Lucid Invasion

The world stops spinning when I catch your face
and haunting silence entraps the body and soul.
New photos of covetous smile you decide to grace
summons pesky old memories to cruelly unfold.

The heart beats faster, harder and aches.
The room, a storm. Burning. Freezing cold.
And as tiny mended cracks fracture unfazed,
laughing cupid boasts and struts his poison bow.

The mind tumbles last, but crumbles nonetheless,
no match for your lucid invasion.
My sanity, you cradle and tenderly caress,
soothes uneasy before assured purgation.

Your ghost, I buried, I swallowed, I fought.
Tell me, my love, do you enjoy playing God?

Stheno’s Kitchen

Tick. Tick. Tick.

Tick tick. Tick tick

Tick-tick-tick-tick

Tik-tik-ti- Ding!

They’re ready!

Mittens. Pan. Table.

Hot! Hot! Hot!

Setting them down by the busts to cool.

My hair gets impatient sometimes,

hissing at the smell of those freshly baked meat.

I pet them down and put them in their place.

As I walk through the kitchen, I smirk at those hardened eyes.

Perseus will one day taste my mastery too.

Plate. Plate. Plate.

Fork. Fork. Fork.

Chair. Chair. Chair.

They call themselves Gods; playing with the helpless human dolls;

Creating freaks of nature like little Perseus.

So very tiny, so much desire to impress, so so close to being stoned to death.

Her only sin was being flawless; all she ever wanted was to be loved.

It was Jealousy, prejudice and injustice; the family that proved

the downfall of my baby sister. Their heads will mark the sacred ground

where she lay. I will turn their bodies into a temple.

And she shall be worshipped.

And she shall be immortal.

Euryale!

Fumble fumble fumble.

Snakes in a mess.

Eyes bloodshot.

Poison dripping from the side of a fang.

Sister. Sister.

Let’s eat.

Fire

The fire cleanses and it destroys like Lucifer slays.
Maybe hell and the devil are one of the same,
residing on
every holy candle lit. It dances at the back
of every mind and laughs as
it consumes you like God.

It is described in many ways -
entrancingly green, glowing red,
furiously blue and dark like
the knight.
It chills as it burns and
suffocates
as it breathes.

Do you hear it cackle?

Calmly,
it envelopes and hugs my neck,
kissing with a fervor I've not felt before;
raising my hairs then razing them down;
hissing at my tears, preying with my fears;
blazing souless innocents and begging me-
begging me to fall on my knees,
bow my heart and feign mercy.

Hush.

The sky falls bland as I lay my head.
So I pray that when the light rekindles my face,
the sun would wring
from the anger within,
hipnotic evil that shall live and rise again.

Magic Trick

Tribute to my gonggong.

A volunteer?
Of course, sexy lady at the back.
Dressed in glitter, wavy dark curls, ruby lips.
Lies down in a box; the box. Tight.
Amazing cloth, always velvet.
Catch her scarlet smirk before she's gone.

Black girl, black box, black cloth.
Silver swords, silver saws, silver spikes.
Red girl, red box, red cloth?

Black Death.
No.
No cloth. No box. No girl.

Aha!
Magical cry, magical chant, magical prayer!
Puff of smoke!
Of course, sexy lady at the back.
Dressed in glitter, wavy dark curls, ruby lips.

Now.
Beige boy. Brown box. Golden cloth.
Trembling cry. Diligent chant. Holy prayer.
Incense smoke.

Grandpa?

Their Tears

I weep for the coughs I hear down the hall

I weep for the kiss I've learned not to miss

I weep for the crows and their merciless calls

I weep for the ignorance, probably not in bliss

I weep for the television, the radio, the news

I weep for the children, the arms, the mind

I weep for the emotional physical abuse

Are those bombs falling from the sky?

I weep for the cities crashing one by one

I weep for the world holding cattle of man

I weep for the seas glowing red with blood

I weep for the guy, laying, gasping for air

I weep for the boy sleeping on white dust

I weep for the girl blowing out red candles

I weep for the parent begging for burnt crust

Is there anything we can't handle?

And I weep for the sake of humane humanity

I wish for more compassionate mentality

I hope for nurturing loving maturity

I pray for the some sort of sound sensibility

So many years of ingenious evolution

So many years of quickened progress

Always on point with being efficient

Maybe it's time to start mourning before death.

Goodnight Grandma

A tribute to my mama

Goodnight Grandmama; sleep tight tonight.
Let your dreams take you away.
Let them take you to a far away land with
clouds beneath your feet. Yes, your feet Mama,
your feet! Throw that wheelchair away, you need
it not. Not then, not ever.
There will be no more suffering and no more pain.
You are being upgraded;
your voice more melodious, your nose sharper,
your bones stronger than your stubbornness,
your mind quicker.
But your eyes will stay the same. Those hazels
exude such warmth and wisdom, they have reached
the epitome of perfection.

I miss you Grandmama.

I miss you Grandmama. Rest your precious heart.
Your amazing heart, filled with love, was never
once too full. Every rhythm had a purpose;
you embrace the world on every thump.
Kindness and empathy always by your side
as you touch the lives of the babies and the grandkids,
the girls and the boys, the women and the men,
the father and the mothers, the friends and of course,
the husband. I wonder if it had ever beaten just for you.

They told me your heart had a condition, Grandma.
They told me it was what brought you to sleep.
I think it was just weighed down by the gold it holds within.
You carried so many of us in there, it's incredible
how big it is.

I love you Grandmama.

I love you, Grandmama, I love you! Do you hear
our cries, Grandmama? Grandmama, I am screaming
up to you! Can you hear me? Grandmama!

I love you.

I miss you.

I want you.

Why did you leave?

Goodnight Grandma; I'm going to bed too.
It's still early so I'll send up a prayer, wishing
my dreams will take me away to a far off land
with my head in the clouds.

And through my pillow, I shall meet
the memories of you and learn to beat
the tempo of compassion and song d'amour,
the dance of affection and how to grow room for more.

Butterfly

Please pause. Freeze pane. Let me take another breath in again.
You were, right here, right there. I can't remember your name.
You are the blue shirt on the crowded bus,
each person pushing me toward the memory of us.
You are the music buzzing in my ear,
every beat touching me, holding me down.
You are the cool breeze on a hot sunny day-
surprising and fleeting, a phantom lingering fay.
In my arms, I caught you, I held you. Only to open up feeling our sheer dismay.

I'm In Love With You

I see your smile on the boy next to me.
Your eyes glitter across the hall.
Your lips on mine when my head's asleep.
Your gentle touch catching me as I fall.
My heart runs free through the park at day.
My love, the chain, around my neck.
My memories dances with the said, unsaid.
You hold power to change smiles to tears and back.
What am I to do,
when I'm still in love,
with the one I've grown apart?
What can I do,
when I'm deeply in love,
with the one who broke my heart?

The Way He Sees

He sees the world every day.
He gets out of his bed into his chair and out to his world.
I swear I was prettier than that little missy pushes him around.
He waves at me.
For years his eyes has never changed. The same wave as
he steps through the same threshold. When he left for work,
when he left for our freedom, when he left for the grocery,
it was in different outfits, different legs and different faces but
he has always looked at me the same way and never leaves
without his signature smirk.

Life used to be crystal clear, then a blur, then grey with the cataract sky.

I remember the bus stop we first met.
I remember the rice fields we splashed our way through.
I remember the tree we first held hands.
I remember the kiss, so brazen, at the hidden corner of my father's warehouse.

Permission. Arrangement. Engagement. Marriage.
He bore me children of seven. Seven bundles of smelly diapers,
raging tantrums, disobedient students, anxious candidates,
proud graduates, driven businessmen and grandchildren.

Today the smirk has gone old.
The concrete ceiling, I see myself in, cries in the rhythm of my
youthful pacemaker. He has been through family gatherings and world
wars with my cheers ringing in his ear; each time reigning undefeated.
Who would have known that the boy who once held my world in his
hands would be beaten by a tiny cell?

From my own prison, I can see the cancer wear him down
day by day; his clock delaying one more second every sunrise.
At least he gets to see our world each day. My eyes feel his
every wave and my heart replays that entrancing smirk.

Little Soul

We met yesterday as any other day, before dawn,

after dusk. You looked as how old would appear

in fatigue's silhouette. Scabs ripped and wounds

reopened by the fangs of another, permitted

to penetrate by your heart. I try my hand at the

bad sewing and offered five doses of a dozen sheep,

every one soaking up the congenial shame you bleed.

One, the words rerun.

Two, the cruel time spools.

Three, the flashbacks breathe.

Four, the story recalls.

Five, your jaded spirit dives
into every memory and with every memory, the
hallucinations come back with a new found volume of

sacrilegious vengeance.

Soon, what that did not once cause a tear will create

the downpour that drowns even the most defensive cactus.

Six minutes in and the girl who learned

to build her fortress of smiles is now the

same one cowering under the blanket.

Even teddy broke a sigh.

You, the luckless shattered soul, have no onus

to hear the cries I screech silent in my head.

Hush now, you are as young as I remembered;

as I pictured; as I find; as I think; as I dream.

You are as innocent as prison calls, as charming

as stars' glow at death. Hush now.

You know, the grand empires you conceive shall never truly

be safe and the majestic castles you raise shall never truly

protect when you are only hesitant to countenance
the entry of the unmelodious serpents.

Death Be With You

A tribute to my waigong. RIP.

You with the lovely eyes,
why don't you open them and see?
Open them and watch the world.
Look at my face. You created me
and then molded my person.
Hold my hand, Papa!
Look at me. Look at your son
that longs your smile.

Why are you colder than ever?
Do you need a blanket? I'll grab one for you.
Speak to me. Where are the words
of the lips that taught me two plus two?
Breathe in the air, Papa,
It's easy, like this.
Please breathe, Papa.
Here, have true love's kiss.

Tell me you're not gone, dear father.
Tell me you've just gone to bed.
Tell me you'll sit up at anytime.
Tell me, Papa. Tell me you're not only dead.
Sing me tunes of robins and larks,
Paint me pictures of sky and soil,
Teach me lessons of strength and life.
Fill me with kisses of sadness and joy.

I think I understand how this works;
what happens when one dies.
The Son calls out and you must go
but why won't you come when this son cries?
I look around and I do see,
pieces of you surrounding me.
You're not only dead, my kind daddy;
you burn in the hearts of everybody.

Pink Is The New Black

Pink is the saltiness in my eye.
Pink is the shivers down my spine.
Pink is the tension in my shoulder.
Pink is the fingers going colder.
Pink is the anger in my fists.
Pink is the lines on my wrists.
Pink is the blood on my hand.
Pink is the betrayal of men.
Pink is the hate in my heart.
Pink is my soul torn apart.
Pink is the vacant broken shells.
Pink's for the fallen in hell.

Poison Me

For the stranded refugees in Southeast Asia

How in thy ordinary did I brand’d as poison pray?

Shunn’d like plague of winter nights in May.

Our tongues doth not meet. My mistress lost.
Mine children art gone. Mine name forgot.

Paper identity sits at bottoms of waters.

I, no longer man, but pest in thy world.

Mine dirt and skin a deadly potion to touch.

Mine face bleeds acid in judgement eyes of angels such.
Mine voice the starving serpent hiss "Big bro'ers,

why art thou changing thy hands o’er o’er?"

Who the po’r unfortunate acquired me!

I yearn to clasp her embrace and feel their souls.

But storm, unkind and punishing.
It swallowed me whole.

Mrs. Montag

Inspired by the book, Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury

I got my stomach pumped tonight.

That’s no big deal. Everyone has done it.

It is almost a weekly routine for me.

In fact, I crave it.

They inject you with this amazing concoction

of dancing colors after you get pumped. It helps

you forget your pain.

They call it Euphoria.

I have tasted it so many times, the body has become

more resilient than the burning flames on the next

government street.

Protocol is to up the dose.

I crave protocol,

so I make sure I’ll always take one pill more than the last.

My insane husband has fled to join the hippies

on the tracks. Something about giving

happiness a try. I call it naivety.

Do I miss him? Well, I get the parlor walls

all to myself and the seashells are never offed

these days. I listen to them as I count the capsules.

The bombings in the adjacent city make the best songs

for each session. Upbeat and dynamite.

The poison coursing through my empty veins,

slowly seeping into my hollowed mind. Hear

the low hum of the machine, sucking the sleep

out, next to me. It sounds like his voice.

Euphoria. It brings me to the perfect world,

their perfect world, my perfect world.

Gaping heart

A tribute to my cousin, Chua Guo Wei (1993-2015)

When men of men ask of space

They talk the stars of stars that glow and shine

No. Space is where he used to place

Where now I cry, I weep myself blind

Where his smell still lingers on the sheets

Where his ghost still haunts my dreams alone

Where my regrets redden, blazes and heats

'Cause space is a cruel, gaping black hole

Thus with the devil, I’d readily sell

My soul and life and material things

For a ticket to the fires of hell

As Saint Peter sounds the judgement ring

If for a minute, you may rise

And watch me breathe my final sigh.

Family Myraid

Inspired by my amazing grandmother

4 years 6 months and a day - I have not spoken a word. The

corners of my bed define the purple sky where the pink and thistle

mocking birds fly. Olive greens and orange daffodils dress me

today. They smell of bitter honey and brown drops of  caramelized coffee.

Kids? I had 7. He promised me the rosy world and I gave up mine,

shooting tiny stars out of my coral womanly womb. Grandchildren?

More than my mind can count. Under the layers of bleach,

I sit atop the mattress that cores my red. I used to sing the shadows

away. Now I watch the gray world pass by me. Ivory walls with

hypnotizing indigo drawings. I see their work more than their

peachy looks. They see their work more than my hazel eyes. I've not
seen my face in 4 years 6 months and 2 days. I see only the devil.

The lines paint my story. This one on my thigh represents an

effort, golden ages ago, to impress the sweet invalid on the left,

who now walks with one leg, pees through a tube and lives on

a tiny orange bottle of pills. The navy cadet I adore now counts

the digits, in rows of four, every cadmium sunrise. He thinks he will

win the turquoise world and make good his promise. Idiot. This

one at the corner of my eye comes from the littlest. When she

moved, the vacuum drew a stream for the crystal rivers. This last

one between my milk machines is favorite. Ignore the nipples,

abused and chewed up in burly love. This line, now sienna, burns

still. It conceals proof that they chose to give me life. Parts

of me is laced with silver silver, parts with steel steel but the

bisque pacemaker is best. It represents the fuchsia unity I long

for so dearly. There is little opportunity for that now. But soon

they will buy a box, together, that sends me to the fiery gardens.

I don’t think they know my favorite color.

By His Grace

"Stand still." and I do. My body only moves as
his tongues commands. He defines me so. His word is law.
I, a mere sheep, follows his voice. They call him Master. He
yields moments with his hands, arresting parts of me. If I
listen well, he will make me immortal. Years after, they will
chant his name but it is the form of me they seek. He creates
timeless angels with the earth, not clay but wood.

"Beautiful" and I smile, just for seconds. An indiscretion
never to be made again. One day, I will be adored by thousands,
bought for millions. My body would be seen by the wealthiest
supreme and the richest poor. No one will see my porcelain face.
Many would hold my robust palm, full of grace, but none will
feel my tender caress. Brilliant! They would exclaim. The
details are exquisite. Unforgiving bastard.

"Stop wandering." My arm aches with the control he reigns. His
furrow speaks his displeasure. Was it for me or her? He is talented.
His chisel hammers repeatedly hard into me. His eyes have left
their lingering gaze on every indentation of my flesh. His mind has
played and replayed with every position of my thighs and my flaws
and my scars. His fingers has touched every inch of my brown skin.
I see him grow art with his wood. I smirk.

"They are going to love you." Show off. He blows the splinters
off my nails, intricately manicured. By His grace, I will soon hold
the power to make the fools drool and the politicians think. My feet
will wield their minds, entrancing them. Hypnosis will be the spell
they gladly come subdued. My breasts will entice their lips. My arse
will make them heave. My sex... Shhhhh. They are going to want me.
But they will love him.

They will not know me. She will be rejoiced as I roam back in
the shadows I came from. He has made an angel out from me.
He has made her perfect with every curve and every line. Her
presence, as large as her self, glows under the artificial lights.
He signs his name - six strokes that seals the digits in his
wallet. I pick up the change with my bare fingers.
"You are not worth the money".

The Transplant

Your compulsive eyes could capture my soul

in a glance. I suffocate by your gaze.

You are a thief.

Stole the glue that holds my sanity and

I fall, for the umpteenth time, from grace.
I wail for the element of me that absconded with you.

My frame rejects the piece of you that fused with me.

A pint of wine twice daily

to suppress the immune response.

This is a diagnosis I readily appreciate.

Arms for Change

For the albinos in Tanzania

What are elbows?

Elbows is the stump on my right as pure as my tears,

as innocent as my screams; a reminder of my darkest past.

My elbow is my hand and my fingers and my hatred.

The pearl-colored sheen reflects our glorious sun.

It represents my blacken spirit, the horrors of men who

denigrate my being with the charcoal in their souls.

My scarlet pains exchanged for their hearty gains,

and my ashy hugs for a couple of emerald bucks.

Why did you make me extraordinary?

Why did I have to be exceptional?

In this world, the uncommon are sold as common goods in the shadows.

I am worshiped as I am discounted.

Dishonor and worthiness are neighbors across a blurred line.

Like a broken snowflake in heat of summer,

my arm sits on a rotting table, waiting to create village legends

that would inspire the generation of more elbow broods.

Thoughtless superstitions.

Do they not know that our hurt is real?

My silver tip reflects the glorious son.

It hardens from the axe that took my agony.

It resolves from the bad that took my anguish.

My Lord, you created me. I burn like the phoenix you intended me to be.

My elbows signify the end of my persecution.

My elbows signify a new beginning for us all.

It is time to hack reckless superstitions off my home.

An Angel's Mirror

Buzzing air breathes spring,
Steaming through brusque bleeding rocks.

I stared down at me.