Codeia Lovesick Singalong

Comic caper, odd go-getter, moral leper, chronic steamer
ever trapped in cosmic cough-mix bliss.

Smokes his pack of Luckies while he hangs out with his buddies
here's a slacker every slag would give a miss.

Anemia got him early, he is frail and he is dainty
gets his fix through cigs and magic clinic mix.

Now he's all alone at night, he cannot figure what's not right
few healthy swigs before he flicks the switch.

Plants

There are green plants, red plants, purple plants, brown plants, yellow plants, green plants with red spots, tangerine-hued plants and more.

Plants that coil through heights and depths
like Shiva's dance of death.

There are plants whose roots you eat
and those whose fruits are sweet.

Plants that make you think
and those that make you see things.

There are plants with flowers
and those that glower

Heart-shaped plants.
Plants that make you itch.
Plants you eat.
Plants with chlorophyl
and those without.
Plants that grow from seeds
and those that spawn from spores.
Big plants
small plants
medium-sized plants.

Plants, plants, plants.
There are many plants.

And they all wither and die
just like you and me.

InDejanous Vu (Postscript)

Write your history, we shall do
Kitsch and folklore, legend too
Nothing here of serious merit
You have no past, why don't you get it?

My children will despise you kind
You people of a lesser mind
And soon your kids will follow suit
Believe my thoughts, then they'll come good

InDejanous Vu

Dupe their kings with opiates
Take their land while they sedate
"Greedy pigs? Not us, old boy!"
His Majesty's servants have no such ploy


fast forward through time


Gratis night at Palace Ville
Politicians come to have their fill
"Turn it to a museum, shall we?"
Common fodder for you and me

Note to self:

Please kindly remember to bring a pen to your next exam paper. If you haven't noticed by now, despite it being the umpteenth time in close to four years, invigilators do not enjoy scampering around the exam hall looking for a spare pen for an idiot who remembered to bring a ruler (for who knows what purpose in an essay-based paper), but not a pen to write his answers with.

The next time you raise your hand at the very begining of a paper, it had better be to compliment the invigilator on the nice pair of shoes he or she has on.

End of note.

Let's get poetically spiritual.

The following poem is one of my all time favs. 'Twas written by the man himself, Mawlana Jalaludin Rumi (1207 - 1273), Sufi master and poet extrodinaire. Sufism is a mystical order in Islam, whose adherents focus highly on the spiritual aspect of the religion, intoxicating themselves with the love for God, 24-7. They lead a rather bohemian lifestyle (Muslim-style, of course), and have been labelled as "the hippies of the Muslim world" for their indifference and passive attitude towards the outside world, as well as their rabid simplicity through spirituality. They have been around for centuries to date. Theory has it that the Sufis played a part in bringing Islam to the masses in Southeast Asia; among other regions, I assume.

The poem I am about to bring you was originally written in Persian, but for the obvious reason that I and possibly none others of those accessing this blogsite understands the language (unless the Ayatollah or any of his people has this site in their favourites folder, of course), I present you the English translation of it:


Hearken to this Reed forlorn,
breathing even since 'twas torn
from its rushy bed, a strain
of impassioned love and pain.
The secret of my song, though near,
none can see and none can hear.
Oh, for a friend to know the sign
and mingle all his soul with mine!
'Tis the flame of love that fired me,
'tis the wine of love inspired me.
Wouldst thou learn how lovers bleed,
hearken, hearken to the Reed!


As with other Sufi poems, it is very easy to read this one as that of a man professing his love for a woman. However, the poem should be understood within its context. Sufis believe that man should be in a constant state of misery and wandering depression in his lifetime, for want of being reunited with his lover, his maker, God almighty. Every being can only be truly happy once this happens. To express this notion, numerous beautiful metaphors are used in Sufi poetry. One that I can remember off hand is that of a drop of water, formed by collected dew on the surface of a leaf, gloriously falling into a river or lake, hence achieving its union with its source (presumably by referring to the Qur'an, these dudes were aware of the water cycle even back then).

Wine is a recurrent metaphor in Sufi poetry, but it is not to be misunderstood with the coarse act of alcohol consumption. It is merely used to symbolise the act of intoxicating oneself with the love for God.

Let me now attempt a (very) brief explanation of the poem from what I understand of it. Excuse the crudeness of my account, for I have neither the words nor the artfulness to match its beauty.

The poem is a narrative about a reed stalk that has been chopped off from its root and crafted into a musical instrument, presumably a flute. Having been cruelly separated from its source, the tunes that egresses from the flute everytime man plays it is a wail of sadness expressing its overbearing desire to be reunited with its root. This, of course, is a metaphor for man's perennial plight.

Tis love so true, that transcends lust and other superficial desires. Tis the primordial and original love.

Now isn't that awe inspiring?

must be hormonal reactions, cause i feel the urge to get mushy for a bit...


A TRIBUTE TO THE ROLLING STONE.

I still remember that day when I was eight, sitting on the bed struggling with my long division homework when my father came into my room with two cassete tapes he had just bought. One was by the Rolling Stones and the other by Eric Burdon's The Animals. Both bands were part of the famous British Invasion of the 60s and 70s which saw a host of Brit musicians taking the music world by storm. The Stones were, and still are, the archetypal Rock band while The Animals were part of the 60s psychedelic counter-culture music revolution.

"Have you heard of them?" he asked earnestly.

"Like every eight year old should already have the pleasure of?" I thought to myself.

I told him no. For heaven's sake, I was still at an age where I was playing with action figurines. Still occassionaly peeing in my pants. Crying every morning at the thought of going to school. I probably had ten friends in the world, at most; and that is a generous estimate. How on God's earth would I have heard of the Stones and the Animals?

After wiping off the bemused look on his face at the thought of a spawn of his never having heard of the Stones, he proceeded to play their tape on the cassete deck. I remember having my mind blown away by the Stones' music. The first track on the cassete was the Stones' classic "Paint it Black". These guys were singing about having no colours in the world and painting everything black. For an eight year old, that was the coolest thing you could ever hope to hear! Yes. I had a very early exposure to evil and darkness.

I remember having a watershed moment then. The longer the tape rolled on, the more I felt cheated by those old coots at school who only exposed me to the likes of Cliff Richard and Tom Jones during music lessons. Blimey! There was more to music and culture than I have thus far seen! My father just sat there by the speakers singing and wailing along to all the songs and giving me brief run throughs of the historical and lyrical significance of almost every track that played. I remember sitting there in awe raving to myself at my father's brilliance. I know that I was still at a very impressionable and naive age then, but the man was spewing metaphysical narratives about an Animals song called "Little Red Rooster", for cryin out loud!

Most men would point to puberty as the turning point in their childhood life, where they stopped being boys and started bracing themselves for manhood. I pinpoint my turning point to that moment in my room. And I thank my father for having the sense to expose me to this explosive world of counter-culture music at such an early age. To be honest, I was already getting a little sick of singing those kookabara-type songs they were stuffing into our heads in school. These songs rot your mind to a stand still and make your guts turn inside out and in again.

But then again, as cliched as it may sound (hey, I don't give two tosses, frankly), I have always noticed that my dad was different from everyone else's. This was the man who stood at one corner laughing and watching as my then 6 year old big brother made funny faces and spanked his own backside in front of a school Prefect after the latter told him to stop playing by the drain. Dad was not one to teach us to be rowdy trouble makers just for the sake of busting people's balls off. But while he preached meekness and respect, he also taught us not to be a dumbass and follow authority just because everyone else was doing it. Enquiry of the norms was his way.

A taxi driver by profession, I remember him taking my brother and I along to work just to show us the value of earning money for a living. He'd make us sit quietly in the cab, my brother in the front seat and myself sprawled at the back. I couldn't have been older than four then. Dad would go along with his normal routine and pick up passengers, though usually just the solo ones since my brother and I were already taking up space in the cab. Everyone of these poor passengers must have had a traumatic ride, because my brother and I would just sit still silently and give each of them these up-and-down probing looks. If their ride lasted for half an hour, then it was half an hour of that shit. Poor souls.

Dad would also sit with us at the dinner table and hold fascinating discussions on topics that ran the gamut from theology to politics to music and culture. Not a big deal, 'cept for the fact that it started when we were both toddlers. As you can probably conjecture by now, we weren't too interested in his lectures. We'd sooner be watching "Fraggle Rock" which would usually be showing on TV while daddy's lectures were going on. His point in the exercise was to promote a spirit of intellectual enquiry from a young age. I would go through life encountering stuff he used to tell me when I was younger and smile to myself in reminisce. An example is a theory he once related to us when we were kids, about the origins of the word "asassin". Accordingly, based on his account, the word was derived from the Persian "hashishi" (hashish) after the practice of a warlord in pre-modern Persia who would reward his hit men with hash for killing members of the Persian royalty. At that time, I thought that he was just full of bull. Not after I read the exact account in the papers in recent years, though.

The old man is hitting sixty these days. He still drives a cab by night. His hair is thinning and one of his front teeth just dropped off. Funny how an old photo I found of him during his younger days springs to mind at this point, an image that has been casted permanently in my head. That image of a long-haired Javanese hippy decked in bell bottoms and a tye dye t-shirt, holding a fag with his left hand and a hot chick with his right (my mother, of course) will always linger in my mind.


To the man whose name I'll carry till the day I die - thank you.



... and the Stones still rule.

This morning I woke up deciding that checkered shirts cause me great offense for projecting a disarming sense of contentment in symmetry through the agency of the final frontier of human representation that is the bodily form. If it be only for one glorious momentary lapse of perspective, I would assume the role of the checkered shirt's variegator and confer disrupting strokes upon its texture, like flying vapor sieving through the night sky. But for the now and present, in the dark recesses of my mind, I hear the cynical and taunting sniggers of the checkered shirt as it makes plain its vision for order, and contempt for diametric thought.


But I should get a life and not be stirred by - checkered shirts.

JACK AND THE BEANSTALK

Just had this thought. Jack and the Beanstalk is a fairytale ridden with drug undertones. It is a metaphor for cannabis consumption. A subtext to a wider message. Probably some hippy's idea of a practical joke.

By way of revision, the story we've been told is that Jack was told by his mother to sell the cow at the market for money. Instead, along his way to the market, he sold the cow to a man in exchange for magic beans. Jack came back home, his mother went hypertension on him, and threw the beans out to the garden. The beans grew into a giant tree which went all the way up to the skies. Jack climed up the tree and found a world where there lived a giant with a chicken (or was it a goose?) that lay golden eggs.

Now here's the real story. Jack was told by his mother to sell the cow at the market for money. Along the way, he met a dealer (most probably a Rastaman, as witness testimonies reveal) who, for unknown reasons, sells drugs for beef (hey, a lot of wierd shit was happening back then during the medieval ages). He gives Jack a couple of cannabis seeds in exchange for the cow. Jack goes home and shows the seeds to his mother. His mother, an ex-hippy herself, recognizes the seeds and goes loco on Jacky. She was heard shouting, "I'm not going to have no drugger in my house!". She threw the seeds out to the garden and it blooms into a cannabis plant. Jack picks out the bud, smoked Mary, and flies to the skies. He enters this world of giants and chickens that lay golden eggs. Of course, it's all in his head.


Now don't even get me started on that fairytale called "The ICE Queen".

You know how this annoying banner at the top of most blog pages has ads which reflect the contents of your posts? Well, the programme that generates these ads obviously do not understand the concept of ironic texts. Ever since my spitting post a week back, they have been advertising Post Nasal Drips to "stop PND and sinus problems".

And it comes in natural spray!




Idiots.

THIS BLOG CONTINUES

Call me evil. Manupilative. Whatever. The only reason I announced the closure of this blog is to cry for help. Technical problems. Dunno how to operate this thing for the life in me. I had lots of ideas for improvement, but no one to help me out. My cries for help were falling on deaf ears. But since my ever-reliable and beloved sister has offered her assistance (i know... i could have simply asked her), I see no reason not to continue.

Best part is, she offered to show me how to upload drawings and pics and links. I see a major revamp on the way. A "Revolver"-like revolution. You know how the Revolver album totally changed the direction of the Beatles' music (do yourselves a favour and get THAT album if you haven't)? Out went the bandstand sappy "she loves you" tunes and in came the swirly sitars, sneering sound effects, melodic dreamscape texture, peaking wit and lyrics laden with drug themes ("ring, my friend I say you call Doctor Robert"). This will be my small way of immitating the fab scouser four. Change is in the air.

So spread the gospel. This blog remains.


I still see things.



p.s. will you sneaky bastids who visit this blog but refuse to tag me please show up??

THIS BLOG IS CLOSING

Hi! Just to inform the audience of this site that this blog is closing. I've had my foray into the public channel of the Internet, but it's time to quit and go back to the "underground" (webgroups, e-mail, snail mail). It's not too difficult a decision to make anyway, cause a viewing of my message board reveals that the audience of this site consists mainly of close friends and relatives, who share my access to the webgroups and mailing list, anyway. So not much will change, if you look at it that way.

Plus, I'm getting preety annoyed with the technical aspects of blog maintenance (yes.. haha.. i'm a caveman.. so what?). Can't figure out how to make this archive link work and am frustrated that I can't upload drawings, graphics and pics to the site. That would have been a fascinatingly whole new dimension to explore, wouldn't it?

But it was good while it lasted. So long, now! Thanks for the support!

See you in the underground!

SPIT LIKE A MAN, YA CISSY!!!

Finally figured out how to spit like a man today. You know how these macho guys ooze attitude just through the banal act of spitting? In the middle of a conversation, they'll just nonchalantly turn away for a moment, clear their throats, fashionably contort their faces... and spit. A gleeful and stylish spit. And while the crowd is still held in awe, he resumes the conversation without the slightes hint of pretension.

Prior to this evening, I have never been able to master the technique. I've asked around for instructions, but was never able to convert theoretical knowledge to practice. When I spit, I usually create a mess. First of all, I emit this hediously dry and empty sound when I clear my throat. And when I spit, the flam and saliva (and whatever bits of food left in my mouth from the previous meal) ejects from my lips in a spray-like fashion instead of the textbook bullet-like form. And on bad days, there's the additional embarrasment of my anointing my t-shirt and jeans with stray spit. Not to mention the excess spit which would line my lips, causing a shiny glimmer at certain slants of light. In short, I spit like a cissy. Due to this inherent deficiency, I seldom spit in public. I swallow (yes.. the secret's out.. I swallow.. any takers?.. hahaha!).

So that's one avenue not available to me from which I can assert my manhood. To make up for that, I scratch my butt a lot. That's another act of manhood assertion. "I scratch my butt... for I am Man!!!". So in times of low self-esteem and when I feel my masculinity is placed in question, I proffer my hand (usually left) to my posterior, extend my fingers and scratch. All in one felt swoop. And as the itch subsides, my masculinity swells (no sexual connotations intended here). The more people who see it, the better. Go ahead and call me pathetic. But when you have wrists as dainty as mine, you have to cover up and go through such measures just to assert your manliness. And I do it all the time. By way of illustration, here's an anecdote:

"It was midnight and I was alone in my hostel room. Seeing that I had nothing to occupy me for the rest of the night, I proceeded to watch the movie I am Sam from my laptop. The movie moved me to tears, causing a slight discomfort in my concience, having laughed at male friends who cry at movies countless times before. Feeling a bit unnerved by this psychological threat to my masculinity, I scratched my rear end even in the absence of any substantial form of itch. Knowing that I still had the ability to scratch my buttocks, I was better able to sleep that night knowing that I was still as much a man as I was before the movie."

Now back to spitting. I was malingering outside my house this evening having a fag after break fast. Feeling a slight discomfort in my throat, I cleared it. A growling, manly sound. "Good sign", I thought. Then it came. I spat. A bullet-like spit. And I got good projection and mileage on it, too. I was then engulfed by this almost perverse sense of fulfilment. The secret is to use the space between your upper teeth and upper lip as the launching pad. All this while, I have been using the lower portion. Damn those buggers for keeping this from me all this while.

And now, ladies and gentelmen, I can scratch my butt less.

I believe that a round of applause is in order.