renewal

All it Takes

2009-08-10T10:16:00.001+08:00

An ant.
A world.

A thumb.
A girl.

A life.
A breath.

Pressure.

A different world.

prayer

2007-04-03T22:00:00.000+08:00

i.
it feels almost as if
my hands are in yours again, grandfather;
these papers are coarse and wrinkled like
your weary palms, thin and mottled as
the skin you’ve worn away. i fan them out
in circles, tracing a history of your days;
it turns out imperfect, but pretty in
an austere way. these are “hell notes”;
the term does ring a bell: the toll of
suffocating, fiery death–

ii.
–which is their sole purpose.
gingerly, we place them into
this cylindrical furnace, then step
back, always keeping a safe distance
from the hungry flames. i am reminded
of the coolness of the glass which kept us
back, shielding us from the heat
of the fire consuming you,
of the grief consuming us.

iii.
father choked on an
anguished sob then; now
he chokes on this smoke thick with memory,
silently tearing, from within, each throbbing ache
to lay, piece by piece, on the
charred remains of previous pains.
it seems he is burning the bridges to loss;
behind his blazing stare hurt must smoulder in private.
i stand by his side, but still we are alone.

iv.
i am struck with the thought that i am holding postcards:
a neat stack of them with peeling silver stamps.
i drop them into this cylindrical mailbox,
into the hands of flickering postmen, who randomly toss them
up towards the blue: all roads lead to you.
i have enclosed the naïve concern of the living:
I trust you are well? like you are on an extended vacation.
or maybe we’re the holidaying ones; well, in that case,
We’re having fun, but we’ll be home soon.

v.
like water from a faucet that trickles to a stop,
this fire dies in agony with crackles and a pop.
the sorrow it feeds on is not infinite; all that is left
is the fading smell of once-cloying incense, and this
lingering warmth fingering our heartstrings
to the tune of a eulogy. we have come to accept
that beneath these ashes, there are bits that
will not burn, but we
no longer mistake them for unfinished dreams.

the truth is they are diamonds that cannot be singed by time.

51

2006-09-27T00:47:00.000+08:00

it began with some impertinence
on my part, though for that i have
no apologies. that was when we
built bridges on harmless banter, before
the storm of understanding eroded them.
years now have come
between us, like the sea that isolates
shipwreck survivors. we bob,
sometimes a finger-length away,
sometimes miles apart. time made me
drift; at times i almost lost hold

completely, resembling
a certain ex-planet, always
the dwarfed outsider, straining to keep
to one eccentric orbit, revolving
around the wrong core. though you
had your circle of friends, held by
one like-minded gravity, you did not
cast me to the oblivion of unknown
galaxies and anaerobic darkness.
by your neptune-like strength i remained
a part, a part of life's ellipse.

your forte is words; i prefer numbers.
but your name, in both, will be framed
in eternal recollection: the cornerstone
of the house of youth. for that
i thank you.

for shayi

softly we struggle.

2006-09-20T02:39:00.000+08:00

i.

i trawl the night for afterthoughts;
the Net manages only straggling
shrimp, some headless, others tailless, all
writhing, desperately, into incoherent

images. i grasp a handful: they
slither, suddenly snakes,
i flail; i fail:
only ghosts remain.

ii.

a general humming: the air vibrates
with monotony, creates
false equanimity. now, under
tacit command, i expect

instantaneous calamity, but
only the earth shifts, an infinitesimal
displacement, unnoticed as these
blades that surreptitiously

slice each minute into shreds.
still, i sense the stirring. is it
time? if i close my eyes,
will we still exist?

sorry.

2006-09-17T01:05:00.000+08:00

the words are not coming. well they are, but they always sound wrong. pardon me if the stuff here is awful; i feel a need to churn things out, if only to keep the cogs running. i hope things fix themselves soon. hmm.

untitled.gif

2006-09-17T00:14:00.000+08:00

the crisp fragrance of apples
wafts in through the gaps
between the murmurs of this
silence, perforated by your fingers
tapping melodies on a tuneless keyboard.
elsewhere the tv blares sitcoms like static.
brother's breathing sandpapers the night.

this is life now. you are running (purposefully it seems)
through invisible cords, like those that used
to bind us, only more technical. i shiver
as i mill in this falsely deepening space, hoping
somewhere we'll meet, wishing you would see
my face in something more than pixels, read
my mind beyond size 12, times new roman.

a hairdryer moans: distress without words;
they splatter on the ground from the rusty showerhead,
evoking no response. there is no percolation.
you lean forward, seeking truth in that digital mirror
you've placed between us. you've made me your
reflection, an illusion behind this imaginary wall.
a metre away, i am trying to reach you
but i don't have your number.

only after

2006-09-06T01:27:00.001+08:00

i. cat

you will leap onto the wall
nimbly, all grace, leave
nothing behind, paws pitter-
pattering the night into morse
dots and dashes.

pause.

now you will cringe, tail swishing
blade-like, claws tapping
out, again, re-morse
slots and slashes. i listen
numbly.

ii. lift

you will stop ringing. now.
you chime when you are empty
you chime when you are not.
now you will stop. rest for the night.
then tell me tomorrow if we're
going up, or maybe you'd say we're
going down.

iii. coffee mug

you have lost your colour.
years of staining tabletops have taken their
toll. i have sipped too much regret
from you, now my teeth are
irreversibly yellowed, like the aged pages
of that photo album stowed away
somewhere, which, if i recall,
still has your mark on page 7.
discolourations are memorable.

(why?)

before morning

2006-08-10T01:19:00.000+08:00

the night coagulates, tangible and portly.
thick as worry, black as regret, it
softly suffocates, slickly strangulates
this resigned earth.

two temples throb.
between them a midnight worshipper
is devoutly devoured
by nothing -

the nothing

- as he helplessly grasps at
remnants of dusk and
fleeting glimpses of dawn.

Park bench

2005-12-12T20:12:00.000+08:00

This is a nice spot, this here bench,
a nice spot to look at the world go by.
That is, partly, why I am here.

First listen, listen to the leaves:
they crackle like fire, exploding into
yellow-red-gold flames! They go forth,
licking the pure air, riding it
violently, vivid, vibrant
sparks, before they
kiss the sweet earth.
They die in beauty.

Then contrast that with this image. These
brown figures, clutching their
brown hats, hugging their
brown cloaks around them.
Browner than this earth, they go forth,
hurrying and scurrying, to their
deaths.
I wonder if they know
where they are going?

They sure look like it.
Look at their purposeful grimaces,
frowning at the brownness about and
in them. They must rush!
Somewhere on the circumference of this circle they trace
an appointment awaits!

And so they go,
step after step after step after
step, until finally, they have
ground themselves to the ground,
leaving nothing but wrinkles where once were
feet. These are the old
circles of life.

They are a blur to me, as I am sure
they are to themselves.
I forget, they do not have the time
to count how many bits of golden magic
have fallen about their heels. They count
another sort of gold, as cold and as hard
as their hearts.

Now listen again, listen to the trees:
they cry at the wind, the wind which wipes away their
yellow-red-gold tears! They weep,
they weep magic to the skies and to
the earth. They weep in fading beauty,
for us.

Then compare them with this picture. This
old lady, who sits, with a silent shudder, on
this here bench. Peer through her paper-thin
skin, dappled with age, and remember that
it was on this bench her crinkled lips
parted, that she then murmured this:

“I waited all my life to die, to die
because I lived. I lived to die.”

There were no tears.
I turned, before she went forth
forever, and smiled,
“Don’t we all?”

bubble dreams.

2005-12-08T15:43:00.000+08:00

He stood small and unprotected,
embracing the only thing that was on his mind
and in his hands. He thought perhaps
his frail stature could somehow shield this
fragile globe of utter beauty from harsh
realities, for someone once said that
love could do the impossible.

And he loved it, this wet sphere of sheer
perfection; he loved it with all the
love his little heart could muster. His heart was
petite, but it had space for this creation, since
after all, purity enjoys company.
This orb made him complete.

He loved it because it came from him.
He had fashioned it from the
simplest of materials; gave birth to it with the
most primitive of tools, but this wonder he
concocted was far, far more profound
than anyone could ever understand. His
inexperienced mind could hardly grasp it, but in some
vague manner he knew it was his, thus
he loved it, and that was that.

It was his responsibility, his
calling, and momentarily the point of his
existence. He had fended off the hungry
wind for it, had fought the burning
sun, had brought it the moon and the
stars. And in return, it gave him the sparkling
rainbow, and more importantly, it showed him
himself. He smiled.
It was time.

He had questioned, incessantly, the
whens, and the whethers. The answer lay somewhere
deep within, and now it surfaced, tearing him
to shreds. He desperately desired to hold this marvel, to
be its haven forever. But the call
can not, must not, go unanswered.
For it, for once, he must weather the inner storm.

And so,
He stood small and unprotected,
Embracing the only thing that was on his mind
and in his hands. With the gentlest of touches,
with infinitesimal strength, he lets go.
It lingers, clutching on for a few

eternities,

then flies, soaring to reach that boundless
height of its destiny
alone. No, not alone, for it carried his
love, his entirety.

It happened too quickly for his tears to find
his youthful cheek. He faltered when they did,
then blinked them away. His twirling magic,
his dazzling son of the skies had left him
this, a dull, hazy ache. He thought perhaps
this pain so detached was merely rushed
pride, a reminder of his rendezvous with
love, which was but a minute’s dream, oh yes, just a
dream, that felt like it took all his life
away.

But he was glad he chose this dream, and
let it go, since
after all, even purity has a shelf life.
Past that, and dreams could explode
with a whisper into nightmarish nihility,
and both would fall, blind, into permanent
dizzying darkness. The sting of
goodbyes is nothing, next to the
fear of forgetting helloes.

Can you hear that soft whisk of freedom?
One day it will shun immortality to
return.