slightly bored, mostly afraid

A Short Shonagon

I want to have a pond where

it would be wonderful to swim

or at least dump giant boulders in.

I want to have a house that doesn’t have walls

everything would be windows.

and the breeze and the sun would say wake up it’s morning

and the chill and the moon would say it’s time to lie down and sleep.

then i would fold away the roof

and since this house is in the province

the stars would all be present and
in their proper places and

the rest of the sky would be really black

but here the stars have meaning and you 
would want their ancient lights.

and also since it has forty four floors 
i’d be so high up i can see the sky curve down

in all directions and i would be reassured that

the world is round and i could reach

you if i travelled or you’d eventually come

if i waited long enough.

Pp

Photograph (\ˈfō-tə-ˌgraf\) – noun, formal: A picture or likeness obtained by photography, photography being man’s attempt to defy the dimensions of Time and Space, freezing what is still warm, bestowing immortality to – it is never a person that is preserved, what is captured is a dent in Time and Space – what should only have existed once, the once being an amount immediately next to nothing, the barely nonzero, as when Pablo got shot in the head after you got off the trucks in San Fernando, marching in boots too wet and tight, your smell anything but clean, anything but certainty and courage, anything but surrender to the goddamned Japs, even though you were already captives, and as Pablo was fighting back tears, he reached for the mucus on his left nostril – that being one moment – and then he was on the ground, a bloody face where a young man’s fear used to be – this being another moment.

The once is what is between them, it’s there, it had to be there, because even a bullet travels through Time and Space, but what do a man’s reflexes and sentiments mean to a bullet going at 3 digit velocities. That is a photograph’s gravity, it is a validation of a once that we were barely aware of, and that is a photograph’s fallacy, because before it is taken the once has yet to arrive, and right after the eye blinks, right after the shutter blinks the once is halfway around the universe, the once is a bridge, a separator, a /: there’s Pablo/’s bloody skull.

The once is verbalized as “Because he was crying,” the once is expressed as “he was shot”, because both phrases take infinitely longer to say compared to the duration of the once, and so the phrases match our reflexes, our comprehension, our sense of irony and wit and drama.

And when you make it out, when you “survive”, the once is supposed to fade, packed in a gilded box and adorned with dust and cobwebs, to be taken out, at first, only in nightmares, then at nights in a hospital bed, then at funerals, then sometimes when a gunshot is heard, then over cigarettes and alcohol, then when by some masochistic impulse you decide to attend a “Reunion”, Christ, whatever is there to prove, that we made it to the future, only to see our bodies finally catch up to what our souls had long been , to recall “Moments”, but in reality, the gathering is an opportunity for the once to be individually relived, that once, this once, There’s Pablo/’s bloody skull, then when your apo asks you “Lolo Tell Us About That Time When”, then when your apo no longer asks you anything but to open the door or to sit down and eat, never if there’s something wrong, because they assume that everything’s gone wrong by this point and that all you have is the past, because they see how you look at the TV and quickly lose interest, and they think it’s because there’s no more room in your mind for the present and the future, “his mind is stuck,” and so your existence is deemed stuck as well, you are ignored in the present and left out of future plans, so that when you finish the Sunday crossword people are amazed, so that when you burp or fart loudly people laugh extra, as if a phantom finished the puzzle, as if a phantom farted, and when it’s your birthday you are given a tiny cake with too many candles, everyone attends, most out of duty, some out of hunger, and when it’s time for you to blow the candles and make a wish they expect comedy, or silence, or tears to condense out of nowhere, or a smile accompanied by hazy eyes, they expect to be ashamed, they expect you to shame yourself, they expect a madman, as if that is what age bestows: insanity. And when, with senses failing, you remember a random grandson’s friend’s name, it is an achievement, so they take a picture of you and the clueless boy, because it is a moment, it is a story, this is life, ha ha, and after the shutter clicks he will henceforth be known as Lolo’s Favorite, and before the shutter clicks you’re already halfway around the universe, where & when today’s history is simply today, where & when you first forgot the wheres & whens, where & when the third generation came, and you officially became ancient, where & when the first day of Junior’s Grade 6 had come and you had given everything to his school and so you had nothing to give to him, where & when you first danced as husband to your wife, your bellies not yet in the way of your hearts, where & when, where & when someone is being raped in plain sight, and 12 hours later the sun rises and it is beautiful, except that 12 hours ago someone was being raped in plain sight, where & when you were not supposed to be afraid of Death but Death gave you the finger and displayed his ass and his grasp in your face, when & where There’s Pablo/’s bloody skull. Where & when your son shakes his head when he looks at you and thinks of things like “Gone”, “he’s had a good life”, “senile”. You on the other hand are cursing the mind because it’s so sharp, it’s so sharp. You’re still here; you’re still there.

Ex. That’s Lolo, right there, he looked really good in his uniform, I think this was taken at the Base, where was it exactly… ask him see if he remembers how old he was here isn’t he handsome?

do villains fall in love

and do they remain as they are

happy, loved, but evil still

do their spouses wait at their doorstep, hoping that they don’t come home

smelling of someone else’s blood

do their spouses feel guilty, that they make whole someone who shatters lives

caressing wounds acquired while committing crimes

kissing lips that chant demonic mantras,

that utter commands like conquer, attack, destroy, kill

that smile while delivering well-practiced tricks and lies

do their spouses feel bitter, because they know that the heart can choose

the wrong person and stubbornly stick to its decision

do their spouses miss being able to go out without being judged

pitied

do their spouses feel loved

do they quote love songs as well,

“For all your lies, you’re still lovable”

do their spouses give and receive flowers

do their spouses fear arguments

do their spouses expect to be treated differently

do their spouses want to have their children

yes, yes, yes to all

we seek the comfort of the cold shadows, away from the burning, cancerous light

we all die, we all fight, we all love

until a monopoly of hearts is somehow enforced

know that this is how some of us live