The New Bang

In my own self-conscious effort to appear anywhere, I no longer do it to invite the people I want to link with but for other reasons. Say, to get tubular perhaps. They are already rightly herded for my own taking : melodies (for those who truly create music), paragraphs and all. So let me skip the opening pleasantries and write hey to all.

I have to correct myself. As always. The previous entries were stuffed with incorrect titles and chapters.

Someone told me it is Philharmonic. Or is it the Manila Symphonic Orchestra? Whatever the correct orchestra is, it does not tarnish the brilliancy of the music arranged for that purpose. I am sorry for the mix-up.

Secondly, the book of Jeffrey Sachs is “The End of Poverty : Economic Possibilities For Our Time”. My prepositions fainted under an environment of constant heaves. Anyway, the must read chapters re : guidelines are chapters 14 and up (and not 17 as written).

Bamboo’s song is “Noy-pi” and not “Pinoy Ako”. I have a mishmash of titles but you get the drift : the urgency of my mind flights sometimes kills me too. Nabokov had something to say on this verbal exigency. He said that when he converses, what comes out of his mouth is only the first draft. I do not have the luxury to double check. Yet, it is not an excuse to perpetuate erroneous statements. My apologies.

I do have a very erratic reading pattern due to the unavailability and/or inaccessibility of the writing pieces I need to read (when they are not fiddled gawkily as if I am the one who is copying). I have to dive out from my cocoon to know if I am actually connecting with the people I want to get connected with.

On the other hand, the writers have a long feedback gestation and it is purely because of my inadequate plugs to connect me to them that it takes a while to react. They did not fall on my dull moments of sloth. Mine is an intermediate world filled with kinetic-free gaps. Thus, whenever I read something that speaks straight from my mind (had I the intelligence like them and my pen did not run out of ink), it makes reading so meaningful. It enlivens the spirit. I feel the splendor of words not passing through my veins but becoming my veins. They give me positive jolts. These writers provide some vital statistics, weight, height and all, to that world already out of my sight and perception. In my present state, that counts a lot.

I have to say my thanks again. Why? I did not foresee the magnetism of interlinked passions and callings in that area where we can still trace our commonality from. Human nature. I do not approach it with whimsical but precise incisions (say, he likes lard that is why he often lies). Even with dizzying strides in science and technology, my greatest amazement still comes from surges of unexpected human responses. Foresight. Insight. Pluck&Nerve. Friendliness. Warmth. Honesty. Witticisms. DNA could not put those in vials and freeze them at below zero degree temperatures. No special sections of reading materials will feature them in bulk and sell them with the operative word “Breakthrough!”. Finally, I have a connection outside the grasp of money and I cherish it more since I could not press elsewhere what I need to articulate without wrinkling an already wrinkled face. When one has stumbled upon this realization, it is remarkably precious. It is made priceless because it is continuing.

Can I begin now? Yes I may, you say.

Let me specifically compose paragraphs on people whom I had omitted before.

The kindred spirits include writers of all kinds. One of my favorite pieces in an anthology of literature which I inherited from my father was an essay on boxing by William Hazlitt entitled “The Fight”. The slang term for boxing in the 18th century was Fancy. Fought with bare fists with no limit on the number of rounds. It is but natural that the medium can easily quote passages from poetry and plays. In describing the fighters that time, Hazlitt wrote :

“If there had been a minute or more allowed between each round, it would have been intelligible how they should by degrees recover strength and resolution; but to see these two men smashed to the ground, smeared with gore, stunned, senseless, the breath beaten out of their bodies; and then, before you recover from the shock, to see them rise up with new strength and courage, stand ready to inflict or receive mortal offense, and rush upon each other “like two clouds over the Caspian”-----this is the most astonishing thing of all: this is the high and heroic state of man! “

Appropriating that within the milieu of life, a pounced self is like a boxer’s jab straight to the right cheek. By standing up for what is right despite being ganged up by the most devious circumstances: that is the veritable shock. Nobody can curtail one’s mind from flowing. Nobody can plaster one’s mouth from piping melodies. Nobody can stop one’s pen from further inking. Heroic acts do not need especially sewn underwear and new coiffure to get noticed. Therefore, whenever I read defiance from that which assaults one’s sense of right and wrong, I automatically consider these people courageous fighters. Yes, even if they write about their pets or play golf and drink beer on Sundays.

I have seen one of these people in my movie incursions in the past. He and his wife scouted the arthouse films together and I considered it exceedingly captivating. One normally hears of couples doing opposite things as they advance into marriage. Watching an exception to this literally walk by, one gets a sense of an everyday myth that a billion people probably work very hard to execute. I recall that because now, he expressed regret over having clapped his hands and surged forth a voice of “this is what I stand for”. This can already be reeled off as an open sesame for upturned noses (from those who may be irked by the statement). I smiled at the way it was crafted. I can spot spunk when I read one. While I am at it, I once sent an impassioned comment about region-classed basketball league to this person’s equally prolific friend. It saw print and I never thanked him for it. Now is the time to express my gratitude.

To the other habitat of wordsmiths so enamored with entities screaming in shadows, the words are: Had I been disassembling the overlapping steel from my brain, I will still get the message of battered purses and stuff like that. Someone who wept over a seventh heaven gift (some mystics call this nirvana) must have been drizzled by question marks why the offered drink never came (it normally consists of water and some dye-colored beverage in my palate). I wish I can claim I have gone Tibetan but that is so novelic. Disappearing brew notwithstanding, the guffaw-magnetic lines still secrete chortles. If there is wonderment about the zilch-dimensional visions of a triangle---it is nothing but a piece of Toblerone without the nougat. You shuffle it with other shapes and the excitement of a promise---that a candy is shaped like hexagon-that is so scary-is lost. Ask your partner for verification purposes (insert a smiley with gap tooth here). Stay away from ferris wheels during concerts because you could miss those note transitions.

On another note, I couldn’t wait to hear some new eyeband’s compositions. Yes, a light always passes through to those who wear the same jacket, jeans and shades in both the supernatural and natural world. Chic Cor(n)ea. What an especially eyerating name. With engraved gems sparkling.

I am on to something semi-fulfilling that I have not finished yet. If by curves of pages, one can spot some inspired words coming out alive, let it be known, everyone who mattered contributed something to that state of mind. I will not trade it for anything else. The best people, at least in my list, are properly reined in. Brave souls, exciting minds, bloody hearts (as I said, they never flee).