Stray

Fathom Me

2006-08-20T12:38:00.000+01:00

When the colours start falling, red first.
When sunlight shivers above.
When words turn to bubbles,
growing as they rise.
When your eyes anchor on mine.
OK? ok.
Now show me your world.

Check My Blood

2006-05-03T10:06:00.000+01:00

Doctor, Doctor,
Check my blood,
Check my liver,
Check my heart.
Are they normal,
Are they fucked?

A Red One Each Day

2006-05-03T10:05:00.000+01:00

I ate my apple
a red one each day
but here's the doctor
and he's come here to stay
till I am away

I Watch The Girl Run

2006-02-22T22:15:00.001Z

I watch the girl run
away from her lover
to hide behind a tree.

What are you doing? I ask.
Shhh. So to see if he will follow,
whispers she,
peeping at you,
still sleeping.

Safe Sex

2005-11-15T23:38:00.002Z

And you will kiss me on my neck,
and on my back,
from behind and hug me
till I can feel your cock
erect.

And I will turn over, wrap
my legs around you, and grind
the cloth between us till the
condom takes over.
We will never really touch.

Said

2005-11-08T21:39:00.000Z

Words creep out of my mouth
to murder me.
Now I am dead
from what I have said.

Unborn

2005-06-17T21:48:00.000+01:00

Words die in my mouth
unuttered.
The ones I can't swallow
nor spit.

And so my baby stays
suspended in my womb,
to be with me
always.

Daffodils

2005-06-17T21:46:00.000+01:00

Daffodils daffodils
all over the fields.
Bright yellow,
never mellow,
filling my heart with their hues.

Dinner

2004-09-29T21:40:00.000+01:00

We could not eat enough
to fill the silence
growing fast,
gnawing between us.

Fallible

2004-09-28T20:02:00.000+01:00

If it should fall
at the drop of a hat
slow-motioned
to the deep abyss

If it should fall
like the drop of a hair
in a moment's breath
quietly as a pin

Then let it fall.

Butter mouth

2004-06-01T20:11:00.000+01:00

Butter fingers
butter mouth.
Words melt and drip
all over and around.
Not what I had intended.

Shedding

2004-02-21T23:14:00.002Z

Milky eyes;
Bluish white.
The world outside appears a blur.
Inactivity
is the safest bet.
Quietly grinding
skin against rock
until I am shed:
a translucent shell
that has ceased to be her.

28, alone in a cafe

2003-11-10T23:24:00.000Z

You may
take away the chairs.
Yes, nobody's sitting there.
Now that you have them,
my table's round and bare.
An odd protrusion,
my solitary chair
is left.

May I
plug my notebook into
your socket,
soaking up
electricity
as if it'd cost
more than the change I have
when digging deep
fingers stretching
into my pocket?

A poem fresh out of my head

2003-11-10T20:23:00.000Z

Like a
poem fresh out of my head,
let me
kiss you down,
tease you up,
twirl my nimble tongue all over you.

Sucking is for longing,
squeezing for possessing,
pulling away
defeats apathy
for the final thrust
before dissipation.

Sunset

2003-05-16T17:01:00.000+01:00

Even when
I have watched the sun set from the evening sky
the ensuing darkness always comes as a surprise.

Which One

2003-05-04T23:07:00.000+01:00

There are those who would stay
and those who would leave.
I shouldn't be the one
who could tell
with one look at their fresh eager faces
which one, which one
would leave me.

Gaps

2003-05-03T23:22:00.000+01:00

There are gaps now and then,
voids here and there,
patches of silence,
thoughts unspoken.
I have to learn
to live with that.

Going Home

2003-04-12T23:20:00.002+01:00

Streetlights yellow, my shadow long.
I hear my heels strike on the tar.

I walk the carpark going home,
through sound of laughter from afar.

Through smell of dinner freshly fried,
a couple by the window admire the night.

A mother canes a child somewhere,
the TV blasts without a care.

A dark room waits with windows closed,
a cigarette sucked and briefly glows.

A door slams shut, driven by wind,
a dog left alone barks unceasing.

These myriad windows lighted or unlighted,

each moment fast becoming the passed as
streetlights mellow, my shadow long,
as I walk the carpark going home.

Redundant

2003-01-21T23:16:00.000Z

Leftover days
and leftover nights,
you've salvaged them all for me.
Scraps and pieces
from your dinner plate,
I await and crave.

Give it all to me
in one gratifying kiss,
then let me in loneliness
miss the man who's made me
redundant.

Steel

2002-12-26T23:13:00.000Z

There's a stillness I can't stand
nothing I can murder
with my rage
my stomach of spite
words as cold as knives

Cut me up
and serve me in pieces
to the people who
can't stomach my guts
their eyes as cold as knives

Skin me gently
let each pain waver
between nothing
and everything
like the cold of knives

She Devil

2002-12-07T23:15:00.000Z

The Devil
she is my muse
inspiring a blush
tender and hush
shortens my breath
heightens my senses
like the way you touch me
making me long
for the short reprieve
until my next penance

You

2002-12-07T23:02:00.000Z

Excuse me,
Could you
protrude a little please?
Let me stroke you where I am.

Precatorius Seed

2002-11-09T23:17:00.000Z

I'm looking for a plant,
the creeping sort
with purple flowers,
and fern-like leaves,
bright red seeds,
five to a pod,
Abrus Precatorius, it's called.

It's also known as the rosary peas,
or in India, wild liquorice.
I would like some stocked
just for emergencies.
Abrus Precatorius, it's called

No, not on this tree.
The next one maybe...
With purple flowers
and fern-like leaves,
poisonous seeds,
five to a pod.
I would like some stocked
for emergencies.

I'm looking for the plant
I know I will need,
my rosary peas,
wild liquorice.
A prayer to god,
a pact with fate,
Abrus Precatorius, it's called.

Our Separate Jokes

2002-07-28T23:17:00.000+01:00

Just an hour ago
we were sitting in a circle
telling the jokes that people in groups tell,
laughing at ourselves,
the witty and the guileless
feeling good regardless.

How easy we disperse
to separate homes later
to weep alone into our pillows
our separate jokes
that nobody else would probably get.
Another sad life recommences.

The Afghan Girl in the Picture

2002-07-23T23:13:00.002+01:00

I am not going to pretend
to understand politics,
to possess altruistic compassion, or
to be the type who'd fight for the rights
of the war-torned children
of Afghanistan, Pakistan,
and whatever similar nations.

It's just that she looks so pretty
to be wearing garbs and a vulgar expression
from an empty stomach perhaps,
and lack of education,
and a heart hardened
from fearing too often.

Wouldn't she have been the belle
of just any school?
A part-time model
who later joins Hollywood?
Instead she's doomed to bloom
and wither in the desert veiled.
The imagined makeover
wouldn't have helped her any.
My petty concerns
are really irrelevant.
I can never relate to her
girl to girl,
when war has made her different.

A Wish to be Kind

2002-06-06T23:23:00.000+01:00

If I could just wish on the beautiful things I see,
the strange blue bird flying across the sky,
the reflections caught on my window chime,
if they could just make me happy
longer than momentarily,
then I shall not be unkind.

Pretty

2002-06-06T23:15:00.000+01:00

They often talk about it at New Year
or other gatherings that I equally detest,
about how pretty I've grown up to be,
about how I could be an air-stewardess or actress
and fetch much money.

They often lament what a pity it is
that my mother had changed her mind
and not given me to them
back then when I was only four.

They do not know that I listen in,
nor that I can remember still
the pretty little dolls and pretty little dresses
that my mother said I could have
if I would stay with them there.

I remember then begging and crying,
sensing the horror of a lost child,
and getting forever lost
in the complexes of rejections
perpetuated by my mother's reticence.

Closure

2002-05-28T23:23:00.000+01:00

You would not let me close the door,
now it is still jammed with
the last stuffed bunny you gave me,
your shirts smelling of mothballs,
and pictures of your charming smile when you were still eager to impress.

How am I to redress now
your last misunderstanding of me?
Ossified and trivialized by the years to your uncaring,
still here, stalwart in its stance,
jamming the door I have to close before I open.

Kite Flying

2002-05-22T23:19:00.000+01:00

How free it feels to fly
a kite,
holding a string
connected to the sky,
transfixed in the abstracts of
vicarious flair,
everything silenced
like the air up there.

The Girl Who Was Jailed For Forging Her Academic Certs

2002-05-22T23:11:00.000+01:00

(Prisons Officer faked educational certs; a newspaper report on The Straits Times, 22 May 2002)

It could have been me,
the profile fits.
We're both from low-income families.
My parents too, divorced when I was young,
and people often say I've low self-esteem.

We've both attended neighbourhood schools,
classmates to other recalcitrants like ourselves,
played truants, had fights, dropped-out and later
took our exams as private candidates,
slightly ashamed of our associates.

She too has a sister like mine,
smart and pretty,
casting a wide shadow with her brilliance
where we could only wallow
and let relatives call us stupid.

So how am I different from her now
musing in in my carpetted office,
my university degree carefully laminated,
while she repents in her prison cell
for forging her academic certificates?

One Evening

2002-05-01T23:18:00.000+01:00

Sticky and warm
from the afternoon's sweat
sitting at the bus stop
waiting

Not dark yet
the insects already restless
harass the early lightings

So would I
get sick of you in a jiffy
I replied
watching

Foul lizards
precarious on the ceiling
snatching at the insects flying

The Storyteller's Prologue

2002-05-01T23:10:00.000+01:00

With a certain unusual tenacity
I remember things from my childhood,
my youth, my past,
details from as far back as when I was one year old.

I remember the shocking wetness and warmth
of urine soaking underpants and streaming down legs, the fear and satiety
that always accompany release,
the pool, and the trail.

I remember helpless in my mother's arms,
waving my clumsy hands about weakly,
fending off the world
of big faces, big hands.

And all the details that my sister forgets,
I recall clearly their nuances,
their smells, and sounds, and textures
and colours
vivid, like my dreams are coloured.

Unforgiven

2002-05-01T23:09:00.000+01:00

Forgiveness gives the most relief
to the same self who does the forgiving.
Or so, the woman on the radio said.
The ball of anger
can then be released;
turquoise tranquility.

My father and all that he did
squeezed into a tight ball in me.
Clench.
Unclench.
I work my hatred
holding in.

TV Scream

2002-04-08T23:08:00.000+01:00

You may not hear it but I do
The high-pitched whine of TV
Even when it's on mute mode
A voice inside the box screaming
The noise of emptiness streaming
Shut it off
Shut it off before I tear my head apart
screaming.
Shut it off!
Quick! Quick!

Garlic

2002-03-30T23:21:00.000Z

I have always hated Garlic.
They smell like vulgar hawkers
or dirty 'uncles' who frequent such
places, picking their teeth,
swearing in loud voices.

They smell like yesterday's cooking
stale in badly aired flats,
residues on clothes hanging
in dim kitchens,
or a mother's body fats.

I remember when my great grandmother
died in her one-room HDB flat.
All the aunties and uncles crowded
close together, the smell of garlic mixed
with their Teochew sweat.
Like my grandmother later,
She had died of cancer.

Homeward

2002-03-25T23:19:00.000Z

6.30
Outside my window people
scattering homeward like the
feathers bursting out of
my pillow when I hit
it hard against my bed,
slowly floating but
surely drifting
downward.