let me tell you the truth

it is this:
i have forgotten about you.
i have carefully moved on, like a
tidal wave, a jack in the box sans the spring. see me, the vehicle stealthily
moving upwards a steep slope. however
gradually, i will get there. i am now dreamless and righteous.
my head, a bubble burst out
of proportion.

the chair where you sat on no longer holds
your weight. i have smoothed over the creases on the
side of the bed that used to have your imprinted shape,
lying sideways. i have forgotten to pick up your laundry.
your photographs are now quietly burning in the furnace.

i have contacted my woman support group. on tuesday, we'll be going
to the beach. we'll be carrying cartolinas adorned with the words, "will have slings
like last summer."
our shoulders are festooned with anxious roses. of course, it is
inevitable that flings would be more than welcome.
i am hoping to meet the man of my dreams. or at least someone who is uncannily
unlike you. someone who is a long stretch, a dream of summer.

i have signed up for yoga class and i feel my center now.
i did not realize that it was as cavernous as it is. i also shop alone
and even went to the zoo once.
i see my face in the mirror and check my teeth for stains.

but lately, the strangest things are happening. i am reminded of you when
i am shopping for cinnamon. your hands jump out of the
page of a book i'm reading. the busboy is you, as well as the lady
who is saddened by green dresses.
my mind has turned traitor. it is spinning me in circles and is hurtful when it rains. the
beer has gone bad without prior notice. suddenly, i
feel a chill everywhere. i am not stronger.
the clock hands stop moving and i write about you.

what is unsaid

everything begins with the boy who is tying his shoelaces.
in the corner of his eye, he sees a young woman
who is seated on a park bench. it looks like she is waiting for someone.
she glances from time to time at a piece of paper. if you look closely,
the paper is slightly torn at the edges. it
looks like it has been folded many times.

the woman smiles softly at times, puts a hand against her cheek.
there is a desperate anticipation surrounding her.
it is a shield, an expensive fur coat. sometimes she yawns and stretches her arms
then looks around. she glances at an imaginary watch. when will
she decide when it's been long enough?

out of her bag, she takes out a knife. she holds it gently
as if it were fragile. it glints in the sun. she shudders
and puts it away. she anxiously looks around her.
the little boy has seen her. he watches her intently now,
suddenly afraid of her wistfulness, her quivering impatience.
but she sits there for hours and sometimes she forgets to blink.
she wrings her hands and gives them comforting kisses.

the boy stays, even after the world has turned a few years older.
he pretends that he is playing
with tufts of grass. he is her lone witness, her afternoon soldier.
after some time, she sighs and gets up hastily, like
she suddenly realized that she was late for an appointment.
she shoves the letter in the bag then
stands up and leaves.

the boy watches her walk away.
he thinks about the letter. he'd like to get
his hands on it just so he'd know what she was waiting for. he
believes that it will explain everything. after all, everyone,
at some point, is tired of reading between the lines.
but why do we stay, if not for the sacredness of things
that are unsaid?

because it's wednesday

Blank Joy
Rainer Maria Rilke

She who did not come, wasn't she determined
nonetheless to organize and decorate my heart?
If we had to exist to become the one we love,
what would the heart have to create?

Lovely joy left blank, perhaps you are
the center of all my labors and my loves.
If I've wept for you so much, it's because
I preferred you among so many outlined joys.

Translated by A. Poulin

when commendation is due

kudos to my friend C who finally, FINALLY cut the ties!:D

got the message, huh? look forward to an interesting ride, my friend. i never really thought you had the guts and the courage to do it but for once you proved me wrong. i'm sooooo proud.:D

sana tuloy tuloy na yan...

Song for D day

Last Goodbye
Kenny Wayne Shepherd

Long before your rusted chains
Busted walls and barbed wire cage
Tried to hold me down
Time was just a fist of change
Tossed in the water just incase
You ever came around

I could lose myself
I could curse like hell
But I’ve lost the will to even try
If you ever doubt, listen to the sound
No lies
No, no, no
This is my last goodbye

Pardon me if I appear
To see beyond the now and here
And try and save myself
I’m not the kind of them to blame
I'm not the kind to pin the blame...
But I can't take more of the same
Livin’ on your shelf

I could lose myself
I could curse like hell
But I’ve lost the will to even try
If you ever doubt, listen to the sound
No lies
No, no, no
This is my last goodbye

Door closes
Another one opens
I feel the cold wind blowing
Over me
Long gone
But not forgotten
I might be lost
I might be finally free
I’m finally free

After the Fiesta

Some things are left here:
Bright confetti spilled on the hard ground,as if by mistake.
There is a lonely, inflated balloon near the
spot where the stage used to be. The remains of
candied apples are peeking out of hiding places.
A solitary chair is waiting for someone.
A forgotten teddy bear lies on its side. Its face
is noticeably askew - testifying to rampage, to
carelessness.
And there is a boy of eight, standing in the middle of it all,
whose mouth is open with wonder.
He thinks it is a battlefield and believes that he has seen glory.
Already, he has forgotten how the
place looked like some nights before. He does not
recall the parades, the whirlwind happiness, the
clowns who cried : step right up and you will see
the miracle of your life. He would rather forget them all.
He prefers the debris that laughter leaves.
It reminds him that he aches when he is bruised.
Suddenly, he hears music that he cannot place.
He makes a sidestep into a remembered dance.
The tune that he carries, which for a moment sustains him,
guides him years afterwards.
Still, he does not remember where he heard it first.

procrastination

come here.
sit down next to me.
for once, let us talk our heads silly
about it -
the inevitably broken heart,
the light and shade of truth,
the pretext of coming and going.
we both know that it will all lead
to the same scenario.
i can see it all now:
i want you to think i am stoic and
god-like, unhurt by calamities so i sit down calmly, eyes dry, while
you bend over with apologies. you are a wreck - a truck
overturned by the sudden push and pull of an unexpected event.
but what do words have to do with anything
at this point? i say i never saw it coming and
privately you think me a bit foolish because it has
happened so many times you are wondering when
i would catch on. you are looking at me as if for the first time. you question
whether i am really as smart, as unhurried as i claimed i was. i used to
say, because I was so young,
that I believed in nothing. leave me and i would not even notice.
everyone is someone else's antidote. you take this as a truth,
as a part of me, like an appendage or a finger.
but privately, i admit that unjustified as it may seem,
there is still the subject of love. even you cannot deny it -
the fact that it exists between us, like a table or a roof over
your head (once). it has already taken the
shape of your cushions, the curve of your arm around
my shoulder. there was nothing like our orange afternoons, i claim, but what have
emotions (mine) have to do with newness, with old/found lovers?
you are decidedly bewildered, like i left you out
of the conversation. slowly, you let yourself drift off peacefully,
allowing yourself to be mesmerized
by her unrealities, her golden mouth. slowly i see you locking all doors, shutting
every creavice leading in and out of you, swallowing your
various keys so that nothing might be wasted on me,
on my pitiful figure so full of hope for returns (yours),
now lying on the floor. and i want to say do not leave
because there's still leftover wine.
there's still the moon, so much dancing to be done.
the band has not stopped playing. don't you hear that?
don't you hear anything other the piano keys
on the other side of the ship - the sound that has pulled
us together and has toppled us overboard.
everytime, you are left in pieces. i try finding you.

but you are gone before i know it.

i want you to know that my eyes are still dry, inspite of you.
i always expect spilled milk.

seeing all this, i change my mind suddenly. today, rules can be broken
because we are laughing and talking about
something riotous.
there is always tomorrow, anyway. it is a tiger burning holes
in my head, waiting to pounce.

Nina Paley

-------------------

I've been meaning to post this for some time. Banksy, an underground guerilla artist, has replaced Hilton's CD with his own remixes and has given them titles such as Why am I Famous?, What Have I Done? and What Am I For? Check out the rest of the information here.

-------------

Quotes:

It's easier to be disconnected than connected. I've got a huge hallelujah for all the people who're connected, that's great. But I can't do that. -- Bob Dylan

I will tell you something about stories.

They aren't just entertainment.

Don't be fooled.

They are all we have.

Leslie Marmon Silko

For K

The Painter
John Ashbery

Sitting between the sea and the buildings
He enjoyed painting the sea's portrait.
But just as children imagine a prayer
Is merely silence, he expected his subject
To rush up the sand, and, seizing a brush,
Plaster its own portrait on the canvas.
So there was never any paint on his canvas
Until the people who lived in the buildings
Put him to work: "Try using the brush
As a means to an end. Select, for a portrait,
Something less angry and large, and more subject
To a painter's moods, or, perhaps, to a prayer."

How could he explain to them his prayer
That nature, not art, might usurp the canvas?
He chose his wife for a new subject,
Making her vast, like ruined buildings,
As if forgetting itself, the portrait
Had expressed itself without a brush.

Slightly encouraged, he dipped his brush
In the sea, murmuring a heartfelt prayer:
"My soul, when I paint this next portrait
Let it be you who wrecks the canvas."
The news spread like wildfire through the building
He had gone back to the sea for his subject.

Imagine a painter crucified by his subject!
Too exhausted even to lift his brush,
He provoked some artists leaning from the buildings
To malicious mirth: "We haven't a prayer
Now, of putting ourselves on canvas,
Or getting the sea to sit for a portrait!"

Others declared it a self-portrait.
Finally all indications of a subject
Began to fade, leaving the canvas
Perfectly white. He put down the brush.

At once a howl, that was also a prayer,
Arose from the overcrowded buildings.
They tossed him, the portrait, from the tallest of the buildings;
And the sea devoured the canvas and the brush
As though his subject had decided to remain a prayer.

Someone asked me this question today:

If afterglow had a scent, what would it smell like?

Like the first day of summer - when everything around you smells like the sun, raw and new all at the same time.

something borrowed, something blue

Sister Golden Hair
America

Well, I keep on thinkin' 'bout you, Sister Golden Hair surprise.
And I just can't live without you; can't you see it in my eyes?
I been one poor correspondent, and I been too, too hard to find.
But it doesn't mean you ain't been on my mind.

Will you meet me in the middle, will you meet me in the air?
Will you love me just a little, just enough to show you care?
Well I tried to fake it, I don't mind sayin', I just can't make it.

I'll be Back
Beatles

You know if you break my heart I'll go
But I'll be back again
'Cause I told you once before goodbye
But I came back again

I love you so
I'm the one who wants you
Yes, I'm the one who wants you, oh ho, oh ho, oh

You could find better things to do
Than to break my heart again
This time I will try to show that I'm
Not trying to pretend

I thought that you would realize
That if I ran away from you
That you would want me too
But I got a big surprise Oh ho, oh ho, oh

You could find better things to do
Than to break my heart again
This time I will try to show that I'm
Not trying to pretend

I wanna go but I hate to leave you,
You know I hate to leave you , oh ho, oh ho, oh
You, if you break my heart I'll go
But I'll be back again

forever young

happy birthday!

to what ifs

Just walking around
John Ashbery

What name do I have for you?
Certainly there is not a name for you
In the sense that the stars have names
That somehow fit them. Just walking around,

An object of curiosity to some,
But you are too preoccupied
By the secret smudge in the back of your soul
To say much and wander around,

Smiling to yourself and others.
It gets to be kind of lonely
But at the same time off-putting.
Counterproductive, as you realize once again

That the longest way is the most efficient way,
The one that looped among islands, and
You always seemed to be traveling in a circle.
And now that the end is near

The segments of the trip swing open like an orange.
There is light in there and mystery and food.
Come see it.
Come not for me but it.
But if I am still there, grant that we may see each other.

------------------

from avs, today.

this is what i think of you

there's nothing like freshly brewed sarcasm in the morning...

Common People
Pulp

She came from Greece she had a thirst for knowledge,
she studied sculpture at Saint Martin's College.
That's where I caught her eye.
She told me that her Dad was loaded,
I said "In that case I'll have a rum and coca-cola."
She said "Fine."
And in thirty seconds time she said,

"I want to live like common people
I want to do whatever common people do
I want to sleep with common people;
I want to sleep with common people like you."

Well what else could I do -I said "I'll see what I can do."
I took her to a supermarket,
I don't know why but I had to start it somewhere, so it started there.
I said pretend you've got no money,
she just laughed and said,"Oh you're so funny."
I said "Yeah? Well I can't see anyone else smiling in here.
Are you sure you want to live like common people,
you want to see whatever common people see,
you want to sleep with common people,
you want to sleep with common people,like me."

But she didn't understand,
she just smiled and held my hand.
Rent a flat above a shop,
cut your hair and get a job.
Smoke some fags and play some pool,
pretend you never went to school.
But still you'll never get it right,
’cause when you get laid in bed at night,
watching roaches climb the wall,
if you call your Dad he could stop it all
You'll never live like common people,
you'll never do what common people do,
you'll never fail like common people,
you'll never watch your life slide out of view,
and dance and drink and screw,
because there's nothing else to do.

Sing along with the common people,
sing along and it might just get you through,
laugh along with the common people,
laugh along even though they're laughing at you,
and the stupid things that you do.
Because you think that poor is cool.

because blogging is a bitch sometimes

i had to repost these:

For C.C. ,who is permanently lost in the flood

the world has lost these pretty young girls.
their angst has woven a different, more impenetrable
planet around them. they sob and weep about
atrocities that take place in other dimensions of space where
everyone else is a lost mother , a drunken father, a neglected urchin of chance - versions of monsters
under beds, the dagger in the closet. they no longer know the importance of mystery,
of holding out. everything takes place outdoors. i would like to peep under
their skirts and find out if the myth is true -
if down there, there is really nothing much you can see but a built in boombox,
a transistor, and dozens of blue and red connectors stumbling all over themselves,
pricking their veins that are seas so blue they look painted on.
their mouths are always hungry for trophies of intellect, for disasters then and now,
for vague properties of love. they say words like "atrophy" or "vindication"as if they were new weapons that still have the capability to hurt. but their ideals are different.
they prefer them raw these days so that they’d be easier on the palate when they swallow them whole.
this fact alone makes me think less of the weaker ones - the ones who scar easily or those
who consider a bad hair day an opportunity for suicide. maybe this is just me,
barring time. in dreams, i see my younger self, running with bared teeth,
my brown skin soiled with so much anger.
i remember being unafraid. but now, i ask myself,
what was i running against? and for whom?

--------------------------------

House Cleaning

Today, I left him.

It was because of all that dust, really, the kind that sticks all over your furniture like an unwanted guest. Somehow, one of us invited it in. Or maybe at that time it was both of us, ushering it in our sunlit rooms, all the way to our new found feelings because we were scared to admit the fact that there were no divinities, no gods in blue.

I remember a day in September when I volunteered to clean the whole house but there was always something he hid, something precious but pointless, wrapped carefully in scented paper that smelled faintly of rotting flower petals. But because he was afraid of losing things, he always remembered where he kept them. He labeled the boxes " for further use." Before I realized it, there were already containers stowed away in darker parts of the room.

I hated stumbling upon them. It felt like I was spying.

There was also a time in early May when he decided to clean up. He got suffocated by the noose the dirt crafted around his willing neck.I thought he threw the boxes away, on account of the dust. We had splendid afternoons then – drinking wine from new bottles, making love on the green couches. He said "I am finally free to love you." Everything was cleaner than god. I forgot about other things, like the urgency of prayers, the anticipation of falling bricks.

But after a year, there it was again. It started with a whisper, a dialogue with wooden tables. It lurked in corners, in shadows of remonstrative possibilites. Then its voice became more insistent, laced with unfeeling confidence. It told me that I wasn't necessary anymore. I have never been. It told me that the past was present and future. There was nothing else. And that I was, after all, the interloper, the singular lie. After the end of the day, whatwas important here was really the insatiable mystery, divine interventions, the fluid liability of fate.

I realized then that doilies can only do so much. I can only do so much.

So I admit I left on account of all that dust. I took a train and went on that long-delayed trip to Panama. At least there, the sun shines without complications. Everything seems to belong to its proper place.
The most that can happen to you is sunburn. I don't really mind scorching a little skin. At least, that's all just surface vanity.

the thing with being paranoid is, you're always one step ahead of everyone. most things are demoted to black and white, really, even if some people deny it. it's always the heart or the sword against your neck. nothing ever surprises you anymore. when the expected happens, all you can do is look away, pretend that nothing ever goes on when you know exactly that things aren't all they're cracked up to be.

it's either you're a very good guesser or things have just become sadly predictable.

funny thing is, you miss the times of being unaware. oblivious,even. you miss feeling anything other than the steady gloating of being right.

Poem sharing!

Here are some poems I'd like to share. Enjoy.


Circe's Grief
Louise Glück

In the end, I made myself
Known to your wife as
A god would, in her own house, inIthaca, a voice
Without a body: she
Paused in her weaving, her head turning
First to the right, then left
Though it was hopeless of course
To trace that sound to any
Objective source: I doubt
She will return to her loom
With what she knows now. When
You see her again, tell her
This is how a god says goodbye:
If I am in her head forever
I am in your life forever.

One of the most beautiful poems I have ever read:

Under One Small Star
Wislawa Syzmborzka

My apologies to chance for calling it necessity.
My apologies to necessity if I'm mistaken, after all.
Please, don't be angry, happiness,that I take you as my due.
May my dead be patient with the way my memories fade.
My apologies to time for all the world I overlook each second.
My apologies to past loves for thinking that the latest is the first.
Forgive me, distant wars, for bringing flowers home.
Forgive me, open wounds, for pricking my finger.
I apologize for my record of minuets to those who cry from the depths.
I apologize to those who wait in railways stations for being asleep today at five a.m.
Pardon me, hounded hope, for laughing from time to time.
Pardon me, deserts, that I don't rush to you bearing a spoonful of water.
And you, falcon, unchanging year after year, always in the same cage,
your gaze always fixed on the same point in space,
forgive me, even if it turns out you were stuffed.
My apologies to the felled tree for the table's four legs.
My apologies to great questions for small answers.
Truth, please don't pay me much attention.
Dignity, please be magnanimous.Bear with me,
O mystery of existence, as I pluck the occasional thread from your train.
Soul, don't take offense that I've only got you now and then.
My apologies to everything that I can't be everywhere at once.
My apologies to everyone that I can't be each woman and each man.
I know I won't be justified as long as I live,
since I myself stand in my own way.
Don't bear me ill will, speech, that I borrow weighty words,
then labor heavily so that they may seem light.

Love After Love
Derek Walcott

The time will come when,
with elation you will greet yourself
arriving at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread.
Give back your heart to itself,
to the stranger who has loved you all your life,
whom you ignored for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

Omissions: A Vignette

for A who says please before killing anyone

Not that she was a sadist, or hankered after being lonesome. Not that she was aroused by anger. It was more of the fact that she found it all ridiculous, these rites of passage for the mute and the eternally dumbstruck- the tiptoeing, secret handshakes, letters sent on the sly. Because she was curious, she could understand the logic behind omissions. What drew her to him was his inability to be farcical. For her, it was harder to break- this honesty, this total lack of regard for acknowledging sacredness. In his hand he holds poison that he never hides. No, he was not like the others. He liked holding it out, displaying his intentions. She sees this as more potent, more damagingly addictive, like the pungent smell of earth after the rain. A field of daffodils, yellow and bursting with strange revelation. Always, there was the promise of bloodshed, of bared wrists.

He tells her, all this is not about you My stories my poetry Some days, I write her letters She responds and it makes me lose my mind for a time I cry when she says she remembers me when she eats cold noodles You know she is in Korea studying I tell her about you She is not pleased Oh yes you are a likely substitute The slant of your neck when you bend down to tie your laces reminds me of hers Your eyes are hers teeth mouth candy ears But here it is, my hand over yours, however you would like to take it I'd like to think my heart is a carrot I will not pity you when I turn my back and say I don't know if I'll ever see you again Parting is never romantic It makes you feel oddly like snow written on then eventually smoothed over to make room for a new writer I will never omit never die for you never ever ever

When he gets this way, his hand brushes against hers. He says how's this for romance the moon you and overpriced coffee Love like everything else is a marketing tool. She smiles. This is the most love she's had in years.

A letter after the wedding

Tell me, what do I call you now?
Now that the tides have turned,
Now that the autumn leaves are my hands,
kissing cobblestones.
Now that you are no longer what is dearest.

Believe that I have always meant to write to you.
In my head, I scribble you notes everyday. I say
that lunch was lovely or that
I feel I will be coming down with a cold soon.

Some days, I write you real letters. He
encourages me to do so. I start off with
mundane weather reports - sunny, cloudy,
indeterminate. Then I move on to furniture,
to the smoothness of freshly polished woodwork.
Sometimes, I write down words
describing my perfumed happiness, about how
cold the new tiles feel under
my feet during early mornings, about
the occasional car passing beneath the window,
about the sound of raindrops falling on the new roof,
which by the way,was painted red.
Red for distress, for the solitary
offering of blood.I also tell you that I am sorry
you missed it. The papers said it was the
wedding of the century- a wedding of tulle, angel cake,
of great promises of everlasting etc etc.

There are moments when I would like to write about him,
to tell you about the way his
arm curves along the rumpled sheets,
an anchor weighing down this
mattress where I drown. I do not do this. Instead, I inquire
about how you are, how you have been,
have you been seeing someone. I try
to see you objectively, like I would
patterns on doilies he asks me to pick out or
the twirling of the wet clothes
in the new laundry machine.

Then I realize that
you are lost to me, that we are no longer
time and tide, twin stars, related incidents. So I write down I miss you.
The words remove themselves from
the page and pounce on me, eating my poignancy, my collection
of polite inquiries, my careful secrecy. All is lost.

I sometimes would like to ask a picture from you. In it, you should
be near the sea, standing on the deck, alone and waiting as if
nothing has changed.
As if the tides have remained still.
As if it is not already autumn.
As if you are still what is dearest, what is true.

I kept my promise. I continue carrying this memory of
you. It is my valise chained to a ready flight. But I am fine. We are all
fine. He sends you his love.

Yours, for always.