the new painful words.

It rained this afternoon, in this dirty city; quick and harsh. It had no grace or subtlety, or grand opening scenes or fade to black happily ever after. I watched and thought about some other place where this rain would fall divinely, but seeing only concrete the wish made me sadder than usual. I slept after the last drop fell, exhausted and depressed and not wanting to go melodramatic at the moment, and just gave in to black, dreamless slumber.

I woke up to fluorescent lights, harsh and sudden yet again, searing my eyes to an early evening. I found out I was cold a few seconds later, and thinking about the water temperature of my bath. I guess it still rained again after I slept, much longer this time and I was still thinking about some other place, where I had blanket and a pillow for wonderfully cold rainy afternoons.

I probably think that the most part of my income would have been spent trying not to go crazy here. the cinema, clothes, shoes, phone bill, etc and food, yes glorious food; these are just avenues for staying sane. But I don't need any extravagance of those things now, I have Rain, and she makes all the difference.

And clutching this tabo, past seven in the evening, wondering how cold it would really be, I came back to her words, the two new painful words here in Manila.

"Hello"

"Papa"

I still have work, and this is as cold as it gets.

pointblank.

it just happens, it hits

(i just heard this song, i just passed by this store, i just happened to sit behind a stranger wearing this cologne, or maybe it was this person's scent, or the shampoo, i just happened to read a book with some familiar lines, plot lines, i just ordered a quarterpounder, i just ordered rootbeer, i just passed by the old school, i just saw the opening credits for this movie, i just started to clean my room, i just heard someone curse, i just unearthed my old shirts, i just got an e-mail from you, i was just cleaning my inbox, i just saw old pictures, old negatives, i just saw your friend, i just saw your surname painted on the side of a jeep, i just happened to read my old journals, i just heard a child laugh, i just found a password protected document in my old files, i just saw the ocean again, i just happened to see an old movie poster, it just happened to rain during a power outage, i just went on a 9-hour day trip to somewhere, i just heard someone call your name, i just happened to wake up in mid afternoon, i just broke the mug, i was just drinking and saw the ice melting, i just found out that my old e-mail account was still working, i just found myself still awake on new year's day and not drunk, at 4 am when everybody else was asleep, i just wrote on my blog again, someone just miscalled on my phone, i just happened to look at the horoscope, i just happened to play the guitar, i just heard the song again)

and it is a sharp pain (and something akin to a sudden itch at the same time) going off like a small explosion somewhere in the upper chest area.

the world is a little blurry after that. or blurrier still.

wings.

And listening to music, I preen my feathers and smell the breeze.
It’s time to take wing again, a little older again and where I am is not changing.
I’ll fly at dusk, as the vermilion slowly becomes muted by the coming night.

For the time being I’ll look around a little more, tasting and speaking.
It has been a comfortable nest, and I guess a bit of nostalgia will settle after I fly.
hold some thoughts to keep me warm in my evening flight.

And shake sleep off, I havent been up there for years,
I foretold some loss of innocence, and it has come to pass.
the times I mistook it for growing old, when it was innocence fading.

For now I'll listen and lipsync with some of my old songs and wait;
wait for the passing of days as the rains have come again.
couldn't have wished for a better time. I can feel the wind again.

soundtrip.

This is listening to songs again for the reason that some parts of it are just like some parts of you right there unraveling. And listening is like hearing stories about yourself. That are true. A rehash of harsh romantic truths and sometimes a helping of your own brutal honesty.

Then listening (sometimes) takes you back more than a few thousand hours ago, and going back, you kind of settle down, like being home again when you are thirty years old; and knowing that you will never be home again. Never.

Just a small sliver of that feeling in the space of a few minutes; then you can feel yourself breathe again.

Then the next song comes in and the world changes…

sporadic again.

GE.

To be so cold that I could freeze your hand off if you held it in your
painful exquisite fingers. Even with the knowledge that chances are, my
hand will die warmly instead when our fingers touch.

-o0o-

Nightglow again.

And everything looks freakish enough for me to want to fetal curl and wish I was back in Naga but this is everyday, every night and every breathing second that I happen to be here. And you get used to it after some time, but in the same way that you'd get used to, say, having someone thwack your head every minute or so. Which you don't get used to it at all.

And homesick suddenly becomes the new painful word.

summer dummer thoughts.

cruel world.

just said hello again. I have no plans of saying goodbye.
because I have a lovely daughter and they still play the blues
somewhere. and I miss my wife.

a good evening, my dearie, when I am up working at night and I go to
sleep in the morning when everything else melts along with me in the
summer heat. lava lamp my ass.

the world is not cruel after all, the people are.

-o0o-

so, if this were some other thing.

Like if things were a little colder and things were a little farther away and things were a little faded to see anymore, and if things seemed like they were not there anymore, and if all familiar things seem a little smaller and if things were a little desperate and if things were so changed they were not the same anymore and if things were so harder than ever before and if things were numbing you down to ice and if things just shouldn't happen and if all these things were getting more serious than yesterday.

Would you still call it your life.

Or some other thing.

tangerine tofu.

I remember a morning, still dark, I burned my tongue on hot tofu, and tasted sweetness at the same time. Not a contrast, but pain and sweetness seem to be strange bedfellows.

So, this is Manila in another way. and being alone.

And yes, don’t forget the rain.

You know, you still pull my strings however far. I should wash my whatifs with the purple rain that would be falling this afternoon.

-o0o-

vertigo and tunnel vision.

I mean right now, and there’s this tic in my lower right eyelid. and perhaps hunger plays a large part, but the food I am looking for is miles away.

Like everything is miles away.

Or kilometers, or whatever way you want to measure it.