ZILCH NETWORK
By : Iris P. Concepcion

Found a way out of the useless words sprouting, eggless and unbobbingly. Just do not read.

Two considerations, I was musing a line, perhaps, having desynthesized by the thirty seven million data my mind keeps on replaying over a couple of days. It was from a film. It made me want to barf---the sublime greediness of the scheme. Ritchie should have megged this instead. Truly a functional spread of covert immortality.

I therefore reread my short stories, the pseudo chick lit I wrote as an ode for the little one. I struck out the messy insertions of that despicable, tawdry, three-lettered word. I really do not like lines bearing the silly and sissy "yet". It is not direct. I just struck out its superfluous appearances in my immaculate lines because the word itself connotes plasticity. The word is unwelcome.Totally. I could not trace why the peed word rained on my pages like acid.

As I am mind streaming, I formed an ad line : "Experience honesty........with us." I don't know where to use it. Bank ad? A sanitary napkin ad? Infomercial for breast enhancement programs? Tremendously, my brain, tremendously revolts. I am fearing I will develop the spiral hair of Toph's brother here. How is he?

For the words flown at my direction despite the short circuits doing poodled hops, the valentine group, gracias. I have heard the loudest because I have felt the deepest. Pride is not something I bullhorn via the aquaducts. You know that by now.

Here, though: It tickles me to death that when I look at things around me, in any medium, the world class superiority of the unique craftsmanship, the brains behind them-----it tickles me haywire that these people, these crazy, unbrady bunch, have put out the garbage from the corn's gate one time. They even made my fictional turtle first class, via a moisturizer ad. Equating it with an event during the Eisenhower years.

All of the usual suspects? Ya know, yar loved. Genuinely.

HOW THE RINGLETS GOT FAMISHED
By: Iris P. Concepcion

The recent journey which produced the entry prior to this yielded the not so badly taken shots and belatedly placed arrows to the book-reading community and visual technocrats. I had the most superfluous supply of anecdotes in paragraph forms that I didn't go out of my room, joyfully, to read them. Except of course when I post-do the pre-fart thing human beings do.

I am looking out, searching, exploring for new words to use. The dictionary is no longer enough a word bank to letterize what's practically screaming to get written.

As I was writing, I got freebies, sweets, clothing but I was itching for my hands to touch, bookwhore that I am, a selected short story collection. I will not name its author because, I mean, well, it is a dead give away. I also fear that the writer will escalate his popularity level to mass appeal, someone so generic like salt and ordinary like lips and peck-able, one you can pinch your ears to connote coziness---I don't like him easily reached that way. Why? It is way too corny.

So here:

The Book
A review by a bookwhore (there fairy sis, is your word hahahaha)

The number of stories is 14 which is a deliberate, conscious selection to name the Nimble. wide-hipped (an uproar!!!) blast from the blog.

The first story was definitely meant to astound. To lend meaning to its cover. The author was correct, the hoofing sound through the horse's nose got my forefinger saying : "Yes, yes, yes, this was drawn pretty good..."

The author, in another time capsule had been homaged when he drew a diagram where a whale peeked out from the blue ocean. As the reader was reading, she felt euphoria that the x mark in the not so scientific table as unpredictably Einsteined, was truly, where the whale emerged. This, from a book about pain. That's absolutely a genius work.

Hence, when the magical style of narration, the horse's sniffing air (what do you call this?) round and un-animated (like a comic drawer would, perhaps, in the 1940s), the reader sensed a Proustian remembrance. A classic nose hoof there. It really looks like it moves.

More than that, however, I adore the little hair surrounding the gladiatored upper half body of the animal. It was drawn like rays of the sun, but for dwarfs. Without possessing a 20/20 vision, you will miss the spectacular, mind-expanding drawing of little porcupines on the horse's head. It can blow the planet away.

The first story was picked, I am just hunching of course, similar to a mind picker because it is superbly vagued and the author knows probably that he has a silent, vague-fixated audience so he chose this particular story. The author now thinks, helplessly: "I am quite esteemed to have this kind of reader." The man and the horse decided to fly and so they flew. As Updike's advice was heeded. Just like that. There is Kafka reference (I don't want to die like a bug), social dynamics (the kings entombed) and artistic inadequacy (exterior magnificent; interior, drab) if the pyramid was a symbol.

Story number 2 is exactly the way one should feel about poems that are NOT written. That amazing grasp of disgust.

Story Number 3 is the best there is since Hugh Hefner perhaps bedded 1,001 bunnies or something. This is the most discreetly explosive tale of the hormonal unknown. Yes, this is surfing (some b.s. wanted me dead, they ought to fix their butts first, perhaps?) and since I write, the awkward but marvelous, nonetheless, explanation to sanitize, clinically, something that is already damp, is laborious (I feel that, weird Al hahaha).

Director Scallop whose mouth was tickered off does not have this kind of problem. The struggle (The author thinks: Will this offend? Am I such a jackass for writing this?) is exactly, rightly, this writer's written toothache also. I always flinch when I attempt verbalizing the waves. What the heck : (K: Jesus says you're a prig!). They should have printed this in Playboy to cater to grannies while they gasp : "Que Horror!"

Story Number 4 is an ode to carpentry (hahahahaha). So J.U.

Story Number 5-9 moved like pretzeled wind, articulating what people go through in anger, pain and that most horrible thing of all, loving. The QT ending, I know I have seen or read this before, shooting the shitty cow and pulling its severed head and attaching it on the shooter's own, you'll get this kind of gore if you put Tarantino and Scorsese in one film. I love the "Silent" equivalent of one short because the nickly moon talked in a dialogue. He is horned-brimmed, of course. All that fidelity and devotion. Yes, special tape it is. These stories have very finite sentences. Fluid, short but so exact. It ended with a moon which "began to speak." Everything is possible as it is.

Stories 10-19. Hodgepodge. One gets a Heller type of writing here. The title is about mothers. Ahem.

And death and mountains (close to my own lake essay) but this is a woman's tale. I was waiting for Colin Firth to appear but he didn't. There was a line about zebras. Do I like zebras? Yes, Arundhati, and my name is Tarantula. I like zebras because they are painted by a color blind man who can only recognize two colors correctly : Black and white.

I also swear like a convent girl would once outside the convent, that Doyle was sneaking a line or two in between the paragraphs, like a thief restoring the stolen sentences. I think I got the process rightly. Absolutely an act of faith.

Thank you for lending this writer's little entity a literary voice. About time. He made the writers sing like nightangles. I didn't expect that. I expected you'd all conk out but no. You all leapt like princes in tight pants. Now, you can kiss each other sick. Hehehe. I think I sang with Casey's brother. It is spooky, remembering the dreamy, icky music video of that gay past. Hahahaha.

Damn miss the real writers. Double films cost much these days, donchathink?

IT ALL STARTED FROM THE END
By: Iris P. Concepcion

These three pictures were taken before I touched the sky, feeling wuzzy out of a sleepless night. My cheeks are red from dryness, my eyes baggy but blinking. In short, it is my plain ugly, hellish, self taking these happy pictures.


The last one is a futuristic look to a surname that's like a prefix to a gun. I got curious with its industrial design----a brand of some sort where bags get checked for inspection before boarding a plane. The background, the shadow stripes, is a bag I lent from a friend. As it is, the pic could stand for utensils, cutlery, sleek gate name for a married couple with a brood hellbent to learn softball. It can be a shimmering car's hide. It is overtly masculine, I think, not a trace of limpness there, with a little brash of poutiness that's like a courage emblem. I liked how it came out of my phone.

I was at the airport five hours before my sky hunting and I felt all the intersection buzzes, similar to that Brit flick "All You Need Is Love", only, people here were not kissing. Everyone was removing their belts and shoes (placed in trays like jewelry) for security check. I did not see its coolness when I got my turn to remove my own butterflied flip-flops. I got a super red wang wang though when I passed by the detector because of my pointy hair clip that was immediately placed in a trash can. As I was looking at these people, it struck me as funny that the airport ground was converted into one huge, bedroom lounge. A man who looks like Rolling Stones' Keith R. inserted his belt to his skinny pants and I sort of expected him to shave afterwards if he were wearing a beard while nuns without shoes were paddling on their toes like penguins at his back.

I am in Hand's zone immediately, the fictive journey back to Greenland (but they did not land there), lifted off from a book about philantrophy and flight. So, this is how it feels like to re-arrange people in visual vista. I badly wanted to check-in the lane where cut-outs of birds (as if pasted onto kindergarten walls) chirped muteless, beside the airline name. I mean, they looked so merry, like adornments in a fastfood resto for kids. Nobody stayed in this side except myself, and because they are worth mentioning, four backpackers, fresh from a camp in Mt. Apo, I surmised, tanned and red burned like the Mongols. Among the well-heeled and fair people milling around the open bedroom area (many were walking barefoot like the ground is sandy; males were holding their belts like upturned fishes), I fixed my irises on them. That's the story on the first shot.

I eavesdropped on what these guys were so anxious about. I found out that they couldn't book their tickets and hoped to get waitlisted. They were just standing while policemen were walking like ramp models beside my chair. The smallest one cornered the longest dialogue and in local speak (Ilongo), he thus spoke: "Indi na kita ma chance passenger. Maayo siguro kun magbarko na lang kita." (We couldn't be booked as chance passengers, we might as well sail on ship). I took a long shot of these four, burnt guys exiting the airport with happy cheeks and equally happy faces and I liked looking at them, like lost schoolboys who will turn into vampires once they sail on ship. I took a pic of the smallest and he smiled. He could be African and wouldn't want to capture his soul. He had a sheepish, contented facade. I thought, I could feed these guys with milk and they'd still be smiling.

But I have to fast forward to my post flight where a hefty guy cut my hair super short. He had fishnest stockings like Minelli would and all throughout, I was wondering where he was hiding his schlong since his front was so lady seamless. My cousin said, they kind of tie it at the back.It kinda freaked me out, the idea of a man's stick hidden like a filling to a pie, incognito. I think I'd be that kind of gay if I were heavy and a fishnet dupe with scissors. It is kind of eerie but the story continues. He was with insightful, passionate people having manicures like myself.

Anyway, the third pic is rocking like a hurricane. It is an Eggerian genius, of course, a humble humbug if you may, graphed dawdle in a book. That was my feeling while in flight. Five years of being holed up in the house, I thought I might as well sleep on it. I am so tired at that time but I was revved up to see my friends whom I am meeting after ten years or so. Including the great margins---people on the sidelines I would like to think of as my super friends.

Is this Manila? I asked upon the plane's descent on the tarmac. Where are the houses? Down below, it was like a barren field. I got out and again, it was like a film, this time around, the movie Intersection minus the smoky effect on the trail path. It is a new airport. I went out of the building and saw a church that is shaped like mosque but had a Christian cross sticking out from the horizon. The lane said, Bay Five. I mentioned my location to my friends. I did not feel like this is the city I left five years ago.

Anyway this is how the journey went: I always have abundant stories about writers, performing artists, musicians, poets and though I fail to recognize them sometimes, I'd know I am with them because I develop tingles at the back of my nape whenever they are around. I really do. It may be a wickedly artificial set-up but when I say "this is so weird", even if the omelet fictionally admonished someone mouthing the same line not to repeat it, otherwise, he had to tell the repeater to stop it, I would still (if I were in fiction) speak it: "THIS IS JUST TOO WEIRD!"

Like, there is a cool visage of a feisty, spunky writer who raised hell and razed iron bars, sitting like a doll,carving her own path by being independent. She was on the phone telling someone to pick her up. Beware: small people can pack so much brain you wouldn't know what hit you unless you truly read. I don't know, I always catch myself dumbfounded when I see the usual suspects. She is with the peppy, very admirable group.

And no, you can't carry me on your shoulder, either, writer, just because I am small and light. I'd rather (this is some kind of a review of the horsey covered book) I am holding the waist and I'd be horizontally in motion like a superhero pushing a building. Picture yourself as the building. You are following J.D. Salinger's Gallagher circuit with your Hand. That's Jack's girlfriend (Jack already dead) surfing the waves and finally I know who Pilar is and why that Velocity-challenged character went to Mexico. That's intentional? The Salinger sail? It may be premeditated but I know that. I like writers who read me like I read them so you know the reason why you are there, bronzed in your sweatshirt. A lengthy discourse on the length of the selected stories---I know the feeling, the truncated shorts, you didn't know how to end it, right?

Each one is created special. I will always share di Caprio entrances with my own weird Al, the sky discussions with the girls, twist and C (who was always with the mother, I discovered, rain or shine). I realized, I look at the window like she would: with wistful gazes. I wasn't just sharing something with nobodys in that sphere: I was sharing it with a shrieking beauty. I am wearing her comfortable shirt too. And the airy hairstyle now.

But before that, I pay homage to to the most gorgeous, exotic, priceless beauty above 200 pounds. She was wearing latex dress for all I care, her round stomach looked like it was sheltering a whale and the seven dwarfs, all snug and cozy inside her sweet bulge and she'd still be damn gorgeous.

This is the foreboding, whether or not she can pull it off. Like her confession : "Jesus, don't let me f*ck this up". And she did not. Never been prouder when she went "Tempura!" like she is John Wayne, speaking the language of smart alecks and while sweating it all out, while she was delivering all this in a background with eggerian touches, three lines overlapping, I said, this is the stuff of the world YOU CAN'T PAY. If you are given this guffaw by the best writers in the whole damn world, you better start asking what you've done in the first place. It is one helluva icky and dank and hilarious spiel and hahahahahaha, though when the latex lady whistled, you just go, "damn, beautiful freak!"

I was actually teary-eyed like my friends were even if she was having the time of her life making us all snigger. My friends went : Ohhhhhhh, how pitiful, she is sweating out. And we were, the four of us, corny as it may sound, kind of semi-weeping. Weird, terribly weird. Chaplin can make anyone cry the hardest. That, I believe, now. Of all the things you want to drop tears for, you do it for the bulging thing with the whale and the seven dwarfs inside it. Hahahahahaha. It is extemely weird. The brain did it by a video of making the world a better place. Now the Tempura man and the mini-me person dropped the tearducts off. Sort of. I love this slob and the mini.And you hit it right, Sir, my country is one brilliant cradle of artists----yes, they need money but you know they deserve everything thrown their way. Just look at them. Those pipes. They are Vegas classy but had to vogue-beg. Yes, they deserve all that praise. They truly do. The artists here, performing or otherwise, can pull your socks off without leaving an odor.

You are all beautiful, really. The ordinary daughter, the Mongols, musicians, the fishnet man, the swaying WASP, the book reading public (one needs to get impressed by the walking, Hawaiian-shirted man who was reading a page on the stairs as if by NOT reading while ascending the stairway, he'd miss a character which will not appear again..).

Need I say it again? Thank you.

My birthday tomorrow and when I did the groceries yesterday, there was a birthday message through a public system that greeted someone. It could be a message for the dead but if it were for myself, then, that's kind of okay--wishing the celebrator happiness and good health and whatnot. There is still justice in the world after all.

Why? I saw a security guard who was latently cross-eyed.

There are chances even for double-seers like him and I want to thank his employer, for giving this guard a place in the employment coterie--that he was not dejected for that weird sight.

Superhero, Somewhat, Kind Of, Sort Of
By : Iris P. Concepcion

It was one scorching afternoon when I took this mask from a kid who, a day ago, was hit by a running motorcycle. She complained of aches and wanted to do some gym work after.

I thought this avatar-friendly gadget saved her. I tried it on and had my nose tweaked longer than its usual size.

What does this say about me? I like my eyes peeking through the hole like some mortal kombat warrior, hawk-eyed and preparing for flight. The look promised a conquered universe.

The reality is: I simply wanted to buy some snacks across a store from my house. I got my wish and looked golden eating with this mask on, outmoding the fire eater in X-Men.

A superhero on a blink. The mask costs less than $1 cent. But in this blog, it appears priceless. :-)

Shoes and The Beatles
By: Iris P. Concepcion

There's that shoe, suspended, with my foot in it. And my favorite band artworked superbly.

I am exactly finding my sentences back to their groove again. Great to see friends from way back.

Iris on My Own Shirt
By Iris P.Concepcion

Additional Shots
By: Iris P. Concepcion

My bookshelf. See the titles.They are sleeping atop each other. Amis,Mailer,Jong. Updike occupies one line, beside Roth (the Eric Roth tip was exceptional---Only Zuckermann and Rabbit and myself know the ties that bind this particular thread). The glass cracked, that is the update on my bookshelf.

The Eliot book is the best gift I received last year.I reread this like I am Energizer Bunny and feels euphoric just seeing,as opposed to glaring, the pencilled annotations.

The ducks are truly pretty. They do not have a leader so they walked in different directions. But in that arrowless world of theirs,they seemed happy being ducks, with a ricefield and great sky as their witnessing background. I was doing my morning exercise and saw these little swimming flock going on board the land. Cute.

That's a sandwich. Egg sandwich. I was chewing and took its last breath, before it went down my mouth. Brain's gotta love the caption.

Plateing,being,a painting on a plate. This is my plate and it really looks like a Christmas card.

Storied Shots
By: Iris P.Concepcion

Match the pictures below.

I like the idea of a clown as an invitation to a ministry. This was taken beside a jeepney terminal. The time I took this shot, there was a bottle of shioktong at the entrance of the edifice,a forlorn bottle standing quiantly. I love the rules as is. Simple,direct,totally fresh,not to mention,enthralling.

The Apple Pie pic is epical, historical. Mike White's character politely ate a double cheese burger and out of my outlandish panic,I took this shot from my disarrayed eating tray as some form of my convenient unpanic button. I gobbled the contents and gained a story. I will always remember this as a skeletal fixture, the true school of music.This is my heart if I were a fastfood outlet.A healthy man striking a smile, a neat hairdo,bourned gorgeous apparition.

The Book pic is my favorite. I took this from a notebook. I skipped the word "note" and got this truly cloudy image of my soul. I superimposed the word Oxygen to this as a psychological clutch.

Birch Treed
By: Iris P. Concepcion

The father, in my realm of consciousness, has created a very apt critique on the health nutrients of milk and I took it hook, line and sinker. They may be anxious, his brilliant clique and all, but now I understood the meaning of his foreboding.

Isn't your child such a magnet? She is quite apprehensive at times. She has seen other penned artisans curiously looking at her and she retreats to what she does best : look in, look back and find the gems as tipped by the brainiacs. At least there are faces to match with the words already and she is an obedient child of the universe who will take all that in her own creative process.

You know me. It takes quite a while for everything to get absorbed, but the extent of words had given me vitality to write, and write more.

Like you, I too had been chased. At least I saw the fireflies, aside from the just "plain" kibitzer chasers.

On my shirt went this line : Precious Hollywood, those who are like me, in some ways, circumnavigating that living theater.

J.S. Hoofrah and Marilyn Strider: I love the incredible trailers done. I laughed my butt off when the caveat came early in the film viewing i.e.: You may be sitting beside a pirate with a camcording. And John Cusack's sister is actually The French Lietenant's wife? Guys, you just do not know the enormous buffer you are doing to me, buffoons you may be but pathetically (I say this in a loving way) way too within the writer's wavelength.

Quotes
By : Iris P. Concepcion

They responded and nailed the nail on the head with the proper hammer.

So this, I got from a Zaire website which found its way into the optics and fed thy creepy self again:

"That brings me to the lesson I learned: do it because it's what you want. That goes for anything in life. I went with engineering because I liked to design things, my parents suggested that path, and I went along with it. Yes, I convinced myself that's what I wanted, but it wasn't, really. Ever since then, if I'm making a semi-big decision, I'm certain I'm doing it for the right reasons. Namely, that I actually want to do it."

Yes, I truly have found my home in terrible clowns with extraordinary language skills. I am being whacked for things I truly did (slothness, etc...) but it irks me when the clueless assume this is just fun. We know better fellas and that robot, hollowblock-bringing piece of smug went to his dictionary, wondering if he can be hip. He should learn the four important things in life according to the fiendish circus. Of course, mother has superior taste---she doesn't own a big tongue for nothing. Only the merits son, only the merits.

I know the effort involved is tremendous (we have the luxury to make films that can blow the galaxy away). So rest. Relish the affinity. Soon, mother will become a domesticated animal and needs to replay the Preacher's Wife one million times over. Even the hardknocks elongated their lips to the hilarious factory going on in the block.

And give it to the youngest, he always sings beautifully, bar none. It tickles me rhino-folds over they caught up the fire. Snoogan as a word landed here and became Filipino. Woohoo.

Oooppps. Literate people do not use that word. Cheers big fellas, cheers.

FAMILY CIRCUS
By: Iris P. Concepcion

I got some real cool shots on my cellular phone.

There's a bad monkey, somewhat signalling something to the elephant (it is really cute) painted on a God-worshipping place but with an amusement theme park aura to it, with eatery stalls beside it too, blaring ditties, as of the moment I was thinking of comfort rooms, Kenny Rogers and Linkin Park, a weird mix-up. I am going to post my ultra badly-framed (as opposed to just badly-framed) pics and allow the readers to enjoy the fruits of their superior, collaborative labor with my outmoded but functional cellphone camera.

Goodwill Hunting is the patty in the bun, the cream in the ice-cream, the lettuce in the salad, the dye to hair, the feet to slippers, the demon to afflour. That dreamy boy just went toast with that cashier shot in the film. Outgorgeoused by the partner. Haha. Didn't you develop crush on your buddy? I mean, if I didn't know he has brains and knows books, I'd tag him as some kind of a Chippindale dancer. And I'd be so gay.

I sort of felt segregated from humanity (those who can't understand always say, you are out of space, or out of reality, but then, am I talking to the creative pool or to the minions hahahahaed by my foster ascendant? The latter's my moral compass, of course, so no dice, I am never alarmed). I really do not care which side of the bun is buttered this time, you just gotta adore this bunch of stripped celluloid frames gaining blood veins and flesh, navigating, getting hungry like you and me, then fades out just like the flashback tool in the movies.

Thinking David pose, what the heck, Fleetwood Mac quoter! Guys, if he weren't like Bob (pound for pound) he'd be Jesus Christ. So polite and still, the best performer in the galaxy of living theater. "Thank you, Ma'am". I'll be damned. Scream. He was served by a character from a Tim Burton film----the hair, so Helena Bonham. Bungo, masaya ka na? Guapo ka raw sabi ng konsensya mo.

Yes! And this is a confession. I thought I died but the french fries were just damn too good to pass up. So I had to chew and continued breathing. To all the guys who gained weight because they love to eat: THANKS!

Kids, I may well be below the poverty line but it will not stop me from commanding you to return the tidings brought by the creative links. I did not adore these guys for nothing. I am a psychic so I can read through them. They are, and this is a tame word, magnificent. Show your love to them but do not be too faggy about it. You know the drill.

They like the Buddy above, this ringfire and quite hilarious in what they do. I mean, totally belly churning. Hospital, burn, burn, burn! Now I know what the brain said and said well: these are really GOOD people, threading the yarn in your quilt creation.

Here's the last stopper. The scene was begging for it. The soundtrack, the people, the dialogue. Half of my brain was processing: QT's going to do a cameo, so him. I was really thinking, perhaps, he'd drop in a parachute. He got better--------he drove a freaking king of the road vehicle and wheezed by. Passing lightning!

So, what's the lesson? When you are creative, like-minded people will swarm you. If you are not creative, what you will see is just plain billboards.

Loving you all and thanking you too. I have cool friends from this side of the planet and am glad you've met them.

The Hood
By: Iris P. Concepcion

Of course, everyone knows why the writer in the bucket full of cutting and adding and pasting and so on and so forth lost her cool for about three hours or thereabouts. Then she saw some crawling hands. Is that super expensive? Auction, auction. If I weren't such a sweet cad to these snoogans (they are really Filipinos at heart----I never doubted why they can blend with my sumans and latiks--I spotted that even before. Offshore Ninoys). Anyhow, let us scale down the recent excitement to: That apparel is such a grab. I hope the weighing scale wouldn't steal all your money. I feel everything, most of all, shyness because once again, the deliverance came. What will I do without these wrestlers?

I am opening my jewelry box. (Twwiiiinnnnng!!!).

Match yourselves with the quotations below :

1. I don’t call myself a poet because I don’t like the word. I’m a trapeze artist---Bob Dylan

2. For her there were two species: writers and people; and the writers were really people, and the people weren’t.---Randall Jarrell

3, The snotgreensea.The scrotumtightening sea. ---James Joyce

4. Officials are educated, but one-sided; in his own department an official can grasp whole trains of thought from a single word, but let him have something from another department explained to him by the hour, he may nod politely, but he won’t understand a word of it. --- Franz Kafka

5. Mary lived by wondering what lay round the corner. I lived by knowing there was no corner. --- P.J. Kavanagh

6. If we cannot end our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity --- John F. Kennedy

7. You know you haven’t stopped talking since I came here? You must have been vaccinated with a phonograph needle---Groucho Marx

8. When I sit I don’t like to/ sit the way my fleshy bottom wants to,/but in the way that my spiritual bottom would, if I sat/intertwine itself with the chair.---Christian Morgenstern but this is truly Keif Southern

9. All art deals with the absurd and aims at the simple. Good art speaks truth, indeed IS truth, perhaps the only truth.---(the quoted somewhat disappeared).

10. The sculptor must himself feel that he is not so much inventing or shaping the curve of a breast or shoulder as delivering the image from its prison---Anais Nin

11. I’m fat, but I’m thin inside. Has it ever occurred to you that there’s a thin man inside every fat man, just as they say there’s a statue inside every block of stone?---George Orwell

12. Real education must ultimately be limited to men who insist on knowing; the rest is mere sheep-herding.---Ezra Pound

13. It is, we believe,/Idle to hope that the simple stirrup-pump / Can extinguish hell.---Henry Reed

14. A confessional passage has probably never been written that didn’t stink a little bit of the writer’s pride in having given up his pride.---J.D. Salinger

15. The truth is cruel, but it can be loved, and it makes free those who have loved it.---Carl Sandburg

SOMETHING CRASHED INTO THE PLATE AND I CALLED IT DINNER
BY : Iris P. Concepcion

It was a meal where everyone seemed to head into palate guillotine. I saw Bob's lapel guys masquerading as Marlo Brandos (read: the Godfather). I am compelled to write like this for the most apparent reason. The guy with the California taco badge is like the gay man dreamie boy. Kind of weird though. I head into the unknown sometimes and they come in droves: colorful people donning real bad hair but with exceptional conversational skills. I do not want to poop out nonsensically in one traditionally weird, Perros-like montage but once a great film is played, I say aye. I do not want it copied and cut so I am hushing up. Put a bear, smiley hug here.Garfield character, thank you. I love mah baby. :-)

I learned about Apple's new technology, watched U2's Boston gig, spotted some singers.

About U2. It delighted me to teach my nephews (cousin's sons) that the lead singer's name is Bono. One of them asked: Is that The Beatles? I also taught them about Lennon's band. I do that to young people, so they may be aware of great musicians far beyond their 3"ft frames pumped up with PSP mechanics.

I love Bono with all my heart (their Boston gig has a huge heart platform---immaculate) and as usual, he spoke not like a plain musician but a musical professor. Watch this clip where he simulated the Greatest Villain, the Devil, and The Edge exorcised the bad, horned guy with his guitar. A duel via music and the devil changed, submerged into goodness. If I were to use the symbolisms taught by the greatest egg, this is the equation. Guitar=Goodness. In With or Without You, the singer got a fan from the audience and while both were in sleeping positions, they sang the anthem together. Imagine the shrivelled world, in that technological intertwining, like moth and leaf. I would like to think of this band as the greatest performing group in the planet in terms of quality content. And their music truly communicates. Lithely but compassionately. I wished they sang Heartland, to fit the platform's theme. My favorite ramp model is now Bono and this gig is the best testament for the shout-out. One. Remove the first letter and you get my nicky (for nickname) embossed. Finely shot gig--it is like a Ritchie film. Give it to the Brits, they are so trainspotting. Which reminds me of Bono's shoe sole. It reads : SO U.

Iris
By: Iris P. Concepcion

I'll be darned.

I think I may have to reactivate Pluto, create my own planet and just string these people together like cut-out artwork. I then ask after : What did I do to deserve the additional stool (chair, not the other expropriation), propping me up quite prettily like Lucy, pearl eyed and all, so I'd be nearer my favorite celestial bodies?

The film makers, by their resumes, do the usual : brilliant executions. Looping with Mcs and Alice in Wonderland and I even saw my own browned children appearing from nowhere. Sometimes I wonder if I can still breathe with all this lush of creativity pouring in, in and in.

My foster father (forgive his sublime yet sharp flash warnings) told me : Offspring, they are doing it, everything your own creative scripture had predicted. Much more, they are all revved up.

Beatrice Affectation, never do a voice-over job to Bob, it makes him look gorgeous as if he ain't already (waiting for the rib, I know I'd get slapped for this).

Above all these, I owe one of my cruelest motivations from one writer who admonished me not so long ago with : "Do not e-mail me. Go fly a kite!". The name is Tom Bissell. I was praising what he wrote and he told me to do some leisure flying. Wherever harped portion of the world you are now Sir, I saw your name in one magazine and got muted by your writing position (near the border of Azure, I am making this up of course). I always go : "What the heck."

Anyhow, this is getting sappier, but how else can I unbind this criss-crossing of sick but absolutely brilliant minds? Perhaps, that is my sin. A super-turbo-invention sin.

I AM NINOY
By: Iris P. Concepcion

I will always equate today's relevance in my country with one extraordinary name: Ninoy Aquino.

Just when I thought everything he had thought, said and done is lost in this generation of blitzkrieg info, came an ad titled "I AM NINOY" (I also loved the commercial ad done for a chocolate brand which the brain tipped me off). It is a badge that is easy to wear. It is a socially cool and hip creative yarn with Ninoy's glasses doing a statesman Lennon. He was a true conscience sparkplug and this creative work kind of pricked again that lost sense of decency among us. To the team behind this responsive output, my absolute respect. Come out and be proud.

Why are you Ninoy? The difficulty of squaring off that query is enough testament that the best thing a Filipino can do, stirs and inspires the whole planet but with a somewhat frightening caveat: a solitary responsibility at its hardest. But then, flowers bloomed after the social awakening and that ought to get passed around, unimpeded, lighting up decisions in whatever form. I am a fan of the man and I am the first one to say, his words need to get flourished. I am proud to be Filipino because of two reasons : Ninoy and its artists, both living and dead.

I have one personal request. I had been reached in a galactical way by this hero's kid who is now an entertainment figure in this country. Very forthright woman. Oprah can perhaps do a special on people like Ninoy or Havel straight from the mouths of their children. Real Heroes' Sons and Daughters who had carried on the dreams of their ascendants in quite quiant, oblique and different worlds. I know my personal endorsement wouldn't back off from any tough question with her public, colorful life ----just to fan the spirit that honesty IS cool and truth, palatable. She said in quite a candid and funny way that she had paid her taxes and almost wept at the amount she had to shell out. I guess, that is her way of saying : I want to see infrastructures rightly put because I had paid my dues.

I am doing this because of her father primarily and I am doing this for her talent, albeit secondarily, but deserved.

AWED AND CONQUERED
By: Iris P. Concepcion

I just watched the intestined brain's tremendous effort to connect. He always makes me feel so unworthy despite his truth, his passion, his creations.

I never, ever, forever, comprehended the extent of Stiller's description of this corned wall until this grey matter talked. I really do not know. Bob made me pee on my pants laughing yesterday (badly framed shots but I envy the film library---the cleanest in the grocery/household list) and today, this walking cerebrum was actually opening his mouth, quite fidgety. And words came out. And he is wearing THE costume of the land, my land, talking about being a stalker/fan. I did want to break down, right in front of the monitor, wanting to sob like a drowning baby, the tears forming the words "confused by how far and wide words can engulf this blue planet." Quaint did the opening shot, correct? So Kill Bill. Really now? I am astounded. I have never felt so dumb in my life. Like me, there must be some acting coach's tremor in the voice but I never misjudge the world-class, gorgeous, mass appeal sincerity (I am mimicking you as if you didn't notice). I could not cry because we are a noisy race and I am with my countrymen right now. I could not repudiate that.

Yes, me. So many opened doors, lending credence to something I can only fantasize. I am looking up on those faces, huge, huge faces moving for a changed world while I am struggling with personal, domestic things. For bringing the best of your creative outputs to my tiny ear cartilages and my rather watery irises now...........you already know the next words to this sentence. Gratitude. It is free. It is felt. Eaten even.

Truth be told, there is an affront to my process by sectors you already know: all the blahs and blechs. It is happening. If the Ohio brothers of Harvard can only speak on my behalf, I am sure they can produce something out of this.

How to filter confessions that people like THESE wanted to go on-line to decob the cob, I am inclined to say, "what the------hair". But with all your resumes loudly and proudly presented as credentials to your productive outputs, I now go "what the-----scalp." Hahahaha. I am so amused by all the frenzy before. I did not anticipate the magnitude. Henceforth, I predict, I will continue being dislodged from my seat of star-struck awareness.

Yes, you all know I want to be with you, creative, genius nuts (still working on the tearducts but tears won't fall because I am laughing, laughing, laughing and it is merry, merry, merry).

I am taking the challenge quite seriously. Seriously Dave, the world's floor is all yours. You are everything what your books present : a truly staggering gift without the fancy ribbons. I love you too as a respect. You know the drill to that.

And to Mr. Spock's assistant : One question, what's that old fashioned cellular phone doing in your hi-tech house? It stands out like a clueless loser hehehehehe. Love you too man.

STAR TREK VS. STAR WARS
By: Iris P. Concepcion

Confession: there was some fusion of farting and melancholy as I was browsing the world wide spiderman's web--aiming to find gems to my jewelry. I did not realize how untechie I am until now. Thus, I understand my cursing foster father who guiltily parted with his typewriter, like having to write without his hands, getting ribbed for being so old world. These young 'uns communicate fast and visually, too.

This ignorance shielded me from the magnets of doom I presume.

In one of the funniest home videos, a girl with cropped hair got chased by a furball and she had to run. It is exteremely displeasing to have those offhand slurs getting in the way of reconstructing national consciousness. Had these bad echoes of tambourines read (I mean slumping on a chair, ingest letters, understand its contents and not wear Andy Warhol since there was a typo error committed on the artist's name), they will regard it as trash. These had been confessed in a superb literary way like Sylvia Plath's character eating her Japanese blooms before. I guess we all know our lineage in a grammatically right sort of way even before we went berserk.Had these book characters stole the "living on a jetplane" life forms, I will be the first one to raise hell. But they toiled it. They know their lay-outs first before they knew their lifestyles. I direct my pieces to artists. And they are artists, bohemes but evolving.

I too was invaded by no-brainers and I have to bear the brunt of their helplessness.

But I see your virtuosity again, especially the shyest and cutest mongrel ever to sing a tune. I am glad he is an offspring of a hot woman (Jesus Christ, did you read the first sentence of this entry?). The New Year present blew my socks off. It pisses me off you couldn't do this mainstream.I thought it was just snarl before, getting tangled up in outsmarting the wits of reality, its mundane, daily breathing. But there is affectionate love there. No wonder De Egg hates my inoperative wink and instead spreads cupcakes in Sudan. Writers are forever, not just diamonds. Thank you for reminding me it is no fluke. I am still harboring this wrong notion you are using your mother to deplanet Neptune.Defraud her to gain fame.But how can I fault them who are just innately inventive?

Silent Barney (laughter)....this is my take. Ever since I became a gem specialist, I noticed the improvements in the creative processes, your links and all. Impressing. That's a craftsman's unspoken motive. It works sometimes. All you've got to ask is : "Where's my corn cereals?" There is really a tremendous organ castration when this avowed Star Wars fan tweaks faith, pulling our t-backs off. Fellows, he is actually a sidekick of Mr. Spock. Damn it! I wouldn't tell you to shut up since you love my people and I saw the most genius comedians/actors in your side of the warring front embracing my often penniless circus. Can't you talk to Mr. Harvey? I am so bad in this unlobbying for butt-saving works. I am quitting. Hahahahahaha.Did the suit fit? To the engraving world, you should watch Star Trek,Nemesis, the uncut version. Whoopi G. is on it. This cult work had been invaded by slaves of Lucas.Funniest. Ever. And the making out part is a B-movie super action: tacky, like it is an ad for a laxative and I kept on laughing my larynx protested. Only some skewer in the sewer can do this. He tried to be Jimmy Stewart and ended up like........himself.Hahahahahahaha.

Well, I want to have Hand's hungry book at 8:57 sharp. I am finding ways to get this as a gift. Please check his site, it is still the smartest. Valencia is a food here. Arroz Valenciana. Aside from the foster father, you give the best tips on how to nourish the brain.

I am still checking, paying attention to your works.

A year ago today, I drafted a Manifesto, sort of pledge that swayed between two navigable, mushy islands: corniness and sappiness. But like the Declaration of Independence, this was the formal engraving of the hand jewelry prior to my home made quilt as superimposed to a sleeping wear. Long story, this known gibberish of mine, but if you write or hum, you know that this tale has, as one reality biter artisan had coined it, started a blog explosion.

Well, I have a story. It is not even in the head as of this encoding but germinating in lush, outside. Picked up by great people and continued. I will share it if the quilt family will command me that they will develop goiter if I do not.

What is happening to me, right at this moment?

I am in this unique rumination listening to a duet of what sounds like myself and a videogame character. Helplessly fetching. In my happyunce (not a word) sphere of meditation while "kulisaps" (shrill insects) twit-twit-twiteed, and while experiencing an aberrant stomach pang (I want noodles and burgers and sundaes), while this incomprehensible physiological script was running down my body, I accidentally looked down on my aching foot.

There it is. As I see it. Not the wound. The print.

A letter. (A letter?? The Chipmunks chorused. Just imagine the background).

Yes, a letter. (Oh, a letter!! This time around, by Barney).

I picked it up and read, munching mangoes sneaked in between writing these paragraphs ( gifts from God). I am writing it down here as I am reading it.

(Goosebumps insert).

"I could not think of any other applicable salutation, of any other opening line, but button, my blood veins speak thus, for you this day:

There is a rotten smell, decaying leaves, no walruses, badly polished nails, absentee inspiration but you lay, afloat, in the cartoon strip. Bringing a replica of your anatomy, x-rayed. You were telling me the most awful thing of finding work in your cute, large shoes. It was your eyes that caught my fancy. In the decapitated states of humanity going to and fro, assaulting your soul, hollering, bellowing, echoing like broken sanitariums, you sought refuge on my face and I did the same to you. That was sacred, that gulf finally connected, swam, waded in, watered, fixed, finally confirming that we OWN each other.

What am I saying? You asked me what's the most heart fluttering occurrence I have encountered, among many other things I had experienced. It is that previous paragraph. I saw your tiredness; I felt your fatigue; I wallowed with your disappointments but in that brief connection, in that gloomy, sad, desolate certainty, we shared the most peekaboo thing to occur in such dampness: we both made each other laugh.

I still couldn't give you much. I haven't given you anything. I always seek out what you want but I am comfortable with the thought that you do not want anything else in the world except to see me as myself.

You cannot say I do not love you to someone who you've always loved. I will never know how to break that chain because until now, when I hear us, calm beckons. Like balm to a tired spirit. I like it when you celebrate your birthday. It means another year of being able to utter this: I, still. IT.

Gladly,
Lying On A Couch Thinking of Spiders"

This is the part where you, readers and myself, do the Goo Goo Dolls test : Ohhhhhhhhhhh.

I finished reading it. I laughed because someone was shouting "Mommy!!!" as she cut in the consciousness. I want to be loved like that I suppose (wink). The woman who wrote it must have truly realized that the most important thing in the world may not be bought.

That being done, I am going to address my Valentine ilk, and my individual wishes for them, on the pretext that they all missed out the Christmas ramblings from this corn. They know they are adored like grilled hotdogs, bitten, genuinely teethed.

FOR THE HUBBY:

The laying foundation you've always wanted for our sanctuary. Subtext? None. Hahahaha.

FOR SKULLDUGGERY:

Why are you hanging those paper skeletons outside nipa huts? I want you to have a poetess with a heart of pure gold. Smart and beautiful who will protect and guard your heart as mildly and ungreedingly like your Mom, her who respects and sincerely loves your entire galaxy of do's and don'ts, your colossal confessions, your smirks and curses. You have written a lot of things and I've never been prouder when they alloted your works for reasons that surf and wave across continents. You have definitely arrived as you should in that genius guild and I was with you in that flight.I truly adore your personhood and your talent.

FOR HOSPITAL WING

It took quite a long time for you to emerge as a favorite. But you know you earned that well. Thank you for allowing me to watch your creative genius upclose. You are a fine burst of creativity that is not simply fireworks. It is skyscrapers meeting protons and neutrons and Milky Way and films and misspells and mispronouncements. I love you for putting up your genius to good use even if you hate the work sometimes. You have always followed my lead even when you whine too much. Where my mind goes, so you creatively toil. Know that when you are hit, I too, wound. (Icccckkkkkkyyyy, the siblings massacred this line). I am proud that in your toughest decisions, you have always put into consideration what your Mother says. You took assignments that clash with your lifestyle but held on. I do not wish anything for you but to be more and more like myself and less and less of your bathroom sibling. (Hahahahaha).

FOR FATHER OF THE HOBBITS

I have to tell you upfront: You have invented the most difficult thing to craft in this profit-propelled communication trajectory, a world often smocked with whirlwind loyalties and misplaced usages. Poetic Convictions. You started that in these islands. You want to know what my other dreams are? I dream of watching the goings on in this world someday, not as seen through sponsors and affiliations but through artists' interpretations. You had fused the chaotic but tranquil edifices in Quiapo (two differing religious structures fronting each other). I haven't read in long years that illuminating grasp of observation as seen through slicing eyes to the wonders of places that we often dismiss as already irrelevant. My wish is for you to get acknowledged (thanks for the potato tip) rightly, free from bone aches.

I would like to see you own a flashy car, perhaps. Leno or Oprah can give you that I suppose. With the emblem: Fruit of My Writing. I know you'd hate the surplusage but aside from the boys, the best ride of my life was given by a dilapidated jeepney with wires tied up by loosened ropes, pauses here and there, conversations replete with fires of hell, totally a crumbling ride. When I alighted, I was told: "That's the unluckiest road trip you've had." I replied: "Nope. I'd rank it as the first, in fact, for sheer gut and grit."

I would like the boys to grow like your triumvirate, you and your blabbering buddies. Moons do curse and they curse nicely too.

The best take off point about my country is through you. You couldn't get more value from this Head of the Family. From the ink of this man, you'd see our race in proper klieglights.

FOR UNCLE ROUGHEN / KING JIM'S COURT

This is a new entry. I know. I got old eliminating terrible omens in my life and with wrinkles peeking out soon, it must be worthy that I still remember the brilliancy of your sentences: built horizontally by the diamond plate, spoken in debating manner by 'al shook up'. You love books and I love your libraries. I have known your fleshly presences before I finally respected your creative outputs. I wish, more men and women thinking, creating, snorkeling (I do not know where this came from), shaping up the world in words, melodies and visuals along your mold, passionate with life, speaking like this writer in passages and loving the ruddy mud and dirt and grime like you do the fragrances of heaven.

FOR DAUGHTER

I can't say much; you have playfully dolled up people in truly cinematic manner. You look well even in the most austere uniform. Thank you for uttering thy name when troubled (it makes me feel like a crude saint), thank you for being honest with your choices. You own up without bugging it up and that's greater than all the envious mudsling thrown at you. It is difficult to be both smart and pretty. If I made you a better person, I would have done my job as your reader. You are beautiful inside out. You dressed up children below 3"(rolled up shorts, turtlenecks, shining umbrellas). They walked down roads like stars, from my window, and wouldn't your heart feel glee when I know, that was done as homage to this writer? I wish you a man who can soulfully rejuvenate your passion and unleash your innate goodness.

FOR BRIM AND KARATE

For using your clout to uplift the plight of my chosen ones, my loyalty is deserved. You have been there since Day One. For showing up the faces of the affinity with much pride, my profoundest gratitude. Never failing, never seeking for any exchange. Thank you for setting up the example of celebrity support and for loving the literary (often neglected) craftsmen of this country. Finally, they have a voice in mass medium.

FOR THE BOOKER

I haven't searched for the right word yet. Bookish? No. I did not know that beyond the tart and swipes and invasion of the world, you have worn the marginalized sections of our society with much grace. I see your face and I tremble; of the brain behind that stoic face. Your pieces are truly a delight. That handshake description with the dead political aspirant is the best opening line I have read from a political essay. I see your print and I know something great is coming out from the oven. Always. I wish you own the discarded manuscripts of Ian McEwan and let's both fool around with them (hehehehe).And that we can both visit Kafka's grave while G's daughter complains.

FOR JOSHUA TREE

Hey smartboy. Unlike your siblings, you have shown a classic example of pure calm, truly pure calm in your outputs. Silence, you brought me silence. Voice, you also lent me that. You never minced words on what I ought to do, without offending. I like that simplicity, the bringing of like minded people, of humility, of providing protection to the bullied siblings, of doing your thing with people in the universe. Thank you for never, ever, giving up the vision.I truly love your friends. Thank you for believing and for slimming down. You truly look terrific now. (an atonement for my first offense). I wish you a woman without my fierce mouth. Hahahaha.

FOR THE QUID HUMDRUM

Bingo. I do not know why you never show any terror when I am commenting on your works. You truly make me laugh. The Gulong ng Palad parody brought me one week of guffaws. You are having fun with your job and I like seeing that kind of adrenalin shot to our national consciousness. I will not apologize for giving you your maturity, you need it. Someday, I will not give you a trophy but an..........elevator. Not elevator shoes. Just plain elevator. So you can go up and down and observe the people inside and create stories out of that going up and going down mobility of theirs. You are one brilliant artist. Truly. The brood will give you your Scorsesesian moment. Believe You Me.

FOR MY FRIENDS AND CLASSMATES

You know who you are.....we've met along the byroads in different spectacles but I must have done something good for you to cover for me. I will do the same thing, even when unasked, no questions, no fuss, no slambangs. Thank you for knowing me.

To the outside world: I will invade you soon. (Disclaimers coming......and they are coming......and still coming........).

I love each rib of you.