Iri-descent

Iri-descent

A lethargic frame makes her way down the stairs. A long way down, but nothing would prove long enough to challenge her. Even her bones had survived her for the last eight decades, albeit a couple of sprains in her younger days, days no longer glorious, but remain a blurry memory.

But while she descended this, the onset of rheumatism pointed out to her rather rudely-- even eternity will have an end.

A few gazes fell upon her. Whether it was due to her being a human road block, or wondering if she needed help, she would never know. She observed the soulless bodies trudging forward; they had neither a sense of purpose nor conviction. She missed the days when people would help each other readily -- they were long gone. Introduction of moral education, leadership lessons, whatever the Ministry and schools are doing; one would have thought, or at least hoped, that it would make a difference.

Or maybe, just maybe, displacement has been mistaken for achievement by those Ministry fellows.

Not just them; but society as a whole.

Her slippers were strewn over the stairs, marking her descent down.

A flash of a face, though familiar, yet distant. It was a man, with much resemblance of his younger self, but now with a face that has learnt not to trust. A side-glance to the old lady struggling down the steps, a hesitation on whether she needed help. That instant of giving in to his past self. Then a resolve; hurrying off to his destination, even if he did lose it long ago. Someone else will help her if she needs it, he assured himself. They all did.

A descent not counted successful by many, but at least she made it down.

As she leafed through pages in her memory, she finally recalled. A sudden scene crept into her mind. It was her, about forty odd years ago; in a classroom as an English teacher, analyzing a short piece. She introduced the term “diffused responsibility”. The class she taught was vibrant and cheery. Especially a boy who did not understand how this term could ever exist; residing and thoroughly hypnotized in his utopia.

She was lying in a pool of her own blood.

In this enclosure formed by a mob, all air and light fade, highlighting an onlooker. The dark silhouette of a future once bright.

He had forgotten.

Dictation

Elusive threads

Tugging at minds' ends.

Chess pieces caress the board

Playing an intense game

The outcome played out

Long before.

One chooses his choice of food

Never realizing

It was never his choice to begin.

And when a poet writes

About what one calls 'inspiration'

He'll never admit:

Every thoughtful word

Meticulously hand-picked;

Is but dictation.

Stop the Mozzie Hate!

If humans have to rely on the blood of another species for the continuation of our own, we wouldn't hesitate. Not their fault mosquitoes are born needing blood. There's no need to kill them over itchiness either. Be brave and put up with it, there are greater things to worry about in life.

Poetry and Happiness and How They Are Related With Regards To Myself (And This Title Is Written With Many Unnecessary Capitals Because It Aggravates Me When a Title Isn't Capitalized Like So)

It's strange how I can churn out nice poems faster when I'm upset. And normally the more upset I am, the nicer the poem turns out. When I'm happy my poems end up rather messed up. That's not good. I can write a happy poem, I know I can. Then why is it that so many of the poems I write are anything but happy? I can be happy. I am happy most of the time. I guess it's just that when I'm happy, I don't tend to want to sit down and write poetry. So most of the time my poetry is churned out when I'm very sad or angry. And you don't expect me to be writing about flowers and kittens and sunshine then. I wonder if that's the case for most people who write poems. Yes, I do know they are called poets, it's just that using it in this context seems to imply that I am a poet, and I don't really see myself as a poet. Although I do write poems quite often, so does that make me a poet by definition? Is that all a poet is, someone who writes poems? Well anyway, if it really is this way for people, perhaps it explains why poetry has this reputation for being gloomy and depressing. Because many people do not like writing poems while they are happy and so they write only when upset, hence naturally the poems turn out pretty grim. So because of the high proportion of unhappy poems, people have higher chances of stumbling upon unhappy than happy poems, and they probably have read more unhappy poems, so they think poetry is an emotional, gloomy, depressing thing.


But you know. That's just my guess

Construction and Demolition

Buildings sprout from the ground, pushing old debris away
They grow tall and wide, and are gone in a day.
They germinate and creep up without making a sound
And then in a second they are razed to the ground
Open your eyes in the morning, a new range of skyscrapers to be seen
Pass again in the evening and they are gone with the wind.
In an urbanized city of shifting and change
The familiar often vanishes to make room for the strange
Nothing lasts forever and indeed they're gone in a flash
In with the new, and the old is out with the trash.
Everything is built and polished and torn down before it can rust.
And shining new replacements spring out amid the stumps of the past
As development rushes on, perhaps can we shed a tear?
For the gone buildings of yesteryear.

Energy

Warning: May contain elements of my religion, Buddhism.

I was just talking to my cousin the other day, and this is what I learnt:

Everything is energy. As you know, e = m*c^2, so even matter is energy. There are two general types of energy, positive and negative.

Positive energy can be warmth, love, gratitude or any kinds of helpful energy. Negative energy is energy that harms us, physical examples would be radiation or pollution, which is chemical energy. However, there are also negative energy in emotions and thoughts. A scientific proof for this is done on something from our everyday life, water. The crystalline structure of water changes  when we speak positive words like 'love' and 'thank you' or negative words like 'hate' and 'ugly'. Plants grow differently with different kinds of music too, like classical music helps growth, and rap slows growth. In this case, sound energy can be positive or negative, depending on the type.

Even cancer is related to negative energy. Cancer cells are hosts of negative energy, and they infect other energy sources in your body too, causing more of your energy to be converted into negative energy. That's why modern medicine is looking in the wrong direction, as they seek to destroy the cancer cells, believing they are the very root of the problem. However, energy cannot be created or destroyed, and killing the cancer cells alone wouldn't help much. The cancer cells are hosts of the negative energy, and destroying the cells would not destroy the negative energy. Chemotherapy or radiation therapy just delay the inevitable. However, if we can find the source of negative energy and stop that, at the same time converting the negative energy into other forms of energy, we may be able to cure cancer.

My cousin is himself a cancer patient since his early twenties. The cause of cancer is not genetic, as there is no family history of cancer, and his lifestyle is probably not the reason either, as his sister is perfectly healthy. However, unlike his sister, he holds a long-term grudge against his father, who shows a lack of concern for him. This anger and frustration is likely the source of negative energy, he realizes, and thus has let go of it ever since. He has survived terminal stage cancer for six years now, and goes around clapping his hands regularly in an effort to convert the negative energy into harmless, sound energy.

Now I have to touch on some rather religious stuff. I believe in karma, and karma itself may be energy. It is the positive and negative energy that attaches to us when we generate it in our actions and thoughts. Positive energy makes things go well, and attracts other people/things with positive energy too. Negative energy makes things go haywire (a.k.a. bad luck) and attracts other people/things with negative energy. Also, that's why most religious things work, be it the Muslim prayer, Christian hymns or Buddhist chanting, as they preach love and other positive things that generate lots of positive energy.

In conclusion, surround yourselves with positive energy. Be happy and love more, as it this will influence those around you and everything you do.

Ignore The Blood

Fighting for your life on the deadly battlefield
Armed only with that sharp metal stick you wield
Parry, riposte and thrust among mountains of injured and dead
A sudden jab! Opens a wound in your side that runs red

It's a deep wound, it's serious, you know for sure that it is
You try to resist the urge to fall to your knees
Agony pierces you in a hot-cold slice
The enemy advances- you can't hide the fear in your eyes

You stumble away as he tries to run you through
Crimson spills and it hurts, but what else can you do?
Ignore the blood, ignore the pain
Force yourself up and strike again
Blink away those blinding, desperate tears
Grit your teeth and push aside those terrible fears
Block off the emotions that rush at you in a flood
Just like how you ignore your own blood
You keep on fighting, it's all you know how to do now
Determined to kill or be killed, and you don't care how.

Oh, whether a battle's won or lost
Who out there thinks about the cost?
Everyone wants to see grand trophies of the conflicts fought
But few see how much blood had to be ignored.