An unexpectedly patriotic rant

Its 12:45 am. Earlier than my usual bouts of reflective melancholy. It is already quiet in the house and I’m thinking of pulling an all-nighter simply because. I like this quite in-between.

My room is a mess – the way it used ot be in KSA. I have been keeping it clean since I got here but with all this stuff…I’m wondering why I brought it in the first place. Its like burning a CD. you burn it with a certain mood and then after a couple days wonder why the hell you put those songs in there. What were you thinking? What was I thinking? I was thinking here would be so much like there. I was afraid here would be like there so I brought everything that I needed, might possibly need here. But here is a new place. I need to make space for new things.

I am thinking of relationships and death, and what Pakistan has come to. What we have come to as a people, as a race, as human beings. What has happened to us and where is that Pakistan I remember from my early years? Where is that possibility of life? I never classed myself as patriotic. But patriotism has become more of a love for the people than a love for the government. If it can even be called love. I detest the culture but I know it and maybe that is what makes me feel for it more than the goings on in Mexico or Sudan or Iraq, Afghanistan. I know what the roads look like, I know the smell, the dirt of that country and this mere knowing…it does something. There is so much potential there. So much talent. People like me who are willing to think, willing to put themselves out there, prove themselves, willing to LIVE and not just exist as secondary things among the political warfare. Collateral damage. I hate that term.

I have the urge, again and again, to pack up and go there. To live impermanently but to live and DO something. To change something for someone over there – to show them there is more to life than desecration and death. But I have no money of my own and money is everything. I do have a “network” there – what I prefer to call a group of like-minded individuals who are willing to be real enough to give some form of a damn about whats going on around them. And yes, we have a vision we are working towards – a vision of Pakistan as it once was, culturally rich, educated, a place to be proud of. The Pakistan that we remember from years ago when we were little kids, the Pakistan we hear of from even further back when our parents were kids. We have that vision and perhaps we can make it something more. Perhaps we can make it better.

This wasn’t meant to be a patriotic rant. I guess this is just what I am thinking of, more than I would care to admit. Maybe its some ridiculous response to being in this wonderful mesh of people and cultures that is the GTA. Maybe its some desperate grasp for identity. I dont know what it is but it has me thinking. I wonder what it takes to get other people thinking too.

Untitled

 

I go

about the house finding

new places

for old things –

my books crammed

in the last drawer

of my chest,

your words folded

carefully

in the one above –

the shelf unfilled

table empty

there is too much

and too much missing

from the weight I carried

with me to this land

 

Morning

in this neat suburbia

with its neat

rows of neat houses -

I dress

in the clothes

from a city that shrieks in the night

and by morning has died

and rebirthed itself

leaving the messy aftermath

of loss and creation

 

Morning

in this neat suburbia –

a cushion room

for the insane    we

who have

and have lost

too much

are in a little corner of

the world playing

with our own demons –

in these mornings nothing

happens

and nothing is real

 

In these pristine mornings

who

can say there is something

wrong

with the world

and who still grieves over

those wrongs?

And if

there is still grief

where nothing happens

and nothing is real

what does that mean?

 

You,

around whom

this foggy stillness shatters

and the world becomes

real

Tell me -

tell me upon which shelf

I should place this grief,

folded in what way

tucked in which drawer

Tell me

what have you done with yours?

Tell me

what shall I do with mine?

 

I go about the house

finding new places for

old things.

I am amazed. Absolutely amazed. I listen to them now and think of the small small life I lived in my small small bubble, in this small, protected little sphere of life where everything was externally mediated and I think dear god how could i have lived like that? How could i have even learned to THINK in that bubble? Let alone reject the external mediation and try and try to get a hold of things for myself. I listen to them and think I was like that once but was I? I remember my life in the past 17 years like a haze – only bits and pieces here and a little there – moments without feeling crushed together, floating in this vacuum of ultimate nothingness. Ultimate nothingness that was meant to be my life, my purpose in that country, society, people.

Life has grown for me here and given me space to grow. And I only just now realize it, after looking back at what it was I moved on from.

Villanelle

What comes out of this pain?

echoing through centuries the lament

of being alive and human and sane

We carry on in the wrong lane

tracing the paths of our descent

to find what comes out of this pain

As gatherers we venture out for gain

from our flimsy paper tent

of the alive and human and sane

Walking while predators line the plane

all that happens now happens with our consent

to what comes out of this pain

And this time the Earth does not birth grain

we return with bodies and heads bent

to be alive and human and sane

Many of us have lain

tired nights, long, bodies spent

for what comes out of this pain

of being alive and human and sane

Untitled

 

Your jacket lies

in my room

where I come to smell it

should I begin

to lose your scent

You said

I don’t know

how

this began,

or when

amnesia seizes us turning

bits of our lives to void

the wells empty

and hunger

sits at the edges

of our tongues

 

—

 

After I had poured myself

into you

after we each had drunk

and satisfied ourselves    moment-

arily we sat with bellies

full still groping

for that last drop    the last

gulp which would

quell our hunger    but

the lie never surfaced

 

—

 

we came to each

other as a land

of forgotten landmarks

bodies rigid with

subdued desperation

there is the cracked

sidewalk I tripped on

and scarred my knee

there is

the hill you climbed

chasing june-bugs

 

—

 

later in your car I

tell you lies    there

is no sidewalk    no

chase

 

you roll

my words on the edge

of your tongue we swerve

violently off the hill

I don’t know

how

this began

or when

your body

slashed open

as I grope for

the last drop

with which to quell

this hunger before

the void forms itself again

Song of the Sirens

 

the sounds break open

and die at your feet -

what are we

supposed to say to this?

the heretical sound

of music this night when

no words can be said

to our children

of what we have done to ourselves

of what we keep doing –

 

tonight the sirens

sing us to sleep

to a chorus of rhythmic bombing

tonight the sirens

wail    somebody

has been shot, somebody

has been knifed, somebody

raped

or all three    or somebody

has been netted

with bullets, dragged

into a cell, stripped

mutilated,    or somebody

has choked on a pretzel

 

.tonight

we lay our children to sleep

shutting the fairytale we told

them so they may rest peacefully

tonight    in some other world

that we do not know    (do not wish

to know)    a child

lays entrapped in

the song of the sirens

 

tonight the sounds break

open

but die at your feet –

tomorrow there will be nothing

to say of this.

Reflections on a Man in a Room

I wouldn’t want to be left in the same room with him, relatively alone. It was only the two of us, and then him. Its better to judge wrongly and leave, then to stay and risk…stuff.

The threat was real then. He could easily have done things to us. The door could lock. The walls were thick concrete – sounds didn’t easily pass through. And he could’ve.

He had this look about him. Like he would. Like he was on edge, ready to snap at any moment, any mistaken word. Like he couldn’t look at us without thinking about “it”. But it might just have been me.

So I left. Didn’t wait for any more evidence. Its usually too late by then anyways. I don’t know what happened to the other girl who was with me. She didn’t leave. You could accuse me of abandoning her there, but I didn’t. I told her what I thought and left it up to her. We spoke about him later on. She said he was a nice guy. He might well have been. A lot of them are. Nice.

Recent Reads

I have hit a writing plateau. My poetry is terrible (not improving) and I cannot even begin to write prose. My words are weak. There is SOME thing I want to say, that is swimming around in my head but I can not for the life of my find the right words.

And so, I have been reading. Amazingly, Adrienne Rich is not at the top of the list this time (because I do not have the time!). Only assigned course readings but fun ones…well, my version of fun…which involves staring for hours at the blank space between the lines, trying to figure out what the writer has implied.

Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye – I read this before, about an year ago when I borrowed it from the college library (also where I discovered Rich). Loved it ever since. It is, stripping down to the bare essentials, a story of a little black girl named Pecola. Of course, that isn’t the real story. It never is.

Doris Lessing’s The Cleft - half way through this interestingly topsy-turvy retelling of the origins of “man” quite literally. That is, a boy child being born in a pre-existing community of women. It is interesting because although it is topsy-turvy, a lot of the conventional “female” attributes and roles are assigned to the first women. The novel explains it as the story being translated by a male historian presumably in Rome’s early ages. Even so, I think there is more to it. I will be posting a review of this soon, if I can manage it between…everything there is to be done.

I have also been researching on the Villanelle form for my english paper and have found beautiful poems by Marilyn Hacker, Martha Collins, Theodore Roethke and how can we forget Leonard Cohen! Click and enjoy your mind being turned to blissful mush.

On my shelf, waiting to be “completed”, are a billion other titles (well, 13 at least). But I must first complete a bunch of assignments and extra curriculars and yes…generally manage my time a hell of a lot better.

Signing out!

My values and ideas are dated. It is as though I’m fighting against a demon that has been vanquished. I feel slightly insane. At the same time I am shocked at people’s passivity and obliviousness to the demon’s existence. It is there! Can they not see?! But it is not. How do I reconcile my acknowledgment with their denial? Is there a demon? Am I deluding myself?

I have not been able to analyze the life here to be sure enough. What if the demon has died already? Has the demon died already? They say so. But I don’t believe it. It is like returning from war and expecting bombs to keep falling. I am still afraid. I am still on edge. I am still acutely aware and yet I am not. My energy leaks away, analyzing trivialities, all for protection and none of it is translated into useful knowledge. I know how they move, how they talk, I know how to identify them from several feet away and yet I do not know how to put it down in words for others to know. I don’t know how to stop this. Do I want to stop this?

I am fighting against something that no longer exists. Thus, I must be insane. But am I? Am I really?

Doubt.

I fear I will lose myself in my little ideas and thoughts, and die. I fear I will die having done nothing to turn my little thoughts into big actions. I fear death before I have been able to untangle myself from the tediums of everyday life, to transcend the needs of the day to day (money, food, living space). I fear death before i have transcended the everyday and changed it so it no longer needs to be transcended.

Every Day We Begin Again

Every day we begin again.

Every night as you drift to sleep thinking of tomorrow, what is it you’re looking at? She stands there, between the far end of the horizon and the place where your sight gives way to blurry globs of colour. She does not speak to you. The only sound you hear is the wind as it blows away her scent, co-mingled with the wet-earth smell post-rain, and the taste of iron lies on your tongue.

Every time I turn to her, she is gone.

She comes wearing new dresses each day, all wet-edged with grass. My hands are numb with cold and I cannot see if she asks something of me.

I keep walking.

Every time I turn to her, she is gone.

The Perils of Feminist Angst and Miscommunication

A little girl gets caught in the crush of women waiting to receive gifts sponsored by USAID in honour of International Women’s Day in Kandahar City. With resources in short supply, women jostle each other to make sure they get their share.

Photo by Paula Lerner

The Globe and Mail has recently published a series of interviews, titled “Behind the Veil”. This series endeavors to bring to public attention the everyday plight of the Afghan woman, and more generally, the oppressed woman, wherever she is. Unfortunately, despite procuring several opportunities to speak privately to these women, The Globe and Mail has failed to produce what could have been among the most powerful pieces of feminist reporting in our era.

A major fail-factor with regard to these interviews was The Globe’s shitty methodology. The interviews were conducted by a hired local woman/girl (I believe there were two because there are two different voices). The hired Globe proxy was “trained” to use a digital camera and to ask the interviewees a bunch of questions on a list that The Globe provided. The list consisted of basic identification questions (name, place of birth and residence, marital status etc) to more “serious” ones such as “what is the difference between men’s and women’s lives in Afghanistan?” “What do you think of the political situation in Afghanistan?” and my personal favourite, “Have you ever driven a car?”. I’m sure that between the daily beatings and degradation that woman face everyday, they’re all just crushed by the fact that they aren’t allowed to drive cars. Absolutely crushed. The denial of choice in marriage, the denial of birth control, the denial of all those other more important things is secondary, of course.

WHAT was The Globe thinking when they put in that question? Or were they thinking at all?

The entire series seems to be centered on evoking a response from the independent, working woman, instead of trying to represent the life of an Afghan woman without biases. The effect of this series would have been exponentially stronger had The Globe tried to promote a sense of solidarity between the Afghan woman and the American woman (or Canadian, or European, etc) instead of projecting Afghan culture as different from ours and thus harrowing. The Perils of Feminist Angst are exactly this – projecting our cultural values onto another person and judging their life by that standard – illustrated beautifully in the question “Have you ever driven a car?”

The penchant people have for finding differences between their culture and one the have judged to be “inferior” is remarkable, and dangerously misleading. In approaching the study of a culture with biases, a researcher or reporter or communicator loses the ability to present an objective 360-degree view of the dynamics at work in that culture. This is what has happened and what keeps happening in articles or news pieces regarding the Afghan culture or others similarly deemed inferior. In asking women if they have ever driven a car, The Globe is implying that driving a car is a priority. But is it? Wouldn’t these women rather have safe households? Wouldn’t they rather be allowed to grow up before they are required to consummate marriages with men sometimes 10 times their age? Why did the Globe not ask them why they raised their sons to be abusive, domineering men? Why did the Globe not ask Mothers in Law why they treat their Daughters in Law with such hatred when they themselves have been in that position?

The flaw lies again with The Globes interviewing “techniques” and the fact that a professional reporter did not conduct these interviews. Instead of an empathetic connection forming between the interviewer and interviewee, a mutual trust, there is a distance and a sense of duty. The interviewees communicate suspicion through even their burka-clad faces as the interviewer reads from her list of questions robotically, not acknowledging and responding to their answers but just drumming out her own questions. An opportunity for female connection and understanding has been lost, and while facing dismissal from their male counterparts, the Afghan women face it from their kind too.

I will end this post with a poem by the renowned Adrienne Rich, who has been and still is among the most influential feminist activists to ever have lived.

Women

My three sisters are sitting
on rocks of black obsidian.
For the first time, in this light, I can see who they are.

My first sister is sewing her costume for the procession.
She is going as the Transparent lady
and all her nerves will be visible.

My second sister is also sewing,
at the seam over her heart which has never healed entirely,
At last, she hopes, this tightness in her chest will ease.

My third sister is gazing
at a dark-red crust spreading westward far out on the sea.
Her stockings are torn but she is beautiful.

Ways to help the Afghan women.

The morning wakes to her voice, like sweet scented wind whistled through the lips of a tropical canopy. Birds gather at her window (barred), wings flapping like a million men running on dry underbrush. The rain inside drips like the pounding of silent piano keys (drumming fingers on wood). Gunshots suddenly (lightening) puncture through the canopy somewhere (men run frantically now).

She has collected her songs in a jar, to sing some other day.

On Writing

Writing is like going to war. There are a lot of inflated egos involved. Most times the issue has been blown out of proportion. Other times there is no issue, just a need for blood, carnage and destruction. Except every innocent civilian killed, imprisoned, kidnapped, raped, mutilated – those tortured and those that torture – are all visions of the narcissistic soul that sits, silently, holding a pen.

Letters to No One

Dearest,

Our last chat has left me with a kind of tasteless melancholy… melancholy that is targeted at nothing and triggered by everything – the coffee pot, the building next-door, the frayed cloth slipper on the pantry floor. I dare not venture into rooms that hold the real memories. You left some of your clothes on the bed in your room, and I found a pair of socks while I was doing the laundry. Yesterday Max brought me a belt of yours in his mouth. And locked somewhere in these rooms is the smell of you. I dont open any doors for fear of losing you again, wholly.

I dont want to go over what we said. We were both hurt, angry, scared. Its funny how these emotions keep coming back to us from childhood. Adulthood just brings exhaustion. I watch our children play in the mornings and wonder what I am to do now. They ask me why you have left.

I am sorry for what I have done to you, and to our children. But I do not regret it. Whether you understand or not my motivation for doing so, I dont know; I am thankful nonetheless that you have accepted this arrangement.

Love,

X

The scarf hanging behind the door flickers in my peripheral vision. It isn’t cold out. The scarf has been hanging there from several winters ago, faded and dusty now, partially moth-eaten.

No face emerges from behind the door. The door does not budge. Yet it seems as though the scarf has become an effervescent vapour that moves to drafts of air blowing through the door’s woody fingerprints, but the air is stagnant

The baby-tongue of my lantern’s flame stands, twitching only slightly. My shadow on the wall is a malformed apparition and the moon cannot be seen from  my window. The scarf still flickers in my peripheral vision and I expect you to walk through that door.

“Leave living to those who know how to do it.”

Cleaning out your home after you passed, I finally understood.

More on my readings of Adrienne Rich

I have been devouring Adrienne Rich’s works by the book-full for the past month – since uni started and I could freely borrow what I wanted from the beautiful, calming, liberatingly massive collection of books they’ve got. And this isnt even the tip of the ice-berg yet.

I have noted a bunch of authors, women, that Adrienne has referred or referenced to in her works. I intend on reading their complete works as well. Once I’m done with Adrienne of course. (I prefer saying Adrienne to Rich because her work is simply so personal, so much her own that to distance her from it by using simply her last name would be…meh)

At the moment I’ve checked out two of her books, Of Woman Born – Motherhood as Experience and Institution, and On Lies, Secrets, and Silence. In contemplating her work, any of her work be it poetry or prose, I have found a much needed affirmation, a refreshingly female perspective on what it means to be female. I’m sure all of this sounds like “feminist tripe” but having struggled with personal identity for as long as I can remember, finding a voice that makes so much sense provides immeasurable relief and strength.

I cant claim to understand what pains Adrienne Rich has been through, how much she has suffered to come to this point of realization..or several realizations..to then voice them, live by them. I cannot even begin to imagine. But what amazes me is her ability to identify all the major issues surrounding the collective female experience (not just her own) within a (still) patriarchal society. What amazes me more is her ability to understand and come to terms with these issues, to then present them in a way that may be understood by others. What it comes down to, really, is the strength to write the complete, unadulterated, unfiltered, stark truth. And to then learn to deal with it.

I hope to meet her some day, attend a reading or some other event and tell her how her words have acted as glue between fragments of myself that I had lost, was losing or would have lost. I wonder how lost still I would be had I never chanced upon The Fact of a Doorframe at my college library, and found in it a voice – a female voice – of strength, purpose, sincerity and disillusionment. I am tempted to say I wish I had found this voice sooner, but I might not have been ready then. I look at my sleeping sister and despite the tumult of emotions I have felt since her birth two years ago, I want to be this voice for her – this voice that refuses self-destruction, powerlessness and objectification. I want to be this voice. I want to be this person.

The Works of Adrienne Rich

I stare in awe at her books, not daring to read them or even to touch them. Sitting in front of the arrangement, I look briefly at the floor (in respect and shame) and wonder what gives me the right to say I can understand and relate. What gives me the right to even read her words?

I sit in front of the books expecting judgment. Like a virtuous lad ready to be knighted or a convict beheaded. I sit in the presence of her words that seem to live outside of themselves…and finally, finally gather enough courage to reach out and pick one.

I have it on my bed now – the book itself a force. And I wonder if ever she felt as weak and displaced as this, if ever she scanned a room for places to hide; or if the strength came to her from infancy, if there was no other way to live than to stride forth and announce her presence.

Chapters – 2

The screen comes in and out of focus. There are patterns reflected on it from today’s pale sunlight. It will rain today, heavily.

She begins her day like any other – with the brown slop-substitute for food. Out the door now, in the car, she goes over what she must accomplish during the day. There are several emails to reply to, mostly from Rob, her editor. She writes slogans for a living; things like Coca cola’s “Open Happiness”. Though not for a multinational company, and not for half as much money as the person who wrote that (slop).

Rob emailed her about a meeting with a big client of their’s – some new office supply company. She wonders if her life could get any more mundane than it is now and concludes that it is possible. Upon further inspection (though), she cant see how.

The clock’s cubic orange numbering tells her she’s on time, punctual, as professionals are supposed to be. She has been debating turning on the radio like she usually does. There is something peaceful about this town in winter.

bullshit

At this hour your eyes are sore
Your body asks for sleep;
the only sound from the window is
that of the wind
and an occasional sparrow awoken
by whatever awakens it and causes
panic   the bird’s little heart racing faster than it does

You fall asleep at your table     a pen between your fingers
and an unmarked book on which rests your head -
you are awakened
by whatever awakens a tired human being  and causes
panic    your heart racing faster than it does

The birds outside are silent now,
the only sound comes from your flipping pages
and the almost inaudible hum
of the table lamp you read by.
If you sleep you will wake;
you cannot stop.
Too much is still left to be

finished.

Middle Ground

Inspired by Mr. Sherlock Holmes herself.

Communication

There is too much silence in life. Sure, we’ve got Twitter and Facebook and WordPress and other modes of communication and platforms for “free speech”, but how much of that speech is useful? How much of it is said for the right reasons? To the right people?

Most of what is said turns into background noise for all the words and questions we turn over in our heads. Half-baked ideas that get pushed aside for some “how do you do? The weather is great today, isnt it?”, questions that get smothered by the repetition of to-do lists, things that need to be screamed out and arent, simply because we forgo quality for quantity, authenticity for some nice warm fuzzy feeling that we get inside by looking at the number of “friends” we’ve got on our “friends list” or contacts on our mobile phone, or views on our blog.

How much of what we say goes to waste? And where does all this lost energy go?

Is this what communication has come to?

I just finished watching Blood Diamond. You know, that film about how diamonds are forcibly mined, smuggled and bought buy people all over the world? The one which ends with a guy finally getting his family together from a diamond he hid. That leaves you with the quote “there are still 200,000 child soldiers in Africa”. Fuck knows, there may be a couple thousand more. And for every child there’s a mother, father and sibblings that’re grieving. But you know what the problem is? The problem is – movies like that, articles like that, books like that…they might make someone cry for a minute, or write a cheque (as the movie aptly points out)…but then what? Then you feed your cat, lock the doors and blog about it.

Can you tell me how it made sense to you

dearest,

to sift through the sands that blew upon you

in heaps, mountains now; Can you tell me

how it made sense

to pick out grains from crumbling sea-shore castles

and hour-glasses and shells?

(Your fingers were dry when they found you,

the sand had caked about your fingernails.

There were traces of sand in the crease of your lips,

but they say it was an errant nail that finally did you in -

cut you up from the inside just the way you would have liked,

after the bath there was not a mark on your body

nothing to tell us you died fishing the grains from the mountain you were buried in)

I dont think I’ll go places. I’ll give up some day and decide to go live in the caves.

I finished the two gifts I was making! :L I are happy.

Dreamers

Dreams? Dreams you say? Frivolous persuits. There are no dreams here. At least none that are different from anyone elses. We dream to be One, all of us. We dream to be better persons, lawyers, doctors and engineers too, of course. We dream to be good wives and quiet children that dream the same way too. We dream in sequence and structure, the proper way dreams should be dreamt. When it is unbearably quiet in the night, we are all asleep. And the unbearable quietness of day is not heard by us either for we have not awaken. We dream, you see, in cyclic fashion, perpetually, continuously. And in our predictably similar dreams, patterned to what a wonderful world, we abide by the dreaming rules, and continue dreaming happily ever after.

Reading People

There is a certain urgency about her. Too much of an effort being expended to please, to be the fun one or the funny one or the one everyone has a good time with. I wonder where that comes from and my mind draws certain conclusions and imagines certain scenarios I know arent true. Or at least I have no reason to believe are true.

Her gestures are exaggerated, as is her voice, her intonation. I’m tempted to say it is an act but it would be wrong to say its not genuine. It is genuine. It is an unconscious or at least uncontrollable way of being. That isnt to say there is anything wrong with being as such. It is simply interesting to observe an exaggerated personality. I would like to know what more there is to it.

~*~

I wonder how accurate my conclusions are about people. But then it is inaccurate in itself to draw conclusions at all because that is to assume a certain finality to who we are as people. Lets see where this new category takes us. I plant to keep on “studying”, people watching and such.

10:35am

I have finished my exams and I’m strangely glad. I’m not usually because exams really dont mean anything to me, but my application for college withdrawal is complete and signed by all the right people. Now all thats left is giving it in after all my grades are in the system. And after that all thats left are the goodbyes…but goodbyes really arent goodbyes anymore. People that want to stay in touch do stay in touch and its better to simply clean out the ones to which your actions are more of a liability than anything else. And so I will be cleaning out, gladly, all the skeletons, spiderwebs and dustballs from the back of my proverbial closet. And I will be happy for it.

Psych final on Saturday, History of Graphic Design on Sunday. No mood to study for either and zero preparation for both.

Hooray.

Its 2:45am.

There used to be days when I used to be writing furiously at this hour. A poem, an abstract piece, a something. I’m too tired now. And the crippling melancholy has set in. Its interesting and frustrating at the same time that I feel this way; that something is fundamentally wrong after a perfectly good day. What sense does that make? When life hands you lemonade itself, what is there to be upset about?

Theres a shitload to do, a lot of it thats emotionally overwhelming stuff. Not the goodbyes, but the arranging things for the school year over there – the registering, the applying for an id card. I havent even sent my dad the form yet so he can mail it. I;ve filled it out, saved it and everything but simply not emailed it. Its called fear, this thing that ruins everything. An irrational fear of life itself. Sad part is I know exactly what it is that stops me and i do nothing about it. And then make up excuses. But dont we all make up excuses for ourselves? Its how we all live as humans.

As humans… what are we as humans?

I want to write something here. I intended to write something here, but its 3:20, I have just returned from a draining wedding, and tomorrow is another day. Another fucking day.

I have yet to complete my photography project. And I have to put the finishing touches on my psych paper. And make a powerpoint for the both of them. And complete the two gifts I’ve been making.

Things keep going wrong. And I’m too tired to do anything about them except seethe internally. I have been telling myself its all in my head, and really, until a while ago I felt good. But I keep lapsing into this state of melancholy where everything matters so much that nothing can matter at all. Where I struggle between action, reaction and inaction. Because things need to be done, but my chest feels like a black-hole into which the rest of my body has disappeared.

I convinced myself today that I no longer belong to the world of the creative. I should simply give up the guise. Stop taking pictures, stop drawing and making things, because I wont get it, no matter when i wont have that flair. With that comes the feeling that my life has been a succession of improbably chances and incredibly good luck. And luck can only take you so far. I dont have it in me to face the odds and brave the waters and do the long list of other things that are done in such cliches. I simply dont have the flair. The life. The vivacity. And no amount of technical excellence makes up for that. No amount of being good at XYZ makes up for that. No amount of anything else makes up for that because in the end I’m creatively fucked. I am snug inside the box and I dont even know that I can open it. To paraphrase again, I am creatively fucked. I am an artistic nothing. I’m a walking, talking, fucking generic cliche. The shallow, vain, psuedo-intellectual, that would like to think there is something special about her because everyone says so – everyone expects as much. But in fact there is no specialty. My cowardice is cloaked in “excellence” and thats all there is to it. Nothing special. Nothing.

Its a kind of strange happiness. Not the overwhelming, fleeting enthusiasm I’m used to feeling. Its a kind of peace. An acceptance of what was, is, and a realistic and mildly optimistic view of what will be. There is some clarity now, regarding a few things…regarding inspiration, creation, purposes and meanings and all of that “deep” stuff. I’ve realised I can feel what I feel without being consumed by it, while still retaining stability, knowing that it is *ME* that feels and thinks. I feel but that feeling does not possess me and does not explain my actions. My actions are mine. My choices are mine. And the way I live my life is mine.

Perhaps I’m in this mood because I know i’m leaving. The date is coming ever closer. And yes, there will be people I will miss…but then what of the people I will meet there? What of being able to “grow into my shoes” so to speak? What of being ME? And being able to freely be as I please? The thought of being given this opportunity, to move to a place where freedom is unconditionally given…the prospect of such a place is enlivening.

We have been having these installation projects lately in college, interactive art pretty much. Today I participated in another group’s project. It was fun but esentially pointless. I think the fun part made up for the pointlessness We took paint in squishy bottles and splashed a person with different colours of paint. I got my new jeans dirty but the paint washed off. Our installation was “installed” yesterday. Its a bed on which people write their dreams. It went well, people connected. I connected. These artworks, they’re beautiful. To get the audience to connect with your concept, and in our case, to have a little piece, a snippet, of the workings of people’s minds…its beyond amazing. Its llike being part of things, not watching from far above as your body moves around and talks to people and does things, but actually being in the moment. I want to feel like this, everyday. I want to feel like this for the rest of my life – completely in the moment but also liberated from it. To be both inside and outside myself, not as a divided half but as a whole. As a whole, complete person that has the right and reason to believe in the future.

I’m going to go treat myself nicely now, get the paint out of my hair and maybe go draw.

Take care all ^_^

I feel SO FUCKING USELESS!

I MUST CREATE!!! I MUST!

I experience vague instances of feeling, every now and then. Vague, unidentifiable feelings, but still, momentary breaks in the bleak nothingness I feel most of the time.

I was asked what I thought about life, how I felt about things, people, anything, everything. She said if she asked me if I was happy, it would be a very silly question. One of the few that realize that. I said here it felt like someone was holding a pillow to my face. I think I might be at the stage where a person loses all consciousness. But I didnt tell her that.

It was a strange day. There was a lot of emotional revelation. People seemed ready to talk, only waiting for someone who would listen. I wish I had been in my usual state, at the top of my empathetic ability so I could have felt the importance of it all instead of telling myself, logically, how I was meant to react and what words said would help the most. But we do what we can. I helped as I could.

Tomorrow will either be busy or filled with mild anxiety. I have not begun working on what I have to do…
So I actually should go.

I think i might write something today, later….or at least draw a detailed miniature of an idea I had for a painting/pastel drawing. Creativity…*satisfied sigh*

I got bored of my background so…here be the new one!

I find it is a refreshing change from the old one which was progressively becoming more drab and boring.

I shall change this one when I get bored of it, but for now, this shall fuel my writery-ness or at least allow it to transfer itself onto teh page.

Letters to No One

There were nights you and I would make the most childish promises; hook our pinkies together and promise to be blood sisters. We stopped short of slashing our palms..we were still kids then, no matter how grown up we thought ourselves to be.

I dont speak to you now. You called me on it once in your tear-filled voice. You accused me of breaking our promise and I denied it. There was no promise. I didn’t make a promise. I dont remember.
But I did.

You hung up and I went to my desk, sketched a picture of you and tore it to pieces. I was the first among many traitors that would walk through your life and disregard it. We were twelve.

Your room smells of old
history books, musty paperback novels
that have been felt
with eyes and read by hands, and later
rested on sturdy mahogany shelves.

You’ve left your glasses on the bed
stand, next to a picture of your wife -
you told me
she died romantically, her head in your lap
on a trip to the alps or some other cold
place. I wonder
if she thought so.

I’ve been waiting naked in your room
for a while now, you said
you had to go take your blue
pill -

The cloud car ran over a cloud boy today,
while he tried to fetch his cloud ball from the street.
I tripped while jumping over a puddle,
trying to save a little cloud ant
instead.
A black cloud cat crossed my path;
I was smitten by the cloud god -
he said I’d better get my dirty feet
back down to earth
before he made the clouds rain
and there was nothing left to stand on.

So many comments! :L

Thank you Darky

I hope you’re well. And I’m sorry I havent been on MSN lately its busy on this side of the world.

Update your blog!! So I can comment too

*non-existent hugs*

I’ve come to this blog more than a few times in the past couple days and stopped short of making an entry because

a) when I first made this blog, I was determined that it wouldnt be a place where I come and whine about myself
b) if I ever did whine about myself, it would be done in style
c) it was supposed to be a place for creative expression of common thought.

Unfortunately my mind is not beautiful enough for me to make it what I intended it to be. Maybe some day I’ll manage to pull it back into shape. For now, I”m convinced of one thing, that is, sometimes the healthiest thing to do is to sit and whine about one’s self. I said sometimes. Being honest I do it more than sometimes but I”m a writer so I”m entitled. Hah. So as days go by and leave my mind blankER than it already is, I shall whine in plain words.

—-

The day started of as usual – I woke up at 5ish, realised I’d fallen asleep without having turned out the lights and such. So I got up, turned off the computer, the lights, turned on the AC, neatened up the bed area and went back to sleep. Woke up again at about 8ish and took out my phone and mp3 player from underneath me. Went back to sleep. Woke up again at 10ish and stayed awake.

It was a rather boring day, after that, as holidays go. It generally has been..pretty dull around here. Even with the exhibition coming up and whatnot. Its like going from walled enclosure to walled enclosure. Life here is like that. Its either my room or the living room or some fucking mall or shop or grocery store..with very little in between except for traffic jams and drives spent arguing with someone or the other about something or the other that really shouldnt make much of a difference. Even daydreaming about catching a flight to somewhere on a whim is ludicrous because of the shitload of legal formalities to be carried out before one can leave the country. The earliest I could ever leave is two days, considering its the middle of the week. I’d never be able to work at an airport and what all those people leave and be stuck in one place myself.

Heh. I just spent the last half hour looking for the cheapest flight out of here. Turns out search engines dont work that way. I’ve got to type in a destination. Funny thing..I dont really know where I’d rather be.

Its easy to think being in a different place would make me a different person. To an extent, maybe…but it wouldnt *really* change much. I would love to keep traveling. Pick up and start afresh somewhere after 2 to 3 years. Live in those places, encounter new people, encounter myself encountering new people, new things. Life gets boring in the same place. In pursuit for constancy and “settling down” people forget how much is out there. Its not a small world. Not in the least. Or maybe its just about having no strings attached, no bridges to go back over except the ones I choose not to burn. As clean a cut as I will it to be. Selfish? So be it.

My recent physical crash I have determined is/was a physical manifestation of..well, this sense of feeling trapped, bogged down, etc etc. After several pricks and tests and whatever else, its been diagnosed as..hmm..nothing too serious. But it couldnt have been nothing. It was too fucking much to be nothing. The last few test results will arrive tomorrow but I”m pretty sure they’ll be clear. They say all situations can be changed but I dont know how to change this one. The cursor blinks now…I have no more to write. Its 4am and I should probably be getting to bed…to wake up to another walled enclosure to spend my day in.

A moment ago I knew what to write here.

The sun hangs hollow
shining hollow rays
that turn iridescent when refracted
through hollow things -
and in the emptiness of the day
what more can you say except
you have no more words?
what more can you feel except
a hollow, unending weakness?

Extract – Nausea by Jean-Paul Sartre

When she is alone in rooms, I hear her humming to prevent herself from thinking. But she is morose all day long, suddenly weary and sullen.
…
She suffers like a miser. She must be miserly too with her pleasures. I wonder if sometimes she doesnt wish she could be free of this monotonous suffering, of these grumblings which start up again as soon as she stops singing, if she doesnt long to suffer once and for all, to drown herself in despair. But in any case, that would be impossible for her: she is too set in her ways.

He thumbs through
your belongings
absently
when you take leave of him -
(the burgundy scarf
pale lipstick,
pencil, sketchpad)
and places them on a shelf
with similar items.

Having cleaned his room (of you)
he steps out the door
to find his pick for the night.

A leaf falls
in the garden
by the pond
on our wet picnic mat
close to your lips
singed by the sudden heat
of the gun barrel
that you held between them

Madness is a luxury – to willfully give in to crippling fears, insecurities, to surrender to whims, to give up simply all form of socially acceptable living…to live for ones self is a luxury. To call it selfish would be pointless. Everything we do is selfish. In acknowledging the selfishness, in bringing ourselves to embrace it, at least we are not being hypocrites.

They say there is a link between madness and creativity. Woolf, Keats, the big and famous, the literary giants, the painters, the musicians, the everything, all of them were mad. Does that mean then that I must surrender creativity for normalcy? Does that mean that I will lose my creativity in embracing normalcy?

I can feel it already – thinking inside the box. Its a box bigger than most, I agree. But a gold cage is still a cage and a box with invisible bounds is worse. It isnt exhaustion, it isnt momentary creative block – it is a thought pattern that has nestled cozily and helped itself to my brain-juice. I am spent without having spent anything. Creativity has been diffusing out of me within these confines – within these spaces that only allow me to be creative in such way, in such context, in such direction. You may only be creative when it is required of you, in the mean while please maintain a clinical distance. Clean cuts, suction, no mess and healing stitches. Keep your creativity bandaged up until we need it. Otherwise it is of no use to us.

This post is an attempt at explaining away my mediocre creations of late. Of course, it is untrue. I am responsible for my creativity, to channel it through whichever pathway, outlet. I am responsible for my mediocrity. Nothing gets to me more.

I hate people.

Its really as simple as that.

“People” includes me, in case you thought I think I’m a saint. I’m not. I’m probably a bad person. At this moment it doesnt bother me much. Its human nature to be bad, isnt it? You’re either bad to other people or you’re bad to yourself. Or both.

Right now I”m ignoring my baby sister’s calls for “doodie” <– me, and I am procrastinating which is eventually gonna bit me in the ass. I’ve also spent the day being used as a doormat. Its a good feeling, to give. Yeah, it really is. <– sarcasm, in case anyone missed that.

I’d better get to that assignment I’ve been avoiding for two weeks.

Bits of the Day that I felt awesomely :L

I am in an oddly chipper mood after my mindBLASTING headache…<–weird joke.

The day has gone well and I might even be able to borrow random books from somebody! Yay! Books make me happy :L

I have also accomplished (I hope) something that I have been trying to finish for a while now (Yay! again!) :L

And despite the fact that I miss a lot of not so random people terribly (Darky included but not exclusive) I feel GOOD :L Does anyone realise how fucking hard that is around here? :L

*happy sigh*

I made a random drawing today..of…well, take a guess… in the uber awesome drawing session thingie. Tis scanned and attached below.

No, It is crumpled paper!

In other news, the colour photography shooting went beyond disasterously. Well, it actually didnt..go at all. There were seniors in the studio during our scheduled session AND they stayed for about 3 hours. But oh well. Life is GOOD! :L and no, that is not sarcasm.

Needless to say, I have not written anything today as I do not feel like shit. Thats an odd relief. I’m thinking I will not attempt to write until I really do feel like it, instead of force stuff out like I have been. I will wait and bottle shit up so the next piece of mine is a masterpiece :L aren’t I smart? I am SO ready for a masterpiece.

Anywho, that is all of this lunatic’s ravings. I shall now proceed to work on my many assignments and random other side projects. hooraaaa! :L

Toodles

Letters to …

Darky! I miss you!

(Yes, I had to publicly declare it)

Its not going to stop
No, its not going to stop
till you wise up

~ Aimee Mann

My heart beats for no reason. I feel dizzy and light headed and I can barely type because the strength of my fingers seems to have given out. I want to crawl into bed and stay there..as I did today. But I have work. Sketches and a test and a process book to get bound. And a colourful dress to choose for photography. And? And. *sigh* I am out of breath. But I havent been running. I have barely moved today.

I should go..and do some work.

I saw you
the other day
sipping tea in the place I left you
darjeeling with mint
I knew from the window;
and from the window I wondered
if it was fear that kept you still
or loss of a certain consciousness -
if you hoped you were like the steam
rising and dissipating
above your mug
or if you had already condensed
on the ceiling
or the cooling fan.

It began to rain
then,
so I left you
twice the same
once – after our bodies had aged
but we were still
youthful
and again – after our bodies had aged
and youth had fled our tongues

Mom and dad were on speaker phone. Sophie was with mom. I was in my room feeling guilty as fuck while trying to (unsuccessfully) concentrate on my homework.

My brother, apparently guilt-less, went to take a fucking nap in the middle of the evening. He will then proceed to go out with his friends and return after 12, incidentally the time Sophie falls asleep.

Its been a strange (?) day. I suppose its because I havent slept. College was good..as was the open drawing class. Its something I can look froward to every week.

Who knew happiness could be this tiring? My day was what a normal person would call “good”. I felt good. Until I got in the car to go home. It is mostly just physical tiredness, this state of mind..but of course, with physical tiredness comes weakening of mental defenses.

I think I might go to bed… but of course, I’ll wake up feeling the same way. At least this way, I’m writing.

The sound of moving people now, in this room where you have closed your eyes and chosen, once and for all, to rest. The sound of moving people. Moving closer to your bed, closer even to the rhythmic rise and fall of your chest, the soft ups and downs of your stomach, the barely audible moans, whines, sighs coming from your cocooned shape.

Moving people- yes, them, the movers that came and packed it all away. Wrong address, you told them. Any address would be the wrong one, except all of those, down the road. The older ones, just so slightly weathered.
We are from there – from those weathered houses.

Moving people, shuffling around, breaking the peace. Moving people, their gray faces and forced words that hold no meaning once rolled on their charred tongues and pushed through their blue lips. Moving people, all of them. Moving over your almost lifeless body, moving with the rhythmic rise and fall of your breathing, the ebb and flow of your blood, the barely audible moans, whines, sighs. Moving.

Too much has happened in this room. In this room where you sit reading my words. Too much has happened to you and we cannot all survive in this room, yours only by proximity.

It has the best view of the garden. A view you saw everyday as they fed. A view you never noticed, thrust on your stomach, breathing through (suffocating in) soiled sheets from the day before. Too much has been taken – we cannot all survive.

You dont remember. You do remember. You dont remember. It never happened. You do remember. It keeps on happening. Moments of peace come to find you now, and you fight them off. It was in peace that you gave to them. You can never touch peace again.

Blurb

You search for empty pages on which to relieve yourself. The sinking heart, the cluttered mind. Outside the window pigeons flutter away, one after the other. You have taken to letting the words pour out of you, with no control. It doesnt work. There is only so much you can write before you have to write the truth.

You remember words (not yours)
stolen feelings – cliches
You scribble down a thought
or two
and call it
poetry

There are only
so many
ways to say
you are in pain;
beyond that,
pain ceases to be;

it becomes the room
in which you live -
the room in which
too much has happened;
even the jewelry box
holds your gem,
the uneven folds of your bedsheet
cradle it,
and the vacant chair is warm
with its heat.

The power of my eyes will diminish as I write this, in the dark, by the soft blue light of a mobile phone (new-age candles). But the pain is too great, and there are too many thoughts. Before something breaks (before I break) I must let go, write, speak, create something of the pathetic excuse of a life I have. I must make something of my anguish, let it not be in vain. Let the struggle not be forgotten, underestimated. That is what its all about, isnt it? Self-preservation, self-recognition, self- retribution, chastisement in some cases. Art is narcissistic. I am, fundamentally, narcissistic. I help because I know what it is to not be helped, worried over, thought of. I help to redeem myself as more than what I think myself to be. To try and be better than I am, better than I can be. To, in some ways, not be me at all, in some ways not be human at all. To not want or need or desire, to simply love, live, breathe as though it were easy, as though it is easy to feel each moment, cherish each moment. As if it is bliss living in sweet pain, reminiscent pain. Cultivated pain. Sometimes remembrance is not enough, and forgiveness is impossible. And the only peace comes from knowing you get what you deserve, knowing you are suffocating, dying and have been so for years now. Knowing life can only be cherished when death is near. An idea you hold close to your heart. That joy can only be felt with despair. And happiness does not exist. There are no “happily ever afters”, and the wicked step mother always wins. There is always betrayal, abandonment, confusion, pain. There is always pain.

Letters to No One

Dear fucktard,

I do not want to visit your baby. I dont want to congratulate you. Basically, all I’ve got to say with regard to you is FUCK OFF!

That, and get the fuck out of my family’s “circle”.

Thankfully never yours,
Me.

I’m sick of these title things.

It begins with slight discomfort, nearing pain. Just not quite.

Imperceptible little aches that plague your being; a twisted elbow, ankle, knee. Headache, muscle ache, back ache. All imperceptible, inconsequential discomfort. Nothing you pay attention to aside from the tightness of chest, difficulty breathing. The weight of the world presses down on your chest and soon your ribs will collapse, pierce through your lungs. Even still, the pain will be unworthy of notice, as it always is.

Who will be able to see, when all is said, broken, thrown away, the fractured pieces of your human structure? It is all under skin, and it is thick skin that you have, molded like putty. You can squeeze yourself through cracks, fill in the gaps, read people, complete their sentences and never really know them, but know yourself enough to know them.

I complete people’s sentences. Often. Most often I am correct. I guess at things and have the audacity to voice wild guesses, believe in them and even convince myself of their validity. I have reasons. What reasons? I do not know. Pretension.

Smarts count for nothing. I am not smart. I am not talented. I am a poser. I am inadequate. The dreams of being “great”, being more than myself are simply dreams. When push comes to shove, I’ve got nothing to give. Its much easier believing I have been restricted than believing this is the limit of my productivity. Of my growth. It is much easier thinking I did not apply myself, and in fact not applying myself, than to give it my all and at long last prove I am not good enough. I’ve got nothing to give. No greatness. Innovation. Wisdom. I am an empty vessel – sealed. I am a pointless hollow.

Bits of the Day

I havent written anything in ages. Not because I am short of inspiration, but because I havent tried. I have no time, no energy, no will to try and write. Well, I do have the will. Just not anything else.

I have written a lot, come to think of it. Just nothing that warrants a read. I dont remember more than half of it.

My head is killing me. I feel nauseous and physically uncomfortable but this is the only time I’ve got to do my work…which I have put off for too long. I am 75% done with an assignment. The other 6 are no where near started.

*sigh*

The bright side is its only tuesday.

The not so bright side is I never get work done over weekends.

Recent Reads: Studies of History

Out there. The mind of the river
as it might be you.

Lights blotted by unseen hulls
repetitive shapes passing
dull foam crusting the margin
barges sunk below the waterline with silence.
The scow, drudging on.

Lying in the dark, to think of you
and your harsh traffic
gulls pecking at your rubbish – natural historians
mourning your lost purity
pleasure cruisers
witlessly careening you

but this
after all
is the narrows and after
all we have never entirely
known what was done to you upstream
what powers trepanned
which of your channels diverted
what rockface leaned to stare
in your upturned
defenseless
face.

~Adrienne Rich
1986

Previous Post

Relief comes after midnight, when she is asleep. Does it make me a bad person to think of relief as her absence? It probably does. I am a bad person then.

Since dad left (i.e yesterday) she has taken to acting like devil spawn. Harsh? Maybe. I’m tired.

She’s angry with dad.

Its really no wonder she throws tantrums when mom and dad are together. Shes rarely had both parents at the same time.

I dont want to have kids when I grow up. Selfish? Maybe. Merciful, in part. All parents hurt their children. Thats how the relationship goes. Sometimes we hurt them, sometimes we dont have the chance to. Sometimes their guilt hurts them more than we ever could know. They are human, after all. So sometimes we forgive them.

I wonder how I will hurt her as she grows into herself. What character flaw, weakness, “issue” of mine will tear at our relationship. How she will be convinced I do not love her, mom does not love her, dad does not love her. How we will grow apart, carried away on different sides of a geographical fault as the earth’s plates move, filling up the void with water. Water, innocuous, ominous at the same time.

Strength, in this case, is hardly a consolation.

I love you, baby sister.

I stare at an unplayed piano in my room – the cliched symbol of unpursued or unpursuable ambitions. The imagined notes played (to Chopin’s Nocturne) fade to the soft tick-tick-tick of a powerless insect trying to make its way to the light through the lampshade. There are holes leading in on either side – but we are not all-knowing, and the path we are set on is seldom altered.

I realize now why most journals are written on un-lined paper. I have transcended the boundaries, grown past the lines on this page. My words are no longer contained and my wander across this plane as they please. The quick sketches I mark with this pencil are enough to convey meaning. We do not need perfection here – life seldom is perfect. This is raw reality; imperfection, illegibility, confusion, chaos. There are no rules to our world. Even Newton’s laws of motion have been partly disproved by Einstein’s theory of relativity. There is no certainty where we’re at. I can only promise you a Today. Tomorrow the world may take me; and the why’s of loss would be useless to you.

I wonder sometimes what it would be like to be in Beethoven’s head. Did he think to himself in music the way I do in words? Did he listen to the sound of water running down the drain, the sound of cars, or chariots in those days, fading as they go down the street? Did he listen to, in moments of peace, the sound of stillness? Is there ever stillness? Will there ever be peace?

Fidgeting. There is much to do. She sends us pictures of her daughters, every once in a while. A small gesture. The personal way to say “I think of you”, a thoughtful click. Her daughters are beautiful, as all children are, because of the very fact that they are children. I don’t know their names.

I can sit here, writing gibberish as the seconds trickle away. Do nothing with my life – not live it, not cherish it. I can sit here writing gibberish till my body is petrified to a dry crust and leave no record of ever having had a soul.

Protected: Letters to No One

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untitled (poem)

When the only chance at freedom
lies splattered
on the sidewalk

When God offers no solace
and even
ceases to be

When anger is not a feeling
but an entire
state of being
and
despair is not a condition
but a thought process

When the only way to salvation
is the razor-straight path
of a bullet

Then come and ask me
why I speak of death
as if it is a blessing that will
release me.

Comfort

You spoke to me this morning of our comfortable lives. Comfort, you said, is a feeling so rare. It is just this country, this place that can give comfort. Luxury, you meant, but confused the words. While you buttered your toast, you went on – it is only here the poor can feed themselves with a single green note. No one dies hungry on these lands.

Last night we passed by a child digging scraps from the dumpster. You didnt see him.

Life is good. God is great. What a beautiful world it is to the girl in that emergency ward. You know what happened to her, don’t you?

There is comfort here. Comfort between the legs of children. Comfort in his amputated limbs. Comfort in her black eye. Comfort beneath the chaffed, bare feet. Comfort in the tattered, unwashed clothes. Comfort in disguised prisons. Comfort in the delicate gold chain he makes her wear. Comfort in pounding hearts, beating fists. Comfort in screams, in suffocating silence. Comfort in knowing you are above it all, because you watch from your glass windows and wipe the filth off when they knock your door. Comfort.

Yes, there is comfort here, in this city of god. But for those that don’t believe.

What I Cannot Write Of

I am lost in I’s and You’s – barriers I cannot think past. I cannot write about people. I cannot write about the boy in the street selling candy. I cannot write about his mother. He is an illegitimate child. I cannot write about his father. Does he have one? I cannot write about the girl tagging behind him. Half-sister? Blood. The one he protects with all the might his little body holds.

I cannot write of what I do not know. I cannot write of what I lack in courage to discover. I cannot write about pain, loss, despair (pleasure, fulfillment, hope). I cannot write in truth. I cannot write the truth. The ink of this pen drips with lies. I am young, naive (dishonest, manipulative). What you read here you cannot trust. What you read here you cannot trust.

You once cut your finger along the edge of this page. You once cried and stained the words, mixed the lines. You once slept, crinkled time. You wrote on these pages, your truths in my ink.

Lies.

It is a pain thinking of titles.

You drip. I drip. We drip together in an amalgam of liquidity. Nothing exists now. Everything exists now. Nothing exists now. Everything exists

Now.

We’re swimming in each other, around each other, immiscible. Once in a while a particle of me gets lost in you. We are never one. When we are still you float over me. In movement you break me, and I you. We fuse back together eventually. Sometimes you suffocate me. Sometimes I hold you back. Neither of us is enough.

I awoke to you last night, fearful, not of you but of what you do to me. I awoke to myself. Untrusting. I fell asleep again, clutching a taped shard of glass like an old teddy-bear, rolled in a ball, cocooned.
(I awoke hours later. By myself. With you)

Tonight my weapon is a thin box-cutter. Tomorrow I will have none. It goes like this, once every few weeks. By time I realize blades do not cut through water and mirrors do not bleed. Please know it is not you I do not love.

Letters to No One

Dear God,

I wanted to ask you, being not human and all, if you have any sensation of pain. Maybe this feeling that us humans so often experience was a byproduct of some sort, a glitch in programming lets say…because God, if you loved us, each one of us individually as you claim, *and* you felt pain, none of this would ever happen. I dont see the point of it, in “the greater scheme of things”. That poor child.

I know you’re angry, God, that I’m questioning you like this. But I”m hurt. And I’m disappointed. I dont blame “Satan”. Heck, if you’re simply letting shit happen to prove a point to some outcast then..well…that says enough. It says enough about being loved, valued and whatever the fuck else. So I dont blame Satan. I blame you. Because you’re supposed to be more powerful. Crush Satan if you “love” us. If this isnt just about your pride.

Oops. I called God proud. I think I’d like it in Hell though, seeing as any fuckhead that worships you goes to heaven, regardless of their behaviour. I think all the good people will be in Hell. For being..good…*people*…and not good worshipers. I’d throw some more things at you, but hey, you’re busy managing the universe. You dont have time for this.

Oh wait, you exist outside of time. Right. Either way.

I’m going to go do some good while I’m alive. Make a couple people smile, protect my sister, feed the hungry even..because with all your divinity, you still seem to have got it wrong.

I dont know what more to say.
Stupid idea. stupid letter.

Incoherency – the second literary curse

It hasnt been the best of days.

Well, it has been. For me. But.

There are some things I refuse to talk about but perpetually think about. It’ll take a few days to wear off, at least partially.

I dont want to sleep.

Mom is back home. I’m being all weird around her. She hasnt noticed. Sophie is upset. My sweet Sophie. The darling with a sister who has failed her.

I’m not off the hook yet. This is just a temporary reprieve. I want rest. I want peace. Theres too much to do and too much being asked of me. I have been feeling my heart hammer my chest walls for the past three days. I dont want to sleep.

I need a shower. I dont want to fucking move.

I”m making no sense.

Almost (barely) there

this is getting really fucking tiring.

Moving in any position aside from the one I am in right now, in front of the computer, slaving away, makes me dizzy.

I like to whine, by the way.

Now that I have this shit out of my system, I can continue.

(somebody please kill me)

I HATE 2009

loving this capslock key though.

IT NEVER FUCKING ENDS!

Letters to No One

Dear words,

Please come back. I miss playing with you.

Love,
Your lonesome play-buddy.

Bits of the Day (insert number here)

I’m wasting time -__-

my fingers are fucking chafed and i have only got one frame mounted properly. UGH! I’m taking a break now, though typing may not be the best way to bring peace to my poor fingers. God, I sound self-centered. I have covered the tips with soft charcoal eraser though. It seems to be working.

I am now going to go and flip through (quite literally) my english book to revise the freaking grammar terms we have to memorise for the damn exam today.

I have slept. I am posting that for all concerned parties Sleep that actually counts as sleep and not just tossing and turning in bed and drifting off to some weird tense, scary place. No, I slept through most of yesterday actually.

That is about all for now. I’ll go waste my time some more learning a language I already know.

On a happier note – I seem to be having a good hair day! I have succumb to shallowness.

Anyhow

*poofs*

Untitled (as usual)

Crimson drip
drops on the carpet
she holds up a piece of cardboard
smeared
“abstract -
its what I feel like
beneath you”

The bell ding-dongs between words
so she gathers up her
art
and washes crimson spots
from between the creases
of her skirt and the unpricked
tips
of her fingers

Never
forget to shake hands
curtsy, a little
like the well-bred lady
that you are.
Serve tea,
serve biscuits serve
drinks serve -

You can buy services now
for a mere
twenty dollars

You can buy servitude now
for a mere
kiss

I’m alive

and havent crawled into a hole…which is surprising.

Exam week starts saturday, first one being English. I have the mounting left for a project I have finished. I hate mounting. My hands are sore and i have random paper cuts all over. Stupid hard museum board. I’ve still got 4 pieces to cut out. *sigh*

I dont want to talk about myself.

Honesty

I”m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. Ima fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I”m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I”m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I”m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot. I’m a fucking idiot.

FUCK! I”m a fucking idiot and I wish I could fucking die.

Rainy Days

A few drops of acid separate you down the middle, skin melts off, falling in gooey clumps at your feet. You have been divided in halves. Thirds rather – theres a bit of you there on the floor. Yes, next to the shoe. Either way, you have been divided into segments that collectively may become you, but alone are nothing but abstractions of human nature that may belong to anyone. Was there not once a con artist with your intelligence? Or an unfeeling sadist with your dry wit and sarcasm? Maybe a molester with your tenderness? Perhaps a gunman with your grief?

Recognizable yet indistinct globs of you float, slither, seep, dry up into the atmosphere to rain down on a tree far off beneath which lies a child, drinking up the fragments of humanity that soak through to the bone. One cannot tell what the child will be. And only he may retell the story of each raindrop falling upon him.

Talent?

What good is talent when it cannot be embraced?

“Understand I’m a Sinner”

” don’t like the idea of coffee” you said, and ironically spoke of kapoofing your head off. The value of human life as one sees it is interesting.

Vague statements, unlike smoke screens, cannot be blown away. So while I sip on the embodiment (in part) of my self destructive tendencies, you inhale the fumes of yours. Of course, “you” exist only as I want you to because I will see everything through my tinted glasses and the fumes making you dizzy will, in my mind, beautify you. Bloody bandages do all the explaining. Only doctors look at the wounds.

I read somewhere it is what we don’t know about strangers that makes us like them. The less I know about you, the easier it is to fall in love with the “you” I fill in the blanks for. Maybe you were me in another life. Maybe you were real. Maybe you felt human…but what is it to feel human? Is it to feel pain? To feel joy? To feel relief, guilt, sadness? To feel (too much), to think (too much) – is that what it takes?

They call it a disease. One we are, in part, at fault for. So many faults to repent for, so little time. Forgive me doctor, for I have sinned. I have felt too much of life. I have thought too much of death. I have sinned I have sinned. And I repent for being too human. I repent for the naivety I tried to maintain, but I am all spent now doctor. How many Valiums will bring me to Salvation? How many more conf(s)essions till I’ve been cured?

Once I wanted to be…

the greatest
no wind or waterfall could stall me
and then came the rush of the flood
stars in mind turned deep to dust

[I dont know why I'm doing this. I want to write.

Lower me down
pin me in
secure the ground
for the later parade.

No, I can not

is very fucking hard to say.

Letters to No One

A forward email claiming we’re friends. Nice.

Am I really supposed to send it back to you? To prove we’re friends? Or…fuck..I dont even know. What do you want me to do with this? After..what? four years? And not a word in between.

I’m not replying or forwarding this back or..anything really. I dont need this right now. I dont need you. I have enough shit to deal with. If I do decide to reply, you’ll have to wait for it. I’m not cruel. This time I’m putting myself first. I need to do that. For a week. Till the 28th. And then I’m back to being..me.

The me that you didnt like. Or perhaps, a better me. A me without you. A stronger me.

Of course, i could be severely delusional, because sometimes I feel like the same little girl I was four years ago, in desperate need of someone to hang on to, and no one to reach.

Today

I missed one of my favourite classes today. Art Appreciation. Because I was registering. I went to the teacher and didnt have the decency to even say I’m sorry (which I genuinely was) because apparently…well, she didnt seem to mind. I feel like shit for not apologisint nonetheless. I should have. Even though I’m attending the lecture with another section on saturday.

So I finally got to register. I got to uni and went to registrars and told them the fucking shit system wasnt working and the shit response I got was “yeah, maybe there was a problem with IT, you can check with the. Maybe you can try registering from that lab?” Like wtf?! >_> the fucking system was SUPPOSED to be online at midnight.

Either way, I went to the lab, registered for courses (loooooong procedure, had to go to the academic affairs head because the shithead at registrars wouldnt let me drop english). Either way, that got done and I had class in the dark room. So I’m trying to print and I feel like I”m gonna collapse because I had had nothing but coffe since last night and ran the equivalent of at least 3 kilometers while trying to get all the signatures and bullshit for registration. So I go to the teacher and she gives me this disappointed look with a huge ass lecture and then sends me to go get food for myself. While eating I ask her what i”m supposed to do to improve my pictures. I am apparently supposed to shoot from my soul. They’re fucking textures. Someone tell me how. Anyways, she said the hourses I shot were the best and it all went downhill from there. I dont know what to do with this. I have a week left and the film I just developed was, in all honest, absolute shit. So I have got 3 rolls left. And a week to shoot and print. I”m so fucking screwed.

and so sleepy. And so fed up. Meh.

I want my bed and I want stress-free sleep.

Recent Reads: The Fact of a Doorframe

The Fact of a Doorframe

means there is something to hold
onto with both hands
while slow thrusting my forehead against the wood
and taking it away
one of the oldest motions of suffering
as Makeba sings
a courage-song for warriors
music is suffering made powerful

I think of the story
of the goose-girl who passed through the high gate
where the head of her favourite mare
was nailed to the arch
and in a human voice
If she could see thee now, thy mother’s heart would break
said the head
of Falada

Now, again, poetry,
violent, arcane, common,
hewn of the commonest living substance
into archway, portal, frame
I grasp for you, your bloodstained splinters, your
ancient and stubborn poise
-as the earth trembles-
burning out from the grain

~The Fact of a Doorframe,
Adrienne Rich

Thought

I thought of you
today
(and yesterday night when I was
wrapping
your wedding present)
I thought of you as
less
than human -
something I never allow myself
to do (not even with you,
or people
like you)

I felt less anger then
as I thought of
your (nineteen year old)
wife
and her
worthless
husband (I thought of you as
less than any
living thing;
less than any
thing)

And then
I asked this
confident(ly indifferent)
girl (a dichotomy
of selves)
how she had allowed
something as pitiful
and repulsive
as you
to hurt her;
to hurt
me

(and then I
stuck a bow
on your
present
and went away)

Somewhere in the dark AM hours

Night comes and I
wish to talk to you (again)
I have not
spilled tears for a while.
I would like to
discuss
at length
my growing discontent with
life and how I have again,
once, many times,
erred.
I wish to proclaim once more
my innocence
and how fate has brought
me to this.
I have not, I swear,
followed my own footsteps
round.
Can I too assert the fact
that I am nature’s making?
The nature of man has made me
and of nurture I can only
say
I have rejected it.
You see, these words
layered with meaning I’ve used
as bricks and boulders.
Only the toughest get in (and survive).
So night comes and I -

I speak
to stone walls

I am not a Poet

When I speak these words
will not be mine
The ones i write are little more
than hearsay put down
to make it seem as though
There is meaning
(some greater cause)
behind the curves of my pencil
other than my whim

Of Life and its Significance

The following post is purely written to organise my thoughts. Not entertaining or interesting.

So the documents for both schools have been photocopied and put in separate folders so bro can go get them attested. Funny how my life/my person/my everything comes down to a pathetic looking folder full of a shit excuse for “achievements”. But no one cares about the person anyways. We’re all just walking manikins, some of which happen to have validated themselves with a bunch of certificates and transcripts and references and statements certified by some governing body or organization that only sees them as such – a collection of certificates. Not a person, not a human being but simply a collection of recognized achievements.

We were talking about mom dying today, at the table. Morbid as it sounds, we were trying to make a point. Mother dearest wants to get/will soon get an operation done and father dearest will have departed for Canada. It’ll be me, bro, sophie and the nanny..and mom recovering from surgery. It got me thinking about death. My death, moms death, anyones death. A human beings death. And what we leave behind in the world. Why is it that certified education and a prestigious career and all that bullshit matter so much when there are greater things in life? Greater achievements and greater happiness. Greater fulfillment. Joy.

Why is it so hard? to…enjoy…to feel fulfilled, content, satisfied, satiated, at peace.

Its funny how you(I) train yourself(myself) to behave and do exactly what is asked of you(me)…and then wonder innocently what the restlessness is born out of; wonder why the tiny inbetweens..the few seconds it takes to get from one task to the next are full of…emptiness? Despair? Like a deep pit opens up within and all maintained happiness begins to sink somewhere into oblivion.

I want to do something more with my life. Feel greater achievement and greater happiness. Feel happiness…genuine happiness. I think of being a child..around ten I think I was…6th grade, whenever that was. I miss it. I miss it so much.

This was supposed to be a post about random shit I’ve got to do for uni. Transcripts, essays, portfolios, projects. And I’ve launched into a rant about everything I’ve been trying to ignore while making myself prepare all this shit.

Maybe I’m reading too much into these applications. But I cant help but feel…so often now..that who I am counts for absolute shit. Who I am is not Gin, or Areej, or Dolly or sister, daughter, friend. Who I am is insignificant. And if I die..when I die…all I’ll be leaving behind is a folder full of certificates, some vague memories, an obscure recollection of someone that once was or might have been or perhaps wasnt at all.

On Repeat

A song that has been on my playlist for more than a while – Tori Amos’ cover of Leonard Cohen’s Famous Blue Raincoat.

It’s four in the morning, the end of December.
I’m writing you now to see if you’re better.
New York is cold, but I like where I’m living.
There’s music on Clinton Street all through the evening.

I hear that you’re building your little house deep in the desert.
You’re living for nothing now.
Hope you’re keeping some kind of record.

Yes, and Jane came by with a lock of your hair.
She said that you gave it to her,
On the night that you planned to go clear.
Did you ever go clear?

Last time I saw you, you looked so much older,
Your famous blue raincoat, torn at the shoulder.
Been to the station to meet every train.
You came home alone without Lilly Marlene.
You treated my woman to a flake of your life,
And when she came back, she was nobody’s wife.

Well, I see you there with a rose in your teeth-
One more thin Gypsy thief. I see Jane’s awake.
She sends her regards.
Mmm… heaha… heh-ha… mmm-mmm…

What can I tell you, my brother, my killer,
What can I possibly say?
Hey, I guess that I miss you, I guess I forgive you,
I’m glad you stood in my way.

If you ever come by here for Jane or for me,
Well, your enemy is sleeping now an’ his woman is free.
Well, thanks for the trouble you took from her eyes.
I thought it was there for good, so I never tried.

And Jane came by with a lock of your hair.
She said that you gave it to her,
On the night that you planned to go… clear.
Sincerely, L. Cohen.

Random developments on this side of the..screen

I have found out today that I’ve got a shitload of work to do (more so than I had thought before the weekend began) and oddly, I cant seem to get myself started. This post is among the many procrastination techniques I’ve employed and it looks like I’m succeeding.

I sat and played with sophie for the first time in ages today. Kids take up time. Pets take up time. People take up time. So I have been avoiding all of them. Its funny how make-believe conversations in my head make up for almost no human contact.

In class on monday, I got up from my chair to hand in something to the teacher. Being me, I tripped and almost fell over someone’s bag/portfolio case/art supplies and whatever else it was that was there next to my chair. I got to the teacher’s desk (after bumping into a table) and she says “please dont hurt yourself.” Its stayed with me all week. Not the fact that she said it but the way it was said. It was…unexpected.

I miss highschool. God. I miss using my fucking brain. College is supposed to be challenging, isnt it? All I’ve got so far is a teacher thats convinced I’m going to fail and ridiculously time consuming work. But nothing that makes me feel smart. Nothing that gives me that high I get from learning something new and excelling at it. This isnt new. None of it is. Well, some of it is, but the basic principle behind it all is…stuff I already know. Dont I sound like an arrogant shithead? If I do “know it all” then I should be getting A’s in…everything. <_>…Oh look! I am! So far at least.

Meh.

Whats funny is…whats really “funny” is that even after my going on and on about being smart..all I can honestly say is that…some day I’ll fall flat on my face and..that will be the end of it. Some day soon, I fear.

I have got a portfolio review scheduled for Feb 20th with one uni and the other is as yet not scheduled…I’ve got the application for it though…Somehow..it seems less daunting than I thought at first. My drawing skills have improved drastically. I’ve been thinking visually which is good for my “career” (terrible for my writing). I want to stop thinking about uni for a while…but everything seems to revolve around it now. I guess that would be the “hard” part.

Coherence escapes me. So I cant really compose my thoughts and write a single damn thing worth reading. Not even a creative rant about things. Not even a damn argumentative essay.

*sigh*

On another note – there always seems to be a atrong female vocalist I listen to for a long patch of time. Sometimes months, sometimes years, sometimes alternating between two for years. Well, at the moment its Tori Amos. And I cannot get enough of her voice. Or lyrics. Or music.

And before my internet connection crashes, I shall finish this post with a…

*flourishes*

Gnight.

I just realised…

“erratic sleep pattern” might be an oxymoron…because something thats erratic doesnt have a pattern to it.

I shall shut up now.

Erratic sleep patterns and their cons –

Maybe thats what I should write about.

I came home, watched tv for a bit, wrote the last blog post but went to check on sophie before posting it. I fell asleep while soothing her. Funny.

So I woke up a while back and I am still sleepy and headachey and want to crawl into bed with a nice warm blanket and some good music (hooray limewire!) but then my head goes “You’ve already slept for 7 hours.”

If anyone else had said that, it’d be met with a “so what?” and a fuck you thought silently..after which I’d go back to bed. But since I am not someone else, and I probably have work to do (my mind has been scrambling to come up with something for the past hour) I might stay awake till I have to go to uni and come back and sleep then.

….Or not.

Gnight.

Meh.

If I were to be completely honest, I’d say part of me misses being the little one. Not the little one in terms of the youngest child but in terms of the naive, young thing thats still learning. I feel I am older than I am. Most times I take pride in it, in my independence. Then sometimes I’d just love to be held and sung to sleep. Or held and listened to until I’ve given all the speeches I make up in my head and all thats left to do is be cuddled in comfortable silence.

We were discussing “segregated education” today at uni for english and the topic went over to how a segregated society promotes homosexuality. I disagree. But thats not the point. Whenever “we” (the world and I) have a “discussion” of this sort, it occurs to me how extremely animal-like humans are. It all comes down the reproduction and progression of the human race. How tiresome…boring…that that is all life is about. And what of art? What of music? What about love that does not need validation through sex? What about sex that has nothing to do with sex and everything to do with making love? And why is everyone so interested in who decides to make love with whom? Be it a man and a man or a woman and a woman or a woman and a man.

Whats simply astonishing is how they’ll accept a heterosexual asshole and attribute his asshole-ness to his manliness, and reject wonderful people whos only “problem” is that they are “twisted”. It was hate I saw in that classroom. And disgust. But why? Why……because its alright for someone to be a murderer, a rapist, a thief, a whatever the fuck there is to be, as long as he can fuck and she can be fucked and the human race can keep on moving.

I will never bring a child into this world willingly.

Bits of the Day #I’ve lost track

I’m home! I’m home!

Okay, I’ve been home for a while now, and only left for a few hours but it seemed like a lot. We went to ze fish market (smelly place) with someone and got fresh fish and shrimps and squid. And had it cooked, of course. Then went to the beach and had lunch. I had my hopes up for crab or lobster..or both..but it seems it was not meant for today.

Anyhow, the fish market was a lot more fascinating than one would think. And because of that, I have decided that my final project for photography will be about the fish market. I’ve already got a roll of film so I’ll get at least 4 WONDERFUL photographs from it. Now its just a matter of getting a couple more rolls filled out, developing them and handing in the damn thing on time. I’ve got a month, so, no rush.

I’ve been working on another project all weekend. I call it HELL. Well, no, its about the gradual sophistication of living arrangements…in other words how buildings and shit have changed from the times of Fred Flintstone. Not very scientifically accurate, since its just images that I have drawn. Focusing more on design and shit and it is now finally almost done. All I have to do is apply the finishing touches and it will be ready to hand in first thing 11:00 tomorrow. *wipes brow*

The coming week looks rather promising actually. Aside from this assignment and two tests I’ve got tomorrow, and one on Monday, theres not much else to do the rest of the week. I will, of course, be spending time working on my portfolio and final photography project. I’ve been a smart ass and finished an assignment early so that makes me free-er than I would be. hah.

Is it sad that all I talk about is uni? <_>

In other news…my Art Appreciation teacher is pretty cool. The kind one can have random conversations with. Which is always good. Teacher ratings are coming up after finals. She gets the highest, hands down.

Finals…meh..*shudders*

I cannot wait till semester break. Feb 17th. Hopefully earlier, depending on when my final projects are due. Projects..*shudders again*…

Must get back to revising for test and doing other random shit.