Reviving dented dreams.

A very raw, unpolished collection of words that try to encapsulate how today, I watched my grandfather die.

Wed, 22 May 2013 14:13:00 -0400

I watched my grandfather die today. When trying to talk about death there’s always some gap between the thought and the available semantics. Always something that sounds off when niceties are stripped from the bear notion you want to say, as though meaning must be adorned by niceties for it to be understood. It must be embellished with societal euphemisms because it sounds better. Less macabre. More polite. More proper. And therefore more comprehensible. Saying you watched someone die. There’s a hint of twistedness there somewhere. A hint of wrong. Watch. Watch isn’t the right word. Watch is too passive, but in the likes of death maybe to be passive is the only response, the only reaction. Maybe, when one dies, all we can do is to submit. Submit to thought; submit to grief or surprise, even envy, even awe, even apathy. Whatever abstraction our emotions choose to reflect themselves as. Maybe in truth, in literal, unadorned truth all we can do is watch, but being human demands we do something more. Being conscientious demands we act. Being riddled with complexes- we feel obliged to prevent death, stop it in its tracts. An impossibility we, as a race, have been obsessed with.

I or any other man could not save him. Despite staying by his bedside all day when he turned pale ash, a whiten grey because he was too tired, too ill even to go on with his dialysis. Despite staying when everyone else broke down, when everyone else submitted to fear because death is as frightening as it is fascinating. Despite holding his hand in the ambulance because everyone else was too nervous to ride with him. Despite staying when he flat lined for the first time, when he was rendered comatose, when he flat lined for the last. And despite all these acts, all I could do was watch as death kissed his cheek and held his hand. Watch with a bit of fear, a bit of envy and above all, a bit of awe.

I suddenly realized how vainglorious I was. How arrogant I seemed forcing myself to look into the face of death. There’s this part of me that says I didn’t stay out of compassion or kindness or strength. I stayed because I wanted everyone to think I was brave. I stayed because I wanted death to feel that I wasn’t afraid of her- not anymore despite its numerous forms. I was daring death- not to take me but to rear its torturous glance at me just to see if I could take on such a glance, without blinking, without crying, without trepidation. And I did. And in my triumph I never felt guiltier. In my ever constant rivalry with death, I had forgotten the significant presence of life, the life of my grandfather. It’s so easy to lose sight of the humanity of things. It’s so fragile a thought, a concept. It proves how society’s constructs though prevalent, though naturalized, though imposed are not imperturbable. It is in fact flimsy, prone to wither, prone to change, prone to forgetfulness- especially the concept of humanity. Which is so easy to lose.

I also realized how apathetic I was becoming under the mask of my vainglory, under the sneer of my battle cry, the ingenious armor of my own insecurity hiding itself, redressing itself as ready, as brave, as strong. It wasn’t the lack of feeling that amazed me and scared me at the same time but rather my capability to turn it on or off in so quick an instance. And just to note, being able to turn emotions on and off isn’t necessarily the same as being able to control them, not completely. You can never really control wild things, neither could you tame them.

There was an instance, a time when death made its move by toying with its pawn- a life consumed by grief. And at that instance, I thought death will win. Death shall take this round. It didn’t but in such a moment, controlling or taming or denying my penchant was an impossibility. I watched the people around me sob. One in particular, caught my sentiment. She held on to him like a child. Technically she was his child, but under the societal construct of being thirty, helplessness, a childish helplessness wasn’t part of the profile. She wept and she whispered sweet silliness into his ears. Simple things like “why did you give up” “you said we would go home together” “you were so strong then”. But one cliché that took me by surprise, one simple word that almost gave the victory to death came at me like a bullet. “I’m sorry”. And there I saw myself. “I’m sorry’. It resounded like a memory, the echo of a dream from long ago. Sorry for being imperfect, sorry for not being there more, sorry for a lot of things, sorry for not changing enough, for changing too slow, for changing all the wrong things in all the wrong ways. I’m sorry. Death has a way of resurfacing the past and amplifying the future, which predominantly composes the reason as to why we fear death. It makes us realize time. And that with time, we have regrets. Because we never fully realize the time we have under the pressures of the mechanical measurement of time.

Another thing that death amplifies is change. Change in context. Death does not abide by the context of the living, by the context of that which is human. As I watched them resuscitate him, I remember thinking: can’t they clean him first? It was so important to me that he was clean before death takes him, that he feels fresh, that he smells nice. As though it was a prerequisite at his heaven. As though it mattered. As though being clean was a priority when one injection of epinephrine after another was stuck into him, when he was being intubated, when he was in a coma. I wanted to give him that. Thinking it was a small something that had its sweet implications. Gestures that played their part. Maybe we prioritize certain things, certain preposterous things because by reviving these things we’d be able to regain a part of the older him. The him that wasn’t sick or dying. The him that was fine, the him that played along to all these trivialities. The him that subscribed to the doctrines of life and therefore the context of humanity, of society. Or maybe death just confounds thinking making it impossible to do such an act competently.

I remember losing part of my inhibitions, that I give to death completely and perplexedly: its ability to take away my inhibition to hide my affection. I held hands- trembling tear-soaked hands. I held bodies- also trembling and tear-soaked. I found myself reciting novenas with my family because it made them feel better. Because it meant something to them. Because they believed in prayer and I was in no mood to spoil such a belief.

There we were huddled together, hands clasped in what seemed like a picturesque capsule of both hopefulness and melancholia, of grief and desperation, of love and regret, of time and age, of weariness and fear. Consumed by a flat line, a single, dangerous, monotonous sound that seemed to certify the presence or absence of life. Waiting for it, anticipating it- dreading it and hating it. As though a line, a sound could capture one of the greatest abstractions and certify its existence.

Guiltily, I must admit that my fascination won over my fear. It masked it but it did not replace it. Perhaps we all mourn differently. Perhaps there is no standard to mourning, only an expectation emphasized by commonality.

I watched him die today. If I could only hint to a gravitas tone, a melancholic somberness, a silent, placid stillness maybe it can justify the phrasing. Maybe it can justify the expression. Because all I wanted to do tonight was to report an unembellished truth. Because niceties are tiring and honestly, I am exhausted. Because propriety and politeness are not priorities. Because that is the purest truth I can give: I watched him passively, helplessly, silently, obediently today. I watched him die. Maybe death did win this round. This turn. Maybe you can’t really compete with it. There is only to live with it. Only to cope with it. Maybe.

"Musings because I had the opportunity to muse" or a post that could also be entitled: "Because we're all broken and messy in a way" or even, "To all the happily broken people: this one's for you." (In other words, I'm still working on a decent title. Please bear with me.)

Mon, 06 May 2013 10:43:00 -0400

I just realized that being an adolescent became an excuse for me. I was a mess, a convoluted stereotype of hormones at play, of rebellious inclinations, of never ending angst. And I redressed my mess, my self as a mere pubescent experiment in a grand tradition of transitioning into adulthood. I hid behind the term “teen” and convinced myself that I had time. Time to be wrong. Time to be lost. Time to be broken. Time to be waxing and waning, and coming and going and never being whole- not quite yet. I had time to make mistakes and pick my pieces up together and above all, I had time to want. Everything. Anything. More often than not things that are not good for me. Things that held in themselves a gluttonous, self destructive, addictive sparkle. Things that eluded my craving mind- and boy, did my mind crave! It craved for knowledge, it craved for adventure, for experience, for life, for love, for sex, for time, for every single abstract construct that’s a pain in the ass to contextualize because postmodernism had its way with language, with meaning. And then suddenly it hit me, that one day, I can’t afford to want the same things. And I find myself wondering what I’m meant to want for myself? For others? When the phenomena of aging, of time, of change, of growth had had its way with me… when I am no longer of the “youth”… What do I want then? What can I afford to want? Because wanting is a dangerous thing. Because needs are dangerous things. Because gratification is just as tricky as any other hypothetical construct. Because wishful thinking can either make you or break you. Because.

There’s always this fear, which age reminds us of, the fear that you’re running out of time. And you wonder, have I picked up my pieces? Have I collected myself? When we come to a point wherein the “teen” is omitted from this supposedly insignificant number that suddenly becomes charged with socially constructed meanings and connotation when society urges the mind to reel, we become aware; more and more aware that- nope, I haven’t gotten myself together. I am incomplete. But the thing of it is every body’s broken. Every one who’s conscious enough to probe into themselves. We’re all broken. But coincidentally, every body also always has this thing they can hide behind, an excuse they can shield themselves from: I’m young. I’m a teenager. I’m not supposed to have it figured out altogether yet. Or, I’m neurotic. How the hell am I suppose to know how to be okay? We have all these labels we can choose from. All these shields we can protect ourselves with. Because as much as we need society to repress our barbarism, we need a linguistic, constructed tool to shield ourselves, even excuse ourselves from time to time, from society’s prejudice, from society’s propriety. From society’s requirement, which our repressed barbarism, our repressed primal being could never fully satisfy: the requirement for perfection, for complete and utter perfection. But maybe, imperfection is a human condition. So is being broken- one way or another, being incomplete somehow. It is a human condition. Because we want. And we can never stop wanting. The trick is wanting something good for you. The trick is wanting and not feeling guilty about it. The trick is- there are no tricks, no trade. Just a thing in pressure. Just a thing compressed and repressed and pushed and pulled from all directions. A thing in a pressurized, shaky equilibrium constantly anticipating the day when she finally tips the balance and collapse into her self. Thinking: if I anticipated this, does that mean somewhere in me, something wanted this? In my own twisted self-fulfilling prophecy, did I want this? Because perfection is unrealistic but failure isn’t?

And at the end of all this? All I realized is that I never needed to be an adolescent to be a convoluted stereotype. A mess of rebellious, unsatisfied angst. That never goes away. I’ll always be that mess. The mess. I’ll always be waxing and waning. Because maybe human nature foretold that to be human is to wax and to wane. Is to bend and break. To be damaged and at the same time to want the unrealistic, seductive, addictive sparkle of healing. Maybe, we don’t need to be that whole. Maybe, in today’s modern world, being whole is relative, being sure. Knowing. Becoming. Maybe the pressure we put upon ourselves are merely induced by the meanings and connotations charged into plain and dull constructs, injected by a bored society. Maybe there is still salvation for me. Or maybe this is my salvation: to get to a point where I know I am broken and I wouldn’t even mind it. I wouldn’t even care. I wouldn’t even notice. I’d just be tattered, lovely in my fragments. Placid in my lost pieces running all over the place, imperturbable in my mess. Maybe.

Dear Cigarette,

Tue, 16 Apr 2013 07:33:00 -0400

You are my dandelion. Your ash the pollen that separates itself from my lips- hungry for an independent existence, thirsty for some sort of freedom from the stem. Your smoke are the wishes that a girl blows into the wind with her breath to find some sort of hope. You are fragile- breaking apart if you aren’t already broken- just like me. I love you, like how Stalin loved Nadya or Marcos loved Imelda or did they? Maybe it was just an image just to make people believe there was beauty behind strength and that even a tyrant could still love. Who’d have known, we’d be this misconstrued? You and I. I can’t seem to quit you but we’re bad for each other. Slowly killing each other. Then again, we delicate, vulnerable fibers redressing ourselves as apathetic tyrants, know only this- only this love. This destructive love. A blackened love with blackened lungs and grey ash. Burns. A sick romance because too much sweet is sick anyways. Why not cut to the chase? As I BLOW you into a death coma. As you give me cancer. See you in hell, lover.

See you in hell.

With all my love,

XXOO

Dear Frued,

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 08:57:00 -0400

There’s a darkness lingering in the spaces between my brain folds. Replacing corpus callosum fibers. Draining fluid. Grey matter reduced in a broth of brain fever. Inflamed senses burning in the night. Sneezing, weary thoughts decaying in the stench of my narrow perceptions. This must be it. This must be the sickness everyone’s been talking about.

This must be madness. The plague of the 21^st century.

I’ve finally caught it.

Insomnia

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 08:56:00 -0400

I can’t sleep.

Sometimes I don’t want to in fear that while I do, reality will slowly slip away from me like a dark stillness creeping. A slow consuming of its diaphanous body like self-cannibalism, a slow mutilation of the I. Destruction of the Id. A gentle slipping. Off and away. Folding into itself like crumpled sheets in a bin. Sucking itself from beneath me while I’m blissed far away in a dream coma. A vacuum of universe. Leaving only the knowledge of loss behind. So when night comes, and when my rebellious, red eyes begin to fall into a spell of fatigue, my hands cling automatically, impulsively. They cling to anything real. Anything alive. A glue grip on a stranger’s limb. A soft lying on a close chest. A sensitivity to someone else’s breathing. A sharp ear sticking to a sound. Goosebump soldiers and admiral hair skins on watch.

Otherwise morning will come as an unfathomable oblivion. And I’m left a heap of flesh spec in a black and white. A flaw in an emptiness. Wondering where it all went. Looking for intact memories of then, finding only holes where a bed was, a wall stood. A lover slept. Infinite holes of then. A treasure trove of nostalgic gaps and endless dejavu. Everything becomes a war of the familiar fighting the lack of recollection. A tension of stagnant dangling things on tips of tongue, a steady footing on tops of heads. Knowing becomes a perfected balancing act standing on a fine string separating the conscious and unconscious. Remaining always in between.

And I? I’ve become reduced to an echo with no resound. Clumsily going back and forth hoping to find anything solid to amplify my existence. Because, in all honesty, reality is that fragile and the mind? The mind is a passive aggressive friend that isn’t really your ally but a sly trick, a treasonous harlequin throwing magic reason to blind a dream, parading a juggling act of self-defensive humor, of perfectly timed witty deflections, of sarcastic, quasi-comedic microcosms to mimic a sentiment and at the same time to barricade it.

I’ve become reduced to a daydream. A bad trip. A slurred speech in a frenzy of losing grip and soundness and stable ground. Because time is relative and relative things are hard to keep track of and easy to lose. Because shape isn’t at all tangible. Because space isn’t permanent. Because blood isn’t as thick as it should be for it to keep hold on a beating desperation, to glue broken bones and tattered veins. To keep life together.

So I don’t sleep.

I can’t.

Because, though I know the chances of this happening are slim, well, slim probabilities are ruses and I’ve never been one to gamble on anything slim moreover could I ever place my trust in a statistic.

Because reality is not a friend.

It’s a stranger looking for a one-night stand.

Fickle. Nimble. In and out before you could even realize it.

Because reality is a bored goddess conniving with the mind for entertainment.

And I am a paranoid, sleep-ridden pawn in the middle of it.

Because.

There’s a comforting notion there somewhere: to be caught in the waves of the unreal. Floating. Drowning. Losing self-

Mind.

Excused by a semi-insanity plea from a perturbed normative, postmodern, nonlinear, caging consumerist existence that’s more difficult to fathom than madness.

Excused in a state of wake-dream.

There’s comfort there somewhere.

I wish I was a saxophone note

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 10:05:26 -0500

with a license to make melancholy sound beautiful.

I’d be driving around with a tune that makes a tear seem picturesque.

I’d be brass born.

A rusty golden thing that knows misery isn’t always ugly, sometimes

misery is just natural.

Wishful thinking.

Mon, 11 Feb 2013 09:22:54 -0500

God, If only I could breathe in your poems!

My lungs wouldn’t even miss the air.

I’d be living merely by your words.

Which is more than enough.

If only.

Just because my pen, like me, is restless. Hence, we decided to...

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 07:11:00 -0500

Just because my pen, like me, is restless. Hence, we decided to draw our nerves away.

Welcome to Wonderland.

Sat, 02 Feb 2013 00:05:00 -0500

The Cheshire cat smiled.

I understand its madness now.

For, now, I too smile the same smile-

With its waxing and waning feel to it.

A simultaneous coming and going.

We all have a bit of it in us-

The bit wherein we’re barely there.

We’re barely there altogether.

Waxing and waning.

Coming and going.

Disappearing and becoming.

Physical

(and)

Formlessness.

The Cheshire cat had taught me to accept this-

Completeness is a state of mind.

We’re all part purple stripes and

Part lavender

Part ivory teeth

And part blackness-

A lot of dark.

We’re all cat-eyed.

A yellow.

Purring.

Reaching for a ball of sun yarn.

Trying to make light sweaters.

We’re all Cheshire cats-

Lost nay banished from Wonderland

And therefore forbidden

To present our true forms

In a world where reality demands to be

Completely solid,

To be tangible.

To be mind and time and space.

Contained.

Otherwise, it wouldn’t be real at all.

We’re all mad men

That have lost our hats.

Looking for something,

In the meantime,

To protect our heads before

We lose it too.

Before our Red Queen chops it off.

Painting white roses into red-

Pale cheeks into rouge

Because we must conceal the madness in us

[before they notice it]

Or was that supposed to be “sadness”?

Rhyming things are easy to misplace.

[Especially when]

We’re all late.

We’re all white rabbits in black coats

Running in a rabbit hole that’s

Way too small and much too dark.

We’re two sizes too big

And yet we feel ten times too small.

In a big concrete world

Suffocating in the concrete dust.

Trapped.

No flowers sing here.

No teatime for hares and mice.

No breakfast of cake and jam.

No happy un-birthday song.

We’re ravens and writing desks.

A deck of cards domino-ing

A lot of red herrings.

We’re all staring through the looking glass.

Trapped in the reflection.

And so I look at myself constantly

Because it’s the only thing tolerable enough to see.

[I see.]

The Cheshire cat smiling.

[Past the illusion.]

I smile the same smile.

[This isn’t a dream.]

We’re barely there.

We’re barely there altogether.

Or is it supposed to be “I”?

Or Is it only me?

I’m barely there?

Barely here.

Pronouns are hard to keep track of

When the noun had lost itself-

Lost.

In the waxing and waning of stripes.

If everyone already thinks I'm eccentric

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 09:45:30 -0500

why am I still afraid to play the goddamn part?

Fill the fucking shoes they’ve already assigned to me?

Maybe I have an issue with fitting.

In.

and filling.s.

I’m not liquid enough. Barely fluid enough.

Too stone.d

Too rock.

Too stiff.

Or maybe

The description’s not just my size.

Beyond (my) shape.

Maybe.

I’m not anybody’s clay.

Not anybody’s description.

I like the latter explanation better.

Being known by my nonsensical noise,

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 09:37:00 -0500

I find it difficult for people to respect my sudden silence or the mere fact that I chose it, that I wanted it.

A defense for the Sociably Challenged.

Wed, 23 Jan 2013 06:48:00 -0500

A brief introductory remark:

Given my sudden fascination with the political philosophers of the olden days up to the 18^th century, particularly with Machiavelli and the Contractarian thinkers, the means in which they talk, argue and posit their inklings, I opted to make for myself what seems to be, in comparison to their gloriously logical rhetoric, a mock and rather laughable presentation of a defense in a style (that hopes to seem) similar to theirs. In modern terms: I wanted to try to write like them or at least in a manner that seems “like I know what I’m talking about” and so I implore you to please bear with me as you read (if ever you read) this post. Thank you.

Sometimes it makes more sense to burry your face into a book and hope to God the entirety of your existence follows, and in its following actually lose itself. Personally, I deem societal politic to be something difficult to fathom. It’s a man made locus of convoluted principles, unsaid but implied and above all, ambiguous. Not that I’ve never thought about the necessity of ambiguity. For I have and must admit to being ambiguous myself, especially under the tensions and uncertainties of societal politic. For in the realm of this politic, ambiguity despite being able to result in further tensions in its extreme, can also, during certain situations, ameliorate it, soothe it that such tensions become more controllable and less eruptive. We cannot live in utter ambiguity but we cannot deny its function and attachment to our being. For man, I suppose, with some respect to its nature, is partly ambiguous and thus, such is also the nature of man’s interactions; interactions governed by the doctrines of societal politic; doctrines that seem even more intangible, even incomprehensible than that of the abstract. Or maybe social interaction and propriety are abstract things? The self, I suppose is abstract and volatile all by itself. Imagine, now, infinite selves, infinite volatile things interacting together, living together in a state of tensions that result itself into a society, a society that demands interaction. Imagine such instability! With such a concoction, it’s only a matter of time before such a mixture, such a deceivingly immiscible mixture- for coherence, social stability and oneness is but a struggle between interacting societal strata and far from homogenous though the surface may imply homogeneity, implodes into itself or explodes into ruin. Because the struggle and tension between selves, the balance of it, also involves a balance of a multiplicity of abstractions- the tensions of power, the tensions of morals, the tensions of pragmatism and necessity and order. A fragile, flimsy balance in a vast harsh plane wherein the self is a microcosm of society, society the compounding, elevating, setting free and at the same time taming of the natural self, and the politics of things, in a way, is the means to control these tensions, is the very arena where these tensions juxtapose under the elevated guises of governance and the more minute but nevertheless crucial realm of personal relationships and by this I mean, the more individual-specific form of relationships and not the general, vague bond that connects all humankind for simply being part of humankind. Our selves are in a constant push and pull, an eternal tug of war, stemming from simple communal interactions wherein power play is almost always present, and so is second guessing and groping in a game of chess-like relations. Personally, it is easier to prefer isolation to this, to prefer the company of books, for there, we have no need of politeness or impressions, appearances and proper conduct. There one needs not measure, weigh and debate over the speech one is to utilize, the position of one’s body at all times, the moments of having to consciously choose courtesy over the impulse of rudeness, the course of action one is to pursue at each interval of the day and the consequences, implications and repercussions of each. Alas, being human, one cannot help but find one’s self in a conundrum, for if the principles of sociability is a puzzlement, one cannot simply separate one’s self from the need for society and to be, with some respect of the term, social. Man perhaps by nature is solitary- as stipulated by some of the Contractarian thinkers like Hobbes and Rousseau, in opposition to Augustine that stipulates no man can stand alone. Though, given that the context of these two characteristics of man are from different states, we must assume that both are right. The solitary man exists in man’s state of nature that is as pre-societal man. Man can stand alone in nature, but in a society connections and interactions are crucial to its development, to man’s very survival, to man’s progress. Thus giving both stipulations an air of truth to them. And with such, there rises the contradictions in man’s character and the possible claim that man, by nature, is a mesh of contradictions. A dilemma then arises as a result of being a mesh of contradictions: what if the very nature that allows one to survive depletes one’s existence into a doubtful sort- an existence beleaguered by a stubbornness, a naturally introverted, socially unsuited character? What if the standards of one’s life and therefore of one’s existence is reduced due to the necessity of sociability, in the name of order, for the sake of allegiance and with such a reduction forces one to put into question the legitimacy of such a life, of such an existence? Why live or force one’s self to live in a reduced state, especially if the obligation of sociability causes such reduction when the need for society arose to ameliorate human life through the guidance and privilege of civic virtue and order? Perhaps my rambles are mere folly given that it is a mere exaggeration and reflection of my own disinterest in interaction, connection and the rules that govern them, the behavior demanded by such rules. Or rather my rambles are a mere defense of such folly and alongside this defense, this explanation also arises my prayer- a prayer that hopes to excuse myself from such sociable necessity. It is true that not all men are sociable though man is in essence social. The problem perhaps arises in the usage of the term that somehow being social implies, nay demands being sociable. The two are rather different things to some extent. Being social means that one is related to a society and given that we are all products of a society, for, as mentioned, only through a society (which ideally should be just and virtuous although in reality such ideal has not been completely achieved) can man flourish, progress and survive, by this we are, intuitively, all social. It isn’t a question. But it is wrong to assume that because we are all related in and to a society in some way or another that we are, as part of our nature, as induced by our circumstance, educated in the manners of the sociable- the friendly. Being social does not imply vast comprehension of friendliness; for ties, the interaction of such ties and the rules of said interaction that limit, define and outline the appropriateness of behavior within such an interaction in such a tie are tricky, convoluted, flimsy and to some extent relative and therefore incoherent. For a society to function, men must form themselves into an allegiance. Society is perhaps like a clockwork of allegiances and ties, wherein society can only function if such allegiances- the very gears that form the clock- interact in the necessary manner they ought to, that a prescribed law and doctrine is necessary for order. Man acts in a peaceful, ideally altruistic manner with other people but this manner is governed by ethic and morals-supported and strengthened by legislature and positive law, which are far broader, far elevated, far civic and less personal than the rules of sociability. There is supposedly an overlap. I cannot deny that. We must be friendly to some extent but the rules of friendliness can apply to even more specific scenarios and in this realm of particulars- such friendliness and its maintenance becomes tricky, complicated, and above all exhausting, especially to those who cannot keep up or tolerate the constant changes, the constant varying demands suited to each form of tie. There is a matter of forming impressions, the changing or retaining of that impression. The rules of friendship and social interaction vary depending on the form, type, and degree of the friendship- degrees which easily interlace over another, change and flow without a notice or announcement and you must always, always be on your feet because a change in form, type and degree changes the rules, the concept of propriety, the needs, demands, expectations and so many more aspects of the connection. It is a given that all ties are strenuous but given that ties are necessary for social order and social continuance we must form them. That I do not dispute. I am merely stating a, perhaps already known or in the least implied, but never fully articulated remark- one that seems naturalized and thus is in no need of articulation, making such a notion overlooked and even forgotten, and that remark is that these ties are dangerous, tiring, upsetting and in tension much like any form of interacting mechanism. And with such a solid statement, I must remind people, that though society and sociality is a given, not all man are capable of keeping up with the maintenance of sociability- a far more specific, particular, personal and “near-the-individual” level of the social. Not all men are articulate in the language of connection, friendship and interaction. Those who are articulate and knowledgeable in these affairs or are lucky enough to survive while being ignorant to this language and politic, must not ostracize but rather understand those who cannot fathom it. Being knowledgeable in these matters does not excuse nor does it necessitate the ridiculing of those who are not knowledgeable but rather, by the very doctrines of these matters, which the majority is allegedly so knowledgeable about, requires that such people accept and perhaps aid those who are in the modern vernacular: anti-social. Although such a term may seem inappropriate, inaccurate and badly used given its psychological meaning, linguistic inaccuracy and proneness to misinterpretation of being understood as literally: anti social- against that of the social, and against that of society, hence, I prefer the term: sociably challenged. In this defense, I wish to clarify that I am not justifying improper conduct or encouraging isolation as opposed to the individual’s social development. I am merely imploring the understanding of those more inept at sociability to bear with those who are less inept in such a way that those who are challenged be encouraged to tackle, and participate in the playing fields of societal politic or in the least consider it for it is inseparable, despite having its difficulties, to a social entity- which we all are.

Sometimes I wish I was a question mark.

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 06:05:35 -0500

Floating alongside the right questions. Longing for immaculate answers.

Because titles are the hardest things to articulate. (Hence this title has no connection whatsoever to the piece.) A prose of musings.

Mon, 14 Jan 2013 09:53:00 -0500

It’s just one of those days when silence is your best ally just because words don’t come out like they’re supposed to. You find yourself dreading the morning and the daylight, anything that’s luminous enough to make you visible, anything brilliant enough that it hurts. Because being seen implies you are solid enough, together enough, tangible and strong enough to be seen and thus to interact. And this interaction presupposes a certain conduct- that of the real, that of the social, that of the normative. Categories, which I find some difficulty identifying with. You can’t just staple a note, you see, on your forehead with big bold letters that say: Don’t talk to me. Not in the mood. Piss off. P.S. Didn’t mean to offend you just naturally rude. Or perhaps milder derivatives of that sort but the thing is, mildness isn’t a priority. Neither is politeness or propriety- the prescribed doctrine of societal politic. Not now. Because at this moment, I belong once again to death. She has beguiled me once again that I am consumed by thoughts of her. A relative of mine just died, you see. Randomly. Unexpectedly- as though death is a thing that announces itself almost, always. Regrettably, death doesn’t abide by our customs. It comes and goes. It kisses you without warning. It’s spontaneous like that. I’ve been pondering on my reaction, whether or not it’s normal, whether or not it’s sincere. But the thing about reactions, in the pinnacle of emotion, in a state of passion, is that there’s rarely anything normal about it. Only expected but never normal in the moment, in the consumption of feeling. Here, relativism is not merely a dangerous –ism word but a truth. And the truth is, I don’t feel sad, not that sadness is the only reaction to grief and grief the only reaction to death but probably the most common- that and denial. Regardless, though, sad isn’t the word. I am affected. That I can guarantee. Affected partly because I was caught off guard and maybe that scares me like all unexpected things scare everybody. Sometimes, it’s better to know. It’s better to brace yourself. We need someone counting to three when the band-aid’s going to be pulled off or the needle injected. We like things we know. We like things we can predict. We like things we can take a deep breath on before we take the plunge or more often than not when the plunge takes us. Knowing is safer or at least it feels that way. There’s something aside from shock though; shock is only partial. Shock isn’t the whole thing. There’s envy there too. There’s envy, there, somewhere. Because I wanted it. I wanted death merely because it intrigues me. Drives me curious and by transitivity, mad. I want to shake hands with the afterlife. See it. Understand consciousness beyond that of man’s, perceive through a spirit, just end. Because I like the feeling of endings. Of finishing. It sounds like closure whenever I say the word. I know endings don’t always imply closure but it sounds like it. And I’ve longed to grasp that sound. I’m not suicidal. I’m not depressed. I just crave death because through the brief, miraculous moments before it, before I am taken, I feel like I can understand life. I can live and be sincere about it. And after which, after those few seconds of revelation, or fantastic enlightenment blessed with meaning, I can retire happily into the undergloom, or heaven or to limbo, whichever end chooses to take me, dares to welcome me. You must find me perverse, I assume, a woman craving death as though death was reversible, simple. You must think me primal, bestial. To want end instead of immortality. To want to renounce life, though I must interject that death is not merely the denunciation of life, perhaps its absence, its opposite but not necessarily its adversary, not all counterparts or antitheses are adversaries. I must agree, though, that under certain circumstances, wanting death is gruesome, beyond that which the civilized teaches us. But man by nature is bestial, not only under the context of war but always. It does not take carnage to bring out the brutality of man but perhaps it exemplifies it. And that being said, man by nature is also only mortal. Would it be a perversion to merely follow the doctrine of the natural? Want it for myself? The only part of my nature I completely agree with- the part that dying is necessary. And immortality is only through memory, legacy- the phenomenal and not the temporal, a comforting ruse to ease departing, to make death comforting, to maintain the quasi-physical, quasi-spiritual connection with that which is familiar, with those that are beloved, even after life, even beyond death. I want to die. Perhaps it’s in the semantics, the linguistic rules that make such statements abhorrent even macabre to some respect but it is far from it. The intention at least of my meaning is far from it. I am not gloomy or dark, merely curious, merely restless. Merely tired. Merely waiting for anything to signify my living, my existence which through some default setting of mine had required that I invoke the presence of their counterparts- death, oblivion. Because only through these counterparts can I check the meaning of both my life and existence, or in the least, this is the only method I know how but I am open to suggestions. To contemplate on death is not morbid, a mere impulse once you begin the act. One of those things that gets stuck in your head like a blues tune or a jazz note or a catchy lyric. A humanistic thing because death is also part of human nature and it merits some analysis too just as much as any other abstraction. And quite frankly,I rather retire into analysis because I no longer know how to feel. Though, I must say that apathy is neither a solution nor is it more comforting as being overwhelmed, neither is it equal I must add. To those feeling things that deny the penchant, I caution you, sometimes, apathy is worse.

Eulogy. (How I want to be remembered. A free verse)

Fri, 04 Jan 2013 08:19:00 -0500

She lived like a moon rock. A hard thing that had no light of its own but could reflect it. Shine from time to time when the clouds allowed it. A shadow that filled the empty spaces of the darkness. A night thing. Shaded. Jaded. A spectrum of seen and not seen. A woman. Technically.

She was the space of paint between the lips of the lovers on Keats’ Grecian urn. Longing. Frozen. Without closure. Erupting. On the verge. An almost. But not quite. There. But never touching. A gap. That wanted to reach. But too afraid to have it all fade away once held. Dots. Pauses where continuity should be. A. lot. Of. Unfinished. Things.

Because finishing is goodbye’s job and she was no goodbye.

But she was a disappearing act. A Houdini that left trails and implied other tricks of the trade when master magicians weren’t looking. A handcuffed thing in a glass box filled with water. Struggling. Panicking discretely. Pushing to a secret door that nobody knew about. Trying. Clasping keys hidden all over. Before the audience sees. A red velvet blanket. Released. Escaping was a hobby. Clever. How did she do it? She’s gone.

A phantasm, now, in the bathroom spilling poems in the sink and exploding words like dandelion petals all over the bathtub. Blowing them away like kisses. Wishful thinking in the toilet. Pulling rabbits out of the hat with verses in black ink. Rejoicing underneath the red velvet blanket. And the closed door. And the shut ears. And the locked curtains. A voice box that instantly croaked when the covers are shed and ears begin to listen, eyes start seeing. Because this was her magic trick. Her sacred thing. And a magician never reveals his secrets.

She was a kiss she could never tell. A scoop she could never spill. Because no one can really explain themselves. What. Is. She.

/She. was./ Noun. Adjective. And verb- the linking ones not the action. A conjunction. A past tense. Phrases looking for completeness. Scrambles waiting for sense.

A scripture. Interpreted. Dissected. An encryption. Embedded as Boolean codes or a dead language that nobody knows how to speak anymore moreover understand. BECAUSE THAT’S HOW SHE WANTS TO BE REMEMBERED:

Fragments. This’s and that’s and Bits and Pieces. Because wholes are just too hard and way too heavy.

NOT AT ALL.

/She was./

(Insert. Name. Here.)

19. 93. 30. (Age is irrelevant.)

Happy. Once upon a time. In a bathroom. With poems scattered everywhere.

Resolutions.

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 09:20:00 -0500

I want to be braver this year. I want to have the courage to send my poems aflame; let them fly on little pieces of paper. Brilliant- like stars in a dark, busy air, and catch a million eyes with them. And say to each stare, yes, they’re mine. My poems.

I want to have the tenacity to send words through the mail and send them to strangers, sign it with my name and not be afraid to try and exclaim, boldly and humbly to a nonchalant world that: yes, I, a fearful spec of spineless clay, a rough of convoluted flaw, an obscure mesh of a thousand personal cages, own a wild thing. I mothered an essence. I bore a child of verse and it may not be the grandest. But it’s mine. I can finally have the backbone to say, though no one can really own poems, because poems are selves, poems are souls, are abstract things, well, they’re mine. These ones are mine. I bled to have them here. I dared to let them go.

Because this year? I want to be daring. Daring enough to choose the truth and not be afraid to listen to it. Truths hiding beneath the poems that’s covering a self, a self that’s afraid of the mirror or rather the reflection, the honest raw reflection, the unpolished, crude and crazy image reflected by the poems because poems are also madness constrained in free verses, and madness has a way of making itself reflected. And if you dare to peak, I guarantee, that you always take a little bit of madness with you because madness is sticky, clinging like a little child with separation issues.

I want to set my verses free and let them cling upon unsuspecting ears. Let it play like an echo child in its canals. Vibrate until it shocks. Electric.

I want to be electric. A bolt of lightning crashing down. Sealing envelopes with kisses and shooting these envelopes into the pockets of nobody’s because connection isn’t that frightening a thing to attempt to have anymore. If I can own a poem, maybe I have the backbone. Maybe feeling isn’t that much of an obstacle. Maybe. I can be strong enough.

Strong enough to declaim verses outside my bathroom. In front of a blurry audience, trembling and shaking, saying with a stare, to the blob of shadows drinking beer and eating bar nuts, the collection of figures that are part eyes and part ears and all judgment, the mob of fellows I’ve renamed as my greatest fear: “ Listen, you, don’t laugh. Except when a joke appears as part of my poem, then laugh. But seriously, spare me a little bit of silence. Treat me to a little bit of your serious consideration. Pay attention because attention means a lot more than a ten dollar tip that makes the tipper feel its enough of a donation to excuse a snide, let-me-just-say-anything-for-the-sake-of-saying-something comment. Comment sincerely. Listen genuinely. Let my poems have a shot at the daylight. Let them embrace your ears because they’re cold and lonely and dying for a chance to touch somebody. And if you feel at the end of it, that I’m only worth an honest smile, then by God Smile and I’ll be the richest poet in the world-“. A poet.

This year? I want to be a poet and not be afraid of the title. I want to remember these resolutions, because this year, they actually mean something.

I want to make meaning because meaning, though abstract, is drenched with possibility and hope and other abstractions. A reachable thing. A human thing. And this year, I want to brim up to my soul and froth at the mouth with my humanness. Celebrate it. Embrace it. Overflow in my own flaw and not be ashamed of it. Because this is also to be a poet: to celebrate the greatness in all things and to radiate this greatness, be overwhelmed by it so much so that you have to solidify it, give it life in the boldness of a verse, in the rejoicing of a poem. With the sweat of the pen and the blood of my pulse, the tears of my lips, the force of my fingers. Create. And there, in my creations, I want to feel alive.

I know. These things, these resolutions are perhaps, too painful to want, too hard to achieve. But for the sake of the New Year, why not hope?

You know you're screwed when...

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 08:28:14 -0500

You crave the feeling of connectedness.

But disdain connection.

I want poems.

Thu, 03 Jan 2013 07:54:00 -0500

Poems overflowing from the sink, spewing from every hole of my temple house just to prove that not all holes are empty. Echoing in the caves of my loneliness. Filling the hollow shapes left behind by forgotten, scarred and sacred things. The shadows of memories. Cascading all over my clumsy feet craving to taste the dreams of wings. Flying.

I want poems. Because poems are the only thing my reason gives me blessing, without disdain or hesitation, to love.

I am in love with a poem. And maybe when I’m brave enough, I’ll be able to declare: I’m in love with a poet.

I hear the music again.

Mon, 31 Dec 2012 09:51:48 -0500

It’s such a wonderful thing to hear.

I'm afraid of my own poems.

Mon, 31 Dec 2012 09:43:00 -0500

There, I said it. They’re no longer words. Not just words at least. They’re emotions. Pounding in my chest. Knocking at the door of my fingers. Shaking in my hands. Kissing the life into me. Pouring themselves into a mold of a soul that had thought itself to be hollow but not anymore. And I’ve always been afraid to feel…

They’re not thoughts. They’re beings, the deities of my penchant, the manifestation of my feeling. The human, beating, pulsating thing in me. And I’ve maintained my apathetic barricade because I’m safer with it, more comfortable surrounded by it. My poems have replaced my pulse and it’s just too damn scary-

Too scary to abandon yourself into passion. To throw caution to the wind and lose yourself in the flow, the blowing power of these words, the magnificence of a poem. I’ve just had myself you see. I’ve just made myself wear a leash, tamed myself to obey myself. And I’m just not ready to submit to the mercy of these poems, not yet. To be a slave of the pen and I’m resisting because this is my freedom.

Isn’t it?

But then, why does it feel so tiring to burry the poems like the past and runaway from it like the future? Forget it like love and deny it like loneliness? Or freedom had always been that way underneath the embellishments of idealization and romanticism? A thing between tensions? A constant struggle to balance?

I’ve just controlled myself. Rid myself of all these overwhelming things. Corrected myself from my own rashness and it’s too early to let myself loose in the world of these words.

I’m afraid. That I might never get myself back again.

Resisting the climax. Keeping it frozen like the lovers on Keats’ Grecian Urn because then it wouldn’t fade. I wouldn’t have to lose it. The poems won’t come and go like happiness, and misery and all the other fickle, incomprehensible emotions.

I want to let go. But I want the reassurance that myself will come back to me once I do.

I want to release the poems. Believe me, I do. I want to let myself feel. To let myself bleed. To let myself cry and grab life in exchange for letting my self-control go. People are afraid of me when I let myself go, you see, but for the sake of the New Year, I want to let myself take this risk. I don’t want to resist. I want to cease. I want to embrace the poems and no longer fear them. Let me feel them. Please, teach me how.