September 18, 2011
God asked me to insert straw on His pack of juice?
I heard people say that God sometimes disguises as a beggar, testing the goodness of the heart of his people. Maybe the belief is biblically anchored for according to the scriptures, God himself said that however you treat the least of your brothers you are doing the same thing to Him.
I am inclined to agree to this belief, highlighting the word SOMETIMES. Beggars are usually ignored but it is interesting to note their varieties. They come from different sizes and ages, from children to the aged, from cripple to blind, from the handicapped to the mentally ill.
It is our routine every Wednesday to attend mass at Santo Niño chapel and have snacks afterwards. More than a couple of handicapped would wait for churchgoers after the mass to ask alms. I never ever dropped a peso to their canisters. Maybe I will donate next time, if I fail to notice their able bodied assistants. Last Wednesday, after the mass and fries, we were strolling on the city sidewalks to digest both the bread of life and the bread of intestines when the boy of about eight years old approached us. He was wearing an oversized shirt/rag that covers down to his knees and appeared to have been deprived of a good bath for a week.
Hypocrisy aside, we would usually shun on the grimy face, but before I could act out the impulse of disgust that my brain dictates the instance the boy extended his hands, I was cut short by the look of innocence when I stared in his eyes. And when I look on his extended arms, he was holding on his hand a pack of juice (Zest-o maybe) and a straw, then he voiced out: “Tito, lihog ko bi tuslok ka straw sa juice.” I was speechless; Kat never said a word either. I took the pack and inserted the straw, with little effort because the straw almost penetrated the pack with his try, and I was thinking he could have made it by his own. I handed him the juice with the straw, he bowed “Salamat”, and took off. Sipping on the juice (or technically on the straw), he ran towards a lady waiting for a ride and harassed her for some money. The lady shunned away from him.
Even on my way home, I was thinking of that happenstance. If God was indeed disguised in that boy, with all His goodness, he never even asked a pack a juice in return to all the gifts He bestowed on me, but instead he asked from somebody else and all He wanted was for me to insert straw on His pack of juice. He never even pestered me for money.
The next day after office, while we were eating in Mang Inasal, a group of boys approached us begging (demanding actually) for “bones”. They were carrying a sack of their “loot”. “ Ngayo kami tul-an kay wala pa kami ka kaon.” Again, we were speechless. But before we could react, two of them tried to grab our food while instructing their comrade, “bantayi ang security!” Good thing, the guard is already coming and the rascals run away, mocking the guard from a safe distance.
I remember the line from the song, “…I look at things from both sides now…” Well, devils can make disguises too.
September 11, 2007
Diaphanous Heart
Do my naive eyes beguile me, molded an illusion by painting an image for a heart that been long trapped in a tinted glass? Out of a blurry vision of dawn, she came like planet Venus on its appearance as a morning star. Her glitter may not be as brilliant and precious as of diamond’s. She is not a perfectly sculptured gem, yet her beauty , as timeless and delicate as amber.
Her light shines through the cold barrier of my heart. I savor the warmth, like a potent elixir that gives life to confusing feelings.
I don’t like feeling this way.
It’s just another September… and eventually passes away.
July 3, 2007
Talking Nonsense Part II
I have five days to spend as a bum. To put it in an intellectual sense, Economics would call it frictional unemployment, that is unemployment that is due to normal turnover in the labor market and that includes people who are temporarily between jobs because they are moving or changing occupations, or unemployed for similar reasons. Strictly speaking, I don’t really qualify to that category. Just trying to sound impressive, hehe. So let’s just stick to my first statement: I HAVE FIVE DAYS TO SPEND AS A BUM. I don’t have a damn idea how to spend those five days. What would a bum supposed to do in the first place? Maybe I’ll try to make a list. A list they say, “offers a wonderful way to confine the nearly insuperable demands of the chaotic, freewheeling world to the possible; to turn abstract to specific; to cut experience into bite sizes.” But the list made by the filipinos on their ballots last elections did not turn out so well these ways. House speakership and senate presidency are like fattened cows thrown over a river filled with pirannhas( spelled it right?, too lazy to check). If Lord Voldemort is “He-Who-Should-Not-Be-Named”, Coco Pimentel would consider Maguindanao as “Place-That-Should-Not-Be-Named”. But I can imagine Migs Zubiri maniacally and possessively regarding Maguindanao like Gollum on the ring of power hissing “My Precioussss”. The opposition ensures check and balance in governance. But isn’t it obvious that this system of “checks (kutong) and “balances” (utang) ensures that any action taken by the administration will be rendered utterly meaningless by an equal and opposite reaction from opposition?
Let’s set aside politics and lemme go back to my list. Perhaps I’ll have my hair cut. Our OIC Assistant Vice President suggested that I should add some highlights on my hair. “Para dadami lalo chicks mo”, his exact words. Maybe he meant it or it’s just another way of saying “You look like a lunatic with your long unruly hair. Our office policy clearly states that your hair is not supposed to be touching the collar of your shirt, asshole!” But I like him regardless what he really meant. It feels far more better that greeting a blank wall good morning.
But only those with an intelligence level of a slug would greet a blank wall good morning, right? Wrong! Try to greet a training specialist and you would most probably experience that talking to the wall thing. Ironic? It is little power from little authority from little people that sucks worst, agree?
Maybe I really have that intelligence level of a slug, for I never get tired greeting the blank wall good morning. Good manners and right conduct are taught through out grade school, and I guess they sunk in at the wrong side of my brain. Maybe I lack the masters degree to fully grasp that level of corporate etiquette.
Next on my list would be watching Transformers the movie. A free Chicken Inasal with unlimited rice would be a welcome preamble. These are some of the pleasures I can enjoy for the moment. I can’t help but envy those people who do things that are illegal, immoral or fattening. I dont want to talk more about risk… until the time that I’ll be riding anything that floats, flies or fucks.
Then I’ll finish my enrollment in the university. I’m taking Enterprise Development as elective coupled with Management of Information System this trimester. I anticipate to experience grave financial distress upon first glimpse of the cashier’s booth.
And then perhaps… hybernate on the next three days. It is more exciting living each day at whim. I maybe used to a routine life but definitely not on a scripted one.
Scrap that list.
June 25, 2007
Talking Nonsense
Summer is over, but the sun glares tirelessly in this penultimate Sunday of June, wilting the pale crimson blossom of gumamela that freshly bloomed this morning upon first glance of sunlight. The air is moist, soil damped by last night’s rain, gracing the celebration of the feast of Saint John the Baptist the next day. The street is busier, a usual habit and scenery during the towns’ market day. A guy in a bicycle passed by with a bagfull of goods in one hand, same hand that keeps the bike in balance while the other hand is propped up, holding an exaggeratedly large red umbrella to shield him from the sun. I can’t help but smile. He reminds me of TV ads of papaya soaps and whitening facial cleanser. Seldom do I find my self at home during Sundays lately, sitting here as dumb as a fish, thinking my own thoughts. Well, I love the idea of living in Bikini Bottom and meet Spongebob and his pet Garry.
Trimester is over too, relieved of worries after the proposal in Human Resource was submitted. Human resource management, huh? Sounds ironic if not pathetic to some public organizations.
And hear this: ” The alterations in the income streams provided by loans or sales, the marginal degrees of impatience for all individuals in the market are brought into equality with each other and the market rate of interest.”— Irvin Fisher. Whew! Do I sound like someone with a bachelor’s degree in engineering? This is one of the concepts in Portfolio Theory that the Diliman guy discussed during the seminar to culminate the course in Finance this trimester. We have to submit a five page-page handwritten report about it, arrgh!.
Talking about risks in different portfolios made me rialize that in everything we do, there are certain level of risks involved, even in deciding on what to do with our very own dick. ( Although most guys let their dicks do the decision making). Silver Surfer on the second installment of Fantastic Four movie appears to have none. Is it worth pulverizing and sucking energy from living planets for the sake of the girl he loves without something hanging between his legs to prove big-bang theory with her afterwards? Maybe he realized it and decided to end his life instead at the eand of the movie. Poor guy, he landed in the wrong planet, filled with suckers that grow exponentially like bacteria over time.
Going back to risk, I had never done much of risky feats in my life. People are even surprised or could hardly believe that I don’t have an inamorata at my age, conjuring facial expressions as if I missed more than half of my life and that my fuckability will decline tremendously for the next couple of years. Crap! Freedom is expensive, right, Mae?
The greater the risk, the higher is the expected return. And our objective my friends, is to minimize risk in every investment we take in attaining that desirable level of return. Trillanes took a greater risk by staging a mutiny at Oakwood, pressuring the president to step down from power, and now he is a proclaimed senator, despite being caged. I can imagine how Gloria salivates in anticipating to kick his ass… but that’s another risk for her to take.
I just finished reading three novels in the last two weeks, one science fantasy, another is a suspense thriller, and the other is a detective story revolving around secret communist ring that still thrives in the United States. The communist idealism appeals me lately. What if I’ll take that risk?
Just kidding.
June 3, 2007
Summer Wine
There are rare moments in life that happiness slips past you so easily that you barely notice it, or ever believe it will end. And there you are, left alone…
Empty.
Everything else is frozen, except the sound of heavy breathing as you try hard to hold back the tears.
Moments tick away.
You seek for the cold comfort of darkness, to be drowned on its chilling embrace until its anesthetic coldness numbed you heart into very deep slumber.
You drifted into illusory dreams. Fall in love with the moon and the night, the poems and the songs.
Only to wake up… with even more longings.
Who are you?
May 6, 2007
A Journey To Hell
Every step heading towards uncertainty
in the absence of directions and point of reference.
Stumbling. Falling. Rising again,
struggling onward the infinite distance
of a journey that has no beginning.
Blistered lips,
craving for the moisture in the desert of death.
Naked feet scorched
in the ember of sand
Every drop of sweat, kissed away by the
hungry breeze,
leaving a sting of salty pain, howling
in a delightful laughter of hell.
Horizon is a blurr in a distance,
transformed into a hallucination
of the paradise that the heart craves.
A false hope
to fire up the desire of existence.
and so…
Another step is made
and another…
A dot of life moving along
the endless string of sorrow.
April 29, 2007
25th Summer Night’s Dream
Bare silken skin showered by mellow moonbeams, soft and smooth to the touch. Slowly, she walked towards me, delicate secrets revealed as she came nearer. A slender solitary figure, a pretty face framed in soft hair as black as the night. She looked hardly mortal when she smiled at me. I reached out and caress the outline of her face with my fingertips. Her eyes searched mine with languid lingering looks in them that made my veins burn in liquid fire. My throat dried, my body numbed in anticipation as desire overwhelmed me…
April 26, 2007
Nocturnal Serenity
Sitting on two parallel bamboos propped between a fallen branch and the base of crooked cocoa tree, forming a beam that forme
d a bridge across a trough in the soil caused by the running water during the last rains. Back relaxed against the hard bamboo that is tied horizontally for support. Legs dangling, bare feet an inch from the soil, arms extended sideways along the bamboo support. Sitting still, just like a hanged man that finally found the ultimate peace in the gallows. Inhaled deeply, lungs filled with summer’s humid air. Placid was the night, even the wind tied in stillness, and no leaf was heard rustling. Stars are few, the pale quarter moon is bland, lazily illumined a streak of cirrus clouds that scarred the hazy sky. Time was of no essence, and there I was, a photograph of a man hidden in the black canvass of the night.
April 14, 2007
The Promise Of Dawn
The Promise of Dawn
By agalam
Dusk displays a placid and gentle mystic sky
Stars begin peering through thin clouds, brilliant but shy
Mountains are silhouetted like great walls from a distance
I am charmed of the scene, heart and mind in a trance.
River streaming in dark silver glow
Reflecting a complexion of a beautiful radiant you
Faded and wiped out by the approaching night
To be cherished by heart and missed by sight.
The soft whispering of the wind of dusk
Awakens all emotions my hesitant heart would often ask
Will morning herald me with my most solemn plea?
For you to be the dawn welcoming me to a new promising day.
Will the night be the phantom gap that will hinder to rally,
My most treasured fantasy and tomorrow’s promised reality?
Will its coldness turn every colorful memory to gray,
Or will it bridge the echoes that my heart desires and fervently pray?
The mystic moon showers the night with its golden light
All my hopes rise like wildflowers blossoming at midnight
Tinting the breeze with the scent of the undeniably growing passion
Paving the way that will take us to the promise of dawn.
April 4, 2007
Spanish Eyes
When was the last time I laid my eyes upon you?
Four years… ahhhhhh, that was long ago. Just like the wave that kisses the shore and silently dies, you came and asserted your self and silently walked away. But as infinite as the waves that touches the shore, so will be my reminiscence of you…
Not that I miss you…
Nor I have regrets…
For being insensitive…
For being indifferent…
You opened yourself, without reservations. I responded with silence, but you did hold on, despite the ambiguities.
Not that, I don’t like you…nor I didn’t care. You are damn too beautiful for me, you deserve better… Was I insecure then? Perhaps…
Did I love you? How could I tell? I never tell. Did I?
But I wrote rhymes for every letters of your name…
J******* and young you are,
Exuberant, eager to reach the star…
You made me view things vividly, being inspired by the image of you. And I appreciated the surreal world of a dream.
River streaming in dark silver glow,
Reflecting a complexion of a beautiful radiant you…
Yes, it was night the last time we met, and the longest we spent together…until dawn. As the eastern horizon burned in rich orange by the rising sun…we part. Nothing was said, nothing was clear…
I contented with absence… did you?
Yesterday I saw a girl with so much resemblance of you. She smiled on somebody… a smile that is specially meant for that somebody alone. It was the very same smile that was only meant for me. I was not completely insensitive then, was I?
And so I decided to write this post, to say thank you.
You have found someone. I am happy for you. When we meet again, I hope to see more joys on those Spanish eyes…
And a smile, specially intended for a friend.
Desiderato 
