol scheme. The true hustler does not clamber up the ladder of success by stomping on others like a deranged contestant in a high heels marathon. No, the genuine hustler rises through sheer sipag and diskarte, powered by a brain sharper than your tsismosa neighbor’s tongue and a spirit more unbreakable than your Wi-Fi during a storm.

In the grand chessboard of life, hustling is your queen—swift, lethal, and absolutely non-negotiable. Without it, you’re just a pawn praying not to get sacrificed before lunchtime. It is the move that keeps you ahead, the strategy that outwits your opponents. So, my dear friends, hustle hard, hustle smart, and most of all, hustle with integrity. Because in this relentless game of life, hustling is, and will always be, your strongest move.

 

Michelin Guide Finally Sets Its Eyes on the Philippines: A Culinary Revolution Is Coming

by Roger B. Rueda

Hold on to your balut! The prestigious Michelin Guide is finally turning its discerning eye towards the Philippines. Yes, you heard it right. The same Michelin Guide that makes chefs cry (tears of joy or despair, depending on the rating) will release its first selection for our beloved archipelago in 2026. Metro Manila, Cebu, Pampanga, Tagaytay, and Cavite better start sharpening their knives because the Michelin inspectors are already on the prowl.

But wait—where is Iloilo City? As the UNESCO City of Gastronomy, Iloilo has long been celebrated for its culinary heritage. From the iconic La Paz batchoy to the flavorful pancit Molo, Iloilo’s cuisine is a testament to our rich culture and creativity. One must ask: When will the Michelin Guide recognize Iloilo City’s culinary prowess? Surely, a city acknowledged by UNESCO deserves a spot on this prestigious list.

Now, let me pause here to say this: If anyone dares serve overcooked adobo or sinigang with underwhelming asim, may they forever be haunted by the ghost of Mama Sita who perfected these recipes.

Tourism Secretary Christina Garcia-Frasco, with the grace of a well-plated kare-kare, welcomed this development. She called it a testament to our culinary excellence and a boost to Filipino tourism. And rightly so! For far too long, our cuisine has been that underrated gem waiting to be discovered—like finding that last piece of lechon skin after your cousin promised they didn’t take it.

The Michelin Guide’s standards are so high they probably need a nosebleed kit—requiring culinary genius, fearless innovation, and a love affair with local flavors. But if anyone can meet these absurdly lofty demands, it’s our tireless Filipino chefs, who can take the most unassuming ingredients and turn them into dishes so brilliant, even the French would be forced to say, “Magnifique!”—while secretly wondering why they didn’t think of it first. After all, who else can make even the simplest tuyo feel like a Michelin-star experience when paired with sinangag and a cup of barako coffee?

This milestone is not just about stars and ratings. It’s about dragging the world to our table and making them taste the warmth, love, and sheer creativity we pile onto every plate—whether they’re ready or not. Filipino cuisine isn’t just food; it’s a full-blown emotional rollercoaster, a story told through flavors, and the culinary equivalent of your nanay force-feeding you because “Mukha ka nang kawawa, kumain ka na!”

So, to our esteemed chefs and restaurateurs, no pressure, but the whole world is watching. Let’s show them that our adobo, sisig, and halo-halo can hold their own against any foie gras or soufflé out there.

And to the Michelin inspectors, welcome! May your stay be filled with unforgettable meals, and may you leave with your hearts (and bellies) full. Just one piece of advice: Never underestimate the power of a humble karinderya’s silog.

Mabuhay ang pagkaing Pilipino!

 

A Life Observed

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

What if this life,
this body we drag from sun to sun,
is but a rat in a glass cage,
a blinking cursor in some celestial ledger—
every breath recorded, every thought observed?

What if we are test subjects—
spines bent beneath a lab coat’s gaze,
skin marked with the ink of unseen hands,
our joys and griefs nothing but data
to be studied, tallied, compared?

Some are born into hunger,
where rice is measured by the gram,
where the stomach folds in on itself
like a withering leaf,
where nights are lullabied by the gnawing
of an empty gut.

Others live like kings,
wrapped in silk and soft light,
where fruit ripens in golden bowls,
where ceilings stretch higher than the sky,
where suffering is something seen,
never felt.

Some live caged,
their days dictated by alarms and ledgers,
by clocks that carve their names into stone.
They walk in straight lines, speak in hushed tones,
move like cogs, breathe like ghosts.

Others roam unchained,
fast cars and open borders,
no curfews, no consequence,
their laughter bouncing off walls
that never hold them in.

What if humility is just a number—
a life lived on bended knee,
pockets turned inside out,
a plate set down for another mouth,
while arrogance is a throne,
a suit stitched in cruelty,
a mouth that speaks
but never listens?

And what if, beyond this,
beyond the concrete and dust,
beyond the cities that burn and rise,
there is something greater—
a place where our lives are but specks
on a sheet of glass,
figures on a page,
molecules in a petri dish?

Are we the makers,
or the made?
Do we choose,
or are we chosen?

And if this is an experiment,
if we are only shadows cast
by something larger,
then tell me—

Who is watching?

Inheritance

 a poem by Roger B. Rueda

Tonight, in the window’s dark reflection,
I saw my father. Not just the shape
of his face, the familiar set of his jaw,
but something deeper, something harder
to name. A stillness. A vacancy.
A quiet resignation I had never noticed
in my own features until now.

I remember him sitting alone,
the half-light gathering in his lap,
his gaze somewhere far beyond the walls
that contained us. A man who lived
as if he were already gone,
who measured his days not in joys
or failures but in the slow subtraction
of what mattered.

He had stopped expecting anything
from the world. Stopped believing in love,
in laughter, in the need for another’s voice
to break the silence. And so,
when the time came,
when his body finally caught up
with his absence, death took nothing
he had not already given away.

My mother called his name,
her voice cracking against the still air,
but he did not turn back.
He had long since stepped beyond reach.

Now, I look at myself in the glass
and wonder: is this how it begins?

I tell myself I am different,
that I still have time, that I have not yet
surrendered to the quiet pull of disappearance.
But I recognize the weight in my bones,
the slow erosion of urgency,
the way I have learned to watch life
from the edges instead of living inside it.

Perhaps despair is an inheritance,
passed down like an old coat,
its fabric worn and familiar,
its weight too comfortable to discard.
Perhaps loneliness is not just a feeling
but a cycle, a reflection repeating endlessly
in glass and blood.

I reach out, my fingertips meeting
cold glass, but my father’s face
does not move. Only my own.
Only the certainty that someday,
someone will stand where I am now,
staring at their own reflection,
seeing not just themselves,
but the ghost of the person
they are becoming.

Only Endings

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

Once, I believed in conclusions,
like the last page of a book, its spine
closing with a soft sigh,
the scent of old ink settling in the air.

In the weight of a final moment,
like the heavy stillness after rain—
water sinking into cracked asphalt,
wind retreating into silence.

That at the end of every road
there would be a gate, rusted brass,
a threshold where feet hesitate,
where dust gathers in small, quiet drifts.

A certainty. But time has a way
of undoing things, unraveling threads
from a sweater worn thin,
the cold creeping through its loosened weave.

Of stretching the last word into an ellipsis,
like a train whistle fading beyond the bend,
the rails humming long after
the weight of departure is gone.

Of turning what we call an end
into yet another beginning—
the wick relit by the wind,
a tide pulling back only to return.

It has come to seem that
there is no perfect ending.
Only hands unthreading themselves
from clasped fingers,
a door left slightly ajar.

No single line that severs
past from present, no punctuation
sharp enough to stop
the ache of continuation.

Indeed, there are infinite endings—
some slow and unnoticed,
like a candle burning down to a whisper,
wax pooling in delicate folds.

Others abrupt,
like a glass slipping from the counter,
midair before the inevitable shatter,
the sound already forming
in the hollow of the room.

Or perhaps, once one begins,
there are only endings.

The moment the first note is played,
the song is already fading,
vibrations unraveling
in the hush between beats.

The moment love takes root,
the unraveling begins—
a vine creeping up the wall,
one tendril breaking away
as another latches on.

Every hello is laced with goodbye;
a child's hand waving from the window,
the blur of a car disappearing
around the curve of the road.

Every first breath,
a countdown to the last—
lungs expanding like sails,
collapsing into the tide of sleep.

And so we wander through life,
collecting farewells,
like ticket stubs from long-forgotten films,
mistaking them for milestones,
mistaking motion
for permanence.

But maybe this is not tragedy.
Maybe this is mercy.
Maybe the beauty is in
the endlessness—

in the way things fold into each other,
the way autumn leaves fall
into the waiting arms of the earth,
the way the tide never stops
reaching for the shore
even as it pulls away.

Maybe the only way to live
is to embrace the endings,
not as losses, but as
gentle reminders—

That nothing ever truly leaves.
That everything
is always beginning.

Wings That Never Stay

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

The butterflies, like whispers, hover in the air,
drawn to the bloom’s fragile promise,
its nectar, warm and fleeting, slipping between the gaps
of their delicate wings. They land,
testing the petals, feeling the soft give,
and in that brief touch, they drink deeply,
absorbing all the sweetness, their hunger momentarily quieted.
But when the petals lose their luster,
when the once-lavish nectar becomes thin and distant,
they are gone—sudden, without a word,
leaving only the faintest trace of their passing.

They move on, shifting from one flower to the next,
as if each one holds some unspoken truth
they are always chasing, always seeking
but never quite holding. The flowers they leave behind
begin to falter—drooping, their beauty fading
into something hollow, like an abandoned melody.
The garden, once vibrant with possibility,
now finds its rhythm fractured, its colors drained
by the cold departure of what was once so eager.

Now the flowers wait—long, patient,
beneath a sun that doesn’t promise what it once did.
They are not forgotten, not entirely,
but their time has passed, and the quiet that remains
is a kind of longing, a silence that hums
with what has been lost and what might still come.
The garden breathes in this stillness,
its pulse measured in the space between
the last flutter of wings and the next,
the fleeting touch of something that will never stay.

In the Weft of Words

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

Writing a poem is like weaving with pandan leaves—
each strand, rough beneath my fingertips,
must be handled gently, folding into the shape
of something fragile, something firm. The leaves
come in red, yellow, blue, and purple, the colors
of my thoughts, sharp like a warning, soft like comfort.
They pull from somewhere deep, like memories,
like desires, coiled and waiting. At first,
it’s a mess—strands out of place, torn edges,
like a half-woven basket that sags in the middle.
My hands ache, sweat running down my wrist
as I pull the next thread, the next word,
hoping the pattern will come together.
I try again, and again, until the leaves bend
under the weight of my desire to make them right.

I twist the words as I twist the leaves—
tighter now, each motion deliberate,
my fingers aching, blood pounding in my palms.
Yellow slips next to blue, a tender balance
I cannot yet explain, but the rhythm is starting,
like the pulse of a heart that beats in the dark.
Some parts break—shards of thought spill out,
but then, like magic, others fit, like pieces
of a puzzle I didn’t know existed.
In this moment of quiet, when the weave takes shape,
there’s a rush of recognition. This is what it is—
not perfection, but something truer: a pattern
that emerges, and in its imperfection, becomes whole.

Writing the poem is the same as weaving leaves—
one step, one twist at a time, pulling through the effort
until something begins to take form,
something that might be beautiful if I wait long enough.
The sweat clings to my neck, the rawness of failure
lingering like dust on the air. But I press on—
the discomfort means I’m close. When it’s done,
the final piece rests in my hands—smooth,
a balance of color and space, its form
an anchor. It offers no comfort, yet it soothes.
The words are weightless, but they hold.
The structure that seemed fragile now supports me,
like the knowing glance of someone who sees
all the parts of you and loves them still.

And then, the allure—
soft and heavy, like the scent of a flower
just before it opens, quiet in its insistence.
When the poem is done, it hums
like a note sustained in the air,
vibrating long after the sound has stopped.
It is not a thing to possess,
but something to feel, to hold in the chest.
In the weave of words, there is pain,
but not the kind that breaks; the kind
that forms, the kind that binds.
And as I surrender to this,
the satisfaction arrives not in the perfect shape,
but in the creation of something that will last,
the quiet moment when the process becomes the thing
it was always meant to be.

In the Quiet After

 a poem by Roger B. Rueda

The memory of the skin lingers,

in the quiet corners of my mind,
where once their hands pressed like bread dough,
soft yet firm, shaping me into something more.
I remember the brush of their fingers,
a fleeting gesture—like wind touching the surface of water,
but leaving ripples that still tremble.
Each touch was a secret,
shared only in the space between breath,
a whispered promise, held close as if the world might forget.

What love is, I tasted then,
in the salt of their palms, the warmth of their wrists
as they reached to lift me, steady and strong.
It was the way they wrapped around me
like the arms of a tree, holding me against the storm,
sheltering me in the quiet bend of their embrace.
I savored happiness as a fruit
that ripened only in the darkness of togetherness—
its sweetness thick, like honey on the tongue.
But it was more than that,
it was the feeling that love could stretch time,
could fold it back on itself,
till every moment was both here and gone.

Now, as I sit alone, the echo of those touches
seems distant, like a photograph fading in the sun,
the edges curling with the weight of time.
I thirst for their hands, their warmth,
a thirst that pulls like a tide,
yet there is no water left to drink.
Still, I surrender.
I am bound here, to this earth,
by forces invisible, unyielding,
as though something stronger than me
has decided I must stay.
In that surrender,
there is peace, like the quiet after a storm,
when the air is thick with the promise of rain.

I take comfort in the images of them—
the way their skin once brushed against mine,
how their touch was always certain,
always the promise of safety.
I no longer seek to hold it,
for it is already part of me,
woven into my own skin,
a thread that never breaks.
And in the stillness of my longing,
I surrender again,
not to absence, but to the love
that has taken root deep in me—
its quiet hum a reminder
that, even now, I am held.

The Fire That Consumes

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

Anger is a matchstick struck
against the dark, a quick spark
cradled in your hands. At first,
it is small, the kind of heat
that licks at your fingers,
thrilling, harmless—until you feed it.

You let it grow, let it rise,
watch it curl around your ribs,
snake through the chambers of your chest,
a golden thread of heat, pulsing.
It feels good, doesn’t it?
The way it smolders, makes you sharper,
makes you certain, makes you right.

But fire is never content
to stay small. You blow on it,
thinking you are in control,
but it is hunger now, teeth and flame.
It leaps from your hands,
catches the edges of things you love—
a doorframe, a letter, a name—
until everything is burning.

It is wildfire now, spilling fast,
lapping at bridges, swallowing homes,
leaving nothing but blackened bones.
And you, in the center of it all,
a torch of your own making,
glowing with rage, with ruin.

And then—death.

The fire does not follow.
The heat you worshipped dies
the moment your breath stops.
What did it leave you? Ash?
Smoke curling into the silence?
A name no one will speak?

Why didn’t you see this before?
Why did you let the fire spread
when you knew what fire does?
You thought you were different.
That you could hold the flame
without being burned. But the truth—
you were weak. You chose
to love the burn more than the balm.

This is how we are.
We stand at the edge of ruin,
knowing it, naming it, stepping forward.
We pour oil on the blaze,
call it power, call it pride.
But fire only knows to consume.
It does not love you back.

And in the end, the fire dies.
And so do you. And nothing you burned
will ever matter.

The Names That Hold Us

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

Ilonggos name their children as if
calling a pet, a playful chant—
Bordagol, Butchoy, Burakday, Burjok,
Botitoy, Toliloy, Toto Buka.
Names round on the tongue,
loose as laughter in a room
where no one needs to ask
if you belong.

But take them outside—
where streets widen, where voices
sharpen like knives against glass—
and they turn into something else.
The joke you never meant to tell,
the punchline they make of you.
Out there, you learn to fold
your name into your pocket,
trade it for something thinner,
something smooth enough to slip
through another person's mouth.

But home is home.
And here, Bordagol is a boy
who carries sacks of rice,
his slow steps steady as a song.
Butchoy is the child who laughs
between mouthfuls of fish,
who eats with both hands
because hunger is always urgent.
Toliloy is the baby of the house,
his name the thread
that pulls the family closer.

These names do not diminish.
They are worn like old slippers,
like the smell of coffee at dawn,
like a mother’s call from the kitchen—
a sound that carries across years,
across miles, across the quiet
shame of having to be someone else.

Outside, the world trims
the edges of your name,
makes it sharper,
makes it neat.

But when you return—
when you step inside the door,
when your mother calls you
by the name you thought you left behind—
you remember.

Home is not the place.
It is the voice that calls you back.

The Thing About Lightning

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

Love, you say? Ah,
I have seen it, lived it,
watched it take shape
like a storm over water,
slow at first, a darkening sky,
a shiver in the air—
then a strike, sudden, blinding,
a heat that leaves you trembling
before you’ve even had the chance
to understand what has happened.

That’s how it was for me.
Love did not knock,
did not ask permission—
it arrived, fully formed,
disguised as an ordinary moment.
The way he stood in a doorway,
the way his laughter moved
through a room,
the way his eyes, so sharp,
so knowing,
locked onto mine
like he had been searching
for something
and had just now found it.

It was not the kind of love
they spoke of in my youth,
not the love passed down
in whispers or written in poems,
not the love my father taught me
to recognize,
to want,
to wait for.

But it was love,
all the same.

And yet—
let me tell you this,
those of you who are just beginning,
those of you who do not believe—
lightning is not love.

That is the first mistake
the young make.
They think love is only the strike,
the rush of fire through the bones,
the breathlessness of discovery.

But love is what comes after.

Love is the quiet work
of keeping what the lightning left behind.
It is the careful tending of ruins,
the rebuilding after the storm.
Love is not the first time
your heart stammers in your chest—
love is every time after.
Love is choosing him
when the world tells you not to.
Love is waking up
to the same face,
the same hands,
the same quiet promise,
again and again and again.

We built a life
from the aftershock.
Not in grand gestures,
not in declarations,
but in the slow, steady rhythm
of being seen.

Love became the sound of his voice
when he spoke my name.
Love became the way he touched
the small of my back
as we walked through a crowd.
Love became the spaces
where words were no longer needed.

And now—
even after all these years,
love is still here.

Not as a bright and blinding thing,
but as something quieter,
more persistent,
woven into the very air I breathe.

It is the way I still wake
and reach for him.
The way he still knows
how to quiet me
with a single look.
The way he remains,
when the world once told us
we could not.

So you,
who are just beginning—
do not fear the lightning.
Let it strike,
let it undo you.

And you,
who do not believe—
perhaps you have never seen
what comes after.

Because love,
real love,
does not fade.

It deepens.
It thickens.
It gathers into memory,
into time,
into the quiet defiance
of two men
who refused to let go.

And if you are lucky,
if you are willing,
it will take you farther
than you ever thought
you could go.

The Light You Left Behind

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

You were always larger

than the space you stood in,
a girl who turned fairy tales
into something real,
who made the impossible
feel like it belonged to everyone.

Now, the world wakes
to a silence too sudden,
too sharp to hold.

Barbie,
they say you are gone.
That a fever,
a breathless night,
a quiet thief called pneumonia
took you from us.

But you were only 48,
still young enough
to step into another story,
to turn love over in your hands
and call it yours again.
Still young enough
to wake tomorrow.
Still young enough
to begin again.

Your sister grieves
in the language of gratitude—
"I am grateful
that I could be her sister."
But what is gratitude
if not love pressed into absence?
What is love
if it can no longer be returned?

At 17, you became a voice,
a name carried beyond itself.
First, a girl in song,
then, a girl on screen,
then, a girl who taught us
that love can be survived.

You were their Shan Cai,
the girl who stared down power
and refused to shrink,
who turned the weight of the world
into something she could carry.

And now,
they cannot let you go.

"Big S passed away,"
they write,
as if saying it
enough times
might make it true.

1.5 billion echoes
of disbelief,
of refusal.

"This is hard to believe."
"It was so sudden,
life is too short."

Your old co-star,
Ken Chu,
can only say—
"What a bolt from the blue."

Because grief is always that—
lightning in a clear sky,
a silence so loud
it leaves the world reeling.

You had already
stepped away,
left the stage in 2022,
closed a chapter
that once made you larger
than the body you lived in.
Divorce, reinvention,
a second love,
this time with
Koo Jun-yup.

You were writing
another beginning.
Now, the pages
have been left unwritten.

You leave behind
a husband,
two children,
a world still holding onto
the weight of your name.

Perhaps they always will.

You were never just an actress.
Never just a singer.
Never just a face
frozen in time.

You were a thread
woven into an entire generation,
a quiet electricity
that will not dim.

Some stars collapse,
folding into themselves,
never to be seen again.

But you—
you leave your light behind,
still burning,
long after
you are gone.

Hunger Weighs More Than Water

 a poem by Roger B. Rueda

The ocean is both their home and their hunger.
At dawn, they slip into its blue silence,
casting nets that know the weight of need,
dragging lines through water that
has given them more than the land ever has.
They know the tides by touch,
read the wind like scripture,
feel the nervous schooling of fish
before they even rise to the surface.
But of conservation, of policies and petitions,
of the fragile role the parrotfish plays
in the reef’s slow-breathing body—
they know nothing. How could they?
No one has ever told them,
and if they had, would it matter?
Would a lesson in sustainability
soften the ribs of a child gone too long without food?

Education, they say, is the answer.
Teach them, and they will care.
But tell me, has a lesson ever filled
an empty pot, ever soothed a fever
burning through a body left untreated,
ever built a boat strong enough
to carry a man past hunger?
They are told not to catch parrotfish,
told they are breaking the sea
each time they pull one from the deep.
But what is the sea to a man
who cannot afford to take his wife
to the doctor? What is a reef
to a woman whose last meal
was yesterday’s scraps?
To them, the parrotfish is not
a keystone species, not a guardian of coral,
not a small, bright link in a world
they have never been asked to understand—
it is only food.

It is easy to preach preservation
when your stomach is full,
easy to speak of shared responsibility
from the safety of land.
It is easy to call them reckless,
to say they do not care,
when you have never had to make
a choice between hunger and harm.
They are not reckless,
and they are not unthinking—
they are abandoned.
The government makes its promises,
draws its maps, drafts its laws,
but the sea remains the only constant,
the only place that has never
turned them away.

What loyalty can be expected
from those who have never
felt the weight of the nation’s hands
except to take?
What care can be demanded
from those to whom care
has never been given?
Before we tell them
what they must leave in the ocean,
perhaps we should ask
what we have left them
on the shore.

The Art of Almost Believing

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

 It started as nothing,

a sentence misplaced,
a breath between moments
I should have remembered—
but she said I did.

"You told me," she whispered,
eyes soft as confession,
a voice sculpted in silk,
so certain it made my own
memory waver.

"You told me it was fine.
You even suggested it."

The words curved in the air,
settled like dust
on something once untouched.
Had I? Could I have?
I know myself. I know
what I would and wouldn’t do—
but her voice was a thread,
pulling at the weave
until I saw the pattern
she wanted me to see.

"You don’t remember?"
She sighed,
as if my doubt was a weight
she had carried for too long.
"You said it last week.
We talked about this.
I wouldn’t have done it
if you hadn’t agreed."

A kindness laced the lie,
so careful, so clean,
as though I had left
the thought there
for her to pick up
and hand back to me.

I almost took it.
Almost let it shape itself
inside my chest.

But the body knows
what the mind forgets—
a pulse quickens,
a silence sharpens,
the space between truth
and untruth glows
like a fault line.

No. I did not say it.
I did not.

Still, she had already
pressed the words into me,
already left, her absence
a quiet permission
for the doubt to stay.

Drifting, Still

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

The balloon drifts by the river,

its thin skin shivering in wind,

held by nothing but breath,

kept whole by pressure, by air,

by the silence between movement.

It rises alone, caught inside

a current larger than itself,

spinning without anchor, weightless,

certain only of the sky.

I think of my mother’s hands,

floured with morning, dusting the air

with stories sewn between hours.

I think of the market’s sprawl,

voices breaking against ripe fruit,

barter thick with sun and sweat.

These are the things I carry,

stitched to my ribs like thread.

Memory, shifting as breath, floats

beside me, light as the balloon,

offering glimpses before dissolving.

Dislocation is an absence with teeth,

a leaving that does not end.

It lingers in rooms, pressed

against windows, spilling into light.

It is standing still inside crowds,

a face lost in foreign sky,

a name slipping from tongues

not my own. The balloon, quiet,

knows this feeling too—adrift, visible,

held by nothing but longing.

Art is the net I cast,

the only way to keep

what wind would pull apart.

It catches the things that fade,

makes visible the half-remembered,

lets ink hold what hands cannot.

So I write. I kneel

by the river, let silence

spill into pages, let absence

shape itself into something whole.

Perhaps we are all balloons,

stitched with memory, filled with wind,

rising into skies without promise.

We drift, we waver, we hold

tight to what we have left.

Yet always, an unseen thread

keeps us from disappearing entirely.

Memory, love, the weight of art—

these things hold us still,

even as wind beckons away.

I watch the balloon dissolve,

swallowed by the empty sky.

It leaves nothing behind, no shadow,

no proof of passing. And yet,

I feel it still, pressing

light as breath against my ribs.

The Quiet River

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

There is a river that runs,
soft and gray, slicing fields,
its edges fraying like worn threads.
At dusk, it thickens, silvered,
a snake’s back glinting under shadows.
It moves slowly, lugging silted words,
the driftwood ribs of fallen trees.

On its banks, we stand still,
our toes pressing into damp earth,
the grass bending under bare heels.
The river hums, its breath warm,
its pulse steady, a hymn beneath,
the restless chorus of whispering leaves.

Hunger hangs in the air, brittle,
like the crack of a bird’s wing.
Clouds stack themselves against the horizon,
gray like smudged fingerprints on glass.
Arrows break the sky’s silence,
their tips glinting like broken teeth.
The river keeps its secrets, endless.

We clutch handfuls of what remains:
grains of sand, wet and cool,
shells cracking under the press of palms.
The water slips through our hands,
each drop erasing what was held.
Still, our fists curl, determined, stubborn,
shaping hope from what crumbles easily.

The river rises, devouring its edges,
swallowing reeds, the old wooden bridge.
Its surface shivers with unspoken words,
a dark mouth murmuring to itself.
The town dissolves, brick by brick,
its reflection breaking into jagged shards,
while shadows cling to what is left.

To live is to wade in,
to let the river drag your name,
pull it apart syllable by syllable.
We are carried by its current,
bruised, softened, shaped like river stones,
smoothed by the endless friction of time.
The river flows, and we flow,
its breath threading through our veins.

Inheritance of Nothing

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

She moves through hallways
as if power belongs to her,
as if the weight of the university
rests on her name alone,
as if her presence alone
were enough to hold its walls in place.

Her hands have never built,
never labored over thought or work,
never drawn plans in the hush of study,
yet she carries herself as if
this place is stitched from her breath,
as if she alone has shaped its name.

She was not chosen for skill,
nor for talent, but for loyalty—
the kind that stirs conflict,
the kind that bends when power bends,
the kind that wages wars
that are not hers to win,
as if victory alone is what matters.

The ones in power know her name,
not for what she has done,
not for what she has given,
but for how well she follows,
how quickly she takes up their fights,
how easily she makes enemies
of people who have never wronged her.

Her husband bends where he must,
a man of easy laughter,
of pleasantries smoothed over
like stones beneath a river,
principles folding neatly
into the hands that feed him,
into the voices that call his name.

And so, she rises,
not by effort, not by work,
but by standing in the right rooms,
by whispering the right names,
by making herself necessary
to the wars that are not hers
but for which she fights all the same.

She does not greet people,
she measures them,
weighs their worth in glances,
decides in an instant
who is beneath her,
who does not deserve
to walk the same halls.

She looks at scholars
as if they are small,
at leaders as if she were their equal,
at those who have built
this place with time and labor
as if they should bow to her name.

She walks like the dean,
like the vice president,
like the board of regents—
though none of them
carry themselves as she does,
though none of them
have ever needed to be seen
as badly as she does.

She believes the university is hers,
that its success lives beneath her feet,
that without her,
the walls would fall to ruin,
that without her voice,
this place would not speak.

She does not know
that the ones who built this place
do not move like she does.
They do not collect nods,
do not gather titles in their mouths
like offerings to the wind.
They work. They build.
They do not ask to be seen,
do not ask to be named,
do not ask for a place
that is not theirs to claim.

But she—
she loves the fight,
wears grievance like gold,
holds her anger as if it were a gift,
as if it were a weapon,
as if it were all she had.

She does not fight for justice.
She fights to be known.
She fights to be seen.
She fights to make herself
as large as the walls
she did not build.

And yet, when the halls empty,
when the voices lower,
when the power she borrowed
turns from her name—

she will be what she was before:
without title, without legacy,
without anything
that time will keep.

 

The Softness of Fire

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

She kneels in the front pew, hands folded, eyes closed,
lips moving in silent devotion, steady as a prayer.
Light spills from high windows, blessing her face soft,
as if heaven itself approves of the grace she wears.

When she speaks, her voice is warmth, quiet and sure,
a balm for the lost, a whisper to the grieving.
She tells them to be kind, patient, gentle, forgiving,
that love is the answer, that anger is a poison.

She leaves the chapel, steps into air thick with shadow,
where hunger waits, silent, where she becomes someone else.
She moves through the dark, through hands that know her,
through lips that call her name in secret and sin.

She smiles in the hallways, her light a soft glow,
her students believing she is all goodness, all grace.
But she watches, listens, collects the words they speak,
the careless betrayals they do not know she sees.

Forgiveness is a virtue, she tells them, smiling,
but she forgives the way fire forgives the burned.
She carries grudges like coins hidden inside her dress,
waits for the moment they will pay what is owed.

No one sees the rot beneath the softness she wears,
the fire she feeds, the hatred she folds like linen.
No one knows the names she whispers before sleeping,
the ones she will cross out when the time is right.

She watches. She waits. And when the moment arrives,
she does not forget. She never forgets. She never will.

 

The Quiet Fire

a poem by Roger B. Rueda

When do we wake,
when do we break—
the spell, the silence,
the long, slow sinking?

A ship drifts blind,
rudderless in waters it stains.
Storm-tossed, we call it fate,
call it history—
but the hands at the helm
have always been the same.

Listen:
the wood splinters under stolen weight.
Listen:
laughter, silver-thin,
floating above the bodies
bailing water with bare hands.

And we—
we are the deckhands of ruin,
adrift in our own forgetting.

On the hill, the great house rots,
but see how the gates glimmer,
how gold glows
against the bones of the hungry.
Inside, the future is bartered
like small change—
a child’s dream cut down,
shredded into wages
that never reach the table.

When the last candle sputters,
when the window stays dark,
when the rope frays
into nothing but dust,
who will say
we didn’t know
this was coming?

How many mothers will hold
the cold weight of their children,
whispering names
already erased from the ledger?
How many hands will reach
for the loaves thrown like scraps,
while the feast remains untouched?

But this—
this is how silence is made,
how hunger is shaped into obedience,
how crumbs become currency
for those who take
and take
and take.

And we—
we are the ones watching,
still and breathless,
as if the house is not ours,
as if the ship is not ours,
as if the fire will not find us
in the end.

But this is not survival.
This is surrender.

The ship, the house,
the rope, the bread—
they are all in our hands.
And it is we
who must decide
whether to watch the fire burn
or to rise before the ash
becomes our inheritance.

Let us stand.
Let us break the hush
before silence writes the ending.

Let us rise,
before the wreckage
makes its claim.