To The Man On The Moon

The sky went a deeper shade of black.
Clouds were swept away.
You faced the heavens in such a majestic way.
Frosty white light went seeping through,
the unfathomable depths of your being
And you saw the stars -
You picked them out one by one
And made jewels for your head.
The clear stillness of the sky
Got carried away
By the softness of your glow
And all the twinkling beauty around you.
Where does that leave me?
Here I am, hidden beneath a cloud -
one of the clouds that you swept away.
I never became part of the sparkles
That made you all the more complete.
So perhaps I'll just let myself slip
Away from the grip of the dark sky
Soar down against the clouds,
Against the wind
And fall not into you craters
But on the face of the sleeping earth -
the only one willing enough to recieve me.

Senglot (At Nahuli Ako Ni Tatay)

Nag-inuman kami kina Mauro nung isang araw kasama sina Ronnel, Jebs, Vincent, Ebin, Lurin, Florence at Titet (complete attendance na sana kaya lang ala si Kakai). Napatumba namin ang anim na malalaking bote ng Red Horse. Nung una ayaw ko pa, batang gin at San Mig Light kasi ko. Pero ang sarap pala ng red horse no? Hehe. Lalo na pag malamig. Kaya lang, sabi ng sa commercial, ang lakas ng tama.

Oo, sabi nga ni Punzalan, senglot ako. Hindi naman as in tumba ko pero anaknam*, ang sakit ng ulo ko! Corny na kung corny pero boy, napamahal talaga ko sa barkada ko dahil sa pagtitipon na yun. Matagal-tagal na rin kaming di makumpleto, pero kahit kulang e tinuloy pa rin namin.

Dami kong nalaman. Nakwentuhan kami ng maraming bagay. Hindi naman "truth or consequence" yung dating pero maraming lumabas: yung problema ni Ronnel tungkol sa tunay nyang pagkatao (oo, mala teleserye), hinanakit ko sa sa parte ng UPLB na hindi tanggap ang CommArts, pagtutol nila sa plano kong pagtransfer sa diliman, mga kabulastugan ni Ebin, ang di na makagulapay sa kalasingan na rebelasyon ni Enteng at marami pang iba. Kakaiba talaga ang nagagawa ng ilang lagok ng alak - madalas, boluntaryong hinuhubaran ng maskara ang sarili.

Hindi ko rin masasabi na wala kami sa ulirat nung nag uusap-usap kami - natatandaan naming lahat yun. Nakakatuwa talaga, lalo na kung ilang linggo ka nang binabagoong sa loob ng bahay nyo at nagsisimula ng makabisado ng katawan mo ang pang araw-araw na kain-tulog ng labindalawang oras. Ang hindi ko lang maintindihan nun e kung bakit ako pauli-ulit na nililitanyahan ni Ronnel ng "Caty... wag kang lalapit sa min isang araw at sasabihing may gusto ka na kay Earvin ha..." Si Jebs naman "Oi, Punzalan, wag mo ngang baby-hin yan si Bucu.." Ano?! Hindi kami ang bagong love-team ng barkada, Siguro nga madalas kaming mag usap at close na kami ngayong sembreak - telebabad, sabihan ng sikreto, seryosong usapan atbp. Pero kami magkakagusto sa isa't-isa? Malabo. May kanya-kanya kaming gusto. Kami na lang ang natatawa pag niloloko kami. Ano ba naman yun... Parang kapatid ko na si Ebin, yun dambuhalang yun na isa pa ring todo ang pagkalasing nang gabing yun. Pero nung may nagtanong kung bakit hindi pwedeng magkagusto sa kaibigan, hindi ko rin masagot. Bakit nga ba?

Sa totoo lang, may maganda sanang laman ang post na ito. Para kasing hindi ko na masayadong gusto si __. Alam mo yun, parang nalunod na sa beer at kasama nang naitapon sa mga pinagbalatan ng dingdong at wiggles yung kabaliwan ko sa kanyang pumupuno ng mga araw ko simula nang magsimula ang sembreak. Hindi pa rin ako magsasalita ng tapos. Marami pang araw bago magpasukan, interesado pa rin akong makilala siya. Wala kasi kong masayadong alam bukod sa mahal niya yung kumanta ng "Run". Hay nako, may hang-over pa yata ako.

Hindi ko talaga makakalimutan ang araw na yun, kung kelan umuuwi ako kinabukasan sa bahay nang parang wala pa sa sarili, nagpanggap na inaantok pagdating sa pintuan pero nabuko ng tatay ko paghiga ko sa kama. Amoy beer daw ako. Naisip ko, mga lasenggo nga naman - ang lakas ng pang-amoy. ;)

Pathetic Nonsense

I want to be with you now and hear you play your guitar.
I want to sense your smoke and look at your dirty, worn-out sneakers.
I miss you and its been days since you last said you thanks.
I'm glad that I saved your life in some sort of weird way-
At least I will still get to see you next semester.
I miss the way I see you from afar, sitting on some withered stonewashed bench,
the way your earring glitters in the sun,
your calloused fingertips (though I haven't really had a good look at it myself) do their strums.
So sad isn' t it?
The fact that you will never know I like you this much.
I was about to give up my argument on the fallacy romantic love.
I was on the verge of entertaining mushiness into my life.
I was willing to give up all my bitterness, and share yours
Including your beliefs that are somewhat contradictory to mine.
I was about to give all that up just to hear you play for me,
Sing your song for me, Write your poem for me -
Because have been doing all that for you and you will never know.
I wish we could write together as you teach me guitar, hanging out on your stonewashed bench.
But you like someone else. I've been doing research.
Yup, you are hell and she is heaven,
the first thing that comes into your mind when you hear the word COLLEGE.
Your dream, the unreachable.
You are the first thing that comes into my mind when I hear college.
You have preoccupied my thoughts at the latest parts of it.
But you know, you will never be my heaven though I dream of you.
This may seem foolish butI'd rather have you beside me -
I could see, hear and feel you better that way.
Isn't life so unfair?
I try my best to be a nice, down to earth person,
Thinking that I could reach anyone by doing so.
But no, people like you always go for the ones you can't have -
the goddesses, the heaven, the unreachable.
Trust me,
I want to go way up there
Just for you to give me the time of day.
But sad to say, I cannot
Because I'm just a mere mortal,
Right here on earth.

Why is Miss Ordinary Being Bitchy?

February 2004

I am someone who passes by and no one sees. I know people, but not all of them know me. I do a lot of things not everybody sees. I am one of the countless people who belong to the faceless crowd.

As I drift into the sea of people that walk on this revolving earth, I see them as they see me. I think, and think in every step I take as I submerge my self into the depths of my thoughts, my surroundings and all those in it warps into a great moving mass, as anonymous as I am.

One may think, the ordinariness that my face, or even my whole being is as harmless as a bunny - I wanted to prove their first impressions wrong.

I regret lots of things I say, good or bad, when it's about people that I don't really care that much about. More often than not, it is my stupid thoughts and the tongue that spits them out is to blame. All the repressed ideas, comments, suggestions, and violent reactions scrambling around and gasping for air, that I have always kept locked up in my skull would leak out, in regretful ways more often than once.

Strike One

There's this guy, that I've known for years, who's trying to impress a close friend of mine and has been dumpred several times. His latest offer is friendship and yet in his very pathetic (and obvious) ways, he tries to make his move. It bugs me, no, it gets to my very nerves; Because not only I and my group of friends don't like him for our friend, but he is a goddamn sexist - treating girls he's not courting like they are some sort of lesser beings in, again, his pathetic yet obvious ways. He thinks he's so cool, tough good looking and a good singer (argh!), but definitely isn't. I HATE HIS GUTS. There are people whom I've really appreciated for trying hard, but his irritating ways doesn't make him a least bit part of them.

And I would blurt out things on this guy's ever present pathetic-ness when I talk to him. I would comment out loud when I'm with a whole group of people, incuding him and his can-you-not-get-the-picture ways. People would just look at me and and either smile or have no reaction at all. But really, it felt good doing or rather saying that, no matter how many people agree or disagree.

Yet, at the end of each day, I would sit down and recount things I've said. Regret would creep into my conscience on the way I pointed out his stinking guts. A feeling of guilt sinks in.

Strike Two

Then there's this girl whom I've been good friends since last semester. For more than half of that semester, she had always been with a guy "friend". That guy is someone from my past. No, not the boyfriend slash love kind of thing, just the dumb i-like-you-i-like-you-too situation (otherwise known as M.U.) and the only past ever recorded in my history regarding the matter. He's the kid who would make you feel high and then for no reason (or at least none that you would know immediately) left you hanging, until you suddenly fall down flat to your face. I have heard his ways because I had been a victim myself. Though he is like that, I had been "friendly-friends" with him when college started, or when he and the girl friend of mine started hangin out together. I don't know why. Maybe I missed him, but jealous? Over my dead brain cells, no.

This semester, the girl always asked me whatever happend to him. For days, the answer has been "I don't know". But deep within those linesI have been thinking tha maybe: he is at it again; he's still the stupid guy I know; He decided to leave her hanging too. So the first news that I got about his whereabouts and his "making porma" to a popular girl in school, I told it to my friend after several weeks of thinking if I should. But with the luck of all lucks, the girl met the guy again and the guy is asking me now about what I've said to my friend. Am I in a big mes or what? Me and my big mouth again.

I grew into disliking him secretly after our so-called history. I still don't, and somehow it felt good to save someone from pain, no matter how much others wronfully accuse me of being jealous. But with all the guilt slowly creeping in like in the case of the stinkingly gutted guy.I'm getting trapped between my own conscience and this whole damn twisted mess.

There are many other times wherein I say things that somehow, after releasing all of the stuff that wanted to leak out of my head (in exchange for relief), my own conscience would nag me. I wanted to say those and I don't want to take them back and yet there is always this overwhelming feeling of guilt that stays at the pit of stomach.

Everytime I do, I feel like I did something deadly - That I'm a blabbermouth. I am evil-tongued. I am stupid. I am reckless. I am foolish. Most of all, I'm becoming a bitch.

I never really dreamed of becoming one. At times I want to change when conscience nags, but I remained in telling what I think when I think it is most necessary to do so, in times when acts of certain people makes my blood almost evaporate from boiling. On the other hand, I am still as faceless as the who-was-that's and never-heard-of's.

I feel guilty at this moment. I want to stop but I want to say things I think at the same time. With all this rage of confusion, trying to worm its way through my already oevrloaded mind, I ask myself how I transform from beign Ms. Ordinary, to a bitchy one and back.

Then I found out that my mind and definitely my conscience, is just as confused as I and my already confusing day's worth.

Pangalan

Huwag mo akong tingnan
Sapagkat bawat titig mo'y sapat
Upang tuluyan akong mabura sa paningin.
May mga tingin na di nakakakita.
May mga pagtawag na walang laman.
Ang pagsambit sa aking pangalan
Ay di patunay ng pagkilala mo.
Kailanman, ang tinig mong
tumatawag sa akin
Ay di patunay na nabubuhay ako
sa iyong isipan, sa iyong harapan.

Under The Cafe Lights

When I was just about to sit on my chair,
I changed my mind and went to another.
Now there you are,
On the seat that was supposed to be mine.

The wind blew colder
As you held the frets of your guitar tighter.
It sees like you would never let go,
Strumming and plucking on those cold nylon strings.

Every note that you left hanging in the air -
I picked them out one by one.
I tried to make a movie in my head.
A short clip of the passion in your song.

There goes the last strike of your fingers,
slowly taken away by the silence
and by the awe you have left me with.
The lights were turned off.

Each one of them flickered out into the dark.
I was left contemplating
Now on the same chair -
That I was suppose to sit upon.

But you sat and spun your melodies instead.
Here I am, still sitting
Seeing you in my mind
Hearing the song that you played

Over and over again.