Note: the majority of this post was serialised in Twitter. I'm putting it up here seeing as Paolo Cruz (@paolojcruz in Twitter) pointed out that maybe a blogpost would be a better form for it.
I don't really know what's more disappointing: the Caparas Appointment, or the collective surprise by people to it. The surprise is disappointing as it shows most people are naive in general, or actually believe in the system. The NA appointments are the least of what GMA has done and will do to us, and yet the artist reaction to it is greater than artist reaction to assasinations of reporters, the disappearances of student activist and labor leaders, even the February 1017.
The lack of initial cynicism towards NCCA is disappointing, too. Wade in deep enough in any NCCA project, you'll find it's just like any old Pinoy gov't system: it is corrupt and run by half-wits. Not to mention how some Nat'l Artists abuse the NCCA benefits outright and use the commission as a piggy bank for pet projects.
So the latest appointments shouldn't come as too much of a surprise. To mangle a metaphor, it's just another brick in the wall. This is how the gov't works. This is how the art scene works. These things are rarely about artistic worth. It has always been driven by palakasan and IOUs. Efforts are never rewarded here. What is rewarded is glad-handing. What is rewarded is being complicit.
That isn't to say we shouldn't react to it with much violence. We should. But we should do so with much awareness and education. This happened because we have been for the most part complicit and laconic and reacting only when we are offended. I think we should always regard everything with an ample amount of critical skepticism. There are atrocities happening everywhere. Why react to this one in particular in this way? Where were the artists' vehemence when the ZTE deal went down? Where were the cartoon jibes during the 1017 march to Makati? Human Rights are regularly violated by the gov't all year round, and yet where is the artist response? For all our nationalist pride in pushing our art beyond our shores, we barely invoke it when it really matters, where it really matters.
And I feel lousy pointing this out, but I suppose I have to: I am also part of the people who have gone complicit to these things. I do try to do my share of the heavy lifting every once in a while, but yes, I must confess that for the most part, I have gone complicit about a lot of things, so these questions are targeted pretty much square on my chest, too.
I'm not begrudging people reacting to the Caparas, et al, appointments, as like I said, we should react to this with much vehemence and violence we can muster, and then some. What I'm begrudging is the impression that people only seem to react to this sort of thing when it only approaches towards encroaching on personal world views - when we find such things as personal insults - as if all the other things - ZTE, 1017, political killings - aren't, or even worse, other people's problems. We have been buying into the notion that us and our art is insignificant in the greater scheme of things, ie Life, Politics, Society, that we all generally see such things - art activism - as something someone else ought to be doing, something someone else ought to be worrying about, someone other than you.
The problem with that is everyone else is thinking the same brain wave, and so we have this largely apolitical art scene where you can't even ask pointed questions aimed at everyone and not be labeled as a "renegade" or a "rebel" or "raconteur," when it's pretty clear when talking about Noli Me Tangere or Spoliarium or Joe Sacco's Safe Area Gorazde that asking questions is one of the main functions of art in society. Why be exclusive to those things only - to certain type of people and certain type of work - as being capable of exploring such things as Political Commentary? Do we really honestly want that the things we do be considered as art? Cause if we do, it bears reminding that art is much much more than mere beauty or soundness or symmetry of form. It is as much about those things as it is about society and entertainment and education.
So yeah, react all we want, and react with resounding voices, but please, please not just with this. We're giving Caparas - and the NCCA, and the Nat'l Artists appointments - way way way too much credit.
Well, she's fashionably lean
And she's fashionably late
She'll never wreck a scene
She'll never break a date
She's the queen of cool
And she's the lady who waits
Since her mind left school
It never hesitates
She won't waste time
On elementary talk
Got the world locked up
Inside a plastic box
No ruined years, no clocks
IV. Ill
I had become fascinated by women obeying esoteric knowing fingertips and wrists,
despite the threat of kitsch. In another life, Love billowed overhead, warm, awakening,
slightly hoping. Might as well have been.
The ladies keep up a constant patter, repeated slowly each n every word, tried to
stretch hips fluidly. I desperately showed the ladies how to make inside-outside, to
spring forth and begin slow, one simple combination, then instructed them to take up
with a new partner. This innocent maneuver had come without a downside. I soon
found myself smiling. I glanced down at massive naked frivolous clump and stooped
to squeeze with adequate success and minimal trampling.
The lesson progressed increasingly, more contortions which involved partners
simultaneously releasing. By the end of the hour, I learned with some concern
the maneuver. Many men and women come in sex. The flirtation never goes: the
caress of a hip, the brief stroke, shoulder to the floor. I realised to come enough
to smell another man's, to saturate women more amply, felt right at home.
Asked one partner for a twirl. I came and I was enthused. I had sore balls.
It felt fabulous. It was sublime. I felt suave, sleek, lived only for the next
song. Very addicting. I would be hooked for life.
V. Flashin Man
Pulling down pants and displaying genitals, I was lost, searching for a breast,
the edge displayed, distended, bobbing, within arm's length. I react.
"Good morning. How are you doing?"
I wore a wide grin and a very tight pair of shorts. The lewd tableau jiggled,
libertine, seeking to escape the noonday heat, the shade provided by palms.
I glimpsed frantically delicate consecrated ground. Sticky-handed and reeking,
hot and heavy, I sauntered, smiling, itchy, horny as usual, astounded.
Not long after, Love bares buttocks, colliding, brazen, aggressive, wide, my
personal favorite. Squirting within seconds, all over jeans.
TO BE CONTINUED ...
PREFACE
This is difficult. However, in deference to the wish, I have tried.
I wish merely to warn readers to take with a grain of salt what
I will claim in the work, for reasons explained here.
- the author
I. CONFESSIONS OF A MAN
I'm the guy every time. So far, I've been saying it's funny, like a rush
orgasm. It's morally reprehensible, evil, old, and stupid. She confronted
me about my indiscretions, reminded me of wife/girlfriend/mistress routine.
"Why?" she asked. An empty bottle hit my head. "Why?"
"Why? I shot back. "How can you be so mad after a lovely evening?" I excused
myself and left her alone. Needed the moment to process the incident: drinks,
down and dirty, saying yes, saying no, belittling love, good, bad, in bed a replacement.
These aren't a big deal. Conscience clear. Truly sad my girl never understood that.
II. O STREAM
My first whole memory: a woman damp, idle, washing clothes. My first wishful
thought: I wanted women. Years later, I stirred, desperate, my voice heavy,
faded. Everything changed. Identified, the mystique died. The horned beast
of love registered between Aphrodite in flesh, bone-strong, inescapable,
hopelessly captured by it, but stuck on one: one channel, one slot.
Anna, Julie, Leni, the Bitch years later, all memorable; Marissa,
Janice, and Lorraine Anne, fuzz readily ripped, the organ used;
Jaclyn, Marsha, chicks; chicks Nova, Carmi; Maria Teresa, to me
the best, sure to delight, for short.
Wasn't our life sometimes a string of humor and frown?
The best stayed determined and went, like Jeanne - who stayed and suffered,
the drama low-stakes cliffhangers, cried and laughed and sucked cheap, disgusting,
yet so delicious, a prescribed pattern - and Julie, untimely letters promising cheer
with sheer, weep with mind-boggling force that hurts deep.
When faithful, lying wounds.
III. 101
There are occasions when the best way to deal with a problem is to
pretend ex is someone you loathe. Proceed with your plan. Demonstrate,
in some way, malicious pain.
You will give satisfaction. Play games. Two hours, countless times,
good and right, spread someone with you. Your foul behavior you
cannot deny. Deny everything to coming.
TO BE CONTINUED ...
from transition
Tired of the spectacle of short stories, novels, poems, and plays still under the hegemony
of the banal word, monotonous syntax, static psychology, descriptive naturalism,
and desirous of crystallising a viewpoint ...
We hereby declare that:
1. THE REVOLUTION IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE IS AN ACCOMPLISHED FACT.
2. THE IMAGINATION IN SEARCH OF A FABULOUS WORLD
IS AUTONOMOUS AND UNCONFINED.
(Prudence is a rich, ugly old maid courted by Incapacity ... Blake)
3. PURE POETRY IS A LYRICAL ABSOLUTE THAT SEEKS
AN A PRIORI REALITY WITHIN OURSELVES ALONE.
(Bring out number, weight and measure in a year of dearth ... Blake)
4. NARRATIVE IS NOT MERE ANECDOTE, BUT THE PROJECTION
OF A METAMORPHOSIS OF REALITY.
(Enough! Or too much! ... Blake)
5. THE EXPRESSION OF THESE CONCEPTS CAN BE ACHIEVED
ONLY THROUGH THE RHYTHMIC "HALLUCINATION OF THE WORD."
(Rimbaud)
6. THE LITERARY CREATOR HAS THE RIGHT TO DISINTEGRATE
THE PRIMAL MATTER OF WORDS IMPOSED ON HIM
BY TEXTBOOKS AND DICTIONARIES.
(The road to excess leads to the palace of Wisdom ... Blake)
7. HE HAS THE RIGHT TO USE WORDS OF HIS OWN FASHIONING
AND TO DISREGARD EXISTING GRAMMATICAL
AND SYNTACTICAL LAWS.
(The tigers of wrath are wiser than the horses of destruction ... Blake)
8. THE "LITANY OF WORDS" IS ADMITTED
AS AN INDEPENDENT UNIT.
9. WE ARE NOT CONCERNED WITH THE PROPAGATION
OF SOCIOLOGICAL IDEAS, EXCEPT TO EMANCIPATE
THE CREATIVE ELEMENTS FROM THE PRESENT IDEOLOGY.
10. TIME IS A TYRANNY TO BE ABOLISHED.
11. THE WRITER EXPRESSES. HE DOES NOT COMMUNICATE.
12. THE PLAIN READER BE DAMNED.
(Damn braces! Bless relaxes! ... Blake)
there are poems in here
for you * always something
for someone somewhere
eight years after the fact
and it's still the only pinoy hypertext
of this level of complexity
(and it's so old, you need to use Microsoft Internet Explorer to enjoy it fully)
a collection of one hundred and fifty-seven poems
 |
| adam david - crows... |
| Hosted by eSnips |
Finally complete.
Click the link to either
view it or download it.
Send eMail to
juncruznaligas(at)gmail(dot)com
if you feel like getting in touch.
~
Other downloadable PDFs
Click the link to either
view it or download it.
Send eMail to
juncruznaligas(at)gmail(dot)com
if you feel like getting in touch.
~
Other downloadable PDFs
|
| adam david - the e... |
| Hosted by eSnips |
the El Bimbo Variations
a collection of ninety-nine permutations
of the first two lines from the classic Eraserheads song
|
| TLWcomplete.pdf |
| Hosted by eSnips |
the Long Weekend
a 24-hour comic book
|
| adam david - texti... |
| Hosted by eSnips |
Texticles
a collection of dagli
~
Other online texts
Instructions for the Inclined
a hip creative writing manual
Perverbs
a collection of proverbs
Crumbs!!!
a set of hypertexts circa 2001
You can't remember where it was.
Had this dream stopped?
Prophecy
between pages and trees
the sky the birds the light
in the dark remain unwritten
and it is time to speak and listen
~
Summer
and then months later the
world pretends it has not seen.
Excerpts from Vox Pangasinense
1. the story
they disappeared one
after the other from
green into grey silence
2. the poet
your prowess in syllables
outlived your youth we
sing them now with
abandon
A Critical Turn
Okay, now, William
Carlos Williams, don't
apologize. Leave.
Claustrophobia
My fear to become a mere extension.
~
Daddy, We are Girls
socks ballet bends
pink face a skirt
Heart Attack
His stomach. His heart. He had big room
in his heart. He had, he and his brother he
loved, his grandparents. He could love as
he did his Chinese mom, and I saw he felt
it just then.
~
The Wedding Dress
I picked the prettiest of the
poor shop. He told me of
diamonds brides should
be crazy about. I wouldn't,
hoping someday I will.
Persona
I am. That voice is mine. It is
not me. I don't matter. I reply.
I understand. My teeth are
sharp. Allow me to introduce you.
~
The Cave
Things have remained in it, years -
wrinkled tangle of constricted
loneliness, voices, fanged vines,
the world, kindness, gnarled
air as if someone loved is still
there, old people, these stories,
years, a city, the good stroke,
fear, a hand - still there.
~
The Zoo
Stay the same, cassowary.
Move inside, large python.
Scream with delight, gorillas.
Jump and swing. Frighten the
girl. Throw a fit. Pull at her hair
and pink dress. Suck on her thumb.
That unbearable pain of sadness will
comfort her.
Breathing Lessons
from edge
to depth
flailing
echoing
succumbing to
whatever end
~
Forgetting
breaking and
washing away
a reflection
shattering
Forget the Night!
Live w/us in Forests of azure!
At the Train Station
Is that a flower a flower a
flower a flower a flyer over
& over a flower?
~
Stalk
for fingers first flicker
forearm flames found
forehead flan from the
mouth she sighs from
her reply like light on
glass
~
Whereas
He has forgotten he has
forgotten he has forgotten
he has forgotten he has
forgotten he has forgotten
he has forgotten forgetting
for the first time where
speech neither nor exists,
is perfect, is wordless in the mouth.
The Mechanics of Time Travel
begin with a kiss
soft simple
irreversible
then shimmer
slow to the
moonlight
Acacia
This is how you live desolately: desperately
go astray, descend among the cracks - inch
by inch, tearing sunbeams open - your way
to the only sin you're entitled to, until one by
one, falling falling falling flowers burst in the sky.
~
Cactus
Drought is one heart from a land where water is scarce
is a sin
is a place where sun-beaten longings sink into the dunes.
Foreword to a Nation About to Crumble
I
And so the streets
sing songs of sorrow.
II
I rest my hands.
I found I was born.
III
We will find ourselves.
We will see. We will find
our hearts heavy. We will
look back and see.
~
I Woke Up in the Middle of the Night
to See the City Lying on the Shore of My Island
And she said she's home, finally.
And she said, Hurry.
And of course, she said, Let's
find the bodies of those
I have loved.
She said, Come, let's drag
them all.
So she said, I'm home, finally.
~
prelude to a streetmarch
an avenue constipated
a street blooming with
hammers pounding thunder
for a memory served on
paper plates
Leonor
Do you remember? You knew
your cousin. You would desire
him. You were twelve. You washed
your hands. You knew. You wrote
the story in your heart. You looked
far - you could. Can you hear the
song? Can you sing? In your mind,
you are your wedding gown. Washing
your face, you read his letters one
last time.
~
Life is a Wait-to-be-Seated Cafe
lines for a teen-age niece
in acronyms
apocopes
the missing letters fall
far but still ask for
identification bold
transcript of curt
replies shortcuts
quickie click links
private gibberish
long long letter lag
~
The Room
In your room, few take no
care as to what will happen
later. The sheets with stains
change every day. There is
no space to become soft. They
close their eyes. Inside them,
a hundred flitting.
Jardin des Plantes
Rilke will not stir from the edge of a pond after
weeks on the shallow end. Without warning, he
turns toward two boys engaged in tug-o-war,
locked in dance with desire, eyes fixed on the
other's, and they dance and tug, tug and dance.
He lays on the ground and probes belly, breast.
He cannot help but cheer and applaud the children.
~
Ledger
A bibliophile might record events corresponding
to each word he had in mind that cut through what
he will never possess: crimson, family, embroider,
passerby, window, heedless of any possible connection.
On the Sense of Touch
poke lift wipe smudge
feel grasp paint landscapes
that need to be seen. It's a
matter of seeming.
~
Pigeons in Last Light
It's a wonder such grace becomes
palpable, certain, a reprieve settling
among looming horizon's figures. Defy
gravity, in turn become form, soaring,
racing home.
The Curved Space-Time Continuum
in the Interstellar Street of Morayta
I. Girl Gravity, drawing love
A story where you are
the antagonist. A sad ending.
II. You
My love fuels the clock
the distance
the space-time
continuum.
Everything else is a cloud
of gas: the stars, the sky.
Communion
the errant tongue will answer
the hard mouth would spit my
prayer sweet now mean.
~
Lake
In the air, all the dead.
Into the water, the clouds.
Now the vigilant, the new
Scream on the face of the earth.
~
Pilgrims
To keep the face unreflected, cloud
the glass with breath. Still dead hands
clasped. They have come with prayers
so perfect so moral so incorrupt.
5:36 am
the big sky was
bright purple the
trees black and
grey in shadows
all wearing thin
~
Thoughts: 020805
I think I love
you must endure
Cars and Dogs
out front on the driveway. If they work
once a week, pet them. Call after them.
Mix up their names. Roll up, roll over,
that's my boy - stall, play dead.
~
Half-brother's Portrait
an apple a day revealed
my half-brother now fully
father and me in the dark
History
1
Father and son. A few stray birds.
2
The laundry. The sink. The bills. The
biggest mishap. The inquiry. A party
where you try to be gracious to everybody.
The guests. The question. The door.
The answer.
3
A well-guarded secret. A voice.
A glass of water. A fable. A finger.
A glass of water. A door locked.
4
The village. The old man. The
crusty pavement. The village.
The spinster. The truth. The
morning. The door. The boredom.
Afterstorm
We forgot we have no choice.
We will find we will wait. We
will easily forgive. I witnessed.
I would make sure I have. I have.
~
Grandmother's Coffin Exiting
leaves fall upon steps
irreplaceable things
boldly marked by frozen dinner
Of Mangoes and Mortals
I am jerking off without hesitation.
The seed I pass in one motion when done.
Black Ants
As I write the absence
unyielding into mouths,
ant colonies thrive, watchful
of pity. This is simply how things
are. Elsewhere, life persists.
~
Hume's Women
Held to the morning light, you looked
younger. You are only tired of the abstract:
desire, love. Certainty: see how good it feels.
rain
Remember how you told me your
demise would stop the rain? It
always rains here. Even on a sunny day.
At Midnight
The black cat trots quietly.
What it longs for is the strength
of waiting to be caressed by the
one waited.
~
The Road and the Tree
The old gate opens to a grassy path to the road
to the grove, the mossy path, the road not yet
there. Many years ago, she opens her eyes again,
surprising herself with trembling fingers. The tree
she planted remains.
Dawn in Argao
years and miles
from home you
imagined distance passing
will disappear beneath
maps and the
break of day
~
The Day She Learned to Draw Stars
she stopped wondering about a useless God.
Swans
I
a pair of white
bones, thin,
a beautiful, barely
useful thing
II
a man and another need
an arm each around the
other, one too tight, reckless,
just beautiful
III
two hearts broken as
if the other were
already gone
Long Walk from Chinatown to Lawton
Remember this story and wet beds.
Forget this story.
Nothing but ghosts from
A horror movie,
Aged like a bad habit
Before bedtime.
Our House
Under the bridge
of stars our Papa
won the lotto and
a new house
somewhere.
~
Tattoo, Part II
an anaconda
a stallion
bony rats
an earthworm
~
The Carnival is Over
Yanked off the wall was a
knapsack. Nowhere to be
found was the train in
transit. What are left are
ticket stubs.
Vlad: May nagtext sa'kin, o, pinagsasabihan ako kahit 'di ko sila kilala:
"Mas kawili-wili at kapaki-pakinabang na sumuong sa 'karanasan ng rebolusyon'
kaysa sumulat tungkol dito." - V I Lenin / Nobyembre 30, 1917
Adam: Sana sagutin mo ng "Wiliwiliyonaryo?"
Vlad: Basta hindi mayaman ang nagtext kasi Sun ang ginamit.
Adam: E di apt nga ang sagot na "Wiliwiliyonaryo!"
Vlad: May bagong African author, si Chimamanda Abiche. Sumisikat siya kahit negra siya.
Adam: Katawa naman pangalan niya, parang pseudonym na base ke Chinua Achebe.
Vlad: Oo nga, ano? Parang katulong na nabasa si Chinua.
Accidental
a cat's cradle of quasars
entangled to beginnings
and ends extending in
all directions a tryst a
junction intersecting
wounds on the face
of a rose
~
Salvation
mayas flock in storage
inert on glass their heads
white reborn in the cold
~
Scrimshaws
a replica of uncharted lands seen
in distances recalls a lover mouthing
promises a world condensed
Poppy Poem
A secluded patch of poppies
tinted this acre.
We crouch to kiss the earth.
March 22
She doesn't know
her mom in the pool.
The little thing she'll never know.
~
We Live the Impossible
You tell me you tell me you tell me,
But what need what need what need?
I need only I need only I need only.
They say, But why? Their lives they believe.
Animal Planet
On August 12, 1883 in Zaire, perched
on a hill in twos or threes, the hyenas
are in heat, come and come again
downhill. Out of the woods, the airport
to Nepal, a holiday in Greece, travelling,
playing, drinking. The stuff of real men.
~
Short Blade History
How the two are one and the
same. One Wednesday, this
whole business would end,
and much later, a hundred
years or so, a flawed barbaric
ritual. Today, feel it against
throat.
Malapascua
In Malapascua, some wrinkled
Chinese mistress would slurp
gin to warm the body for a few
miserable pesos.
In Malapascua, what remains
is the shame of white men, stiff
on her shores his dream. Now he
drowns, snickering, as he slumbers
on Malapascua's sand.
A Fairy-Tale Ending
You watch her, your fifth. You wish.
Your table beside you. You wonder.
You hold your name, your bottle.
You hear you tell yourself you will
drown. You are given your eyes.
~
Movement
Of permanence: her father leaning
on the wall, slanted, brown, creased.
His wife allowed him travel, his feet
on the ground his only audience. He
would look out the window in silence,
always in the same direction, familiar,
of comfort, in the end nothing more
than another room.
~
Sometimes Their Feet Refuse to Touch the Ground
A slow song moves towards him, transition
inevitable from point to point, curves above,
beneath, dancing, flickering, catching a glimmer,
the answer to his prayer, his lap, his chest, his
heart, everything sacred.
Young Girl in Drugstore, Waiting
She cares only so much, enough
to bruise her red, that much, or
just a little more. Inside her, the
blankness her lips will never know.
For Example: A Flower
Pain never fails to come
eagerly in time. The promise
the same the same the lie.
Deliver
Between the hours
of night, a fading.
Between my palms,
flocks pass.
~
Page Torn from the Book of Devotions
I've measured I've weighed
I've measured I've traced
words to paper across, past
a corner, away, to retreat,
meters a stride, all over the
world, distances far.
In Singapore After The "I Love You" Bombings
The Lebanese leader received word: "I Love You."
A Valentine. A good thing. A box of long-stemmed
roses red, the color of the day and wine. Three sips,
then down.
Fatigue
Embrace my heavy feet, my
eyes, my hand. Give whispers
to my ears.
~
Names
I leave I wear I wear
I wear I wear I wear
I get I have I arrive
I open I haven't I wear
I never I am I am
Brasserie Speak
b a aa
b c a
a f f a aa
b f a
a b a
a b f
a b b
dd a d a
c a c
f a push-up
aa d aa
aa c a d
aa f c a c
f d aa a c f
f b a dd a
b f a c d aa over their heads
their heads padded with
surprise or solitude finally
Earth
Hands of woe and carts and
rice, fish on the table. Seeking
warmth, callused, beseeching,
beseeching.
Manananggal
1
A woman of a more carnal kind. Imagine
her skin, wet somewhere down her legs.
She exhales.
2
Love is like coffee with milk and sugar. Love
was like nights and days alone with a book and
a rose. Got tired. I just got tired. I got tired of Love.
~
Poem
1
about love. I'm in love. Is love
the search of, the validation of?
2
of my photograph. Remember my
little gesture of the mouth, a bit of
bliss. You finding beauty. Remember.
3
is nothing but finding meaning.
4
about pain. This distance I rush
to and find friends who know.
5
about love. I am in love. This has pain.
Agham Road, 1999
Best brave bell boys black behind
believed bitter beer but -
~
Once More, the Minister
Opportunity of once obvious of, of
old only of on only of one.
~
Once More, the Minister II
Seems sources stealth sends sky shot.
~
Once More, the Minister III
Outside, grass grows then grows some
more, and feels like it has always been
this way. Song, some sad, appears, palpable,
lush, no fault, as if in constant practice, expectation.
In the Pre-Departure Area
An absence around us would
Breach the empty fantasy. Our
Heartbeats board separate
Airplanes to destinations
Divergent.
~
Magician
I slash and stab my
heart, let the blood
spill, flowing into song.
Mass Transit. 60KPH and Counting
but your thoughts travel faster: it's
dusk and you're sitting by the river. Feet
wade, but you're still on the train, your
clothes still the same, you're still on the train
hitting 60KPH. Fast enough for this distance.
~
The day I ate my parents
It just happened. Dad chasing Mom around the
house. I asked questions later, realizing Time had
run out. The Future left unfed.
Lunch with Lola
He pored over the starmap coursing
up her hand, arm, neck. Fortunes
change. Let go of the portents.
False Memory
Fabricate absurd thoughts. He
longs for wisdom non-existent. He
claims he cannot realize his place in
collision of self against self.
~
The Voice of Angels
the sky the dirt
the empty water jug
the sound that is and
song deep and still bear
down on us heaves ripens
ripens a great love the
overflowing syllable
understand our hands
receive it
Portrait
your image cuts the hand
your image as a kiss
your image my woman
water and wheat
your image falls drop by drop
your image always
your image the need
your image the music hailing the day
a child with one of your eyes
and one of mine
And Now
the words make up their minds, go
their separate ways, die within hours
of being divided, another casualty, another
ill-fated incursion, lines gone, lost from some
faraway war.
Aubade
The city still asleep fumbled
in bed, errant. Tangled
muffled noises encouraged
by fingers to navel, sloping
chest, this momentary
merging shifting, glowing,
emerging, drifting.
I tighten my hug and you
stir. Don't wake up. Don't.
For now, everything's enough.
~
Letras y Figuras
a before before canvas
carrying a baby burdened
cockrow chatter close
conversations between
between and all appear
almost almost afflict
amnesia and a century
collection be be
~
Nimbus
The horizon over landscape
unwound. The sky endures.
She Who Jumped as Tragedy
was not surprised. The smile
was projectile regardless of the
wound which she slashed. Still,
heartache she had.
~
The End
I have no right to
hold you which is
what you want
which is what
they want a flow
of meanings of
what used to be
~
The Fall of Judas
In truth he slipped
like a thought snatched
like a feather.
Fun
Someone burning the neighborhood
calls his friends over, all excited.
They watch it burn, then go lazy
in spite.
Collect Them All
I love you I've always
found I like when I
go to a surgeon and
cut off my tongue
I'd be thankful about
how I arrange my
words I love you
~
Euphoria Morning
You are a thousand nightingales behind
a song at one in the morning, a hopeless
longing for night.
Brickhouse
Sometimes the house needs an immaculate veil disguised
as your dreams, the brick wall your hands, the roof your breath.
~
Consolation
Mother's breast is
the greatest one over
over over over
all over.
One of the more interesting books on my shelf is Life Turns Man Up and Down, which is a collection of Igbo Market Pamphlet Literature. These pamphlets ought to be of more special interest for bibliophiles 'round these parts, as these things are the lone proof/artifacts of a culture formerly striving towards modern (= print) literacy via straddling a popular mass aesthetic founded on Christianity and Country-Bumpkin Old Timey Philosophising through Mild Erotica condemning Modern City Living (= sex and drugs and alcohol), and there are bits about managing money, too. I bought the book five years ago and reading through it gave me a brainwave about the inevitability of literature's progress, meaning how we all start with the "simplistic" moral proposals of Religion and Tradition and then move towards the more "sophisticated" emotional highs and lows of popular readings and then maybe breach the "liberal" moralistic/artistic ambiguities of high lit, and in between will be smatterings of intellectualisation just to keep things in check, and this progress is actually recreated through our own individual reading habits. Regardless of the Western Imperialist whathaveyous of this structure, this is very much what happens all over. This is what happened/is happening to our own literature, and this is what happened to the Igbo Market Literature, only with the Igbo, literature's march hit a brick wall when the Biafran War more or less killed everyone reading and writing these books, more or less killed everyone in sight. It took no less than genocide to stop literature's progress. Not to downplay human life, of course, but it's really something to think about.
One of the more exciting bits in the pamphlets was this rundown of nearly two hundred proverbs that were either in translation or appropriated through Christianity. It was a very interesting read, how the proverbs provided several slices of the Igbo life via their concerns and wishes and fears and dreams, and it was very interesting to see how all of them are all still very relevant today. Answer.Com defines "proverbs" as "short popular sayings of unknown authorship, expressing some general truth or superstition, found in most cultures, and are often very ancient," and it's interesting as we really all do have universal cross-cultural concerns, and we all seem to have this universal timeless urge to put them down to paper hoping maybe it'll help someone in the long run, and both of these concerns, it seems to me, will always be relevant.
One of my own personal concerns was this urge to write my own set of proverbs, but more a la Blake's "Proverbs from Hell," a set of ribald, bold, not-quite-right proverbs than the usual religious moralistic proverbs, but I wanted to write them with the least amount of ego possible. I felt I had to do some mechanical processing thing for the proverbs to work the way I wanted them to work, so I pulled out my Igbo antho and did a little something-something here and there and came up with Perverbs, which is a set of fifty-five proverbs processed in one afternoon a few months back.
I had other publication plans for Perverbs (as opposed to just blogging it here), but Kenneth Goldsmith's essay on Flarf and Conceptual Writing (via Gelo) got me to thinking about these things (Flarf and Conceptual Writing) which got me to thinking about my own projects, most recently the proverbs and Crows and Rages. Of special interest for me were the bits about how Flarf unearths a few issues on sincerity, about how "... this new poetry wears its sincerity on its sleeve ... yet no one means a word of it," and it really made me think Yeah, that's true, but I don't see it in any of the writing I've read that calls itself "Flarf," but maybe I'm equating "sincerity" with "emotional affect" when in context with Goldsmith's more out there propositions, it really seems more like "sincerity" is equal to "I am a construct of words compiled mechanically from other people's constructs of words, also compiled mechanically," and that proposition is a very interesting one, albeit not new, but still very relevant, only the regular reader (= person who does not give a damn about Flarf and Conceptual Writing) will most likely only dismiss Flarf as bullshit writing and move on to the next one with none of her preconceptions about reading and writing ever being questioned as Flarf reads as if really just more interested in making fun of you than proving its point about the malleability of language, the open sourceness of the written word, etc etc etc.
I don't really see what's what with Flarf. I think it's a bit funny how ultimately Flarf's contribution to poetry's discourse will come from all the defensive defendings that Goldsmith, et al, are churning out left and right extolling Flarf as the Next Big Thing, the Saviour of Poetry from the Dusty Shelves of Academics, etc etc etc, when the actual writing is all really just iterations of attempts to recreate the initial artistic vandalism of R. Mutt's "Fountain," (and the subsequent hammering vandalism dealt to it by Pierre Pinoncelli [we're all really just hammering one another]) and doing that rather poorly as it's all ultimately just iterations of that and nothing much else. What it's saying is something a lot of people already know, a lot of people already read in better configurations, ie Gertrude Stein's Tender Buttons. I think it's a really big problem for Flarf's propaganda that its practitioners have to effort to essay its virtues through articles belabouring things that ought to be inherent in the pieces in the first place. Less of the Art and more of the Politics, maybe?
I can't help but see literature's progress as pyramidic, with Duchamp and Stein and Joyce and the Oulipo and the Situationists, etc etc etc, along with the Romantics and the Belle Lettrists and the Propagandists, etc etc etc, being the foundations for the constant building towards progress' peak. So far, all we've been doing are just iterations and reiterations of things we already know. We've been belabouring the point of L+A+N+G+U+A+G+E poetry for nearly one hundred years, now. We've been "officially" deconstructing everything close to sixty years, now. We all already know how these things work. All the toys are broken, in parts, and it's time we start putting them all back together and make them work again, only now that we know how these things work, we can start efforting to build better toys. I think we need more reformers than deconstructionists. But who will do the reforming? What form will the process of reforming be? The pessimists in the audience will probably say that we might quite possibly only unwittingly replicate the old structures. I think we need more optimists. These things bear thinking about as we loiter in our hundredth-or-so year of Modern Philippine Poetry.
A good reformer considers what the result of his reform will be like;
before he raises his hammer to destroy, he thinks of What will replace what he destroys.
Or so the Igbo proverb goes as printed in one of their pamphlets from way back in the 1960s. Still words to live by after all these fifty years.
Thanks to Vince for some initial comments! It's a better post because of him.
A House
the space we inhabit
we inhabit the silence
the something that's no
longer there
does it matter?
this is not a poem
this is a poem
a house
this poem
a house
and no one is home
imagine tongue
imagine spit
imagine
become something
~
Beatific Visions
I
God and his sermon was just
too high. Hear, God, come over.
II
God was a cigarette I lit
for him. Did I swear? I
worshiped him.
III
God with beer. It was heaven.
~
Still Life
Every poem is a dead
Grandmother.
Every poet a dead
Grandmother.
Remember the porcelain
urn chipped by the cat,
atop the window sill?
Outside, the morning bread,
eggs, coffee turn to words,
suddenly still.
~
Those Who are Left Behind
Sweat and blood gather
before a privilege reserved
for failed imagining withering
us. The gagged questioning
grief silence our small
small hearts.
In Burned White Paper
The words fill my
lungs in every line,
syllable, letter,
paragraph. The
tangible dream
in white paper.
~
In the Green of Marahan
Perhaps our souls
Time
Memory
Love
Is on the ebb in this distance
Incalculable
~
The Incalculable
This distance brings words
Hope
Pain
Love
Memory
A moment when time
Stops our hearts and we
Get carried away
Excerpts from The Poem of the Muse
4
the self calling
wanting shedding
falling staring
pointing rolling
weighing testing
you you you
5
the enduring metaphor of
the window: everytime she
is lost to you allow her departure
shadow radiance allow her to wave
goodbye to look back she will not
complain
~
The Main of Light
Now, the body felt
cumbersome, less graceful, the
struggle a release, and nothing
nothing nothing was felt, seen, known.
Overhead, the woman was out of
focus, alerting someone in detail.
~
The Origin of Power
From where I was, the sun sizzled. As a child, time trickled late, and
then she arrived, a moment of exposition, to look at my wounds, taunt
me, and it was this that made me hard: the folds of her clothes, her
body, the unsuspecting impact, her body tossed, standing, curled, laboring
my desire.
At Quezon National Park
Rainfall after hours go with the scenery:
wind, branches, trees. The hum of engine
a return. The wet road the culmination of
my search for home, the most lived-in of
rooms.
~
Citrine
Kittens rip apart my abdomen,
seeking warmth of my golden
flesh. One by one, rip me open,
red animal children.
Reach in for a bit of
heart or lung, my
bone ready to be
called wondrous.
~
I the Woman Who Feeds on Light
Behind the ears
Into the pores of your anatomy
A death wish to feed
On your life and
Apologies
~
Residence
We sought to recreate what we had
read: improve the pages, cram with
promise, polish the graceful curve of
normalcy, sharp enough to slice away
hearts, regrets, worry, loss, the wicked
world where I truly live, this body a constant
map to bring us closer, no walls, finally home.
Mid-Stride
I cannot remember.
I find I have forgotten.
I find I know.
~
secret of oceans
In her belly, like a wave
tugging, quietly breaking
against the sand. One day,
allow me to watch her
sleep.
~
What They Meant by Provincial
I never knew what they meant: TVs, radios,
cellular phones with the sound turned down.
I saw no pattern, no shape, none of the ordered
lines. Crying, I could only see the fruit on the
ground, brown.
After Kiukok's Lovers #2
Do you love skin
The mix of pigment
Of pain?
Do you love this game
Of gestures?
To be able to love
To shut out the senses
To despise the dark?
~
Exercise: Unlearning "Heart"
My heart write out "heart,"
the heart done, no splatter nor
surprise, above all.
~
Nostalgia
Each fist fumbled
with paper one after
another after another after
another. Could've lasted twenty
years. A violent craving delayed
his pleasure.
Eclipses
I
Body breaks black blanket.
II
Lamp stays lighted. Tighten the
bedspread. Still fearful with the
dark that follows.
III
The only possibility of sadness is
dawn, and morning.
~
Isabelle
The beautiful afternoon before us. What
else do we care for? Some foregone
destiny, finalities, fated sequences? Our
bodies break us over time. Breathe.
Crack.
~
Quarter-Pound Love
My cheeseburger in
a corner of this universe arrived
to stake its claim.
Conversion
I don't believe. I cannot feel. They
Are dropping bombs this morning,
Part lesson, part hate. We don't
Need them.
~
Epiphany
Now, this: I do not trust
this sudden knowledge.
This heart - all feeling.
I must think.
~
Sestina for the Jazzman
The grit and gravity, the dissonance
of a gesture, the curly hair climate,
how heavy the hurl, her hissing, hiding,
lining our pain, this pain a line.
~
Speech Lesson
He'll switch; he'll ask; he'll
trade; he'll drop; he'll even
turn this one, this one,
he thinks he says he could
know your friends; he changed;
he called; he invited, then left
for good. Snug in bed, you
wonder, then learn from
his absence, ponder.
A Certain Necessity
Certain devices for forgetting dreams: a flower;
sadness; sleep; a vast field, the end only one
point leading to uncertain coasts. The sun dries
everything: earth, oceans, tears, loneliness,
destiny, the future, memory, dream, hope.
Tell me
how.
~
bicol express, manhattan stop
A word embodies a location. A journey.
An arrival. All lead nowhere, moving
through a word, a language that my
tongue recalls.
~
Gravity
The palm kills a man, intimacy culminating
into a certain fate. A further investigation:
subject is memory, the object made accessory
is the lens. A snap.
~
Now
Day shadows pass through the afternoon. Two
bodies dying, validated in death. Endings. Many
variations of unknown chaos contained in a single
moment. Out of the balcony, a rainbow. The
possibilities of spectrum. There is only one.
~
santiguar
In 1978, a felon spewed out memories back
and forth, back and forth, the still hum an
elegy, a chorus unheard unformed, wont to
answer back to reveal where the heart
used to beat.
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