When it rains

Have I ever mentioned how much I love rainy days? I think it stems from having such good memories associated with it since childhood. Memories of playing under the rain with other neighborhood kids, and walking home from school with my friends, drenched and happy.

Rainy days also make me thoughtful and quiet. I have this favorite poem that kind of sums up the thoughts running through my head on this dark, rainy afternoon in Zamboanga.

When It Rains

by Ryan Kathman

Flintlock Spring 2000

"What reason weaves, by passion is undone." - Alexander Pope

We all pick our noses

And it's gross.

The key is,

To be spotted the least,

Rarely chided,

And often washed.

We say the things we wanted to say,

Ten minutes later, when we're in the car,

Pounding the steering wheel -

Like that'll help.

Unless the car is the Delorian from

"Back to the future"-

Which is unlikely.

We all wish we could trade lives with our pets

Once in a while.

Because sleeping where the sun hits best

And licking oneself in public

Are joys we will seldom know.

We weigh ourselves down

with the girth of our gods,

The depth of our demons,

And the mesmerizing and lonesome

Space of ceiling just above our beds.

We are not who we want to be

Nor who we hoped to be,

But we laugh out loud in empty rooms

And stare into the bathroom mirror,

To practice thanking the academy.

We are fickle, funny, and profoundly strange.

Accomplishing little, sacrificing less.

Aware of mortality, yet daring to be fat.

Desperately wanting to get over ourselves,

But secretly hoping for someone who never will.

And as I sit at this stoplight, in this classroom, in this restaurant,

With gentle rain crashing to the sidewalk outside,

Thinking of people, listening to people,

Watching stories brush by my face like a silent storm, 

I realize I probably don't love my parents enough

And I have no idea why.

And I believe none of us has any idea what the hell we're doing here.

But we don't seem to go away. And we smile briefly at one another.

And we are all a little quieter when it rains.

Mood Music: Rainy Day, Dream Away by Jimi Hendrix

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Best Intentions

by X.J. Kennedy

Guilt keeps an attic crammed with things undone,
Old friends ignored, the months-unwritten letter,
Duties we'd sooner shrink from than confront,
But won't let go. Tomorrow we'll do better,
We tell ourselves, and yet remain inert,
Watching our best intentions by the minute
Incubate mildew like a dirty shirt,
An outgrown bassinet, mice nesting in it.


Mood Music: Watching the Wheels by John Lennon

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an invitation

A good friend shared with me this beautiful poem by Oriah from her book The Invitation and I would like, in turn, to share it with you.

It doesn’t interest me
what you do for a living.
I want to know
what you ache for
and if you dare to dream
of meeting your heart’s longing.

It doesn’t interest me
how old you are.
I want to know
if you will risk
looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn’t interest me
what planets are
squaring your moon...
I want to know
if you have touched
the centre of your own sorrow
if you have been opened
by life’s betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know

if you can sit with pain

mine or your own

without moving to hide it

or fade it

or fix it.

I want to know

if you can be with joy

mine or your own

if you can dance with wildness

and let the ecstasy fill you

to the tips of your fingers and toes

without cautioning us

to be careful

to be realistic

to remember the limitations

of being human.

It doesn’t interest me

if the story you are telling me

is true.

I want to know if you can

disappoint another

to be true to yourself.

If you can bear

the accusation of betrayal

and not betray your own soul.

If you can be faithless

and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty

even when it is not pretty

every day.

And if you can source your own life

from its presence.

I want to know

if you can live with failure

yours and mine

and still stand at the edge of the lake

and shout to the silver of the full moon,

“Yes.”

It doesn’t interest me

to know where you live

or how much money you have.

I want to know if you can get up

after the night of grief and despair

weary and bruised to the bone

and do what needs to be done

to feed the children.

It doesn’t interest me

who you know

or how you came to be here.

I want to know if you will stand

in the centre of the fire

with me

and not shrink back.

It doesn’t interest me

where or what or with whom

you have studied.

I want to know

what sustains you

from the inside

when all else falls away.

I want to know

if you can be alone

with yourself

and if you truly like

the company you keep

in the empty moments. 

Reading this made me examine my feelings, attitudes and convictions in relation to life and to others. And I realized that I may not have lived exactly the way I wanted to but I have lived the best way I could and tomorrow, I can strive to live the way I should.

Mood Music: Both Sides Now by Joni Mitchell

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childhood

Yesterday, I was mulling over how some moms and dads seem to rush their young ones into looking and acting like grown ups way too fast. Some dress their kids up into lilliputian versions of themselves and some teach them to behave like little ladies or little gentlemen although I do find those quite cute and endearing most of the time. But I think there are some who go a bit too far, usually with little girls, in the dress up department with the Lolita outfits, makeup and snapshots of them in supposedly sexy/model-like poses. Other children are disciplined to behave like marine soldiers.

I believe that there's a time for everything and for now, let's let our kids be kids. Allow them to cling on to their innocence for as long as they can, to look at the world as one big playground where everything is fun and possible. And when they're finally all grown up, they can find that special memory in their souls to savor and remember how wonderful it was being a kid.

Childhood

It would be good to give much thought, before
you try to find words for something so lost,
for those long childhood afternoons you knew
that vanished so completely -and why?

We're still reminded-: sometimes by a rain,
but we can no longer say what it means;
life was never again so filled with meeting,
with reunion and with passing on

as back then, when nothing happened to us
except what happens to things and creatures:
we lived their world as something human,
and became filled to the brim with figures.

And became as lonely as a sheperd
and as overburdened by vast distances,
and summoned and stirred as from far away,
and slowly, like a long new thread,
introduced into that picture-sequence
where now having to go on bewilders us.

- Rainer Maria Rilke

Mood Music: My Wish by Rascal Flatts

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i carry your heart with me

I found one of my small notebooks where I write and keep my favorite poems, quotes and anything else that inspires me. After riffling through its pages, I came upon the poem that made me love Edward Estlin Cummings, more popularly known as plain e e cummings. He's an American Poet who writes his name in lowercase and without periods. Scholars have suggested that it may have been a gesture of humility to write his name that way. Anyway, here's the poem "I Carry Your Heart With Me" and I hope you'll love it as much as I do, if you're not a fan yet.

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

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Letting Go

To "let go" does not mean to stop caring,

it means I can't do it for someone else.

To "let go" is not to cut myself off,
it's the realization I can't control another.

To "let go" is not to enable,
but to allow learning from natural consequences.

To "let go" is to admit powerlessness,
which means the outcome is not in my hands.

To "let go" is not to try to change or blame another,
it's to make the most of myself.

To "let go" is not to care for,
but to care about.

To "let go" is not to fix,
but to be supportive.

To "let go" is not to judge,
but to allow another to be a human being.

To "let go" is not to be in the middle arranging the outcomes,
but to allow others to affect their own destinies.

To "let go" is not to be protective,
it's to permit another to face reality.

To "let go" is not to deny,
but to accept.

To "let go" is not to nag, scold or argue,
but instead to search out my own shortcomings, and correct them.

To "let go" is not to adjust everything to my desires
but to take each day as it comes, and cherish myself in it.

To "let go" is not to criticize and regulate anybody
but to try to become what I dream I can be.

To "let go" is not to regret the past,
but to grow and live for the future.

To "let go" is to fear less,
and love more.

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The Gods

"I was shown clearly
and often
what it would be like
to live
as nature requires.

The gods did all they could --
through their gifts,
their help,
their inspiration --
to ensure that I could live
as nature demands.

And if I've failed…
it's no one's fault
but mine.

Because I didn't pay attention
to what they told me --
to what they taught me,
practically,
step by step."

- Marcus Aurelius

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What a ride!

Roller coaster

The thrills,
the chills
goosebumps
up and down
Never could
have ever known
how it would be
Now I can see
this ride can go
so very high
I laugh, I sigh
I scream
I fling my dreams
outside...
I hide...
Am I safe?
Will I fall?
Am i even here
at all?
I'm scared...
not of the turns
or drops
or not seeing
'round the bend
I groan...
What I'm fearing
are all the burns
in my hands
when this stops.
The ride is over
and I’m alone.

A few years back (has it really been 6 years?), I met one of my cousin Eleanor's college bestfriends when I crashed in the condo they shared for a few months while I was processing my papers to work overseas. I never expected that Judee would turn out to be a kindred spirit. We shared a lot of stories during those few months... about life, love, family, dreams, books, music, food... everything and anything. I was at a crossroad of my life then, about to take a big step into the unknown. And she shared with me this poem that she'd written. It has stayed with me because it said exactly what I was feeling that time. I suddenly remembered it a few weeks ago as I was reflecting on my life's journey. I know I still have a long way to go but I'm thankful to God that eventhough life's been a crazy ride, and continues to be one, I realize now that I was never alone and I never will be alone.

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for those who wait

I love this poem by Rabindranath Tagore. I’d like to share it with my friends and anyone else who’s still “waiting“…

Waiting

The song I came to sing
remains unsung to this day.
I have spent my days in stringing
and in unstringing my instrument.

The time has not come true,
the words have not been rightly set;
only there is the agony
of wishing in my heart.....

I have not seen his face,
nor have I listened to his voice;
only I have heard his gentle footsteps
from the road before my house.....

But the lamp has not been lit
and I cannot ask him into my house;
I live in the hope of meeting with him;
but this meeting is not yet.


And in answer to that, an excerpt from another of his poems Hard Times…

All that is past: your fears and loves and hopes;
All that is lost: your words and lamentation;
No longer yours a home nor a bed composed of flowers.
For wings are all you have, and the sky's broadening countryard,
And the dawn steeped in darkness, lacking all direction.
Dear bird, my sightless bird,
Not yet, not yet the time to furl your wings!

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