Cosmic thoughts

Feliz cumpleaños a un alma que busca conexión sincera

The exercise was to clear my energy. On my back, eyes closed, her hands grasping my arms, then calves, then placing ointment on my forehead. Like any good curandera, after saying prayers and laying her hands on me, the imprint that was left was held down by ancestors, and the voice of my querida abuela Rosaura, her voice resonating in my head, calling out my name to assure me of her presence. My therapist picked up a drum and stick and with each impact, each bomba of the instrument, I saw in my mind dancers, they were in New York, inside a cafe I have only seen in my dreams. Everyone was dressed traditionally, long skirts, hair wrapped—each pounding of the drum a blue spotlight would pulse and I’d see, for a blink of an eye, the dance, hands clapping, the conga players in full rhythmic harmony. Hands clapping, faces smiling, a single woman in the middle, posing, still amidst the chaos of drummers and dancers moving manically yet synchronized. Bomba. Dark. Bomba. Spotlight. The woman looks at me.

She is you.

My therapist beats her drum one more time. Darkness. She tells me to open my eyes. Center myself.

I have seen what my future looks like. It is with my people. No more trying to make a place for myself in the hopes others will join me. My people already have a place for me to enter, for me to feel at home instead of constructing a fascimile of home I would want to call my own. This would be mine, and not a single building, nor a single town or city, it would be an island.

One whose shores extend to every Boricua anywhere in the world, but there are certain places closer to its heart than others. I need to be closer to its heart, to hear its rhythm, to inhale it, savor it. To be the wind that moves its seas, the water that caresses its coastline, the rivers that nourish its lands. To be the palm tree, the guayaba, the flamboyan. To hear the coquis song and to be the coqui singing. To march along the cobbled streets of San Juan, demanding liberation.

This is where I belong.

But before I can go to my island, I have to go to our adopted one. I have unfinished business. A dream of being an artist pursuing creative expression that I was not ready for previously. To prove myself in New York, where in the 2010s I got to be an artist one trip at a time for 48 or 96 hours, once or twice a year. I have the material. I have the knowledge. I have the abilitiy and self-belief. I want to be part of the community there, and work directly with the island, build my bridge one relationship and opportunity at a time, and then step foot once again in San Juan, not as a visitor, but as a resident.

I will find that cafe, the one where you dance to the music of our ancestors. The ones who crossed oceans, who adapted, who survived, who created and overcame all the suffering of a history of whips and dismissal from the world they inhabited, but which could never inhabit them. The human spirit cannot be contained in chains, neither physical nor esoteric and it is that spirit that inhabits the drums that move us closer to each other. That helps us forget the weight of the day and give in to the possibilities of tonight.

Will you recognize me from across the room, as the one who dreamt of you?

The last few months has felt like life was on hold. I have existed largely within my head, trying to find space in my outer world for the inner life I had been cultivating to come forth. I am tired of old narratives and tendencies and hiding myself. I live in so much fear of being seen. I sometimes resent that my way with words clouds the value of my actions. I can get on a stage and be charming. I can communicate a beautiful sentiment. My words demand respect for our people, and are my most powerful weapon to protest and advocate for a free Puerto Rico. My words can be vulnerable, but I feel like they are too flowery, poetic in order to hide the brutal sincerity of simple desires.

I don’t want to go through this life alone, either alone with myself or with a partner who makes me feel alone. I want to go through this life with someone who sees the best in me, and who I can expect the best from them. A person I trust absolutely. Who I can grow with, and who will be a full partner, supporting each other, cheering each other on, and be dedicated to our passions. A partner who is just as much of a fighter for Puerto Rico and for Puerto Ricans as I am. A partner I can be stupid with, like silly to the max, and serious, philosophical, deep, dark, and then light and joyous again. I want to feel free to be my most authentic self, and I want her to be her most authentic self. I want us to be free, as individuals and as a couple, and to be fully invested in choosing each other every day, in ways large and small.

That last paragraph was difficult to write. It feels naked. It feels corny. It is so hard to talk about my desires openly. There are always caveats and fears and pessimism but why can I be bold about professional pursuits while shrinking when I speak of personal ones?

I can make this life. I have to listen to the music within me. I have to trust that the dream I see for myself is a reality that has yet to manifest. It isn’t a fiction. It is a promise. A light that never dies, like the stars themselves, crossing unimaginable time and space to arrive within our view, on a night when a chorus of coquis calls to me to walk down a street I don’t recognize yet intrinsically know, a drum beat in the distance that inches closer, and I make a turn into a cafe filled with bomba musicians and dancers, and the spotlight this time doesn’t flash on and off, its illumination fixates me to watch continuously, until the moment you emerge from the dancers and pose, your face turning in my direction, and our eyes kiss.

Do you recognize me from your dreams too?