RANT: Something I have always noticed...

Some artefacts veiled with dust
on a decade-old cabinet:
a bowl of goldfish
full of stones and air;
lamp clocks with hands
rendered still;
shell with a palmful of dead
batteries, hair clips;
pictures of babies
now grown, suffering
distances and absence;
and a face mirror where
the cheeks of a man turned
dangerously edged, stares back
puzzled with his position.

Cris Hugo

Some unfortunate news you read
on a small column in a tabloid :
three columns in width, ten lines of phrases
impressed together, tells
the final story of his mortality.
You want to be more familiar of him,
sketch his face as it stares back
from the page: want to understand
how his eyes smile like an old friend's;
want to know this stranger more
scribbling his mouth, what dreams it could tell;
want to hear with his hand-drawn ears
what he heard, how the bullet spinned
and splayed him on the pavement.
You'd switch ink from time to time,
black to red, red to black, wondering why
a world promises then quickly takes
a hopeful glow to guide us in the dark.
Your hands become heavier,  the strokes thicker,
the lines of his profile more chaotic
and confused, you forgot when you started
and why you can never stop.

Everett Ruess

                                     - Where I go, I leave no trace.



I followed the narrative to Escalante
where the Earth shimmered brighter colors
and stones have stories, none of which told where
you last left clues of your final presence.
Now we go about acquiesce to the toil,
the rhythm of days, rest of our lives pushing
cities further upwards to the sky,
something marvelous you didn't envision
because the wilderness, a constant Muse,
has always been most beautiful, sui generis.
Now I wonder the fragments of bones
that can have your name, the spot of canyon
where I can make pilgrimage - mysteries
not even the old wind can answer
even if he frequents himself  here
in the other hemisphere.

Afunakwa

i.


Nights I can't sleep, I let you
disturb me, one more time
in the room, haunt me
in my sleepless disposition,
let your formless self whisper
a lullabye in the dark
some old folklore:
a father sojourning further
the edge of the island;
an orphan crying his name.
I wonder that name,
which syllable lilted
to comfort the little boy
or some child I keep
hidden in my heart.


ii.

Your music rose ambient
like flood in every corner
had me grasping to put
a face to your voice
which the decades hid
like a mystery unsolved,
nothing visual to cling on
but an aging record
whose hiss before the end
becomes more profound
because it precedes the silence
that is more silent
than the hush of your sound.

Mosquito

If you must bother his night, make haste -
hands can be indecisive.  They murder in vile.
Sopor is a luxury he wants uninterrupted
coming off from grinding days wide awake.
He knows there are more of your scuttlebutt kind
buzzing from the corners, crowding the dark.
Be careful tempting an unpresuming colossus
from whose blood you thrive.

Fly

Fly crawls over the page
of a planner full of schedules,
desolate of plans. Nothing comes
out of it.  Nothing (let me name it
air, and it sits still) rests smugly
and stares back nonchalant.

Fly misses feeding on the ink
of names and numbers scribbled hastily.
Boxes of supplements clamor
departure from their cabinets.
Bank accounts require more zeroes
to follow a prime.
Air sits still, probably smiles.

Fly remains, pressing its legs on paper.
I follow my trail of thought into the dark.
Sometimes a page tells a story
so clear by remaining blank,
or a phone tells more information
keeping calm.

changed title, 01/16/2012.  

PANTOUM: Easter Bunny

Something to read to my niece and nephew when Easter Sunday comes :-)




There in her kitchen, painting eggs
in every colors of the rainbow,
the Easter Bunny would dab her brush
on the hard and white but fragile shell.

In every colors of the rainbow
she'd paint some triangles, circles, and squares
on the hard and white but fragile shell.
The colors burst in wonderful shapes.

She'd paint some triangles, circles, and squares -
patterns of stripes and curls and swirls.
The colors burst in  wonderful shapes:
blue diamonds for boys; pink hearts for girls.

Patterns of stripes and curls and swirls;
little figures of animals, shapes of clouds;
blue diamonds for boys; pink hearts for girls;
oh what magic she does with lots of love!

Little figures of animals, shapes of clouds,
the Easter Bunny would dab her brush.
Oh what magic she does with lots of love
there in her kitchen, painting eggs.

Breather

Outside, we arranged ourselves
by the brand of cigarettes we loved
to play with our mouths, pushed
the thin smoke with our breaths,
watched them as they silkily rose
and vanished in congested city air -
hints of translucent white
we will never remember.

In between breaths, chatters -
how the call went, how slow
in the head the caller was, who's
going out with whom, who's not
out of the closet, how many
deductions we got from the last
monitoring, how come you hit
your conversion and i can't -
filled the certain spaces
we stood on like wafts
of mutterings and mumblings
ascending with volatile
indecisive patterns.

At the ground, I realized
time when we crushed the little
embers that burned with our chatter,
the sinless asphalt an unwary victim
of soles that twisted and murdered
some little fire that gamely lit
from the opposite edge,  unaware
of how little time it had
between our conversations.

PANTOUM: The Nativity

Too late for Christmas, hehehe
made some edits. 01/06/12, 3:15 pm



Over a stable, humble and small,
A choir of angels sang with the stars.
The little baby slept quiet as night
as shepherds and kings gathered from afar.

A choir of angels sang with the stars.
A mother welcomed the gathering crowd.
As shepherds and kings gathered from afar
The father hushed the giddy throng.

A mother welcomed a gathering crowd
under the light of the bright North Star.
The father hushed the giddy throng
while the wind whistled a happier song.

Under the light of the bright North Star
A little baby slept quiet as night
while the wind whistled a happier song
over a stable, humble and small.

Dead End

Here, I can relate to the blue
cushions of my cubicle, my blue mug,
blue purse scant of coins - that color
cool as mourning, resting on thick plywood
like some unwanted hue.

Out there, I would not understand blue
but a hot spread of sky,
thick iridescence of happiness -
infinite blanket of morning
covering the city.

So this is the event horizon of my future
staring at the throb of an electric eye,
leaving fingerprints or what can betray me
on the black keys, dusts of time swirling
from the beams of an old structure, collapsing
from within, and white is light from the ceiling
flickering in uncertainty.