"Because we don't know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well, yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number, really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that's so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four or five times more, perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless."

--The Sheltering Sky

a wall graffiti

I wish I was born naked
Without a face,
Without gender,
Without race.

I wish I wasn’t born in society.

the dying farm*

Once again the day ended without a dark cloud signaling the end of drought. Dusk drenched the sky with blood without the promise of famine's end. In the countryside, the days were unbearably long but the passage of time was not measured by the predictability of hours and months but by the inconsistent season.

“This drought is terrible. It has scorched our rice from its stalks down to its roots. We won’t have any harvest again”

Father’s tone was desperate after seeing the condition of the farm damaged by the El Nino. Tired and hopeless, he removed his hat, dropped himself onto the bamboo sofa, leaned and he pensively looked at mother waiting for a reply.

There was no reply. Mother continued to paddle her sewing machine.

“Last year, we barely had enough. It all went to our debts.” He continued.

Still, there was no reply. Mother kept herself busy with the cloth she was sewing. She measured the cloth, marked it and then she cut it almost mechanically. She ran the machine again. She didn’t say a thing. She knew what father would say next.

“If only you did allow me to sell the land, I would be working in Saudi by now. We would not have gone through this again.”

“Ramon, there you go again…”

“For as long as the time to plant and the time to harvest are dictated by the rain, there can never be security for us. We will all die with our eyes open.”

Mother stopped the paddling the machine. She folded the cloth, fixed the scissors and the marker.

“Where are the boys?” she tried to shift the conversation.

“Tell them to bring firewood in the kitchen. I’ll be cooking dinner after I am done with this. “

“Look Esperanza, the farm is slowly deteriorating, if we sell the land, it can pay more than half of my placement fee and the rest will be for salary deduction. “

“Are we going to argue about this again? You can’t sell that piece of land. You know how much I wanted to keep that.”

“Be reasonable, the farm can not support our needs anymore. I promised Tony to enroll next semester. Our son has been complaining; it’s been two years now since he graduated from high school.”

“Patience, Ramon. You see I am working like a carabao too to help you. Who knows, next year might be a good one. As for Tony, he can wait until our pig gives birth next year. Have some more faith. We survived the past.”

Father let a deep sigh, shook his head, went outside and lighted his cigarette.

Mother is extremely religious in a traditional sense. She is fatalistic and he attributes the suffering as ablution by god. She has an odd way of venerating her great forefathers and things handed to her. The piece of land was the only property handed to her. It would be sacrilegious and profane to sell the land: in its soil lies the sweat and blood of her forefathers.

During hard times, mother would just pray harder. She would bring us to the chapel every Sunday and we rub our hands at the image of ST. Joaquin, and St. Isidro Labrador, our patron saints. In the evening she would pray the rosary with us. Her faith kept her hopes alive.

My father on the other was never religious. He never joined us in our prayers. In times of trouble, his constant companion were his cigarettes. He puffs his troubles away. If the smoke failed him, he would swill his gin and sleep. Both the smoke and the wine had calming effect on him.

I thought my parents have two different religions because both have the same effect on them. It keeps them going despite suffering sand misery.

My father works over time to support the farm. My mother works overtime to support us.


________
* I wrote this in my Comm Arts class long time ago.

waiting for the train

CARRIEDO STATION, AUGUST 2002 - The wind came foreboding, like suppressed whimper of a suicidal child. The cold dusk seeps through my spine. The sky is overcast. Neon lights barely perceptible in a night shrouded with a dark mantle. From my view, I could see the outline of the building like a giant monolith, doleful in the gloomy sky.

Lightning crashes.

I see shadows darting across the opaque and rickety metals and walls darkened by soot and dirt. Yonder, I see the spires of the San Sebastian church, the cross of the Quiapo church stab the sky. The protruding iron bars of under constructed flyover, and the dangling shards and barbed wire of dilapidated buildings violently slash the rotten street.

The street bleeds drowning the streets. Clogged canals cough and spurt gore. I smell the stench of moist decaying flesh. Human cannibals lustily came. Manholes sputter swarms of roaches and rodents hunting for the cadaver.

The earth shakes as thunder roars like furious beast.

Silence.

I hear the beggar serenades in a song, whimpering in hunger. I drop a coin. The clang reverberates in his empty McDonald’s cup, haunting like vesper bells.

The train comes and like a giant hungry maggot consumes the rotten Avenida.

I am mine*

yesterday i was born.
tomorrow, i will die.
but the in between is mine.
i only own my mind.
i am mine

the east is for the south
the west to the north
the clock tells the time.

the ocean is full
for everyone is crying.
the sorrow gets bigger
and the sorrow is denied.
the full moon is looking
for a friend in high tide.

the feeling, we cant left behind
the meaning we cant left behind.
our innocence lost in one time.
we are different behind the eyes
theres no need to hide.

i only own my mind
i am mine.


*Pearl Jam