WORDS AND OTHER THINGS

2011-12-24T04:42:00.000-08:00

twentyfour
-
i wake up to an ending,
clutching at slumber
in my reluctance to admit
the disappointed morning.
-
all day, i am
remembering the wrong words
for the right conclusions,
the silence replaying
the sound of the passing time,
-
habits and solitude
repeating under different lights.
by now,
the empty breeze
concedes the impending night.
-
amidst the evening's helplessness,
the bruising clouds
become the sky.

2011-12-19T06:29:00.001-08:00

december
-
At once, everywhere,
the loss of a stillness.
The shattering of water,
the drawing out of rain.
-
silhouettes
rushing through the grey,
made blunt by the drizzle.
the inscrutable concrete,
unfolding in lines.
-
the continuing streets
and blurring expectations.
the remains of the moment,
the persisting time.
awash,
in a reminder of smallness
and flesh.

2011-06-22T06:02:00.000-07:00

after
-
Derelict sojourns in
Obfuscation.
Unknowingly
Chasing an imaginary coincidence of
Happenstance, misjudging
Even you. The
Brief possibility of otherwise
Allows an insistent recollection of folly. then
Gravity. then the neverending why.

(121210)

2010-12-13T04:47:00.000-08:00

homebound
-
the day recedes
into partial night.
somewhere inside
i am revisiting
the sensation of circles,
unlearning
the smell of the cold.

here

i am colourless,

comprehending
the weight of the air,
contemplating
this refraction of you,
with the certainty of rain.
on the verge of a nothing,
tilting heart-first
into the passing sky.

(011010)

2010-10-02T03:42:00.000-07:00

fragments

and so it is.

the incomplete moon
halfway in a muddied sky,
strung along its tired trajectory.

the darkness hides my disarray,
unfolding in the crumples
of weary bedclothes
and sleepless space.

alone,
remembering the absent stars.

(220910)

2010-10-02T03:39:00.000-07:00

polygraph

in this beige room i endure
the careful documentation
of my falling apart,
the calibration
of my complexities.

i cannot forget.
that chair,
made of rightful angles,
and its specific
standard
of brown.

somewhere in 2007

2009-04-06T14:08:00.000-07:00

somedays i just feel an urge to write, usually on a scrap of blank white paper [usually torn out of a nearby notebook otherwise even the back of an envelope will do], almost always with a black ink pen. there is a strange comfort in articulating a moment, a funny satisfaction in coherence. sometimes i actually get round to typing it out and saving it someplace, even if it is only a paragraph, or even a sentence. othertimes i am not as successful in following up on the intention to save these efforts. i don't know how many scraps of paper i have lost over the years.

my childhood ambition was to write a book that would be good enough for publication. i think because i loved reading so much, i thought it would mean the world to be a published author. these days, the range and modalities of written works have changed much with the advent of self-publication and the internet. admittedly, my love of books has also suffered from my discovery of magazines and [if i'm being really honest here] mold. i don't think books will ever lose their relevance though, or at least i hope not. because really the only thing that makes us human is the power of thought.

anyway i digress, i was looking through my old files and i found a little paragraph i wrote back in 2007 -

This one is for the wall flowers, for the grass, the average and the quiet, who exist but exist so unnoticeably that you may perhaps notice them for that aspect of their lives, for those who may live rich inner thoughts and animations but cannot fathom public expression and hence cannot inhabit the society of people and presences. For those forgotten or remembered for the wrong things, for the people you never got to know well enough, for the random names you hear and obscure, for the ones who inevitably make themselves easy to ignore, who cry out and argue and scream in a silent voice void of decibel. Those who don’t easily shake the feeling of being strangers and thus viciously make themselves stranger, who are afraid to invite judgement. Which is both the key to condemnation and exaltation. For the Jesus of Somewhere Else who was shy.

And life doesn’t wait for her to play catch-up, it has moved on, solidified, flowed away, eluded and laughed.

(051008)

2008-10-04T18:19:00.000-07:00

the other end of the line is just another point in nothingness

we bristle over static.

in my head i am holding you,
conveying what i cannot say
but need you to know.
i curl up on my mattress,
i toss, turn;
mis-understanding is uncomfortable.

i cannot tell you in three words
how to cross a chasm,
but in my quietness all you comprehend
is steep descent;
this is the fall that distance brings.

outside my window
the world is dark and indifferent.

pain, my dear, is sometimes silent.

(280407)

2007-05-07T05:12:00.000-07:00

saturday

Empty evenings a world away.
-
There is one sun
sinking in my room
and it will not take yes for an answer.
I am scalded by accusing rays
of what else I can do and what else I
cannot control - hold - change.
-
laundry manages to drip
with careful malice and
every noise - muffled - word - laugh mocks,
reminding of a parallel path
in a could have taken world.
-
long days and Longer weeks
less tears and a chill inside the house
says I Cannot Move The Universe
and I will leave alone and
wonder if every hushed footstep - voice
is intentional
-
avoidance of unwanting. April
will not budge, and
the air is too dry for my skin.

(still backdating - 090407)

2007-05-07T05:09:00.000-07:00

(untitled)

Long days lure melancholy,
white-shirted, tiny-fisted,
insubstantial but shattering
ballerinas-in-waiting
flooding the wings as
a deep pirouette drum
whistles from the corner.
You re-enact in my head
on repeat
all smiles words laughter,
memories of joy and faith in
a world that still turns and marries
and soulmates and smooths.
I have given up on
paths and forgetting, I
have confused forgiveness
with resignation.
These are far hours
and classic tears.

(120107 21:43)

2007-05-07T04:57:00.000-07:00

deadweight
-
you are a burden i have become accustomed to carrying.
to let you go is to lose a kite,
so i leave you tangled in the branches, barren, and
frustrated at the fruitlessness you cannot identify
if i keep up my denial.
i alone am
the sum of my selfishness. you struggle
in the tree but i cannot walk
away, not because i want you.
i make my excuses to the passerbys.
they wait, they ignore, or they do not heed and
i wonder if they see the whiteness of my words.
admission is a labour
and i silently delay my guilt.
-
i am unable to miss you.
i am scared of the wind.
i do not feel when i am with you.
-
moments and minutes and distant sirens and
apologies and regrets and promises and
excuses and awareness.
-
i hate your silences i do not laugh at your jokes.
i want to forget your embrace and
your form. i am ashamed of my embarrassment.
i am ashamed -
-
of you, for you;
Of me, for you.
-
And i am sorry, I really am.

(old somethings, from "but," 2005)

2007-05-07T04:44:00.000-07:00

felt
-
i have lost a half-hearted
dreamer in halfway-love.
-
it is a small thing, a clear thing,
a mere thing,
but a dear thing, a real thing,
a blue thing
now missed,
fragile.
-
oh, to lament the feeble
and long for the more than,
cherish the once felt
and pine for the could have
when it is hard to know better than to.
-
there is no outlet in forgetting when
the sensed absence of memory
indicates the sensed presence;
the aftertaste of yesterday's proximity
still lingers in my mouth,
the crease where your side touched mine
still refuses to be washed away,
and all these awakenings
-
once missed
now felt.