i scrape existence off the skin of the milkfish.

I scrape existence off the skin of the milkfish
and stuff my nostrils with roe, smothering
viscera between my teeth to give
a taste of what it means to be pure,
sole-purposed.
 
My lips slick with fat, dribbling down
my chin like haste kisses crude oil.
I consume like I can remember it, a long-
lost art form, the aged recipe of my being.
 
My fingers drag along my features, poking
at the kamatis blotting my cheeks, and I want to
peel away each taut lace sinew, each ligament.
Strip me down to the bone, lunge for my
waxing gibbous eyes; my steely stare
is proof that beneath soft epithelium,
I have always been coarse. The gills in my
neck sting beneath the water, overworked
and sore, and I gasp for air in the bathtub.
 
He told me once that “We are fractions of who 
we are meant to be.” His voice echoed like 
fractured poetry—ontological substance
I heard and understood—felled before it reached 
the ending. 
 
Another’s home is my body’s entelechy,
and my tiger-skin belly is clutched like
I’m desperate to hold onto my whole-and-
fissured body. Like my hands can keep 
me from falling apart. I’ve traded 
the sun for my stripes and stars: 
“Noodle Girl on Canvas (White and Brown).”
 
I’m squatting in the corner, I’m drowning
in the bathtub, I am the tiger who eats
the human who kisses and kills the milkfish.
 
April 6: I ate bangus and kamatis for breakfast.