Behind The Glass Window

 

I still don’t know what love means the first time I saw you many months of June ago. From above, behind the glass window, I watched your every move below. I studied your every detail storing the moment in my memory I kept all these years inside my heart. It would be a surprise for you to know that I still remember the clothes, the shoes you were wearing and the person you were with that day when my concealed tales of you started and endured many years. I opted to stay behind that glass window, I’m better off this way, you will never know my secrets for I will contenue to watch you from afar and admire your every detail from the distance. In silence.

Something happened inside me that day. I fear losing the magical feeling so I kept it to myself ~ Somehow I have triumphed for the feeling always remains. Returning to memories, feeling that feeling again, reminiscing, opening the glass window of my heart, I still get a blush and my heart still beats faster everytime. It grows with me, it evolves as I go on, surviving the seasons, re-surfacing, re-emerging from my highs and lows in love. My safe place, my refuge and everytime I fall, I run back behind that glass window to watch my photographs of thoughts and I would feel better. The feeling endured many years of triumphs and defeats, of joys and sorrows. You are my true bliss, only I celebrate you alone. You are with me wherever I go, I have pronounced my vow to you in silence, I have kept that promise.

The world ’tis vast, ‘

tis graced with too many faces.

Many wouldn’t last and some few just leave some traces.

You are the face that I longed for and missed.

‘Tis your cheeks, your lips that I dreamt

To plant my first

Kiss.

The sun will contenue to rise and set,  the days would contenue to bring forth the cycles of the seasons that would grow new sprig of life, of hope and I would contenue to believe, returning to memories celebrating my love behind the glass window.

Wherever time would take us in the face of the planet the sun would contenue to shine on us, at night the moon would keep the mystery of my secrets as I whisper my wishes upon the stars behind the glass window hoping one day my feeling would become transparent to you and you would see what’s inside this heart.

If forever means falling in love to the same person over and over again, then I must have found forever.

___

For Writers Island prompt this week: “The Return”

http://writersisland.wordpress.com

 Behind The Glass Window is part of my “Love Stories (Well, Almost)” collection.

http://jeques.wordpress.com/2008/05/17/love-stories-well-almost/

Love Stories (Well, Almost)-2

Here is to contenue to write the trails I left with the steps I took to my journey to the higher ground of understanding my quest to find the pair that would make my perfect match.  Before you read the sequel, I hope you read the preceding part first. Please click link below:

 http://jeques.wordpress.com/2008/05/17/love-stories-well-almost/

—

After my two failed love stories that ended before it even bloomed, I found myself running away, I went to places in search of something but always, always I see an arrow pointing inwards. The compass took me home to my center, I found myself and learned to enjoy my company and became at peace with my solitude. In 30 years, learning to love myself is the only, and best love story I allowed myself.

And then you came in disguise taking the face of friendship.

I found you in the abyss of the unxpected.

I caught your hands in a loose grip ~

You held my hands tight.

I prayed for you, I thought I was ready. As if all the elements of the universe conspired for our meeting in the most unusual way, and wednesday was never the same for us again. You slowly permeate my core in a peculiar romance we weave together every morning. I revealed so much of my soul to you before we even met in person. You made me write. I chronicled our moments, you awakened the dormant poet that was inside me all along, it took only you, it took only love to emancipate my heart to start singing happy love songs which eventually turned to blues when our love song faded with the waning of the almost colorful love story that ended when both of us just gave up.

But I’m still grateful to you. You taught me a lot I’ve not learned in my 30 years of existense. You liberate my heart teaching it to love. The greatest gift you gave is making me realize I could be loved, and I am capable of loving. The greatest memory you left are the words my over hundred poems had expressed, for that alone our story have triumphed. Our tale could have been a beautiful love story, well almost.

You’ve shown signs early on that it would never last. I was too smart not to notice that, I was too strong to fear that I would loss you eventually. I saw it coming. Perhaps that is the reason I kept a place for me to run when you’re gone, I was ready. Well maybe that, and this force constantly drawing me to higher grounds I still need to understand. This force who was there like cushion to ease my fall when you first show the signs that you’re capable of hurting me.

I tried to hold you for as long as I could.

But your grip loosens with the passing of time.

Later, ’tis only me left holding on.

I need to catch my breath

Being in this deep chasm for awhile.

.

So I let you slip away,

Losing you back to the dark void.

I tread the shallow waters of the expected since then.

I know you are there somewhere,

But I lost the heart

To plunge back

To the abyss of the unexpected ~

.

For I don’t want to drown again.

It was a long on and off  game that I became tired playing. After 5 years, the spaces we contenually tread away from each other are enough signs that our love story would not work. You and I failed. 

—

Our Story

We have reached the bottom of the line

Your story has ended in mine.

I guess ’tis time I face my fear

Of losing you and us forever.

.

I have dreams for you and me,

But you seem to think differently.

I tried to reach out each day,

But you never felt the same way.

.

I guess ’tis time we go on separate ways.

.

As we step on to the roads

That will split our paths,

I wish you well, God knows,

I have loved you enough.

For all the moments we once shared,

In my heart I will keep that.

You will always be safe here

In the strand of my memories.

.

Even if you have long forgotten ~

.

Our Story.

—

For Writers Island Matinee muse prompt: “Liberation”

http://wrtiersisland.wordpress.com

Love Stories (Well, Almost)

Now that I’m years away from the scenes, I think it is time I write about them. My love stories. Well, almost. Why not? It is now that I could see them in clearer angles which I miss look when I was still in the picture clueless. While I was still on that journey, I did not really appreciate the trails I was leaving behind until I reached a higher ground and watch every step I took that lead me to understanding my quest of finding that pair that would make my perfect match.

—

Part I

You came looking for a place to stay. I was looking for somebody to share the rent. It was a magical impulse that I took you in my place and in my life. We were both young just starting our careers, learning to budget our salaries from our first jobs. We were a perfect match for that reason. Destiny put us together, as if things just fell in the right places and through our friendship we created our hearth away from home. Yes it was just pure friendship, other than that we were together for practical reasons. But looking back now, I think we were just too afraid to step beyond the line we draw. We were very young then.

That was the first time somebody treated me so tenderly. I could never forget waking up many mornings finding you watching me in my sleep. I understand how tender it is doing that to a person you cared about when I did the same thing to you. But we never talked about it. A smile was enough to seal what we feel finding ourselves in such an awkward situations in many mornings we shared.

Images Of You

.

In my dream

I watch you in your sleep.

My soul feels glad,

My heart leaps.

.

Images of you haunt me

From the time I wake,

‘Till my sleep.

~ 

Was I so afraid that I have to run from you? I was. I took my dreams as my reason to leave the home we unconciously built together as friends. You were finding way to make me stay, but I was head strong to chase my dreams that summon me in another place, but it was just an excuse to fly away from the feelings I was starting to feel when I’m near you. We can’t be together in one place anymore, lest we want to break that fragile strand that connects us and step beyond that line we draw. You cried when I left. I cried many years later realizing my lost, my first love, my love story. Well, almost.

 

We were miles away from each other. . .

—

Part II

Months later, I was breath close to the person who made me forget you. . .

I was broken when you came, lonely as lonely I could be. I was nursing a broken heart not realizing I was when you came to really entertain me - you introduced me to night life - from sundown to sunrise, friday nights to monday mornings. We were together like that for many months. I was trying to forget something. You made me. You made me feel how it is to be taken cared of and respected. You made me forget I was hurting, but in the end you hurt me, too.

I never thought you were falling, love was the least thing in my thought on those times. You became impatient because I’m not really that sweet - I treated you like it was just pure friendship. I’m sorry. I must be very insensitive to you. You were easily snatched from me for that reason and it hurts me finding that it was my friend who took you away. That was my first taste of betrayal. My friend was making stories behind my back, in my absence to polute your mind. You were asking me questions I was clueless not knowing where they came. It was late when I discovered that a friend has planted seeds of hate in your heart and they have grown to lush forest in your thoughts. You already partially believed all his lies. I find no more reason to explain my side. You cried when I told you to stay away from me and go with him - I still remember the scene: outside the hotel we were in a parking lot over-seeing the sea at 10:00 PM, inside my car. You wanted me to ask you to stay - it was a childish impulse when I drive you away to him waiting in another car. You cried because you didn’t expect me to do that, you just don’t know I was driving you away even if I was hurting. I must have fallen, but I was denying it to the last minute. You left crying in the rain, I was left chin up inside my car watching the seawaves breaking in the rocks. My heart was hard as the rocks, I broke your heart when it hit me. I saw him ruin your life after that - I feel guilty, I feel responsible for your falling to that pitfall. I was not able to save you, I was not able to save our love story. Well, almost.

Memoir Of Our Love’s Twilight(Sonnet) 

.

I watch the gray twilight through my window

‘Tis dark, and I can’t see the setting sun. 

The dusk is darkened by the cloud’s shadow;

The birds that criss-cross the skies are now gone.

.
My eyes trace the silhouette of a tree;

‘Tis there, but like you, I no longer see.

You’re into places since I set you free;

Oft I wonder if you still think of me.
.

Tonight, as I rove to the land of dreams,

I hold your thoughts close, afraid to drop you

And lose you in to oblivion’s dark streams.

Oft I doubt if you keep me that way, too.

.

Tomorrow, when the sun would rise again,

I pray there’ll be no clouds, and will not rain.

~

There would be more “almost” love stories to come in the next parts. Until then.

Here’s a link to the sequel:

http://jeques.wordpress.com/2008/05/22/love-stories-well-almost-2/

For Writer’s Island prompt: Impulse and Betrayal.

http://writersisland.wordpress.com

The Mother’s Lullaby

I love you my precious child, my bliss. You carry the sweetest juice of my veins. My costliest joys come from you. You deserve the fullness of my affection. The brightest and the loveliest of all the fruits I bear in my womb and grew on my branches season after season.

Even when you were just about to bloom out of the bud I conceived from a leaf I shed in october, I knew by maternal instinct, that your fate would be different. You attracted a bizarre mob of insects: bees, bugs, ants, butterflies. They all feasted on your sweet nectar. The wind stole you kisses morning and night, and along carried your fragrance too distant. Perhaps, your spirit had reached faraway lands and shores even as a tyke. You were destined to travel, you will go places.

I cling to you the longest. You mellow in my nourishement. I wanted to embrace you forever, but I know, I could not. The hardest of all my tasks is knowing that I have to let you go when I’m done with my duty with you. I fear that that day, I dread the thought. I stayed awake day and night to guard you. I loath the winds for they might snatch you out of my grip. I curse the insects for they are taking too much of you. I resent their carelessand harsh advances. Because I know, being your mother, that you would live a life far more than all that.

But you are already sturdy as the tree that you would become early on. I am relieve from all my anxieties as you surpass, surviving your initial tribulations. I am proud watching you metamorphose into a tiny precious fruit. I cherished our moments together.

We danced and flirted with the winds. At night, we counted and wished upon every stars. We revered the beauty of wild flowers and sniff their exotic perfumes that permeate the gardens and the fields. I welcome the birds that serenade you on my branches. I nourish you with crystal clear water of springs that my roots sip from the nearby streams. I catch and gathered the dew in my leaves to bathe you in the morning. We are cleansed by the cool ppristine showers of the rain. The sun keeps us warmth and dry. I ask the sun to smile at you, but at noon, I leaned over a canopy of my leaves to shield you from the scorching heat of midday rays.

We marvel at the gifts of every sunrise. The sunset blesses us with tranquility and peace. On quiet moonlit nights, I rock you on my cradle to sleep. I watch you close in you slumber, as I sung you lullabies. My soul feels glad at your existence, my heart leaps. I caress your face tenderly with my leaves. One touch, and I felt bliss.

You’re more than everything I asked for,

More than anything I need.

You are my son, my beloved.

Her lullaby fades as she kiss her angel goodnight. She closes her eyes wanting to freeze the moment, but then she, too, falls into a deep blissful sleep.

You breathe me life, so I may live,

You’re the reason that I exist.

You are my mother,

My life, to you I am indebted.

—–

To my mother and all the mothers of writers island and the world.

Happy Mothers Day!

For Writers Island prompt: “Fantasy”

http://writersisland.wordpress.com

Color Of My Heart

—

Kleig Lights

.

When the show is over

And the crowds are gone.

After the applause has faded

And alone you stand,

Remember that I would be backstage ~

Waiting.

After the blinding

Kleig lights

Are gone.

—–

 

 

Prayers, Unsaid

.

I pray that you’d never learn to forget,

Even if spaces take away your heart.

I hope tomorrow you would not regret,

When distant places would take us apart.

.

Listen to our melodies, they’re inside your core,

Remember the sweet fragrance of passion.

They will bring back the mirths we shared before,

Like hued photographs in our souls’ vision.

.

I pray that you would always remember,

Even if time erases memories.

I hope tomorrow you’d still keep me dear,

‘Til the time we both conclude our stories.

.

Feel the fine sands in the soles of your feet.

Their tender touch would remind you of me.

Like seawaves to the shores we would soon meet.

To kiss through the salty breeze of the sea.

.

I pray God’s hands would keep us together,

Even if moments pass us by swiftly.

I hope tomorrow would bring forever,

And God’s pure love would bind us endlessly.

—–

Tenacious Heart

.

Tenacity of heart, that’s how I’ve loved you.

Until you are gone, ’til you’re gone. . .

.

Things are sometimes better understood when left

Unwritten, or left undone and remain unspoken.

.

They are immortal not in pages, not in words,

Not in works of my hands . . .

.

They are engraved forever ~

In my heart.

~

“A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and sings it back to you when you have long forgotten how it goes.”

—

For Writers Island: “Faithful”

http://writersisland.wordpress.com

April Rain

My senses tell me it’s about to rain,

I run and take refuge in a cavern.

Paying attention, I sooth all the pain,

And allow the rain to heal  me again.

I smell the earth’s intoxicating scents

Brought by the swift pouring of april rain.

I seize the boon after the solemn lent,

The earth exults, now my re-birth will reign.

~

Brilliant drizzles of crystal clear raindrops

Quench the the thirst of the fruit trees of summer.

The rain showers refill the plants’ sweet saps

That would make season’s harvest juicier.

~

A damselfly alight on the reed’s blade.

Pellucid mist caught on its net-veined wings.

Raindrops form pools in the forest’s glade

The earth’s bosom bears the heaven’s blessings.

~

The rain stops and winds blow the clouds away

To bathe other grounds with april shower.

I’m enriched by my silent reverie.

‘Tis time I bequeath the cavern’s shelter.

I wish when april rain reaches your place,

You would pay attention and seize its grace.

~

 

 

 

Lavish Summer Inspirations

It is summer morning,

Armed with note pads, a pen

And a mind ready for take off,

I fasten my seatbelt

In a corner

underneath the bower of trees

At our home’s secret garden.

 

The dainty sunshine lights my face,

And the spider webs

On the twigs in front of me.

There’s really nothing in my head to write,

So I opened the windows of my mind

And the door of my heart

To weave glossy web of thoughts

To invite and capture

Lavish summer inspirations.

 

I listen to the rustling sounds

Of leaves as the winds blow

Through the garden’s green roofs ~

Their reflections move on the pads

Like mystic shadows tracing my writings,

Flirting with my thoughts.

Scents of ilang-ilang flowers wafting in the air.

Enticing incessant winged bystanders ~

Bees, butterflies, grasshoppers ~

They signal summer!

 

Random summer thoughts swarm my mind,

So I open the draperies of my heart

And tie the curtains apart

To welcome showers of summer inspirations

Bathing my fiery soul with cool emotions.

 

The birds’ repertoire are unusually merry.

They seem to rejoice with my company,

Or perhaps ’tis my heart I’m hearing

In tune with the beats of summer.

 

Outrageous blooms of bougainvilleas

Against the white wooden verandas

Festive contrasting colors

Treat the eyes with priceless raptures

Make one crave for summer flavors ~

Buko juice, fruit shake, iced cola

Water melon, pineapple, mangoes, papaya

Garnished with flowers of gumamela.

 

‘Tis the season for lavish summer fiesta!

 

—

The writers island invites us to write on the prompt this week: ”Outrageous,” I thought of using the word in a more positive note. Please visit http://writersisland.wordpress.com to be inspired.

Sweet Rewards

           Vagrant birds fly west

                                     Chasing sunset’s subdued light

                                                                       Dense clouds clear behind.

       Waiting is one the toughest passages of life. I feel confined and stranded being neither here nor there. I am not anymore what I used to be, but not yet also what I would become. I’m like a hatching egg on a hanged nest, and what I am tasked to do for now is to wait.

       In 2004, I left the safety of my harbour - resigned from my job - and plunged into an ocean of uncertainties to answer the beckoning of a better life promised for nurses in the US. I never thought I would go back to the profession I deserted 10 years earlier. After all, I was contented living one of my childhood dreams working as a store manager. But in life, there are things that we have to do not because we want to, but because we need to. That explains my unpopular decision and the risk I took then, which surprised my peers and against the advise of my superiors. And so, just like other nurses chasing their fate overseas, or worse, like most filipinos dreaming to live anywhere but here, I became part of our country’s version of modern-day exodus: The alarming problem of Filipino Immigration - or is this the solution to our ailing economy?

Clear shallow puddles

                                   Fishes feed in the harbor

                                                                  Off seas, the fleet goes.

       I found the enlightenment I seek for my action while treading the narrow passage of my life’s transition. The clues are revealed in the fleeting moments while I wait. I capture them by writing, and it is amazing how they take shape on paper as I move forth. Heedful to the unfolding of each day, I trusted God’s time to take me where I am headed. Books opened my mind to look at things in a pellucid perspective that mostly I didn’t fathom initially.

       Perhaps it was providential that I chanced upon a haiku piece from a book I am reading that started it all.  Basho’s most famous verse, the old pond, stirred my interest on his works and the Haiku. I found a perfect form and pattern to inscape my ideas and present state of mind. It inspired me to compose my Filipino Immigration series : a collection of poems that helped me explore my sentiments about this journey.

Land of Childhood Dreams

                                  Hedged in by enormous seas

                                                                           Butterfly alights. 

       Haiku is a poem that depends on images for its effect. Suggestiveness and brevity are the soul and life of a Haiku. It is the shortest of the Japanese poems consisting of 17 syllables in three lines of 5, 7, 5 syllables respectively. Almost always, a Haiku makes some reference to the seasons. Although contemporary Haiku writers maintain that such is not a necessary element. They infused human affairs and variety of subject matters such as love, journey, and the uncertainties of life in their works. Like other Japanese poetry forms, it has no meter and rhyme.

Cool winds from the west

                             Carrying the scents of pines,

                                                             Entice the palm’s fronds.

       Matsuo Bashu (1644-1694), is the greatest Japanese Haiku poet. His style contenues to exercise great influence on the works of his followers upto the present day. His Haiku are finished art giving expression to actual life he calls, a life of poetical refinement. His themes mainly are natural beauties. He has deep insights on the essence of things and the advantage for powerful impressiveness. Here is my attempt to becoming his would-be follower:

Rare pearl of south sea

                             Strewn on far off foreign shores

                                                                        Conspicuous gems.

       One of Basho’s follower I admire is Taniguchi Buson(1715-1783), Buson’s style retains natural beauties, an influence by Basho, but differs the master in some respects. He infused romantic themes and interesting incidents in history on his works, giving free play to fantasy and imagination. Many of his verses are sketches in words with wonderful realism and vivid descriptive power derived from his style of painting. Buson exercised his strong influence in these 2 verses of my series:

Odd drizzling showers

                                 Frozen waters on brown skin

                                                              Drenched soul, shivering.

                                           ~o0o~

Sweet tropical fruits

                                  Food for migratory birds

                                                                New trees in new lands.

       Another disciple of Basho that added fresh touch on his style is Issa(1762-1827). His verses are essentially pathetic. They are poems in human affairs dressed in haiku. His tragic art is the apt pattern to cloth my own pathetic insights on immigration.

Foreign busy streets

                              Teeming with nameless faces

                                                                        Alone in the crowd.

       There is confusion among some western writers calling Haiku the japanese epigram on the ground that in length it resembles the short european epigrams. Asaturo Miyamori cleared this issue sighting that epigrams rather bear great resemblance to Senryu or witty poems. Senryu is another Japanese verse of the 17th century originated by Karai Hachiemon who uses senryu(the river willow) for his pen name. Though it resembles Haiku’s syllable count, they differ much in manner, contents and subject matter. Senryu is more biting, witty, welcomes humor and is often vulgar. Humor is considered bad taste in a Haiku, which is a serious verse. Here’s my senryu verse that fits to this series:

Fingers rolled on ink

                            Black mark streaks on documents

                                                                                   Flying to US.

       I encountered many setbacks along the process of my US  immigrant visa application: false promises from agencies, retrogression, delays, delays, delays! The agony of waiting I silently suffer had shaken my optimism, but I realize now that all these, too, are part of my journey’s itenerary.

       Waiting help build a person’s character: it did a successful overhaul job in mine. I appreciate better now the true meaning of the line: never save anything for the swim back. No matter how hazed the horizon in the morning, or how narrow the roads may seem, or how uncertain the ocean may be, we should always thrive to take that one more step forward. Because we would never know how close we are to the shore unless we try to take that one more stroke.

He is my life raft in the rough sea;

My compass when terrains are hazy.

I fear no more my journey’s dark alley,

For God lights a candle inside me.

       I got my approved Visa in 2006; left the country and arrived here Chicago, October last year. It is my ticket to this current phase of my life’s journey.  I thought before that my ultimate prize was to get here. I know now that I already claimed bits of my rewards with the wisdom I gained along the way. I dreamed of setting my feet on the american soil. I was enthused to have the chance to show them what Filipinos are made of. Perhaps, that waiting phase was God’s way of giving me time for self-appraisal before I leave, so I would know what I could offer the world.

                    Arriving sandals

                                         Carry specks of home

                                                           Brown shoe-tracks on snow.

       I value the wisdom that the school of life taught me in that oppressive confines of the classroom of waiting. I will forever treasure the Haiku lessons I am fortunate to learn in the side at that moment.  I have packed them with the memories in my luggage. As I re-opened the pages now, Flashback of thoughts flicker in my mind. I promised not to forget and this haiku collection will remind me to remember.

—

For Writers Island prompt: Triumph and Survivor

Soul In Flight

For the Writers Island prompt this week: Flight, I’m sharing pieces I wrote 3 summers ago when I was still in the Philippines and before my soul embarked and took off to an exciting flight. . .

 

 It is three hours before sunrise, three hours before I face again the humdrums of my impending day. I lie awake perspiring in my bed, enduring another night of summer  heat that exceeds normal body temperature level according to the weather forecast last night. The whistling of the electric fan only intensifies the oppressive heat of the air that circulates my room. The sheets are soaked with my sweat. This leaves me restless and incapable of sound thoughts.

       I am dehydrated body and mind.

       It’s been weeks now that I feel this way - my mind is seems empty - and it is weeks, too, of zero journal entry. How can an empty mind fill empty pages? I wake up with this question every day and sleep with it finding no answer. I’ve been through this and back, feeling defeated every time.

       But today is different!

       As though emerging from drought, I suddenly have a flood of thoughts. It feels as if a dike has burst and I feel like am drowning! I am confronted with overflowing bits and pieces of puzzling thoughts, voluminous and inarticulate, I am overwhelemed and confused.

       Thoughts clash inside my mind like boxers in a ring, nobody is giving up or losing except for me. I struggle to throw the boxers out, but they remain caged and battling inside my head. It is I who is knocked out black and blue instead. I need to toss them to save what sanity is left of me: I need to write! The pen and paper are my refuge. I use them like pincers to pick each inane thought out of my nutty mind, to find their meaning and to give it sense.

       I drag my self out of bed.

       The emerging light of day illuminate the window panes, which gives me a blurry vision of my room. The silhouettes of the chair and cabinet guide me to my writing table that stand facing the window that opens to the garden. I am seated for a moment doing nothing. I am not even sure if I am awake as I stare at the motionless darkness. But the tarry, tutti-frutti scent of the eraser filling my nostrils, and the sensation of my sweat trickling in my forehead and down my back confirms that I am. In a trance, I hear the deafening wails of my inner silence.

~ 

Lonely is a writer whose soul

Has nothing left to give.

.

Sweating hands, labored breathing.

Heart’s aching, and restless feeling.

Dehydrated thoughts, bloodless pen.

Lost for sound words to be written.

.

Dying spirit of a lonely artist;

Hope is out of sight.

There’s nothing left, but to embrace the light.

Death it is not, ’tis life.

~

       I also hear a strangely familiar voice between the throbbing sounds of my heart beats. In the stillness of dawn I hear my soul speak. Its voice echoes in my ears awakening the dormant artist in me waiting for inspiration. I hear it speaks to the still sleeping would-be poet chanting verses that rhyme with the whistling winds. I see it hand to the would-be painter a brush and colors, which will bring to life the perfect hue of dawn. I see clearly now those incessant images that haunted me in my sleep, and I write when I awake.

~ 

Happy is the artist whose soul

Has embraced the light.

.

Nimble hands, rhythmic breathing,

Agile heart, and soaring feeling.

Fertile thoughts, and blood-stained ink;

There’s no more words left unwritten.

.

Strew of colors inside a fecund mind,

Where a painter hides.

‘Tis where poems and vast ideas reside ~

This meek poet’s life.

. 

Keep the heart warm, satiate the eyes,

Feed the mind, embrace the light.

Set your spirit free!

Embark your soul to an exciting flight.

~

       I have filled pages with my thoughts, scribbling the draft in my mind, when the stimulating tutti-frutti scent of the eraser returns like spirit of ammonia, restoring me to conciousness. However, it is not able to efface the vivid images sketched in my head, nor can it quiet the lingering voice of my soul. I am back, seated at my table, sweating, staring at the empty walls again.

       The unfinished tale that took shape in my mind is nagging me to be completed. Stories are conceived in the heart, take shape in the mind. They belong to the pages and will find homes in the hearts of the readers. There the stories will evolve and begin a new cycle.

       I am enlightened and fully awake now. I hear the roar of traffic leaving the city on the nearby road, or is it arriving? Of this I am not quite sure, but I am aware and certain of the life slowly coming awake outside my window.

       The roosters are the earliest to rise; well, it seem that way for me. They wake people up with their annoying crowing at dawn, but the sound may also be idyllic depending on the ears that listen. The fowl just knows when and how to praise God for the new day. Perhaps they serve to remind the ungrateful, callous humans to do the same, but few take heed.

       It is so pathetic of us to let this moment pass by sleeping, unmindful of its beauty, missing every day the miracles that happen just outside our windows. When was the last time you saw the sun peek through the mountain ridges with its rays reaching out to every corner of the horizon? This is happening every day, but each moment is unique, unlike any other. The clouds of varied hues are tinged with different light each day. The birds always fly across the horizon, yet nobody can predict from which angle or to what direction they will rise. One morning you are lucky to wake up with the stars still sparkling in the sky to vanish with the daylight, but on other mornings you will see no trace of them in the gray heavens. In yet others you’ll catch the moon still in vigil waiting for the sun to come.

       These are only some of the many gifts of life we do not unwrap. Gifts which only the flowers, the trees, and the beasts - the roosters, frogs in the ponds, the four-legged and winged-creatures of earth and sky - constantly notice and praise.

~ 

Swaying vines like curtain drape the garden;

Hanging from the bough of a mango tree.

‘Tis my haven, my version of eden ~

A nook where I express my artistry.

Violet orchids and whites search the day-lights,

Like birds on flight, peep through the canopy.

Broods nestled up there, unafraid of heights,

Serenade my soul with sweet melody.

A bird perch on the twig near the pool;

Driving the fishes and the toads away,

While I stay still watching a wee ripple.

The elements are semingly showy.

I’m sated with ethereal scenery,

Seizing the subtle garden’s poetry.

~       

   

       I hear my mother’s voice calling me for breakfast. From my room, I can smell and tell that scrambled eggs, daing, sinigang, and a steaming cup of coffee are in the table. I am enlightened.

       

 http://writersisland.wordpress.com/

The Narrowed Road

~

Morning comes and off it goes,

Like people come and(ouch!) they go.

 

Some came and gone

Just passing my way.

But few are meant to stay.

The hard lessons of letting go

And holding on

Are left here with me.

~

 My first real bestfriend was a boy my age I met on my first day of school in grade one. I remember his name was “Hanibal,” but I am not sure how his name was spelled. As bleak as my memory of how he looks(I only have a blur image of him in my mind as a boy with a new haircut). So I am writing his name perhaps the way my seven-year-old mind then wrote his name.

Our friendship begun as soon as our first class in grade one started. We met in a classroom with mixed smell of fresh pads, newly plastic covered notebooks, scented erasers, freshly sharpened pencils, lunch boxes, bottled juices(mine was milk) encased in our new school bags. I remember I used safeguard soap when I took a bath that morning for my first day of school, I remember I was wearing a new shirt, I forgot the color, but I can still remember how it smells. The scents of these items always conjure nostalgic thoughts, reminding me of my first bestfriend I lost with the passing of time. We were about to build highways together as friends but we lost it too early in life. The places we reached and contenually explore widen the spaces between us, and narrowed the road that we briefly shared. But in my mind we are always back to that corner in our grade one classroom.

I was seated on a desk in the front row at the right side of the room next to him. A stranger just like all the other faces around me. It was fate that placed us seated next to each other, but it was our choice to become friends. The feeling of being left alone for the first time draw us together. I feel at ease with his presence the moment we first introduced our names. We became friends before our first recess, and by the end of our first day in school, we have found in each other’s company the joy of real friendship. I can not remember any other details of our days together, like I can not recall anything more about him. I just know that he made my first day in school less scarry to the surprise of my mother who anticipated the worse. I easily get over my separation anxieties and fear of strangers, I looked forward to being back in school and I always take home great stories at dinner time announcing to my family my newly found friend.

Days passed. Our school activities progressed, school became my second home. But one day, I found myself unusually seated alone in our desk. “Hanibal” was absent when our teacher checked our attendance. There is that certain longing I understand early on. I waited for him until recess, but lunch and afternoon class came and gone without him. The same thing happened the next day and days after that. Our teacher later on changed our seating arrangement, making me vacate the desk we shared in our classroom where the emblems of our friendship vanished.

I later found out that their family moved to another place and he transfered to another school far, that my young mind is unable to reach.

I was assigned a desk in the second row at the center isle of the room after that. From time to time I would glace at our desk wishing he is back. My new seatmate is faceless in my memory now, like the friends that I had after we parted. I remember only one name from grade one: Hanibal, and he is my first real bestfriend.

I am not sure if he remembers or he also think of me this way. It doesn’t matter anymore. It is sad to think that the road where we first met has narrowed and we never ended up building highways together. He may forget, but as long as I still know how the desk smells, I will  always remember. 

~

You’re like a needle that pricked my heart

My heart, my friend, you rift.

.

Come closer, see the wound in my chest

My heart, my friend, bleeds.

.

Blood filled my pen like ink

My journals, my friend, are stained.

.

Years tinged with pain since you left

The void, my friend, still hurts.

.

Comeback someday and heal this broken heart

Come home, my friend, I’ll wait.

~

“Solitude” oil on canvas, by: Jeques B. Jamora, 2007

___

For Writers Island prompt

“Lost Highway”

visit the island for details

http://writersisland.wordpress.com/2008/04/04/prompt-link-lost-highway/