http://aberwyn.net/words/ observations through the whisky glass en-us Nucleus CMS v3.64 © Weblog http://backend.userland.com/rss http://aberwyn.net/words//nucleus/nucleus2.gif http://aberwyn.net/words/ xml-rss2.php?itemid=14 see the thorns pierce your skin smoothly,
enjoy the sight of growing red speckles,
beautiful contrast against the ivory canvas.

I want to see your wide-eyed wonder,
surprised at the beauty of this stanza.
I want to hear your mind sing the exuberant song of fear,
to the rythmic drip, as your heart falter.

I want to lay you down on a bed of roses.]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=14 Fri, 30 Sep 2011 23:37:02 +0800 xml-rss2.php?itemid=12
She laughed goofily as she shared her joy of the moment when she received a card from the girl she adopted. Her voice trailed off as she expressed regret for forgetting to send her a birthday card.

I lit a cigarette as I listened to her in amusement. Her energy was refreshing. Her frankness, infectious. I found myself revealing to her my innermost thoughts and dreams that were long buried by cynicism.

Soon our conversation was interrupted by the splattering of raindrops on the concrete ground. We stood at the edge of the void deck, staring silently into the rain, each withdrawing into our own thoughts.

I breathed in deeply, mustering strength from the scent of the rain to push the rising sense of regret away...

------

She removed the scrunchie from her hair and ran her fingers through her long lustrous black hair. Then she stepped out of the shelter, into the rain. She raised her face to the night sky, with arms outstretched. I could see that it was an act of cleansing of the soul, as the raindrops flowed down her cheeks. She turned to me and beckoned me to join her, with that irresistible grin of hers.

I flicked the cigarette away and took her hand. I stepped out into the rain and joined her in the private ritual. We stood hand in hand, heads raised to the skies. Thoughts of her impending marriage was not welcomed tonight, as we let the rain cleanse us of our guilt and regrets.

This night, the rest of the world did not matter. We held each other tight, as we danced to the rhythm of the rain, cocooned in our own little world. This night, nothing else mattered.]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=12 Mon, 26 Sep 2011 23:32:07 +0800 xml-rss2.php?itemid=10 you sobbed,
you reached for the packet of tissue...

When you were ill,
you sniffed,
you reached for the packet of tissue...

Aftter you finished your meal,
you burped,
you reached for the packet of tissue again...

Have you ever given the crumpled paper napkin a thought?
Have you ever voiced a prayer of appreciation?
Have you ever shed a tear for the stained piece of tissue
lying forgotten in the corner? ]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=10 Mon, 26 Sep 2011 00:49:31 +0800 xml-rss2.php?itemid=9
My curiosity was drawn by a strange sucking sound coming from their direction. As I moved closer, I observed him raising and lowering his arm repetitively in a mechanical fashion. He was stabbing a blood soaked pencil into the woman's side. Every time he pulled the pencil out of a newly created puncture, her flesh refused to let go, creating the weird sound, just as a toddler resisting his pacifier being removed. Her side was a mangled mess, her eyes wide open, lips parted in a silent scream. Her soul had fled in terror.

He was rocking on his knees, whimpering, and telling her softly, "Now you know how much I love you?"

He seemed to finally notice my presence. He stopped his stabbing actions and raised his head slowing towards me.

The faint moonlight lit his face, as he grinned at me.

It was my face staring at me... grinning maniacally...

I screamed...]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=9 Fri, 23 Sep 2011 14:04:55 +0800 xml-rss2.php?itemid=8
I was sitting alone, away from the crowd, reminiscing the good times I spent with him. How, as kids, we won marbles from the neighbourhood gang. How we defended another kid from the neighbourhood bully (and got caned by our parents later for what we though was a righteous act).

A fresh, feminine and strangely familiar scent wafted passed me. I shook my head to clear the lingering traces of old memories as I peered about looking for the source.

It was Her.

She looked as beautiful as before, walking with that signature gait, which always reminded me of the transitional stage of a young cat gambolling around to the graceful catwalk of an adult feline.

She saw me.

I wondered what her reaction would me. Anger? embarrassment? Or would she just plainly ignore me?

I got my answers in the next split second. She broke into that unconstrained grin of her. She walked over and sat next to me, resting her hand on mine reassuringly. There were so many questions i wanted to ask her. How has she been? What happened since the last we met? And most importantly, what was her relation to the deceased. Somehow, instincts told me not to ask, commanded me to maintain silence and wait....
There was a sudden shuffling as the priest walked up the aisle. It was time for the final prayers.

She stood up and intercepted the priest. She flashed her angelic smile at him. He nodded, and stepped aside.

She faced me again and gave me a reassuring smile. Then she started to sing....

This was the first time I heard her sing. Her voice was mesmerizing and ethereal. She sang in a strange language. I was sure none of us present understood the it. Yet through her song, images of the past flooded our sensory ducts. The creation of the world, the rise and fall of the First, the coming of Man, the Golden years of the Heroes. Adrenaline raced through our blood she marched us through the Wars. Anger filled us when she sang about the Betrayal. We wept on our knees when she lament the destruction of the Great Forest. Then she sang about blood ties, the bonds of kinship and the blessing of friendship. How these bonds form the basic blocks of the society.

Realization hit us, all who were present at that moment. Those who were criticizing the deceased's lifestyle stared at their feet in embarrassment.

I felt a certain sense of peace. I knew he was a good man put through difficult circumstances. I knew then that he has moved on through the Veil, to be the hero that he has always been.

The song stopped. I looked up to find that she is gone. I smiled.

Thank you for the Song of Passing. You have given us, the ones still caught in the Web, Hope.]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=8 Wed, 21 Sep 2011 02:29:17 +0800 xml-rss2.php?itemid=7
------

After her shower, she took the heated briyani dinner pack from the microwave and plonked herself in front of the TV. As she bit into the chicken, she promised herself for the last time, not to buy such tasteless microwave packs again. She put the pack down and started observing the three cats cleaning themselves after their dinner.

"Sigh.. They sure have good lives. I am sure they enjoyed their dinner more than I."

The twins were snuggled against each other on the sofa next to her while the black tabby was sitting on the cabinet staring at them. She adopted the three kittens a couple of years back. She was planning to get two, just the twins. But he saw the lonely black kitten and immediately took a liking to him. So they ended up going home with three.

Angel, the black kitten, was looking at her solemnly.

"No wonder they went straight for each other the moment they met. They are so alike. Solitary. Observing. Distant..." She felt a slight ache in her heart as she remembered the good times they spent together...

------

She put the book aside and switched off the lights. She took a while to slowly remove the tendrils of the novel off her mind so that she could attempt a peaceful sleep. Muttering a feeble prayer to God to give her strength to face the next day, she curled up fetal under the quilt.

As a wave of sheer exhaustion crashed over her, the cheerless darkness of sleep swept her away. She finally gave in to the loneliness... and a solitary tear escaped through the corner of her eye.]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=7 Tue, 20 Sep 2011 00:02:30 +0800 xml-rss2.php?itemid=6
A strange face peered at him suspiciously from the water. It was a gaunt face, with sunken cheeks and a pair of dark haunted eyes. The lean hungry face was framed by a shock of oily hair plastered to the scalp with week-old stubbles lining his jawline.

He was about to ask the stranger who he was, when a tiny sane voice seeped through the murky waters of his mind. The muffled voice revealed the identity of the strange man.

The clouds cleared a little and he remembered he was not scrying. That was not a scrying bowl.

Bits of his memories started to piece together. He remembered then. He was waiting.

Soon. The Time was coming.

He whispered a prayer of strength to the gods. He needed all the help he could get to keep the sickness at bay just for a little while more. He needed the strength to stay conscious. He had to.

Yes. He remembered then. He had to complete the Pact.

A stirring in the water.
He watched patiently.

---

She peeled herself out of the pupa and stretched her tiny wings for the first time.

Hunger.

---

He watched intently as she emerged from the water. She stretched her wings languidly as he admired her striped curves.

It is time. He offered his arm to her.

She sunk her proboscis into him and drank hungrily.

The Pact was completed. He smiled.

A sigh of release escaped from his lips as the darkness enveloped him.]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=6 Sun, 18 Sep 2011 23:26:28 +0800 xml-rss2.php?itemid=5
I lit a cigarette and stared out of the window at the last light, with a deep sense of apprehension. My vision marred by the thick smoke that I exhaled. Julie London was singing Fly Me To The Moon in the background. The faint light from the new moon was getting brighter as the sky darkened. The dark shadows of the craters on the moon were like scars on a battle wearied face. I wondered what stories each of these scars carry.

My thoughts were shattered by a commotion coming from the street below. Eight men in black suits were chasing a woman. The form of the small lithe body sprinting ahead of the men looked familiar. I could almost catch the scent of her thick lustrous hair, that I knew so well. It was her.

I snubbed the cigarette hastily in the ashtray and dashed out of the apartment, into the streets. It was easy to see which was the direction they went by looking the direction the passerbys in the street were gawking at. I trailed them down the street, through the front door of a Chinese restaurant and out the back in to the dark alley, led by the angry shouts of her pursuers. I sprinted towards the exit of the alley.

And found myself in front of a white chapel. It was quiet...The noise from the commotion suddenly gone.

I walked into the chapel warily, my footsteps intruding the thick gel of silence. The stained glass of the windows were in stark contrast to the bleached lifeless white of the walls. My attention was drawn to the white marble opened coffin sitting on the altar. There was nothing special about the design. It was just a rectangular coffin made of white marble. There was none of the usual elaborated design. Yet I could feel it beckoning me. Maybe it was just my curiosity.

I approached the altar cautiously. Every step i took reverberated within the chapel, threatening to overwhelming silent sanctity of the holy ground.

It was her... Lying within the marble coffin, her head resting one a small white pillow. She was dressed in a white flowy gown, her hands resting lightly on her bosom. She seemed to be asleep. A peaceful look on her face...So familiar... Memories of her sleeping on my lap on the sofa surfaced in the sea of my turbulent thoughts.

I smiled and kneeled to plant a light kiss on her cheek, like I always did when she slept.

-----

A shot rang, shattering the peaceful silence of the chapel. Blood splattered on the marble coffin. It cracked asunder and she screamed.

I looked down at my chest, still in the half kneeling position, to discover a bloodied hole in my chest. I stared at it curiously. Reality refused to register in my mind.

She was still screaming...The shrillness shattered the stain glass windows, revealing a full moon in a pitch black sky.

Cat appeared, in that little bowtie of his. The colour of his fur was no longer ginger. He had became tuxedo black, with a patch of white on his chest. He leaped gracefully and landed lightly on her chest and meowed a small question at her, looking at her in his familiar pensive way. The question soothed her somewhat. She stopped screaming. Her eyes twitching behind closed lids. Beads of sweat formed on her anguished face.

I fell on the floor, a pool of blood expanding slowly around me. I was amused that I could have so much blood in my scrawny body.

As my vision began to blur, I noticed the full moon was blood red... And Julie London was singing Fly Me To The Moon in my head...
]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=5 Wed, 14 Sep 2011 00:51:48 +0800 xml-rss2.php?itemid=3
I am fine. Thank you for your concern kind sir.

Doesn't it hurt?

No sir and it's been broken for so long that I nearly forgot how it was like to have them whole.

Don't you miss soaring through the skies and free as can be?

Not really sir. I can still be free hopping ON the ground.

But don't you miss having a bird's eye view of the world little one?

It is subjective kind sir. You might think being up there equates to freedom. You might think that being up there means you can see the whole world at a glance. Yet you might have forgotten that there is a different set of predators up there and the blanket view from above might not be better than the involved view down here.

Why so little one?

Well and sir. Sometimes it's better to see less and know less. Sometimes it's better to enjoy what you have around you than to sulk about what was Lost. See those crickets chirping in harmony there? See the butterflies flitting round the flowers? If the accident never happened and I would have not been able to enjoy these sights.

But you could have still landed and watched them no?

Haha! Don't take offence for this but most of us live our lives with our eyes close sir. It is usually through an extraordinary encounter that we learn to open our eyes to the little things around us.

Well said little one.

Pardon me sir but I have to go. Time for me to feed. Thank you for the wonderful company kind sir.

Thank you for the enlightening conversation little one. Fare thee well.]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=3 Mon, 12 Sep 2011 00:37:21 +0800 xml-rss2.php?itemid=2 History purged.
A new beginning.
Again.]]> General xml-rss2.php?itemid=2 Thu, 19 May 2011 23:32:31 +0800