in body and in soul
tomorrow, a leader,
and a lamp, the speaker
and the unheard

the rough paper project

nice and raww.

for me, to touch is to distance
to create space, to freeze
it, wrap it in the cold of longing,
to watch as the ice grows
between you and I, to
plunge slowly, deeply
to the bottom of the condominium
pool, to suffocate with desire,
and then to leap, both hands
outstretched, out of the water
______________to clutch air.


psst. post number 50 !:)

beware the boogey man

have
-----you
--------heard
--------------of
the boogey man?

he
---comes
---------creeping
-------------------up
------------------ -at night
---------------to steal
your dreams

and --------happiness
---and ---------- childish

glee

hibernate

waiting for the night to creep
in on weary dream and tired
chatter swimming through mindless
banter between moon and sky
and stars peek out from the curtain
of the night, smiling their sad smile
coaxing me, teasing me
dragging me off course
over the river where Charon sails
his magic medicine where sleep
overtakes.

Epilogue

I cannot remember what flooded today
and what drowned in it. The bell at 7:20
must have been the last, and everything
after that a mere epilogue;

the beginning has another name: the end
there is nothing in between, only the periphery,
but that too is easily forgotten, like the
aftertaste of coffee licking my tongue,

but loss is not the knife-flash of the camera
not something we only see but never remember.
it slips away secretly while I cling to it
for comfort, fully aware of its poison

I am the snake charmer now. I press the silvery casing
of my life tightly to my skin, and it slithers
round my neck, flexible as a curve, all this while
its venom waiting in the bite

that will be more than enough to
burn me up like the ant on which I’ve just spilled
my coffee.. That must truly be the aftertaste.
The submersion; the warm ache of a bath

I stare at the flame for so long
until my eyes feel like they’re burning. Warmth
takes the sweat-drenched shirt, it soon dries,
ready to be worn again. Ready for the next flood.

Flying

i believe i can fly
i believe i can touch the sky

i know what goes up must come down
i know i will plummet and hit the ground
i know i will accused of the illegal suicide
i know i will never get to say goodbyes
i know i will not be understood
i know that death is no interlude

it is permanent
it is a forever sleep
it has no waking

just retreat
just rest

yes, rest
rest in pieces

Some present thoughts:
"Arhhh Motherland! All hail! Let it hail!"
''Happilife Insurance: Live your life flippantly and happily. You'll die anyway. You won't get anything out of it so wadeva"
"Am I on belay? No, but climb on anyway. You'll die sooner or later"
"I think I should do my vork"
"Yeah... maybe"

one month

already.
and i think itll get better.
no matter how butter
we getter the merrier.

pos3rpoets!

it's been one month, but we're hardly there.

cheers anyway!

3:28

we live in the city- we don't need sleep
we just need less of these clocks to keep
the time on our minds. Nescafe 3-in-1
is the latest addition to my daily rituals

I know that something is coming soon.
Sleep.

3.20am

shhh.

orange consultants

biscuit factory -
break away,
be unique.
enterprising creativity
individual talent
pursue personal goals
don't be a biscuit.

spoon feeding
social studies
slide by slide
for the good of your pocket
for the good of your family
for the good of the nation
not mine. the nation.

processed and packaged,
we're all still biscuits in
the end moving down the same
conveyor belt.
it's called value-adding.
the machinery moves on
pushing and not
stopping.

who gets to eat biscuits
if you want to be a biscuit
thats your choice

now where is that
switch.

a taxi man's frightening stand

i'm very sorry sir,
there's just too many people in here
but no worries, you'll still get a ride,
though there is no space inside
you see, you can take the trip in the boot
BUT if you complain, i can make life very hard for you!

wait sir wait, you think you're so cool?
you know what i think, i think you're a fool!
oh? threaten me with a knife will you?
i can take you to court and i will sue!
And what?? give you my money or my life?
look sir, which one? can you please decide?

yes yes, i'm very sorry sir - if you had wanted to get off
you could have told me, don't just cough!
ah ok ok, this must be the place you stay?
now can you please take your knife away?

...

sigh, these people are just so funny
Why don't they just tell me they don't have no money?
i would give them some, but only if they ask nicely!

--------------------------------------------------------------------

think reggae. yeah think after listening to sean paul (not sean ong whose name is pronounced see-an-ong) and you can'tt think much else. yeah. zzz. oops... i continue my daily habit of screwing things up for myself. and the stupid dishonoured guard of honour todae... embarrassing and tiring. now still have 3.5 pices of reading portfolio to do. and lotsa other eng hw tt will destroy me lest i flee from this evil.

i thus plant my victorious flag! and claim nothing for myself! for nothing is nothing. and everything will be nothing after something will end in nothing. but at the end of it all you still have a ting. not no-ting but one-ting. yeah. "shake that ting, yo sethusmasses. "

okae... i think i betta sleep. this work comes creeping up to steal my brain. and sanity.

Skoo

Which school do u go to?
I go to Khong Guan Sec. School/ Institution.
What do they teach you?
How to be great biscuits.

Anyway, a prelude to Luae's Lame Corny corner.
Bing Wen, applause please.

School, well, does indeed hold a predominant place in our lives, in fact for many, it occupies theparamount position. But, as with this grp of poser poets, we often find school flooding us with work, that can be enjoyable for some.
Let's see what they have to say:
Tim Chow: OWL (ahref: http://vanquishshadow.tk) {Lest I be accused of copyright infringement yet again=)}
HL: No Life. (ahref: http://mysecretgardenoffalls.blogspot.com)

Read.

orange consultants

A paper aeroplane can only fly as far as your hand can throw
you are not a biscuit and your school is not a biscuit factory
Luae: I like Khong Guan biscuits
There is no ten-year series for creativity.
So take back your crayons, don't be a biscuit,
keep on looking for all the needles
Royce: I didn't learn anything from this.
but SIX and IX6 haha and if P.E=mgh
6X6 is 36 that is what I call magic. I sleep at 3 but I don't live there.
motivational speakers go to places uninvited paid to answer questions you never asked
tell you things you already know


..

sorry, i'm experimenting.

out at sea

the lingering scent of sea air
tousling your hair,
teasing the slight waves
tickling the hull.

rock and row as the wind
whistles a sparkling tune
shining like myriads of jewels
under the sun.

tanjong rhu up ahead
jetty breakwater just behind
but a sweepstroke around me
leaves nothing but a sketch
in the water fading

with the tide coming in.

nightly murder

i hear the bells begin to chime
for midnight or noontime
but tarry a while, dear former
i shall need thy oil to fuel me longer

but far too soon a new day begins
not one morsel of sleep, i thus wear thin
battle-weary, squint-eyed, work-undone
be there impending victory? i sense none

what is it that i can see?
what do i see laid out for me?

it is but a long, depressing road
and i shoulder a heavy, killing load
watch my life slowly ebb away
drop by drop and day by day


i continue my valiant fight to save this poemsite from degeneration into an angsty, cryptically saddening hard-to-read blog thing. Herm. Well yeah with bing and royCE, nothing can stray far from a lack of humour and rhyme (or is it ryhme. eek.) As for the LOO, well it's a different case altogether... It harbours unreadable, strange tendancies that range from intelligent to abuse of copyright. No la. Not being so evil. But yeah its just different style of writing. The former two are just more how wud u put it... musive? contemplatively cryptic? jaja someting liddat hee hee. I just like being a little more rhyming-like and stuff and lighter? I dunno...

anyway i came up with a few poems this morning. 1am and just now... put them up later maybe....

yawn

the sweet strains of sleep
wringing itself in the coriander
where untold caricatures of tap
water and drunken folly frolick.

wandering through pipe dream
pint after pint of drowzy drifting
piquant moments drowned under
bland direction and sullen sulk

of brown rust and tired brass
at the crossroads where echoes sleep
and the tap at the end pulls us
ashore

confirmation

on the other hand
is a whole new thing
altogether.

remember that time when you
said that affirmation would no
longer be enough

singing the sing crap rap

Can you sing the Singapore Sing'?
Had a taste of the Singapore Sling?
Y'know we don't have bells going ding ding
Most people don't flash their bling bling
So few jackpot machines that go bing bing
Though there's 4D Toto that's never win win

Can you Sing-a-pore?
Can you Sing-a-porean?
Sadly, we've lost most o' da folk lore
Gladly, we will migrate and go a-ski-in'

We 'ave Singtel, Singpost n' Singnet
Can you sing dat?
Can you sing dat?
Can you sing dat?
Dat's why we 'ave Singnet.
It's always da gahmen that takes de step
But so many are still in their debt
And we are still singing dat
Like da fat cat dat sat on 'is mat

Sorta like a rap i thought up. Wasting my time is vry fun but deadly. Anyway I probably forgot the tune. Aw. But I like the "Can you sing that...Singnet" part la... the rest a bit funny, weird funny. Twist your tongue by saying everything real fast.

sometimes

it's me who wants to shrivel up
to curl up and crawl into the
corner of the room
i'll huddle up
against the cold
in tropical singapore

im just waiting for someone
anyone
to touch me, hold me, tell me
that everything is fine
that everything will be fine



ok crap poem. haha.

destinations

at that particular moment
you realize that every path
every journey, must lead somewhere
every sail points in some direction,

and I find myself often trying
to locate that uncovered thread
that cuts into that fastens things
the same way it burrows into words
and emerges at the end of the book

having completed its narrative, and
finding that destinations become journeys
once more,

like that of counting the total number
of squares in a grid,
similarity breeds distinction

and it amzes me to think how one
can travel both across and into the sky
like the smoothened clouds
or the airplanes, you might say

but alas, airplanes, too, are always
in constant transit: their landing
allows them to depart once more

for some location so familiar but
never and closer. instead,
the moment before the touch
is still the longest

that's where the fade comes in.
the sun and moon never meet
therefore, the asymptotic fate,

the missing intersection,
the words,
almost spoken, almost heard
the love,
almost lost, almost rekindled,
the destination,
almost there, almost
nowhere

la vallee des cloches - ravel

tinkling rustle of the trees
swaying in the gentle breeze
pealing in whispers
sighing of songs
sang once upon a time

by the aged silhouette of
birds dreaming
grass grazing

by the soft chiming of
ferns chanting
flowers dancing

by the sky when she
kisses lightly the valley,
painting a canvas of colour
misted up with dew
tainted with smiles laughter
tears and fears

the artist's brush
tied to a bell

song

as promised, heres a tribute to our mysterious newcomer *er-hm*, the ever-mystical, elusive being of the luae. [note: post contains offensive language]

i am lu
i make poo
it weighs twice as much as you
and i look good sitting on the loo
if you have some toilet paper
you can pass it to me later
i am lu, i am lu,
hear me poo.

hmpf. made this up when me and bing came across some cows in a field. fake cows. push bing for the second stanza xD.

you see yourself

"The boy sat at the table, pen in hand. The chair was beginning to feel like stone now. He shifted uncomfortably. There was very little on the paper - a few scrawls in English of little maturity. Nothing like Shakespeare or Hemmingway. He supposed anybody could write if they wanted to. There was no talent in him that made him special, or so-" The author paused, facing his tormentor, who gripped the beginning with a discontented growl.

"You call this a story? This is barely an introduction. Your language is forced. There is no life in it. You are not the talented writer you think you are. Just because others say so does not mean anything. There is no talent; there is nothing special, nothing unique!"

The boy looked blankly at the laughing figure. The torn pieces of writing floated to the floor in slow arcs. "Why do you do this to me?" He could feel the heated breath scouring his face.

There was no reply as the other paced the room "Why? Let me ask you a why. Why do you persist in this. You are wasting your time and you know that. And you waste mine. You waste my breath. You waste my warnings. Why do you not do more productive things? You have seen the websites. How many other wanna-be writers are out there? You have not even a slightest hint of a chance!" His fist shook the table. The words were mangled and ground through grit teeth.

Tears were forming. "But I always try my best. I try my best, I really do. As long as I do that it doesn't matter what other people say or think." He tries to wipe the wet paper dry, but the ink only spreads further. "But yet, I know. I do, I really do. Sometimes it's so useless. Whenever I try to write, why do people think I write of myself. I don't want it just to be autobiography. They are ideas, carefully thought of... but yet... i have so little time to write... it's so frustrating"

"Feeling sorry for yourself, as always. Self pity is always so pleasurable. And you do write about yourself. You have no imagination. What happened to all the magical stories you dreamt of? The poems you composed on your journeys? You do yourself no good, for you will never listen to me will you? I might as well be invisible. Advice is before you, but you refuse to eat!" The eyes are angry, he too is hurt. He turns and rids himself of the ignorance.

Then the mother bustles in, arranging the table and picking up the torn words, sighing and chiding. "My dear boy, I've been gone so long inside the kitchen and you haven't done anything... is there anything wrong?... And you must stop wasting your time on this scrawling, it gets you nowhere son... It seems like ever since you came back, all you do is stare at the mirror......"

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

this little blurby story was not meant to be representive of me. it was actually intended to explore dual personality, sorta like scolding yourself and stuff.... but a bit late... must slp for napfa today, so i cannot continue the story to full depth... wad a waste of time....

dissapearing into nothing

8 p.m. and rain starts to
grow on my windows like mould

silently it watches my life
ready to pour like it just did
I watch it too, and realise that
it is inconscpicuous only because
of the equally raw gloom of night

this rain has no scent, no cheerful
fragrance from after a shower
no comfort no restoration
just draws on everything like a pencil

but it waits, motionless - like creatures
frozen in ice, with grim persistence,
before it finally recedes into nothing

so short lived is permanence, so short
it gives longevity to the temporal
as we trace their evolution,
both switch places frequently
as from both sides of a mirror

what we think will stay goes quickly
what we think will go quickly stays
we wish that some things stay and
we wish that some things go
but whether they stay or go we don't know

eventually we approach that point
where nothing goes, or nothing stays.

watching death

The boy sat on the edge, watching - quite calmly in fact. The hundred foot drop did not seem to bother him, gazing between his swinging feet at the tiny rocks below. He was very observant, yet, despite his youth, he had the countenance of one several times his age. It was, perhaps, not in his look (although his innocently drawn face revealed much) but rather he exuded that certain feeling of hunched shoulders and withered soul. Still, he remained in his place, looking on silently. His face contorted itself, whenever it could, into a visage of arrogance; his eyebrows arched in sceptical disbelief and lips curled in cynical smile. He spoke not a word, but he communicated with ease. The violent wind tore past his body, the eyes glancing past the angry grey clouds ripping apart the sky in indifference - a tempest, like all the brews he had seen before. He would be battered and blotched, but it was no matter to him, and neither the fall. Eaten away; breath by breath, he was taken apart. He spoke no words as he watched the destruction. The boy knew.

don't worry

i won't bite.
i won't bark.
i'll not even chew off
that sign telling
trespassers to Keep Away

things aren't what they seem,
not any longer.
i'm being selfish,
if i strike off that sign.
now just leave me alone.

and i hope i'll be fine.

The Mind

with graph paper and a pen i attempted
to produce this mind of mine. it
surrounds us like time, but

we look at everything and only see remains;
only foreign tools, unknown to us and each
other; hinting at a pyramid with no peak.
Even if Imhotep was within he would sigh.

It follows behind like a doppelganger,
a garment not made to be worn. A religion
we cannot disbelieve.

Like water, it washes everything away but itself.
Yet our lamp usually shines on what is lost;
what the mind drowns, we sometimes deign
to drown with it.

thus are we prisoners of loss! But,
consider the phenomenon of busy roads:
cars appear endlessly, then vanish. We
never uncover their destinations. Almost like

sitting in bed and talking to myself, wondering
where words go. They may marry the air and
dissolve like night into the light.

How difficult it is to accept something so
pervasive, and transcendental! It always recalls
the faded photos of my grandfather whom I
wasn't early enough to see.

It makes martyrs of everything, so
we carry each and every newborn, and
love them till they die tomorrow.
it goes on and on and no one really minds.

It's just

so coincidental. wonder if that would ever happen.

i hope not. i sincerely hope not.

You don't understand

But that's good. Good for the both of us.

selfish

u sit there motionless. yet ive used you to tear myself up. the funny thing is - you know nothing about it.

ZzZz

i have four words to say. oh my goodness. ok maybe my math isn't very good... But i've only been away for a few days and suddenly royce has posted like a million times and this mythical toilet named LUae has joined the blog! Dearie me. This blog is becoming elitist already, three other total aces. And the Lu is totaly showing off his intelligence with biology and stuff. Assorted smarties and M&Ms (Mad & Moody).

Wish I could make my blogging nickname bigger now... Oh, it has been confirmed I didn't get into CAP. Oh well. No cap for me. I have reebok cap, but no camp CAP. Aw. Just not cut out for it.... yet. Maybe I might try with Jenner in JC! Yeah!

Anyway, as I was blogging, I haven't posted for like a few days and suddenly royce posts like a million times. Then the Lu decides he wants to defy copyright and post somebody else's song just so he can challenge royce's thoughtful and intruiging song. Excuse mr. Lu. Can we please post our own works? Hmpf

"Good Morning". He is at rest; unmoving, silent. Before my hand can reach out to waken, his eyelids flick open. But there is no life in them. They are dull, bearing course straight ahead. There is nothing there, ntohing left to sink. Nothing begets nothing, but darkness' reins.

"Good night then". The eyes hide themselves. There is nothing to see. Nothing, save for the growing tear. "That was alright, was it not?". And so the first day passed.

Sigh, royce was bugging me to post. argh ok... i can't remember any of my inspirations, so this is just a nonsensical prose. It just goes to show what happens if you force yourself to write or poemise. I can't do that... there is no life in that.

zzzzz should be doing mathematics assignment but dunno how.... zzzz...posting can be a waste of time... especially if cannot make it... what do i care what other people think? a personal philosophy from arlene feynman.... and no i am not well read...

Love

The need for it is confusing...
NOT suggesting anything.

Sometimes When We Touch - Dan Hill

You ask me if I love you
And I choke on my reply
I'd rather hurt you honestly
Than mislead you with a lie
And who am I to judge you
On what you say or do?
I'm only just beginning to see the real you

And sometimes when we touch
The honesty's too much
And I have to close my eyes and hide
I wanna hold you til I die
Til we both break down and cry
I wanna hold you till the fear in me subsides

Romance and all its strategy
Leaves me battling with my pride
But through the insecurity
Some tenderness survives
I'm just another writer
Still trapped within my truth
A hesitant prize fighter
Still trapped within my youth

And sometimes when we touch
The honesty's too much
And I have to close my eyes and hide
I wanna hold you til I die
Til we both break down and cry
I wanna hold you till the fear in me subsides

At times I'd like to break you
And drive you to your knees
At times I'd like to break through
And hold you endlessly

At times I understand you
And I know how hard you've tried
I've watched while love commands you
And I've watched love pass you by

At times I think we're drifters
Still searching for a friend
A brother or a sister
But then the passion flares again

And sometimes when we touch
The honesty's too much
And I have to close my eyes and hide
I wanna hold you til I die
Til we both break down and cry
I wanna hold you till the fear in me subsides

living a lie

there are some things i cant tell you
some things i just cant say
im beat up tired
just keeping it in
but a lie i'm living cant stay

i wish i could just shout it all out
and cling to you and cry
no matter what
no matter when
it's a lie i'll live no longer

i don't know how you're gonna see me
i don't know how you're gonna feel
all about words just empty whispers
there's nothing that can ever be the same
when you've lived a lie
nothing will stay the same

if ive torn you im just sorry
that i havent heart
if ive let you down just know
that i don't want to be apart
now that it's out i hope that nothing
nothing will ever change
please forgive me if ive lied to you
cos i didnt want to

[chorus]


whoa. its beautiful. and im proud to say that i wrote that. can almost imagine the music as i read the thing. and i wrote that in 20 mins. i feel so accomplished. haha. im glad i got that off my chest. well. cant wait to turn it into music. maybe during the weekend. =D.

Proteins

The tertiary structure
knitted by faint hydrogen bonds
gives that protein
its shape
its usefulness
its essence.

Our feelings
intertwined and complicated
with primary, secondary, tertiary structures and beyond
weak and susceptible to change
bonds form and reform
making it ever so difficult to predict
its use, its dictation of our response.
But yet
to do away with it
this complexity and order in chaos
would be to destory
perhaps what makes us
us.

the duality
and bipolarity of the situation
a complexity of a complexity
irony in a contradiction

Life?

betrayal -

its just this emptiness, echoing out from the miles of barren caves by the seaside.

prose

hmm. did someone ask for prose the other day? well. i guess the pos3rpoets are not just interested in poetry but abt art in general. but of course poetry is so much more convenient. you can just crap up a poem in like 5, 10 mins, sometimes even less. and its concise and succint - you get alot out in a small way. and then precisely cos theyre succint, they can be interpreted in so many ways. that u get alot of fun trying to decipher them.


the incense hangs in the air, draped over the white-washed walled; along white rows, white columns. a heavy blanket caresses the urns, robbing them of life long gone. a world in glossy ceramic, in peaceful silence. ash-grey memories maybe just one dusty glass panel away, watching, pointing. but slowly fading, softly dying.

there are times

when i just wanna wave and smile
times when i like to watch for a while
days when it just seems that everything sings
for that rowdy laughter
that suppressed chuckle
for bare necessities in miles

bubble

mine just burst.
i've been living in a world
of fantasy and values
ideals and superimposed
justification.

it's just burst.
should have known it long ago
just never occurred to me
how trivial it could be
as mirrors misted up in the dew.