poetasterixtanix

Tomorrow the Sun

2012-02-07T04:56:00.000-08:00

(Image from Billfrymire.com)

Storms send out warning
of dark clouds and drizzle
ahead of wind, rain, death

Tremors don’t
But the dogs howling
at ghosts; birds flying
into windows, walls

Songs crash into words
Breaking stride, crushing dew
Fear in faces, stuck in place
Feet turn to stone

Leaden the dead
Spread the news
The world ends anew
Tomorrow the sun

One Day that Shook My World

2012-02-06T14:34:00.000-08:00

(Image from 30.media.tumblr.com, Joe Strummer, Earthquake Weather)

Give me the shakes

shake and bake

run for the hills

Oops! This is uphill

The fool who lives this high

has nowhere to go but down

Can’t go out without a sigh

Cry and look like a clown

Call and text

Shoot your load

No more sex

Forget that broad

Holy book this, holy book that

Catch the last train on track

Sing His praises

Get high on smack

If the world ends today

Buy that last happy meal

Here’s a toast, don’t stray

My God is right, hooray!

I was in Love with Margaret Salinger

2012-01-30T01:20:00.000-08:00

(Image from Media.smashingmagazine.com)

I was in love with Margaret Salinger

J.D. would have not approved

But he normally didn't care

So the coast is clear of doting father

Beyond pretty, Meg is a gem

She’s smart, got her father’s genes

She’s pretty, her mother is the same

Her parents split, what a shame

Margaret was her daddy’s little girl

They watched classic movies on reel

Amidst the New England woods

Fairy-tale setting, ideal for moods

Imagine Meg growing up to be Margaret

Went to college, worked as a mechanic

Jerome David could have made it easier

For her to earn a diploma, plus money for beer

But, no, daddy loved his isolation

Her daughter’s desolation forced her

To find a man of his image, futile

She hated him like Plath hated Hitler

The dream catcher wasn’t much help

All it did was give a catchy title

For a book like Mommie Dearest

With daddy stepping in for the beast

Sure, J.D.’s lover came out with her own tell-all

You can’t blame Joyce, she will always be

A little girl whining about the world

Making a living on bones in her wallet

But how could Meg do a Joyce?

Get back at an absentee daddy?

Get royalties for a book well done

Even if it hurts her as much as it did J.D.?

Should anyone care as long as we get to read

A book as fun as a day on the beach

A whale struck by a bus

A train crashing into a truck

Meg turned out OK

She married, got kids

She looks happy on the Web

She’s a Christian minister

I write this down using Courier New font

Ten-point-five points small

A boy turning fifty

Throwing rhymes, so nifty

Stories High

2012-01-02T03:30:00.000-08:00

(Image from http:1.bp.blogspot.com)

Stories are told in ways
As numerous as heroes’ names
Sizes various as egos wandering

The best storytellers are mothers weaving tall tales
To children who imbibed their milk
In soothing tones of silenced cries, cooing contentment

The saddest sight is a widower
Who whistles in the lonely afternoon
Against the wind, sees his wife in whirlpools of dust

The happiest sound is a bird chirping
Who knows not it has wings
But sees people shuffle their feet

Attempts at Translating Neruda

2012-01-02T02:55:00.000-08:00

(Image from fc06.deviantart.net)

An Attempt at Translating Pablo Neruda's 'Soneto XI'
from the Cebuano from the English

I yearn for your lips, your voice, your hair
Quiet, famished, I stalk the streets
Bread cannot sate my hunger, dawn intrudes
Throughout the day I search for water measuring your steps

I hunger for your slippery laughter
Your hands the hue of fierce reaping
I hunger for the pale pebbles of your fingernails
I want to consume your skin like an almond whole

I want to eat the sunshine ablaze in your body beautiful
The queenly nose on your haughty face
Desiring to consume the passing gloom of your eyelashes

I lie in wait ravenous, breathing in the twilight
Hounding you, for the warmth of your heart
Like a cougar on Quitratue’s wastelands

Sulay nga Paghubad sa Kang Pablo Neruda nga 'Soneto XI'Guikan sa Iningles nga Guikan sa Kinatsila

Gipangandoy ko ang imong ngabil,
imong tingog, imong buhok,
Hilom ug gutom, gaukoy ako sa mga kadalanan,
Ang pan dili makabusog kanako, gibalda ako sa kadlawon,
Tibuok adlaw gipangayam ko ang tubig nga sukod
sa imong mga lakang

Gigutom ako sa mimis mo nga katawa,
ang imong mga kamot nga bulok,
Sama sa usa ka bangis nga ani,
Gigutom sa mga luspad nga bato sa imong mga kuko,
Buot ko nga kaunon ang imong panit
sama sa usa ka tibuok nga almendro

Buot ko nga kaunon ang bidlisiw nga gasiga
sa imong matahum nga lawas,
Ang maraynahon nga ilong sa imong mapahitas-on
nga nawong,
Buot ko nga kaunon ang lumalabay'ng landong
sa imong mga pilok,

Ug galakat-lakat ako nga gutom, gasimhot sa salumsom,
Nangayam kanimo, alang sa imong kasing-kasing,
Sama sa usa ka puma sa pagawpaw sa Quitratue.

Pablo Neruda's Spanish text for 'Soneto XI'

we will not be loners

2011-06-22T00:42:00.000-07:00

(Image from ugniusdapkunas.wordpress.com)

we will not be loners
we will run with the pack
and think nothing of going back
we will not be loners
we will live in a city
full of lovers and hoods
screaming for the moon
and baying for blood
we will not be loners
we will learn how to write
in upper case
and use punctuation
we will be punctual for work
which we will find
to put bread and beer on the table
we will not be loners
we will ask ancient people
to teach us
how to love and multiply
we will not be loners

She Thinks of Me at Least Once a Year

2011-01-31T07:36:00.000-08:00

(Image from merlinspath.files.wordpress.com)

She thinks of me at least once a year
She never was sure if it was love or fear
Undeserved emotion or mere empathy
For a creature rare as a quotamonee

She was young when we first met
I was seven years her senior
A big boy acting like junior
I swept her off her feet

Always tongue-tied
Heart in sleeve hogtied
13 marauders raided her heart
Her castle walls held rampart

But the gods were unwilling
Gave me no grace, muses unsmiling
Nyx sent her nocturnal hordes
Pushed me back to the sad overlord

Where messages vanish
In fields of dead bodies
Regret and thoughts of Hades
Deaf to words admonish

I write of nursery rhymes
When the finger of poesy
Is caught in cookie-jar mimes
Of middle-age fancy

Forgive my daring, light of Ley
Princess of my youth in fields of hay
I sing of bitter fruit hanging on dead branch
Melodies, words they work perchance

The Arrogance

2011-01-16T08:23:00.000-08:00

(Image from s6.thisnext.com)

With arrogance that should only belong to God
she breaks my heart.
Fearing neither karmic outcome or the speed of my hand
she smiles while cutting up vows like paper falling on floor.
The betrayal of ultimate candlelit dinners
whispered flirtations sinking in wine
are ancient recalls of moonlight caught in lace curtains.
Will the victim live through blotter reports
blood dripping on snow
the cliché of shared movies, shred tickets?
The query of final judgment
will prove a pretty smirk
is not the right to hurt mock.

Trois Femmes sur la Cote a.k.a. Three Females on a Beached Will

2011-01-09T00:36:00.000-08:00

(For Jane)

(Image from imagesfromus.com)

The girl, the woman, the lady walk
along the boulevard of spoken screams
Along the coast where suns bobbing up and sinking
Are multi-colored balls children play with on the grassy lawns
Captive of concrete marble slabs, benches for weary flesh and soul

Every rising of the sun is a new year of whorls in the tree of strife
Love confounds all but the purest of spirit
Those who need not the wars of affection
Point and go where drizzles and rainbows call
Whispering vows and a skip and a jig

Short Wings

2010-11-08T01:01:00.000-08:00

(Image by Luc Viatour from www.upload.wikimedia.org)

Live impermanent of cycles
Memories transparent shimmering
In the dim of sun, gloom of moon
Sisters of dragons flying low, waiting vainly
Of knights blue armor diving smokeless jets
Amassing not for war but for love, peace

A creature that dies everyday cannot go extinct
It lives dead between vampires and recall
Forgetting nothing, eating air
Breeding, springing forth gushers
Nymphs and imps watching
Long may you fly, bye

He Wakes Up Neurotic

2010-11-01T01:02:00.000-07:00

(Image from farm5.static.flickr.com)

He gets up happy, they say
Smiling from day to day
Never see a frown on his mug, grey

He blows the trumpet divine
Angel or strumpet, he declines
Sat on a bench, C’s on his side
Mo’ money they plead
The babies they bleed

His arm is strong
His fingers are steel
But soft as velvet
They string the reel

Notes fly into space
In between
What’s in your face
Race to the edge
Plant veggies
Eat the soil of Eden

It’s a wonderful…
What the hell, are you?
Don’t speak, it’s a mouthful
Didn’t your ma teach you?

2010-10-24T00:16:00.000-07:00

(Image from davegranlund.com)

The Arrogance of Stephen Hawking

The arrogance of Stephen Hawking
is the insistence of humans that they matter
more than something else.
Big Bang, theoretical physicist, which came first
the physicist or the bang?

Hawking once straddled the faith fence
not committing to one side.
Later changed his mind
with gravity pulling his ego down
to the molten core
where everything melts
including event horizons.

(Image from divorceinsurance.files.wordpress.com)

Did you do it for love?/Did you do it for money?/Did you do it for spite?/Do you think you had to, honey? – The Long Run/The Eagles

Marrying for Money

Not expecting marrying for money’d be this bad
No sex for love, no sex for love
Security, comfort, prestige -- unworth the air printed on
Sow the seeds of lust, barren feelings field
Birds, insects feast on unburied seeds
Thorny plants choke seedlings
The foolish man builds a house on mud
The foolish woman believes middle class is sad
Dead is sad, indifference mad
Not expecting marrying for money’d be this bad

Tiger Through the Rose Bush

2010-10-18T07:42:00.000-07:00

(Image from wwwdelivery.superstock.com)

The blood the prick
Thorn elects
Goads is a gift on the land
Parched by invaders from north
Two footed and four

Cat of stripes and rare gripes
Ambles through thickets swims through flows
It minds not the cuts remind it it’s beast
The biggest one on any block

Growling mewling mood dictates
Humidity this deep calls for waters
From below and above

Tiger beauty and death
Is god to the famished

Her Heart Broke

2010-10-10T20:15:00.000-07:00

Her heart broke like the bottles of alcohol
she flung to the wall when drunk.
Not a drop of firewater
until they took all her children away --
to assimilate, she was told.

From the red man’s land
to the frontiers of abuse and beyond.
Her husband didn’t say much except, Gute!

Her eldest child never met her.
She died when eight wasn’t even nine,
too young to leave, too old in soul.
She had seven, lost them all.

Pagsakay ni Inday sa Multicab

2010-10-03T23:38:00.000-07:00

(Image from lh5.ggpht.com)

Pagsakay ni Inday sa multicab
Napakong siya
Gipungngan niya iyang agay
Apan niluha iyang mata
Dili siya buot nga madaut iyang postura
Maanyag ug madanihon
Lumoy ang pamayhon
Sihag iyang blouse
Itom iyang sayal
Dili matago ang tinguha
Ang pangandoy sa mga panglantaw
Ubos ug ibabaw

Yes, No Isosceles

2010-09-23T15:31:00.000-07:00

(Image from http://aleph0.clarku.edu)

Summer is never gone from this land
It merely hides during rain,
sneaking a peek at the sky,
waiting for the sun to smile.

The times you think it’s fall,
you are reminded September
wears different clothes near the equator.

You shine in your own way, sunbeam.
Dropping the baby blubber
to be a young woman,
growing miles of legs
that make your mother look skywards,
your pale brown eyes stop boys in their tracks.

Your sister and I share September
the same way your brother and mom
tarry with January.

Facile rhymes and ignored cadences
make it easy to write verses.
Same way three fourths through the year
bring the smell of Christmas near
and carols to the doorstep.

2010-09-15T14:47:00.000-07:00

(Image from absolutechinatours.com)

The Emperor’s Reign

Refusing to go
after the king;
they fall over each other
declining chance
to say something.
Too brilliant even for the sun,
Too smart for the report of a gun.
I remain alone
on top of my mountain

(Image from images.bridgeman.co.uk)

The Emperor’s Rain

It comes without
so much as a by your leave.
It falls soft, pitter patter,
or hard, an invading army
hungry for gore glory.

It is food.
It is death.
It is sink or swim,
stuck in the mud.

It is an old lover,
the only friend;
when gods
abandon Olympus
fearful of fear
and a child’s smile.

Nick of Time

2010-09-08T13:09:00.000-07:00

(Image from weheartit.com)

The dawn she was born
A star fell from the void
The breeze whispered her name
Mari, her eyes a gift of the sun
But with a mouth that needs soaping
She gives warmongers pause
Wakes her father at 5
Telling him a fire rages
He jolts out of day sleep
Runs downstairs, sees no smoke
It’s her spirit that burns
From the top of the landing she smirks
Mission accomplished

The Green Fairy

2010-09-01T16:04:00.000-07:00

(Image from images2.layoutsparks.com)

The green fairy haunts dreams
Colours the paper this is written on
She flies on gossamer winds
Bleeds chlorophyll when cut
By the wit of poets

You can look at her
You can smell her
You can drink her
She is whatever you want her to be

Banned in some climes
For her noxious notoriety
They changed their minds
With the new dawning
The new twisting of meanings
That tint windows with wishes

The Girl With a Red Balloon in a Black & White World

2010-08-22T22:58:00.000-07:00

(Image from laurenusher.com)

The girl with a red balloon in a black & white world
walks the streets bled of lonely.
She thinks what a lovely white dress she wears.
And she smiles.

She knows lips have to be ruby red to be pretty.
But grey is OK.
And her pout stays put.
An extra spring is added to her skip.

She almost lets go of the balloon string.
And she frowns.
Her fingers tighten.

I will not stop writing paeans to the moon

2010-08-09T01:11:00.001-07:00

(Image from goldtent.net)

I will not stop writing paeans
to the moon
The same way I can’t stop
getting up at dawn to pee

This mistress’ cruelty is pain
that strengthens
Lengthens life, sweet torture

Cool to the eye, warm to thought
Clouds cover its repose
singing melodies that singe

Ang Kulafu ug si Noy Andoy

2010-08-02T01:54:00.000-07:00

(Image from gingmaganda.multiply.com)

Pagkalaay kung walay tagay
Busa nag-inusara na lang og yarok sa Kulafu si Noy Andoy
Nagkadugay, nagkahinay, dili na kalahutay
Dali na mahubog ang tiguwang
Apan tag tu’tu’o ra man gihapon ka botelya iyang mahurot
Gustong malimtan ang kamingaw
Napu’o na ka tuig sukad nipanaw si Nang Pining
Mga anak nila minyo ug galahi na
Ma-o ning si Raha Kulafu na lang ang iyang kanunayng kuyog
”Shot, nyor!”
Hangtud mahubog, mohigda daplin sa da’an gabilangkad
Nawalis and purol, walay putos, kita’ng lagay

Trinity Far

2010-07-12T08:09:00.001-07:00

(Crucifixion by Salvador Dali)

Jesus Pose

Down on the ground
Arms spread-eagle
Legs figure four
The lamb, black
Head shaved
Goatee mocking
Messiah lost
In the ether
Real blood
Bullets flesh
Save for the soul
Soldiering on
Solder back
The halo of you.

Ang ha’s mitabok sa da’an (Snake Crossing)

Ang ha’as mitabok sa da’an
Nakurat ang driver sa habal-habal
Matud pa niya, ”Daku-a oy!”

Nagdahum ko nga sawa
Sama sa akong paa ang gidak-on
Apan pagka-cute man di-ay
Sa babuyon nga bitin
Naninguha pa gyud intawon
Og kamang sa lapukon nga dalan
Aron motabok sa pikas daplin

Maayo gani wala suwayi sa driver og ligis
Nahadlok man sab gud siya nga mopahit kuno
Mayna lang hinan-aw ko og Discovery
ug National Geographic Channel
Ug Animal Planet pa gyud

Sige ta’g kakita sa mga naturalists
Nga yano rang gipunit ang mga bitin
Ug moingon pa gyud, “What a beautiful animal.”
Diri sa amo-a, it’s only beautiful if we can put
An animal in a cooking a pot
Bantug rang hapit na mapu-o ang mga mananap dinhi

Slew (Song for You)

She killed me
I don’t know how many times
She kissed me
I don’t know how many rhymes
She told me
To write in cold climes

I come back for more
Each time she says I hate you
Her wicked smile sweet honey
To a fly caught in a web
Of desire and regret

Nice View Ruined

2010-07-04T06:36:00.000-07:00

Her legs are two of the whitest
and smoothest I’ve seen
But she walks like a duck

Wasting the short denim pants
Clinging to her butt
Like a scared child

She can cause accidents
On the street
Or make your day
With her gait

You Are Not The World's Best Dad

2010-06-19T14:05:00.000-07:00

(Image from ablemuse.com)

You are not the world’s best dad
There were times I wished you dead
I forget the reason why I felt that way
You were not the world’s best dad

Freud believed that a father is a godlike figure
in everyone’s mind
I don’t know about that,
but you sure did act like your were God at times

No father, no son, no daughter
Where is mother in all of this?
In the kitchen cooking,
In the toilet cleaning

Loving you is not easy
It should be but not
Today is your special day
Mother has hers too

Who wins out in father-mother contest?
Counting the number of mother’s boys
And father’s girls
Mother should win by a landslide

It’s not the easiest thing in the world to say:
I love you, father
You are a creature of darkness and light
Can’t live without one or the other

Congratulations, you have done enough to pass
The paternal test of love and hate
Happy Father’s Day, dad
Someday you will die, but today you live.

Ang Cerveza

2010-03-07T20:20:00.000-08:00

Ingon sila ang beer hinimo gikan sa trigo.
Pero nganong humot man nga kamoteng linung-ag
inig agi nako usahay sa highway Seno?

Dili man pod ni gikang humota sa kusina
sa mga balay ilawom sa tulay sa Tipolo.
Basta diha gyud sa tungod planta sa San Miguel.
Kana bang makita gani nimo ang daku kaayo
nga tangke kay bildo man ang bintana,
nga mora'g diha buhaton ang beer.

Dili sab tingali ni dautang hangin
gikan sa ginhawaan sa usa sa mga pasahero
sa jeep nga akong gisakyan:
kamoteng-utot, kay dili man baho,
hinuon humot.

Kaniadtong bata pa ko
cerveza ang tawag nila sa beer.
“’Day, taga-i mi’g tulo ka cerveza, bi!”
Ang mga Katsila man gud
ang nagdala aning cerveza diri.
Apan pag-abot sa mga Amerkano,
sa radyo ug TV gi-advertize ang beer,
beer na lang sab ang naandan nato.

Lami gyud ang beer, labi na kung bugnaw.
Pait apan lami.
Makalipong, makahubog,
makabusog sab kuno
kay "beer is food" kung taga San Mig pasulti-on.
Ayaw na lang og palit og bugas ug sud-an,
i-inom na lang sa eskina
ang imong kwarta, apili’g sumsoman.
Panlingi lang kay apason unya ka
sa imong asawa, makulatahan ka;
outside the kulambo pa gyud ka.

Beer is cold. Very cold outside the moskitero.

Stormy Weather

2010-02-28T21:26:00.000-08:00

Image from www.isavo.com

We will make love
for the first time in stormy weather;
water swelling clouds,
darkening your brows.

You will cry in glee
insane for the waiting.
A quarter of a centurion
of wounded animal pride
And lions mad with fear.

You will dig your nails
into my back
which has deflected
bullets of stares and whispers,
sobbing silently into tin ears.

Comings and goings mean nothing
with you here,
your pretty head
on my shoulder,
insisting you are home.

A Storm of Butterflies

2010-02-14T16:51:00.000-08:00

Illustration by Wendy Plovmand

Whispered sighs bring about a storm of butterflies
Sweet nothings are nothing
Promises unkept, unbidden, reap a yearning
You tried to lasso a hurricane
With a string of pearls
Breaking it, falling desires turned
into islands floating in the sea
Forests will sprout
on what little soil there is on the rocks
Love and envy will grow
on scorched hearts
A mass of moths will descend
suffocating the sun

Who Needs A Centipede?

2010-01-18T21:04:00.000-08:00

Image from the cover of Tony Ross’ book: The Financial Centipede: Waiting for the Next 99 Shoes to Drop

Who needs a centipede?
Who needs 100 legs?
Who needs an arthropod
with high-maintenance shoes?
It scares the heck out of schoolgirls
and gives boys ideas for torture.
One leg off; 99 to go.
Who’s counting and who cares?
The centipede does.
It hates to walk with a limp.

Coke Killed Mary Joy

2010-01-11T02:17:00.000-08:00

Painting by Jim Warren

She drank acid to end the pain
that had mother written all over it
in blood and vomit.
The first time it didn’t work.
That suicide wasn’t successful.
Homicidal success easier to achieve
than any other.
She drank Coca-Cola
to finish what she started.

Mary Joy: lovely and smart,
all wasted in a poison womb.
Sixteen summers of malignity,
short periods of happiness pure.

How long before glass breaks
under a hammer’s power?
She broke. She died.
She won’t get up on the third day
intact in pride.
She goes where no mothers
of eternal torment are.
She is joy now.
Sadness was her bliss.

2 Dreams

2010-01-03T18:03:00.000-08:00

Illustration by Koldo Barroso

I Dreamed Of You

It’s been a long time
I’ve seen a rainbow,
but last night
I dreamed of you.
In colors of forests,
screaming simians,
mornings and dew.

Mimi of the
hoarse whispers,
lewd curses,
cigarette blues.
You were in a dress
of fields of blooms,
your eyes stabbing spirits,
suggestions profuse.

I followed you into a room
dark and fearful, symmetry askew.
You pushed me away.
I stood my ground.
Couldn’t lose you again
in platonic platitudes.

Lips crushed lips
like meteors
crashing on satellites.
You weakened.
I got stronger.

The lights turned on.
Eyes kept closed,
barenaked, unashamed.

Illustration by Emila Yusof

Haiku kuno

A rainbow I miss.
Painting skies
with colors bliss.
I dreamed of Mimi.

Never Be Merrily Gone

2009-12-14T01:10:00.000-08:00

(Classic undone)

Lonely crystal clear
Dove grey
Silent gray waters
have one voice
My heart seeks song
My ghost dreams lost
Smoke, pale, alone
Grey doves

Alevera Throwaway Lines

2009-12-06T20:42:00.000-08:00

pretty face
stupid man
smart once
brains gone

New York
loves shamrocks
Furtive looks
shame hard knocks
She tells me
to move
I jump,
how high
She has me
in the palm
Of her hands,
fortunes read
Like
psychic bombs

Eating green mango strips
in Decembertime chill,
scrunching her pretty face
in sour buds kill.
Wind blows her hair.
She pulls a band from her wrist
to tie her tresses.
Her dimple sinks.
I die again.

The Day Before Silence

2009-11-29T15:14:00.000-08:00

A day before the 8th of the month
of leaves falling and leavings
was the day you went dead silent again.
There was no reason given,
no words thrown in anger,
no frowns etched in scorned banter.

There was nothing just like before.
There will be nothing from now on.
Nothing comes from a vacuum.
There is a reason.
I am on a quest.

(The) Police and (Romantic) Thieves

2009-11-22T22:31:00.000-08:00

Cold wind from the hills
from the east
brushes off the chirping of crickets
from the west,
never fails to dredge up memories
of broken hearts and tired dreams.
Shut up, fool,
say the romance police.
We have a warrant for your arrest.
Put you hands behind your back,
your heart in its socket.

Lead Day In Bed

2009-11-15T10:41:00.000-08:00

You died from me again;
came back in red gown,
bending from hip to lip,
pulling keychains from your mouth.

Explanations are still strangers
that don't age past decades.
I know your middle name.
I know where you live --
on the be ever early hills,
flatlined on glens.

Love as easy as a smile.
Every boy is your father.
I wanted to be your lover
not your dad.
Dead before leaving.
Sad before dying.

You dare throw pebbles
on Narcissus' pond,
but unwilling to grow roots
by the bank.

4 Verses

2009-11-08T19:18:00.000-08:00

(Image by Alexander Semenov)

Dusted off 4 verses of mine published in the Weekly Sillimanian. Enjoy and/or abhor.

Pass

Days go by sluggishly.
You don’t know what you miss
until you do.
The moon creeps behind
begging for lies.
Expedience can only be kept
through smiles.

We took baby demons
silent in unsuspecting throats.
Mortals kept away.
Mere fear blunt whispering
at the other side of curtains.

Magicians played,
weaving laughter, paranoid tones.
Neighbors mum.
Loose skirts still hang.
Never will the sun rise,
unless stars bow,
smirking beer in weird glasses.

Muses will never run out,
never run out,
for wizards
with broken wands,
clean cauldrons.

Die every night, lie every day.
Close shall it stay.
Ripped apart when omens fail.

Sing, sing for leaving.
Forget it. Fool.

Lost Border

Travel Seashell Tunnel.
Walk, slide in laughing.
Your hair turns to salt.

Coconut leaves whisper wind,
taking nothing for granted.
Feet splash to high tide.
Stones sharp, image waves
stand guard in excess.
Dwarf fish the deep expect
find their way into pots of dusk.

You can’t land on the beach.
It has been stolen.
Living stones under,
smoothed by years of waiting,
stand in the way of mountains
threatened with extinction.

Let worries worry alone;
savor the moment,
no matter how consuming.
Eat the tempter away.
No weakling to sway.

Destiny

When I was young,
there were many ways
to get to the roof.
I am not young anymore (some say I am),
and I don’t even know where the roof is.

* Written as “Billy Yang-Yin”

Pregnant Spider

Moves, split time
on an unmoved plane,
heavy with a world to be borne.
Born on when who knows where.
Beauty mapped on a back,
symmetry bloated to beauty.

And when the time does come
for the giving forth, the giving away
of tiny crawling web-spinning lives
to a world indifferent of such displays
of donor and donee;
juxtaposing jubilee
with famished droughts
of scientia dementia --
a world spins on its own.

As easily lost on its machination.
Predator peering on prey.
A thought lingering on a moment,
captive of a motion,
of an emotion.
Creating a universe all its own.

God’s Karateka

2009-10-18T09:34:00.000-07:00

“I will appear before God with empty hands.” -- St. Thérèse

Illustration by Daya Callan

Dame Edith tells the story of a Catholic girl
who fell in love with a Protestant boy.
She was determined not to let a little matter
of sects get in the way of her happiness.
It didn’t harm that Ed loved stories
as much as she did. They wrote of words.

Asking Jesus’ mom for guidance;
the Virgin Mother let all the flowers
in the garden bloom the next morning.
Edith had her answer.

They married, had kids, didn’t exactly
live happily ever after (Ed went away)
but were as close as they could get
to ecstasy and literary paradise –-
words brilliantly uncommon,
words garden variety, words warring
east and west, words begat worlds.

At St. Therese’s little church
north and south united.
Blades swirled in blurred motion,
poetry bouquet caught in blades.
Petals and blood nectar splattered
Edith’s story in sequel.
The necklace winds its way
back down to the clasp.

Demons Don’t

2009-10-11T16:00:00.000-07:00

The Jews all live
by the coast,
the sea that Philistines
said they’d drive them to.
Abraham cries in heaven
looking down on his progeny
wipe each other out.
While black rain falls
in bushels full of torrents.
The Torah birthed the Koran
by way of the Bible.
Bile in words that spawn
wars of race and pride.
Landlocked hatreds,
giants taking sides.
Fires smolder in silos.
The devil smirks, I smile.
I got a shot at heaven.
Demons don’t.

Ode To My Unborn Fourth Child

2009-10-04T09:42:00.000-07:00

I would have taught you
how to play basketball
on a 3-by-4-meter hardcourt.
I would have taught you
how to scribble pencil marks
on bare walls.
But you wouldn’t have needed
my help with that.
I would have taught you
how to fish with bamboo pole,
nylon line, sand centipede on hook;
cook little ciclids
on open fire of coconut leaves.
I would have taught you
one-step sparring
and disarming pretty girls
with quick footwork and a smile;
as you put me in my place
with a stern look.
But love wasn’t so kind
the first time around.

Rain

2009-09-27T08:44:00.000-07:00

(Image from www.rossphillips.net)

Before tropical storm Ondoy/Ketsana gave Luzon island in the Philippines its worst flooding in memory, I had written down Rain. Whatever relation you may find in this particular verse with the storm in question is totally unintended.

Needles fall, piercing leaves
down roots of memory ghosts.
Pain, guilty moves, singling out
the skin of Avalon’s wounds.
Luck, a hook on string,
waiting for the bug
dumb to vision quest.

It doesn’t last,
this deluge refused
Nirvana’s iconoclast.
The ground still thirsts
heaven won’t fill up.
The sun doesn’t shine today,
it tires of unceasing play.

Caffeine Fix

2009-09-22T01:48:00.000-07:00

She lives on coffee
The deep dark seas
That know no waves
She sips the foam
From surface tension
Of romance circumstanced
Skimming divine approval
For unplanned conceptions
It turned out OK
Like rum on java
Kids calling daddy papa
And you stir your cup
With a teaspoon cold
Steel on porcelain
Stares on sweaty skin
You need a glass to drink
Leave the tap open to suggestions
Let liquid fill the sink
Air turns to water
Everything swims

The Land Of Ire

2009-09-13T10:59:00.000-07:00

The land of ire
is not far
from anywhere.
It is a word
and an act away,
at arm’s length.

It has two seasons:
warm and burning.
The devil was born
in this place;
hands curled
in a fist,
with no face.
He exults every time
someone settles
there, here.

Guilt is the only rain
allowed in the land of ire.
It is a worm gnawing
on rotting flesh on a silent battlefield.

Ballads and lyrics
like bullets litter the ground;
gestures mean,
words with no sound.

Channeling Discovery

2009-08-31T09:58:00.000-07:00

The strange things sudden electric discovery makes one do. I normally post verses only on Sundays. Let this Monday be early or an extension of the previous day, birthing a serendipitous event. Nah, it’s just another post.

I have had two women name their sons after me
without the benefit of sex.
Is it better than the real thing?
I can’t tell you,
but I know it’s not mine.
One woman has half my wife’s name,
the other is the first spark
dying on the wick.
The wind knows not where it blows.
The night knows not when it trips
in the city light, the urban blight.
The old ticker warms
at dawn, while mosquitoes
feast on legs.

We Will Not Be Lovers

2009-08-30T10:42:00.000-07:00

Lest anyone gets suspicious ideas on the title, let it be known that I lifted this from The Waterboys’ fourth studio record Fisherman’s Blues. It is the second cut on side one of the original vinyl release. It is an intriguing and romantic line begging to be duplicated and expounded. So, there. Let your mind be at rest –- to whom it may concern.

Like when I knew I didn’t want to marry you
I know too that we will not be lovers
You call me friend
I say your eyes enchant
Your lips lie, but you slay me under the night sky
With promises of keeping it chaste
As the stars fall to crush the fields
Where the grass fail to grow
Let flesh putrefy in adulterous want
I will not lie in your bed for its own sake

More Of The Same

2009-08-23T10:21:00.000-07:00

From the century that went by, more of the same...

Two Worlds From My Window

Colors divide
Sounds subside
No escape from life
And none is asked for
Dusty morning
Jaundiced afternoon
The world is one
From my window

Guiding Light

Lost in time
Evening eased
A rainbow breathes
Haloed on a lamp’s flame
Swaying with the cold wind
Leaning without breaking
Burning shadows bent
The sole guide
For an old man’s shortening candle
Lest he stumbles
In darkness’ urge
To answer nature’s call

Ascent

Venus, you rose from the depths;
resplendent, curvaceous and wet.
You dried the spit on my lip.

With every step I took
you leaped into garden beds.
What I thought were flowers
was gasoline.

Dark Rainbow Love Poems

2009-08-16T09:52:00.000-07:00

More poems from the past. These were among the first ones published in a local Sunday supplement magazine. I am still digging for more. Don’t hold your breath; I don’t intend to stop doing this until all the dust is blown off the covers.

And Now

(The morning was for him,
Free to be had.
Everything beckoned, everything cried.
But he was brought up in isolation,
Strong enough to be sad.)

He closes the windows,
Snubbing half the din.
Still he can see the flowers.
Their fragrance hangs
On his cheeks.
Tempted to reopen the windows,
He remembers his strength.
To darkness he gives in,
Allowing a crack to exist.
The morning is screaming.

With grace and an unsettled mind,
He notices dust
In an untrampled corner of the room.
Bending on seldom-used knees,
Hearing lightning tear,
Thunders his back.
He draws a heart on the floor.

Powder sticks to cold fingers.
He tastes it, bitter with age.

Frowns won’t take away youth.
Amid the wavering dawn,
An attempted smile
Will settle for a smirk.
Feeling safe,
He takes three rabbit strides.

I love you

You face wrapped
by ancient roots
like jealous lovers.
Kites lay their eggs
in you ears.
I don’t know why,
but I incubate mine
in your mouth.
When I sleep
I huddle tight
in warm breasts.
I am the perverted parasite
too scared to say,
‘I love you.’

Unblinded

All that is white
come crushing in.
What is left must
all be black,
close behind follow.
Sleep and will,
the lack of it,
tempt what comes.
Then war is given birth to.
Somewhere around here
must be the rainbow.

9 20th-Century Poems

2009-08-03T03:02:00.000-07:00

Illustration from loonybinart.wordpress.com.

Time to dig up some chestnuts from my personal oak chest. I may just be tired of coming up with new poems for this blog or I love reading old stuff. Whatever the reason, here are a couple of verses of mine printed in the defunct Focus magazine. If I remember right, this was the first time I got published in a national mag. You will also notice that at the time, I detested punctuation. Except for some tweaking, this is how they appeared in Focus, in this order. PJT

For A Chink In The Index

How I tried to imitate your shrewdness
Evident in a one-hit parchment
The wit snatched from tight crannies
Jolting my silent mile walk
The pleading of fading nature
Of rain from lips
And clouds from eyes
But when I saw your visage
Without baroque carvings
Almost a blank
I was almost convinced
The most ordinary-looking
Befriend the extraordinary, coming easily
Your number is in the book
Only the finger is reluctant to call
Nowadays you may be teaching
Same as what you once were
I am still being taught

The Absentee

At the appointed time
You did not come
It was foolish
I waited
Knowing well
Even your shadow is timorous
Of voices in the hallway
I trusted hope
On a passing cloud
With flowers jutting out
But it just passed by
I knew you hid in it

Plea And Pleasure

Please take away
The splinter from my eye
I cannot do it myself
For I’m blind in the other
Be gentle, be delicate
My eyelashes are raring for war
Your petal fingers they can pierce
A pond of blood
Pretend to be a heartless surgeon
For a moment
(Make an impartial choice)
Orbs are starting to mesh
Into a solid mass
Inside a wooden ball
Be quick with it
I’m losing patience
Doing all the talking
While you gape
With a dry tongue
If you hate all the sticky trouble
Do it now
Be done

She, The Devil I Love

Raving mad because she eloped
With my basketball
Instead of my soccer ball
She’s going to invent sports
In the middle of the street
Remembering her confession
When she was a child
She dreamed always
Of a big blue screen changing shades
She was also blind then
Success she’ll find
In her scheming and dealing
I have prepared a valley
To bury her soul when she dies
Lucky for the farmer
Who finds her skin still taut
Dry as the stone, her heart
There is wealth in breaking
Her bones to oil

Life Tales

Those were the days quite carefree
Love was a non-existent word
It lived only in the act
Barely making ends meet
We survived but didn’t mind
When everything isn’t everything
Without noticing the second hand
Running out of a fixed orbit
Looking down at the floorless pit
Swallowing every available passage
Yet every dark hole
Is a rainbow in disguise
It takes but a little patience to brow-raise
Maidens simple and fair
Ponies and mares
Cavorting in one playground
Skies run aground
Finding songs in a splatter of tears
God’s fingernails edged
Are discovered the stairway to His heart
Why does supremacy
Set booby traps of tests
Taxing indeed
Maybe that is why
I am getting better at getting bitter

Imaging A Plot in Compostela

Under the shade of Sapodillas
Blotting out all colors
Allowing light in unnoticed cracks
Why should I always wonder
About internals and externals?
When only the ground trembles
In its own chill
Then you appear
From out of a wink
With arms outstretched
You glow from within
Pointing to a grassy trail
Which leads to a house made of wood
I know I built it dreaming
But I am awake now
And without a will of my own

Lines Wayward

Slam the drawer silently
Lest you disturb
The stolid pictures on the desk
Imprisoned by a glass pane
Open the other boxes of dust and rags
Flying fleeing poems of moths
May you discover anthologies
The world will never know and savor
If you yourself would escape
Spider-web traps set up for adventurers
Kiss my elbow in farewell
Leave your lips
A memento

Meandering

Open the door at the fool path’s end
Someone told us home would be within
Breathe in the dust for old time’s sake
This emotion we both grasp
Is painted with hatred and forgiveness
The first to choose the latter as a weapon
Will look noble to other lovers

Journey Of Lovers

Trekking together to my refuge
A couple of kilometers away
The wheels under us are full of eyes
Knowing you are deathly afraid
That the closing of the century
May come too close, too soon
You wonder then why all stares
Have broken into slits of smiles
Your blue skin can feel
The sea and the passengers are one
In wishing both of us
Good luck

Emulating Ariel

2009-07-12T11:52:00.001-07:00

Emulating Ariel is easier
read than written
Plath had so much wrath
and bitterness
Not exactly exclusive
She hated her father
She hated Hitler
That attitude and vision
cut through races and ages
A successful suicide for an idol
Is like worshipping a demon
in place of God
Riding a race car
in the safety of an armchair
Ovens have their uses
Baking bread and wiping out races
Taking your life in winter
When you can’t wait for summer
To thaw and rot in the sun
Ariel was a Tempest sprite
An archangel, or a mad woman
Who took her own life
Two times unlucky

579

2009-07-05T11:14:00.000-07:00

Three odd numbers in a row
Is like three straight love affairs without a heartbreak
If all things come in threes, it sure did with ’70s icons
dying one after the other
Kenny, Mike and Farrah kicked the bucket in close proximity
(although there might be arguments about Kenny being an icon)
If the sixties ain’t dead, just three decades older
The seventies sure seemed to be on its death throes last week
If you are one of those still listening to Top 40 hits of that decade
When “disco sucks” and “punk ain’t dead’ were T-shirt staples
Check your calendar
You might be signing out yourself
It won’t do you no harm if you update your last will & testament

Sorefly

2009-06-28T14:03:00.000-07:00

it’s enough I see
your eyes
past fluid shoulders
languages rendered dark
upon sight
your hands are gifted
with the power
to mislead
are no match
to your wellsprings
of light

Sandra Smiles

2009-06-21T10:48:00.000-07:00

(illustration by Sandra Chi)

The rain never stops for Sandra.
It gets too excited with her smile.
Let foreign invaders pose their art,
let native collaborators prance their dance –-
don’t let Sandra smile,
it is the end of romance,
or the beginning of revolution,
the breaking of idols, the falling of gods.

From on high, angels sigh,
scatter seeds of confusion & inspiration –-
the silence of sacrifice.
Hearts on slabs, wheels on fire.
The gentlest of touches,
the wispiest of dews;
all bear witness to the promise blank.

Men never tire of the chase,
Bear witness to desperate disparate deeds.

Sandra smiles.
Anything exists.

The Rain Falling

2009-06-13T10:30:00.000-07:00

The rain falling
on everything
is the only sound
I would like to hear,
drowning out thoughts,
killing the feeling.
Falling down and falling
in love again
are the same.
You feel pain,
regret too late.
You are in this
for the pleasure,
ending up
with the torment.
Your soul feels
the warmth
of hell’s flames
nipping at your feet.
She was always like this, sweet and bitter in equal woman-child parts.
You sought to play, never expecting to pay the price of a flood of fear
and lust. The rain keeps falling. I can still hear my heart beat.

Twice

2009-06-07T09:55:00.000-07:00

(For Gift)

Bitten, my loves, bit,
ate their hearts
Out, over a jewel they are not: cannot be, have.
Had felt it just twice in six.
Years go by like
so many sweet spells.
Sour fuels, nervous energy
keep me running.
I stumble & don’t notice,
too late, too deep, the wound –
Smiles & bleeds.
I fight & get worse.
I hurt & curse. We fight.
Have I fought enough for peace, for friends, for trust, for tranquility?
For complacence, I don’t do anything.
The feeling runs its own course.
One does not notice until it’s beside you.
Neck to neck, heart to heart.
You can’t keep hungry hearts apart.
Born to run, afire from the start.
Corny is just another word
For love’s the truth.
Told her.
Went for broke.
Nothing & all.
Wasted.
Was that all there was to it?
Get close, then get lost?
Spilt, nothing saved.
The floor’s still cold.
Warm, as long as the sun stays.
It will go away, for sure.
One got away in silence,
three years stretched.
One about to,
Go away. Away, yeah, away.
Scat!
Twice bitten, I died. I die. I keep on dying.
Damn death deadbeat heart hurts.

Swallow Song No.2

2009-05-24T14:48:00.000-07:00

A swallow yawns,
eternity is glimpsed.
A hole is punched,
a tear is torn on
a black expanse.

Only the swallow sees. Black eyes on black face on black head on black neck on black body on black wings on black tail on black chest on black feet.

A privilege bestowed by a god who’s first thought-of word
was freedom.

On air on a wing a prayer is answered.

Retribution

2009-05-17T12:40:00.000-07:00

You broke the spines
of the books
I keep in a white cabinet.
painted over, twice over,
once lacquered brown
now hospital white.

The pain can be seen
through glass panes:
writhing paper bodies,
bruised, wounded, mangled,
bleeding dry ink.

This crime must be paid in kind.
you must agonize,
learn the pain of writer’s block.

I will pick your eyes out with pencils,
stuff down your throat
pages of pulp romances,
starve you with cancelled stipend.
Grant? What grant?
You will never write again!
Your fingers will turn to springs,
the kind in spiral notebooks.

You will pay.
That will teach you to mess with my library.

Sins of September

2009-05-10T09:54:00.000-07:00

Past summer, September,
we were born.
A season neither of us
has seen.
Autumn was waiting
at the end.
It’s on a different time zone
we haven’t been in.

Senses yearn, unfelt;
we don’t talk anymore.
Everybody’s talking.
Letters, souls disguised,
masked, given the benefit
of the undoubt.

It was tense. It got worse.
I left.
You wanted to hang me
for someone else’s crime.

In this land, borders blur.
Men are men. Women wicked.
Femme fatale your ego.
You like that don’t you?
(Mata Hari got shot.
This id is for you.)

Getting even is never easy.
You take as much as you give.
Justice collects its dues.
And September comes every year.

The Cheshire Woman

2009-05-02T20:54:00.001-07:00

her smile is the only thing that remains/if you stare long enough into her eyes/everything else vanishes into the blank wall/in unexpected seconds they flash back/to whisper her Eurasian features/she is adamant/she won't stay for long/her tribe is not eternal as the fleeting clouds/you might like to know who her creator is/sad to say in a festivity/he is long dead and gone/to the watery hole that spat him out/whoever watches patient enough to ask/knows he himself will pass/run as fast as your feet would let you/the foreign dust which sticks to your soles' stride/is the lone company fate will allow/don't try to whistle/let alone sing/winds are beginning to be pushy and cold/a raincoat won't do/sleet and rain are having a fiesta/while we snore a siesta/a lady is hard to remember in the middle of a struggle/she has been painted as liberty and equality's flag carrier/one french breast exposed to the battle/sneer at her precious back with punk/panacea is just a stacked pharmacy/mix a new drug to make all others obsolete/cross it with gunpowder and pull the trigger/violence over sex/dance over song/whichever way around/mama mother nanay mater madre/everything means the same/all the rest is the gibbon's business/would she go out of style in the test-tube baby boom?/how does candy taste with the wrapper?/do you make love with argyle socks on?/quiz me baby/this is the era of returning truths/flashbacks and hitbacks/the comeback of tarzan and musical extravaganzas/the return of the carpenter's son/will he be mugged and whacked again?/not on the hair of your chinny chin chin/the greatest legend ever rumored/the making of an international blockbuster/today is tomorrow's breeding ground/alice came limping back to wake up/the cheshire cat is just a puss with a fancy grin/THE END

From College To Cinema

2009-04-26T23:58:00.000-07:00

Shot, Died, And Buried
(For Jacqueline L., who saw that movie with me for 3 minutes)

This is the way heroes
come to an end,
not...

A stab at glory
is dangerous to your health.
Fool people to be brave with you.
No meal is free.
Shoot in the dark,
hit Anonymous.
Unshackle chains
for the price of lead.
Believe the man;
power and flowers
are twin daughters
of the same mother
: the trigger finger.

Every story must be told.
No life is unimportant,
no life is boring.
You don't get to being dead
without being alive.
No shortcuts.
Lazy as lazy comes, one takes it.
No second acts.
The stage is the best.
The telling should not be wasted.
You don't get to hear
the director shout “cut!”
What you see
are what memories are for.
And no life could be so short
as to fit into an hour and a quarter movie.
Shot, dead, and buried
in an unmarked grave.

A Love Song After Shade No.22 or Lana's Aria

The woman has a smile like dusk receding,
pregnant with the guilt of rivers dying.
A flutter of butterfly wings, she cries.
Every sound becomes a faint goodbye.

Pain in the grace of God

2008-12-23T03:18:00.000-08:00

I don't need no enlightened one
to tell me
that everyone suffers,
everyone dies.
What I want to know
is the why, the for how long.
The questions and sensations abate
after realization -- there is a point
to everything over and under the sun.
In a state of grace,
it hurts,
it's exquisite,
it's pain in the grace of God.

Unblinded

2008-12-14T06:54:00.000-08:00

All that is white
come crushing in.
What is left must
all be black, close
behind follow.
Sleep and will,
the lack of it,
tempt what comes.
Then war is
given birth to.
Somewhere around
here must be
the rainbow.

The end is nigh, sigh

2008-12-07T08:17:00.000-08:00

Let's scale your ivory tower
Where Rapunzel hides the loot
Of a buried fairy tale
Tea for two
Hillary's Himalayas don't know
The labyrinth of the Minotaur's riddle
Only the griffin dares answer
And Morrison, my dear Morrison
Why did you leave Apocalypse's care to me?
Only Nostradamus knows
1988-3797
Bowie's '84
The split that broke the Cordilleras
Tsunamied the Rockies
Mere messed dismembered numbers
Don't scare me
But monsters sleeping in flag folds
Twice pestered the blue orb
Still he comes the bastard triplet
A nuclear patsied stooge
Why him?
Because John says so

Getting there

2008-11-30T17:31:00.000-08:00

Leaving the city urban dead
Seeking green
Seeing gray instead
Looking to the East
Walls on beaches
Walls over trees
To the West are houses
From bamboo to concrete
Nothing left of memories
Dust, smoke, hubris

Dug-Up Gems, Maimed...

2008-11-20T19:26:00.000-08:00

(Image from carrieellenartstudio.blogspot.com)

In a particularly early portion of a previous experience – I can't get more cryptic than that – I wrote the following verses. As the preposition for preceding each title shows, these are dedications. As to whether the objects of these consecrations appreciate the gesture is a whole different matter entirely.

Dusted off and humility suspended, PoetasterixTanix presents:

Dug-Up Gems, Maimed...

For Gemma (don't tell her)

her memory strikes me
like slammed door echoes
on a dark silent night
terminal AM static
scraped cola caps
asphalt paved highway
whistling shouts on anemic epidermis
lightning-struck tin man
ash-burned scarecrow
fish on a hook
how do you skin a cat?
give me no answers
she did that to me too

Leaving (For Gemma Part II)

Your white and blue presence
melts my knees
like the sun did
to Icarus' stubbornness

A single base drum
beats the bosom's windowpanes
into a thousand shattered crystals

When you fade away from view
in unclad stiletto heels
a sinister smirk
sows doubts...
you'll never be mine.

For Emma (please, please me)

called you on dead men's day
of all the...
why bother?
heaven's go no cover
on a highway it crawls
a high drunk he bawls
heh, heh
none nun dumb
she speaks to me in whispers
teenybopper's giggly patois
an elder stranger
ex-classmate's brother
lost chunks of his sanity times before
depression, a hate hobby
melancholia, a mania
pondering, a pastime
spin me records, dear
Lover the Dan, I swear
Brown Christmas
in a supermarket paper bag

Secret Satan (For Emma Part II)

You were born naked
clothed in water and salt
fortified by the archbishop
bored by sabbatical Sundays
weaned on television
reared on education
dirty
egos found
smug
counting rosary beads like marbles
tearing novenas like playing cards
shamed by a fig leaf
gored by a horned serpent
you love everything
horror
bless your besotted behind, kid
Inquisitions are behind us
or you could have burned at stake
fried to a crisp
like your soul probably is
now

My fay, my demon (date deleted)

My fay, my demon
silent child
wish you were here
wish you were mine

with dusk on curtained forehead
innocent rain lips
to share the night's wind
on the sly

absent the moon
an incomplete vision

days we see are few
hours we share too brief
only the gods of love
know for sure who suffer

Let your doubts bloom
bitter among the blossoms
for I'm only biding time
wishing what breeds contempt
loses its mind

keep looking
keep smiling
my fay, my demon
silent child

but please,
be silent no more.

haiku dawn7

2008-10-14T13:06:00.000-07:00

3:01 AM, The Mother Seed
Nothing stirs but my love snoring
The whispers of memory
Make me do strange things
Lips move without prodding
Just to utter you name at dawn

3:20 AM
All still but love snores
To utter you name at dawn
Lips move on their own

3:21 AM
Nothing stirs except
But for my love soft snoring
Memory whispers

3:26 AM
Pining soft spoken
Rain falls name holy bitch
Makes me do strange things

3:28 AM
Four is a bore chore
Thinking past gray remembrance
She says yes, I know

3:34 AM
This new contraption
Substitutes for masks and lies
Utter names, dawn dies

3:38 AM
Woman-child her friend
Arrogant beyond reason
She let him go away

3:41 AM
Last is easiest
Bored, sleepy, at its weakest
Damn! I rhymed two words

3:45 AM, So It Went
Hand goes cold, colder than dawn
Fingers find keys in the dark
Sickly green light
Message Sent
One word,she replies
Yes
I just wanted to utter your name at dawn
Quote me on that

Kill The Vampire

2008-09-27T21:00:00.000-07:00

Don't let the sun shine on TV
Don't let the tycoons
hold you down
The race of night stalkers
has come home to roost
The tube smokes
of signals and heat

Waste basket not want not too hot
A bloodied stake in the trash
is worth two in the chest
Fangs well hidden in luscious lips,
rosy cheeks and pale skin

Speak not into the mike
Hoarse baritones off key
sound like seduction of the translucent

I singe of the body eclectic
Seeking shadows that melt into the day
I lay me down to weep
Burying pain in art and warts
Tomorrow is another sunrise
Tears mixed with spit of lust and regret

Patricia Javier & Y2K

2008-09-21T18:50:00.000-07:00

Mind cobwebbed
by the pochingkai
Reflection is genuflection
on a past gipapas
Bunnyman Prime howls of sugar kisses and killing luna
Y2K scared the shit out of the computer geeks, generals and tycoons
Midnight struck, nothing happened except for Patricia smiling hither
and tither,
covering her mammary glands inches short of glorious display
for the world to see, flower in her hair.
Patricia disappeared along with the phantom fears.
Everyone and everything went back
to their business including her
She married into money and Euro genes, bore beautiful children
who walked the earth as giants the color of precious mocha
They will rule the world like potentates with the power of mutants
Intelligent beyond belief, powerful as gods fallen from Olympus
struck down by lightning screaming of thunder and vengeance
The powers that be will quake in their uniforms and suits
spill scalding coffee on the corporate war-room table
Patricia who was born into grinding poverty and purity
Patricia who grew into ambition and execution
has realized her destiny
She is smug and proud
While she feeds her offspring the milk of bitterness and desire
She sees a future owned by her sons and daughters,
of arrogance and no compunction
She sees herself as what she is --
the Bride of White Pride and the Mother of Mass Destruction
The yesteryears of bare-skinned shame
are ashes under her feet.

BJJ Fighting

2008-08-24T15:03:00.000-07:00

(* Apologies to composer Carl Douglas, Vivian Hawke, and the Deftac Cebu guys, not gays, all right?!)

REFRAIN:
Everybody was BJJ fighting
These dudes were slow as lead lightning
In fact, it was a lot frightening
They rolled, experimenting

They were funky Chinamen from Cebu Chinatown
They were choking them up, and they were choking them down
It's an ancient Japanese art, the Brazilians knew their part
From a grab into a slip, and choking from the hip

(REPEAT REFRAIN)

There was funky Norman Go and little David D.
They said here comes big Carl, lets get it on!
We slapped hands and made a stand, started grabbing for the arm
The sudden motion made me slip, now my gi’s ripped

(REPEAT REFRAIN 2x)
…make sure you have expert timing
BJJ fighting had to last all evening…

Schedule of Classes:
MWF 8-10 PM
The Loft, 4th Floor
Asiatown IT Park
Brgy. Apas, Cebu City

T-TH-Sunday 7-9 PM
Baseline Sports Complex
Juana Osmeña St.
Brgy. Capitol Site, Cebu City

Saturday 6-9 PM
“Open Mats”
The Loft, 4th Floor
Asiatown IT Park
Brgy. Apas, Cebu City

Stay

2008-08-20T23:18:00.000-07:00

It’s been a long time
Anytime is not long enough
Anyone but you and your arrogance
Your petty ego, your petty torso
You have always known
You were inadequate
There’s nothing you have
That I want, except your body
And that’s a lot
I stammer, I falter
I yearn, I crave
You have finally given it away
Not in a huff
You are forty
Forty and small
Threescore and more
I never did learn to count
I hate, that’s what I’m good at
You are hateful
You have always been good at that
We have stayed away
From each other long enough
Damn the distance, damn the years
I dream, you scream

automatic cows (Revised); Demons rule this room

2008-08-20T22:44:00.000-07:00

Before I realized that poetry.com was a scam, I had two poems published there, not to join their dubious contests that promised (they still do, I guess) money and fame to the winners, but just to have my poems on cyberspace. “Over 6 million records” or poems hence (poetry.com’s not mine), I sought out my contributions. These are the children I gave away.

automatic cows (Revised)
let loose on the streets
herds of cattle
who have lost their cowboys
snorting poison and thunder
racing to the darkness of the skies
never letting up
chasing heartbeats
beware if you venture
into the filthier side of the lane
their screeching hooves
might ground you
into water and dust

Demons rule this room
They laugh, swagger like they owned the world
A slice of unswept floor their kingdom
Slippery with spit and feces
The children of their profanity
Their glee echo in the air around them
Fat and putrid, wrapped in clothes
purchased from knockoff shops
Orphans of vanity, jealousy and power play
Growing up with memories of eternal fire
Showering in urine of fastidious filth
They insult, tend rumors -- mongers of strife
Intrigue is bread and butter, life of death
Sinking in the mud of mediocrity
Self-delusions, illusions in the dark
Half-eaten peacock struts; heathen moth's pet
Lick salt off tortured bodies, beaten minds
Bear false witness on the supposed ordinary
They are kings, queens of empires in the mind
Of fire that burns like dried leaves soaked in kerosene

Kalinaw Sa Kinilaw

2008-07-19T17:32:00.000-07:00

Didto sa dagat, wala gyuy hasol
Gawas sa kahugaw sa polusyon
ug sa mga dinamitiro
Sagdi lang tong mamana, mga mangingisda
Pero, ingon ana man gyud nang tawo
Sabton na lang nato

Nagmalinawon ra unta ko
Sa akong pagpamuyo
Salom diri, salom didto
Ka-on diri, ka-on didto

Apan gipasol man ko nila
Ambot nganong na-ilad man ko
Kahibalo baya ko nga taga tong
Gitangag sa uhipan
Uhipan ra may nakit-an nako

Sakita, oy!
Bitik akong ngabil
Gibira ang tangsi
Unya, naglisod ko og ginhawa
Mora man ko og astronaut
Nga nawad-an og air tank
Didto sa outer space
Mora bag alien in a strange planet
Sans proper breathing apparatus,
Ingon tang punga.
Kana kung kinahanglan
Bang moginhawa ang alien

Ma-o di-ay toy tawo
Lahi gyud sa isda
Dagku sila, dili sama kadaku
Sa mga balyena, apan dagku sab
Daku pa nako, taas og buhok
Ku-an ba, duna silay buhok,
Duna say opaw pero dunay bungot
Dili pareho namong isda
Nga hingbis ray naa

Gatangag pa gyud og sigarilyo
Ang usa ka mangingisda
Giibot ang taga sa akong ngabil
Unya giitsa ko didto sa baldi
Ipon sa akong mga kabarangay

Daghan mi
Dunay pakol, dunay danggit,
Dunay mamsa, nukos
Apil pang labayan
Gagmay ug dagku gisagol
Ang uban pinukotan,
Gipasol ang uban, sama nako
Sud-an na ming tanan

Hay, kapoya ani, oy!
Nagmalinawon ra man unta ko
Adtong Dominggoha
Namahaw ra man ko
Kahuman magsipilyo, ligo
Unya deretso na unta ko og simba

Napasol na man hinuon ko
Na! Kung dili ko ani tolahon
Sugba o kilawon, silihan
Mayna lang, kay sa i-itsa sa iring.

I Cannot Be The Great Hunter

2008-06-28T17:57:00.000-07:00

I cannot be the great hunter
You wanted me to be, grandmother
I have ridden the raven
Saw the whales do loops on the waters
The white man's sickness
Made me spit blood on the snow
A white man took me away to his homeland
I found myself amongst victims
Wanting to be cured of a spirit
You haven't seen in the forests
Living in rocks, living on water
It is like a tree growing in my lungs
I have no spear with which to kill it
The white man calls it a name
Our tongue finds strange
He says warm weather
and his world's medicine will cure my illness
They cut me open, placed me in a room
white not quite like snow
I feel stronger now
(My heart is hard and sharp)
But I cannot be the great hunter
You wanted me to be

Butuanon

2008-06-28T17:41:00.000-07:00

The ripples are not the afterthought
of a child with a pebble,
or that of fish swallowing a bug fallen on water.
They are the spirits of the river made insane
by unnatural filth.

They scramble and fall.
They gambol and crawl.
Nothing makes sense anymore.

Long ago, all they knew were fish
and shrimps and crocodiles,
grass on the banks, bamboo clumps.
Wading through to the other side
was an adventure ripe
with fairies and sprites in the mind.

There were no bridges then.

Mewhat

2008-06-08T02:51:00.000-07:00

Scales fell from my eyes
when Saul gave Paul up
the down staircase.
Kiss Grace goodbye,
my friend, my lever.
Kiss your piece goodbye.
Night has fallen forever.

For two years
the number 3
has held magic
between the lines
of the mind.
All it takes
is the knowledge
of the cry,
and the jags of the dance
cease to flirt
with blind lying bravado.

How can I get back to --
for myself -- the land of promise?
Of fields verdant fruits abundant.
Reveling in innocence pure.

Shall I exile my soul
tonewandbetterfutures?
Will we ever know which is better?
Bitterness blinds the search.

Cosmic Love Song

2008-05-08T23:56:00.000-07:00

I look at the skies at night

and watch the stars die.

I imagine myself

an eater of worlds

not content with planets anymore.

Water and soil

make my stomach turn,

revolted by the constant

east-west revolution of orbs.

Even a god's taste buds have limits.
So I search the heavens,

cross dimensions, in search

of alternative sources of food.

Meantime, meteorites provide sustenance.
(Heavenly bodies tidbits --

flavor of the month.

Although, what month it is,

I don't know.

No moon left

to keep time with.)

Sometimes I get tired

of my quest.

Sometimes, I think

if it would not be better

to give up,

to stop moving,

to stop seeing,

to stop breathing,

and let my body float in space.

I imagine myself imagining

why I have become this way.

I know the reason why:

My heart is broken.

sleep far

2008-05-06T15:59:00.000-07:00

eyes see visions of orbs in sockets
the music from somewhere is noise now
sleep is a land worth a two-way fare
i will be back when i find my way

little dragon balls

2008-04-30T15:56:00.000-07:00

later.

i will access my poetry files.

will post a few, maybe more

who knows if the sun falls

and turns into a ball

bright as the moon

hot as Mercury