the week hasn't end yet, but there's a lot that happened already. first day of the week and a 6.9 earthquake rattled Cebu. series of aftershock and a level 2 tsunami alert that left the Cebuanos really scared. pressure from school, from the people around, misunderstandings, and expectations that fell short. i have so much to tell, but chose to just hit the bed. and when i was about to, i was directed to this poem by ASIA SAMSON. one of the poets i so look up to.
** i know this is really long so you can just go and skip right to the bolded part. but then it would be great if you can read the whole thing. ASIA SAMSON, THANK YOU!!!
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Have you ever noticed how life is a lot like toilet paper?
How it always seems to unravel faster, the closer you come to the end of the roll?
Smoking cigarettes with my father, this is what he passes down.
This profound insight the day he turned 58 years old.
My father has never been clever with metaphors.
He attends a prayer group on Saturdays.
Goes to church on Sundays.
And once a month volunteers to serve communion to the elderly, at the local retirement home.
If the entrance to heaven was measured by the path we take to reach the pearly gates
God would blow breath on my father’s feet to lift him to the sky
While I…would have a lot of explaining to do.
I spent most days dodging confession booths while my father,
My father served salvation like 6 o’clock medication
to folks who think of Communion as the frequent flyer miles we rack up to get to heaven.
Some of them have cashed their tickets by the time my father returns.
But he returns.
Every month.
If not for them, then for the old man in room 14.
For him my father remains persistent.
Peers into his room and offers Communion as if this time will be different.
Only to be met each month by a face as distant as the relatives who no longer visit.
But for the first time last week, the old man said yes.
Took the leavened bread from my fathers fingers
Placed it on his lips where it lingered, until that evening.
He went to sleep and never woke again.
Left this world with nothing more than a bedpan that needs cleaning
A 3 piece suit to be buried in
And the one question my father started asking since.
What is it about death that makes a man finally come to terms with God?
I am the wrong guy to be asking.
There’s a part of me that believes death doesn’t give you too many chances to escape the light.
You might as well smoke your lungs into midnight.
Drink like the liver deserves to be punished.
Super-size your value meals.
Pimp slap an ex-convict.
Masturbate until your brain explodes from a lack of oxygen.
There’s 6 million ways to die.
Choose one that best fits your personality and run with it.
I, I been running ever since.
Going through life as fast as I blew through cigarettes.
Tipsy walking on the rim of shot glasses.
Haphazard and reckless.
Eyes wide open.
Searching for places I’m hoping god will never find me…
------- (this was the part where i just can't stop crying)
Until I see my father.
Knee buckled at the pews.
Hands knuckled at the brow.
Eyes clenched tight as a redemption reveals itself on the inside of our eyelids.
And we are trying to squeeze it through our tear ducts
So the world can see God’s glory inside us.
My father will never show his tears.
But I know,
Watching as his temples move in prayer.
He sometimes curses God for the calloused palms
For the tired fingers.
Cursing how he can leave them so tight with faith.
While God just watches his wife, his children and his ambition slip through them.
My father, who will feed you with one hand while spanking you into oblivion with the other.
Who will lecture us why an A- wasn’t good enough.
Bring home a B and he’ll ransack your room looking for drugs.
Who will brag to his friends about us.
Who will worry about my living life with such reckless abandon.
My father,
Who after every cigarette break asks if I can stay even for just a little while…
And I find myself always saying no.
Because I’ve got things to do and places to go.
And I watch him disappearing faster from my review.
Distance glowing like the skid marks that blaze behind me.
You were right Pop!
Life is supersonic.
So grab my arm and slow me down like you always have.
Remind me not to run too fast.
Teach me to look both ways before crossing the street
Because the world is out there.
Blazing by at high speed.
And I get lost way too often
And some days I forget to come home.
But you should know these days
I’m only reckless on the microphone.
I’m looking both ways before making a decision.
I’m holding tight before all unravels with a simple misstep.
So please light up another cigarette.
Let the smoke linger a little bit longer.
Let it rise to the heavens
And I will ride it like God blowing breath at my feet
And when I arrive
And they ask me if I’ve come to terms with my faith enough to come inside
I’ll tell them the one thing I know to be true.
I’ll tell them I came to terms with God
The moment I saw God living in you.
