February 2012
3 posts
5 tags
Stolen Breaths
4 tags
I Refuse to Listen to Sad Songs
I refuse for sadness to have a long chat with me I refuse for it to sit beside me by the sea I refuse for it to seep into my ears I refuse for them to induce my fears I refuse to turn my smiles into tears I refuse for it to devour my years I refuse to listen to beautiful melodies telling me a thousand little tragedies I refuse to acquaint myself with your broken hearts I refuse to know what goes...
2 tags
“I thought I understood it, that I could grasp it. But I didn’t, not...”
– Anna, Like Crazy
January 2012
9 posts
2 tags
“Who is more to be pitied, a writer bound and gagged by policemen or one living...”
– Kurt Vonnegut
2 tags
Reserved Space
I was sitting on the seat where you last settled, and had myself a cup of your favourite hot latte. Everyone else in the room seemed engrossed in their own little worlds. Everyone in there seemed to be engaged. Conversations were kept at a decent volume, and there was the occasional hum when new patrons entered and left the room. I sat with the constant effort to portray, ironically, an effortless...
4 tags
“Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep...”
– Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment
2 tags
“There is something at the bottom of every new human thought, every thought of...”
– Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Idiot
4 tags
Reading novel after novel, sipping tea, scribbling away thoughts, listening to good music, ensconced in my sun kissed room alone, is my idea of bliss. Right here is where I journeyed through adventures and lived several different lives and felt more alive in just a month than I ever did during the previous four months of slogging away for exams which saw me in a sad vegetative state… I’m so...
2 tags
“I write, of terrible things, of beautiful things, I write so unimpressively, I...”
4 tags
2 tags
Perfectly Aligned
I was walking down the streets last night when I looked up to the silent velvet skies and saw a scatter of stars swirling around and flickering in palpable delight. Three in particular caught my eyes. They are perfectly aligned, forming a small constellation in the center of it all. I stood in awe of the unusual sight and wished there was a way I could fold the black cloth of shiny sequins and...
3 tags
Aftermath
Last year taught me aplenty, but not without a fight. It was a boxing ring I got unexpectedly pushed into. My competitor was condescending, familiar, and unsympathetic. He knocked me off-guard, threatened my disposition, completely disarmed my inner stability, pinned me to the ground, crushed, for a good few minutes till I felt blood trickling down my forehead, but after which he struck a chord...
December 2011
6 posts
2 tags
“I made no resolutions for the New Year. The habit of making plans, of...”
– Anaïs Nin
4 tags
Counting Down
If I were to tell you that we are not living, that we are merely counting, would you believe me? Happiness continue to elude us as we continue to count. In the pursuit of betterment, in constant chronology, in hidden consciousness
Counting down to the end of work Counting down to the weekends Counting down to the start of school Counting down to next month Counting down to your final exams ...
2 tags
“No matter how yawnful a book is, I still feel compelled to complete it. If I...”
4 tags
Date A Girl Who Doesn't Listen to Good Music
Date a girl who doesn’t listen to good music because the girl who listens to good music knows the importance of careful arrangement of melody and lyrics. She can remember by heart the eloquent words accompanying the sincere strum of the acoustic and the gentle weeping of an electric. She is aware of the depth of meaning weaved through the soulful rhythm and beat. She is meticulously...
2 tags
Straight Lines
structures. parallels. angles.
boxes. squares. containers.
rules. perimeters. rigidity.
standards. conformity. laws.
regulations. similitude. congruity.
a stray curve.
2 tags
It's Tough Being The Most Hated Day of The Week
Whenever I make an appearance, I hear a concerted sigh. Everyone will give me dirty looks and I begin to wonder why
They groan and they moan and they speak in that menacing tone, “oh why’d you have to come again, won’t you please leave us alone?”
Postmen, policemen, nurses and doctors, teachers, bankers, soldiers and lawyers, All dreaded my existence, all wished I...
November 2011
6 posts
4 tags
“How come no one told me
All throughout history
The loneliest people
Were the...”
– Misread, Kings of Convenience
3 tags
Is he out there?
Let me be frank and explicitly state The qualities of a man I’d love to date: He who writes and appreciates the art He who’s loving and has a big heart One I could engage with in interesting conversations, about life and death with no reservations He who reads and reads and reads He who truly knows how to take the lead His music taste syncs well with mine His dressing sense is dapper...
4 tags
“We all question our place in the future. The artist’s job is not to succumb to...”
– Gertrude Stein (Midnight in Paris)
7 tags
You Should Date An Illiterate Girl
Date a girl who doesn’t read. Find her in the weary squalor of a Midwestern bar. Find her in the smoke, drunken sweat, and varicolored light of an upscale nightclub. Wherever you find her, find her smiling. Make sure that it lingers when the people that are talking to her look away. Engage her with unsentimental trivialities. Use pick-up lines and laugh inwardly. Take her outside when the night...
2 tags
“A writer is someone who spends years patiently trying to discover the second...”
– Orhan Pamuk
6 tags
5:08 am
The low rumbling of a car engine and shifting shadows cast by the vehicle’s headlights clearly reflected on the ivory colored ceiling of my room, was the only indication of time moving past me. My eyes chased the faint squares till they disappeared from sight. The itch on my neck grew increasingly unbearable. My hair was drenched with sweat and each stubborn strand looked like spindly legs...
September 2011
2 posts
2 tags
“A person is a fool to become a writer. His only compensation is absolute...”
– Roald Dahl
2 tags
“Beauty plus pity-that is the closest we can get to a definition of art. Where...”
– Vladimir Nabokov
August 2011
5 posts
2 tags
“In theory there is a possibility of perfect happiness: To believe in the...”
– Franz Kafka
2 tags
“I want to stay as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge...”
– Kurt Vonnegut
3 tags
A Skeptic's View of Love
It is not entirely a rare sight to be surrounded by couples frolicking in their own world while I chew on my bagel, smiling to myself and thinking how happy they must be. It is not entirely a rare feeling to be left figuring out what is it exactly that defines love as such a wondrous feeling that so many yearn to feel. A friend once said to me, “You won’t feel it, unless you’ve...
2 tags
To You
You are very, for the lack of a better word, fidgety. And so uncertain. Dubious about everything. Stubbornly unwilling to peel away from your comfortable spot. Why are you so off kilter tonight? Do you know how terribly exhausted I am, having to tirelessly convince you while dodging those endless worries that kept ricocheting in your mind? Yes, you made the right choice. Yes, there’s nothing...
3 tags
Locked
That’s where I went wrong. Sometimes people appear in our lives only just; temporary, fleeting, distant. Never to be permanent, never to be felt, never to be explored. These circumstances negated my emotions. My guards since then have been hoisted sky high. I don’t want to know what it feels like to love. I have conveniently disengaged all faculties of feeling. I feel safer now. I have them...
July 2011
13 posts
2 tags
“If suddenly you do not exist,
If suddenly you are not living,
I shall go on...”
– Pablo Neruda
4 tags
Islands
We are but islands Some clumped Some distant Some so far they never collide But we are all surrounded by the common oceans vast, blue and crystal clear
We are similar, in time, in place But we are different, in so many ways Perhaps that is the reason why I would prefer to be deserted, to be my own island, far south where I can bask in the sun with my thoughts as my lungs pull in the steady breeze...
3 tags
On Why I Think Social Networking Sites Do Not...
How many times have you gone online, log into Facebook, scroll down the News Feed, and sigh (or snigger.. depending on the situation) to yourself as you witness strings of updates by your friends scrawling out their life stories about how miserable or how awesome their life is currently on status updates?
I have. All the time, in fact. I don’t particularly find that wrong, but it is a tad sad,...
3 tags
Stolen
What was once freedom and space Now stacked and storeyed in concrete embrace What was once fine terra firma Now tarmac and gravel What was once a gift of nature Now stolen by man
4 tags
Stupidity Street
I saw with open eyes Singing birds sweet Sold in the shops For the people to eat, Sold in the shops of Stupidity Street. I saw in vision The worm in the wheat, And in the shops nothing For people to eat; Nothing for sale in Stupidity Street.
2 tags
Keeping Things Whole by Mark Strand
In a field I am the absence of field. This is always the case. Wherever I am I am what is missing.
When I walk I part the air and always the air moves in to fill the spaces where my body’s been.
We all have reasons for moving. I move to keep things whole.
4 tags
“How I long to live inside a window, by the sighing motorway, feel the city...”
– Reflections after Jane, The Clientele
5 tags
“The capacity to be alone is the capacity to love. It may look paradoxical to...”
– Osho
2 tags
“Being able to write becomes a kind of shield, a way of hiding, a way of too...”
– John Updike
6 tags
5 Cs
You know what would complete me? Certainty of the future I endeavor myself to live and comfort in its entirety. The materialistic monster that dwells within strangely desires not of cars or condominiums. Instead,
cats, children, croissants, coffee, classics,
should very much keep me more than pleased.
2 tags
“So therefore I dedicate myself to myself, to my art, my sleep, my dreams, my...”
– Jack Kerouac
6 tags
Finite
I feel disgustingly small and passive and irrelevant as dust. I know of only a single cure to this. I need to see the world.
I yearn to touch the bricks and walls and marvel at the architecture in Rome. I yearn to smell the sweet scent of tulips in Holland. I yearn to drink in with greed the breathtaking mountainous backdrop of the Karakoram Range. I yearn to feel the wind in my hair as I am...
June 2011
3 posts
2 tags
“You live like this, sheltered, in a delicate world, and you believe you are...”
– Anaïs Nin (The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol. 1)
2 tags
A birthday is a birthday is a birthday
So.. the last time I had a 2 in my age it was some good 8 years ago. Tut. Anyway, 20 is good. I think. They always say age doesn’t matter.. unless you’re cheese.
But age does matter. To me at least. Age equals Time. Time lost equals Age gained. Time not utilized fully equals Ageing miserably with eternal regret. So for the past 20 years are there any remarkable achievements gained? None that I...
3 tags
Dreaming of Paris
Take me to London, Fly me to Venice,
But in my dreams I’m in Paris
Hop on the next flight with me to Peru, Or we can scale the mountains of Kathmandu,
But in my dreams I’m in Paris
Let’s frolic and savor the art in Milan, or Two tickets to Spain sounds like fun,
But in my dreams I’m in Paris
I see Paris when I close my eyes I hear Paris as my heart sputters sighs I’m learning...
May 2011
7 posts
5 tags
My Three Years in One Extremely Long Post (and a...
3 years ago, I paced the long sheltered walkway to Nanyang Polytechnic for the first time with a great deal of uncertainty, a package of non-existent enthusiasm and (I must confess), a terrible fashion sense.
I remembered the first day of orientation being a huge ball of suck and would you like to make a guess why?
(a) It was on my birthday. (b) It was from bloody 9 to 5. (c) It was barely...
3 tags
In Paris With You
Don’t talk to me of love. I’ve had an earful And I get tearful when I’ve downed a drink or two. I’m one of your talking wounded. I’m a hostage. I’m maroonded. But I’m in Paris with you. Yes I’m angry at the way I’ve been bamboozled And resentful at the mess I’ve been through. I admit I’m on the rebound And I don’t care where are we bound. I’m in Paris with you. Do you mind if we do not go to the...
