"Origin Story in Black and White", Rodrigo Jr Dela Peña

In the beginning, I buried 
a metaphor between my flesh
and fingernail. I buried it,
the way people buried my home
in memory. My shoulders slump
when I look for a remedy, lost 
in the rooms and hidden 
corners of my mind. Let me 
begin again: something 
was buried beneath my fingers. 
Love. A symbol. The window
is locked. The door, jammed
with cloth. Still, heat escapes
and page by page, my body turns
into an archive of loss. Begin 
again: I understand it was me.
I was iridescent, changing
with the heat and cold. Folding
and unfolding into the black 
and white pattern of the wall. I try 
to find myself through a beginning:
I weave my flesh into story. 

/ Rodrigo Dela Peña, Jr. (he/him) is the author of Tangere (University of the Philippines Press, 2021) and Aria and Trumpet Flourish (Math Paper Press, 2018). He is also the editor of A/PART: An Anthology of Queer Southeast Asian Poetry in the Pandemic and co-editor of SingPoWriMo 2018: The Anthology.

READ: "Cooking Dinner in My Mother's House", Elizabeth Fong→

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