For “M”
Of that night: a scenic noise
An amber strewn cape
From inner-city to cove
It was a postcard holiday
The darkness wrapped us
We are still and tiny stars that endured
Our eyes gleamed
from the candlelit balcony
Of your mountain space
A wine with a twist
Thanks to altitude
You told stories of the weather
I lit my cigarettes
And was soothed
By the breeze
And your voice
At times, I’d steal a glance
On your earth-colored skin
Perfectly untouchable, such that
Ghosts would take us kindly
Too awe-struck
By the light in you
We were too moved
To derail that peace
As we bed down
Wrapped still in the blinding dark
I could see you
With your touch
While the fire
You stirred in me
Kept me warm all night
With your hand on me
I was met with bliss
In the morning
I woke first, startled how
I dreamt of the day
That I would stare at you
Sleeping
At sunrise
I whispered a thanksgiving
The gift of light
On your face
Again
So enthralled, we were of
The search for flowers
In daytime
No, it would not compare
To what was already found
These days I wake like a bird. In the morning there is much to do. But I am the kind of bird that greets the sun pensively, careful not to rush, and at times too settled to fly.
These days I long for a companion. Someone to eat with, someone to walk with, someone to sleep with, someone to whom I can share the banal things. And yet I will recoil at the thought of being known. For when they know you, they can hurt you.
I am afraid. I will meet you outside with all my warmth and sincerity. But I have kept my door closed and locked away, for now.
The walls of my room know me well, it goes without saying. I write my life history that way. And yet I must leave this room behind one day. Not a word shall be said of what happened here.
These days I manufacture thoughts to put me to sleep. I think of a touch or a smell or a voice. I let it linger in the ceilings of my mind, before it drifts away like the darkness creeping in to the morning. The transition is as seamless as the past, present and future.
In these days, we muster all the strength we have left to survive. There is barely any left to lend away. Now, I understand.
These days, I think that there are more days. Time seem as endless and as seamless as time.
Sexy Coltrane in the morning
before he turned free
My heart unwinds
Every layer
Removed
With a blow
on the woodwind
Cool Chet in the evening
before the dentures
Music undresses
leads me to
bed
shuddering in
sensual reminisce
For a moment
I remember why I loved
for “M”
I.
We are
Divergent tides
who met at the delta
coalesced in a delirious dervish dance
uncertain where to go but
round and round
until a break inspires
its eventual journey
onto the endless sea
II.
There is time
- years it take for
the rapids to
smoothen the rocks
that bravely greet it
‘Tis god’s way of
letting nature
sculpt the bones
of the earth
refining its shape
perfecting its form
III.
With some luck
secrets will hold out
with the ease and panache
of a crustacean expertly teetering
along mangrove roots
one deadly habitat, they say
But No, says this shrewd side-winding creature
there is no feat too bold
no crevice too threatening
so long as you
mind your own walk
albeit
sideways or straight
I don’t like to write when I’m sad. I end up writing very little. I end up being secretive. There is a part of me, after all, that I’d like to leave unread.
I do however listen to music in these times of little or no consolation. That is why I sometimes miss the loneliness of the booth, in the dead of night. Putting listeners to sleep, the radio blaring next to their bed. Music comforts me and I know that it can have the same effect on others.
On nights like these, I like to listen to Karen Carpenter or Chet Baker. Voices of melancholy. I think I am an old soul that way. If I had wine right now, I would be sipping glass after glass throughout the night. Sitting and thinking. After all, passive leisure is a legitimate style of life.
Sometimes though, I feel that there is so much to do but I fail to do what my mind can conceive. That is when sadness strikes, disarming me. I become unproductive; which is actually a conscious refusal to be productive. Emotions can be addictive and I linger on sadness if only to keep memories alive and feel that I had once lived in interesting times, in the company of even more interesting people.
What is strange is how one can smile at the thought of sad memories. Sad because they seem to be slipping from the possibility of ever happening again. If life was only happiness, then we live in these fleeting moments one after another. That of course is impossible. Happiness is intermitent and temporary. Most days and in moments within a day, we don’t realize what we are feeling. When we become aware, life seems to stop and time passes without us noticing.
Nights like this I stay a little longer with you, in my mind. You are hardly there anymore but at least I know where I can find you.
These closed eyes will lock the pain in, shove it back. Clench these porous hands that had once waved at the air for a touch of a ghost. Arms around the knees, concealing breasts and face. I compact myself. A return to the security of the womb. A love and life asleep. Pulsating, yet not quite alive.
***
I give you this apple, will you refuse it? I have taken it from the forbidden tree, defying the gods. It is a sweet fruit, indeed. Yet every sweet fruit has a bitter price. Will it dismay you to have tasted it at all?
It is written that we are only forbidden to take from the tree of knowledge. I have taken this apple from that tree. As a consequence of our partaking on this fruit, god had banished us from the garden and have hidden from our view the tree of life. What treasure the other tree holds we cannot know. Unless gods are defied and the garden shall be found again. What is the tree of life holding out from us? That remains a mystery.
Bug-at kini nga sipit sa akong gibati
ang giyagaw nga huna-huna
nga walay ikabutang
ang akong pagdait
Pirmi nalang!
Kada muhangad ko
naay magpatay
Wala pa ko nahuman sa pagsubo
sa kaniadtong pagpatay
nagpatuyang ang mga bala
sa pagtay-og sa akong panimuot
sa akong mga damgo
Makapiyong ta sa dahay ug kasapot
Pignit sa balaod
Pignit sa namatyan
Pignit sa atong nasod
Pignit sa batan-on
Pignit nga makapiyong sa kaluya
You once held me in your palms
clasped together
concealing a jewel in the dark
I once leaned my head on your arm, carefree. Your hands rub my thighs, discretely, we can fool the eyes on the rear view mirror. No one seems to be looking.
When our faces become too close we can no longer see our own ages. It escapes me for all I feel is the softness of your cheek and how thick your lips are, at close inspection. That your tongue is playful and that your hands seem tireless as they grope hungrily for my flesh. Does it mean anything to you at all that I have entrusted you with my youth? That I have betrayed my own kind, the young, who long to cherish it. When your touch deserted me, did it occur to you at all that you have taken with you the sensation in my skin?
I try very hard to understand why you can never be mine
for it does not seem to matter to you
anymore
that
I know the ways of care
and that I can carry your mind
to the fineries of your soul
endless rumination of what is beautiful
the strangeness of every corridor
of what makes us human
and alive
You have forgotten
how I’ve breached you
and how you were dying to be
found out
by someone who would not
look away
from all your nakedness
both mind and body
The morning dew
glistens at the touch of the sun’s rays
greets the light and scatters
in to a thousand molecules
The fool rushed
Before the first shot was fired
I salute that first wave of
Reckless courage
Cicero did not cry in vain
Overwhelmed, but steadfast still
You cannot kill
Those who fear not death
Shall it dismay a wisdom gained
From this fruitless yet
Beautiful love
If one chose to die again and again?
I have searched your face
For truthfulness
But I was wantonly
Shooed with
The wave of your knife -
A confused threat
Your face begs forgiveness
But your hands, stabbing still
You cannot kill
That which chose to live
A steady flame burns in
Akeldama – you shall never
Step in this cursed plain
For as long as you feel
No compassion
For the traitor
I am Judas and Jesus
I am traitor and betrayed
Bound by a kiss of death
Charged with an apology
I forgive you
But you have yet to understand
That I have done you no wrong
Even when I shook
Your dear life
Do you mourn for Cicero?
Carted away after battle
With the white plum in his chest
You can take that which lives
And leave the corpse
At an unmarked grave
