Papier-mâché

"Twenty-four seems scary," I tell myself. Sometimes, I tell jokes, or mostly, it was conveniently told, like how a laugh returns and  introduces itself as villainous friend, but an enemy is the positivity that takes. It is so much scarier when it visits me: a quicksand brought by faux geniuses, a peeking sock-made puppet,  I am a whole drama— a ventriloquist of his own dreams. Delighted by my father's cake: "Happy birthday, son!"  I still know how to stay still  when everybody sings me one.  My Mom gave me bills: Money is an angel.  Indeed, for it lets me fly out of the reality— out of reality that everything  is still made of infinite loops,  as in manmade experiments, and how they can be destroyed by one gentle blow.

" Death and life are a friend ,"  the old lesson keeps bludgeoning me. Death ripples through the streams and creeks that flow near the homes that depend on recollections.  Each of these bricks used to be housed by fine architectures,  now bound by white bands and prayers. On the front porch, the most-welcoming wreath of carnations,  which are enveloped by symmetrical stanchions,  greets every person that comes through it.  And I thought: if death comes near,  then life is nothing but sprout of vine reaching its arms to a far cry,  and never will it give you time to read every sentence death foretells. In this house, it now gives homage to the days I could remember but never hold. Here, I witness: Candles are as still as my stiff existence,  while the quietness of each life in the room screams. The sympathies dress black and how regrets strip my skin. But how could a friend hurt you when they only visit you once? That every gaze to the rectangular—which holds my dear roots—las

Where do I room this grief? Every aisle has the pain: one corner lets me see through her weeping eyes. In the corridor lies a box of the garments that once felt her warmth in the coldest days. This particular section is known as the Circular Room wherein all the comforting lies are said, never acted upon. One step run in a lap is a heavy load. One room is another made—painted with cerulean-blue acrylic paint. There is another room where there is a canvass a plainly white canvass that I cannot embellish my tears with, so I will cover it with my blood. Every room is a room filled, yet empty.

 The hatred is piled up, enough to orchestrate a crime  and to hide it in nightmarish metaphors. I have imagined you getting piercing through the fragility of the roof of your mouth, until you beg for forgiveness with your really untamed spirit. Perhaps, flaying would be much better, but crying will be reverberated through every corner of your long shattered room, as your annoyingly pleading voice will still be heard. An unforgivable, hell-bent serpentine, you always are, caressing the man’s ego extracting his exhaustion, and me against a fiend in your presence. Such a soft way to demonstrate hell to you— as it was not even a flinch, or a poke. You deserve heaven appearing reverse, so the gods you have known will forbid your salvation.

Ang aking kuwento ay umiikot lamang sa dalawa: Hiraya sa umaga, katotohanan sa gabi. Narito ang mga Reduplikasyon ng mga salitang bibihis ng bugso. Aahon, bibilis, at tatalon hanggang maabot ang apat na sulok. Mananahan, at doon mananahan ang aking hapong katawan.   Escolta, anak ng Maynila, ako ay ampunin, sa iyong sulok Maglalakbay tayo nang nakayapak. Mula sa init ng natuyong aspalto, Magtatagpo tayo sa kung saan iniluwal ang isang anak ng Tundo. Ako ay luluwas nang madaling-araw kahit dalawang kilometro lang ang humihiwalay sa amin; Narito ang kasabikan ko, ang mga paa ang aakay patungo sa kanyang ina.   Uuwi at sasaluhin ng pinakamagaan na papag. Habang ang Elesi ang natatanging ingay na naririnig. Lahat ng pagod ay papawiin ng mapupulang labi; Sa mga mata ang kahandaan kong umibig sa aking sarili, At ang mismong init ay magpapatulog sa atin.   Ibig ko, sa aking panaginip, tayo ay naglalaro sa gitna ng mga sabi-sabi, Yaman ko ang ating sigaw sa lipunang hukom ang karaniwan. Obra n

Everyone calls my mother by how I call her: mommy . Sweet, dearly Mommy! But mostly, I call her by how she is always right, as she still makes fun of my fire: " Son, pour your blood onto something else "; Sweet Mother, goodness gracious, Mommy! My mommy loves a husband clothed in reeking patriarchy; regardless, he is a Plath's "Daddy," and my Mommy's love for him is a Shakespeare's until-death-do-us-part. Then he comes home, and she dies every time he speaks. Poor, Mommy ! Is love that delight? I have known love as how it looks like a two-sided coin: with rusting ridges, still I use it to pay the fare, but it is not fair: distance still wrecks. I am far from where they are, I am near my Mommy and we will never meet.

  My love, the month is here:   Can you hear The cacophony of harmony? The harmony of dissonance?   They come to greet us, but   we sit on our feet, and on the Bermuda grass we sing, we sway with it as   you hold a yellow rose, and I hold a plumeria,   You grip me with thorns, And I do it with my rebirth.   Voilà! These flowers of us will bloom, from every strand of our hair to the footmarks, and April will be our dress.

The thermometer and the Mercury, I touch while it is fragmented. Syringes and how they are accompanied by comforting words. Is it my death to begin with or my life to live? So, when did it all begin that the flatline has become my habit,  and the zigzag creeks I never want to befriend? A trapeze and my unharnessed body, A life of flights and my displayed fears of soar on concave mirrors. Will you tell me how my veins are a life of their own? Those spaces do fulfill their promises of recovery, and not a sentence with periods.  Tell me, I am sane along with my compulsions, that I am more worthy than any receipts of the pseudos. Of some thousand bucks as gratitude, I am more than the hundreds of pills I should be calling friends.  Ten thousand consistencies, million more, or maybe five times—five times counting the vase I always want to shatter seeking the righteous one that hides the magic pill. Am I sick?

I. PIGURIN Sinasayawan ng mga tao ang piguring gawa sa gintong tonelada ang bigat Animo'y buhay sa sariling kamatayan ng mga pumapasan―isang luhod, dalawang pagtaas ng mga kamay. "Ay, ay! Ito ang rituwal ng kanilang nakaupong anito. Ito ang awit at ang sayaw na Na ang tagpo ay sa hilaga. Ang sinag ng Araw ay wala sa  Libong dasal, kung 'di sa mapambuhay nitong mga galamay. Subali't Umulan man ay wala pa ring apoy ang Araw na magpapainit sa nilalamig na mga kaluluwa. Landas sa kanilang magliligaw sa kagubatang lumuwa sa kanilang paghihirap. Ang pigurin ay bababa mula sa limang-talampakan niyang pedestal. Mula rito, Ni anino ay hindi makikita ng mga tagasunod, ngunit at Ang buntot na gawa sa limpak-limpak na salapi ay kikinang at makikita ang pagkabahag nito. Narito ang tanso ng traydor, ang ginto ng ganid. Lahat ay Gawa mula sa paghihinagpis at pagmamakaawa ng kanyang lipon. Kung ito ay susukatin ng mga paa, hindi sasapat ang libong pulo ng bayan; Ang kaliwa ay nakaturo