“True company is rare and must be kept raw with drink, distance, a few fangs, and scandals”
-Ricardo de Ungria

Why people call this place “Kittens”
you will never understand, save for nights
the occassional cat drops by for its ration
of strokes &random caresses. Or why

people sometimes call it “Batcave”
when no bat at all hangs upside-down
its topside of peeling paint & rotting wood
to sleep or drop its share of guano.

What you do know is what goes straight
to your heads no longer comes out
alcohol but wisdom, that what passes
thru your veins is not polluted blood

but verses, satanic ones, the type
that finds itself not scrawled on pages
but floating on a puddle of puke
disgorged by a friend who has long

since drifted away. And you
miss him; each bottle you raise each time
is a tribute to him whom you met
at the nearby school a street-cross

away where once in your lives you
called each other brothers, allies
of the pen, this pointless vocation.
Volitionbe your guide, erudition

on craft the raft that sails you thru
stormy seas of imagination, rivulets
of beer, puke, imagery, & metaphor–
pathways that lead to that homeland

you call poem. And this place serves
as port of passage, & life has never
been the same since you got here.
What you aim for’s not for wimps,

a poet wrote, & not for wimps it is.
Imps, maybe; perhaps even enemies–
one of whom you once shared this
table with, chicharong bulaklak,

isaw as convoluted as your friendships,
your lives. And there isn’t any name
for this sort of familiarity, the way no one
has names for things that truly matter,

like this breerhouse, for instance–
for which all you do now is approximate
nomenclatures, as always. Make do
with monikers momentary as memory,

fleeting as a friend’s face, passing
quickly like occassional cats, imaginary
bats, their crap falling at a speed
you wish could also apply to forgetting.

This is not the exact text i would like to see in my epitaph.

Hmm. O well, di ko naman malalaman e. Maybe some stupid person will probably etch it 45 years from now. Anyway, di naman un ang point ng entry nito. I went to Kittens last night and just looked around, catched the feel of the place for the last time. Talked to Manang about the status of the place: kung kelan sila aalis and kung kulan idedemolish ang place. Naghihintay nga daw silang magkakapitbahay ng 100k para sumibat na, pero sabi din nya kahit 30k lang solve na sya. She also asked me kung sino daw iyong girl na kasama ko noong one time kame nag-inuman nila red and ronald and i told her about mics. Hmm. Madamedame din kami napag-usapan ni manang kittens and what’s weird is that for seven years that i’ve been drinking there, hindi pala niya alam ang pangalan ko. And i told him it’s wes. Just plain wes. don’t know kung may last inuman pa sa kittens. Hmm. Any plans Red, Ronald, Gelo, Eric? It will surely be a blast to have one.

and Pardon me. Puteek. This version of Pardon me is really something. Classic Incubus!

One smile, i knew i was lost.

My eve: who keeps me jumping from the tops of buildings for the thrill of the fall.

Cause of deaths: Liver Cirrhosis. Malamang sa Kittens pinaglamayan itong mga mokong na ‘to. Anyway, kudos to the person who made this picture. JL, ikaw ba gumawa nitong pic? Nakita ko kasi ‘tong picture sa friendster page mo e. Kung ikaw nga, Astigas ka!

Is this card worth P 1200 (per Comic Quest price)?

Now have a look at this card,

and remember how it appeared in all editions of Magic: The Gathering. From Alpha to 9th Edition it made collectors, players and smackers very happy.

My verdict: worth every penny.

The North Star or simply North Star, is the brightest star in the constellation Ursa Minor. It is very close to the north celestial pole (42′ away as of 2006), making it the current northern pole star.

A passage from Pnakoptic Manuscripts by H. P. Lovecraft:

Slumber, watcher, till the spheres,
Six and twenty thousand years
Have revolv’d, and I return
To the spot where now I burn.
Other stars anon shall rise
To the axis of the skies;
Stars that soothe and stars that bless
With a sweet forgetfulness:
Only when my round is o’er
Shall the past disturb thy door.”

Polaris by Jimmy Eat World

I’ll say it straight and plain
I know I’ve made mistakes
I’ve always been afraid
I’ve always been afraid

A thousand nights or more
I travel east and north
Please answer the door

Can you tell me
You say that love goes anywhere
In your darkest time, it’s just enough to know it’s there
When you go, I’ll let you be
But you’re killing everything in me

Get down on your knees
Whisper what I need
Something pretty
Something pretty

I feel that when I’m old
I’ll look at you and know
The world was beautiful

Then you tell me…
You say that love goes anywhere
In your darkest time, it’s just enough to know it’s there
When you go, I’ll let you be
But you’re killing everything in me

I’m done, there’s nothing left to show
I try but can’t let it go
Are you happy where you’re standing still?
Do you really want the sugar pill?
I’ll wake up tomorrow and I’ll start
Tonight it feels so hard
As the train approaches Gare Du Nord
As I’m sure your kiss remains employed
Am I only dreaming?

You say that love goes anywhere
In your darkest time, it’s just enough to know it’s there
When you go, I’ll let you be
But you’re killing everything in me

When you go, I’ll let you be
But you’re killing everything in me

By Jenny Scott

He (Night) / She (Day)

Wrap yourself in your best bright clothes, your red and purple scarves of silk.
Run with me to the festival, where we will dance until sunrise.
The dwarves will beat their funny drums of zebra skins and hollowed trees,
while stiltwalkers perform, and the musician blows his bamboo flute.

And late in the night, the poets and storytellers entertain,
delight us with their dancing words, as we listen, clapping by the fire.
Enchant me with your tale-telling. Tell about Tree, Grass, River, and Wind.
Tell why Truth must fight with Falsehood, and why Truth will always win.

I will tell my father’s stories: how the giant mantis fooled Death
by holding still as a felled tree; how the elephants trampled
the leopard cub, and its father, though he knew, killed nine goats instead;
how pirates gambled with a djinn and lost the thing more dear than gold.

Tonight we’ll eat a farewell feast. Cold corn porridge is not enough.
Let’s peel papayas, pineapples, and mangoes, drink coconut milk,
and bake bananas. We’ll dine on crocodiles, wild birds, and turtles,
perhaps a hippopotamus–if only you can catch it first.

I’ll build a palace made of stone. Two hippo-headed guards will serve,
and tigers carry in your meals. I’ll capture flying zebras
for your steeds, and fill the stable with every kind of unicorn.
Butterflies and salamanders will decorate your garden.

I’ll strand long strings of beads for you, blue, the color only kings may wear.
I’ll carve a soapstone lioness, a wooden box to lock it in,
girded with sapphire amulets, ostrich feathers, ivory.
These things will protect you while I’m gone, remind you of my love for you.

Your voice resounds like a songbird’s, every word is a sweet, soft song.
When you run you’re graceful and swift, sleek as a powerful panther.
Mysterious chameleon, you’re a thousand women at once,
sharp and strong as a lioness, yet gentle as a striped gazelle.

On this our last day together, let us walk across the grasslands.
Hold my hand and let’s walk slowly, seeing everything as children.
Let’s walk on the Daraja Plains, where leopards hang from trees, dosing,
tasseled tails swaying in the shade, near villages of tree-dwelling elves.

Glorious, to walk again across the savannah with my beloved.
A lion walks commandingly, a general among his troops,
camped the night before a battle. A snake, colorful and coiled, loops
around his bough, mischievous, hanging over the village path.

We’ll find termites in their nests, hard tall towers above the plains,
and point-eared cats, taking their turns, guarding their many entrances.
We’ll find the basket-nests of birds hanging from the acacia tree.
Rhinoceroses and dragons for once will let us walk in peace.

When lightning tears the sky’s dark cloak and heaven’s bird beats the water
on the muddy plains with its big wings, termites and frogs escape their homes
toward the lamps in the nearest village. Spiders dry themselves indoors,
the spotted lizards that never fall from ceilings suddenly appear.

In the forest, fires light the sky as the black clouds unfold their weight.
The black-and-white sacred monkey holds her children to her, and waits.
Love, like lightning hits suddenly. It sparks the heart with blows of light,
its fire extending, bends, expands, beats and breaks your hiding places.

* * *

Remember when we were children, herding the sheep together,
leading them over the grassy hills with long sticks. Your silly songs
made me laugh, and in the evening, you’d enchant me with your stories,
lying on your back beside me. Even then my heart was yours.

I remember your sacred rites. You were so funny, so grown up,
so stiff and serious, all arms and elbows. You went in a girl,
but you returned a warrior. You marched back with the others–
your hair was cut, your eye tattooed with the red triangle of war.

Tomorrow I must go, my love. I will tattoo my head with braids.
My shield will bear a shining sun so you will always be with me.
Inlaid with gold, it will shine like glowing embers. I will return
with lizard skins for your sandals. Paint your eyes black and wait for me.

I am the sun, you are the moon. Wherever you lead I will go,
following across the wide sky, as long as I live and you love.
Sun follows Moon until she tires, then carries her until she’s strong
and runs ahead of him again. I’ll carry you, too, my beloved.

My love, we are not Sun and Moon. Instead we are like day and night.
The old ones say Day is a woman, who works only while it is light.
She herds her goats and catches fish, fills her fields with golden corn,
shows her children what is just and protects them from the cobra.

Day loves Night, who works in darkness, walking through heaven’s milky sky
collecting stars with his quick arms, piling them into a basket
like a child collecting lizards and piling them into her pot
until the pot overflows with lizards, ’til the basket overflows with light.

Night wears a black cloak lined with fire, studded inside with gleaming stars.
At dawn and dusk he spies his love. Across the rolling hills of sky,
they glimpse each other–so briefly. They throw each other kisses, cry.
Their tears spill over Jamuraa. Mixed with blood, they wash everything red.

But once, with a magician’s help, Time was stopped and Day stood still.
Night spread over Jamuraa, wrapped Day in his dark cloak and held her.
In their miraculous embrace, the two became as One. Until
pulled from Day’s arms, Night sank, commanded by the western horizon that always beckons him to come.

I won’t give up hope, my love.

Our love is like the river in the summer season of long rains:
For a little while it spilled its banks, flooding the crops in the fields.
But soon it will evaporate with the dry heat. Like Day from Night,
I’ll live my life apart from you, just glimpsing you across the sky,
because you cannot change, my dear, and nor can I.

It takes just two people to bring the world
to ruin. So goes the history of love.
At the end of the day we tally the casualties
of war, victory for the one who gets wounded

the least. You say it’s time for a change
but I don’t know to what end, change being
just the skin of some incandescent creature
whose grotesque beauty is what we adore,

whom some people call love, whom we
venerate because it consumes us, morsels
for its huge soul. My people say, don’t look
or you’ll go blind. You say the end was always

just around the bend. I say all we have
is unconditional surrender to the future.
So unreliable is the past that I feel compelled
to leave unmourned the blind, relentless loves

that may have scorched into our hearts
the way the saints accepted stigmata. My people say,
look back or lose your way. Or, walk backwards
if you can. So I found myself on a bus to New York City

to lose myself completely. Past Hunters Point
we hit the factory of souls – a thousand tombstones
whose subterranean chambers manufactured
the silk-like smoke that we must feed to God.

I don’t think the world’s ever going to end.
I think it will go on and on, and we will
be as nebulous as Nebuchadnezzar, our lives
not worth a footnote, our grand schemes

no more than insidious whispers, all memory
shifting like the continental plates. I should grieve
for time misspent, love returned to sender,
ambitions gone awry. But bards more sage than I

have seen the folly of our loss – and have sung
more dirges than I can bear. In the future,
perhaps all science will finally come around;
genetic engineering, I hear, will be all the rage,

and we will be a super race in a world
infallibly perfected, where trains run on time,
love never dies, and hope can be purchased
by the pound. They call it “immortalization

of the cell lines.” We will choose what will survive.
Our destiny made lucid, we will find the world
contemplating itself, like the young god
who held his breath and found Narcissus,

the beautiful rapt face all sparked with awe,
one hand about to touch the pool,
his body lurched towards that marvelous
reflection. I suppose the human race

has always felt compelled to desensitize
its failures. My people say, to go unnoticed,
you play dead. Or something. I myself
(and here is the part where even this poem

stops in its tracks to contemplate that pool)
may have chosen to forget a face, a name,
some cruel word uttered carelessly, but not,
after some reflection, intending any pain.

And many others may have chosen to forget me.
It works both ways. My people say, regret
is the final emotion. It’s what you see
when you look back. It’s what’s no longer there.