Last Night in Three Acts

Act 1. Exposition
....................

In an open vehicle,
dusty roads
winding down a mountain
toward Athens.

It is daylight--
long road, bumpy ride
bright sun.

Sudden night.
Manila.
The house is full of people.
Party.

I try to figure out how much to pay driver,
write it on a piece of paper.
I don't have enough cash,
go to my room on the ground floor.

Mom has done something,
the walls are now of different texture.

Where are my notes?
I find a scrap of paper again at the bottom of the trash.
It's sludgy from party offal,
just drawings.
Where are the numbers?

Look at my watch.
With all the searching
an hour has passed, maybe two.

Poor man, still waiting.
I never even got him a glass of water.
Party noise starts to fade.

Act II. Revelation
....................

I go up to the indoor garden,
give him some water
and realize that I forgot the cash.

He starts speaking in a booming, strenuous voice
I don't understand what he says.
I don't understand his language.

First I'm scared, he's clearly insane.
I just want to give him his money--
finally, he seems to appreciate the gesture.

I go back to my room.
I find the money
but I realize I should put the money in an envelope.

I find an envelope but lose the money again
and I'm searching
through my bed, my table and things.
Someone is behind me in my room.

It's the driver.
He starts speaking in tongues again.

Here is your money, I tell him.
I'm sorry you waited so long.

Sudden silence
and the camera pans to his face.

He is Javier Bardem
and speaks in english.

That was a month ago in Athens, he tells me gently.
And I stagger.

In my heart,
I know that this is truth
and everything clicks into place in my head.

I've lost a month of my life.
He is someone I love or who loves me,
someone I care about
but I don't know why--
can't remember.

The wall in my room has changed again.
He shows me these beautiful carvings that he's made
for me.
A gift.

We lie in bed together,
him only in his underwear.
He talks to me qiuetly in an attempt
to restore the life that I lost.

Act 3. This is Where it Gets David Lynched
....................

Two women, my mother and the housekeeper,
are watching us on some closed circuit camera.
My mother is incensed.
Has he touched her, she bellows.
Has he?
The housekeeper silently shows her the footage in affirmation.
My mother says: he has to be killed.

Johnny Hallyday
swaggers in,
joins the unholy chorus on how
Javier Bardem must die.

I fly out of the room, enraged.
How dare you?
If you lay a finger on him
(I find a weapon, a fireplace poker)
I will kill YOU,
I will KILL you.

I'm weeping, I'm dead serious.
I want to scream louder,
make myself more believable,
more dangerous.

I am aghast, mocked by Johnny Hallyday.
I ask my mother who he was.
She admits that he has shacked up with her,
he's someone that she settled for
after my dad had died.

The loser taunts me
by showing off how he's comfortably esconced
and he has his own den in our house:
black and white floor,
outsized, primary colored furniture,
and a Phoca Groenlandica lounge sofa.
A what?!? I ask.
A baby seal, he says smugly.

That makes me angry again.
I brandish the poker and tell him:
I can't believe you have a baby seal
as a sofa.
You're a horror
and I will end you.
This time it's not an empty threat.

But then I see the thing.
This giant, soft-eyed baby seal.
I lie in its fur
and all my hatred dissipates.

Scene cuts to
darkness all around.
Velvet red curtains.
Spotlight on empty green stage.

THE END


Sometimes I have these vivid dreams.

Bearably Lonely

Drink from the bitter cup
of my imperfect love.

I have held you fast to my chest
and will let go even faster.

I am more honest in hate;
with enemies there is no pretense.
Them I could kill,
you I will hurt.

People search all their life for love;
my quest is indifference.
I will cast my heart in iron
and seek a cold harbor.


I'm in a foul mood.

The Citadel Chapter 3. Hunted

Twenty steps. Thirty steps. Fifty. Third lamppost. Seventeenth Why-Wait?-Let's-Procreate poster. Two blocks until the next food rationing outpost.

Pili Gazan kept walking, counting out the distractions.

Eight broken walkways. Two black cats. Five bus stops.

She had spotted a pack, almost full, under a park bench.

A pack! She'd been lucky some times before with a half-smoked butt, surreptitiously hidden in one of a few uncartographed places in The Citadel for secret smokers who cared to share.

She was always ready with a small box of matches in a pocket or handbag for times like this. But a pack was worth its weight in gold.

Three streets to cross. Two. One. Finally at the park. Public and open, it was safer to find a secluded bench or corner for the smell to dissipate and where no one would notice. Safer than home or any building.

With the slim cigarette between her lips, she fumbled with the matches, hands shaking. The flame burst yellow in the dark, burned the cig orange at the end before dying out.

She dragged slowly as she tried to unclench herself and savor the flavor. It was a little bitter, probably old. She inhaled, letting the smoke escape a little from her mouth before drawing it back in; the nicotine spiked her mind. The intangible caress of exhalation was a slow goodbye. She tried not to be greedy. To let it last. It might be another week before she could score.

Pili was suddenly on the ground, sprawled and uncomprehending. The quiet space was suddenly a whirl of guns being cocked in her direction.

She was pinned down by the full weight of a cop, she realized, and her left arm behind her back shot a searing pain up to her shoulder.

A shiny boot appeared in front of her, stubbing out her cigarette and grinding her fingers into the ground. Pili whimpered and craned her neck to see a woman in uniform. Dark glasses obscured the officer's visage. Weak chin, dark red lipstick.

"Filthy habit", the officer said. "You're under arrest."

The boot then flew at Pili's head and everything went black.



The fog was heavy, thick and gray inside the room. Sweet and tenacious. The silverware and wineglasses clinked discordantly as people argued, laughed, murmured and ate with gusto. These people were falling in love with each other, marveling at having found common cause and kindred in these dark days. But among them were also the cautious whispererers, unaccustomed and unwilling to raise their voices. Outcasts, rebels, hunted. But in this moment found, saved and protected--even if briefly--to savor a moment of freedom.

The conversation slowed and halted as the bald, tall man at the head of the table stood and waited, lighting a cigarette and drawing in the first drag deeply.

"A woman was arrested and executed today in Grid A20-34 for violating Proclamation 1081."

A babble of anger, terror, confusion and shock immediately rose from the table. Two people fainted, a quarter of the audience fled the house. A man was flattened by an over-excited obese woman who tripped.

At the head of the table, the bald man surveyed the mayhem with his sunken, unfathomable eyes and calmly turned to a petite woman with ruler-straight black hair cut diagonally across her face and framed at her jaw, whose lips were set tightly in consternation.

"Imagine what would have happened had I announced that the FP bombed the nicotine shipment from India before it reached the harbor" he said drily, as he took another drag.

The man was Xaris Noz, the last scion of The Citadel's capitalist past. The woman of the angular lines was Mina Chiresh, his right hand woman from time immemorial (the ageless quality of her unchanging demeanor and fashion sparked speculation that she was the 6th or 7th model in a line of Mina Chireshes over the decades) and rumored paramour.

Xaris was also known in more esoteric circles as Frankenstein's monster. Ravaged by cancer and other diseases, 30% of his body had been replaced by extremely expensive stem cell repair and cloned organs. Xaris had been a notorious chain-smoker for 40 years. Xaris was, by reputation, a zealot and megalomaniac with a penchant for wearing flamboyant neck-ties.

"Perhaps you might have waited until after dessert before dropping that bombshell", Mina observed in an even tone, ducking briefly as a rack of lamb, medium-rare, flew above her head.

Xaris laughed, bemused at the mayhem. "Look at them. Terrified. I'm sure Yesu will blow his brains out before dealing with the prospect of living without his nicotine fix. Bolan is probably on the Net now, denouncing our nightly soirées and everyone he can identify that's ever been to one."

"And you, sir? Will you go into hiding?"

"No, my dear Mina. I have a plan."



The ashen-faced prisoner faced his captor, trembling. Various thoughts raced through his confused mind. Rumors of secretly-installed smoke detector alarms in every housing unit throughout The Citadel were true. How else would they have known?

Before he knew what was happening, an electric jolt coursed through his body.

"Do I have your attention now, Mr. Corgan?"

Yesu Corgan was still reeling from the shock, literally, before another jolt was administered.

"You are a self-confessed smoker, Mr. Corgan. There couldn't be a baser crime. With a wife and children at home?" Jolt. "And a dog, too?" Jolt.

"Yes, yes", he stammered. "I was wrong. I'll tell you anything you want." His chest heaved. "Please! Don't hurt me!"

His captor smiled, teeth glinting like a shark's fangs.

"Tell me then", she said dangerously, in silken tones of artifice, "Who's your dealer?"

Corgan's eyes grew wide then blank as a spot of crimson suddenly appeared on his forehead. He slumped forward.

The interrogator whirled around in time only to see the red laser line disappear. She raised the alarm, barked terse instructions to her subordinates, cursed well beyond anyone else's vocabulary.

But she didn't find the assassin. Mina was far too good to be caught.



The rain came heavy, hard and fast.

When it rained in the city, the streets were emptied of people. Acid-proof coats didn't come cheap and were suffocating, the smell of sulfur stultifying.

Reev loved the rain. He prayed for it every day. He rejoiced in the monsoon months, despaired in the summer.

For the storms that engulfed the city, while feared by most everyone else, were his shelter. Not even the Freedom Patrol would present themselves in great numbers.

Under a roof in a narrow alley, Reev carefully unwrapped a cigarette that he'd been saving for weeks. He lit up and closed his eyes.

"Smoker!" A shout roused Reev from his reverie. Without waiting to see what it was, Reev began to run in the direction opposite.

"Stop!" A gunshot rang out and Reev felt the heat of the bullet streak past his face.

Reev ran, ran hard. He saw other police officers running toward him from different directions.

With an anguished scream, he slipped on the street and plunged forward. Tears streamed down his face, snot dribbled down his nose. His life was over. He thought of the women that he never got to fuck. He sobbed and closed his eyes, waiting for the inevitable.

Gunfire. Shouts. Screams.

Silence.

The rain beat in staccato on the ground. He knew nothing but the pounding in his ears and the ceaseless downpour. Acrid steam filled his nose and mouth.

When he finally had the courage to open his eyes, what he saw made his brain stall.

Four dead police men. Blood bloomed redly throughout their pristine white uniforms.

A bald man and a tiny woman stepped out of the shadows.

"A war has begun," the man said. "A new nation born. Spread the word."

Reev gaped wordlessly as the two disappeared into the deluge.




Singapore, July 2008

shit i am never acting again

unless:
1/ christian bale is in the cast
2/ joss whedon is writing/directing
3/ i get to be a cylon or a vampire slayer

see this review of last year's Project Chiaroscuro performances.

it was actually a very fair and correct review.

but man does it hurt.

that's what i get for googling my own name!

thought for food

12 years ago, independent analysts warned that World Bank and FAO projections of today’s world farm output were higher, and price increases slower, than they should have been. The World Bank recently reported that overall global food prices increased by 83% in the last three years. Food price inflation could rapidly push at least 100 million people into poverty. Looking at Asia, since January this year, rice prices have gone up by 141%.

Naturally, rising food prices will have various effects on the different Asian countries, which are politically and economically diverse. Rising food prices should benefit farmers and, in the medium-term, spur agricultural production. A recent study by World Bank economists found that the short-run impacts of higher staple food prices on poverty differ considerably by commodity and by country. Nevertheless, they found that poverty increases are much more frequent, and larger in scale, than poverty reductions. For example, in Indonesia, more than 75% of the poor are net rice buyers, and an increase in the relative rice price by 10 percent will result in an additional two million poor people (or 1% of the population).

Even if recent news reports, as of this writing, indicate that an infusion of supply from countries like Cambodia, Vietnam and Pakistan will ease the rice crisis, this does not detract from three serious problems that the last few months have exposed: a resounding dissonance in government responses that does not auger well for the future; the failure of global energy security efforts to arrest the accelerating price of oil; and, the shocking gaps and tatters in the safety nets—especially for agriculture—that governments assured would accompany trade liberalization.

Firstly, the events have revealed fissures in East Asian integration and the limits of its crisis management capacity. Given government reactions such as a proposal to start a rice cartel or the imposition of rice export restrictions by key producers, it is obvious that governments might take policies seemingly in the national interest that hurt the region, and the world, economically. In contrast, regional coordination and sober management of export and import flows as an extraordinary and time-limited step could have buttressed confidence in the food market (instead of further driving prices upwards).

Secondly, Asia has been unable to curb its reliance on oil for energy security despite lessons from the oil shocks of the 1970s. Oil prices have again quadrupled over the last five years. While some headway has been made with renewable energy, Asia has been slow to develop such alternatives and attract large-scale investment in this sector. Surging fuel prices and, hence, transportation throughout the food supply chain, contribute to food price inflation. To complicate matters, incentives for biofuels—while part of climate change mitigation and improving energy security—divert land and crops like wheat, soy and maize from the food market. Governments should consider temporarily suspending subsidies or re-channelling crops to food supply.

Thirdly, trade liberalization in the developing economies of East Asia necessitate social safety nets. These should be designed to brace vulnerable sectors, like agriculture, for the crush of opening trade and globalizing competition. It seems that these safety nets have very wide holes through which the region’s poorest have fallen through. The current situation uncovers a disconcerting absence of effective mechanisms to attenuate trade-related disturbances. Direct cash transfers, food relief (as well as its variants) and hoarding are unsustainable options; medium-to-long term planning is required. Agriculture has weakened in some Asian economies; moreover, there has been an increasing shift from subsistence to cash crops. Policies to improve farm output and attain food supply targets will be integral to attaining food security for the future.

The potential human cost of unguaranteed food security is staggering. The current troubles have already sparked protests, work stoppages and other forms of civil disobedience as well as riots. With scarce natural resources becoming scarcer in the coming years, in the absence of any stunning technological breakthrough to feed the world’s hungry, the prognosis is bleak. Furthermore, East Asia needs to consider approaching future crises in a coordinated way at the regional level.


I'm still thinking about that half-eaten sandwich that I left for garbage last Friday...

synecdoche

there was this girl
this really fucked up girl

she put her mind into a box
stuck a handle on the thing
cranked it and, hey presto,
it started chugging.

she put her hands to labor
to create a certain form;
re-ball, re-mold, re-ball, re-mold
a swan, maybe an ashtray.

her feet walked the miles
between then and now
across never, again and always
among other extremes.

she let her heart float like a bubble
upwards until high
where it silently burst
into a thousand words.

she stands at the close,
watching thoughts as they fall
unshaped.


gabby's art material comes in handy at 5:17am

outgrownup

There are things you just have to outgrow: shoes, socks, bicycles, beds, toys, blankets, nursery songs. Hairstyles, books, outfits, shampoo, tv shows, pop music. Hobbies, diaries, dreams of ruling the world, dreams. The girlhood crush on Daddy eventually fades and infatuation flits toward the school bully or the classroom nerd, or the teacher--and later, the professor, the colleague, the CEO, the rebel without a cause, and so on.

You look back on who you were, and you are either nostalgic or appalled to realize how different you are now. How much you've grown. I just happened to be looking through old CVs and application letters that I still have on file from, god, eight or nine years ago. How embarassingly stupid I was. Today, I'd never hire that then me. The horrible graduation photo (which was what everyone did in Manila, how gauche). The references to obscure achievements that nobody would be able to relate to. The use of the words "fervently hope". Gaaaaah.

But I understand that me. That was the me who had, at the age of 10, thought that getting a job in the world (or anything that I would ever want career-wise) was all about some sort of kismet. Careers were about fate, romance and falling in love. Someone would come across me and my life crammed on a page, and think, "she's perfect" in this particular and unique way, like a soulmate finds his or her kindred spirit. Yeah, I think kindred spirit captures it. I had this idea that people were matched to their jobs by some alchemical ether in the universe. Unhappy people and accountants were just those that gave up on the search for true love.

Well, now I know better.

The same goes for school. I'm particularly obsessed with grad school. Getting my PhD. And for anyone who's applied to US grad schools, you know what I'm talking about. The Statement of Purpose. What an ominous, daunting name for an essay. Millions upon millions of Statements of Purpose, churned out by the machine that is the American University Application System. In 800 words, tell us your raison d'être. The first time round, I laid my bloody heart, guts and pancreas on the table. And asked them to pick me. Choose me. Love me. They politely declined.

On a tangent thought: when I was 22, an older friend, maybe 10 years older than I was, told me over coffee, I would realize that there are friends that I will need to cut loose. If people have no use for you, he reasoned tautologically, then you don't need them. I thought that his cynicism was absurd. However, by the time I cut him loose I was a number of years younger than he was that day at some Starbucks (bleah) in Makati. You outgrow people too. Then again, there are the people you never get over.

The day I realized I had finally come of age, or rather that I was finally an adult like my mom and people on that TV show thirtysomething, was the day I had to deal with a pitbull of an insurance agent. Taxes, insurance, mortgage, loans, preschool, all the trappings of bureaucratized social organization. Trappings.

At a climate change conference, someone said "the world of the future is not open to limitless choices; the choices we have left to define the world are very narrow".

Gabby told me the other day that when he grows up, he'll be a strong gorilla. I suppose that's one option I'll let him mull over for the time being.

Me, I'm all outgrownup.


Gaaaaah.

traveling without a camera, living without writing

New year resolution in the middle of May: five-minute blogging. Because I haven't been writing enough, haven't really been thinking at all.

Maybe because there's too much to do, too much flying around. I'm actually pretty happy these days. The San-Francisco-and-other-parts-of-California-trip was great! Jr and I both had our things to do, people to see-- and didn't actually honeymoon all that much. But we had a great time. Futurescope-wise, an amazingly productive trip. I just need to keep that momentum going.

It's my last day in Tokyo. I'm with Natalia to visit Anjeli. It's been a lot of fun--with a huge sense of being exactly as we have always been and will always be. But just in a different city. Oh, and getting older so we have only been able to pull off one one-nighter club at a place called Womb which was pretty awesome. Good drum n bass. And, oh the eye candy!

The Japan of my imagination has been filtered by Yukio Mishima, Hayao Miyazaki and Akira Kurosawa. I have been walking around the city half-hoping for a sudden world shift, waiting for the buses to turn into enormous cats and the people to get cute and furry. Instead, there are the eclecticly-dressed crowd of Shibuya, the cosplay Lolitas around the Meiji shrine and the well-heeled drabness of Ruppongi. My impression of Tokyo has radically changed from the hotel rooms and conference halls from 2005. I'm sure if I ever travel back this way and spend even more time, it will change again.

Guided by no plan and only by instinct, we've blundered our way through cafés and restos, funky boutiques and shopping districts. We've torn at our hair and beat at our breasts outside great clubs that have prospered for years but seemingly closed down especially for us. We found great bars at random in unlikely places. We've lounged on crumpled pages of The Japan Times in the park, talking about life and sustaining each other with a lot of tea and sympathy.

The best part was our fearless forecasting about five years from now. Natalia will be in Indonesia or somewhere in Southeast Asia, running her own NGO. Working on community projects with kids. She'll have three beautiful kids of her own. We've plotted out how S's amazing bar business will bust and boom. They may live apart for the first year or so because Natalia's career will take her out of Singapore, but S will think, fuck it, pack up and go to be with her.

Anjeli will be a famous artist/designer/theater person in Berlin, after a torrid but painful affair with a musician in New York. She'll be alone for a while, until she meets Hans in a bookstore. Hans is a housing contractor, ship-builder or plumber, and a self-taught philosopher as well. He will be possibly divorced with a kid; but will definitely be a lot older and they will fall in love deeply but at a sedate, unhurried pace.

With me, there was nothing much left to imagination. Grad school, US, Junior, Gabby. Anjeli tried to sneak in a little girl. I was surprised at how pleased I was at the fixedness of it all. Maybe I have finally settled down.


Each monkey is a placeholder until either Nat or Anjeli uploads photos from their camera!

Finity

Life is a plane, a train, a zooming of a carriage from one point to the next. I'm in it, I'm sitting still or maybe I'm standing against the wall or maybe jumping up and down, maybe I'm banging on the door to be let out. Sometimes I resent having each stop pre-defined for me; and that the motion is linear, inevitable.

Forever is hypothetical. Time is counted out like coins: half an hour before I need to check out; an hour to get to the train station; thirty minutes' buffer before the train leaves 17 minutes past the hour; almost three hours exactly until I'm where I'm headed; I'll be able to have a hot bath, watch some TV, check my email in an hour and a half. Yearning for that, or yearning to be home, or yearning for a different context, or waiting around until the alarm goes off and I need to start counting out the minutes again.

That's why I used to miss my flights. I flipped my finger and wanted to just be in a place, just be, for a moment longer and not have to worry about things that tend to sort themselves out. I believed in just-in-time manufacturing. In my charmed existence, cabs miraculously got me wherever in the nick of it, concerts started late, people forgave me, coincidences happened fortuitously, the kindness of strangers was dependable. Sure, I'd curse and scream when, on the odd occasion, things didn't work out. Like that time heading toward Seoul, or worse, that time coming back from Paris. Fifteen minutes, even five, were the difference between now and another 12 hours, between life and its opposite, between movement and stasis.

My mom lives in what we fondly refer to as her own time zone. Which is half an hour earlier than the rest of the world, whichever way you spin it. She'll be at the airport unfailingly ahead by three hours. Is it something about getting older, I wonder. You come to the inescapable age to put away childish things-- like subjective approaches to clock-watching.

I was doing so well on this trip I was on. To there and after there. Five train rides, responsibly early each time almost. Almost. But my resolve was all but depleted at the end. I nearly missed the last one for no good reason, really. Just as likely, in an alternate universe, I was still pottering around and packing while my oblivious mode of transportation dutifully arrived, waited with a respectful pause, and chugged forward just as indifferently as it came.

"And the years shall run like rabbits" What comes to mind suddenly is Ethan Hawke intoning the poem, imitating a recording of Dylan Thomas reading W.H. Auden's "As I Walked Out One Evening". And J. Alfred Prufrock, measuring out his life with coffee spoons. Me, I tally the March twenty-sevens.

I'm turning thirty-one next week. Come buy me a drink.




But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
O let not Time deceive you,
You cannot conquer Time...
In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.

The Citadel (working title): Background Notes

In a city with a few million lost souls is a man who lives by his pen and his mind's eye. He is a celebrated artist. Monumental renderings of his sketches, colored in by his charcoal pencils and pots of black paint. The curvature of bone, muscle and sinew is drawn in sharp relief; his subjects often awash in the white of negative space. His craft resides in the shadows he casts on his surfaces, trapping movement within his frame. But the faces he does not draw. Although each elbow and knee, penis and vagina are drawn in all their distinctiveness, all the faces are featureless and smooth. On occasion, he wakes in the dark from a dream of a woman laughing at him. Colors and sounds, and the shock of rain--the dreams baffle him.

She is his lover. He was once fascinated by her and the scars written on her body. There are a hundred of sketches of her that decorate her otherwise bare life. The angle of her shoulder. The parabola of her spine. A leg extended. In repose, in action--she hoards these sheets of paper covetously. But even if there were a thousand of them, it wouldn't be enough to convince her that he sees her. She wants to be fixed and certain in his gaze. She resents his other lovers and wants him to be hers alone. In her youthful naiveté, she plots to have his child and keep it.

The year is 2031. Global nuclearization has successfully eroded international institutions following the accidental detonation of a nuclear weapon in the Middle East in 2009, forcing undeclared weapons to surface. The procurement of nuclear arms went virtually unchecked, develop capability or enter into alliance with nuclear powers. Defense and security budgets spiral upwards while social sectors and services get next to no funds. Democratic governments elect increasing numbers of military figures into power. The trend of suspension and deterioration of legal protection of civil rights, triggered by the wave of terrorist attacks at the beginning of the millennium, are exploited and new restrictions constrain basic freedoms. Borders are closed, immigrants repatriated, refugees turned away, populations divided. While the language of universal rights and democratic ideals has been retained, liberal democracy is generally viewed as a distant goal which would be nice to achieve once global security is again established.

By 2018, the city had barricaded itself with rare and tightly-controlled flows through its walls. Procreation is now state-controlled and mainly through in-vitro fertilization. Doctors have accelerated gestation and harvest fetuses after 7 months; children are reared by the state; this system was perfected and implemented in 2014. Child-bearing has become a well-paid profession; in order to continue to grow the population, the state purchases children from abroad as well.

.....

The coffee cups grimed with the solid excess of what you tipped into your mouth. I am one with it.

I am the cigarette butts. The ashes. The excesses that you leave behind. The words postspoken. The unclasped fingers. The released embrace. I hate your women and I hate your men. Your shallowness. Your craveness. Your unhappiness.

How many hours have you spent with your eyes on my body? You trace the scars on my skin with your fingers, first, and then with your pencil on paper.



another abandoned project?

whois

I can see myself standing in the distance. But that horizon just doesn't get nearer.

Maybe that girl, that woman, that person that I wanted to be--that I want to be--does exist somewhere. Looping in eternal return, still smiling with a heart filled with dreams and a fanciful understanding of how the world works. Living with the virginal passion of one who doesn't possess the crushing knowledge of defeat.

Am I looking at who I could still be? Am I mourning over who I was?

it's been a shitty day

Orihinal na Pagkakasala

My only creative lit in Filipino

"Shit", pabulong na pahayag ni Angelita. Parang ulan kung dumapo ang mga daliri sa keyboard tapos madiin at puno ng ngit-ngit na binugbog ang RETURN.

"Asan ang files ko?" Patuloy ang pagmumura. Gusto na niyang ihagis ang walang silbing monitor na mukhang ayaw palitawin ang pilit niyang hinahanap.

"Lisa!", hiyaw niya, "Hindi ko mahanap ang files ko, damnit!"

Isang sekretariya ang nagsusumagsag na pumasok sa loob ng opisina at humalili kay Angelita sa harap ng monitor.

Lumabas si Angelita na umaapooy ang bibig at dumiretso siya sa kape. Yamut na yamut siya dahil sa dami ng dapat niyang gawin, hindi niya kailangan ang pagluko ng pesteng computer.

"Angge." Nagulat si Angelita sa tinig ng lalake.

"Ruben! Ano ba? Hindi kita nakita," na-iiritang tugon niya.

"Sorry--hindi ko sadyang manggulat." Sabay umalis ang Ruben.

Tahimik si Angelita na naiwan sa mesa ng mga baso't kape, sa gitna ng gulo ng opisina. Napansin niyang nanginginig nang bahagya ang baso sa loob ng mga kamay niya.

--

"Honey! I'm home!", dating gawi, magiliw na pagbati ni Angelita. Narinig niya ang matitinis na tinig ng mga bata, sina Ana at Lea. Ritwal na nila 'yon--pag-uwi ng ina, nag-uunahan ang magkapatid na salubungin siya.

"Ma! Mommy!", tili ng nagtatakbuhang mga bata. Halos matumba na si Angelita sa pagtalon at pagyakap ng dalawa.

"Akong nauna", pakantang sabi ni Lea pagkahalik sa ina.

"Okay lang!", sagot naman ng isa. "Ako naman ang nauna kahapon, eh. Di ba Mommy? Hmm?" Halik. "Mommymommymommy?" Lambing pa.

"Kayong dalawa, oo." Pinaghiwalay ni Angelita ang dalawang nagsimulang magtulakan.

"Pa 'Honey, I'm home, honey I'm home' ka pa. Ano tayo, sitcom?", pagbiro ng kabiyak ng kanyang puso, si Marco. Nilapitan siya nito, hinalikan at niyapus-yapos ang buhok.

"Loko. Hindi mo 'yan linya. Sasabihin mo dapat yung kung gaano mo ako ka-miss." May pait ang mga salita na hindi nabatid ni Marco.

"Kanina ka pa?" tanong ni Angelita.

"Mga... kalahating oras pa lang. Na-trapik ka ba?"

"Mm hmm. Bumper to bumper sa taft at España. Babagsak na nga ang katawan ko, eh."

"O, ako na ang magluluto. Kanina pa naman ako pa-relaks relaks." Hinalikan niya muli sa pisngi si Angelita at tumungo sa kusina.

"Teka, teka. Ikaw kahapon, di ba? Ako ngayon, ano?" angal ni misis.

"Sus! Magbihis ka na nga, ha. Mukha kang natalo sa sabunutan", huling hirit ni mister bago lulunin nang tuluyan ng kusina.

Si Angelita ay umakyat sa master's bedroom upang mag-ayos ng sarili at sinundan naman ng dalawang nagkukumpitensya para sa pansin. Kalahating tainga lang ang nakikinig sa pagkukuwento nila pagka't malalim at malayo ang kanyang isip. Wala namang napansing kakaiba ang mga bata.

--

"Marco!"

"Anooo?" Galing sa taas ng bahay ang boses.

"Ayaw gumana ng CD player!"

"Ha?" Bumaba sa sala ang lalaki at nakitang kinakalikot ng asawa ang stereo. "Kapapatugtog ko lang niyan kanina, ah."

"Eh, ayaw tumugtog 'tong Mozart. Ang sarap ihagis!"

"Cool ka lang, Angge. 'To naman, ang high blood," natatawa na sa kanya si Marco. Nakikalikot na siya sa stereo. "Kahapon naman, nasira mo ang microwave. Tapos, noong makalawa, yung aircon. Ano bang nangyayari sa 'yo?"

"'Wag ka nang dumada, ayusin mo na lang 'yan, puwede?" Nainis si Angelita na pinagtawanan siya.

"Sungit", maamong paglambing ni Marco. Nilapitan niya at niyakap, pero kumalas naman si Angelita sa nakapulupot na mga bisig.

"Wala ako sa mood pakipaglambutsingan." Nakakagimbal ng tahimik na boses ni Angelita.

Biglang nahawa si Marco sa pagiging seryoso ng asawa.

"Bakit, Angge?"

Tumalikod at huminga ng malalim, pinikit ang mata, naghanap ng sagot.

"Ang daming problema sa trabaho."

Minasahe ni Marco ang balikat ni Angelita hanggang lumambot ang pagtayo niya. "Kawawa naman ang career woman ko." Hinagkan siya sa tuktok ng ulo.

"Career woman mo?" May nahagilap na giliw si Angelita sa loob ng sarili. "Ang kapal mo! Kailan ba ako ari-arian?" Humarap siya kay Marco at sumikat ang ngiti.

"Ayan, masaya ka na, ha?" Marahang tumawa si Marco at nangurot ng pisngi. "Isama mo na sa listahan ng mga ipapaayos nating yang CD player. At 'wag ka munuang maghahawak ng gamit, ha? Nakakahalata na ako sa jinx mo. Baka maski ang mga haligi ng bahay ay magkanda-kalas-kalas sa hawak mo."

"Heh!" Wala nang kasamang iritasyon ang katarayan ni Angelita. Subali't sa kalaliman na ng gabi, nang si Marco'y mahimbing na ang paghimlay sa kanyang tabi, muling lumipad ang isip niya at muli siyang nangamba.

Saan dumapo ang isipan ni Angelita? Saan tumungo at saan nauwi?

Sa isang araw noong nakaraang buwan. Sa isang kuwarto sa third floor ng isang apartelle sa May nila. Kasama si Ruben.

Hindi niya pinigilang ang nangyari. Hindi niya nais ipigil.

Nguni't mahal niya si Marco. Asawa niya si Marco.

Bago siya nakatulog, sinabi niya sa kanyang sarili na mahal nga niya si Marco. Iba naman ang pagmamahal sa pagnanasa.

--

Pinatay ni Angelita ang gripo, tumigil ang maligamgam na haplos ng tubig. Nagtuyo siya ng katawan at ibinalot ang tuwalya sa sarili.

"Diyos ko po, patawarin ninyo ako," aniya. Humarap siya sa salamin. Pinahid niya ng kamay ang kaputiang parang sumabog na ulap. Nanginginig ang kamay niyang nakalapat sa salamin.

Pinagmamasdan niya ang kanyang sarili. Tatlong-pu't dalawang taon na siya nguni't nakukubli ito ng taglay niyang ganda. Ang makinis pang balat ay kayumangging hinagkan ng araw. Makapal, tuwid at malambot ang buhok niyang abot lang sa panga--"powercut" sabi ni Roy sa Eve's Salon. Sa mata lang naka-ukit ang bakas ng panahon. Maging sa katawan niya, bagama't hindi na hugis-dalaga, hindi malupit ang pagluwal ng dalawang sanggol.

Isang masuring pagmasid ang ginawa niya sa traydor niyang katawan na nagtaksil sa asawa niyang mahal, sa mga anak niya at maging sa sariling paniwala't pagpapahalaga.

Ipinikit niya ang kanyang mga mata at pinahintulutang tumulo ang luhang isang buwan niyang inipon.

Naramdaman na niya ang pagkamuhi at pandidiri na kanyang kinimkim, ibinaon sa pinakamalalim na bahagi ng puso niya.

Bakit ngayon niya pinakawalan ang libog niya? Bakit ngayon, kung kailan pa kapiling na ng pamilya si Marco na dalawang taong nadestino sa ibang bansa.

Hibang ka, Maria Angelita, sinabi niya sa sarili. Gaga. Simula pa lamang ng pagpasok niya sa Vicente, Lopez and Associates, dalawang taon pa lang ang panganay niya, nararamdaman na niya ang hila sa kanya ni Ruben. Pero hindi siya makapaniwalang may attraction siya sa lalaking hindi si Marco. Pinigilan niya. "Strictly professional" lang sila.

Kamakailan, nagkataon na hindi dumating ang klienteng dapat nilang kasama na maghapunan sa isang hotel. Naiwan silang dalawa. Mahabang kuwento. Sabihin nating "one thing led to another" at nalaman na lang ni Angelita'y dumadalas ang mga pagkakataong ganoon. At sabik niyang hinihintay na mangyari muli.

"Mahal kita", mahinang pahayag ni Ruben minsan. "Mahal kita".

Gusto sanang magsalita ni Angelita noon subali't makasisira ng mood. Gusto sana niyang sabihing: Hinde, Ruben. Iba ang pagmamahal sa pagnanasa.

--

Shit, ano ba 'to? Tanong ni Angelita sa sarili. Laruan lang ng bata, ang hirap hirap ibuo. Ito kasing si Marco, abala sa kung anong pag-ayos na naman ng appliance. Diyos ko at libu-libo na ang nagagastos nila sa pagpapagawa ng mga nasisira niya. Kahit ang mga bata, nagtataka sa pagiging "walking disaster area" ng kanilang ina.

Mahina pa naman ang loob niyang magkukukutingting ng mga bagay dahil, sa di mapaliwanag na katangahan, biglang nag-usok at (pakiramdam niya) muntk na sumabong ang answering machine (na 110 volts) na sinaksa niya sa 220 na outlet. Kung sabagay, ito namang inaayos niyang dollhouse ni Lea ay walang kuryente o kahit anong mapanganib na bagay.

Maya-maya't mainit nang husto ang ulo niya pagka't tatlong oras na, tang ina, at hindi pa rin magawa-gawa 'tong lintek na dollhouse.

Ano ba't hindi niya ma-kontrol ang panginginig ng mga kamay niya; maski sa mata'y parang may tumitibok na pagkalakas-lakas.

Napahiyaw sa gulat at sakit si Angelita. Napukpok niya nang malakas ng martilyo ang daliri.

Napuno na siya, nagwala. Hinagis niya ang martilyo at sumabog ang salamin ng bintana. Lahat ng mahawaka'y pinupunit, winawasak. Kung hindi masira, iniitsa.

Naririnig niya ang sarili niyang mga iyak at sigaw. Sumasakit na ang lalamunan niya. Humapdi ang mga mata--napupuwing siya ng kung ano.

May naramdaman siyang mahigpit na pagyakap sa kanya. Nakita niyang nagdurugo at sugatan ang kanyang mga kamay. Nanginig siya nang nanginig.

--

Nagbukas ang mga mata ni Angelita sa kadiliman. Nakabukas nang bahagya ang pinto at lululusot ang kaunting liwanag galing sa labas. Nakakarinig siya ng nag-uusap sa labas.

"Marco? Marco!", tawag niya.

Pinagmasdan niya ang pagbukas ng pinto, pagpasok ng liwanag, pagkilos ng isang anino--hanggang nasa harap na niya si Marco.

"Angge?" Nagtatanong ang mga mata, nag-aalala.

Naalaala ni Angelita ang sarili niyang repleksyon sa salamin. Nakikita niya muli ang pag-uusig sa kanya ng sarili niyang mga mata, pagbibintang ng sarili niyang anyo.

"Angge?"

Hindi na niya maramdaman ang gimbal na kay tagal nang nakalingkis sa puso niya. Namatay na ba ito o naghihintay lamang na magising at magpakawil-kawil muli sa buhay niya? Natanong niya tuloy sa sarili kung sino ba ang may kasalanan at pinalayas ang tao sa Eden. Si Eba nga ba? O si Adan, na nagkukulang bilang kasama ni Ebang nagaasam ng higit pa?

"Angge? Magsalita ka--", biniyak ng matinding damdamin ang boses ng kanyang asawa.

Nagpasiya si Angelita. Huminga nang malalim. Nagsalita.

Diliman, 1995

Comfort

Spent three weeks offline in Manila. Found a lot of old writing from when I was in high school and college.

"I'm... I'm leaving," she said, the words forming with difficulty. "I'm going home to mother--until I can come home to you." She picked up her back and went to the open door.

She stopped and turned.

"I love you," she said. And left.

He watched her through the window, impassive. He watched the sunlight turn her hair from brown to gold, watched it paint the leaves and the petals of the flowerbed she had planted. He squinted at the blue of the sky and the wisps of clouds that laced lightly through it. He looked again to where she was walking but she was gone. He drew in his breath and turned away. He lay down on the couch and closed his eyes. He had a hell of a headache.

He stopped going out of the house. He stopped answering the door. He subsisted on canned and dried food, rice and the cooking skills he learned during the guerrilla war against the occupiers. He lay down all day, asleep, and stayed awake all night, prowling around the house. During these hours, he would fix anything that needed fixing. He repaired the damage the bombings made on the roof.

Once, when working on the shingles, he hit his finger with the hammer. Swearing loudly at earth-dwelling demons, h e started to work but hit his finger again. He erupted.

Hammering and bellowing, he made a hole in the thin wall, pounding at first, then tearing at it with his hands at last--he hurled the cursed hammer at a nearby window, shattering the glass--he tore through the house, destroying what he could, destroying. He picked up her picture, framed for her last birthday, and smashed it with his fists. He looked up into her dressing mirror and stopped.

He saw that he was weeping.

...

"Bert! Stop!"

Her voice pealed like a clear bell in her head as he washed the dishes. "I'm going to shoot into the moon!" She had laughed. He laughed too, then, but went on pushing the swing. "Shoot to the moon!" he echoed.

Carefully, he rinsed the dish of its soap. He had to be careful. For some reason, he couldn't stop his hands from shaking. That was going on for days. "Lucing said that you and she were sweethearts", she had pouted, looking so young and fresh on the green grass.

He picked up another dish. "Lucing is crazy, plain crazy", he had reassured her. They were in Laguna then, at a class picnic. The shouts of the boys busy finding field frogs for lunch could be heard above the wind.

He soaped the dish slowly. "Then you're not?" she asked with studied innocence. "No," he said, swinging her around, gazing intently into her face.

Another image crept traitorously into his mind. The moon was high and the breeze cool. The whispers of the leaves were hushed and fireflies danced around them. "I love you, Bert," she had said. "I love you, my husband."

He blinked and saw that he had dropped a dish. His hands were still shaking.

...

"Bert! Bert!"

A shrill voice woke him; a hand that felt like a claw shook him roughly. Bert's limbs were heavy with sleep and it was hard to lift his eyelids.

He swore inwardly. It was his mother-in-law. He closed his eyes.

"Aling Flor," he rumbled, "go home.

"Bert! Come with me. Por Dios, por Santo, Marie is hardly eating anymore. She is getting thinner and weaker, Bert!" The small woman was frantically trying to get him to move, her hands flying about nervously. "Bert," she pleaded, tears streaming, "death will come for my child.

"Please. Talk to her."

Bert said nothing.

"She needs your love, now! Bert!" she wailed, collapsing on her knees in defeat. "Her condition is grave. She'll die--have you forgotten that she is with child?"

Bert's anger suddenly came to life.

"Devil's child!" He spat. "Child of a whore! It will be born with hooves and a tail, surely!"

He watched the old woman anxiously make the sign of the cross and watched sacred, holy words pass her lips. He wanted to bash her head in. He wanted to bash his own head in.

"How can I forget that she is with child?" He asked her this tightly and left her crying, slumped on the floor. He stamped up the stairs to escape, his mind in chaos. He didin't know what to do. Breathing was hard labor. What was he going to do?

The old hag chased him up the stairs, her voice rising. "What do you want to do, ha? Let her die? After all she has been through?"

He ignored her.

"Listen! Will you leave her to die?"

"Find the bastard's father. Tell him to save the whore." He entered his bedroom and slammed the door behind him. She followed and grappled with him.

She slapped him, hard. It jarred him for a moment.

"Listen." Her voice was heavy with intensity, almost a low growl. "My daughter is no whore." She slapped him again. And again. "Understand that first."

Dumbfounded, numb with the pain, he sat on his bed and stared at her stupidly. If she wasn't a whore, the japanese Captain's pampered whore, then what was she?

"Things were quiet in Laguna then. You were gone and Marie stayed with us. We had no problems. There was plenty of food." The mother's eyes glazed as if the images were burned on their surfaces. Her voice didn't seem to be her own.

"Then one day the trucks came into the schoolyards and the marketplace. And the children clinging to their mothers were kicked away by the soldiers, by those beasts!, as she.. they---the young women were forced into the trucks."

She turned from him and seemed to speak from farther and farther away. "I could see them from the window. I didn't know what was going on and I stared too long. I was just standing there." He noticed that her tears were drying. "I got a glimpse of her as they pushed her in. Her face was bleeding... I think I saw it drip onto the red circle on his uniform. I thought, where did it go, that drop blood? It just became part of the circle, blood against the white. I though... how much blood did it take to make that red sun?" He saw her move farther away, faster, dizzyingly fast. She got smaller until she became a dot, until he couldn't see her anymore.


Diliman, 1994