best kept secret: defying gravity

Because poetry reveals what prose can’t.


EASTER EGG
The irony in an Easter death is just too delightful to be ignored. Out of boredom and morbid curiosity, but mostly because of boredom, I wondered what it would be like to die. I wanted to know if the free fall would make one feel much more alive than how he felt before the jump. I considered naming it "Humpty Dumpty On Crack" because I'm whacked out like that.

STARGAZER
Stargazer was initially planned to be the prelude to an account of a grand love story. The latter never came to fruition because I'm too lazy to write it, or probably because the story is still on going. Whichever is more romantic, your pick. It reminds me not to over think with regards to all things love-related. Otherwise, complexities will surely ensue.

BULALAKAW
I seldom write in Filipino because I find my vocabulary of the language lacking so it was a surprise that Bulalakaw turned out fine considering its directness and simplicity. I like how it acknowledges that there are indeed persons whose problems are way greater than the petty ones that irk us to no end. Like gaining a pound, or missing a much-awaited concert.

WHEN THE MORNING COMES
When The Morning Comes is a revision of an earlier work published back in college. Whereas the original was inspired by Mariah Carey's After Tonight, the revision stemmed from a fellow blogger's entry back in March, 2008 that hit close to home.

HUNGOVER
It's that instance when you like someone, and you assume that the same person likes you back, sort of. And because you are unsure, you decide to coax that someone into making the first move. I blame this on the Cuervo.

ERODE
This is a poem about sex, damaging relationships and Daine. But mostly, it's about sex.

SNOWDRIFTS
The last line of my first short story – "and there was nothing but the snowdrifts left by the calmed storm" helped me set the setting for this poem. Inspired by a life-turning event which happened back in the summer of 2002, Snowdrifts remains to be one of my most treasured works regardless of how juvenile, mushy and saccharine it is.

FOR DAVE
This poem took me about three hours to finish. I never edited it as I wanted it to appear as raw, wordy, colorful and confusing as possible.

CALLED YOU FOR THE FIRST TIME YESTERDAY
The first 31 words that came out after a month of drunken stupor.

SWAN SONG
There's a certain yearning to go back to the life you once knew after every fall.


Defying Gravity collects my ten best attempts at poetry for the past year or so.
Because April is National Poetry Month.
In the United States and Canada.