Pagbigyan

11/21/2022 | Quezon City

A Heart In Search of A Home

The world does not keel over on its own – this I have learned with kindness undeserved yet given nonetheless. For this, the gratitude that brims from my heart spills into my wakefulness the way water from a river would crawl the miles in desperate search of the calm it yearns for, finding refuge in the depths of the ocean it seeks to dive into: unseen, thriving in partial silence, in full surrender to the currents of life, but unhesitant to flow where the tide ebbs. I sink on the bed, her hands creating the gentle undertow that hoists my sanity back to where it belongs. I grip them with no intention of letting go, although at times fear would cradle my heart, my fingers trembling ever so slightly, because one day this too could be over, waking up to find nothing more than the same hands that were once so full but now having become nothing more than an empty shell. Yet if everything was to fold and fall over time and again, I would have held on, without reluctance, to the one person who moves my world, for life would have still been the same even if everything else has changed. In her, I found a glimpse of permanence despite the uncertainties that hound my steps like relentless shadows.

She says her hands can move things, but perhaps she forgets during days of little to no sleep that it is her willingness that drives one to turn the world on its head when life seems to drift farther than it should. There is a kind of warmth in her touch that nurtures things into their proper place and time, retrieving what might have been misplaced because these days no one else seems to get things right, and in a world full of sin her touch feels like it is the only one left that is divine, though truth be told she is far from perfect. But I have never desired perfection, let alone for the one I love. All I ever wanted was someone who stands tall even if the world makes her feel small. She does so with what others might mistake for as relative ease, though I know that, deep within, she, too, has to summon all the strength she could muster just to anchor herself and weather every storm. This she does with grace. She is five feet and six inches, her stature imposing itself off the ground with the kind of humility that does not gesture itself into view just to make itself known, for it has always been there, having seen many prayers, ours notwithstanding, others to reappear in redundancy, floating momentarily before dropping on the earth like a moth without wings, and what moves everything in my life at this point may just as well be the same hands that I hold.

But even if it were not for those same hands, even if they do not possess the same firmness in which they hold mine, I would have loved her all the same, because I have learned that hope is as persistent as the rain that knocks on the roof on sullen days, and this same hope I would have nurtured even when all that is left is the raging sun leaving everything dry in its wake, because life is short and sometimes all we need is a little rain to get by.

They say she is young, but her age does not compromise the ways in which she leaves no stone left unturned. Her resolve in committing to whatever she has on her plate, though not always the type where food is involved, is quite similar to what water does to fire: it seeks to put out what is getting in the way by diving straight into the heat of things. This she does with measured eagerness despite the trepidation that others may find as ample reason to pause, for she does things without misguided confidence, but rather one with the humble certainty that some things in life are at least worth the try.

There are times, too, when her body can barely shoulder the weight of her world and her knees can only hold themselves together so much, and by then she would find herself at the mercy of decisions that had to be made one way or the other. At times when her hands become full, she recedes into the comfort of her solitary space, confining herself to these little pockets of air where she could breathe and regain her composure. By then, she would carry herself without flinching when that is what the world demands from her, because she has learned that what has been given can be taken away without warning, often too early and rarely too late, so she must carry on. And if I could help her – if only I could and if she would only let me – then maybe we would have finally understood that life without complications stirs people into complacency, truncating whatever it is that they have tried to build into nothing more than a memory best forgotten. The art of surrender is painfully beautiful, but I would rather be given the ugly side of life if it meant having the kind of acceptance that is nowhere less than complete.




“You are not for the weak,” she said one day not too long ago. For someone who is primed to move a world as big and as heavy as this heart whenever I have my back against the wall, she has become the home my heart has been searching for.