After.

11 Jan 2019

A meeting at the intersection of death and rebirth.

She becomes neither male nor female.

She is pure vengeance,

raging against time

defying gods in a society

where women are objects to be won.

 

A haunting familiar tune.

At ang iyong mata’y biglang lumuha ng di mo pinapansin

(Before you realise it, tears are running down your face)

Nagsisisi at sa isip mo’y. Nalaman mong ika’y nagkamali

(And you realise you were wrong. And you repent.)

Hardly soothing but I remember

being lulled to sleep by these words.

 

S/he moves like a scorpion about to sting.

There is tenderness in this revenge.

S/he moves to embrace him,

He will never fully appreciate the suffering

he has wrought on this life.

S/he touches his face as he dies.

The darkness engulfs him.

The earth cracks beneath their feet.

One kneels. One stands.

One falls, surrounded by arrows.

As this vengeance, hate and suffering falls away,

another cycle of suffering begins.

Somewhere else.  

 

Only faultlines remain.

Glowing in the darkness.

 

Until the Lions – http://www.akramkhancompany.net/productions/until-the-lions/

 

Reflecting on Danger Risk of Falling by ParkourDance (while thinking about GE2015)

Walking through a house of heartbreaks

littered with the corpses of failures

hanging lifeless, upside down,

displayed for all to see.

Uncanny gallery of battle wounds

the scars still hurt

after they heal.

This is not another broken-hearted poem

but it is about love

Worried about losing the now

because things could always be much worse.

Taking the slaps

because it is easier than losing a home.

Wanting less pain

but not fighting for it because somehow

we’ve learned to believe

that we get what we deserve.  

And that suffering builds ruggedness of character.

And the hurt increases with each ask…

even then…

                         risk that heartbreak

follow that dream

                         (and make it real)

another failure

is no more than

                          the others before.

There is nothing more depressing

than wandering with the ghost of a dream

and living each day

in exactly the same way as we did

50 years before.

Keeping to the same limits

prescribed for each of us

with boundaries drawn in for us

in accordance to our merits

(determined by someone other than ourselves)

Dare we pursue the possibility of being

much much more than a cog in the machine

of one man’s dream?

This is not another broken-hearted poem  

but it is about love.

The Sea

Sandcastles fall and crumble with the rain.
Too many clouds to read the sky
Too murky the ocean floor
Every wave churns up
more of the past

Too much regret
gets in your eyes.
Stings and makes you cry.

You laugh because it’s easier.
But remember,

you are meant to be here.
Exactly as you are.

– written in response to You Learn by Jorge Luis Borges