On editing

Editing is more than just pointing out and correcting glaring grammatical errors or making sure subjects and verbs agree or that infinitives aren't split. What most fail to realize is that editing involves ensuring sentences are constructed in a way that does not slow the reader down or impede on the joy of reading.

Take a sentence. It may be grammatically sound but an ardently placed comma (often with good intentions from the writer) could ruin the flow of an otherwise heartfelt statement. It takes a truly generous writer and a talented editor to give the reader the gift of free reign through flow, coherence and construction. Some sentences are decision-makers and take the fun out of reading. As a reader, you would want to decide for yourself as to how you would like to take to what you're reading. It's never a good idea to relegate your readers to the role of passive observers.

I wouldn't like that. Would you?


---
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And because I understand that writers get proprietary about their work (I do). 

The monster in your head

Seems like words up and left sometime in the wee hours when I was dreaming of weaving them into a poem I guess I will never get around to writing anymore. The writer in me is waning. And I've enough strength to even slap together bones of a piece I've been working on in my mind.

Words, words, words elusive.

Floating in my mind, flitting out of reach every time the urge to pluck them off arises. A pity but I don't dare wish for sadness or tragedy to fuel my art lest the Universe grants my fucked-up wish. Prevention is always better than cure or the more apt but hardly ever effective, damage control.

On a positive note:
We try.

Measuring yourself 

on a metaphysical scale

and finding yourself

lacking.

Realizing 

that there never were

monsters under your bed

in your head, all this time, in your head.

I am glad we are in love again.

Halfway through this week's batch of laundry and I am assaulted by the faint smell of longing --- plaids combined with the musky smell of Bulgari you favor. Yes, I long for you greatly these days, more so than I have ever longed for you in the time that we have been together.

Somewhere I read that your truths are revealed to you at times of great distress. What has been revealed to me is this: I would gladly fall into your abyss and anchor my heart onto your raging sea, be slammed against the rocks repeatedly at every turn of the tide than drift aimlessly into a world without sight, touch, and smell of you.

Perhaps this molding of my heart into the small of your palm is the desire to remain worthy of your affections despite the incessant fall of rain on this path we have carved for ourselves. Hearts somewhere find comfort in the rain, however mine remains hopeful at the prospect of (successfully) braving the eroding waters.

Here's a prayer sent to the high heavens and whispered to whoever wants to listen: Allow the rain to beat down on us mercilessly to carve for smarter roads, stronger hearts and deeper underground recesses, where we turn to for strength when life decides it isn't done with us yet.

So in this season of water we blossom.

Literary tattoos and then some

Early birthday gift from V.
An impulse I don't mind repeating.

Cacoethes Scribendi

If all the trees in all the woods were men

And each and every blade of grass a pen

If every leaf on every shrub and tree

Turned to a sheet of foolscap; every sea

Were changed to ink, and all earth's living tribes

Had nothing else to do but act as scribes

And for ten thousand ages, day and night

The human race should write, and write, and write

Till all the pens and paper were used up

And the huge inkstand was an empty cup

Still would the scribblers clustered round its brink

Call for more pens, more paper, and more ink.

Oliver Wendell Holmes

---

Oh my good man.

Buhos

Hayaan ang buhos ng mga salita mula sa pluma

Ipinta ang daloy ng bawat letra hangga't matakpan

ang kalumaan ng kwadernong muntik nang makalimutan

Asul para sa pag-asa

Puti para sa pag-ibig

Dilaw para sa kaligayahan

Pula sa pakikibaka

Punuin ang bawat pahina.

Ibaon sa tula at pintura.

#ScrapPork

Dugo't buwis-pawis

naghalong pagod at panalangin

isa, dalawa, tatlo

Diyos lang ang makapagsabi kung magkano.

Tama bang agrabyado

na naman tayong mga Pilipino?

Halos silaban ang sariling paa

sa pagtatrabaho, para ano?

Para kanino?

Sino nga ba ang hari ng mga Pilipino?

Tayo, mismo, dapat tayo

hindi ang mga baboy ng gobyerno.

Walang dayuha't baboy ang gagapi.

Tayo ang huling may sabi:

Tayo ang hari,

wala na sa'ting aapi.

In memoriam

Death

offers no peace

for the living.

Sentiments profusely offered

well-meaning to soften the blow

fall on deaf ears 

plugged with the question ---

Have we done 

everything we can?

A hand plunged into an empty room,

save for careworn books

and a bottle of calming oil,

fails to answer ---

What is the average amount

of time needed to accept 

the loss of someone

dearly loved?

All the unnecessary steps

we take to convince ourselves

enough is enough

flitter uselessly in the sea of people

bearing one face ---

that of who we lost.

---

Because I see her everywhere.

Utterance

People

Places

Circumstances

Photographs of almost faded memories

the seeking, the chance meetings

of returnings and leavings

seen

unseen

desperate almost glimpses

A symphony

Silhouettes of broken soliloquies.

---

29 March 2012

Crux.