The Catch

The Catch

Flames
Within these casual games
We play
Where water is so scarce
Where the wind is just too fast

Flames
Licking every morsel from the plate,
Clean and pure.
Where light is just too black
We’re happy with our pet.

Flames
Grinning every round
Seeking every sound
That rhymes with now, now and now
But can we put them out?

How
To tear down all the houses we’ve constructed
To burn down all the bridges we’ve raised
Flames, can you help us
Find the grey area?

Dry
We’ll only dry these flames with
Ashes of our own
Since pain becomes our pleasure and we don’t even know
Or is the gate just too narrow?

Run
Run through them
With dampened spirits and tears from battle
And pray for the mercy of the grieving sky,
“Let go, let go.”

Hold
Hold, hold on tight
My friend
Living is so much more that catching
Butterflies and keeping them alive.

~tc©

When, She Is

When, She Is

When was she?

She stands still, she stands still
In men’s dreams she
Lives for who she is in this
Casual cyclic drill, one drill
Stretching and striking her domain’s
Ignorant.
Everyone feels, feels this drill
Grinding into the flesh of
Blood and steel
Her creatures are chained and numbed,
No one grieves.
Alas, the Ignorant
She is as casual as he permits.
When he grasps her slender hand
She slips behind and
He adds, wisp by wisp to
What he thought she was to be,
Already.
Completely under trivial mercy,
Golden shackles round and round…
In dreams of query
He stands still, he stands still.

When was she,
When is she...
When, she is.

~tc©

Don't Discriminate

This poem was nominated by UN as the best poem of 2006, written by an African kid.

When I born, I black
When I grow up, I black
When I go in Sun, I black
When I scared, I black
When I sick, I black
And when I die, I still black
And you white fellow
When you born, you pink
When you grow up, you white
When you go in sun, you red
When you cold, you blue
When you scared, you yellow
When you sick, you green
And when you die, you gray
And you calling me colored??

r. Egret

Snowy egret, Egretta thula http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Egretta_thula1.jpg

The Tail of r. Egret

The brushwood rustled with the sound of new life. Leaves auburn with the season rubbed against each other; the scrawny twigs quivered with the tickling of movement – and it was then that the shell broke, right at the crack of dawn.

And another, and another and another.

He turned his head away, escaping the sudden inlet of brightness, wondering what he’d just done. Deciding that there’d be better place to not get deafened by the reverberations of his own tiny, piercing squeals, as he already did a couple of times, he turned back to face the mini-oculus he’d just made in the ceiling of his first ever home. Brushing away more sticky slime from the tip of a jet-black muzzle he’d found growing rather intrudingly from in between his eyes sometime ago, he aimed it at the walls this time, creating an even bigger hole. Armed with a brand new novelty, he continued, feeling quite clever. Not until the ground started shaking even more violently. Fortunately, it only lasted for a chirp.

As they harked, it seemed the branches bent in salute to the arrival of Mother, who was a full-grown snowy egret with magnificent white plumage; her elegant feathers seemed to sway and dance in the wind with the graceful foliage of the canopy above. She looked upon her new hatchlings with a tender eye of the simplest, purest motherly warmth. With a gentle shuffling in hope of not startling her cherished young, she bent down to place, at the side of the nest, a glistening emerald leaf.

He wasn’t yet accustomed to sudden jerks of the floor, nor sudden appearances of white, gi-normous, arm-flapping walls, yet had nowhere to retreat to but the remnants of his recently demolished three-hundred-and-sixty degree cave. However, overcome by a new sensation of utter dryness in the throat, he instinctively leaned towards the brilliant viridian palette a few shell-bits to his left. But no matter how hard he strained his neck, he couldn’t reach those sparkling crystals that was sure, he thought, to wipe that feeling completely clean. Suddenly, the palette tilted, and a few of the crystals converged into a petty stream that inched closer and closer to his eyes.

Mother slowly released her feathers upon the leaf, watching closely as her firstborn took a tiny sip of the morning dew. Before long, the rest bad begun to clamber clumsily, with the tiniest steps and flutters, out of their eggs, like the man she observed stumbling out of a tent clutching a black bottle not far from here that morning. She craned her neck for a better view at the babies.

He realized sound worked quite differently outside, worse than expected actually. For every short, sharp squeal he made, three others followed, and he felt he couldn’t stop until the crystals in his rotund belly would stop playing tag; they were making almost as much noise as he did now. But then the big white wall started lowering small supple, ashen pieces (later he would know as meat, meat of fishes – creatures who swam in the big blue diamond and meant for food) into his beak, and it seemed to cure it for a while.

Time was like the torrents Mother spoke about in one of the nightstories before sleep, where many many little crystals, ranging from brown ones to blue ones to greens ones, and everything in between, would race each other from the skies to the mountains then to the seas. Sometimes they came directly to the nest from up above, but this wasn’t happening very often now. Rarely in fact.

Naturally, he learnt that he was a snowy egret born in the springtime of youth (very late spring actually), and had three very similar siblings. Mama was apparently able to differentiate him from the rest because of his larger beak. (let’s call him Beaky shall we?) But that was just one part about Beaky’s “dissimilarities”.

You see, there was this once, not long after their birth, that Mama gathered the family around the usual leaf with morning dew. This one had so much crystals in the morning a pool of it was still there after nightfall, and it was under the moonlight that four of them appeared so…at home in the iridescent family photo cast off the shimmering surface. Mama called it “reflection”. Unfortunately however, it was at this point where she discovered that Beaky’s right talons were withering, like the sunflowers in autumn she witnessed three seasons ago with their late father. That time it was honey under the moonlight, this time it was pure death.

Since then Mama never looked at Beaky the same way again. Beaky never thought anything wrong about that, since he thought Mama was giving them lesser attention since they were to be independent soon. At least not until he realized he could no longer perform the “branch-hopping stunt” they used to dare each other to do in the past week. One round around the Big Ol’ Deci Dewers was his record, now he couldn’t even manage a traversing the balancing beam. He peered down at his legs for a explanation, and he got it. Just as his feathers were getting whiter and purer by the day, his right leg was becoming blacker and dirtier by the night. That was also the first time Beaky found out crystals could come out of a bird’s eyes.

There was a second, and it happened during the summer Solstice. The rest of them had already started flying lessons with Mama, but I was forbidden because she I said I would never be able to keep balance with control of over only one foot. The most I could do was to savour the envy of listening to my sisters’ tales of flight, of how Mama would throw them off Deci Dewers’ hightops and then swoop down and catch them at the last second, of how Mama would show off with her brilliant speed as the fastest bird of the flock. All I was borne to do was to clean the nest, to just be one of the rest.

That afternoon, the others were out practicing near ground level in the kind shade of the undergrowth, whilst I was left in the nest embracing the wrath of Summer’s eye. I never thought to glare back, and I never intended to. I was furthest from fit to even steal a glimpse at the perfect source of our cyclic verve. Nevertheless, summer was unrelenting, and I had been cooped up in the branches for almost two days without water. Mama returned with the familiar gust of her long white feathers, now almost lustrous gold in sunbeams. I averted her eyes; not more than once have I felt as if I was aging quicker than the one who borne and bred me, my presence was already parasitic. These thoughts didn’t but add to my searing throat.

Ma could tell Beaky was thirsty. But she never could look at him and give him all the love that he wanted and needed. Not with no prejudice; no it’d take more than a mother’s love to care for those broken bones, and she couldn’t afford to show that kind of favouritism in front of the sisters. But now they were alone, and she knew exactly what he needed.

I didn’t dare look her in the eye, she was sure to return the stare with an iciness to amplify the burning pain in my gorge.

Ma had looked everywhere for water but none was to be found, and all she could do was to gaze at Beaky with a broken heart. But then something struck her.

Then I saw her take off again, diving into the scrubs below, probably calling the my sisters back up. I knew it, I was different, and there was no pity nor impartiality in the animal world.

Ma couldn’t risk staining her beak because fish had no blood, and she’d never want to be accused of attacking another bird. She arrived back at the nest just to find Beaky huddled in the same corner just as she’d left him.

What?

Clasped tightly in her beak was a smooth, slim, and sharp rock sharper than the sharpest talons she once had and used to catch the biggest garoupa for the flock feast. Beaky saw that Ma was shivering slightly, and it caught his attention. With a sudden action, Ma struck herself just under her left wing using the lethal edge of the cracked pebble. Her poised sinews grew tense immediately, and she stumbled towards the borders of the nest, sending an ominous tremor throughout the branches, but then she clung as tight as ever to both sides of the stemmy bowl to keep it in balance, safe from tipping over. Maintaining her open wingspan only served to widen the crimson gash at her side now, and her breathing was quick but heavy, her heart palpitated like the rattle of a venomous snake waiting at the prowl. Struggling desperately with the pain, she limped toward Beaky.

Ma knew it’d work from the moment she picked up the rock.
With Beaky staring up at her in shock, but resting in her bosom, Ma relented to the blazing pain, and let the crystals well up and then fall and slide of her eyes, downwards, glistening drop by glistening drop, carefully like how the morning dew was sparking that dawn of spring.

And all I could do was gape.

Then, recovering slightly from that ordeal, Ma said that she’d let me try flying next week, when her wound got better. I was to keep it a secret.

Ma and Beaky were at the top of Big Ol’ Deci Dewers. They’d taken a slow long walk from the nest all the way up here, but the view itself, exquisite as it was, was already worth it. On the right was a brotherhood of mountains with their snow-white hair and enigmatic mist around their eyes. At the base of the skyscrapers and continuing on to the left was the beautiful evergreen sea of swaying lungs that renewed the air everyday, made it fresh every morning, made it even more pleasant to look at Ma as she danced in the wind.

Beaky was scared, but Ma said he’d shown an incredible sense of balance while climbing to the top, and that him flying was actually quite possible. Under the sweltering scrutiny of the sun, Ma went through the routing one last time. She would grab Beaky, throw him off the branch, and he was to flap his wings as hard as he could, and then she would catch him and bring him back up. Beaky was still scared.

Ma grabbed Beaky at the collar with her beak, just around the skin so her jaws wouldn’t crush his soft bones, and with a swift flick, she hurled his white-grey body flailing into the open air, swimming with the tide of gravity.

Beaky dreamed of this, but never did he dream that it’d be such a nightmare. Everything around him was a mosaic of blur, green – brown – green – brown, and an occasional blue as he spun to face the sky. The leaves weren’t going to cushion his landing, the branches weren’t going to catch him if he couldn’t land, no, his locomotion was beyond control, he shouldn’t have taken the flight, he shouldn’t have even thought about it.

Green – brown – green – brown – green – brown.

The noise was a medley of a wind-and-leaf spar and the silence of death within him. Then he remember that there was supposed to be one more sound. And he started flapping, and he wasn’t about to give up, because Ma said not to.

There was a focusing peace.

The leaves and trees were elucidated to his eyes with each passing second. He was surprised that the he hadn’t met with the ground yet; Deci Dewers was indeed the tallest tree in the precinct. Beaky started to build a momentum with the rhythm of his breath and the beating of his wings. He was slowing down, yes! He was rising, slightly!

Ma was watching from above as she glided down slowly behind him, letting Beaky pacemake. There was something unusual about her faith in him that she couldn’t attribute to anything but primal instinct. Something unusually steady. And then, as Beaky alternated between plummeting and levitation, the gale sent a vine colliding square into his chest with a soft, thudding crush.

I didn’t know what that was. But it made me dazed. I didn’t lose consciousness, but I couldn’t move for the moment, at least not for now. I needed her help but I was just too close to the ground.

Ma never failed to walk the talk. She thrust her wings backward and created an aerial-V, propelling what was once the drift in the wind to a cutting thrust through forest air. She spiraled downwards along the inflictor-vine with full resolve in her scintillating eyes, even if she broke a bone or two superceding the threshold it’d be well worth it. The vine was now kept so still because of the circling wind currents in orbit of its stem throughout Ma’s lightning wake.

“There she is! That’s the one I saw, go!”

With my half open eyes I saw Ma right above me, and I couldn’t believe it. She was the light, all along, at the end of this tunnel. But then I heard the most horrible sound I’d ever heard and ever remember in my entire life. I didn’t know what it was then, but it left the cruelest, most deadly, and most mechanical echo resounding throughout the entire forest. The canaries and sparrows scattered around the lower ground took flight immediately. And I was still falling just to notice this.

“Got her.”
“Her feathers are mine.”
“Her beak’s mine.”
“Shut it.”

The brown floor was just a few branches away. Ma overtook me, but as she continued her nose-dive she left a trail of innocent red blood joining us in the downward journey like rubies you would find if you went to the centre of the sun. I was aghast, but I was too mute.

My wings were recovering from the temporary paralysis, and she, now under me, spread her silver feathers wide and closed in upon my body, wrapping around me, engulfing me, for the first time in my life, in the warmth of a Mother’s love. Then she closed her eyes. It eased away the numbness in my limbs.

She landed hard, but I soft, in her cherry bosom. My eyes were stinging because I knew the face of death when I saw it, but upon such a beautiful creature! The strangling sound of footsteps were approaching close and I had to leave, but how stupid and useless I was, having no ability to even carry this body away to safety. The redness I will never forget.

Using my beak to pluck off the longest feather she had stemming from her tail, I scampered away, and with memories in my eyes, I took off to fly the most confident flight I’d ever have had.

~tc©

Epigram

This is blogpost number fifty,
It deserves a tribute witty,
A name I sought but could not see,
This poem I give epon'mity.

Epigram by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Sir, I admit your general rule,
That every poet is a fool,
But you yourself may serve to show it,
That every fool is not a poet.

A Blade of Grass

I finally understand what this means, nay, I've finally felt what this means.

A Blade of Grass by Brian Patten

You ask for a poem.
I offer you a blade of grass.
You say it is not good enough.
You ask for a poem.

I say this blade of grass will do.
It has dressed itself in frost,
It is more immediate
Than any image of my making.

You say it is not a poem.
It is a blade of grass and grass
Is not quite good enough.
I offer you a blade of grass.

You are indignant.
You say it is too easy to offer grass.
It is absurd.
Anyone can offer a blade of grass.

You ask for a poem.
And so I write you a tragedy about
How a blade of grass
Becomes more and more difficult to offer,

And about how as you grow older
A blade of grass
Becomes more difficult to accept.

Coeur de L'Oiseau (Aves)

Coeur de L'Oiseau (Aves)

Under the spell of the rain
I am compelled to release the
Burgeoning bird from my chest,
Growing, flowing!
Her tunes are a bride’s silky gown,
Her song is thunderous,
Her songs are canonical,
Like the drenching in sweet honey of the rain
Like Acer saccharum caressing the tip of my tongue, the fluttering!
Oh what keys it takes to unlock this cage!

~tc©

Political Poetry

I was browsing through my very neglected IHS notes during a little rust-wipe exercise when I came across a set containing a long excerpt of our dear Catherine Lim's contentious compositions. To my absolute delight, she had compiled a series of political poetry not very dissimilar to her reputation. I like.:D

[...that is, keeping the basic elements that allow Singapore to be a legitimate member of the free world, and throwing out all the messy bits.

Here's a light-hearted poem on the subject:

Say out the four-letter word.
The Devil at once shouts
"Pope",
The Pope frowns and says
"Hell",
The pessimist mutters "Hope".
"Porn", growls the puritan,
"Bush", scream the Iranians,
"Cops", grumbles the hooker,
"Jews", roar the Palestinians.
For Donald Trump, it is "Poor",
And for the poor, it is "Limo",
The PAP says, "We have two,

They are 'Oppo' and 'Demo'."

.

.

.

.

.

...The government knows that it must deal carefully and sensitively with this group of Singaporeans. The prospect of bright, highly-skilled young professionals emigrating to countries that can afford them, in their own words, "more voice, more space", is very worrisome.

Here's a verse that could easily have come from one of these bright, outspoken Singaporeans:

World reports and surveys

Are impressed by Singapore;

They note its glowing charts

And watch its economy soar.

An A for sound investments,

An A for rule of law;

An A-plus for governance.

Each is a perfect score.

But it is a dismaying D

For freedom of the press,

Political debate and dissent

Get a grade that's even less.

Since we have turned global

We need the world's regard,

So let's correct the imbalance

And improve our report card.

.

.

.

.

.

...a little poem about how easily the government can manage a people who have become overdependent and hence politically naïve:

"We do have freedom,"

say Singaporeans,

"As is clear from our presentstatus,

Since we are free to do everything

That the PAP government

lets us!"]

~©ACS(I) IHS Dept.

and Catherine Lim of course

Sigh, it's a pity local writers find no ground in our "science and technology and PAP is the best!!!" island. How??

May God save my blog too!:D

Proud of My Descent

Yesterday, two people said I have the look of a doctor.

My Chinese teacher said, "医学啊！你很有医生的形象啊！"

To which my eyebrows replied with gymnastic flexibility.

She continued to me, and the class, "我觉得全部的医生们都长得像你这个样子的吗。"

To which my eyesbrows persisted with gymnastic endurance.

Right.

Next, my hairdresser.

She said, "医学？很好啊！你好像很有爱心的(leh)!"

This time moving my brows meant moving my scalp meant moving my hair meant getting some hair that I want kept on my head laughing at me on the floor. My conjecture's that I probably blushed and said something stupid.

Besides that, the hairwash; she was masterful. With a masseuse's hands, her delicate fingers were meandering gracefully up my neck and around my scalp with professional alacrity. An extra five bucks for that? Yeah definitely worth the therapeutically spine-chilling experience. She's more than good, and I am so going back.

Today's HCL prelim paper was...somewhere between a breeze and a gale. 记叙文 beckoned my pen again. And I gave in again.

理解篇章 was the least pokerfaced I'd ever had, enjoyed every single word. =7

Ah. Let the ink end here today, the title says it all.

Ever Heard of One-line-poetry?

The Cornucopian Multiplicity of Poetry-Composing Folk Inhabiting this Global Vicinity Unanimously Agree that the Measurement Lengthwise and Articulate Convolution of a Poem, Unconditionally, do not Unconstructively Impinge on the Quality or Prospective Eminence of the Subject-matter Thereof

However, I don't.

~tc©

The Trivial Matters

The Trivial Matters

It irks the modern soul to think
Of how the God of stars and seas
And overflowing majesty
Could conjure up the idea of
A reddish swelling facial bump
To which we all refer to as
The pimple. Oh divine imagination!
How heav’nly all we see our zits
Contraptions of our Father’s glory
Well let us not forget the story
Of breaking wind and breezy weather
What sin is found in such synergy
But glory glory to have a Dad
As droll as this. That brings to mind
Our vocal chimes and why they come
Alive just during shower time.
I think God truly hoped that we
Could praise Him anytime, He did.
Just let me add colloquially,
The same Supreme who crafted all
These random idiosyncrasies
Had given me a helping hand
In wielding brave this crafty pen.

~tc©

Harmony

Harmony

Microsoft word opens
Leaving me staring at it
Blank-
ly
wit
h al
mos
t not
hi
ng in
min
d.
Detachment and extrication.
Death and resurrection.
Death again, no not ag
ain. I won’t give in th
ough I already hav
e, haven’t i
?
?
?
.
.
Detachment and extrication,
Phoenix, dragon, unicorn, seraphim, light, dark, energy, light, burst, light
Vocabulary, imagery, tactile, kinesthetic, auditory
Old factories.
Purgatory.
$%#@!
Devouring your senses
These immenses
Consuming your right, no left, no right, left, right h
and, STAY STILL!
C://syntax error 9938*(4) Sever wrists lest processor erases life of userid 23748
Error2
Error2
Erro-
BOOM!
Up, up, up-
Down
Falling up and standing down, phase fax,
You were straddling nowhere, nowhere
NOWHERE
Ever since you stared
at
The opening words my crows softly whispered.

~tc©

Comic Treat!

I didn't realise today was Happy 4.13-Math-Teachers-Should-Tell-A-Joke Day. Gave me quite a pleasant poke, since both my teachers never really put up a good laugh with the class before.

Amaths

So there we were, playing Block Dude on our GDCs during amath tutorial on Mathematical Modelling, after finishing the worksheets that is. And it so happened that a question came into my mind so I cornered the man to voice my doubts.

Me: So, sir, how d'you get this thing to plot an absolute-value graph?

KY: Urhh...I'm not very...absolute about that.

Me: (wide-eyed) Er...okay.

KY: So...I'll find out for you and tell you next lesson, alright? (looking exceptionally enthusiastic at my retarded expression)

Me: Er...yeah sure. Thanks sir. (hides a grin, goes back to seat for more Block Dude)

How interesting.

Cmaths

The last lesson of the day found our class extremely hyperactive. Apparently, MS decided to match our frequency as she started teaching us about probability.

MS: So, a situation is said to be biased when the probability of an event happening is not equally likely.

Class: (nods)

MS: Okay. Let's say, if one fine day I were to just come into class, will the probability of a person getting scolded by me be equal for everyone else in class?

Class: NO. (laughter)

MS: Of course! Because some of you just REFUSE to hand in your homework, or you can say that I'm biased towards a few of you people!

Class: (rapturous laughter)

MS: Yeah I never said I was fair what. Look at me, I'm not, I'm dark-skinned! (points to arm)

-silence- (crickets chirp, crow flies over)

Class: (jeers, then even more rapturous laughter)

Ah what a day. Thank God for humour, again.

The Marriage of True Minds

Shakespeare is genius. Brilliant sonnet, no. 116.

The Marriage of True Minds by William Shakespeare

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no! it is an ever-fixèd mark,
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error, and upon me prov'd,
I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd.

My Faith is in the Wind and the Rain

Grats blogspot, upon your international face has been inscribed my 40th post. Yeah! My blog's 40 posts old, 不惑之年! o.O

In addition, happy Hungry Ghosts' Festival! Sorry spirits, all I've got to offer is a lexical feast, so enjoy. And don't blow at my ear when I'm sleeping, legs are rather uncontrollable in sub-consciousness. But then again you guys are supposed to be ethereal. So how the hell do you blow anyways!!

(In case you haven't already noticed, I'm so kidding -.-")

Aside from that..ah, when the night and the drizzles paint such a lovely ambience, how can one resist the temptation of poetry even at the risk of absolutely owning oneself by taking one's mind off several extremely-highly-complicated-and-examinable-in-less-than-one-days-time Hamlet extracts? Duh you can but I can't. 情非得以！:p

My Faith is in the Wind and the Rain

A crystal kiss, a passing wind
That lifts my shivers pure but not
The swifted dates that none recall.
An icy mellow hark of strings
That stroll my soul with shadows warm
A clamour, a fondle, oft’ deep and sweet
Snakes and seraphs, my skin beneath.

What slipp’ry thoughts in falling clouds
Might He be He my light to grace?
Has He my golden wish forgot?
But all perceived, He sings for me
And cries when He allows me be.
By not day, not night, nor not by neith’
I slip in trembling, glorious bright.

Spite Man Divine such clefts to crawl,
I catch His chosen springs and falls.

~tc©

Experimental Blends

Experimental Blends

A little of this
A little of that
A bubbling chorus and
A sizzling clap
With uranium on the bench
And fart on the tap
Oops that’s acid on my lap
OUCH THAT’S ACID ON MY LAP!
And the wrong tap leaves me
With gas in nasal cavities
Not the liquid
I expected
Ah there, there, the water channel
Soothing burns in nasty places
Thank God thank heavens for filter funnels
And plastic briefs for private spaces
Alright, that’s done
Back to more fun
But what’s that familiar orange swarm
Ahoy there! A mushroom cloud!
That’s something to worry about.
Rather cute I thought, rising through
The conical tubes
Smelling of breakfast’s chicken soup
Well, what goes around
Comes around
Ew,
Shouldn’t have tried bovine
Latrine exocrine,
Should’ve just used mine.

~tc©

The Old Wound

团契聚餐 was quite brilliant. Many thanks to the Duck brothers, and God of course. Zz bad HABIT to leave blogs dormant for fornights, some one help me:p.

Here's a new story

Part I The Old Wound

Fatigue was routine. Cupping the lower-most hollow of his ribs he eased the familiar pain away and trudged on. The air was damp and heavy with the jaded breaths of a hundred other uniformed veterans, wearing the youth of age on their faces, flaunting the maturity of martyrdom under their focused brows. He was the kid of the lot, but nevertheless a fraction of the whole. Glancing behind, he reinstalled confidence upon sight of the grin of the Nazi flag, secured his grip on his weapon, and proceeded to take the boldest step he had in about fifty. The rest then gradually slipped into a stupor of hesitation once more.

The barren lands echoed with the rhythm of a ruthless march. Small, makeshift huts that lined the pedestrian inlets were completely vacated; their tin roofs seemed to clatter and tremble at the sound of impending death, though they housed no life. Unlike the others, the soldier still preserved fragments of a conscience, but he was careful not to show it. His eyes wandered to a finger that had started bleeding again and motioned to tighten the already taut bandage clasping the digit stiff. It became even more pallid, but he shut his eyes and deeply inhaled the sweet stench of sweat and blood nonchalantly; he enjoyed the numbness.

Then there was a swift movement of flesh and metal. He took less than a second to absorb the gliding action between his palm and the hand-grip, but it was too late. The rifle met the earth with the loudest possible clash, and the damage was done. He panicked like never before, as if a thousand shadows were devouring his core, and with a fleeting movement he recovered his weapon and his stance, immediately encircled by piercing stares and raised barrels. He wished he could run at the speed of his heart.

His adjacent comrade didn’t let out the slightest cry. With a feverish glimpse at his new wound square in the chest, his legs collapsed and he fell to the ground, eyes wide shut.

“Damned traitor!” bellowed a voice in the vicinity.

“Bastard!”

“Kill him! Now!”

The soldier heard a sickening crunch. Colonel Leurc’s massive knuckles sank deep into the jaws of a man whose fingers were about to make resonant another gunshot.

“Sir we have a turncoat! Right here, right now!”

“Silence, McCain.” Leurc’s voice was deep and imperious. “Lower your weapons.”

“But sir! He-”

His eyes were equally commanding, and there was a shifting sound of relinquishment.

“Who did this?” He inquired.

The soldier knew there was no escape. Perhaps death would be a better reality. Meekly, he raised his quivering arm. “Sir!”

Leurc moved towards the fallen body and with a sharp stroke ripped apart its owner’s uniform with bare hands. Blemishing the otherwise well-defined sinews were numerous cuts and shallow stabs, as well as the most recent wound in his chest, which appeared to be a small rotting cavern of charcoal flesh, all a grotesque mosaic of red and yellow. A crimson patch was visible towards the left side of the right thigh, another gash.

“Well executed.” Leurc turned to meet the frozen expression of the jolted soldier, flabbergasted with mounting relief.

“Men,” Leurc spoke. “All he did was to end the suffering of a fellow soldier mercifully. Realistically. Learn from this. Now resume the march, the other companies are growing impatient round the bend. Move it!”

“Sir the body-”

“Leave it.”

“Yes sir.”

The soldier re-marshalled his medley of feelings and hastened his pace to catch up. His skin was still ice with fear. Everyone else had shrugged it off in a matter of seconds, leaving him to digest, once again, with whom, for whom and for what he was fighting this war for. There was no turning back; there was no room for tears and such.

Gratsburg inched closer with the decline of daylight. Soon, it crept into sight. The soldier examined his uniform soiled with blood, dirt and grease, and wondered if his soul was comparable. Eyes ahead, he marched towards the city with bittersweet remorse.

~tc©

What We Need to Know

Finally.

What We Need to Know

Space tails my gaze and
I feel the drag, can’t
help but feel it come
fast and soft with death
in wake. In this wide
plain of white I scarce
can dream our past with
cuts and bites, just brave
scars that boast in eyes.
But now have we lost
you or me?
The flames come,
the flames come.

What we will be I see no tree
I lock the chains you set them free
When winds and rain shall gust as one
how then shall we not come undone?

~tc©

煮豆燃豆萁，

豆在釜中泣。

本是同根生，

相煎何太急?

“七步诗”
曹植
《三国演义》

Whatever It Takes

07/07/07 was very colourful, but for reasons I just couldn't bring myself to paint. So here I am one day later, composed to compose.

Lifehouse, brilliant band. They're something like Switchfoot, semi-secular, always shunning the Christian label, living to make music for everyone.

"A faith, not a genre." Very cool way to put it.

Jason Wade simply writes too beautifully (that's Lifehouse's lead vocalist, guitarist and lyricist). He came from a highly spiritual background, having both of his parents being missionaries, and it is shown very evidently throughout his music.

One thing about their music for which I hold dire admiration - ambiguity. They're always two layers of meanings in their lyrics, one for the spirit and one for the flesh. And both are edifying. Sadly, perhaps only a believer can appreciate the full beauty of these songs, especially when I looked at these lyrics below last night, from the perspective of what we know as the 三角关系. At one time the voice speaks to God, at another, it speaks to a person. And when you see these things together as one song gently whispering one message, that soothing feeling is...there, just renewed once again.

Great is Thy faithfulness.

One more thing, the subject "she" in their songs, also often mean more than one person. I think it's spiritually artistic. Ok here it is. A full rendition can be heard over there on the right too. --------->
(If it doesn't display for you, you might need to install Adobe Flash Player 9)

Whatever It Takes by Lifehouse

A strangled smile fell from your face
It kills me that I hurt you this way
The worst part is that I didn't even know
Now there's a million reasons for you to go
but if you can find a reason to stay

I'll do whatever it takes
to turn this around
I know what's at stake
I know that I've let you down
And if you give me a chance
Believe that I can change
I'll keep us together whatever it takes

She said "If we're gonna make this work
You gotta let me inside even though it hurts
Don't hide the broken parts that I need to see"
She said "Like it or not it's the way it's gotta be
You gotta love yourself if you can ever love me"

I'll do whatever it takes
To turn this around
I know what's at stake
I know that I've let you down
And if you give me a chance
And give me a break
I'll keep us together, I know you deserve much better

But remember the time I told you the way that I felt
That I'd be lost without you and never find myself
Let's hold onto each other above everything else
Start over, start over

I'll do whatever it takes
To turn this around
I know what's at stake
I know I've let you down
And if you give me a chance
and believe that I can change
I'll keep us together whatever it takes

A Timely Surprise

A Timely Surprise

Recall today’s verdicts of the wind and the rain,
it was her who frayed the windmills and kissed away the pains
She treads along my memories, singing the same refrain
that she’d always be running out, I could never end this chase.
I saw her in the ivory, amidst the velvet of the night
but she wouldn’t pay attention till dawn had me by her sight
with Cerulean, White and the angels of Christmas night
unfolding their wings, I was at the corner of her golden eye.
My ears described, what she’d been, that I could never change
but with each tick I paint at hand, don’t new smears flee into the main?
Her fairness flushes with herself in play as I return her autumn smile
she beckons with viridian eyes, I shall be yours to claim
But the prospect of prospect stays a forged reality
as long as we’re drunk as victims of causality, now is bygone history.

My fair Lady,
I’ve seen
You’ve brought me back to the bouquet and wreaths
the carpet of love and the strides of grace
the you when you were made to marry
to touch, to matter, to stuff and space
for without whom you cannot take place, you cannot take stride
in my ocean memories.

And beauty is all I see.

~tc©

In Justice

This post is here mainly because I can't stand the fact that I've only posted five times this month despite having so much time to burn. It's a disease called laziness and I need a cure. I need a drug. I need a new substance, new subsistence.

Inevitable is such a great song. But Imeem has just recently decided to embrace the existence of what's known as the copyright law today, and as such listeners can only enjoy 30 seconds of each uploaded track. Good or bad?

And then there is the end-of-holiday-"OH YEAH! THERE'S HOMEWORK!"-routine. Inevitable. Haha.

This here below is a pic of the six of us at the chacha studio. Dance is...a different feeling.(:

EXPLOSM!!!

Didn't intend to post today, but..my goodness, when I read these four I was literally Rolling On the Floor Laughing My Ass Off. Thank God for humour!!!


Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net


Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net























(Big space because the comic would've overlapped into the tagbox and I can't be bothered to edit my html to widen my post column. LOL.)



























Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net


Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

Oops, answers on next post!!

Love at Second Sight

The rain is my loyal friend. I think she's a girl, for if not, her cranial massages wouldn't be so...sensuous. Ok all I'm trying to say is that, after 17 days of cognitive degeneration, I really thank God for sending the rain this morning to rouse my "amorous" tendencies. Finally something original.

Dear rain,

\m/!! Rock on! Thanks for coming today! :D

God bless,
Torsten

Ok here it is, enjoy and comment!

Love at Second Sight

Some people say that this was how love was made
Not our common notion of made, not for what price can be paid
But the core of it all, is what I articulate
is that maybe love is just a hormone secreted from day to day.
No no! You don't-know desperados, love was never ever made,
It rests in the form of a golden planet not quite far away!
Its brightness in the gloomiest nights never seem to fade,
especially not in the darkness, where it can be made
(Yes now I do refer to the upper lines of fiscal masquerades.)
Cattle dung, oxen muck! cry our geniuses with dangling crosses
(who never get laid…
not ‘till they wed)
Love is in Corinthians, what more has to be said?
Salesmen preach of spring, sponge and latex gadgets
But I reckon it exceeds the covers of the harem beds
It drinks not wine but spit and spite
It’s not endocrine and it is despite
I’ve seen its lines and squares and appetite
and what it offers is truly divine
So what about love at first sight?
Somebody said God made us in pairs long before time
and when there was earth He threw us inside
A mix and match of search and find
with Him to pronounce where it honestly resides.

~tc©

(p.s.: Spot a paradoxical phrase in the poem and tag a quote if you want! Answer'll be on the next post!;))

Cyanide and Happiness

I especially like the last one. Oh. And please refrain from following the link for more comics if you're allergic to vulgar or crude connotations. Haha. That's it for now, enjoy!

F is for Fun

Feeling footloose and frisky, a feather-brained fellow forced his fond father to fork over the family finances. He flew far to foreign fields and frittered his fortune feasting fabulously with faithless friends. Finally facing famine and fleeced by his fellows in folly, he found himself a feed-flinger in a filthy farmyard. Fairly famished he fain would have filled his frame with the foraged foods of the fodder fragments left by the filthy farmyard creatures. 'Fooey', he said. 'My father's flunkies fare far fancier,' the frazzled fugitive found feverishly, frankly facing facts. Frustrated by failure and filled with foreboding he forthwith fled to his family. Falling at his father's feet, he floundered forlornly. 'Father, I have flunked and fruitlessly forfeited family favour.'

But the faithful father, forestalling further flinching frantically flagged the flunkies. 'Fetch forth the finest fatling and fix a feast.' But the fugitive's fault-finding frater frowned on the fickle forgiveness of the former folderol. His fury flashed.

But fussing was futile, for the far-sighted father figured, such filial fidelity is fine, but what forbids fervent festivity? The fugitive is found! "Unfurl the flags, with fanfares flaring! Let fun and frolic freely flow!" "Former failure is forgotten, folly is forsaken! And forgiveness forms the foundation for future fortitude."

~anonymous

Angel

After several bouts of grappling with what I call verbal or lexical alexithymia, I've decided to just prose it off my chest. And yes, the lizard and its...dysfunctional wall-crawling capabilities. Imagine your everyday dust-brown tiny-saurus expertly scaling his all-to-familiar vertical terrain, only to "lose grip" and fall flailingly towards a plumbing depth, hitting the floor with a resounding giggle - the laughter of gravity, and of course, not excluding ours too. If the above description hasn't struck your funny bone, it's the second time this lizard's done it, apparently, since last week. If he was thinking of suicide, maybe it's time to try a new method. Coincidence or stupidity? Nah, I reckon it's just a random joke from God to liven up good old Sunday School. What a sense of humour he has haha. Utter and complete randomness.

Was doing nothing when this song came to mind. Hmm...there's something I want to say about it but it all goes back to the first line of this post. And it's probably about that. Attempting to express the explanation of the inability of expression. I'm mystified.

Angel by Sarah McLachlan

Spend all your time waiting
for that second chance
for a break that would make it okay
There's always some reason
to feel not good enough
and it's hard at the end of the day
I need some distraction
oh beautiful release
Memories seep from my veins
Let me be empty
and weightless and maybe
I'll find some peace tonight

In the arms of the angel
fly away from here
From this dark cold hotel room
and the endlessness that you fear
You are pulled from the wreckage
of your silent reverie
You're in the arms of the angel
may you find some comfort here

So tired of the straight line
and everywhere you turn
those vultures and thieves at your back
The storm keeps on twisting
you keep on building the lies
that you make up for all that you lack
It don't make no difference
escaping one last time
it's easier to believe in this sweet madness oh
this glorious sadness that brings me to my knees

In the arms of the angel
fly away from here
From this dark cold hotel room
and the endlessness that you fear
You are pulled from the wreckage
of your silent reverie
You're in the arms of the angel
may you find some comfort here
You're in the arms of the angel
may you find some comfort here

Dusty Morning

May. Nothing's coming in, can't seem to write anything. This is the fourth post of the month, pathetic. Yawn.

Dusty Mornings

It’s on morning like these when
the toxic air-con makes mucus snowflakes
and the sun having just whet
his blades last night
maiming the flesh between the air and my eyes
groaning repetitions of the twenty-sixth alphabet
with supper’s yellow cookie crumbs
(to my surprise)
finding their way between the gaps
to coalesce with flesh
to block out the bright,
in laughter and mocking.
Bough under bough, meat under cloth,
pins and needles.
Ouch.
Last night’s dream was of
Nah, can’t rememboooaaaaarrrggh.
Wet cookie crumbs.

Well, this is the day that You have made.

Thanks for the five senses.

Thanks for letting me wake up before the alaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrgghhm

Slimier cookie crumbs

clock.

~tc©

The Poet is Mightier than the Swordsman

The Poet is Mightier than the Swordsman

If my eyes could draw a painting now
it’d be grey, black or white
like the passing clouds of a teary sky
where the silver lining is fiction
where dreams would vanish when one thought twice.

If my ears could note a melody
of beauty sweet and bitter,
my heart could then take a rest
and my staff would cease to quaver
I wouldn’t need one with this harmony.

If my hands could put into shape surreal
and marshal the monochrome endeavours above
then my threads of gloom and thoughts of love
would vie to vie with the hardest steel,
soften the iciest heart
find the lost
at the cost
of less than a meagre meal
and a single copper coin, perhaps.

~tc©

Mêlée

Its been long enough. A fortnight of network retardation could prove the same mentally as well. Well at least the papers are all over now. I'll save the colloquy for next time, this one here below is quite long. I initially wanted to italicise a few lines but I figured I'd let you do the figuring. It may seem a little alarming but I assure you I don't harbour thoughts about betraying my faith. I can't. That's the beauty of it. Heh. Enjoy.

Mêlée

Peace to you, my brethren!

Hallelujah for divine languor.

Dear child, pl-

Hallelujah for anticipation! Hallelujah for the anticlimax! How ‘bout the antichrist!? Heh, agreed. Hallelujah.

Your bridge, Your grace, Your strategy
Is this how we choose today?
Is this compassion, or love when we tear in vain
for the ones that fade away
Are our words cacophony
fallen on apathy
since You knew what we were going to say?
Have we no say?
Now the wounds of this gap scream of how
they’ll never close away.
The gap You promised to seal.
The scars You promised to heal.
But all is left, is the rain of the unremitting
and our wishing it could all dry up
Just like the sporadic decks of cards that You deal
everyday
spades, clovers and diamonds forlorn
Melodies, hymns and symphonies are noise
Every prayer, every voice
right before every slumber, every meal
Have they become a routine even to You?

Where were you when I was drenched in blood?
Then and now, spears and guns
scorning My tears and My choice, My fate
worse than that of the prodigal son
Yet I haven’t closed a single door
since your walk on the aisle begun
This is My profession, He played that suit of hearts on Me
There was no dice but sacrifice
This is My confession, I need you not but I still love thee.
Child, you won’t live long if touch dictates!
Nor sight, nor sound nor smell
for beauty lives where spirits compel
where ours shall weave and interlock...
I pray.

Light and dark
Light and
Light

It’s been there all along
Oh Agnus dei
break these chains
of alexithymia
of cursory
of vice and felony

Break me and make me again.

~tc©

Pillow

I'm surprised I managed to find solace to inscribe my thoughts despite the informational cataclysm occurring up there right now. Hm. Good, indication of sanity retention.

This one below...I think I'll write a tune for it once the hustle-and-bustle is over, won't do it justice if I don't; at least thats what I think.

Pillow

She’s been beside me, always there
since vacant memory
I’ve held her close from spring’s echoes
to winter’s evergreen
Night by night she’s been the drawer
of the prettiest, darkest dreams
and at dawn, no matter from which I left,
she’d never leave me.
She’d never leave me.
She’s braved the rains of my brown white clouds
and she’s never said a thing
Migraines, lullabies and folded hands,
now she’s old enough for me.
I wish she wasn’t white and soft
or something close to none
because I’ve dreamed that dream so many times
that she would be someone.

I’d scream and sweat and dry my eyes with
my head upon her heart
wishing she’d say, My days have gone,
but our days have just begun.

~tc©

V

"Who are you?"

"Who...Who is but the form following the function of what, and what I am is a man in a mask."

"Oh I can see that."

"Of course you can. I'm not questioning your powers of observation; I'm merely remarking upon the paradox of asking a masked man who he is."

"Oh, right."

"But on this most auspicious of nights, permit me then, in lieu of the more commonplace sobriquet, to suggest the character of this dramatist persona.

Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a bygone vexation stands vivified, and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin vanguarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition. The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous. Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it's my very good honor to meet you and you may call me V."

V for Vendetta

Anger, Assumptions and Androgyny

It was my second time to that salon.

Upon arrival, my eyes met with an astonishing character. Disturbingly astonishing. From vague recollection, I saw him around the last time I came, but never up this close. It was a permanent impression.

He immediately detected my presence and rose to receive my advent with a promotional offering of services.

Herein lies the dilemma. The stupidest thing is, I didn’t know how the hell to address him, or her in that sense. But I guess, for the sake of convenience and ethics here, let us just utilise the paradigm of "he".

On the other hand, my eyes were completely fixated at his elaborate…phenotype.

His face was pallid with thick layers of mascara, with a tinge of reddish-beige sprinkled at the top of his cheeks. A glistening crystal rested blissfully upon his right earlobe. His eyelashes seemed to reach towards mine, and his lips were two distinct creases of bright red. His hair danced in curls from his head all the way to just below his shoulders, and the most formidable perfume penetrated my olfactory defenses like spear and rice-paper. I could have sworn he looked almost identical to Michael Jackson.

He spoke with the most bizarre Mandarin accent, and as such I couldn’t hear nuts. But that wasn’t the only reason. My reserve buckets of attention, all that were left from the busy day, were completely stolen by the pitch of his voice. I thought there were birds in the shop.

So I starting conversing in English, but as soon as I realized we weren’t getting anywhere, I approached another hairstylist near the counter, whom I contrived to be, erm, evidently more perpendicular to the ground. I soon found out that my previous hairstylist was on leave, so he proposed I come back on Wednesday if I had specifically wanted her to get the job done. But since I was already there, I might as well just get it done, so I said to him, “Anyone will do.”

That may have been the stupidest thing I’d ever have said in my entire life. Word of advice, don’t use ANYONE ANYHOW.

Mr. Happy then came over to guide me to a seat. And I was like “Oh @#$%.”

Well, what could I have done? So I put my bag down, got my ass on the chair, donned the prevent-hair-from-falling-onto-your-skin-and-clothes-rubber-cloth-cover-sheet thingy, told him how I wanted my hair to be done, and he started working on it.

We had an amazing conversation of four lines.

“你今年几岁？”

Cool, I understood him.

“十六。”

“哦，刚放学是吗？”

“Er, 对。”

Ok, so maybe it wasn’t going to be so bad after all. As soon as he finished snipping the back, I remembered something I forgot to tell him.

“Er, (long pause because I didn’t know whether to call him Uncle, Sir, or 小姐), 你可不可以把我旁边的头发剪得touch 不到耳朵吗？” I gestured. (Pardon my bilinguistic ineptitude)

There was a short pause.

“我还没有剪好！等一下你要我剪多短我就给你剪多短！” He lashed.

I couldn’t tell if my face was cringing, my glasses were on the table. There was a deafening silence. After 3 seconds, I retracted my right arm, he resumed cutting.

At the corner of my eye I could see his expression. He was DAMN PISSED. His lips continuously muttered vague whispers of “我还没有剪好”. Quite differing from what was repetitive in my mind at that moment. Two phrases. “Siao!! What the hell!?” and “My hair’s screwed.” My fears were met. His hand motion increased in speed, and so did the razor activity of his scissors. The deadly combination of flesh and steel circled the side of my head in a blur, even when it was right next to my ear, and I felt my hair growing thinner, and thinner, and thinner, and EVEN thinner. I was completely at his mercy.

That’s it; he was taking it out on my hair. At that moment a very random thought entered my mind. Hairstylists would make really efficient terrorists in future when nanobombs are invented. But I shoved that notion away; I had more important things to worry about.

He tilted my head with a crude stroke, snipped some more, another tilt, another snip. Even so, this didn’t seem to appease his wrath; his hysterical lip movements hadn’t ceased. I thought his perfume was going to crush my throat as he continued his athletic endeavour to scare the shit out of me.

When he was done, I didn’t dare look myself in the mirror. Then, the squall turned to a gentle breeze.

“来，把你的眼镜戴上。我帮你style你的hair.” What’s that supposed to mean to me, someone else has a similar level of linguistic incompetence? Absolutely not, it was the comfort of casual colloquy.

I put my specs on. First impression: Eh it’s not bad!

He continued to apply some gel, simultaneously telling me about the different kind of techniques I could use, the different hair products I could use, all with deepest affability. Or maybe it was because of the contrast I perceived. Then he lifted the covers, and two dark blue handprints on my pants greeted me with a cooling, deriding sensation. I almost laughed aloud. I wonder if I’ll go back there again.

And that’s anger, assumption and androgyny for you. Here’s what I look like now haha. Not bad right!?

Hey hey, my brows are asking,
"Look above us, what do you think?"

By the way, after paying the bill, he gave me his namecard. It said "Michael".

Golden

I think I'm getting lazier. This 3-month-old baby blog seems to be diminishing in posting frequency. And it'll continue to go down the hill as I phase into mug-mode for T2 Common Test, Mid-Years mildly put. I seem to be the only one is class who hasn't really hit the books yet, but who knows, sometimes inspiration can be so strong it pulls you away from everything.

Anyways, this song below is dedicated to everyone who lays eyes on this post, no matter who you are, and especially to Aiping, whose birthday happens to fall on today.

Happy Birthday to You!

Click there to play! --------------------->

Golden by Switchfoot

(Like freedom in spring)

She's alone tonight with a bitter cup and
She's undone tonight, she's all used up,
She's been staring down the demons
Who've been screaming
She's just another so and so,
Another so and so

You are golden,
You are golden, Child
You are golden,
(Don't let go)
(Don't let go tonight)

There's a fear that burns like trash inside
And your shame of the curse that burns your eyes
You've been hiding in your bedroom,
Hoping this isn't how the story has to go
It's not the way to go,
It's your book now,

You are golden,
You are golden, Child
You are golden,
(Don't let go)
(Don't let go tonight)

You're a lonely soul in a land of broken hearts
You're far from home, it's a perfect place to start

(Yeah!)
(Burn)
(Burn, Burn!)

So this final verse is a contradiction
And the more we learn the less we know

We've been talkin' about a feeling,
We both know inside but couldn't find the words
I couldn't write this verse,
I've seldom been so sure,
About anything before

Golden,
You are Golden, Child
You are Golden,
(Don't let go)
(Don't let go tonight)

This world is a dead man down (Golden, you are)
Every breath is a fading crown we wear (Golden, Child, you are)
Like some debilitated king (Golden, don't let go)
Don't let go tonight

The Earth spins and the moon goes round (Golden, you are)
The green comes from the frozen ground (Golden, Child, you are)
And everything will be made new again (Golden)
(Like freedom in spring) (Golden, Golden)

Hey, like freedom in spring, (Golden, you are, hey)
Like freedom in spring (Golden, Child, you are)
(Gold...)

Charade of the Chimera

Happy 16th birthday JGoh!

Fish and Co. was excellent. I'll never forget the Swordfish Collar. AND the box of condoms heh. Took miles for us to get it for you.

This one's dedicated to a special group of people.

p.s. you might want to check out what chimera actually means I assure you I don't suggest the existence of any mythical creature of the sort, not even in this context.

Charade of the Chimera

We are three demons and we burn our lives
trying to wreck your soul, to pull you apart
to pull you away, away..

My name is skin but they call me exterior
You dress me up and you polish my sheen
but I’m always looking so inferior
to you
What do you want from me?
Demons and men have nothing in common
but I just enjoy this imprudent disorder,
when life’s all about eyes and ears
and I just live off your ornate caricature.

My name is faded and jaded and faded
Why must you make it so complicated?
Why can’t you just show that I’m standing beside you
when you know someday
some light will come this way?
I’m so alone because you keep me far away
from other people with demons like me.
Since you think I’m so much bigger and scarier
won’t you open this cage to set me free,
so that I won’t have to be
a part of “me”?

My name is intrinsic and everyone knows it
I am the winds of the hurricanes and the seas
Yet you can give me a transparent casing
to give my eyes roads, keep my ethereal hands waving
at everyone, everyone, I am not over yet
everyone, everyone I am not over yet
This fool thinks I am.
This fool thinks I’m lost and away in the daylight parade
but the night returns with the wounds still bleeding
with the wounds still laughing at
this ornate caricature.
Oh boy, you can’t think, but at least you can still draw.
You draw well.
Just well.

~tc©

Salvation of the Amnesiac (White)

YEAH!!! 20th post.

Please read this s l o w l y.

Salvation of the Amnesiac (White)

Yesterday was a smudge in the sky
Now was all she had
left behind
And she smiled at the new stuffed toys
resting on her bed
She got new toys everyday
New dresses and a new way of tying her ponytail
She never kept the outside screams
nor the teases, nor even any incoming mail
She just had the one same dream
of smearing her own doodles
her very own doodles
into blotches that seemed to gleam
with a blinding white.

Yesterday was a cross on a hill.
She heard that someone paid the bill
for the meals her granddad had
a long long time ago
“Those are bad for your health, dear.”
“Yes sweetie, mummy’s right, so just run along now, ok?”
Her teeth were really white.

She skipped back to her toys
and she beamed with joy
when Bunny told her she’d be alright.
Oh, how she loved her toys.
And then, she found a new storybook
She promised Bunny she’d read it to everyone
She knew it’d be so much fun
because her audience was never the same.

And one day she was taken away
from her teddy bears
and lullaby days
Those people in white coats
were right
their silver cords and nerdy eyes
They were right
Sooner or later she’d have to go
someday, today
But Bunny was right too
“You’ll be alright.” (smiles)

“It’s over now, you’re by My side, you’ll be alright. You’re white inside.”

~tc©

Epiphany - Part 1

Everything makes sense now. It's a revelation.

Whatever His plans are for me, it goes even beyond the most inflated definitions and borders this world has for superiority.

Again this has arisen from a series of casual musings, late-night to be exact. Thursday was the last day of my attachment at the Biopolis. During our lunch break my friends and I ventured outside the food court after our lunch to explore the jewelery bazaar lined up neatly along the roads. My narcissistic nature controls the feminine side of me, and thus explains a few of my radical reservations for metrosexuality. Of course, this also shows why I have an eye for shiny things. We probed around for about 20 minutes, and I bought this ring which just happened to catch my attention. I didn't know to what about it I was attracted, but time was running out and I promised the she in me that I had to spend, so I gave him the cash.

Fast forward. Herein lies the narration of my act of stupidity. Back at Proteos building where and as the other group finished their presentation, I lazily slapped my right hand on the tables in a continuous motion -- an apathetic effort to applaud with one hand. Then I realized was wearing my ring. Then I realized what an idiot I was. Then I realized I'd scratched my barely 1 hour old object of vanity. Oh yeah, and I went "SHIT!" really loud too. Here's what it looks like now.



See that blot there right under the crystal? That's it. And then the next day, which was yesterday, Good Friday, it came. And it just HAD to be on yesterday. The ring was no coincidence. Now just take a look a that picture again. This is where it gets complicated.

As you can see, the ring is composed of two separate layers, the top possessing a polished, mirror like shine, and the bottom having a more metallic, chromed surface, duller and much less gleaming. The upper layer represents God and His divine being. His existence is glorious, bright, clear, palpable, arresting, and you cannot hide from it, because once you look into it, all that is visible is your wretched nature reflected off the mirror of such a sacred entity. There is a stark contrast between the two layers. You cannot hope to look Him in the eyes because all you get is your aberrant self thrown back to you repeatedly in the face of dazzling light.

The lower layer is composed of metal whose surface has been deliberately blurred, as if it wanted hide something, or hide from something. This is analogous to our falling short of the glory of God. We cannot shine as conspicuously and as radiantly as we once did when He first made us. And we’re constantly reminded of this fact because we bear an insignia of sin, just like the scar I gave my ring right below the crystal. The blemish was permanent; it was unsightly. We couldn’t erase it even if we wanted; it was embedded into our nature. Sin was embedded into our nature.

The two are separated just as we were divorced.

But along strode the diamond. Ok it’s not really a diamond it’s just some bogus piece of crystal. Let’s just take it as a real diamond for the sake of the analogy. The reason diamonds and crystals can boast of such a scintillating sparkle is because of a scientific phenomenon called total internal reflection. Total internal reflection is an optical phenomenon that occurs when light strikes a medium boundary at a steep angle. If the refractive index is lower on the other side of the boundary no light can pass through, so effectively all of the light is reflected.

Ok this is physics. Optics to be exact. Let me first assume you know what refraction is. Basically it happens like this. A light ray enters the diamond, is refracted by the surface by which it enters, hits the other surface by which it’s supposed to exit, but does so at or beyond an angle known as the critical angle (which is determined by the refractive index of the material), and so is consequently refracted, or in this case, reflected back into the diamond. This continues until the light ray hits an angle where it can finally escape from the diamond. Sometimes it never does until a few years later. Light that enters the diamond can get trapped in there for a very long time. This is what makes a diamond look so shiny when viewed from the outside, like a transparent particle with brightness frolicking within.

So why did I choose light to explain this? Is it because Jesus is the one to light our path? Is it because the Bible says we are the light of the world? No. It’s more physics again. Light has one very unique property that scientists have proved but are still struggling to explain. Light exists both as a particle and as a wave at the same time, just like Jesus, who parallels this attribute by descending on earth one hundred percent God and one hundred percent man. No theologian can tell you how it’s possible. And like the light in the diamond, flesh and spirit, He allowed himself to be trapped within the tortures of this world; He enforced humanistic limitations upon Himself, He embraced the limits of tolerable pain. But He also established victory over death; the light ray found an egress.

And in that God bestowed upon undeserving mankind the glorious hope of eternal salvation and reconciliation, just as the diamond bridges the gap between the two layers of conflicting metal, just like the magnificence and splendour of heavenly opulence the diamond exudes in its sparkle with which the beholder adores like a caressing to his heart. This is faith, hope and love.

Amazing?

God is.

The Shape Awaits, the Words Proceed

Greetings from the new man who has recently arose with spiritual rejuvenation and enlightenment from the attendance the pair of BGR talks held in fellowship the past fortnightly saturdays.

Ok forget that, it sounded too artificial lol. But sincerely, the series of "intimate" seminars have truly shed light on a few of my most shadowy of doubts pertaining to the matter. And because of these things, my Switchfoot obsession has again not failed to manifest, and it is with great pleasure for me that I share this wonderful song "Easier than Love", which has been newly uploaded RIGHT there -->

So please listen, and don't get put off by the first word of the song; this is one of those I can really identify with in this modern society :D.

Below - nothing that's gotta do with what I said on top.

The Shape Awaits, the Words Proceed

He’s been sleeping inside your head
from the time you first opened your eyes
He slowly wakes up in the cold dark night
his boundaries are always so grey
He pacifies your dreams
and haunts the lights
You can never ensure
that he turns out right.
He gives you wings of grace
but threatens to steal them
feather by feather
lest you lose your own race
You can’t really hold him in your hands
Sometimes he’s too slippery
Sometimes he’s the only oasis
in these washed out lands.
Sometimes there are others around,
but they're still part of him.
You know he’s there forever till death
but his last vestiges avoid your eyes
till final, final breath.

I know someone who knows him really well.

Do you?

~tc©

"The future is a question mark with kerosene and electric sparks."

Switchfoot

"Burn out Bright"

I'm in a Cage

I’m in a Cage

I’m holding liberty’s hands
with red-hot ash
kissing my ankles, still
sore and numb from yesterday’s run
I’m touching her soft, fair skin
with thoughts of tonight
and heartstrings still knotted together
with yesterday’s theory of flight.

I’m watching her dove-like eyes
dreaming of tomorrow’s light
with chains of the yesteryears
still tempting my tears.
I’m begging her, just her
to restrain the gusts
of yesterday’s winter
and restore my broken wings.

I’m holding liberty’s hands
but they want me to let go

I’m still holding her hands.

~tc©

The Fluid Public

My computer is running so many processes at once that its beginning its journey to amnesia. So much so that I can't properly run my recently downloaded Company of Heroes. Zzz what a letdown, that game has such a high rating. I must rectify this soon. My friend said I could cancel a few of these redundant processes through task manager to save some memory. Yeah I could do that do, if it weren't for the computer's incomprehensible, cryptic dialect(it's still english, but it's thoroughly severed and thrown all over the place lol).

And below is, well, the usual. Or no, because all of them are different. This one is a social critique, only difference from other critiques is that, its a poem ha.

The Fluid Public

Populace is a queen
She has everyone
Including you and me.
She moulds and draws
her shadows and form
with this furtive box
of changing shapes,
of changing doorsteps and keys
And it’s just taking off
with its arms
around you and me.

Everyone’s a corporate slave
Everyone complies with
this boxed-up fallacy
Everyone has a coloured soul
but they are not their own artists
Reluctant conformity,
but by the box
she’s been paid every cent
for acquiescence so it stays up there.

This is our fluid existence
within this stagnant painting
Can’t you just stop holding back
from orthodox bittersweet?
Everyone is either with or without
either in or out
of this box
and she knows not all of her
can cry out in the open
like this...
because of this.

What will happen, oh
what will happen
when we unfold this carton?

tc©

The Lights Must Never Know

The Lights Must Never Know

I’ve been penning down my wishlists long before I heard the bell
Beneath my concrete mantle, a liquid flows and tells
of the chimes that resonate within my lonely, lonely cell
I’ve always wanted something, but this concrete never fell.

I’ve carried with me this avarice of which the lights must never know
I see no hope in giving up, much less to pressing on
The rulers of today's kingdom only enjoy a green paper show
Feeding their lust, in broken bones I satisfy my own.

I crave silver after brown and then the gold after the grey
I scream out loud for the moon’s awake, while the sun remains in reign
But the coldness of the precious stones, they reach my tongue today
The clearness of my ardent eyes, they slowly fade away.

My love for you has made right now my second last death
For even in flames and yellow, I can’t breathe my final breath
Compunction conserves its coldness, chanceless alas, I can't turn back
To the time I could have broken open to escape this ceaseless cleft.

~tc©

Pre-16 Exposition

I've just arrived home. It's about 8.15pm, and the first thing I do when I turn this machine on is to navigate to this webpage. Someone wants to say something really really badly.

For reason unknown I dropped off one stop earlier on my way home, semi-consciously, to just take a walk in the night by myself. I don't know why I do this, but I guess it's good to sometimes just spend some quiet time listening to your thoughts and marshalling their sequences, much like being a self-romantic. At this point I would like to thank the guy who invented blogger, thereby providing such a universally convenient dimension for people to pour out their minds lest they forget such musings in the future.

The sky was unusually clear. It wasn't totally black, instead it was a mixed palette of brown, red and blue. Because of that I was privileged to see the many stars that lined the velvet curtains of night. If there was a word to describe such a sight, it would be pretty. A cool, gentle breeze clung around me and played with my hair, and as I breathed I inhaled the sweet smell of contemplative lonliness. I don't deny that with two it would be sweeter but that's not gonna come round anytime soon.

Back to the stars. The unfortunate thing was the presence of multiple lamp posts that screamed into my eyes whenever I endeavoured to appreciate the celestial models. Man was crafting a world that didn't belong to him, and he was beginning to overdo it. Those lights were bluntly bigger and brighter than that of the stars but, it was only because they were physically closer. When I opened my eyes again, the mystic specks of light just made the man-made fade away.

There was one particular star that caught my eye. It was reddish-orange and much more luminous compared to the rest. I wondered for a moment if it was Venus, but I didn't really care what it was, so long as it was...pretty, as I've said before haha. But as I continued with my promenade I began to realise what those stars really had within them. I saw within their light the friends I had, the mentors under whom I've been disciplined, my parents who have brought me into this existence, and all who cared and are still waiting to care for my tiny little soul. Those stars would be there forever, shining down golden light to show me the way; those stars would hold my hands until I met my maker; those stars were going to be bigger, brighter, warmer, sweeter than any man-made lamp post, composed of mere strips of cold hard metal. It was a beautiful moment of revelation, I'm glad I'm able to write it down here for future recollection.

I must admit, a few strangers shot me bewildered looks. Who wouldn't if you saw a person staring up at the night sky for five minutes in the middle of the pathway. And to add to that, he's smiling like he's never smiled before. Ok that was exaggeration, but it was something like that.

I'm reaching a pivotal age of sixteen in four hours time. Actually, in twenty-three and a half hours time, because I was born at 8pm according to my mum. A sixteen year masquerade, a sixteen year escapade, a sixteen year serenade, or a sixteen year promenade? Time is like a bolt of lightning, today is gonna feel like yesterday twenty years down the road, and when that reality hits you, it can be quite painful.

Time is defined as a system by which we distinguish events. I believe it's more complicated than that. I might die tomorrow, I might end up as the next oldest person in the world (which can still satisfy the conditions of the former statement). All I know and need to know is that I'm following someone who knows what the future holds. It's like buying insurance. You should buy it too. Unlimited warranty :D. Well, this is me. This is my pre-16 exposition.

Passenger

4 days and 3 nights gave me the name of supernumerary, or Advanced Drills Instructor. All this at the expense of burning about 3/4 of my march hols, which was supposed to be spent rushing accumulated homework. NCC HQ still needs improvement. CADETS need improvement; they need to have more common sense. CLTs need improvement; they need to be free from prejudice, and free from the love of being an asshole. These people need serious, drastic change if the governing and organization of NCC is ever going to improve. RSM can't do it by himself, and these people are just dragging him down. Some things need to be synthesised, not regurgitated. And people need to LEARN how to do this.

Anyways, I experienced the empty, meaningless aftertaste of completing an NCC course, as usual, but I just don't know what keeps me going back to HQ to endure such torturous regimes. No, I don't love pain lol, but I do enjoy NCC. It's bittersweet. And just to draw the line, its more psychological than physical. Hard to explain nevertheless, because you'll probably never know it unless you're a cadet.

By the way, a "supernumerary" is defined in the Oxford Dictionary as an extra; a substitute; or a walk-on(actor). For something that's supposed to be most impressive and prestigious to attain, this defintion hardly does it any justice. Or maybe, the idiot who suggested this term for use in NCC never heard of a dictionary. I guess that's why they renamed the course ADC for Advanced Drills Course two years ago.

Ok, enough of lamentations. Tonight, I'm surprised my tired brain actually managed to come up with something. It's a simple and honest poem, actually written to be a song. It's quite short now, just two verses and the chorus, so I'll probably expound on it next time. If I might ask, just let a spontaneous, soothing melody ring in your heart as you read it (note that I classify the genre of the type of music ;P) It might make more sense.

Passenger

I’ve been driving round these broken dreams
in circles right from the start
I can’t believe that there’s nothing new
now that my gas is running out
I see the trees right up in front of me
waving to my heart
It’s like they are the only everything
that marks my very path.

I need to be the passenger of this flight
Of this fading wooden decadence, that I just can’t deny, yeah
Letting go, I don’t want to see these tears before I die
Because right now, I’m telling you, I step aside.

I step outside to find myself just
drifting in the winds
I need a light because I’m lost
in my sea of memories
This is a search for the only cure
for these wounds that never heal
because I’m holding to something small
my hands can barely feel oh

Joan

Joan

She put her palm against her chest and felt the melody of her heart, and her eyes touched the skylines. Vision fell upon the majesty of the clock tower a few blocks down; the second hand ticked with a rhythmic stroke, just like that which was within her. It was one and the same, she saw it and she knew it, and she was glad.

Joan felt the wind running his fingers through her hair and she ran her own through them, with a tight band in one finger. She paced down the streets and saw the lights on the lamp posts, just as they were playing in reflections of her necklace. She reminded herself of the reality of this existence, this was but a dream she had called upon, a request that her guardians of siesta had granted, and she had no more till daybreak to spend this time. But she was not sure why she knew of this.

She arrived at the first shop at the junction where the street met the main boulevard. Everything else was gray and quiet. The light with which she used to see ceased to come from the lamp posts. Instead, her eyes were brightening, showing her every last vestige of the place that lay right in front of her now. The doorknob melted into a mixture of gold and immediately took the form of a pair of graceful arms with long slender fingers. They caressed her hands and she felt a faint kiss just above her wrist. She released the band on her hair and her ocher strands fell to her waist. They curled towards the door, nullifying their naturally vertical nature, and they became very beautiful. The hands of gold rubbed together an exquisite sentiment, and then escorted Joan through the door.

She couldn’t stop those crystals and fabrics from painting that camberous stroke on her face. A fresh, sweet scent followed her around the room, and wouldn’t let go. Still, there was no sound, just like outside, and her mind saw her free from dissonance and she sang the tunes of the notes in her eyes. Joan relished her privilege of green paper, not once did she lament about her greedy hands. She thought she didn’t have to.

With two packages hugging her arms and she exited and moved on to the next. The previous scent had released its tender vice and a new one impressed her more. It was like she felt the rain and tasted honey for the first time since ghastly decadence came. This one didn’t need the golden arms and scintillating eyes. She didn’t look back and stepped inside.

The person who came to attend to her bore an ashen mask and the whitest suit. Joan could only see his warm brown eyes, but that was enough to make her stay. He led her through a few doors, finally reaching a room from where that beckoning aroma arose. Putting a rose in her palm, he left. The space was circular and carpeted with crimson cloth. Two ladies, each having the most alluring smile one could afford, stood beside a cherrywood table. Upon that desk lay the most delicate chemicals that could induce the most delicate, most soothing pleasure, not forgetting the pair of catalysts that would be working their gentle fingers to bolster the reaction.

Joan left her bags to rest on the floor, and then she took off her clothes to reveal her tawny, silky skin, and the meticulous curvatures of her body. She stepped towards the soft bed in the centre and the two started their job, layering her skin with the very desires that fed her beauty.

She left the place about two hours later, only to see the clock tower again. It was six, but the sun had already donned its cape. Her heart beat accelerated with tension, and to her disbelief, the second hand followed. The boulevard was waiting for her patronage; the streets were tugging at her dress. She burrowed through her memories, and amidst the splinters, this was all she could get. This was all that was real.

The sky turned black, only to be torn through by an impaling light the next second. Joan looked again at the streets, and noticed for once, that they were empty. The only people who waited for her were the ones behind those doors. Colour leaked into her eyes; the sky was changing its shade. The lamp posts withdrew their light and hailed the rays coming from above. Joan remembered her sentinels of sleep and why she was having this dream; it was a leaf from her memory. This was real, this was who she was.

Her silver necklace tightened around her neck and she fell down, her head collapsing on her severe, jagged, crystal merchandise. The newer scent flooded her nose and closed his hands upon her soul, and he did this despite the light the sky, which was getting stronger and stronger. By her last breath, she saw the clouds part their ways, and a blinding flash came down upon her.

Then Joan awoke, just in time to see the sun rise.

©tc