Monday, December 31, 2012

江ノ島へ行く途中

I guess we'll just have to wait and see
given the rate we're going
I think we must be heading somewhere important
the hours seem to grow shorter each day
but then again, some of them weren't all that great
for every precious memory and new discovery
I should've built myself some sort of museum
it seems the present has swept the past away
can all those things really have happened?
sunshine, blessed sunshine
new house, same house, old friends, blue skies
new jeans, a haircut, new shoes, another haircut
late night again? wanna order? nah, it's okay
staying up all night studying for exams the next day
wandering the city aimlessly waiting for work to start
sighing and crying and laughing and singing
faking smiles and hiding tears
which were the fears? which were the dreams?
the concrete heat, the mist and morning chill
it all comes back to me now, feeling just like yesterday
but if I really try to think about it
I can't recall a thing
time really does fly

Sunday, December 30, 2012

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

the muses dwell here

his tendency to laugh at my opinions never failed to annoy me. His laugh was one that contained no mirth - a hollow, miserable noise - unsettling and sudden as the screeching of a blackboard or the yelping of a cat. First his lips would curl in ugly amusement, before an infernal gargle would rise from the back of his throat to spew forth infuriating laughter like a thousand tiny daggers colliding in the air. His mouth was exceptionally skilled at producing a range of offensive and unpleasant sounds, but among them I resented his laugh most of all.

---

I wish to perish like the poets of old;
nursing a thousand afflictions and tending to none

Monday, December 24, 2012

nativity

prodigal son keeps trying to buy his way home

---

Let me wander no longer, I don't need forty years to see
that it makes no difference where I am
if You're not there with me

why does faith feel realer in the fire
why does God feel closer in the wilderness
could it be the closer one steps to comfort
the further he gets from God

you need both the rain and the sunshine, they said
but either way I still end up running for cover,
desperately trying to preserve my head

---

Holden Caulfield just wants to come home

Friday, December 21, 2012

the end, apparently

well, we survived today

---

Ruby Sparks was a promising film with a solid cast and an intriguing premise. I liked the way it explored the selfish, controlling nature of an immature love and the consequences of letting it get out of hand.

I thought the movie was pretty brave in allowing Calvin, the protagonist, to be an unlikable individual with a generously hideous catalogue of genuine character flaws, as opposed to the generic sugar-coated "faults" that a main character is often affected to possess, which are ultimately compensated for by some inescapably apparent redeeming feature. Whereas with Calvin, you have a character that is plausibly human - not succumbing to simple designations of good or evil, nor submitting to the archetype of the romantic hero - but simply fumbling about on a quest to find or define something and making many terrible mistakes along the way. He has his old wounds and they do affect him visibly, particularly in his interactions with friends (oh wait he has none) and family, but they aren't enough to excuse his actions toward the end of the film.

So far, Calvin is a great, complex, conflicted, classical villain - you have the audience feeling sorry for what he's been through but also kind of hating him for what he's done. Now if this were a typical romantic drama/comedy, the ending would have him eventually overcoming whatever wound(s) that had influenced his disposition, negating that which led him to his regrettable courses of action, transforming him into a new man and consequently turning him into someone deserving of a fresh start or second chance - in other words, he'd end up learning from his mistakes and make a sincere effort toward rectifying them, shifting  the audience's allegiances back in his favour. But this doesn't happen, and that is where the problem begins.

(Spoiler ALART)
What really chafed me about the ending is that they gave him a happy ending without showing he had what it takes not to screw it up again. Sure, he wrote a book and said that he was sorry, but that's hardly enough to demonstrate real development. The film offers no real penalty - aside from the pain of losing Ruby, which turns out to be only temporary anyway - no confrontation of consequence, no justice. Instead of being subjected to biting eventuality, our real and believable character is instead treated to some strange form of purgatory - a time-out session effectively. Plus, Ruby has no say in the matter. She doesn't decide to forgive him or take him back (goodness knows why she'd want to), she just has her memory magically erased by the overwhelming virtue of Calvin's self-pity and regret, which we're meant to mistake for love, refined and made true by the fires of contrition and sorrow (I'm assuming that's what it must have been) and everything's fine and peachy again. If she had considered his tortuous apology and appeal, and decided to love him again, warts and all, and in spite of his disastrous track record, that would have at least been somewhat poignant, if supremely cliched. In fact, I would gladly have traded the whole Happily Ever After idea for something bittersweet like "and Calvin continued to make money off his misery while Ruby lived a real life."

Perhaps in allowing her to be free (I hear feminists fetching their pitchforks), he is implied to have outgrown his selfish and jealous nature, but people have done kinder things in fits of remorse or intense madness; a kind word doesn't constitute a saint. Similarly, a book and sad puppy dog eyes do not a good boyfriend make. A change in character must be verified by some visibly consistent and sustained difference in practice. Also, the mere act of giving her up for good does not provide that he cares about her more than himself - people sometimes do the right things for the wrong reasons. It takes a lifetime to build a reputation and only moments to ruin it. My chief complaint is that Calvin is let off the hook before we see any hint of an attempt to rebuild.

I'm all for innovative subversion of formulaic expectations, and perhaps the filmmakers set out to defy the conventions of plot with this movie, but if so I just wish they had done it differently.

Thursday, December 20, 2012

floaters / it's gonna rain


there is something that rests dormant upon the seabed
unperturbed by swirling currents and changing seasons overhead

lagan, sunken yet still tethered by a tenuous thread
bits of a previous life, remnants of some ancient shipwreck

into old wounds, into abyss, saltwater tears be seeping
thirsty creatures borne by years of sunless weeping

for ages men have feared monsters that lurk beneath the sea
yet the waves know that in darkened waters, the clearest mirrors be

Saturday, December 15, 2012

안녕, 안녕

the apopemptic sky said its symphonious goodbyes as the planes kept shifting listlessly across the tarmac with a reluctance that made you think maybe they weren't coming back again

---

they keep saying that the world is ending, so why do i feel as if it's just beginning

Thursday, December 13, 2012

the True Chronicles of Sandy Buffleoak

- they told me that my mouth and my nose made me look like a stubborn person
- and then?
- and then I said, 'so what'

---

and the curtains were an ocean, endless waves in soft plication

Monday, December 10, 2012

berlin wail

L'enfer, c'est les autres
---

there is a wall in the city
whose name is brother
its bricks are laid with
spit and cancer

Friday, November 30, 2012

love deficit

"I used to be a really nice person, back in high school," 
her voice shook as she stared at the ground, trying to find her words
"and I used to hate it. I hated that I was so nice."

---

oh sayang, sayangku
mengapakah beradamu
begini jauh daripada aku

hari-harimu tentulah dipenuhi
dengan riang dan lagu
tapi adakah ruang disana untuk
dengarkan pada kisah burung hantu

ataupun renung pada langit malam
dan kadang memikirkan aku


---

내 비어있는 팔이가 너무 외로워

Sunday, November 25, 2012

Sherwood / my boss is a massive cockblock

I used to work in a small, family-run establishment that sold overpriced Malaysian cuisine to mostly European customers who, at some point, had either visited or lived or worked in Malaysia before. Needless to say, their target market was neither particularly robust nor diverse, but it was enough to keep the business afloat, which was good enough for them I guess. The Madam was a staunch advocate of Malaysian culture and ran the kitchen with all the brusque authority and expertise of a middle-aged south-east asian woman, while her husband, British down to his bones, ran the front of house operations. He was a staunch advocate of small talk and would engage in it as often as possible, eventually petering out in muttered conclusions like, 'Well, yes. That's life, I suppose'.

On the way to work, I would dally along the streets examining the neighbouring shops that populated the vicinity, fascinated by the vintage hipster stores selling vintage hipster clothing at exorbitant prices and the arthouse cinema that only showed movies that I'd never heard of and their neon cafe that no doubt sold similarly exorbitant coffees. These small businesses found their niche huddled up against each other; I wouldn't say they flourished - but they seemed to spring forth in great numbers and shared a tenacious quality, like a persistent patch of mold or a beggar by the side of the road.

I remember walking back to the bus stop in the late December afternoons amid hordes of city folk, wonderfully unique in every possible way, of different ages and agendas, walking at different speeds and in all different directions; I would bathe in their flow, basking in the chaos of the day, surrounded by Brownian motion. Each day I would watch the Christmas market take shape in the twilight as the wintry air danced between my fingers, licking at dry skin with its icy tongue, wearing down the fragile fibres with its frigid vapour. And then I would sigh to the orange sunset on the bus ride home, watching the silhouettes and lights roll past like credits at the end of a film.

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

the sound only Malaysian planes make

they sat together on a grassy knoll in the fading rays of winter's light when all of a sudden the boy's conversation halted, like a stream of water arrested by the abrupt diversion of its flow.
what     what is it    she followed his gaze into the clouds, trying to discern the object of his fixation
shhh he urged with a finger to his lips, ear still cocked to the heavens
for a minute, they were completely still; he, the attentive statue and she, his bewildered attendant.
do you hear that  his voice was hushed, almost whispering
what?

---

"what was that, by the way? that sound at the end of your sentence"
a look of puzzlement pinched her features for a moment, before being chased away by epiphany. a tender smile blossomed on her lips as she recalled the sweet weight of the syllable on her tongue.
"it's nothing," she replied, "just an old habit of mine."

Monday, November 12, 2012

obstare

so this is how we are born; not all at once, but gradually - by deliberate degrees and with much risk and difficulty

Friday, November 9, 2012

postpartum

There is a time and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die

one year ago, these words meant nothing to me

 ---

when my dad passed away, I felt some pressure / saw a need for me to step up and take certain matters into my own hands - but then I got carried away and started taking things that weren't mine to take. These unnecessary burdens made me a miserable person - a resentful tenant who distrusts his housemates to do the dishes - but once I gave them back, I found some peace

---

a clanging cymbal, a resounding gong
He quiets the storm; the tempest is gone

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Telemachus

there are tiny spiders running up and down my spine
crawling into the dusty crevices of my unkept mind

---

Odysseus just wants to get home

---

I just got home from fencing. Usually, I enjoy the exercise, but today my heart just wasn't in it.

These days, I don't really feel like myself; it feels as if the real me is somewhere else - gone away on vacation or something, leaving behind nothing more than a fraudulent facsimile to fill in for him - a cheap knockoff or hollow imitation, painfully aware of its hollowness and terrified of being found out. He's not always absent though - occasionally he comes back to visit - just stopping by for a quick chat and cup of tea before he's off again to see more interesting places and meet more delightful people. When he's back though, everything is great; things just seem to fall into place, but it never feels like very long before he's gone again, and his absences tend to be dreadfully extended. Meanwhile, the bright echoes of laughter and joy that always seem to accompany him get drowned out and swallowed up by all sorts of deadlines and commitments, to the point that I sometimes question whether they ever really existed.

Sometimes, as I'm walking home late at night, my eyes will be inexplicably drawn to peer into the windows - illuminated portraits elaborating accounts of other worlds - decorating the gallery walls of dark brick and concrete that cordon off the lonely avenues on either side. Glancing into each room, certain details will capture my attention and appeal to my imagination - for instance, the sight of an oak chiffonier idling alone in the corner with white tubes of cosmetic cream laid out along the shelves, or perhaps the particular glow and tint that the light takes on from being filtered through a paper lamp-shade - and then, from these fragmented figments of vital information, I'd try to piece together, in my mind, a picture of what the actual interior looks like - but then I can't help but wonder about the sort of people that might inhabit such a space; I'd try to predict how their daily lives might play out; the sort of jobs they'd have; whether they get invited to many parties - in this way, I'd study these fictional neighbours, extrapolating their characters until I grew tired of them.

I'm not quite sure why I feel so compelled to sample and speculate upon these glimpses of other people's private lives; I suppose you could call it a mild form of inanimate voyeurism. But I think the real reason might be that I'm still looking for the real me - searching for him without meaning to - as if one day I might happen to peek through a crack in the curtains and catch him sitting there with a glass of drink in hand, laughing along with some stranger in a warmly furnished room, living some sort of comfortable and wonderful life without me.

Monday, October 29, 2012

青い時

They say you have to put a lot of thought into the first few seconds of introducing a character, sort of like how they always say first impressions are so important. For instance, if the character is going to have some major flaw or motto or catchphrase - any recurring feature really - you have to indicate it early on or it'll be awkward bringing it up later. In theory, you should establish the identity of the character and make sure the audience knows all the important things about them within the first thirty seconds of meeting them. But that's not how it works in real life. In real life, you meet someone and, depending on how good they look or what sort of clothes they're wearing, you decide whether they're worth remembering, which determines how much of an effort you're going to invest into scrutinizing the sort of person they are. Then judging by what they say and how they laugh, you make a few assumptions about their sense of humour and character, but just in a broad sense, like a sketch - messy and incomplete. Then as/if you get to know them better, you eventually fill in the blanks with empirical evidence and correct any conclusions that may have gone askew. You can't get to know a person in thirty seconds - it's impossible. And it doesn't help that people guard their actions and words so carefully, mainly because they don't want to give off the wrong impression. You see, the reason people are so careful about how they appear is that they're well aware of that one crucial step - the one where you decide whether someone's worth remembering or not - because that step is the hardest to correct.

---

"how can I describe this sensation to you?"
he paused to search himself, rummaging through an assortment of old feelings, dusting them off and holding them up to the light one by one, trying to cobble together a suitable analogy.
"it's a bit like...      being able to understand a language you've never learned...          or being able to recognize a stranger's face without knowing how"

words are for nerds

most of what comes out of my mouth is either an outright lie or somebody else's truth

---

now we can't even say 'squaw' no muaw

---

I must find some sort of beach or abandoned library to colonize

Samejima

He had always been fascinated with architecture. I admired his fixation, although I hardly understood it

---

his hands kept scrubbing meticulously, but his tone remained flippant
"something big must have happened," he remarked softly, almost to himself
"people don't just suddenly change personality like that."

---

Sometimes I find myself identifying a lot with Tony Shalhoub's character in the TV show Monk, in that his obsessions both glorify and incapacitate him

---

he struck the fly with such a violent blow that the sound echoed throughout the polished marble walls and hung there in the empty air, haunting the house with its lingering vibrations

---

C.S. Lewis argues that our waxing desires and fickle cravings are just parts and pieces of a much grander question that can only hope to be answered by the joys we shall receive in heaven.
I think/feel/hope he's right

---

- because beauties found in words and books are less likely to betray me
- but they're also least likely to affect you
- exactly

---

and then the music stops
the lights come back on
the performer leaves
and the magic is gone

---

writing novels that have already been published

Saturday, October 27, 2012

Mr. 散漫

If you're always looking to find the trick, you'll never see any magic

---

but why? she glanced over. I think you're a good role-model.

he stared into the sink and then into the depths beyond it
thanks

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

가을

the leaves are still green but the skies have gone misty
and I can't tell if fall is late or winter's come early

---

O how I wish I could be a tree
and with the last sparks of an ancient ember
set myself alight and swell into delicious colour
a pyre with the blistering allure of the ripest fruit
and feel the radiant flowers burst and bloom
spreading warmth along my timbered limbs
that my dull apparel be consumed
by the voracious tongues of fiery plume
to go out in a blaze of gold and scarlet glory
searing through the frost and gloom
for a moment
before my stars, with a lovely sigh
renounce their place amongst the skies
dwindle faint into eternal sleep
and collect in tragic heaps at my feet
O how I wish that I were a tree
to depart, to die that spectacularly

Monday, October 22, 2012

I never really loved the sunshine

- ya feels very empty. How can u tell?

- Just imagining. What time is it there? 
Weather starting to turn grey, very wintery 
Lovely in a depressing way

- Yes I know wat u mean. Remembr it well. Pls keep warm. Wear ur timberland, thermal underwear.
U r ur father's son! Dad liked bleak depressing landscapes! Give me bright colors anyday!

---

For a while now I've entertained this strange fixation with the moon, but under scrutiny its peculiar charm always seems to elude me.

---

saw the light but not the source, chasing spanish rain; a ghost behind my eyelids, a negative in my brain.

Monday, October 15, 2012

舞台裏で

the only thing harder than coming up with the perfect comeback is not using it

---

do you ever notice the dismal gratitude that haunts an actor's face as they survey the crowd, knowing all too well that their overenthusiastic applause is merely the antiphon to a secret neon command

---

no point acting if there's no one watching

---

They love to air documentaries about those who made it to the top, but they never show the reels of discarded film that have been wasted on those who failed

Saturday, October 13, 2012

廃虚 / 偽物語

I rose from the dead 
and was an emperor

---

The exaggerated silhouette upon the screen stepped out to reveal a young athletic man in military uniform. Her hands flew to her mouth as she gasped dramatically. Like lightning, she rushed into her brother's arms as the audience cheered wildly for their fateful reunion. Of course, the applause would be amplified and music would be edited in later to enhance the moment, but for the time being the studio audience was transfixed by this touching display of genuine affection unfolding before them. As the emcee began interviewing the girl, who wiped her tears gingerly so as not to smear her makeup, she broke off in mid-sentence, trying to stifle the emotions that had overtaken her. She shied away from the cameras and attempted to compose herself, embarrassed at letting her feelings get the better of her. Somebody backstage called for an aide to hand her a tissue, which she gratefully accepted, remembering her manners despite blinking back tears and trying to conceal a running nose. The emcee and a few members of the audience made sympathetic noises as she sat daintily on the couch and dabbed at the corners of her eyes. She took a deep breath and then smiled like a summer breeze, first into the audience and then at the emcee, signalling that she was ready to resume the broadcast.

---

"You did well today. I told you the stuff works."
A large man in a white T-shirt and trucker hat praised the dolled-up adolescent as they made their way through the enormous parking lot filled with black vans and cars belonging to high-profile media executives.
"It worked a little too well, I'd say. It made my nose run, you know"
"Yeah, I talked to the staff about that. They promised to edit it out"
"Tch. They'd better. Last time I was on their show they made me look like a total ditz"
"You were eighteen. It worked out well for you"
"So now that I'm nineteen they expect me to be hysterical"
The manager didn't flinch.
"People want a show. It's your job to provide it"
"I don't want my life to be a show"
The manager didn't say anything. He didn't have to - she knew her mistake the moment she said it.

They walked in silence until they reached the car. Once they had pulled out of the parking lot and onto the freeway, she summoned the curiosity to inquire upon thoughts that had infrequently plagued her mind, as she lay in her modest bed staring at the ceiling, wondering what was to become of the rest of her supposedly brilliant and advancing career.
"Hey. How long have you worked in this business?"
The manager kept his eye on the road but considered her question.
"About ten years, maybe"
"And how many singers have you worked with?"
"Singers or idols"
"Idols."
Another pause
"Three. Including you"
She thought about that for a second.
"But I'm your favourite, right?"
The manager didn't reply.
"So  when you first started out,    did you have a problem, you know, lying to people?"
      "Who says it's lying"
"But isn't that what you do? Make people believe in something that's untrue?"
 A longer pause
"My job is to make sure people see the best side of you."
She looked at the floor wondering what to say to that.
"Even when you don't feel like showing it," He added
"Doesn't that make me rather two-dimensional then?" 
His grip on the steering wheel tightened. He could tell she was very pleased with her little rejoinder. One thing he liked about ferrying her around - she made for some pretty good conversation, but today he was less amused. His work was not something he liked joking about.
"I suppose so," he said in a tone usually reserved for implying the end of a discussion, but she was eager to argue and wouldn't let him off that easily.
"But isn't a half-truth as good as a lie then?" 
Another thing that separated her from the rest is that she was clever. Sometimes a little too clever.
"Whose face are you wearing?" he asked abruptly.
"What?"
"The face you're wearing now - whose is it?"
    "Mine."
"Really? You're sure?"
She was flustered by his insistence and refused to answer. She knew a trap when she heard one. Nevertheless, he continued. 
"So those are your eyelashes, then. And the powder on your cheeks, do you own that as well?" 
She didn't have an answer. This pleased him more than he'd like to admit.
"The truth is ugly - boring at best. Nobody will pay to see it. Popularity comes to those who can pretend. When you're on stage, people don't really want to see you. They want to see a performance. They want to see something amazing - something extraordinary. That's the nature of human beings: to always want that which they can't have."
She fell into a sullen silence. He caught himself and adjusted his tone. She was only nineteen after all; what could she know.
"We provide an invaluable service, catering to the desires of the audience at our expense. By acting out our roles we're able to give them some small sliver of hope, because the real world is too cruel to spare it. You said that we make people believe in things that aren't true, but isn't the joy that they feel real enough? And the excitement they feel when they cheer for you onstage is a thousand times more visceral than cheering for a character in a movie or book, because to them, you're real. You see, the reason people are so easily tricked is that, deep down, people want to be tricked. They want to believe in love and kindness and happy endings."
"We're not liars." He assured her. "We're fiction-makers."
He stopped himself there, thinking he may have said too much. He stole a glance into the rear-view mirror. She had retreated into herself, gazing wordlessly into the distance. He had learned to distinguish her feigned indifference from her real indifference and knew she had been listening. He left her alone to tend to her thoughts. 

The industry was indeed unfair - exploitative even, to expect these girls to bear the weight of such monumental demands. But they had chosen this path for themselves, signed away their hopes of having a normal life. He quickly chased these notions away - his job was not to think. She'll be fine, he assured himself. It takes them a while, but they eventually adjust - they learn to tolerate the constant attention, and adopt some form of public persona - a second skin to be comfortable in. But some girls just can't handle the limelight; they usually drop out and fade back into the depths of obscurity, but he knew that wasn't an option for her. Her ambition was too great to be satisfied by anything less than success and it would be that refusal to settle that would keep her going. She just needed some time to develop. 
It was getting dark. She tilted her head to face the tinted window, observing the oncoming headlights as they flew by in the twilight. "Fiction-makers," she repeated softly. She could live with that.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

colonel colon

I can never quite consider a city mine until my feet have thoroughly kissed its streets

---

you know what they say - aim for the moon, die a frigid death in space

---

Being at this age, I too get chances to see my boyfriends of old times, some of whom've turned into such nightmares!   Well, they probably say the same about me. But I really do see those decayed men often, and how I wish not to

---

with gossamer sorrow, the word left his lips. "Excelsior," breathed he, and said no more

Monday, October 8, 2012

Goose Fair

This year wasn't quite the same. It was fun, to be sure, but just not as fun as I remembered it. It's quite strange really; the weather was much better but still the lights didn't seem quite as bright - in general, I just didn't manage to see as much magic as last year. I remember being surrounded by crowds, amazed by the sheer scale of the spectacle, in awe of the towering rides, assaulted from all sides by the deafening roar of music and the multitudinous screams of joy and terror, mixed with a hearty dose of industrial noise. Since then, I've been completely besotted with the idea of the outdoor amusement park and have been looking forward to Goose Fair ever since term started. But now I can't help but wonder if my expectations killed the actual experience

---

- did you hear about the girl who wrapped roses in medical infusion bags to keep them from dying?
- no, are they still alive?
- hard to say

Sunday, October 7, 2012

the spiders have taken over this city

It was a gradual process, like falling asleep. Most of us didn't know it until they had thoroughly invaded our homes and our lives. Nobody knew the exact day the rain decided to stop falling. The showers had become scattered and infrequent, but nobody paid any attention - too busy worrying about their next paycheck and things like global warming. So we left the spiders to their own devices, to spin and be swept away eventually, assured by the simple rhymes that we'd been taught to recite each night before bedtime. How foolish of us to assume that nothing would change - until one day we awoke to discover that the cobwebs had covered us completely

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Nessun dorma

Hong Kong is a sprawling, scowling masterpiece - a city confident in her underwater allure, unconcerned by the sudden unraveling of her mystery; who will show herself to you completely but won't love you back

---
But my secret is hidden within me; none will know my name! No, no! On your mouth I will say it when the light shines! And my kiss will dissolve the silence that makes you mine!

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

bonfire night

False eloquence is exaggeration; true eloquence is emphasis
---
A man's style should be like his dress. It should be as unobtrusive and should attract as little attention as possible.
---

I thought doctors were supposed to care about justice

---

I really want to drive

---

bringing angels into bed to keep the demons at bay, when all the ladies I could foreseeably spend my life with are on buses with somebody else

---

I feel dangerously close to becoming a man preoccupied with style - a man of little substance, who tries to get by conveying the complexities of thought by using big words and shrouding his muddled meanings in layers of flowery fanfare


maybe I should listen to less kpop

---

quick, to the catacombs

Monday, October 1, 2012

연애 편지 / love letters

홧김에 뱉어버린 말, I hate you
그래놓고 맘 속으로 외쳐, I love you
맘에 없는 소리만 하는 나 밤새도록 후회만
너 땜에 울고, 너 땜에 웃고

Sunday, September 30, 2012

Cinema Paradiso

There are few things as romantic to me as the Mid-Autumn Festival that takes place in Malaysia every year between the months of September and October. The festival is also celebrated in a handful of other Asian countries including Taiwan and Vietnam - not to mention mainland China, where it – and many other things – first originated. In fact, the Government of the People’s Republic of China, in all its august authority, has recently declared the Mid-Autumn Festival, also known as the Mooncake Festival, an “intangible cultural heritage” - a sentiment I could not agree with more.

If you were to ask me why I feel the way I do about this festival, I probably wouldn't be able to give you a coherent answer. You might, however, catch me babbling about the times my cousins and I would stray to the nearby neighbourhood park at night after our inaugural family dinner, traditionally held at my grandmother's old terrace house in Petaling Jaya. The house was modest to a fault; its only defining features being the massive mango tree that overlooked its gates and an old porch swing that the dog was perpetually chained to. It'd wag its tail and eye us expectantly as we'd pass by, making our way into the brightly illuminated interior of the house where we'd proceed to stuff our faces that fleetingly resembled each other’s. After that, once we got to the park, we'd light lanterns and try to incinerate leaves and twigs in the darkness, fascinated by the dancing flames as our neolithic forefathers once were. My uncle would observe us remotely, wearing down time with the eroding tip of his cigarette - a lingering artifact of his own subdued pyromania - before guiding us home once we'd had our youthful fill of fun and fire.

To be honest, I don't think this nostalgia is due to any one thing in particular, but rather a whole laundry list of seemingly insignificant factors that collide and combine in certain ways to produce a childhood that smells of light and warmth and laughter - or maybe it wasn't all that special. Perhaps you could've given me a few measly crumbs of cake or some dried up leaves and a lighter to play with and I'd easily be just as nostalgic and sentimental about the whole affair. Perhaps it's just the warped lens of memory that bends to my desire to believe that the past was beautiful - my longing for elsewhen and elsewhere that transforms pumpkins into carriages in order to transport me there - wishful for a distant star to align my sights and steer my yearning.


Part of me wants to think in those terms and reject these feelings as emotions unearned, but some other part of me truly does believe that it was real - or at least some of it was - and that the good times don’t necessarily have to be fabricated. More likely, I’ve chosen to forget about the less memorable aspects and decided to focus on what I loved best about the occasion – namely being with family and setting fire to things – birthing wildly skewed recollections. I suppose I’m still stuck between disregarding the past completely and being unable to let it go - revisiting it in my head over and over again, each time romanticizing it with revised fictions. But I suppose it can’t be helped, since humans have always been suckers for a good fantasy, particularly if it comes with a public holiday.

Saturday, September 29, 2012

obnoxious new yorker

In the right hands, I think, the violin is an extraordinarily eloquent instrument, possessing a language of its own and speaking in it all the things that words cannot convey

---

I fell in love with the way her body moved - poised as if to strike, half-crouched in some feudal battle stance as she strafed about the stage - a spring wound up tight, immense energy coiled up inside her being, rattling through the walls of its prison, threatening to explode. The tension, vicious and palpable, buzzed about the air with feverish intent, every passing second building up to a vehement mountain of volcanic anticipation. With such ease, her instrument found its niche between her shoulder and her jaw, slipping into place like two pieces of a puzzle, as if specifically crafted to fit each other - an amputee receiving an old appendage, reunited at last. The way she softly cradled its body resembled the act of laying one's head down in repose, her eyelids shutting intimately, instantly engulfed in sleep; but often during her performance, her brow would be furrowed in artistic anguish, such that the illusion became that of a fitful dream. She would surrender herself completely to the whims and passions of each piece, lovely lips agape in wonder, sometimes grimacing, letting the entire story unfold upon her face, conveying the secrets and nuances of each note. The music would fill and possess her frame from head to toe, and wherever it would take her she would inexorably go. Her generous hips would float and sway to the ephemeral arcs and swells her figure would express - nomadic feet rambling about as if being blown by invisible winds. Her fingers were like fiery tongues, traversing the length of its neck like lightning, writhing and reaching and shivering as if they possessed a life of their own. Her arms were sure as tempered steel, but moved like segments of a serpent, voluptuous and wary, deftly guiding her bow with the severe precision of a surgeon and the astute subtlety of a sculptor's touch. Her elbow would always be spectacularly askew, positioned at some majestic angle, completed by the vertex of her bow. With a flick or sublime twist of the wrist, geometric configurations and planes would shift in sudden and surprising ways in accordance with the fantastic contortions of her torso. To witness a performance was like watching some kind of primal dance, fueled purely by urge and emotion, or perhaps it was more akin to some uncanny ceremony, feral and magnificent in its ferocity - an enchantress in the frantic throes of a spell, waving her wand with unearthly fervour, but whether she was summoning or exorcising, I certainly did not know.

Thursday, September 27, 2012

lady of a thousand lovers

lady of a thousand lovers
whisk me away to your secret island
away from the city
where I can listen to leaves
whispering wryly, cacophonous
in their austere chatter

let us take the train that runs along the coast
and watch as buildings and roads accede
to the heavens and the sea
and dip our legs in light laid out
like golden carpets at our feet

lead me along the weathered stones
through canopied corridors of forest and moss
till I reach the steps of the temple courtyard
where flimsy hopes hang from fences
where crisp winds blow through misty eaves
and whisper with the mountain’s breath

cajole me to the busy beach
by the sea, let me be romanced
and grounded by the warmth and grit
between my toes and beneath my feet
fill my head with the soothing static
of crashing waves and children's laughter
and leave me there till the sun recedes
and the sounds have softened and the sky
turns tender
and when the crowds have had their day
and wandered off in twos and threes 

clutching their towels and things
then stand by me when the light grows dim
and the water’s sheen begins to falter
and trade sighs with me in the twilight
till darkness falls and our thoughts 
have left the shore. till the wind 
is at our faces
and the ocean at our door

then stay – please
a little while longer – stay
and sigh with me some more

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

유리같은아이

her eyes narrow as they flick over the lines of text, back and forth and back again. Her mouth is slightly agape. She takes care to appear impassive, but her expression has stiffened - the lines of her face fixed into place. The playfulness evaporates from her eyes as she combs through each sentence carefully. She blinks a few more times at the screen then looks away. Someone is saying something to her. She raises her head and looks at whoever it is, simultaneously attempting a smile, but falls short - the half-heartedness of the effort appearing way too obvious, underscoring her inner turmoil and unhappiness. But it was too late to do anything by then; the words had already taken root; burrowed deep and fastened their hooks into the corners of her heart, leaving her smile a deflated balloon - all tension and no air.

Monday, September 17, 2012

the first stone

last night I dreamt I had found the girl of my dreams. She was cute, had a great sense of humour and was into batman trivia. Wherever we went, I held her close - as if she'd vanish if I were to let go - but then I found out I was dreaming (so I was right after all) so I left her to join the basketball team, and then I somehow got roped into joining an underground rebel operation run by a surly Russian gentleman of hefty build and ruddy complexion, complete with an unruly, beer-stained mess of hair that clung to his chin. Escorted by my contact, we made our rendezvous in a dilapidated old eastern-european apartment building, with debris and dust decorating the stairs, spartan wallpaper peeling back to reveal bare plaster and mortar. In growling english, he tried to explain the plan to me, which involved chips, which he pronounced shits, but his accent was just too thick for me to understand and whenever I asked him to repeat something, he'd just glare at me in an expression of aged annoyance.

---

Stop! Stop! The man yelled in Japanese, almost screaming. His words were punctuated by the ferocious blows he received, replaced by breathless wheezing as the air escaped his lungs. The teahouse patrons had slowly risen from their seats to watch the debacle unfold. Waitresses in their aprons had retreated behind the counter and peeked out through the kitchen doorway as they stood horrified with hands to their mouths, frozen in shock. A table lay on its side as spilled soup snaked its way through the irregular grooves of cold tiling and embedded textures upon the floor, staining the grave masonry into darker shades. The police officer echoed the man's pleas in Mandarin, but without any conviction or accompanying action. He had his arms stretched out wide on either side, in a half-hearted pantomime of trying to hold back the hungry crowd that had gathered outside. They gladly played along, contented to watch and spur on their compatriot in clamorous voices of violent indignation. The Japanese man was now writhing on his side, legs tucked into his chest with both arms raised, trying to protect his head while signaling his surrender. His assailant, face contorted in monstrous rage, paid no heed and continued his frenzied attacks, sometimes kicking, sometimes stepping as he aimed at the man's head and belly and anywhere else that was left exposed, raining down blow after blow until the man's cries became a guttering gargle of blood and teeth as bits of brain and hair scattered themselves across the floor. When the beatings subsided, the people had grown quiet. A deathly silence descended upon the crowd who held their breath as if waiting for the man to get up, but he did not. Green winds rustled through invisible leaves. The madness had left the air, and the people, suddenly aware of what they had just witnessed, walked away without a word, one by one and left his crumpled body there.

Sunday, September 16, 2012

the God who answers by fire

swept up into cloud without a word
o to hear your merry voice once more
what lofty air your lungs did breathe
upon your final draw
what chariots of fire and great thunder
did out of the aether soar
and what heavy shade that cloud did cast
the day you entered heaven's door

Friday, September 14, 2012

civil unrest / something in the air

Perhaps the problem has something to do with the way nations today are built by the kings of slaves, who rule by crude manipulations of fear and desire

---

how do you hope to control people who cannot control themselves

Thursday, September 13, 2012

halcyon days

The scenery speeds past as I gaze hazily out at the paraded exhibits on display in this moving museum, except I'm the one encased in glass. Familiar horizons gradually retreat into the distance as the long road winds on and rushes soundlessly beneath me, which will eventually bring me to an airport terminal where I'll get on my flight and forget about this life for a while. But in the meantime, my mind is filled by a distant sigh for all the alleyways I've never explored and other unopened doors; windows I've never had the privilege of peering out of; the streets my feet won't get to caress anymore. Above all else, I think I will miss the busy heat of this city - the sweat and grime that would cake my skin as I sit on flimsy plastic stools set haphazardly upon the fractured sidewalk; the bustling hubs of commerce, the faulty neon signage of seedy establishments trying to be trendy, the technicolor glaze of stolid stoplights; but also the sleepy nonchalance and cold fluorescence of night, stark white tubes that burnish people in flip-flops and shorts as they stroll about the streets in droves, carrying out daily life at their own relaxed pace, taking time to indulge in mundane pleasures - to dip their weary feet into cool waters.

shadow proves the sunshine

It's been nearly three months now that I've been back. At first, I couldn't wait to reacquaint myself - to see my old compatriot and co-conspirator. I regarded the task with the earnest anxiety of a schoolboy before the first day of term. I leapt at any and every chance I got to escape the house and experience the world that had continued while I'd been gone - that was the first week back. I made a game of trying to pick out the tiniest of changes - a billboard here, a new restaurant there. And then somewhere in the middle, I got bored; I simply lost the urge to conspire any more. A certain passiveness crept over me and convinced me to stay in my room and read, or stare into empty screens endlessly, imploring them to entertain me. And then, before I knew it, the holiday had come to an end.

memento

I wish I could bottle up the shine and sparkle of our shopping emporiums; the finely adjusted chill of overhead air-conditioning - such expensive air; the glittering decor - the fashionable walls and impeccable floors adorning the rows and rows of exquisite boutiques, those beautifully crafted temples of modern decadence - which is strange; I thought this feeling would've faded by now. It's certainly not the first time I've said goodbye to this place; and yet it never gets easier, bidding farewell to pavements I've known almost all my life and the buildings that I have grown beside. Leaving a city really does change the way you look at it.

homing bird

The road was a glowing array of red and orange orbs, burning themselves out of focus as a thousand slow-moving taillights dipped and surged with the flowing curvature of the freeway. At 7am, the sky was still a yawning expanse of blue and gray; a lonely, intimate hue, only made bearable by the legions of anonymous companions tersely huddled up against each other, the various tribes of this city amassed in the midst of some great exodus. Against this somber backdrop, the hot colours that crowded my view looked like the lanterns of some outdoor festival; they bobbed along and wandered about like distracted children at an evening fair, grilled meat skewered on sticks clutched tightly in their tiny fists, straying from stall to stall in excited amazement, trying to sample the sights and savour the lights with their enormous eyes.

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

have you met my buddy samuel

all the great poets are busy writing raps

---

you've got a real problem, you know that?
how so?
you only chase the girls you don't love 
(that's not-) 
and the ones who won't love you back
    ok, yeah         so what's the problem

---

it's kind of ironic, isn't it
what is
asking a celestial entity to help you stay grounded

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Rejoyce

At that hour when all things have repose,
O lonely watcher of the skies,
Do you hear the night wind and the sighs
Of harps playing unto Love to unclose
The pale gates of sunrise?

When all things repose, do you alone
Awake to hear the sweet harps play
To Love before him on his way,
And the night wind answering in antiphon
Till night is overgone?

Play on, invisible harps, unto Love,
Whose way in heaven is aglow
At that hour when soft lights come and go,
Soft sweet music in the air above
And in the earth below.

- James Joyce

---

If I should die before the rest of you,
Break not a flower nor inscribe a stone.
Nor, when I'm gone, speak in a Sunday voice,
But be the usual selves that I have known.
Weep if you must,
Parting is hell.
But life goes on,
So........ sing as well.

- Joyce Grenfell

Sunday, September 9, 2012

the sparks that the Greeks knew about

"Do you really want to know what makes a mountain great?"

He leaned across the table with such fierceness in his eyes, and in them I saw sadness also - an ember's tongue spitting the last of its sparks, defeated remnants of some long-lost fire.

"Its heart, and all the days that have shaped its decay. How age has stripped all of its desire away."

Saturday, September 8, 2012

チアキ

but if nothing amazing happens in your dreams, how can you tell if you're dreaming

---

fallen in love with Japan again

---

As if in reply, she set down her pen and removed her glasses with a flourish of resignation. She turned her head deliberately to face me. I wondered if I had somehow offended her.

"Are you familiar with the name 'Hokusai Katsushika'?" She asked.

"Not really. Friend of yours?"

She gave me the stink-eye. Not in a jocular mood, I guess.

"He was a prominent Japanese ukiyo-e artist of the 19th century. He produced many works but he is arguably most known for Fugaku Sanjurokkei, Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, a series of ukiyo-e paintings that all depict the same mountain from different perspectives, in different seasons and various weather conditions. Few people know this, but there are more than thirty-six prints in existence - unique prints, that are not officially included in his portfolio. It's estimated that over a thousand prints were produced during his lifetime. Hokusai Katsushika was known for using a number of pseudonyms throughout his career under which he published a sizable portion of his work. From dusk to dawn, he would paint pictures of Mount Fuji. For days on end, he would labour over a single print without rest, only to discard it and start over again. It would be no great exaggeration to say that he spent his life painting that mountain. Now why do you suppose he did that?"

I shrugged, even though I knew all she wanted was the pause for effect. Right on cue, she continued.

"Because he was obsessed. He was searching for something in that mountain. He spent years wandering Japan, searching for the right light, the perfect angle to capture it from, but he could never show in his paintings what he saw in that mountain. That's why he made so many paintings. The Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji were what he saw as his most accomplished failures - the ones that came the closest to describing the magic and majesty of Mount Fuji. He realised that even if no single painting could capture the mountain in all its glory, the combined efforts of thirty-six may just be able to graze it tangentially. The rest before it were simply practice - mere sketches in comparison - a mile-high pile of scrap paper on top of which those thirty-six may stand."

She paused for a bit to let her point sink in. And then her eyes lost their focus, as they do whenever she gets drawn in by a new idea.

"Do you know what makes a mountain great?" She asked, her voice lost in a daydream.

I didn't bother responding this time. At that point, nothing I said would've mattered anyway; she had it all figured out already.

"Transcendence. Perpetuity. Deathlessness. They've endured more years than any living human being, witnessed countless cycles of the moon, enough to intuit the celestial configurations and cosmic occurrences. Towering titans as old as the earth itself, they've seen war and famine and drought, having weathered all forms and degrees of calamity and disaster, scars etched forever into their stony sides. They are the fossilized heaps of history's debris, slowly changing but never fading - an unseen giant - a looming colossus in ponderous stride amid the shifting tide of human events. Wiser than any sage and more august than any sovereign, it rises, defiant, daring to point back at the heavens, unperturbed by the wrathful winds of conspiring deities voicing their contempt as it encroaches upon their lofty perch. Stretching steadily, trading winter and autumn's coats on its skyward odyssey - so many layers to be shed, so many faces upon faces to be deciphered. How many tellings would it take to uncover its immense past? The possible origins of each weary wrinkle just waiting to be fathomed, every crease and canyon bears the echo of an elaborate tale, a chapter of treasure buried just beneath the rubble, revelations written in invisible ink that remain hidden until coaxed forth by the appropriate conditions - herald held hostage at the mercy of the seasons."

She then closed her eyes, exhausted, and leaned back in her chair. She was a terrible listener, but boy, could she talk. I studied her face for a while, every inch the tired portrait of a tortured artist - a part she played to perfection. It all sounded very convincing, I'll admit; she may have even believed in some of it herself, but I just didn't buy it. If you ask me, there's nothing particularly great about a mountain; they're just meaningless mounds of rock and dirt that happen to be a lot bigger than the rest. That's all there is to it.

Friday, September 7, 2012

driving lessons

Actually, now I see that you're quite nervous.

You changed a lot since the first time. You weren't like this before, right? Suddenly got so many problems, why?

That's why, you are letting the fear control you. You think so many things until you don't know what's in front of you. That's what happens when you keep using your clever.

You keep turning too much. You need to see the road and follow using your heart and your eyes. Once you're straight already can let go. Don't keep turning anymore.

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

ode to beach / calypso


her voice is the wind of a tropical breeze

of lands made of sand and the soft-sighing trees
of the tall-swaying grass and of dirt-kiss'd knees
of the star-brush'd thigh and of youth-fuel'd heaves
of the sun-lick'd sky and the moon-mad seas
of the light-drench'd morn and of sweat-dripp'd eves
of the barefoot wood and of heat-press'd leaves

so weaves she together an island of fragrant pleas

'tis a world made of song - of impossible ease

Thursday, August 30, 2012

無常



機会の関して 時々少し貪欲な取得することができます. 私の愛が急いでいる. それぞれの終了を満たすために猛烈に突入 - 割り当てられた時間内にできるだけ多くの. 手の届くところにすべてをで浸して味わうために自分の欲望によって消費される; スプリンターの目は絶えず次の追求を探しています. 息をのむような物に - 息を吹き込むことができないものに- このように完全に自分自身を放棄, 最終的に排気されるだけ

Tuesday, August 28, 2012

そう簡単じゃない



can't get enough of this band

---

you know, a millennium from now, anomalous deviation may be mistaken for contemporary norm and common convention

Monday, August 27, 2012

mortal landscape / drama king

Fall
The leaves drop gingerly
from their towering trees, at the capricious
mercy of Autumn's breeze

Cold
It works its way to the bone
The universe steals our speed,
seizing it in her icy grip
only to give it away again

But by what means of discernment
should she choose whose to take?
Perhaps the swaddled babe, yowling and howling
in ardent wake, or the ancient patriarch,
whose breath is brimmed with age and aches?
Nay, neither pawn nor king might persuade their escape;
neither bastard nor saint; Yea, none can be saved
from Mors's mighty hand, smoothing out
the senseless creases of our fitful fates,
easily leveling the majestic ridges and valleys
of this mortal landscape

---

Did the wind weep, the day King David died
or did it flee from his side, eager to court
the next royal claimant to rise?
Unaffected by such quotidian succession,
seeing the seasons wax and wane -
the only changes occurring truly
are of their faces and their names
and possibly occupation -
ephemeral ornamentations on an eternal plane,
repeating themselves over and over again,
always the same productions played
on this finite spherical stage

Sunday, August 26, 2012

water on the altar / wrong gods

So they shouted louder and slashed themselves with swords and spears, as was their custom, until their blood flowed. Midday passed, and they continued their frantic prophesying until the time for the evening sacrifice. But there was no response, no one answered, no one paid attention.
- 1 Kings 18:28-29
---

Praying to the wrong gods in the wrong ways for the wrong things

---

 how did you get to be such a hateful creature?

 practice

Saturday, August 25, 2012

jelita

she was the single most odious girl I had ever met, but had she smiled at me just once, I would have married her in a heartbeat

---

I swear the like button has ruined everything

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

machismodo

clamouring to be heard
because we are invincible
desperate to be seen
as something we've never been

---

I feel I just want more   ...
more what?
I don't know       chaos?

---

why am I always wrong nowadays

---

why have we been conditioned to avoid boringness like the plague
is our company really so precious that we can only allow interesting people to surround us

Monday, August 20, 2012

rɑyɑ relɑpse


가슴에 밀접 매달 렸지
언제 이렇게 행복하게 됐니

---

I held my brand new, month old, baby nephew for the very first time today and, for a fraction of a second, I felt like an honest-to-God human being

---

행복을 좀 공유해주면 안되

Saturday, August 18, 2012

unique equal / domestic virgin

I came across the door of a fantastic underwater vessel, governed by a contrivance of intricate and fanciful design encased in glass that caused gears, antique weighted things made of bronze and lead, to whir and visibly reconfigure for vivid blue liquid to fluctuate and flow at the touch of a lever, but when I tried to discern its mechanism by experiments of trial and error, it defied my reasoned expectations - the same action performed twice produced two distinctly different results. This is not logical, I thought. It is broken, you were too careless with your touch, my mind said. As soon as I became convinced of this invented explanation, it was proven.

---

sometimes I think I may be a misanthropist, but I sure hope not. I sure hope to hell I'm not.

---

it's pouring in shinjuku today
where are you?
a man grabs my hand hurry we don't have much time
wait, what's going on? 
haven't you realized? this is all a dream
wait, if this is all a dream then who are you?
nicholas cage
i stop and turn to look
his moustache stares back
and then i wake up

Thursday, August 16, 2012

paperback writer

when you tend to have so many pairs of other people's shoes, it becomes quite easy to mix up which belongs to who

---

She sits at the tiny table just opposite the gentleman in the corner, his smart-striped tie folded neatly into the crisp collars of his white shirt. Decked out in a sultry-yet-understated one piece, the two would not have looked amiss attending some sort of film festival or fashion event together, her hand delicately draped across his arm as if it had always belonged there. But tonight finds them sitting at a quiet, dingy bar, on bar stools as polished as the bartender's manners. He pays no attention to his apparent dinner partner. His body is angled away obliquely and his eyes rest exclusively on the book in his hands. Her hands are folded politely in her lap as she gazes expectantly in his direction. He glances at her from the corners of his eyes. It's been ten minutes now, since she first sat down without a word, just watching him. It becomes increasingly clear that she doesn't know how to take a hint. Without looking up, he exaggerates a sigh. "Look, I'm very flattered, but I'm afraid you're wasting your time."
"Why is that?" Her voice is smooth, like lilac.
"I have no interest in chasing girls this evening."
"That's alright, I have no interest in running."
He peers over the top of his horn rimmed glasses for a moment then places his book on his lap. There's something unnatural about her otherwise attractive face.
"Who are you, exactly?"
She shrugs. "There are so many people inside me. I'm still trying to decide"
He contemplates returning to his book and abandoning this bizarre conversation, which at this point, can only get weirder but eventually decides against it. There's some mesmerizing quality about her words and her speech. He can't quite put his finger on it. "What do you do?"
"I guess you could say I'm a collector of sorts" she says in a nonchalant, sing-song sort of voice.
"What do you collect?"
"Feelings, that sort of thing"
A pause. "Feelings?"
"It's quite a long story, to be honest"
He nods and leans forward slightly. "I've got time"
She thinks for a moment, takes a sip of her cider and brushes her hair behind her ear, gently placing her glass back on the table. After a moment of pronounced silence, she begins to speak.

"Well, I was a writer initially. Sort of. After graduating, I worked at a tiny, unknown publishing firm as an office assistant, but in my spare time I would scribble short stories or poems in the back of my notebooks. A colleague happened to discover one of my poems one day and made quite a fuss about it. From then on, I became some sort of office phenomenon as 'the girl who could write'. For some reason, my colleagues became enamoured by my simple stories and turns of phrase. Their praises spurred me to consider taking up writing seriously, perhaps attend a few workshops or something like that. Looking back, their kind words may have simply been a form of polite flattery. My stories, to me at least, weren't anything special. But anyway, it became apparent that if I were to start writing for an audience, I would likely have to appeal to their emotions as well, which would be a difficult task, given the limited range and scope of experience at my disposal at the time. You see for as long as I can remember, people have described me as rational, detached or simply cold. Where the appropriate response would be to either cry or rejoice, I would just stand there, unaffected. I did not smile or frown very often. I myself had no idea that this was the case until my own sister pointed it out. It was not that I was unable to - I simply wasn't inclined to. I didn't see the point in performing the same muscle movements that came so naturally to others. Around the time I entered high school, I began to realise that this made the people around me uncomfortable. My classmates started avoiding me or called me a robot. As a result, I would spend hours alone in front of a mirror, practicing my expressions - perfecting them until they seemed genuine and ready to be employed at a moment's notice. I trained myself to react to cues in conversation and body language, but still my features always lacked authenticity. They were always a little stilted, mechanical, perfunctory. Anyway, I managed to master smiling and subtle concern, but I could never perfect my laugh. It always sounded hollow, forced. But at least I was no longer considered a social outcast and they had stopped calling me a robot. Since face to face interaction was such an exhausting ordeal for me, I became a very withdrawn, reserved individual. Although I managed to pretend to have emotions pretty successfully, I never discussed my fictional feelings with anyone, for fear of being found out. I suppose that may have been why my colleagues were so surprised at the fact that I wrote poems. But it was clear to me that these poems were not the sort that contained great meaning or got published and recited for generations to come. They were just a fanciful arrangement of words - idle strokes of the pen - pretty things to look at, but with no real gravity that would hold them together and secure their place in the mind. From then on, I made it a point to expose myself to various mediums - books, movies, music - to try and broaden my comprehension of human experience. Once I got started, however, I was hooked. I discovered that I had an innate talent for deconstructing emotions to their core and studying them. Like Beethoven at a piano or Archimedes before an equation, I could instantly discern where an emotion came from and what it was fueled by. It's difficult to describe but it was as if I could literally taste and grasp the phantom sensations. To this day I'm still not sure why this was so; perhaps it had something to do with my prior lack of experience with emotions. I was able to tell apart types of boredom and frustration that most people wouldn't even be able to recognize. I could catalogue the nuances and components that normally wouldn't register on a person's radar. I travelled far and wide to sample the world's happiness and sorrow. Did you know that there's a certain type of loneliness that can only be found in Japan? There's nothing else quite like it on the planet. As my collection grew so did my repertoire. By dissecting and analyzing the emotions, they became easier to emulate. I could be gregarious one moment, and then bashful the next. In the morning simple and good natured, and in the evening mysterious and melancholy. I soon found that the sort of emotions I had been searching for - the kind that can inspire novels and destroy people - they could only be encountered a certain way. You see, none of those secondhand sources could convey a greater variety or offer a more potent cocktail of emotions than those derived from intimate contact with another individual. It's a tedious process though, understanding another human being - and I don't just mean their words or actions. I mean going beyond knowing their name and occupation - those things are merely indicators of a larger truth - little bits of a bigger picture. I mean knowing what truly makes them tick - hopes, fears and dreams. And it's more than getting them to tell you how they feel. Quite often those under the influence of intense emotions, or particularly subtle ones, don't really know how they feel. All they can give is a vague outline - only shapes, no textures. To really put yourself in their place and feel the things they feel - there's no other way about it. it takes patience - and a delicate touch, like taming a wild animal. Humans almost never fully reveal their real selves to another. One must approach carefully and build up trust over numerous encounters before they feel comfortable enough to show themselves. But one false move and they'll retreat, fast as lightning, into their dense walls of hedge and undergrowth, never to be seen again except for fleeting glimpses of their tails darting between cover from time to time."
She finishes her glass and says nothing else, indicating the end of her story.
He studies her face. It's a good face - neutral. He wonders if this too, is all just an act.
"I imagine you must've met and gotten to know a lot of people"

She nods. "Thousands"
"Did you ever sleep with them?"
"Some of them, yes. Occasionally. Sex means so much less these days. There's nothing invested in the act anymore. Just another tedious social ritual."

"And then you left them"
A nod. "There was nothing more I could learn from them," she says candidly
"Can you tell what I'm feeling now?"
She stops and lowers her chin with her eyes fixed on him. Like a doctor listening to a stethoscope or a person trying to tune the radio into a specific frequency, a flicker of concentration crosses her absent expression. He feels a dull weariness grow over him, as if something inside is being slowly siphoned away.
"A sense of apprehension," she concludes.
"Anything more?"
"Well, I'd have to get closer to know that"
He considers her words for a second. "You make yourself sound like some sort of emotional vampire"
A mischievous smile plays out across her lips.
"Don't worry, I won't bite"
Deadpan. "That's not what I'm worried about"
Her smile vanishes
"What are you worried about"
A pause. "That you'll turn me into you"

---

But they're all really your shoes. You've just given them different names

Saturday, August 11, 2012

bloom / ring of fire

the wheels just keep on turning
the drummer begins to drum
I don't know which way I'm going
I don't know which way I've come

---

the beggar possesses no treasures
and memory astoundingly poor
so devious and temperamental is he
the unreliable raconteur

---

the very act of forgetting
is both blessing and a curse
that each time I should fall again
feel exactly like the first

Friday, August 10, 2012

underwater

I prepared a house
to contain my sadness
and now I can't get out

---

単調な笑いは、世界は遠いと思わ
拍手、方向、星
それは、ただの画面上の架空のファンタジーだ
世界は手のひらにある, なぜ私はほこりを持ったい
まだ探して, 延々探している
単調な笑いが, 気泡を通過する際
泣きながらのように聞こえる

---

oh really? I don't think I've ever heard of you before
that's cause I'm a very specialised kind of writer
oh? how's that
I only write things that can't be published

---

just looking at the covers, as an intelligent human being and on behalf of my kind, I already hate your books

---

I think everyone should be allowed to get super melodramatic every once in a while

world music

ツッコミ 入れるよ   [tsukko-me]

---




---

I think I may have danced all my happiness away

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

next thing you know

how do you hope to win against such a handsome man

---

She had the sort of profile that could've been painted on the side of an ancient greek amphora, or cut out from black card in one of those silhouette portraits from the 18th century. Honestly, I've never seen the curvature of someone's forehead meet the slope of their nose at a more charming angle. Her nose itself culminated in a gentle peak, like a hill from the english countryside, modest and sweet. Her lovely lips were full and downturned slightly, looking vaguely like some kind of sensuous trapezoid. I don't know if there already exists a proper term for that exact shape, but it definitely deserves one - a distinct name of its own, and a dedicated lecture on it for architectural and art and design majors, and an award for the most appealing shape known to man, and for its likeness to be painted over and over again and framed in numerous galleries and museums around the world and eventually auctioned off to be displayed in some ostentatiously dim, velvet-filled private studio for the consideration of generations to come. Her eyebrows floated like manicured clouds, their fading borders measured perfectly. Their edges were slightly higher toward the center, a sort of winsome perplexity etched into her brow, and when she smiled - surreptitiously, never revealing teeth - it was like a single ray of sunlight peeking through a curtain of shade and drizzle. Combined with her coy, coquettish lips, her smiles were subtle concessions and always contained some sense of dolorous mystery.

---

I was once told that anything capable of being imagined is a conceivable reality; if it's true then I suppose it must be

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

可爱 / unheard and obscene

holiday checklist:

experience SS2 pasar malam again                    
scout out prospective girlfriends there                 
get an actual girlfriend                                    (KIV)

---

so what do you do in your spare time?

oh, well, sometimes I write poetry on the internet - hey wait    where are you going                  come back

Long Revision

 夕食後、ベアは湾のパノラマビューのために4月をエスプラネードに連れて行くことを申し出たが、彼女は翌朝早く空港にいなければならないと言って断った。代わりに、4月は金融街を二分し、川の河口を横断して少し上流のMRT駅に到着できるルートを提案しました。そこで彼らは手入れの行き届いた都...