Words, words, words

We take chances hoping the universe would somehow realign itself to advance our good fortune. And nine times out of ten that doesn't happen. But is words all that lovers have for each other? You could string together the sweetest-sounding words and still lose everything the next moment.

But to the right person it does matter. To the person the right words are meant for, those words aren't just words.

They are an acknowledgment of our lifelong search. I don't like to boil something down to its essence when the flowers are to be found in its elaboration. But to a woman the soul of the right words pronounces in effect a man's converging attention; to a man it extends a woman's exclusive invitation.

But words you can never take back. Then again you wouldn't have known. There are words that felt so right the first time you might never say them again because they had already been said... only to the wrong person. Of course it always seems a waste thereafter. But would you have withheld yourself and left those words unsaid?

If there are things to be said, say it loud and say it well. Leave heartache for the morning. It always comes whether or not you plan for it.

Story of my life (and death)

There are things you learn only in retrospect. But at my 29th year I knew some things right away. For one I know I'm the luckiest man I've ever met, and that all the things that made me who I am, good and bad, were just shadows of what are to come.

People who don't know me, when they read something like this, they'd think that I've probably had it easy, and that this is how I define lucky. I would admit that I have been very good at concealing my inner life even from those very close to me, so that only very few who know me can construct my life story from all the pieces of the puzzle.

They say when a life is lived to the fullest, it overflows and changes others. But my experience of life so far is just the opposite. I seem to have been made a chalice rather than a vase. What's poured into me tends to get distilled so much there just isn't enough to spill over. If you were never intent on tipping me upside down you would never have tasted the last drop of life that's hidden at the bottom of the cup—that's how unnoticeable I designed my life to be... since I first discovered the want for romantic love.

Something tremendous happened the month leading up to my 29th year that converged all efforts and struggles of mine for love in a most unavailing confrontation that led to a climax most unbearable there wasn't an existing category to name it under. It was, to borrow from old idioms, a baptism of fire that could only be described as a sort of death... and rebirth.

For the first time in love I was betrayed. The betrayal brought about death that seemingly must be and most strangely with it, a resurrection from hope. Though it killed me, it gave me at the same time a new name to bear for the rest of my life. And that name I couldn't utter in any language even if I want to. It was made up of certain sounds, but mostly psalms and lamentations, a lifetime of keen questions and deep answers, honors and humiliations, faces, words, visions, terrors, light, and secrets.

So what after all do I mean by being lucky? There is only one reason behind my celebration of this life after death. And that is a pain-filled life is the only life worth living. I do not say this lightly. Every day countless out there suffer more severely than I did. But no one ever suffered needlessly. That is to say, people have without doubt suffered unjustly but no suffering was or ever will be undergone without its rewards. The human soul seems to be just the kind of thing that thrives on hope the more it goes without, and that's all I'm saying.

I'm lucky because I died.

"Answers (And More Questions) From The Lover"

Kind Sir, you would not have asked me such things
If you have yourself in the Valley parched;
But my burdens were fastened on saintly wings
When all my eyes could see were dead souls that marched.


If I were a Knight who gallantly slays,
My deeds would have been told—no, I've seen my days
Through the baptism of utmost Betrayal
From heartbreak of death that drank wine from gall!


And what of my service before comrades and lords?
If love summons, would you not die by blade or quill
(You may not find courage now, but then you will)—
To meet lies with Truth with no thought of rewards?


I bear no secret that has not been revealed—
Unless streams can return to brooks they flow wherefrom!
Do you still suspect I have a pouch concealed?
Hear now: Joy may wane and Love bereave; Hope will come.

"Questions To A Lover"

Dear Poet, you are not a sonneteer by trade,
But by the way you love you might as well be;
Your love is hidden in the swift Everglade,
Away from fading eyes that are not meant to see.


Do you want to tell the world how you worshipped,
Of the distance you travelled just true love to taste?
But the world is not prepared for a love so chaste
And a bedtime story in such sorrow dipped.


How did you do it?—tirelessly you seemed to rise
From culminating deaths that attacked by night,
When food and spirit were ever low in supplies—
This cannot be, but are you also a Knight?


Was there a lost secret we do not know of
That kept you in the battlefield and the king's court?
Tell us now, even of a haven thereof;
Have your eyes seen the city of gold?—love's Free Port!

"What I Have Left To Live For"

What I have left to live for
Since you're gone
Is just the memories of your warmth
That passed through my hands,
My arms, my body;
What I have left to live for
Now that I'm all alone
Is just the ghost of your smile
Lighting up the dark corners of this room.


What I have left to live for
Everyday since you left
Is to stand on the street we used to walk,
Hoping you would suddenly appear
The next time I look up;
What I have left to live for
Cannot fill up the hole you left
When you took my heart away
In the deep of an unfinished refrain.


I could pretend that nothing happened
When someone asks me about you,
Saying you're just a fleeting romance.
But if my heart had a say,
Knowing what's true,
It would cry out your name again and again
Till it breaks into a million shattered pieces...


What I have left to live for
Now and evermore
May not be quite the same as before;
What I have left to live for,
Unless you reappear at my door,
Would be all that I draw each breath for.

"I Take A Walk Outside"

I take a walk outside
And wish you by my side.
Nothing seems as gray
As when you're far away.


Come back into my dreams
And mend their broken seams.
Long before robins sing
You're my first hint of spring.

Story of my life (crescendo)

This has got to be the strangest thing that has happened to me in years. Recently I noticed I've recovered some of the things I stopped doing or experiencing.

I was done with it a long time ago but lately I began to search the vast blue sky and exhale lento. What was that! The last time I did that I still had a whole heart to rend on the altar of life...

And I began to be afraid again. Really afraid. Suddenly there's something in life that I'm afraid I might lose...

But strangest of all, I've totally detached myself from all the past grievances that I ever visited... I stepped out the door one day only to hear birdsongs and feel the sun's warmth on my face.

I found the source of my newfound joy in the most unusual place. I want to let the world know the reason I'm happy but for now I'm content that my reason already knows.

"One Week"

Strange that a fire kindled my heart,
And it has been one week since;
Across terrains my soul did chart—
O heart, hail to Love's crown Prince!

"Sleep Well in Saigon"

In town they call you river-goddess.
Your nose is the narrow cliff of their life source.
The dripping faucet bids you home to the river...
Your place is in this sun-baked room made of our liquid love.

Your dark unruly hair makes the lawn of our bed fragrant.
Your limbs are collapsed towers accepting a delicious fate.
I eat and drink you for all these days that you let me.
Now I cannot go back to earthen food or water.

Your voice is a small house that I can live in,
Your lips the swift portal of a laboring man's bliss.
I enter your voice through your lips and sleep well in Saigon,
In the afterglow of a slumber I never wake from.

"Glass House"

You sit in the corner to avoid
Your own radiance in the sun;
Light fails to miss you
While you stay motionless.

Your eyes swimming, searching,
Fearing that you might wait until cold dusk
For a man who hasn't come home
To you heart.

Where are you?, you ask,
But do you know he's asking the same?
How long, you ask again,
Till you stop dreaming
And wake to a smile
As bright as the reflected sun?

You've been suspected an illusion,
A mirrored silhouette
Of his young-aged yearnings.
And your own yearnings—
Who is to notice them?

It can't be him—not this day—
For he is still dying to call out a name...
A name that will be beside his own
One day in this glassed fortress.

I have no advice nor comfort for this
Your hardest hour,
Save to only bear it
Until a river comes forth from your core
And engulfs his parched land.

You will see him rising from the graves
Of his many a dark death,
Clutching the air with bone-tired arms
That turn thunderous;
And his feet, lean though they are,
Will charge, with full sagacity, to where you are.

True, he is not here now,
But this glass house is consecrating your tears
For the day he walks in through the front door...
Will he see the same you?

Time to sleep now,
The deep, bright secret sprouting in your heart
Let not the angels see,
For it is even more sacred than they!

"Roses"

A balcony full of roses
Is like your sweet love for me.
They smile and astound,
Blush when they are admired,
Tenderly holding my breath.


Then one day in all suddenness
The roses I no longer see.
Since you are not around
The flowers grow sad and tired,
And they miss you to death.

Story of my life

Do you have any regrets in life? That's what I found myself answering today when I was caught in the Simba-and-Rafiki moment as I was pulling up some fond cases from the memory file.

"Yes...?" said Simba.

"Try again!" replied the nosy Baboon in me.

"Well... no?"

"And why not?" asked the monkey as he invited me to stoop low and watch him form ripples on the water's surface with his ugly index finger.

In an enlightening moment an answer came...

"No..." this time the monkey gave me time to finish my thought, "no I don't have any regrets in life..." and he waited still... "Only pity."

That's when the pesky monkey disappeared.

So what's with that? It took me a while but I finally figured out what the simian was trying to say. He wanted me to know for sure that I haven't been living with regrets. But on the other hand there is pity, which may look just like the same thing as regrets but is not.

I haven't a regret in my life, because I eliminated them along the way as best I could.

But I'll always have pity, because hard as I tried, I could never make someone love me.

So there you have it, the story of my life; a life with pity but no regrets.

"A Call For Truce"

O Night, cursed be you, for yours is a scheme most vile—
Were your offenses to be numbered, the list would run a mile;
The Book of Mem'ries isn't meant to be read for pleasure,
Yet on the stage of dreams you dealt it out as hard measure...
You turned loss into a love scene, as only a jester could;
You rejuvenated hope, but that doesn't mean you should!
Love is gone, don't you know? it's time to take your last bow
We were there, remember? We can't ever go back now.

Hapless in dreams

I hate dreaming lately.

To put things in perspective, what I really hate is waking up to find what I thought was real when it happened was actually a dream.

Dreams are a cruel machine the better they get. There wasn't any signs or banners in the dream that warns against emotional investments. And you always find out the truth a second too late. And like lovers who steal your heart along with your money, the best cons always manage to vanish and keep you swooning over their acts despite the fact that you're left with nothing but your socks and the memory of a cheap thrill.

Nonetheless, though I hate to admit it, heartbreaking dreams have a place in the cognitive process.

They remind you that though it might seem like you own the world, it could all be gone in an instant, and that you're fundamentally powerless in the greater scheme of things.

Don't like the sound of it? Nobody I know does, myself included. That's why I guess it's all the more important that we're reminded that every single day, lest we take for granted the simplest of things that usually mean the most to us.

Are you a philosopher?

I met a Frenchman today and expressed to him my fascination with Paris. He encouraged me to visit his country with the following reason.

According to him, in France an average man gets to have seven women, and often five of them are knockouts and the other two are plain ugly.

He then wittily offered to confer two of his ugly ones to me out of goodwill. I told him if that was the case I believe I might just find the ugly ones beautiful by my standards (like there is such a thing as ugly Frenchwomen). The man expressed his touché by raising his hands and eyebrows as only the French could do, and said, "Are you a philosopher?"

Oui monsieur, comme vous, je pense à de belles femmes toujours.

Love gets dated

Who needs this day right?

Tell me the meaning of Valentine's Day. You gotta set a day in the year aside for birthdays. Celebrating it any other day won't do. Same goes for memorial days like Australia Day and Anzac Day, lest we forget. But a Valentine's Day? Do we really need a set day in the year to celebrate our love—in whichever sense you take it? Love is the only thing you can't have an anniversary of. If it's ever there, love is too large and too close a presence to need reminding, and too pragmatic to get exclusive attention only one day in a year.

I'll tell you what Valentine's Day is for. It's for those who can't decide on when to celebrate their love—if they haven't already realized there isn't a single day when you shouldn't celebrate. It's also for those who want, for at least a day, to forget love. Love in it's truest, day-in-and-day-out sense. Without February 14th, most people would probably lose the only chance they have of being treated the way they aren't treated the rest of the year... like getting expensive boxes of chocolates wrapped up in glossy ribbons, receiving scented cards written with notes on feelings and good opinions, or walking on rose-petaled hallways.

In a word, pampered.

Love on the rest of the days is hard work and stripped of pretense. You see the other person in their realest form and most of the time it leaves much to be desired. The sad part of it all is that you know you're stuck with an imperfect person when you're secretly gauging them against ever-increasing standards. I for one am a perfectionist, and therefore do not condemn the desire for perfection. I believe we're made for perfection. That's what I believe Valentine's Day is for. To create a fleeting illusion of perfection in the other person through royal treatments.

Why don't we do what we do on Valentine's Day everyday? A culture that makes a day for love will soon need to make appointments to love.

Love gets old

Good thing about eating in public is you can listen in on some of the most interesting conversations.

This afternoon I was sitting next to two chatty young girls munching my Filet-o-fish burger and leaving the earphones of my iPod on in pause mode to obscure the fact that I was blatantly eavesdropping (though the volume at which they conversed did save me the trouble of straining my ears). And boy! the things they talked about could shame a grown man into shrink-wrapping his high school yearbook.

When I was making acidic comments in my mind on each silly thing I heard, I knew my transformation into an old fart has come full circle. I no longer root for Andrew the ex, who thinks Matt is no good for the girl. I don't trust Matt either, who shared dessert on a first date that wasn't an official date anyway. And when Matt still attends his ex's family reunion, I wondered why people don't turn into old farts any sooner.

Looks like the dating scene still hasn't changed since my time. The young are the easiest to fall in love. Just as easily as they fall out of it. What remains is the reminiscent old fart who wonders about possibilities. I think it would be wrong to say that he wishes to relive the past differently. The old fart is someone who's pretty comfortable soaking in the bittersweetness of life, being well aware that whatever choices he could have made, he's bound to live with regrets either way. Rather than sulking over what befalls, he's the happiest when he realize he's actually enjoying the torture of not knowing it both ways. C'est le mystère de la vie.

Musings on a blue Chinese New Year

As family and friends are celebrating the arrival of Year of the Rat (you gotta love the Chinese for including a rodent among the signs in their calendar), I'm quietly tugged away in a far corner from home where festivity is underway.

The blues have long been anticipated since I found out a month ago that my housemates will be flying home for Chinese New Year, leaving me Melbournebound for 3 weeks.

Just when I was beginning to enjoy having the house all to myself, I was visited by old memories in the form of an early autumn night's dream in the middle of Week 1. To protect the privacy of innocent parties involved, let's just say I dreamed of a love interest from the past and was living out an alternate version of reality until sunrise.

The dream was so vivid it left me as loathsome in the morning as a pregnant hyena. To think of all the efforts I've put into rearranging related memories according to Jungian archetypes throughout the years, they finally retaliated and showed me a demo reel of the director's cut. Naturally, it gave rise to questions that begin with "what if..."

What if I made a different decision at some crucial point in history, would things have turned out differently now?... Oh brother... this is a time when I wish I were a hyena—at least hyenas don't ask hypothetical questions! But then again I guess hyenas don't experience reveries on an autumn night either.

That's not to say that I'm accustomed to living off relationship carcasses from the past. OK maybe I am. But if you know my personal history you'll wonder. I wish I have a penny every time I'm asked a variation of "Have you found someone yet?" Brothers and sisters everywhere, to satisfy your spirit of inquiry and end all curiosity toward my love life or even my sexual orientation, let me answer your question once and for all with the title of U2's song, "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For".

To end the concern of some and maybe disappoint others, no I'm not gay. But I'm not in love either. That might be hard to believe for a man my age (I'm going on 30 in the Year of the Rat according to the Chinese lunisolar calendar) and erm... virility (contrary to misconceptions propagated by my boy scout image, I do experience hormonal drives). It is common that polite society cannot fathom such a sub-species as healthy single heterosexual males, at least not as a constant life form in no need of further enhancements through pairing with their female counterparts.

Don't get me wrong if you think I'm not looking. Just ask my housemates how I have pushed the envelope of being desperate in the past... though I operate on a highly selective mode and rarely show my hands, to borrow betting terms.

Maybe that's my problem. Probability dictates that success rate increases with the increase of the number of throws (or so the casino would have you believe). I detest the idea of leaving up my love life to random phenomena, therefore I fold, untie my bow tie, and help myself with a glass of whisky at the bar.

I am the missing link in the human cultural evolution—a single man who thrives amidst survival of the couples.

The lazybone-paranoid's guide to living alone (Part 2)

1. Check your mailbox daily to avoid important letters being left out in the weather. Getting rid of spams could leave an impression of constant activity around the house. Overfilled/unattended bins do the opposite.
   
2. When you're out having fun, leave a light on where it can easily be seen from the street. Give a spare key to a trusted friend or the designated driver.
   
3. Bolt the door first thing when you get into the house, even if it's likely that you'll leave the house later in the evening. Plans could change and it's common for friends to stand each other up.
   
4. Always put emergency calls on the top of your phone's speed dial.
   
5. If you're getting picked up by a taxi from home, always give your next-door neighbour's address and wait outside their house.
   
6. If you live in a townhouse or ground-level apartment, shut all windows save those in your bedroom before going to bed.
   
7. When walking home, circle around the block twice if you suspect stalker activity. If it's after dark, pretend to call a friend and that you're expecting them at home. Ask something like how far away they are so that the person you suspect can hear you. If needed, pretend to repeat your mate's reply that they're there already and say you're just a minute away.
   
8. Assign a wash day for whites and another for colours. 'Nuff said.
   
9. Unless you have a dryer, wash your favourite work clothes on Friday night to make room for bad weather over the weekend.
   
10. Stock up the pantry on candy/muesli bars and always keep a couple in the bag as rations.
    

The lazybone-paranoid's guide to living alone (Part 1)

1. Save the movies on your hard drive for when Internet in down and you can't stream off YouTube.
2. Turn up the music in your room and leave the bathroom door open so you can sing to your favourite song in the shower without fear of voyeuristic housemates.
   
3. Never cook for just one meal. Prepare extra portions and keep them clingwrapped in the fridge for when you're hungry but don't feel like cooking. They usually make good packed lunch / snack at work.
   
4. Always keep a green bag in your slingbag/suitcase. You never know when it would come in handy when you need to take a trip to the grocer's after work. Environmental issues aside, it makes for a more durable and less clumsy carry than plastics.
5. Always hang up two ironed shirts of tangential colours in the closet for when you sleep in. That way you buy time and reduce the chances of wearing something that looks like what you've worn the day before.
6. Unless you have easy access to a power source or a second charger at work, charge your phone/iPod the night before. If your iPod's battery level goes below 20% let it play out an hour or two before you hit the sack and charge it only after the battery's flat to maximize battery life.
   
7. If you don't shave everyday take out the batteries of your electric shaver to avoid damage from battery leakage.
   
8. Keep extra rolls in your toilet(s) in case you're stuck to the seat realizing that you run out and it's impossible to reach for one.
   
9. Drop off rented movies at the store a day before they are due. Penalties can add up and you don't want your membership suspended the week your favourite movie is released on DVD.
   
10. Keep two distinct perfume scents for when you're wearing a shirt from the day before out of desperation. At least you smell different.
    

On bad advice

My good friend Adelaine has recently written an entry about bad advice people give on relationships and I thought I might chip in my two cents to enlarge the circle of awareness toward the cancerous disease.

I totally agree with her that there are people out there who like to think that they are doing the world a favour by sharing their "wisdom", until some serious damage is done as a result of someone putting their advice into practice. They gain practically nothing out of giving the advice (perhaps other than the delusion that they've changed the world for the better), but it is the one who mistakes their folly for wisdom and applies it to real life who has to pay for it. How irresponsible.

Don't get me wrong if you think I'm against giving advice. I do it myself all the time. I'm only against giving stupid advice that are the variations of "if you're bored with your relationship, get married" or "if you're not satisfied with your marriage, have children." That's the kind of thing that pisses a sane man off. And for obvious reasons that apparently aren't obvious enough for some. If getting married could solve almost all relationship problems, the lawyers better start reconsidering their career options. And if having children is the answer to a failing marriage, why do the kids always end up in the psychologist's couch 20 years later?

Count your blessings if you've never come across people who freely offer such advice. But the next time you see them, do yourself a favour and run for your life the other way.

"The Plaintiff's Remark"

Dear poet, pray pardon the lawlessness of my estate,
But since the last riot no one was to mend the gate;
Though the stars stood guard their kinds have been shifty—
Thanks to them I had to issue an increase in bounty!
When you visit next don't forget your magnifying glass,
For in my exhibits there are items of undefined class
Retrieved last summer near one of Guantánamo's piers,
Among them a pristine necklace from your lady's tears...

"A Case of Night"

Sweet night, wake me when the day is done for
So I could plunge into your arms and soar;
The clouds are swagging across your murky dress—
Their myriad crimes they wouldn't confess!
Least of them on rainbow and her embezzled gold,
Now en route to some island with treasures untold...
Your domain is one where dreams roam free
But do wake me, or yield to this ransacking spree!

Resolutions 2008

In 2007, I maintained 2005's productivity with an average of a poem in a month. Mid-year saw a surge in creativity, with July and August being the most prolific months, yielding three poems each.

As far as traveling goes, both my trips sent me on an R.S.V.P. to Sydney in September for Arthur and Stephanie's engagement and Toowoomba in December for Valen and Ruth's wedding.

There hadn't been many cultural events in 2007, with Cirque du Soleil's Varekai in June being the highlight of the year.

In March I suffered from a yearly getaway syndrome and went only as far as pre-launching a new travel blog. The year ended with a new job and prospect of better pay on the horizon.

As for 2007's resolutions, I've had 33% success rate by achieving only one of three resolutions.

All in all, a good year. Now on to 2008's resolutions:

1. Continue to sponsor my boys throughout 2008.
   
2. Sign up with The Writers' Studio.
3. Go to Paris for a writing stint.