30 October 2007

Saccharine High


The Tumult: Obliterate my memory of your poetry. Ravage the thing that dares speak your name. Deafen my ears from the lilting strains of your song. Shield my sight from the trance of your gaze.


The Poetry: All of these don't mean I love you less. I still plan to live my life with you. You mean so much to me. I hope you realize that also. Sorry if you didn't understand me. I want you to know that I truly understand you. Wish I could be there just to hold you tight.

The Tumult: ...................



Then there was just silence. Merely silence...

28 October 2007

Touched


I'm catching raindrops in my hands again. In my grasp, I'm never letting it slip.


The biting cold of rain granting me bliss as it soaks every pore as though roughly making love with my being.

I'm alive again. With the touch of rain.

23 October 2007

Fissured

At 2 a.m. Oct. 7, while savoring my cup of instant noodles, I was laughing my head off recounting for the nth time our slight brush and getaway with the traffic law. The nagging emptiness inside of me mocking the forced racket I was making at such an ungodly hour. In the light of confused sadness, I laughed the loudest in vain attempts to muffle every strain of sadness.

Half-awake at 7 a.m., I squinted at my mobile phone to know who was responsible for the reveille that morning. It was mom bearing the news that would illuminate all the unexplained emptiness I felt the night before. Lolo (grandfather) bade us all goodbye at 5 a.m. Oct. 7, Sunday.

It was indeed time to visit home and take a respite from the self-imposed reclusion. But it was all too late. For the past 10 months, going home has been my lowest priority for countless reasons and personal issues I can hardly bring myself to come to terms with. In silence, the lament of remorse is so deafening it fissures my sentient being.

Seeing him in a seemingly deep sleep behind the thick glass confirmed the reality I was denying to accept for the past hours. Yet he looked so peaceful that tears are almost a shame. He looked so peaceful that on the third day, I requested to literally feel Lolo's skin. His hands were soft nary a tinge of coldness, it can pass for being alive. The gesture would have truly amused him.

For someone who can never tolerate watching horror flicks, it is unlikely to be able to sleep on someone's deathbed for eight days. Yet sleeping on the very bed where he breathed his last was far from being scary. Not least, the closest I ever was to feeling him again after so many years. Not least, a good confirmation of his reassuring disposition.

Not least, a testimony of how much his absence will be missed.

04 October 2007

The Art of Digression


Ha Jin's Waiting still sits gloatingly on my bedside table and I believe it is mocking me. I have been trying to finish it for almost a month now. I am at least 10 or so chapters short of knowing Lin Kong and Manna Wu's fate. What is it about this book that somehow lulls me to sleep even after 3 cups of café noir?

As a workaround to this dilemma, this afternoon I perused the book while walking back and forth in the living room like a human pendulum for a little more than two hours. A definite killing-two-birds-with-one-stone scheme, I must say. One, I get to read without falling into oblivion. Second, my rusted appendages can use this rare stretch. And assuming the role of a human pendulum has placed the older graveyard shift denizen of the household into a blissful hypnotic spell. So, I was actually enjoying a quiet afternoon walking and reading Ha Jin while Corinne Bailey Rae croons Another Rainy Day in the background for the nth rerun.

Listening to Corinne Bailey Rae (CBR) always puts me in a trance. As the overture of her song reaches my ear, it's like being propelled to a different era with a thick gossamer separating me from my world or the world as I know it. But just the other weekend while listening to CBR and anticipating the trance, the youngest household denizen quipped, "Her voice makes me want to eat the entire gallon of ice cream." Then she went on licking the remnants of ice cream on her spoon. Oh God, Oh God I am salivating... For someone who is actually rice and sugar famished, this is a rather disturbing observation. Yes, I admit the mirror reflection stirred me to adapt a healthier ummmm... lifestyle (I hate the d word!). Now, apart from hurling me into a trance, CBR reminds me of a freshly-baked brownie with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top! Where did the brownie come from, you wondered. You see, my mind can get carried away at the slightest mention of food.

From Ha Jin to Corinne Bailey Rae to food... this is the art of digression. Before I swerve to another subject and drive you all bonkers, allow my sugar-bereft mind to go on strike.



 
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