An dullouch

Quaver, quiver,
Dull shiver
Blunt pin
On dead skin
But take me whole
Spirit, body, soul
The pain is a mould
Shaping misshapen fold

Else the Kells

You have to stop it
Stop wishing you were someone else
Had his life his heart
His mind his soul
'Cos no one else can be like you
(Here I'm thinking
Who would wanna be?)

May it be, oh, so may it be
For the things that we change not
Make us strong, and true, and free

One of those

Today I like the alone time. And I wonder if I should be more competitive, more ruthless (hah, if I can!), because it seems like I'm falling behind, or find myself aiming for second place because I don't want to get the limelight, and ending up way behind.

Today's one of those days I acutely feel the nice naive guys finish last.

My morning star

Who will exculpate me from vilification if not You?
In your goodness blot out my offence, dearest.
Save me from myself, that I will not bring shame to Your name.
Speak to me in the darkest hour before dawn, that I may not give up, give in, to weariness before You arrive and invite me in.
I have no need of praise, yet so do I crave;
Put me right in Your sight and I will find true peace.

Oops

I want to be a hermit. And watch Red Dragonflies. Or an alien. So I'm sure once and for all it's ok to be like Lady Gaga.

I think I just busted my brains trying to write a paper on Math education.

I've been having bad dreams in the waking state. Butterflies in my tummy. Walls coming up where they weren't before.(or at least transparent force-fields)

I'm growing paranoid. And anxious about wayyyy too many things that are beyond my control.

I need to just do it.

"Paint me with Your purity
That I'd attract Your majesty
When others boast in fame and gold
The purest place is where I'll go"

concentrate

I'm just about sure what I have now qualifies as a full-blown migraine. Sigh.

@ 4.30pm

It's been an unproductive day. Been staring at the mountain of notes and I don't know where to start writing. Throw in a deadline just 3 weeks away for TWO papers and the desert-dryness...I don't know how to start because I can't see the end.

Still, I will sing, you are
Word made Flesh,
Bright Morning Star,
You are.

...is the speck in yours

It really is true that, usually, the things we don't like in others are the very things we struggle with.

changeable/unchangeable,
steadfast/flexible,
dedicated/knows-when-to-let-go

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!