Re-opening Pandora’s Box

First they robbed us of our food by illegally fishing in our territorial waters. Then they gave my mother skin disease by indiscriminately dumping toxic waste. The malignant seeds they once sowed have now completely infested our Somali shores, crippling our fishing industry, pushing us towards spiraling famine. The only way to make them pay for the banes they brought us is to target the mindset of blatant corporate greed, to give them a taste of their own bitter medicine, a generic drug – piracy.

My name is Abdikarim Muse, technician of the Puntland Group, an organization of ex-fishermen-turned-pirates. Remember the spurt of media attention over Somali pirates a few years ago? Yup, that’s who we are. The struggle still continues, every day. Right now, we are in the middle of a ransom operation. Having captured a cargo ship MT Hai Wei in the Gulf of Aden a while ago, we have transferred the hostages to another vessel, the one which I belong to. My job is to monitor GPS devices and radar transmissions, making sure patrol ships from NATO and the like cannot find us, so that the hostages remain untraceable. In the meantime, other branches are responsible for guarding MT Hai Wei and negotiating ransoms.

I sit in the engine room, reading a book of Greek myths which was nicked from Hai Wei. In the adjacent cabin, my crewmates are throwing a party, yes, getting drunk in the afternoon, with the sun blazing in the sky – chewing khat, smoking hashish, listening to deafening music. I prefer the constant humming of machines, and anyway, my job demands drug abstinence. So far, my favorite story is that of Pandora’s Box, in which Zeus, the god of sky and thunder, gave Pandora, the first woman on earth, a box which contained every single kind of evil there was. Zeus made Pandora promise that she would never open the box. But Pandora did anyway, out of curiosity. Out flew the evils of the world, and all have escaped by the time Pandora shut the lid.

Only hope remained inside the box.

I do not understand what the ending means. The radar screen tells me that there are no threats within our vicinity, so I decide to go and have a chat with the hostages, as I did on previous occasions. My crewmate Dalmar will be happy to be relieved of his guarding duty. Sure enough, when I appear at the doorway of the room holding the hostages, Dalmar immediately jumps up and leaves, muttering, “Man, I need a hashish break.”

Inside the room, metal bars are keeping the hostages safely in their lock. A stench of sweat and urine hits me but overall the condition is fine. The book belongs to one of the twelve men. His name is Keung.

“So, which one are you up to today?” He asks me, the corners of his lips lifting up very slightly.

“Pandora’s Box. Is it okay to call it my favorite even though I don’t get the ending?”

“I don’t get it too. But the mystery is what makes it appealing. What do you not understand?”

“Whether hope was intended to be a silver lining – a natural assumption – or an evil, like everything else in the box. Each interpretation has different repercussions.”

“True. Let’s say hope is intrinsically good though. By being shut inside the box, do you think it means hope is kept locked away from humanity, or preserved for us?”

“That’s precisely the dilemma I was pondering over. I don’t know. It depends on whether we can open the box again. All the evils that flew out manifested into what we see today – war, poverty, environmental destruction. What we’re doing… I guess that’s evil too. So supposedly, if hope flew out at that time as well, all of us would have it. Our country needs it… desperately. I wish Pandora opened the box again. And the hope inside had better be intact.”

“You know, perhaps hope is one of those entities where it’s important to distinguish between one’s disposition and circumstance. Say, your disposition is to hope, but sometimes your circumstances may suggest otherwise.”

“That makes it sound like an exercise in futility to me. Like walking along a Mobius strip, one surface my disposition, the other my circumstances, but eventually you realize they blend together into one. And yet, what if hope was meant to be something bad? What if this dispositional hope on my Mobius strip – what if it is an empty, illusory hope that results in nothing and merely prolongs our torment?”

Keung can’t give me an answer. No one can. I walk out to the deck, looking at the horizon stretching beautifully towards the distance. All of us are bound within our own constraints, but are subject to the same drives – for happiness, for some sense of fulfillment, for liberation from anxiety about life. But when one’s boundaries are so pressing, so urgent, as to be demanding every breath of yours to work towards an impossible goal, for your survival, your country’s development… One may lose hope, because the struggle appears to be never-ending.

These strangleholds binding me are tight and suffocating. Within them I am doing what I can, giving my all, but I won’t know if this would be worth it in the end. At times it feels like I’m under asphyxiation, where I lose control of my body and mind, letting my deject thoughts run freely at their will. Paralyzed, I can do nothing but think, until it becomes so wild and violent a process that in the end, my body has shriveled to nothing more than a hollow crust, deprived of life.

The gentle sea breeze caresses me amidst the intermittent booming beats coming from the cabin, arousing me, keeping me from brooding on. How different are Keung and I, actually? We are just pawns in this game, where some great power dictates our lives as we walk along our Mobius strips, trying to find a way back to Pandora’s box, so that we may have the shadow, the promise of an answer – hope.

Between Fire and Ice

(Written March 2011)

Tyler missed death by a nanosecond as he took another step forward into the smoky haze and the floorboards behind him gave way, collapsing into the hungry fire below. “Great,” he thought, “an auto-extension.” Blazing flames leapt up from the cockloft beneath him, and Tyler quickly glanced at his partner, James, who was reporting the extended fire to the IC through the radio. Over the black smoke that was billowing out from the wide opening, he could hear instructions crackling through, heavy with static, “Unit 12-S to continue with primary—” Big burst of static— “3 victims confirmed present in area. No back-up in stan—” Dead signal.

For a split second Tyle rshared a look through the smoke with James, a look that conveyed grave mutual understanding. The heavy voice reverberated despite the roaring fire. They had to find three people quickly, on their own. Dispatching their vital back-up unit meant that there was insufficient manpower elsewhere. No one would be at their assistance. The fire was escalating.

“If anything happens we’re dead meat!” Tyler yelled, conducting a final axe handle sweep under a cupboard.

“No, red meat. This room’s clear. Let’s go!” —radio beep— “Reporting from Unit 12-S: No victims in A-side, now starting C-Side. Over.”

Outside in the hallway the situation was deteriorating quickly. The fire originally below them had auto-extended up from a number of rooms, and was advancing towards them in an erratic series of mighty leaps and bounds. Visibility was drastically reduced and time was running out.

“Let’s do one room each!”

“That’s against protocol! We have to stick together!”

“Do it! Three lives depend on us! Five minutes!”

Tyler forcefully pried open a door and quickly hinged a rope onto the knob to act as the anchor line. Low visibility, high heat upon entry— there was a definite risk of a flashover occurring. His eyes flickered around the room, his years of training kicking in, allowing him to analyze the scene with surgical precision. Punch hole in ceiling for vertical ventilation. Open windows for horizontal ventilation. Luckily, there was a window right beside the door— jammed, of course. “Every… damned thing… gets jammed… in… a fire,” Tyler swore, breath getting ragged. OK. He’d start with vertical ventilation.

He grabbed his TNT tool at the head, and, directing the pike pole of the other end towards the ceiling, gave it a sharp jab, and pulled down the plaster. Oxygen was starting to run low. Tyler felt the first symptoms of heat stress. He fumbled to force the adze end of his Halligan bar between the window and its frame, sweat filling up in his goggles, stinging his eyes. He repeatedly struck the Halligan with his TNT— God, when would this window open?

And suddenly, the window shattered of its own accord.

The sudden pressure differential that was caused by the abrupt opening produced an ensuing heat wave that almost knocked Tyler out of the building through the broken glass. As he took a difficult step back to steady himself, all of a sudden a thick ceiling beam crashed down onto him, catching fire, trapping him underneath with its dead weight across his gut.

There was no room for maneuver. Tyler tried to lift the beam off but it would not budge. Forget about the internal bleeding. The flames were slowly engulfing him, creeping up from his lower torso. He heard a shrill volley of high-pitched clicks. There was less than a quarter of oxygen left.

“James!” He yelled, voice as coarse as sandpaper. The fire was eating into him. There was no way James could hear him in another room. The radio was with James too.

Tyler felt his vision dimming. He felt a rising, painful heat in his groin. Sorry Martha, he thought about his wife, his beautiful Martha, I’d never get you a child after this. We’d have to adopt one instead. The flames were fading out. The TNT and Halligan slid from his hands. His head suddenly felt very light. Spasms shook through his muscular frame and he succumbed to a fit of seizures, foaming at the mouth. Darkness seeped in.

“Do not go gentle into that good night… rage, rage against the dying of the light...” A distant voice welled up in his head.

Oh shut up Mr. Thomas… Tyler’s high school English Literature teacher prided himself on being a descendant of the Dylan Thomas— and so had forced Tyler’s class to memorise his each and every poem until everyone could recite at will.

“‘Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight, blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay.’ Tell me, Tyler, is that how you would want to die? You do know you’re risking this if you join the fire service, don’t you? Blinding sight, blaze like meteors. I advise you to consider your career path carefully.”

Tyler fumed at Mr. Thomas, who had the iciest, piercing blue eyes. Frail little Mr. Thomas, safe and warm in his baggy black turtleneck, had never been in a real fire before. He hadn’t felt what it was like to be truly afraid of death. He had never lost a loved one to a fire. So of course he, of all people, had the right to scorn Tyler and his ambition.

“Please, just go to college. An SAT score of 2100 can get you anywhere.” The class gave a collective gasp of surprise, and many heads turned towards Tyler, sitting at the back, Tyler, who was always invisible despite his hulking size.

“Don’t waste your life away by joining the fire service. It leads to nowhere. You know, be a professional or something. That should be the path for you. For everyone of you.” Mr. Thomas’ eyebrow twitched. He had a tic there, it always twitched, attracting even more attention to those blue eyes that seemed to bore right into you. “Now let’s go back to the villanelle— the second refrain, ‘rage, rage— ’”

Rage, Tyler! Rage against the dying of the light!

Tyler snapped awake. The light was intense, burning through his retinas. If he didn’t get the burning beam off him in time, his protective gear would soon catch fire. Then that would be the end. He twisted his head, cheek flat on the ground and, gritting his teeth, pushed against the floor to create leeway, but the beam was deadweight. Blinking away the sweat, he thought he saw a pair of eyes staring right back at him— piercing eyes that penetrated through the thick smoke—

“No,” Tyler thought, “I would not die with blinding sight. I would not let innocent people die.” His gaze fell upon his TNT and Halligan. “Right there!” He grabbed the Halligan and forced it in the gap between the floor and the beam, levering it, pushing his feet, and simultaneously tugging on his anchor line. The beam had burned through to the metal core and had become significantly lighter. He gathered his last ounce of strength. One final push… and it was off!

Gingerly, Tyler righted himself up as a searing pain tore through his abdomen, ripping him apart. Blood rushed into his head and he felt like fainting again, but another shrill series of clicks jerked him back to the scene. He crawled slowly towards the person, who was having a hacking cough, and pulled him out from underneath the bed. Hoisting the bony, quivering body up on his shoulder, Tyler hurried out of the room and prodded back to one where a ladder company was situated at a window. James was there, escorting two wailing children onto a platform where they would descend to safety.

Tyler slid the man off and laid him flat on the ground, where he had stopped coughing and had slipped into unconsciousness. No pulse could be felt at the carotid artery and the man had ceased breathing.

“He’s under cardiac arrest!” Tyler yelled frantically, slicing through the man’s thick black turtleneck sweater with a carabiner blade. “We can’t wait for the ladder and the EMS. We must do CPR now!”

“Ok, let’s do it.” James extracted a barrier device to do mouth-to-mask resuscitation while Tyler placed his hands on his breastbone and began to do heart compressions as quickly as he could. He forced himself to keep pressing hard despite the pain and fatigue— this is professionalism. Every second counted in saving this man from the jaws of death. “Come on”, Tyler urged on in his mind, “Don’t die!”

The man’s eyebrows started to twitch. Good, that’s a sign of life. Tyler kept pushing harder. Just as the ladder returned, the man took a deep breath on his own— and opened his eyes.

The iciest, piercing blue eyes.

That bore right into you.

Trust without wavering

This will only get worse.
I will not concede that
I love you
And I say with certainty that
We were never meant to be
I was stupid to think
We can last forever
I felt as if
You have never loved me
And I’m wrong for thinking that
I could be the best for you
I am trying to show that
My studies
Are more important than
You
Now, I realize
Love is a waste of time
It’s not true that
I love you.

Now read this in reverse.

Star

Freewriting

I hold a freezing star in my hands. It’s so cold that it’s burning, melting its own core and eating at our flames with relentless trickles. It’s fire and water in one, hot and cold. Blazing and pouring. A perfect yin and yang, a complete fusion of yin and yang— an absolute expanse of grayness, but just an equilibrium balanced at the wrong end.

It used to shine with a warm glow, so comforting to look at and to feel in my palm; it was the brightest and most beautiful thing in my world. It was an infallible guide in my darkest nights. Always this star, this one single star that gave me so much strength and hope day after day.

Perhaps I held it too tightly in my hands. Perhaps it did not like the touch of my coarse fingers. It turned cold, as if trying to get away from me. It stopped glowing, and instead became a shiny black mass, like a piece of coal, staining my hands, leaving dark streaks and imprints behind.

Perhaps mortals like me should not dream of owning stars, as if they could ever belong to us. Perhaps it was wrong of me to have picked this one out from the sky, that one night in spring. Someday, I would have to place it back, hide it deep into the endless sky, where I would never be able to find it again.

Winter In His Apartment

This is something trite to be regarded as a bit of light reading. The bulk of this was written on a gust of impulse, with almost no editing. There is minimal input from personal experience; my position best parallels Stan’s. Perhaps someone like me should not have attempted to write a narrative on a subject like this in the first place.

Winter In His Apartment

The double-glazed windows cannot keep out the cold; sharp, icy rays of sunlight pierce through slits in the torn blinds. They grip the room in a harsh severity, drawing unforgivingly like fingernails across the old furniture, the empty bookshelf, the gray floorboards. Yellow slants streak across a half-finished architectural model of a building complex, lying abandoned in a corner of the room. Dave stares vacantly at the clock, lying with his feet askew on twisted bed sheets. 3:07 AM. He lifts up a bottle by the bed, mouth open, tilts it, and the beer splashes onto his face. He chokes, stomach tightening. He looks at the clock. 3:08 PM. He can’t shake the searing, prickly feeling in his nose. He falls asleep, feet cold.

Someone rings the doorbell and wrenches him from his deep sleep. He drags his feet towards the door, opens it and is met by – Dark eyes, huge eyes, probing into him. Eyes of concern, and a whiff of strong cologne.

“Hey Dave where’ve you been? Haven’t seen you at work for two weeks – you’re still in Hong Kong – ohmygod what the hell happened? How come you haven’t been listening to any of our calls? Hey, are you okay? Did something happen with Yvette? Hey – ”

Dave slams the door in Stan’s face.

The howling wind seems to come from the unadorned walls. It whips away at the interior of the apartment, stripping away any last vestiges of warmth. Whistling out through the gaps of doors, smuggling out bits of memories, the emotional attachments and forgotten intimacy. This hollow is perpetually in a state of biting coldness. Stripped naked, exposed and subject to Dave’s violent whims. A physical manifestation of Dave’s scarred and empty heart. Day after day, it is where he returns. Always with the dying stub of a cigarette between his teeth, an occasional blunt hidden deep in his jeans pocket.

The days in which Yvette would come here, laughing and with her arm tightly wrapped around Dave’s, are long gone. Those were the days when no cobwebs infested the ceiling, when flowers bloomed in elegant vases by the window, and when switching on the lights felt like kindling fires, warming the room in its soft glow. Now, nothing in the rooms suggests that they once held the gem of a passionate love, sparkling and crystalline. Its shattered, lusterless fragments lie scattered among the floorboards, threatening to pierce Dave’s soles.

Flashbacks of those perfect days engulf Dave’s mind every night. Sweet dates familiar and cliché to all couples deep in love – they’ve had their share – haunt him in his sleeplessness. The fragrance of her hair, as he pulls her close to kiss her neck. Her eyes, the way they shine when she looks at him. And her voice – it was so gentle, so full of love and tenderness. Flitting images. He grasps at them without success. It is only in the absence of love that one remembers the best of it, failing to acknowledge the intermittent pangs of bitterness and angst, which are the very things that slowly pushed their love into oblivion in the first place.

He has forced all those negative sentiments out of his mind, but now they come resurfacing in immense surges. Yvette’s cell phone beeping, and out of the corner of Dave’s eye he saw a flirty text sent by one of her close male friends. Yvette pulling away from his arms as she turned around to reply. The look of disappointment on her face when she opened her birthday present – and saw a YSL wallet. The tearing sensation he felt when he saw Yvette using a new Gucci purse the week after, only to find out it was given to her by that (fucking) guy.

Yvette was impossible to please, and everything was overshadowed by Dave’s inferiority at his failure as an architect, having lost his job at an architect firm one year ago, resorting to a refuge in an obscure arts centre, teaching kids to paint. Yvette, on the other hand, was a fledgling lawyer, but nonetheless a rapidly growing asset to her firm. Dave did everything he knew to keep Yvette’s heart beating for him – showering her with endless gifts, devoting every second of his spare time to her, shunting aside his social life and ignoring any job opportunities. It was a vicious cycle – the more he gave, the more she demanded, until he was sapped and exhausted, but he still loved her. The most difficult times were when Dave could feel Yvette’s distaste at his incompetence. Inevitably, many of their differences in the end deteriorated into unresolved arguments.

Then there were his own cravings. He tried to keep them in check, sometimes without success, and one night he let them run wild, and Yvette decided enough was enough. Dave remembered that stark Friday night. After dinner at a high-class restaurant he could barely afford, he had brought Yvette home, and they were kissing fiercely on his bed. The countless fantasies he tried to lock in gushed out again, and without knowing it he had slipped his hands under her shirt, running his fingers over her smooth skin, and then burying his head between – only to be forcefully pushed away, and feeling a sudden, stinging slap on his cheek.

He could not lift his face to look at Yvette’s furious eyes as they bored into him, and every word of hers drilled into him relentlessly.

“How dare you do that – and it’s not the first time! I’ve given you chances – many chances – you keep doing it again and again. Don’t you, don’t you know respect? You perve, you cheap bastard, is that all you want from me all this time? You – jerk!”

She slapped him again, this time on the other cheek. She was so consumed with anger that she could not carry on, and had stormed out of the apartment.

Thereafter Dave bombarded her with endless texts and phone calls to apologize, but to no avail. It was as if Yvette disappeared off the face of Earth. Thus began Dave’s decline, the beginning of an undying winter in his heart, his apartment.

The doorbell rings again, snatching Dave up from falling deeper into his abyss. It is Kate this time. She comes in, having brought with her two take-away dinners.

“Jeez, it’s only been a week since I came, what have you done to yourself? Look at you! You look like – you look like… oh, I don’t know.” She rolls her eyes exasperatedly and walks across the apartment, crushing the broken gem pieces under her feet.

“I knew you would be locking yourself up in here, refusing to go out. Dude, you can’t expect me to come knocking at your door now and then, wondering if you died or something, fussing around like a mother. But hey, I got you – kebabs! How’s that for dinner, huh?”

Kate smiles at him and he tries to smile back. His facial muscles tense – and Kate can’t help laughing out at his horribly forged out smile. But then the laughter is quickly extinguished from her eyes, to be replaced by concern.

“I got your text last night. So how’s it going on with Yvette? Still sucking?”

Dave looks down.

“Yeah. No word from her for almost a month now.”

He notices her slender legs that her mini-skirt does not attempt to cover. Kate is silent.

“Well, I’m hungry,” Dave says and reaches for the kebabs. “Thanks for these, man. Did you get them from the new restaurant in Wan Chai? I’ve wanted to try it out for a long time.”

“Yeah, if you like this you should take Yvette there!”

“I don’t think it will ever work out between us again.”

Another silence.

“Oh well… you don’t know that for sure. Plus, it’s not the end of the world! The kebabs are awesome, don’t you think?”

“Yeah.”

They sit on the couch, quietly eating, until Kate turns the television on and The Lake House is playing the scene where the female protagonist, Kate (what a coincidence) stumbles across a drawing of her lake house and learns of the story behind it and the man involved. Dave puts his hand on Kate’s lap.

“This was our favourite movie.”

Kate stopped short of her breath. The emotional associations are tantamount.

“Yes, six years ago it was. It’s been a long time yeah?”

“Yeah. Good times.”

“Oh well, life goes on. And look what life has done to us. Or me, at least.” Kate says, and grins, pointing at the faint but apparent wrinkles around her eyes.

“Haha, you used to always say that life is like a giant conveyor belt, moving us on whether we want it to or not.”

“It was what my favourite high school teacher said all the time.”

“I know.”

Kate looks at him and he holds the gaze. He still has his hand on her lap.

“Oh well, it’s late, I should get going.”

Dave’s jaw tightens. He moves his hand up her lap and leans in for a kiss. He doesn’t know what he is doing, just that he is suddenly overpowered by a strong urge to hold Kate in his arms and to feel her. After so many years, does she feel the same? Does she feel the same?

Kate jerks away and light-heartedly pretends to strangle Dave at his neck. With a slight frown and looking sternly at Dave she says,

“Jeez. Men never learn.”

Dave looks away. Doesn’t anyone want him? Is he that worthless? What is it that he lacks, why is he such a bad – man?

“I mean, look at you.” Kate paused, wondering if she should go on, looking for the right words. She decided hell yes, this man needs a good shake-up.

“Look at you. You’re pathetic. You get dumped by a woman and just waste away like that. You’re not shaving and in case you think you’re mustache is cool I’m telling you it’s not. It’s gross. A huge turn off. Can’t you get a grip? I mean, can’t you… can’t you care more for yourself? She’s not the only thing in your life that matters. Jeez, she’s just a fucking lawyer. So what? She doesn’t rule everything. She doesn’t dictate your life. And now that she’s gone you’re free now. Just… dude, just open your damned eyes and see what it is like to be free! And I might as well say this now that it’s over. She is the worst. Girlfriend. Ever. Any guy with a bit of decency would have dumped her a long time ago instead of slaving away like that for so long. I mean, enough’s enough when she used that Gucci handbag or whatever. It’s intolerable!”

She takes a deep breath and goes on.

“For God’s sake, there’s your work too, and oh this reminds me.”

She pulls out an envelope from her handbag.

“I found this on your doorstep. Since you don’t appear to be in much of a suicidal condition I suppose I shouldn’t keep it from you. But sorry man you’re fired from that arts centre.”

Dave reaches out for the envelope with trembling hands. He opens it and out falls the merciless job dismissal letter. Along with it there is a check for a fair sum signed by… Stan.

“You’ve got a good friend there, man. Don’t push friends like that away. Use the money well. I heard you were working on some urban redevelopment design competition some time ago? Well get a grip on it. Finish it and enter. Would land you a job if you win. Don’t forget you graduated with first honors! I know you’ve got good stuff up your sleeve. Dude, look at me.”

Dave looks up.

“You’re a good man.”

Kate stands up and walks out the door. Dave looks at her back, not noticing her sleek hair, shapely hips or slim legs. Instead his mind is drifting off towards his unfinished architectural model. As Kate closes the door he rushes out and flings it open.

“Kate.”

She turns around.

“Thank you, Kate.”

Kate smiles and punches Dave playfully in the chest.

Back in the apartment, Dave carefully lifts the model up and carries it to his huge desk, from the days when he was an architect. He brushes the dust off lightly and begins examining it from different angles, recalling his original design concepts. Pulling out sketches and drafts from drawers, he lays them neatly on the desk, along with thick volumes of architecture books. He puts on his glasses and slowly sets off to work.

Hours pass. The sun is rising, and fingers of golden sunlight creep across the room. They feel warm.

*****

I wish my friend can pick up his life like Dave does (or attempts to) at the end of this story.

The Fish and the Goat (1)

(At the boundary of two distinct worlds, I partially submerge myself in your element to get a glimpse of the universe that you come from. I cannot stay indefinitely, but the certainty of briefness is what makes the time we spend together, exploring each other’s worlds, so sweet. We both know that I would have to leave very soon.)

Fish: You know, one thing that I don’t get is how you can stand being alone. As a member of a tight-knit community, we are almost never by ourselves. There is always something to do with my friends, my family. Some project or recreational activity that everyone engages in. I can’t imagine life being by myself. Doesn’t the loneliness get crushing sometimes?

Goat: Well, to me, solitude is kind of liberating.

Fish: How so? A lone life must be drab. There’s no one else to have fun with.

Goat: I guess I have my own indulgences. We’re different, you see, because I don’t need another person with me to have fun. There are so many things you can do by yourself.

Fish: Really.

Goat: Oh yes, definitely. But that aside, my point about solitude being liberating is that, you have maximum freedom to do whatever you want. The only limits being your ability. No constraints at all. I am not bound by another person’s whims, his moods or his preferences. That’s what I like about being by myself. The only person you have to listen to- is yourself.

Fish: Ok, I’ll take that. It’s just that, you know, if we’re not careful, we sometimes drift in our sleep because of the lake currents. Some nights when I wake up in the middle of the reeds, and realize I’ve strayed away, my first response is fright, and my natural instinct urges me to go back to my shoal. But once the fear has subsided, the loneliness is suffocating. I only have my own thoughts as company as I find my way back, and in total darkness. It can get scary.

Goat: It’s a good thing to connect with your thoughts without any distractions. Introspection. Clearing things up in your head. A continual process of analyzing yourself, with respect to changes in the environment, or events in life, whatever. I guess I can relate, in the sense that you mean you are out of your element when you drift away. When situations change such that they are not what we were accustomed to, anyone would feel uneasy. If you suddenly put me into perpetual herd life, I’d be driven nuts. It’s the same thing, just opposite for me. You get what I mean?

Fish: Yeah, I guess. You’re weird.

Goat: We’re all weird because we don’t understand each other. We don’t understand each other because we’re different. Each of us has a tendency to believe that, he’s the correct one. And when we meet someone who has a different approach to life that we’re unfamiliar with, we can’t connect, and may feel that the other person is weird. But there’s no right or wrong. There’s only what works best, and there’re no absolutes.

(to be continued… indefinitely)

Ngau Tau Kok

Drifting through streets of industrial Hong Kong
Dimly lit stairways quietly lure us deeper
Into this old beating heart, throbbing
Through the dust and smoke, a constant
Unchanged variable, through colonial days
To the handover, there are still men who live by

Lifting crates and smoking.
They used to play cards,
Now they have iPhones.

Narrow alleys, motor repairs graced with
Graffiti, uncivilized sophistication
Slipping through backdoors, stuffy fire escapes,
With abandoned offerings to gods
Rows of rotting Chinese buns pinned with incense
Going up and up, straining our ears for
Footsteps of security guards, who turn out to be
Lonesome, craving for company.

These rooftops don’t give panoramic views,
But here they show you what the Peak cannot.

Integrated into the hazy skyline,
Isolated from the perpetual bustle,
We take pictures of ourselves like
Typical teenagers
With the backdrop of ordinary buildings
Caressing us, into this city with a face
We finally see.

Paradoxes

You can’t escape from the system.

Life is not without a sense of irony.

The World Revolves Around You

 

again, image display because the text formatting sucks

on selfishness

Metaphor

My first attempt at Villanelle! Untitled…

displaying an image because the formatting sucks

***

Pretty obvious what this box/ page is…