A Little Love Story

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There is a story told to us by a young priest from our diocese about true love in action. As I recollect, this is how the story goes:

One time, he came back to his hometown to pay respects to a departed relative. The dead was mother to a young man married to a young lady who used to work as secretary in their parish.


Now, after a while of stay in the survivor's house, the young priest noticed that the husband was saying a lot of weird things. At first it was thought that it was merely a play of jokes to console himself, but time came when he would say the weirdest of weird things, all out of nowhere, like: "Would you know how it happened that when I placed some strings on a platter and had it covered, when I opened, it already turned to pancit!"--It was like his thoughts have kept him in some insert of dimension we know nothing of that it became clear he was indeed spacing out and getting deranged.


This was further evident in every time they sat down together for coffee during breakfast and share some bits and pieces of wit and laughter. Also, the man cared less about the way his trousers go and so his shirt, and all about him was a mess.


All the other people who know the couple, would group together to discuss about how pitiful the wife is. Every so often they would visit her and talk her out, convincing her that she should leave the insane husband already.


They would tell her that she is still young and she is beautiful. She doesn't deserve any thing like her husband. She deserves to be happy and live a comfortable life with a man who can take care of her and provide for her needs.


But every day, the woman religiously does her tasks in that house. She gets up early and prepares good meals for the man. She cared for him like a child and respected him all the same as her husband. She did not hate him for becoming such. She would help him bathe and dress up and comb his hair when it gets into shambles. When at times people scoff at her, she doesn't give in to them and up till this time, they are still together as husband and wife as she simply shows them that she continues to be a faithful wife despite the husband's situation.

A very simple story indeed. In these times when the congress is busy discussing about legalizing divorce and annulment of marriages, it is inspiring for the Christian community to know that by the sanctity of marriage and virtue of true love, divorce is an unnecessary law.And as Father Joseph lays it out for us, this is just how the love of God is for man: an unconditional love.

It is interesting that the young wife stays by her husband's side. Could it be that the wife understands that there are events which happen beyond our comprehension, but there is nothing to worry, fret, or fear, because everything is sure to fall into their proper places when we put our trust in the Lord our God for He is Love and LOVE IS THE ONLY TRUE INTELLIGENCE? Maybe.

To think, what need does God have for man? Nothing. He has everything to Himself. He is the source of everything. He is the creator of the world. He is the giver of life. We cannot have faith if we are not in his subsistence. We cannot do anything without his providence and help. And yet he continues to love us. Despite our madness over worldly things, our madness at continually falling into sin and separating ourselves from the love of God, and still God seeks us, calls us, embraces us.

This is the Good News. The Kerygma that every heart touched by the Love of God, every soul moved by the Words of Life should announce to the world: GOD LOVED US WHEN WE ARE SINNERS.


He did not love us only when we have made steps to be come clean, to have our sins washed away by our baptism and renewal of faith.... he had already loved us from the beginning....

Let us remember, God is good to everyone be it a sinner or a saint, because GOD IS LOVE.

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Posted by innocentthing at 2:14 PM Friday, February 27, 2009
Towards You: Walking from Darkness into the Light, one small step a day.
Tags: enthousiasmos, True Love Stories

Sharpening the Pencil

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"Value solitude greatly for everything that pondering can unearth, out of the piles of thoughts of the human mind, and out of those feelings scattering on the floors of the heart. Do drink to the pleasures of hearing out the beats and voices of other souls who are looking at the same sky: in discourse we do not only exchange ideas, we become either foes or allies at finding the rightful place to take our stand and fight."

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For the past two years, writing was more than just a passion for me--it has been my life. It is what I have always liked to do, but it was also something I always had to do. Being a bummer I have all the time in the world to muse, so excuse that this blog is filled with my blabbers.

When other people ask me what I do for a living, I am wonted to say that I am a call center agent, which is true enough if to look at where I get a monthly salary out of spending eight hours of my every weekday/night and somehow it pays the bills. But I am the kind of person who has a life outside of work.

And of people who are my own, they need not ask the same question--they know the truth out of the wasted pens the garbage picker always finds on my bin and the stockpile of paper filled with many scribbles (which are mostly illegible to curious eyes) on top and underneath my desk; if not, by the time I spend keying-in words on the computer. Despite that I have more than enough work in supervising the account assigned to me, I would always find time to write and write.

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At home, music is my father's greatest interest, and my mother's, mathematics. The eldest sister will pay you attention if you are speaking, thinking, and having food. The elder brother loves communal events and the outdoors while the younger of him is hooked to computers and science books, but they agree on soccer, table tennis, basketball, and chess. Altogether, everyone in the family supports me in my writing endeavors. The last child born next to me after a decade, I fondly call "Shadow" for always wanting to be almost everywhere I go (but she is actually the more sociable and I am the more recluse of us two so when we are together she usually speaks before I do so I am like her echo or alterego).

From high school, I belonged to a large circle of friends, and not everyone of us are deeply interested in letters and words. Others have a passion for fashion, others in music or arts, and still others of miscellaneous sorts. Nonetheless, I have never ran out of support from them. They always poured it as necessary, I never felt I wanted of any. It filled me with enough confidence to pursue writing in college. It was there where I first found delight in community with people of similar interest.

In my present company, I first worked as a writer. I did have a writing partner and there were also other writers like us in the office, but the environment was not much of help--I was back to being a lonesome writer no sooner than about a month. Then there were changes that had to be made. I was given the task of overseeing an account and occasionally, I was on the phone. Later, I had to give up writing tasks.

Then, not long ago, some work colleagues and I became a team, and we did work together as writers. For work, we wrote technical and field-specific articles: far from the thoughts of my midnight musings and the style is also more formal than what you would usually find on this blog. I do get paid for my writing services, and my earnings out of those endeavors are what can be called pin money, which supports my lifestyle quirks and largely funds my food trips, art ramblings, and pilgrimages. The feeling was different this time, for before we worked together, we were already friends. We also keep our own blogs , but still our main interests vary largely. One writes about sports, the other music, and I was more inclined to write of literature and philosophy.

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I seek the community of people who do have the same interests as me--not a mere sameness of activity, but a cosmic oneness--yes that same force that keeps the world together in the midst of life's complexities and diversity. I do not know how else it can be described, but that is it for me. Soon as this realization hit me, it was then that I began to explore the world again and dare to stand before others to communicate, learn, and share with others who are on the same road and are moving towards the same destination. This is how I continue to live, and of more that I will be experiencing ahead of the road, I hope to affirm my existence.

...

I will travel and I will read and I will listen and I will discourse and I will write as much as I can.

It's time to sharpen the pencil once again.

Autumn Fireflies - Part 3: Pagkasulnop Minabangui

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click on thumbnail to view larger

(c)20 August 2004 5:30pm. Legazpi City, Philippines

"Sa Paropakinabang kan mga Santos" ni Kristian Cordero

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I have been reading about Kristian Cordero and how his writings have sparked a new Renaissance for Bikol literature, especially of it's own brand of poetry, the rawit-dawit.


I admit I have not been very diligent in searching for things, but chatting around anonymously with polyglots, writers, and artists of various sorts while working out an AV for "Pagkasulnop Minabangui", I felt a little more encouraged to finally sit down and search for resources about this emergent literary hero of our region.


Discovering a podcast of Cordero reading 4 poems via the PCIJ network, I feel disappointed.


YES. I feel so disappointed, that I did not seek to know of his works earlier; for, I have several times set it aside and ignored everytime I came across a link that talks about him and his writings. I have read his blogs on Santigwar previously but with a great deal of inattention, out of sloth to study words and meanings--a sentiment that is true as with the works of all the other Bikol writers.


Today while still there are words I am not quite familiar with, having listened to "Sa Paropakinabang kan mga Santos", I discover the profoundness that everybody else is speaking about. I admire how his works bear that characteristic Bicolano humor and wit that reflects contemporary reality and a distinctly Catholic religious sense, wielded in a simple yet compelling arrangement of words and ideas: a wisdom which I used to only hear from conversing elders and priests in our churches.


►Related post: Learning the Language (An Sakong Pag-adal ki Tamang Bikol)

"I ♥ TO READ" girl comes to life!

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Notice something new on the sidebar?
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YEP! You got it, the "I LOVE TO READ" cartoon girl is off the grid and what we have now is a pretty, pretty face..............................................................................................

oooooooooooooopppppsss... it's not me i'm talking about!! *wink*


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Her name is Leslie, one of my classmates from BUCELHS.

People are a wonderful source of inspiration, and also of material resources for arts and crafts.

I just stumbled upon this lovely shot of her and I got quite carried away, so there I went and sought her permission to re-post it and voila!, there it is on the sidebar where the "i love to read" cartoon girl used to be!!

Ain't she pretty?

:D

Semi-colon

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a child, i used to be unafraid of telling just what i feel or think
but growing, i had too, my troubles to bear
my heart and my spirit was filled with many fears
but coming of age and discovering the light in the middle of groping,
once again i am finding the courage to be just who i am
without doubts, without hesitations, and trusting the voice within

Autumn Fireflies - Part 2

Chasing the Sun...

Searching through, treading where the leaves have come thicker by the number, the idea of this scribbling came to me like dust settling on my pad as filters of thought would on top of some barely used appliance.... I fell silent in awe and delight of the many splendid colors that spraye in my  midst! the magnificent variety--and now they're coming to me like the crimson sun's caressing touch on the rock face of the earthen sphere! I am not a good conversationalist; I often bring the indulgence of sharing thoughts to a calm surrender, and in the stillness and the silence, let divine thoughts play most freely, despising the need for a mesh of words. But vindications of thoughts are simply in great paradoxes! For eyes are not without a shade of disbelief from spiritual enlightenment over the true countenance of life.  We are all but particular substances: elemental passions trapped within the magnificent test tubes of the Great Scientist. I know I am not to be saved from this cleavage of burden and choice; for, weighing what is proper to me, my academics in the observing world, I felt, have branded me with tags pricing with brilliant judgment what they outrightly claim I posess, while all my other seemingly natural occurrences, they have carefully appraised as mere sediments of stone and sand.  Yet, I do contend The Pen has to bleed, to purge, The Dream, and The Words, that in the humdrum of inexperience are being deliberated whether to be pursued and sustained or, be detested and deleted yet fittingly are disposed again on the deck to draw upon in time. I entered through a door that has been opened for quite sometime before me, half-knowing what is there to find once I've crossed the line. I wonder, how, the virtues of fortune allow this frail cruiser to escapade at sea! I have trod along this path with the sinceres and purest intentions that I have, duty-bound to the fulfillment of some romantic visions, which to many, are but wild and crazy dreams. My hands led me here, when my feet were starting to feel numb already.... I felt a powerful presence... then, there was a silence that proved a voice was harkening in my midst. It told me, "You must quit holding back...You must set off and let the world know you are alive. even when being different could mean to be at odds with the world, you must be firm in your stance. Else, you will suffer for the desires that you would have given to your heart if not for the sake of compromising what you want... "You must be patient. You must not cease the search, even when in wait; the next ride of your life could pass you by ina  moment's bliss..." Then I met My Stranger. As our eyes met, it seemed like I was looking down a well which is so much delighted in showing me all the things that have been for ages been rambling in my brain, only they were in better visual order.  It evoked something in me--an explorable field of feelings. I wanted to shrink down to the minutest particle of atom at such a confontation, or perhaps, evaporate fast before the cork is screwed above me, as if I were the most volatile thing there is. But my subdivisions have become chillingly frozen, only slowly melting like ice cream on the lips of such a cute child. A consummate strangeness smoothly traced the wilderness of my repulsive sense. My time halted. Then again, My Stranger uttered words that to this day echo when the world embraces the fluid darkness of the night.... Thoughts and words continue to flow from the delicate bottle of unadulterated substance inebriating into the reams of extracted flesh, as the theses of The Pen continue the honesty of their own issuance and edition. I've been long lost in my wandering; but I now know, an no longer as alone in my feat. My Stranger, I must recognize, has become my most familiar ally, and by the break of dawn, we shall meet some more who might be with us, to walk with us through the pages of history and time amidst the rage of oblivion and suffering, to make manifest the virtues of The Pen, in this ancient quest of the land's true youth. As with the fireflies that chase the sun at twilight, so are we to dare seize the day beneath the moon's cradling calm....   *** ***** *** *** ****** ** * ********** **** ***** Repolles, Goldimyrr B. "The Fireflies in Autumn." Legazpi City, Philippines. Copyright August 2004.

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diit na birik na naman sana,
ang orasan mahudyat na
sa katahawan kan banggui
giraray mapupukaw
ang mga ideyang hinihidaw
sa otro magkakaharagilap
asin surunudan magkakapralastar
magiging mga tataramon na
kun bako liwanag sa diklom
magkukulay na mainit o malipot
sa itom na interface kan laptop
na kabanga naka open an Facebook
kabanga an naka bukas MS word
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just a little more forward movement
the minute-hand will strike twelve in a moment
and once again these ideas
which we all yearn to arrive and ensnare
will all be around and found present, capturing them,
by the letters they will be grouped in words
to ignite sparks in the middle of this darkness
or stain the glass screen with cool or warm hues and shades
that will be impressed hard and imprisoned on the black interface of the laptop
viewed in split windows of Facebook and Microsoft Word.

Watching No Sunset

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alone in the middle of a crowd
just wandering about with no one to meet
and no one walking with,
--standing out like a child wrapped
in a neon traffic lights jacket because of it--
yet is passed by unnoticed by people
who only have mouths, ears, a camera, a celphone,
and some beans ready to pay for coffee or food and beers.

in the city port, they built a boulevard
she sits by the side of the ocean
near the entrance of the leisure park
and watches everyone going in and out
they are not as many as the waves
nor are they as placid or as tided
they come in various numbers
in groups that are more like the boats
that dock on the pier, some are small, some are big,
with many things or with a few passengers.

she is looking at the horizon:
this is where the sun rises every early morn
and we are all here late in the afternoon
we could not see the sun setting
but later we might capture the rise of the moon

discreetly pressing buttons
keying in a poem
the people beside her or the tourists in the complex
they have no idea what she wrote
but then come midnight when she reaches home
the memory of sitting by the city port
where she could not watch the sun come down and go
will be read by a hundred others
who have not even been alone
musing and writing a poem
watching no sunset by the seawall.

The Paradox of Sunset, The Irony of Dawn (Full Story)

"The Paradox of Sunset, the Irony of Dawn" is a short story written in symbolic narrative style. It is the story of how life sometimes is like a hard-to-solve puzzle that leaves us contemplating, only to realize that it has solved itself easier than dust accumulating on top of your desk.

First published as a back cover feature for the "Deconstruction" issue of The Wordsmith, a student publication of the English Department of Bicol University College of Arts and Sciences in 2004, it captures the heartrending experience of two people who had known each other and lived together for almost all of their lives, to whom a major, major event happens which significantly changes everything for them. 

 Sounds like a typical story of love or something? Oh no, wait till you read the piece and discover the twist! 

Celebrate the beauty of life and love early this Christmas with this indie mini-book release. 

Grab copies for you and your loved ones today!

Contact me via the blue Skype button for details.

Learning the Language (An Sakong Pag-adal ki Tamang Bikol)

Bicol is perhaps the most romantic and most flexible language I can speak and understand. Being a writer, I could not help but wish to be able to use it as a means for literary expression. In the past, I have sat down and read books at the university's Center for Bicol Studies, partaken in forums merely for the sake of conversation and chatter in the language.

Books alone are never sufficient, for language has its rules and yet it is dynamic and ever evolving, but along with participation in the forums, I was able to be come up with a Bicol adaptation of one of the poems I have already written in English. This was published back to back in a literary folio in our department, in which luckily, I happen to be a member of the publication staff.

At leaving the university however, nothing has followed. Over the years, I have continued to write, but in the language I have trained for half of my school life. It is absurd that when we speak of writing in the native tongue, my hands fall into a hush. It is by lack of diligence in study and eagerness in communicating in Bicol that too many writing opportunities in the language have passed for me, I admit, and it is sad that there are pieces left unwritten for lack of proper words to write.

Today, I set my mind to start again, and begin by reading the works of renowned Bicol writers. I go back to reading the blogs of Jose Dalisay and Vicente Nierva. Of Kristian Cordero, I have yet to look into his writings.

For now, The Midnight Writer will have to sleep, and tonight, post the remaining parts of the Autumn Fireflies series--the last of which is "Pagkasulnop Minabangui", to mark the new avenue that this blog and its writer is heading to at the turn of the season.

Autumn Fireflies - Part 1 of 3

Fireflies, we learn through science, are bioluminiscent... they are few of the species on earth that have the utter capability of producing light through photic organs. Although the precise mechanisms of how this bioluminiscence works are still at issue, it has become a generaly accepted hypothesis that fireflies use their luminiscence as warning signals, especially usefeul in communication and even, in procreation....


Fireflies are most numerous in autumn and are usually active at dusk, at almost an hour before the sun sets--a comely audition for a metaphor to the writer, who in the words of the modest Rabindranath, "spell the day as night to justify their ink's spilling," celebrating the virtues of creation and recreation, finding joy in giving life to ideas through words that ought never to depart, and if could, ought to shed light to this gloomy world....

 

Autumn Fireflies is a 3-part series of posts featuring my first attempt to build a site filled with Bicol poetry written in the tradition and form that alludes to the writings of classic and contemporary oriental writers.

The first part is an invitation, quoting 3 poems which have evolved over time. I will post their new versions after this 3-part special. The second is the first of my works under the genre of creative nonfiction called "Chasing the Sun...", with footnotes and resource for further reading. And lastly, look on for my first poem written in the Bicol language, presented through enjambment and also filed under creative nonfiction.

The finale poem is a Bicol adaptation of "After the Twilight", which inspiration derives from a night of watching the fireflies with fellow romantics in a scenic place in Daraga called Busay back in 2003.

Jazz it up!