Library Labyrinth [a poem]

(Note: This was crammed one early morning, a teacher asked me to contribute something to the scrapbook for another teacher's birthday. She forgot about it, I forgot about it, so it wasn't included in anything.)

I cannot recall when I was born
But I have been wandering in this labyrinth
For as long as I could remember.
I know of no other world other than this maze,
Where infinite books line eternal shelves –
And I am in a journey where I don’t know where to go
One of the books tell of a story:
That there is another open world outside, unlike this place.
Maybe I am walking to find a way out.
I have met the blind Librarian once,
A crazed man believing himself a prophet
Mulling over tomes of braille and false Bibles,
Books all older than me by centuries.
He said that the labyrinth was a universe expanding,
And he fed me a book, and in hunger I could not refuse,
and told me I am now the book,
My skin suddenly showing tattooed typography
of a language I cannot understand,
text so dense I cannot see my skin anymore.
I did not see him again, and I hide myself in thick robes.
The other seekers of this labyrinth,
Chase after me with swords and knives,
thinking that I am what they are looking for.
They will skin me open, they believe, that I am the Book of Answers,
that I am a Door to the End of this World,
the death of this eternal labyrinth.

Sanity

I think of my sanity as a fragile aluminum cover over a turmoil of boiling, foaming water in a pot. I can’t keep it down. Its a makeshift sanity, but I don’t have anything other than it. The skin of my hands is scalding off, and foil can only hold so much. The rules are: the fire will not stop and  you can’t take the pot. Its not that easy. They are in an inseparable symbiosis. The foam will soon change back into me. I left my old skin inside for a fake one (that looks more fashionable and normal), and I already knew it would never work. Yet I still hope it won’t spill over. If it gets out of the pot, this body will be re-absorbed into it. I will forget reason. I don’t want to forget what I am until now. I kind of like what I am until now. The thing inside is hideous.

Thinner than thou, or ‘Fat Blues’ [a poem]

What, you’re eating regular meals and then cereal? My smartass sister remarks.
She thinks she’s better than me because she’s thinner than me
Her meals are evenly measured in perfect two tablespoons of cooked rice
I cannot live that way, I gorge myself until I am full, I eat until I’m sick

I imagine what it is like if I was waif-like, having a slender body
Hearing people’s compliments of how thin I am
But in reality my chin sags, my thighs constrict my pants, if my upper arms were sliced I have a bagful of fat
My sister is 14 and I’m afraid she has a kind of anorexia her circumference is smaller than mine

But in reality I am jealous. She’s better than me because she’s thinner than me.
I imagine weight loss, I imagine how its like to have a tight stomach
Then I beat myself over for not moving more, for eating too much
Then I pass by someone whose first remark is how large I’ve become...

I like writing, I disappear, if my thoughts are on screen or on paper you can’t see how fat I am
I blame society, I blame the concept of beauty, I blame myself for being ugly
Even if how much I convince myself to accept myself and how much I read about self-acceptance
I MOTHERFUCKING CAN’T.

Each mealtime I think of avoiding her, and I feel like she’s sneering if I eat less
Even if you try to starve yourself you’ll never be as self-disciplined as I am! Hah, what you get for calling me fat before when you were smaller than me but look at us now
I know there is something wrong.
I am thinner than thou, thus better than thou

I want to disappear so no one will see I’m fat, so I won’t have to see my sister’s self-importance and competition
I want to take a knife and be on a mission, I’d cut everyone’s eyes out
So no one will judge by the cover, so I won’t have to feel like I have to (literally) diminish myself to win BEAUTY.


I want to devour I want to eat all I can eat even your flesh I want to eat the world I wish I were a dragon swallowing fire and dust and planets and I will encompass space I keep on imagining dragging myself away I want to lie and lie and sleep and not have anything else to do with the world I want to stop thinking of myself I wish

Ode to Electricity [a poem]

(Note: I don't usually write poems, I just want a good electric supply and a future with no blackouts.)

You left again with no warning, leaving me in darkness.
The streets submerged in quiet, the collective hum of TVs, computers, electric fans and radios silenced
I salvage for artificial light: high-voltage lamps and candle-stumps
I wait, and wait, in the false hope that you would go back.

You'll always go back.

Hours pass. I perspire in bed, unable to sleep, I only dream of your return.
A candle flickers in front of the mirror, shadows dancing on my floor in orange and black
I seethe, almost froth in the mouth like a rabid woman, now desperate
Now angry, that they would take you away, but I trust it,

You'll always go back.

Without you, I am unable to do a thing, the night invites demons again.
The wind blows and extinguishes the wisp of fire on wax
The weak white flare on my flashlight stutters and turns off
I bite my sheets, I taste my sweat, in this damp dark I cannot rest.

And I doubt it now,
Will you ever go back?

[P.S. Someone shouts, "Yes, nag-siga na suga!" *Hay salamat pwede na ko ka Facebook!*]