the sunset waves goodbye

You defied gravity

And took yourself up to the skies

You searched for your nonexistent gods

Thinking they're going to make you whole

Go ahead and reach all the stars you want

Find the person you said you'll never find with us

One day you'll fall back into the ground

And you will see

Oh, how you will be surprised

That the search was just a pretense

To avoid what's in front of you all this time

THE HAIRCUT AND SOME CLARITY

Today I decided to cut my hair. The last time was in early December last year, the one I did with Omie. I wanted it to be a boy-cut, as in really short, but when I showed the lady at our local hair salon (Fred's) the way I wanted it to look like, she kind of freaked out and said she didn't know how to do it. So instead of taking the risk, I decided to have it the way I've always chose to cut my hair. And I'm feeling better. I haven't been feeling very good the last few days, and this haircut, it made me feel... lighter. A couple of loads out of my back.

I wonder how a haircut, an act done and achieved in a very physical and tangible way, can make someone feel better inside. I have always resorted to cutting my hair short every time I feel like there's something that I needed to let out but I can't. Back in college, I had things in mind that I can't tell the people around me, I had my frustrations at its peak level, and the only solution I could think of was to cut my hair. While under the mercy of a hair-cutter's scissors, I imagine every problem come out of my system with every strand of hair on the floor. And it's gratifying that my problem is there and that I can see it with my naked eyes lying on the floor, helpless and out of me. To see is to believe, as they say.

Here's a poem I made early in June 2009:

Clarity is here
I can smell its scent
Like a perfumed cloth
Releasing my soul

Like stories of battle won
I can almost hear me cry
For freedom from delusions
Escape from this withered heart

I smile as it all becomes clear
Waiting was worth it after all
I've fought against many villains
And now I have conquered them all

The concrete walls that chained me
They have started to set me free
All the chances I took before
Slowly they turn to rescue me

Savor this moment
Leave the past behind
Exit from the guilt
For now I am redeemed.

Incidentally, the file name I gave this photo (taken in early March of 2008) is "clarity":

MESSED IT ALL UP

Do you ever wonder how it feels to be completely free from everything -- from the loudness of the world outside, from the heat of the scorching sun, from the height of the mountain that they say you need to climb, from the world that you've spent your whole life into, from people? How does it feel to be so close to freedom that it's as if the sky is a breath away from where you are? And yet the breath that will take you to actually touch that freedom means an entire lifetime you have to give up? Where were you when they opened the doors to freedom? Were you busy summing up the means to get away that you missed that single chance they gave to all those who were jailed inside their own lives?

How does it feel for those who are literally behind bars? One single act of deviation from sanity and there they are, wanting so bad to turn back the hands of that clock back to that single moment where they lost their rightful judgment.

You look at your own world and you wonder how you got here. Haven't you known? You don't need to mess up to prove your worth. Because at the end of the day, nobody even cares enough to tell you that you did the right thing. At the end of the day, you are the one responsible for saving yourself. Nobody else will set you free from the expectations embedded to you by other people's criticisms and commands of what you clearly cannot do. When it all boils down to nothing, your last redeemer will be yourself.

You wish you could just runaway and leave. If you only you had enough courage not to love.

Note to self

 

Do not allow other people to stifle your drive to dream. 

Do not ignore them. 
Do not resort to tolerance and numbness. 
Do not feed on their accusations and belittling words. 
Do not shelter their intentions in your heart. 
Do not let go of your faith-- when it's all that's left of you.