un-indefatigable: is not a proper word

honest-to-goodness struck-to-the-core, nomorepleasenomore, tired.
how run-of-the-mill I am. trying to find the gem but all I'm grasping is sand, that's runs through my fingers, pours to the floor, escapes my grip to be seen no more.

I don't want to show it but it's seeping out of my pores (and eye-bags).

Remembering Brideshead Revisited in Her Fearful Symmetry

Endless waiting at the bus stop
That's how it would be without you
For the train that never comes
Missing the one that I had missed:
Periods full of regret.
Melodramatic moments
To spill tears over
Like the moment you see
A faulty red light
Blinking, blinking
I want to be in that place with you
And hold your hand with
Passion, meaning
The glance and you know all
The touch which channels all I mean
To you.

struggles

life quickly spiraling out of control in slow motion. need to prioritize. need to know what is important.

What is important to me? Everything else seems to be important to everyone else, which has all along been important to me, until I realized if I continue this way I would lose 10 years in a blink of an eye.

(old) First struggle: discernment - what is your will, Lord?
(new) Second struggle: decision - this is what I should do

maybe.only.a.drop.left

I.am.exhausted.to.the.core.and.the.worst.part.is.I.don't.know.why.

Oh, maybe I do. But I won'tdon'tmon't acknowledge it, won't look or think about it.
And that's why I'm inexhaustibly exhausted. sigh. Freud would tell me it's no use repressing - it'll come back to haunt me - Lacan would probably analyze my speech for linguistic trip-ups, Cixous would whip me for not standing up to my feminist rights, while St Augustine and Shakespeare's Cordelia would agree I should 'love, and be silent'.

I guess the majority wins.

so be it, Lord

wow, indeed this is true...

"We reach the holiness of loving, and the perfection of being utterly upright, only in God’s way, and in God’s time. We reach it while still being frail and failing. And, in fact, we do not reach that ideal at all. Rather, it is something done in us, by God’s doing and blessing."
From today's Sacred Space reflection

Lord, the love that you have and that you call us to is beyond all things, beyond the deepest hurts, covering all sins. Because you are greater than our hearts Father, fill us with your highest and truest so that we may give to others as you would like us to.

Dusk

I smiled
At the way you turn
The sky a purplish-blue
With a tinge of red
Hints of clouds
All for me.
And I thought
of how I would spend
All day with you
When I'm gone
Writing silly love songs
or deep poetry with feeling
to you, by the cool stream.
Yet, til then,
The pain still lingers
Etched, burned into my palm
The memory
just beneath the surface
As though stretched on a rack to languish
For a lifetime.

But you tell me,
The night is darkest just before dawn
And I am branding you for eternity.

No Man's Land

I am so so honest-to-goodness worried about him. He has so much heart 

and yet he's consumed by what the world offers.

What he's doing is not in itself evil, but the way it consumes him 

is very unhealthy. What can I do? I am so helpless. They may be 

sad when they hear from him tomorrow. 

And I am consumed too, in an unhealthy way.

Therefore once for all this short command is given to you:
"Love and do what you will."
If you keep silent, keep silent by love:
if you speak, speak by love;
if you correct, correct by love;
if you pardon, pardon by love;
let love be rooted in you, 
and from the root nothing but good can grow.

~St Augustine of Hippo

The spectre of hunger

ragged breath
peters out into
the fog-driven
cold, where
nothing seems,
turning blue with
quick pace

almost, then,
do I drive
the stake into
her heart
which barely
misses the
spot of unrest

spearing, trying
to quiet the
spectres,
ghouls of
'mases
to come

softly, then
It dies

Be

On the way home, with the music playing, I heard the words,
"In the presence of a thousand kings, you are my one desire."

That line made me think of a fairy tale, one in which a widowed queen who needed a male figurehead for her country lined up her many many suitors (kings, no less) and put them to the test. (Is this tale American? Arabic? Greek? I can't remember)

In the end, the one who mattered to her was the one who had the greatest, noblest, kindest heart.
And who else has the greatest heart but Him? (of course, in the fairy tale, she didn't join the convent =p)

Lord, make me fall in love with you. More and more, so that nothing else matters except living life fully, according to how you made me.

Flowers of time

And there is this: some kind of amends today as I wish you well, after all the years of feeling betrayed.

Not by you, primarily, but you were involved and I could not swallow it, could not stomach it for a long long time.

Yet seeing how you have blossomed, how you have changed (I believe), I realize that
seeds have second chances to be re-sown, and people have second chances to be re-grown.

And I am able to pray for you with a deep, heartfelt hope that you may be well.

let my prayer be

The Opening Prayer of the Mass for the Third Sunday of the Year reads as follows:


Let us pray
(pleading that our vision may overcome our weakness)
Almighty Father,

Your love exceeds the furthest expression of our human longing,

for You are greater than the human heart.

Direct each thought, each effort in our life,

so that the limits of our faults and weaknesses

may not obscure the vision of Your glory

or keep us from the peace You have promised.

9 years on

Now that I think about it, maybe H was right.
He'd messaged me late on the night before my A Level Literature paper to tell me that my downfall would be caused by my 'hubris'. (Yes, I had to check the dictionary for its meaning back then)
Maybe that's why I can't forget the message, or the day in 2002, or even where I was when I read that message.

What a strange thing to click 9 years down the road, after a long week in school and a retreat thrown in just a week before.
Like someone turned the lightbulb on.
Like someone giving me a tap on the shoulder, saying, 'Stop. Look. Don't walk there.'

I've built up so many barriers it's hard to tear down. These walls of pride, these barricades built on the foundations of open wounds.

I remember the only person I could turn to with my frayed nerves, rather shredded to bits after that sms (it was the A levels for goodness sake, and I had failed all my prelims, in large part due to the failed relationship with H), was my brother.
Although he was only 13 at that time, he listened well and his words gave me peace.
I know Jesus was and is in him, as He is in my friend now.

On pride and humility

insight

A trusted friend told me today,
"You're an old person
trapped in young body, hey."
I guess I am... I guess I am...
Well, as long as I keep
the warts at bay!

Amen indeed

"A faithful friend is a strong shelter, and whoever has found one has found a treasure. Nothing is comparable to a faithful friend, and no weight of silver or gold is worth more than the goodness of his fidelity. A faithful friend is a medicine for life and immortality; and those who fear the Lord will find one. He who fears God will have a similar good friendship, because his friend will be like him."

Sirach 6:14-17

Anointed

Yay! Thank God! I made the difficult call (praying first) and it turned out to be not-so-difficult after all!

On our Feast of Christ the King: An anointed priest, an anointed Mass, an anointed people. Praise God, remembering that even if people and priests fall away, God's love is stronger than death, and there are saints and martyrs and priests who are sacrificing themselves for Him.

In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us

Today is a day of putting the house in order. There are still many things left to do but I'm glad I struggled through the mental inertia throughout the day and checked off a number of items. I found it really useful to write out a list, especially when things got jumbled up and the monster just kept growing bigger and bigger.

Still, I'm a little discouraged that I didn't manage to clear the hurdle of two major items: one that needs to be completed by Monday (despite a busy day tomorrow playing wedding planner and airport chauffeur), and another that requires me to say 'no' on behalf of a friend. I can barely say 'no' to stand up for myself! Make that three major items: I wanted to apply for that but time is running out fast and there may not be enough time before the deadline for next year's entry. Then again, I knew this long ago and didn't make a move because the monster said I would fail. It's still telling me that.

The monster's name is fear.  I can hear that monster taunting me everytime it has a chance - when I'm ill (and I have been for more than 2 weeks), when I try to weigh the pros and cons (it tells me the sacrifice is not worth it, that I have to give up too much, that I will be lonely).

Lord, I claim your promise that you are greater than any power on heaven and on earth, greater than any principalities, greater than life or death, and that nothing can separate me from Your love.

sing to me

I've been listening to more music (my selection on the iPod) in the past week than all the music added up in the past 6 months before this week.

It's because my muse has no voice, and has to borrow words from arias already written, strings already strummed, keys long-worn. Just like Ovid's Echo, her melody will go unheard, unnoticed, washed away as the lily withers, because she cannot, must not, step out of line.

It's not a cruel nor violent fate, just a sad ending which aptly ends every good book.

And I want to be a good book.

Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns
driven time and again off course, once he had plundered
the hallowed heights of Troy.
~That which begins Homer's The Odyssey

"Enough, enough now."

~A line from Love Actually, in one of my favourite scenes

And with it the dust settles. Joni Mitchell's Both Sides Now comes to mind. But for now I will close the door.


Because I'm still believing all of the things you said.

My heart is spoken for

I had goosebumps and tingling hands from hearing this song again. Not metaphorically speaking, but literally!

It brings me back 6 years ago, to a place where I could proclaim


To hear you say "This one's mine" 
My heart is spoken for

Spoken For - MercyMe

I don't even have to speak, to move, to act, to dance, to sing
You chose me, as you chose each and every one of us
Hand-picked by the Saviour
My words are only a shadow of the joy

she hangs upon the cheek of night

I suspect, God, you have been very naughty and have pushed me in the deep-end so that I will depend on you.

sigh. Thank you. :)