15.70

Five-teen dollahs and seven tee sense,
says the waitress,
her slang as sharp as the slits of her Chinese eyes,
her verbs and nouns
planted so haphazardly,
almost growing out of her equally garbled flowery apron.

Fifteen Ringgit and seventy cents,
corrects Mom,
in the accent acquired from St. George’s,
where the finest girls are given British brains
to etch up Eastern Elizabeths,
perfectly poised to stand upright, polite and petite,
flawless aristocrats, no bawlers of fowl vowels.

15.70 please,
I mouthed
a weak reply to a matted-haired Mandarin woman,
so meekly I’d hope she wouldn’t mind my English
though she didn’t take matters into hands, her lips battered me
in diction enunciated faster than I could pronounce Women’s Weekly,
exposed me a British banana, muted within my sallow skin.

Spiritual Oppression

Two syllables kept babbling in my ears,
A tape blaring, banging away at my drums
With sticks sprouted with thorns.
Good Lord, take them away,
My hands are bleeding,
Marking my pleadings on the wall
Only You and I could read.
I’m left bleak with unsympathizing, sick
Hands violating me with great shame,
Patronizing again and yet again the repeat button
That plays the agonizing percussion, “You’ve failed.”

My Japanese Roommate

My roommate from Japan knew not Pepé,
A skunk he called a puppy dog,
Doggie, Doggie, Doggie, chased he the thing,
He never saw what hit him then,
No marks, no scars, but he left like a corpse,
Both eyes and nose kept wide-opened,
Third day he rose, never to near one more,
Shota boy, bless his heart and soul.

My Dusty Photo

My table stands a picture framed in dust,

Of friends, dear friends who one by one have left,

How ticks and tocks time, blown as if by gust,

At last, one more flew, ceded me a cleft,

Prompts me with pain that cleaning is a must.

Letter To a Friend

Letter to a friend,
Meant to be written to bid farewell,
All clumped up in my head,
Clogged up as it seems
With erratic emotions,
Flushed with days gone by,
With stains that could have ruined the friendship,
Yet become the source of laughter,
Making us closer than brothers.

Dear Lord,
It's not easy to see a friend off,
My mind is filled with desire to stay on,
Unwilling to move on,
Yet, You have plans for me,
Good ones beyond what I can ever imagine,
So I thank You that I got to meet him,
Even if it is for a brief period of time
In this world that is never ours.

Son of a Weatherman

I'm a son of a weather man,
Whose sole obsession is
To stare at the sky and hope it'll fall,
But I'm not like him,
Dare I ask why?
I love the smell of the air before
The waters plunge down,
I love rainbows visible and green grass,
Wet with heaven's dew.
Yet, I'm not my Father,
I can wait for eternity just staring at nature,
And Father is like me,
Except that he'd expect dollar signs to
Fall down with the rain.
I used to despise Father,
Because I've never quite seem to resemble him,
Sound like him,
Or like the things he likes,
Pray, should I even be like him at all?
I've learned, though,
That I'm never meant to be like him,
That it's alright to be myself,
To have my own ideals, opinions and goals,
And to have the rights to believe that money isn't everything.
Father, I pray that you'd understand one day,
That I'll always be yours,
But I'll never quite be the one you'd hope,
And my greatest desire is for you
To return a smile and embrace me.

Reflections on a Rainy Day

Gloomy days are usually dark,
Cloudy and occasionally rainy,
I don't know why,
But it reminds me of times of being
Separated from loved ones,
Of times when sorrow seems to be
Unending,
Of days when my food are but tears,
And my heart cut open,
Waiting to bleed down the ground.

Honey, many have said,
Is good with a cup of hot tea on a
Rainy day,
I wonder why,
Perhaps it reminds us that there is
Goodness in the world,
That healing tastes even sweater
After the torrents break loose,
And especially when life seems nothing
But a floodgate of tears.