"We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time." - T.S. Eliot
Another exercise at meshing song lyrics to letters.
X,
Remember the ultimatum? I wanted you to decide. Instead, you asked for a year. You never really wanted to take matters to your own hands.
You wanted things to happen 'naturally' without you having to decide. Are you just a coward? Yes you are.
The ultimatum was meant to know who your first choice is. It was just a go or no decision to make. You say go, and we 'take the plunge'. You say no, I'll lick my wounds and finally have the closure I deserve.
Instead of doing either, you decided to shrug everything off - not taking any side. However you choose would liberate me. But you never really made a decision. Again, you left things hanging.
It hurts me. Well, I'm more like angry right now. I just want the closure. You wanted, oh I almost forgot that, YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU WANT.
I was looking at another video when the title of this poem caught my eye. Catchy title... Words in it, direct.
Just a backgrounder... this is technically called def poetry. It has its critiques, just as anything that has come to be conceptualized has.
Finally, below is Amir Sulaiman's I Prefer A Broken Neck To Another Broken Heart. Scrolling further down would reveal my favorite lines from it. I admit that I have some contentions with the way the words have been chosen to express the idea as I find it not so consistent with what the title's trying to say. Nevertheless, I did enjoy the lines for their directness.
And it took her some time with herself to discover
That having love is even more important than having a lover
(...)
She said, "Yeah, I'd like a man to kiss me, I'd like a man to hug me
But he's gotta truly love love before he can truly love me"
I said, "I feel you." She said, "No, you're not feeling me.
We are women bringing up seeds,
Our own sons grow up thinking love is a disease
Ducking and dodging real relationships, and just gonna take what they please
And they treat pregnancy like it's an STD
If the test comes back positive, it's a negative
And they are ghost in the streets,
Drunk in the wind, only a moment is spent and those moments are brief
Our sons' role models are rolling stones unknown or deceased
They figure we can't teach them manhood, so they'll get grown in the streets
So in the cold world they find warmth with the men holding the heat."
(...)
"But when I think about my childhood, I don't think about poverty
I remember how she hugged me, kissed me, taught me, loved me.
And I know you prefer a broken neck to another broken heart
Broken parts that litter the night sky like stars.
But remember, even the beauty of birth leaves its own scars
And know that you will find your home, right where you are
We will find our homes right where we are."
(excerpt of Amir Sulaiman's She'd Prefer A Broken Neck to Another Broken Heart)
Motherhood, is simply the most profound way of showing human's capacity to love and probably evidence to love's existence itself. To all mothers out there whose lives are no longer theirs but their child's as well.
"This is the way I want to love: in an idiom stronger
than tongues, I want to love in the way that tides pull
and release, like the moon which holds without touch,
I want to invite the sky to create a bigger space in me
a place spacious enough to hold all the wings
of the passing moment. I want to be buoyant enough
to carry all of love’s weight."
(excerpt from RW Trommer's Talking To My Son Before Sleep)
As I write this, I am holding my tummy for the hilarity of what my friend and I has come up with. The past couple of days I've been teasing her about how gutter-mouthed she is. To make her chronic cussing less obvious, we came up with these alternative pronunciations to expletives to make them sound less than what they should be. By doing so, we potentially decrease the intensity of these words BUT it could prove to turn things around since they could really be funny.
Gaaah. It's so awkward to explain funny. It just is. Anyways, I also learned about Lord Putai Technique which according to G is a laughing exercise. To someone who knows Bisaya, saying Lord Putai Technique repeatedly and faster by each repetition makes up something that has lewd undertones. How can a mere technique title be so hilarious? Ha! Only in the Philippines. :)
Now, we're supposed to be doing more important things. Nevertheless, on to cuss words!
1. Dapak
This is commonly used to express anger, irritation, frustration, etc.
2. Mader Pader
Kinda difficult to understand but this is another common expletive. G. suggested that we don't pronounce 'r' in the end for some slang swagger. Pronunciation key: a = cat; e = duh!
3. Dahell
Dahell sa'yooooo... nais kong mabuuuuuuhaaaaaaaay! It's something one says when s/he doesn't understand or is unhappy about something.
Ending the post abruptly with an animated video of Mary Lena (Lina?) by Jason in Town.
PS My brother told me that this song is originally sang in a different language and was only overwritten with Bisaya lyrics.
PPS Be warned! The video gets a little weird towards the end BUT it's the only animated version (to facilitate understanding) of Mary Lena that I can find.
I was walking
along my university's academic oval with my music player in the pocket of my
dress. I was in a hurry, well sort of. My phone tells me it is five minutes to
4 pm. I was running late for class. I
needed to walk about a kilometer just to get to my college.
While walking I
had to slow down a bit. I caught myself humming along to This Ain't Goodbye! I
am pretty positive we can still get back together.
But that was...
let's see. A year ago. Now I'm after you again. Like the song, I'll never really
be able to say goodbye.
Traipsing through invisible lines in an effort to keep people is a dangerous game to play. Most of the time, being firm and clear with what we want is better. It could hurt in the beginning but it has its rewards in the end.
I am talking about being friends with benefits with anyone. That status is endlessly fascinating for its literary beauty. Talking about repressing emotions and jumping in bed with each other sure sounds good when masterfully transformed into a series of metaphors and rhymes. In real life, it could cause distress.
Wanting to have it simple, stable, and peaceful is not that bad. No strings attached could be tempting in a way that you're given the chance to mess with the one you're attracted to. Whatever one hopes to get from that; physical satisfaction or that one chance to be with that person is something that needs to be given serious thought.
Agreeing to the friends with benefits status could either be courageous or thoughtless. Courageous in a sense that how it turns out was carefully weighed against the pros of being with that person. Thoughtless as the decision may just have been a result of too much alcohol or the proclivity to seek warmth. Whatever the motivations are, there are clear pitfalls in being friends with benefits.
In as much as courage is needed to agree to such status, the same courage to say no to it (no matter how tempting) is admirable. It could hurt for a while or could make us bang our head on soft walls for the sexual frustration or regret but it may prove to be wise in the end.
However it is decided on, whether to go through it or say no to it is really just up to us. Is the initial fun and many orgasmic moments obtained from it better than solitary nights at home feeding stray cats? Would it be worth it to make oneself vulnerable to pain and jealousy despite the very nature of the relationship technically disallowing us to be?
Regardless, being aware of what we need and being firm to stand by that (no matter the consequences), whatever the choice is, is the only way to decide.
I've always had an issue with Frodo as the savior of the Middle Earth. I think he's just so lucky that he has very supportive friends and a few other groupies.I think it's also the same thing with Harry. What it actually teaches kids is that networking is good. Hahaha.
Anyways, pitting them against each other is such a fun leisure activity. See how Cracked plays it out.
It's Monday and we need something to hold on to to get us through the week until it's Saturday again. The cycle could be vicious and tiresome for many but glorify in the fact that we're given poets like Bukowski to help us see life's beauty.
I attach in here the poem, The Laughing Heart as read by Tom Waits. Scroll a little lower to savor the words.
In a recent field trip to Bolinao, I had asked a classmate to read the cards for me. He mentioned that he has the ability so I was curious as to how it works. Personally, I avoid having my fortune told since it scares me more than it excites. I know of people who are very cooperative when it comes to those things saying that having a glimpse of what the future brings provide hope that things will change for the better or if not, it will help them plan what they are going to do to somehow soften the blow.
Using regular cards (the one used in playing black jack, etc.) he asked me to count the number of letters comprising the pet name I have for the person that I like. I gave him the number. He then asked me to shuffle the cards the same number of times as the letters to this particular person's pet name. With that, he did his thing and was able to reduce the cards leaving me with more or less five to six cards. The cards left were the king and the queen who's supposed to stand for he and I respectively. The other cards were two hearts (black and red) and some other cards with numbers.
According to the reading (he analyzed it based on the position of the cards), the guy and I know each other very well and seem to agree on a couple of things, since the king and queen are facing each other. He then looked at the position of the hearts and told me that although I know how I feel for this person, I still can't figure out yet how to really feel about the whole thing. As for this particular person, my classmate/card reader said that he has his back turned away from my heart which is another way of saying that he doesn't like me the way that I do.
Being bothered by a set of cards is not rational. I've been schooled and taught to believe that I am in-charge of my life and not some other force. What happened to the cards were arbitrary, that much I know. What is so frustrating is the fact that these things are supposed to support any daydream and act as cheerleader. I mean, I want to have the cards read in a way that affirms any delusion that I have of he and I being together. Instead of that, I get my hopes crushed by telling me what I already know but refuse to acknowledge - there's no us, just he and I, separated by spaces.
To satisfy my vanity, I checked on the blog counter to see who is reading me. To my surprise, I have a lot of readers from Indonesia. Terima kasih banyak-banyak for reading. It is heartwarming to know that you would spend a few minutes of your time in this small virtual space that I use to express myself.
Numbers have a strange way of reducing the uniqueness of an individual to mere figures. Regardless, this shouldn't cripple our imagination. For the past couple of months, your numbers have been increasing and it's just amazing how the internet has made it possible for strangers with similar interests to find each other and be less lonely.
I can't thank you one by one for I do not know you. But to you who's been here, patiently awaiting my sporadic updates, look, my posts are starting to become more regular! I have you to thank for that because for some reason, knowing that you come here everyday motivates me to come up with better things to say/share.
I feel almost bad for not posting an entry on music. This is a mix of the mainstream and the obscure. Enjoy!
Not Like the Movies by Katy Perry
I swear I could write an entire post on this song, but I decided I shouldn't. :) A beautiful song about hoping for the kind of love seen in romcoms. The beat is melancholic hinting on the story being told in the song.
The Marriage by Billy Bragg
I only knew of this artist recently and I'm already liking him! Here is the first song by him that caught my attention. In the song, he dishes on what he thinks about getting married accompanied by an upbeat melody. The instruments used were blended so well you'd love the song even if you have issues with the view presented.
Throw Me a Rope by KT Tunstall
Another slow song that talks about how to be clingy in a subtle way.
I will be talking about what happened last Friday on a post that appears on a Sunday. That makes me two days inefficient. Nevertheless, what about Friday?
For the past couple of weeks, months, I haven't really gone out except for the required once a week grocery and other school-related errands. Although it is not a huge change from the kind of lifestyle that I'm used to, it still is a little strange that I don't find time to go out anymore. Last Friday was different as I had the rare opportunity to go out with my best friend.
She had been so busy with her field work that would take her to a province about three hours away from the university that the last time we saw each other was the first day of class after the holiday break. Lately, I've been feeling blue and demotivated but there's something about being with her that is therapeutic. I'm not saying that we all should get best friends just so we don't feel blue, I'm only saying that by surrounding ourselves with the people who value us (and we treasure in return), there's always joy to be found in being able to connect so well with another being despite life being so cruel at times.
