Wednesday, September 29, 2010

I've Been Dirtier Than You'll Ever Know

I.
I am not a ripple-making rock thrown into the pond of eternity with my significance fading away as it gets further from me. I am a mighty meteor crashing into the middle of the ocean. You are terrible tranquility and I'm here to tsunami your psalm trees and shake up your sandy beaches, your obsession with the sin-ery.  God's thoughts toward you are countless like the sand. You were meant to build castles and kingdoms, not number them. Consider the time that each grain represents, as it slips away through the hourglass of eternity. Tell me. These words. Don't you love these words? Don't you love their sound, their comfort. How they never expect anything except your satisfaction? You could never afford this. You have never paid your dues. We are never easy. And yet we are prostitutes; Why did you let them throw pigs among pearls?

II.
Tighten your hold. Vice-like grip.
This dagger would never slip.
Blade blaze. Already blasé
from the taste of blood.
Must possess beauty. Must mark it.
Exist only in memory.
Dagger's tip and Masterpiece must meet
First lightly. And slowly.
Fingers fleet over terrain; Over dreams slain.
Feel destruction in every crater,
As flesh gives way to steel, to lead,
To voices in your head.
Where perfection retreats.
Left hand stabs. Right inspects.
Soon we're playing five-finger fillet.
One-two, one-three, one-four, one-five, one-six
Two-six, three-six, four-six...
Sooner or later you'll be playing butcher.
Squeeze me. What did you expect to see?
Tear out these veins and see worship stain the pews.
Go ahead and stare. Make a scene.
Scream and call it horror.
The greater horror are the millions dying slow deaths
in buildings we call places of worship
Playing a game called religion.

- Daryl Goh

Saturday, September 11, 2010

Home Was A Gift Of God

back then, where you lived was where you were alive
and you climbed trees, you could touch the sky
back when houses hid behind garden forests and felt safe,
when homes were families,
not masterpiece monuments of brick and glass,
to flaunt prestige and class.

the mailbox hung proud upon the gate.
letters went in the slot,
the newspaper in the cylinder on top
and life was that simple
because everything was where it was supposed to be.
the gate was rusty red with diagonal grills,
which made it tricky to climb.
every contact left a mark,
guilty like bloodstains.
evidence that revealed your rebellion
simply because dad demanded it locked.

you could sit beside it and count cars
as they cruised by,
when mom and dad left for school to become
other children's parents.
one day they would put you in a bus for your first day of school
you fought them as long as you could
but those arms weren't strong enough.
you exhausted them the evening before
as you stood in the driveway trying to fly away
wishing to the stars that could be seen
from this city of meritocracy,
telling them to take you away,
while a rolling tear cries 'no!'
and your 7 year old heart resolves to never grow old,
to never grow cold, to never withhold.

and some wishes do come true
and while you stood in that driveway
behind a rusty red gate
of a house on a hill
on a road of jasmine
a voice above your head will say
you are
in the right place;
you are a gift of God.

- Daryl Goh