WHY
never again
09 June 2009
03 June 2009
it is a small and fragile i who speaks a string of pearls from a mouth shaped like an o,
one by one
maybe prayers or half-thoughts blown out like soap bubbles from the spaces in my spiderweb nervous system into opalescent candies with
shells of nothing and break like small eggs.
the dust becomes and falls together, lines up like a cocaine intake, it dreams being blown off by the wind, sucked up dreadfully into the mind of God, becoming something maybe something like the chilling consciousness of a clear blue morning, if that's what exploding in His nervous system is like.
but i mean, who am i kidding? there is hardly any breathing when i open my mouth to speak.
it is the small and fragile i who talks about you and we and the next couple of days,
one by one
time leaves as if the ocean on the orange horizon is really licking up the sun into lines until the sky swallows the ocean in a large black mouth. no one wanted this, really,
being up all night wondering about an answer, waiting to come out the other end of the universe into light again, waiting for the damn the baggage to slump out of the black hole and around the metal carousel number 8, imagining that it would instead be all of the questions of the world solved and packaged, coming through to us
one by one
maybe prayers or half-thoughts blown out like soap bubbles from the spaces in my spiderweb nervous system into opalescent candies with
shells of nothing and break like small eggs.
the dust becomes and falls together, lines up like a cocaine intake, it dreams being blown off by the wind, sucked up dreadfully into the mind of God, becoming something maybe something like the chilling consciousness of a clear blue morning, if that's what exploding in His nervous system is like.
but i mean, who am i kidding? there is hardly any breathing when i open my mouth to speak.
it is the small and fragile i who talks about you and we and the next couple of days,
one by one
time leaves as if the ocean on the orange horizon is really licking up the sun into lines until the sky swallows the ocean in a large black mouth. no one wanted this, really,
being up all night wondering about an answer, waiting to come out the other end of the universe into light again, waiting for the damn the baggage to slump out of the black hole and around the metal carousel number 8, imagining that it would instead be all of the questions of the world solved and packaged, coming through to us
30 May 2009
my dreams before I forget them
I am in North Korea. They are holding a celebration of some kind for their beloved leader, and to commemorate their nuclear weapons testing. The festival is huge and glamorous and they have exotic fruits like mangos and strawberries that I wonder about. How did they get there? The street vendor has an icy smile.
Somehow the colors are vibrant, like a Chinese New Year. People dress up in costume. Am I insane? I guess I've never been here before and I walk around writing things down in my mind while over the loudspeaker spoke Korean and an English Translation by Michel Norris talk about the history of this wonderful nation.
I see my aunt and uncle and grandmother. I run to them surprised but when I opened my mouth no Chinese came out. They barely recognize me. My cousin is there too. He starts a chant
"Kim Jong Il!" And everyone would reply:
"Kim Jong Il!"
"Kim Jong Il!"
"Kim Jong Il!"
And screaming and shouting and clapping and everywhere there is noise as thick as the hot summer air. How did I get there? I am about to tell my family I somehow got a free weekend pass when a tall, lanky Korean man comes to face my cousin. The man has long hair. His beige button-up doesn't look very proletariat, I think. Glasses and leather shoes, he could snap in half if he leans down any lower, staring at my cousin, nose to nose. My cousin's mischievous smile responds look for look. When the tall man turns to look at me, I am ashamed and I look at my feet. He laughs, walking away.
"Dont pretend, we know", he says.
I walk along a hallway with my cousin I hadn't seen for a year. I want to tell him everything, but on the loudspeaker, Michel Norris started to talk about recipes and food.
"So, tell me about this dish, what's in it?"
I look at my cousin, I try to ask,
"Are you understanding this?"
I wake up to the radio. It is about a lentils recipe, under $5, the interviewer was Michel Norris. Bryce was listening to npr while I was asleep.
"Did they talk about North Korea?"
"Yeah, but that was about three minutes ago."
Somehow the colors are vibrant, like a Chinese New Year. People dress up in costume. Am I insane? I guess I've never been here before and I walk around writing things down in my mind while over the loudspeaker spoke Korean and an English Translation by Michel Norris talk about the history of this wonderful nation.
I see my aunt and uncle and grandmother. I run to them surprised but when I opened my mouth no Chinese came out. They barely recognize me. My cousin is there too. He starts a chant
"Kim Jong Il!" And everyone would reply:
"Kim Jong Il!"
"Kim Jong Il!"
"Kim Jong Il!"
And screaming and shouting and clapping and everywhere there is noise as thick as the hot summer air. How did I get there? I am about to tell my family I somehow got a free weekend pass when a tall, lanky Korean man comes to face my cousin. The man has long hair. His beige button-up doesn't look very proletariat, I think. Glasses and leather shoes, he could snap in half if he leans down any lower, staring at my cousin, nose to nose. My cousin's mischievous smile responds look for look. When the tall man turns to look at me, I am ashamed and I look at my feet. He laughs, walking away.
"Dont pretend, we know", he says.
I walk along a hallway with my cousin I hadn't seen for a year. I want to tell him everything, but on the loudspeaker, Michel Norris started to talk about recipes and food.
"So, tell me about this dish, what's in it?"
I look at my cousin, I try to ask,
"Are you understanding this?"
I wake up to the radio. It is about a lentils recipe, under $5, the interviewer was Michel Norris. Bryce was listening to npr while I was asleep.
"Did they talk about North Korea?"
"Yeah, but that was about three minutes ago."
26 May 2009
Congratulations! lai is boring
Karen: I need sleeping pills
Lai: you need a boring movie
Karen: nn.
Lai: you sound like you're almost there, though.
Karen: I'm faking it. Oh I know. you should read me GRE words.
Lai: haha. Ok. How about denigrate?
Karen: What?
Lai: Denigrate? probably has to do with lowering the status of a person. Or something. Like that other word relegate.
Tina: Oh.
Lai: Hm. How about hegemony? Maybe that'll be on the GRE.
(20, 30 seconds later)
...and that would be an example of hegemony, or a hegemonic system.
Lai: Karen?
Karen: nn.
Tina: That did it.
Lai: you need a boring movie
Karen: nn.
Lai: you sound like you're almost there, though.
Karen: I'm faking it. Oh I know. you should read me GRE words.
Lai: haha. Ok. How about denigrate?
Karen: What?
Lai: Denigrate? probably has to do with lowering the status of a person. Or something. Like that other word relegate.
Tina: Oh.
Lai: Hm. How about hegemony? Maybe that'll be on the GRE.
(20, 30 seconds later)
...and that would be an example of hegemony, or a hegemonic system.
Lai: Karen?
Karen: nn.
Tina: That did it.
23 May 2009
lies
Fiction exists to become myself? Fiction is love?
ok. I stop with abstracts and make picture instead.
I am 4 and I'm not eating vegetables. rice is yummy because it tastes like mini-water sponges.
"lai-lai, what is your favorite dinosaur?" mom asks
I point to the brontosaurus in my dinosaur book.
"he isn't mean, huh? he doesn't eat other dinosaurs, right?"
I nod. I imagine riding on its back through the jungle, telling it to run whenever I saw velociraptors. I did not cry but I thought maybe I was supposed to when all the dinosaurs started dying of thirst in the Fantasia movie.
"it eats green leaves, right? that's how it gets bigger. so you should eat green leaves too. they make you bigger and stronger like the long-necked dinosaur. I'll even measure you tomorrow to see if you get bigger, okay? On that wall over there. Quick, eat!"
she rigged it so that I was an inch taller everyday. I ate that bok choy voraciously - especially the green parts so that I would meet up with Little-foot later and share stories about our favorite vegetables.
"lai-lai you know you cannot have a baby brother or sister. look at my tummy."
her huge c-section scar was purple, and went from her belly button and dove under her pants. I imagined the pain of falling down compared to the huge knife that must of split my mother in half. I couldn't.
instead, I imagined the little ant that i found crawling up my thigh. I tried not to kill it, but I smashed it under my fingers while guiding it away from my shorts.
I almost killed my mother, i thought.
whenever i scraped my knee my mother would tell me to hold my breath.
"There's no blood, lai-lai! that means it's ok!"
I look at the huge scrape on my leg. I look back at my mother. She is smiling. I look around. everything is the same. There must be something wrong with me, I want to cry.
"Don't cry, lai-lai. You are brave, huh, lailai?"
I want so bad to be brave.
I don't even cry, not even for dead dinosaurs.
ok. I stop with abstracts and make picture instead.
I am 4 and I'm not eating vegetables. rice is yummy because it tastes like mini-water sponges.
"lai-lai, what is your favorite dinosaur?" mom asks
I point to the brontosaurus in my dinosaur book.
"he isn't mean, huh? he doesn't eat other dinosaurs, right?"
I nod. I imagine riding on its back through the jungle, telling it to run whenever I saw velociraptors. I did not cry but I thought maybe I was supposed to when all the dinosaurs started dying of thirst in the Fantasia movie.
"it eats green leaves, right? that's how it gets bigger. so you should eat green leaves too. they make you bigger and stronger like the long-necked dinosaur. I'll even measure you tomorrow to see if you get bigger, okay? On that wall over there. Quick, eat!"
she rigged it so that I was an inch taller everyday. I ate that bok choy voraciously - especially the green parts so that I would meet up with Little-foot later and share stories about our favorite vegetables.
"lai-lai you know you cannot have a baby brother or sister. look at my tummy."
her huge c-section scar was purple, and went from her belly button and dove under her pants. I imagined the pain of falling down compared to the huge knife that must of split my mother in half. I couldn't.
instead, I imagined the little ant that i found crawling up my thigh. I tried not to kill it, but I smashed it under my fingers while guiding it away from my shorts.
I almost killed my mother, i thought.
whenever i scraped my knee my mother would tell me to hold my breath.
"There's no blood, lai-lai! that means it's ok!"
I look at the huge scrape on my leg. I look back at my mother. She is smiling. I look around. everything is the same. There must be something wrong with me, I want to cry.
"Don't cry, lai-lai. You are brave, huh, lailai?"
I want so bad to be brave.
I don't even cry, not even for dead dinosaurs.
rabbit update number 3
our backyard is blooming fruit and vegetables and finally my dream of the demise of my father's useless flat-green lawn is slowly becoming manifest. i do not know where my father got the idea that a perfectly trimmed and green 10 square feet is a status symbol of any kind, yet it makes him happy to sit on the patio and look at it.
i am happy because there are rabbits who come and go and eat my grandma's chinese celery. i am even more contented to know that it is actually my grandfather who baits the nibbling beasts, but leaves just a small space in our fence so that it is only the baby one that comes.
i am happy because there are rabbits who come and go and eat my grandma's chinese celery. i am even more contented to know that it is actually my grandfather who baits the nibbling beasts, but leaves just a small space in our fence so that it is only the baby one that comes.
19 May 2009
seriously, I have a formula
Dinner conversation:
Nancy: Snide remark accompanied by lols
Karen: Sarcastic (?) comeback
Nancy: Accusatory insult accopanied by more lols
Karen: Sarcastic apology
Nancy: Genuine (?) forgiveness
Karen: Scoff
Nancy: Leftover lols
Stay tuned for the MadLibs comic.
Next: Pillow talk with Karen and Nancy
Nancy: Snide remark accompanied by lols
Karen: Sarcastic (?) comeback
Nancy: Accusatory insult accopanied by more lols
Karen: Sarcastic apology
Nancy: Genuine (?) forgiveness
Karen: Scoff
Nancy: Leftover lols
Stay tuned for the MadLibs comic.
Next: Pillow talk with Karen and Nancy
18 May 2009
guilty pleasures
Bryce sent me this over OMGPOP, an embarrassingly addictive multiplayer game site.
It made me lols.
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