Philosophy 101

I

Do we breathe because we're alive or are we alive because we breathe?
Are we emaciated little souls crouching by the sidewalks, ravenous and rapacious
for all eternity;
or are we machines that come to life when certain parts are well-oiled,
when we are fed scraps of metal and when certain buttons are pushed
at certain intervals of time?

II

Bite down hard on truth:
is it alive and moving? is it dead?
is it really thin air and that we've been imagining it all along?
does it taste of clarity or complexity, luminescence or the eternal abyss?
And if it exists, where do we find it?

July 24th

So... It's currently 12.02 a.m. and I've been eighteen for 2 minutes - actually, 3 minutes now. Apparently I'm pretty much legal now, and like, I'm no longer considered a teenager. Funny, I don't feel any different.

I think that one of the world's greatest tragedy is that, often things turn out quite differently from what you had imagined or expected when you were little. I don't think 8 year-old me would have been very impressed with 18 year-old me if she time-traveled 10 years into the future.

I thought that I would be smart and wise by now. I thought that I would have the answers to all the complexities and mysteries of the world. And now look at me. I'm still asking the same questions that used to bother me ten years ago. The existential crisis that used to occur is still occurring. Why was I born? What am I to the world? Nothing would happen if I die, the world will not stop spinning, the human population will not dwindle. What's the universe made of? Why does the universe exist? Do any of us have any inkling why we exist? What purpose do we serve? 

I feel smaller than I had ten years ago in this expansive universe.

But then, I don't think its fair to say that I've learnt nothing at all. In fact, I would say that in a non-philosophical point of view, it was spectacular in its own unspectacular way. I have crazy/weird/annoying/wtf-do-you-think-you're-doing friends and annoying/love-me-in-their-own-incomprehensible-way/i-guess-they're-nice-after-all family and I'll never stop complaining about them but at the same time I love them with all my heart.

It's late and you know I don't do late. My brain's not really functioning right now and this probably sucks a lot and I'll be look-at-all-the-shit-that-I-wrote! in the morning. So I better shut up right now. And gah, I'm sorry, I don't mean to be all emo on you. I don't know why but birthdays make me emo.

Love all of you. Thanks for everything. I'll try not to delete this in the morning.

Happy birthday.

Mad World

I

She had become a phantom. That was it. Standing in front of the mirror, her hair unkempt and eyes deadpan, she could see it – that she had been fading away for the past… what? Five days? Three weeks? She had no idea how long it had been since she was in this catatonic state. Her mind vaguely registered that this should have been alarming, should have warranted a larger reaction compared to this idle curiosity. And yet she found that she could not have summoned the energy to elicit the appropriate emotions even if she wanted to.

Her eyes skated over the image in the mirror with the same mildly curious look: over the pallid, sallow cheeks and the once-luscious lips; along the gentle slope of her slumped shoulders down to her arms hanging limply by her sides. But it was her eyes that captured her attention. They stared back at her with the same indifference: one eyebrow minutely raised as if in mockery or as a challenge. The look in her eyes was dead. There were no other words for it. It was pure and utter blankness.

They say it happens when you wander too long in your own subconscious mind.

II

"We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."

"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.

"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."

III

Mad - em. ay. dee.

M.A.D, as in:

Morbidity – the batshit crazy cat lover who is so poor she couldn’t even feed herself. She carves out chunks of her thighs for her hungry cats.

Agony – the sweet twin sister of suffering. She is forged in the womb of humanity and born from the marrows of desire. She is the blood pumping through our veins and the breath we hold in our lungs.

Despair – the poison that spreads through your mind like the Black Death. It ravages your soul and eats up your hopes and your dreams. And when you’re cold and dead and gone, it will shit on your corpse and dance on your grave. 

Madness. The satire of humanity. 

I would say that this is the longest we've been apart? 3 months is a record I've never thought I would survive. But then, I wouldn't say I was completely alive in the past 3 months.

Do I still love you? Irrefutably and implicitly, yes. I love you; but only because I will never stop loving you. You've been too deep in me for too long that I don't suppose I'll ever truly let you go. I guess you can say that you're too big a part of me that cutting you off completely would be like severing a limb, or an organ. But have I given up all of hope of reconciliation? No - despite the almost over-whelming urge of the pessimist in me, we have too much history for me to believe that it will all vanish in moments.

Because up till now I have no idea what went wrong. Of course, I was the one who became a zombie, I was the one who pushed you away, but I've never understood the trigger. For once in all these years I couldn't find solace and peace from you. My inability to feel has eclipsed all the love you lavished on me; it exhausted you and I couldn't even work up the energy to care.

I've been better lately - pulled back to the world of the living and feeling. I miss you - your dark eyes and your nose; your soft lips.

Not In Love

Going back to
Reality - isn't an option. But,
Easing my soul into
Yours. Is.

Things That Change

Once upon a time I was

flesh and blood and bones, 

I breathed the infinitesimal stars and the sky

and I breathed the universe.

I had the fire of the sun

between my ribs and 

the swiftness of the wind

in my legs 

(I unfolded them like wings). 

I had hair interwoven with thunder bolts and a 

head full of hurricanes. 

Perhaps I have spun on my axis alone

for too long. 

Perhaps I swallowed the inexhaustible salt of

loneliness too much -

because now, my 

dreams are scattered like constellations

in the perennial night

and my heart

is the color of

dying leaves. 

A Story of Teeth

I remember when I was 6 and my baby teeth were dropping like flies throughout the year. Remember how the falling off of baby teeth would form a border in the transition from being babies to being full-fledged children? Despite the initial horror of toothlessness (which I then overcame by trying not to show my teeth when I smile) I was delighted that I was finally getting rid of whatever categorized me as a baby. It was when I was trying to grow up too fast and had no discernible idea of what growing up meant. 

Anyway, I started a collection of baby teeth after deciding that I couldn't bear to throw away a part of myself. I think I was scared that all the teeth I dumped over the years would come together and form the phantom of a mouth I once had but without my lips or my tongue or my oral cavity. It would be two rows of vengeful, malicious teeth snapping their way into my bedroom when I sleep and haunt me for the rest of my life. Far-fetched, I know, but you know how kids are. 

So the first two teeth were given the royal treatment. I used to brush and clean them individually then rinse them in Listerine every night before placing them back into their little bed of cotton wool in a matchbox from England that my aunt gave me. I lost both of them in an unfortunate incident in which they were washed down the sink when I drained the water. The next three survived for another year before I grew bored of cleaning baby teeth every night and just left them in their bottle until they rotted. I washed them down the sink, this time of my own free will. I traded the succeeding one with my brother for dominance over the TV remote control. (He wanted to watch Ed, Edd and Eddie but I wanted to watch The Book of Pooh) I still don't know what he wanted with my tooth. 

I lost more teeth as the years went by, mostly due to similar incidents and once because I planted two teeth in the garden after the dentist told me about teeth having roots and all. I now have approximately ten more in a bottle filled with mouthwash (because I am too lazy to have to clean them every night or even every month) and they have all turned Listerine blue. They remind me of floating fetuses in jars of formaldehyde and I certainly have developed a kind of... maternal(?) feeling towards them over the years. The first two even had names: William and Harry. Dead serious. 

I don't know why I'm remembering this now but Born to Die is making me strangely nostalgic. It makes me sad to think of William and Harry and the others. It's like having a cemetery of unborn babies. 

You Know What's Beautiful?

In French, you don't really say "I miss you". You say "tu me manques", which is closer to "you are missing from me".

I love that. "You are missing from me." You are part of me. You are essential to my being. You are like a limb, or an organ, or blood. I cannot function without you.

Blinding

I found my song. ♥

I Don't Know Anymore

I wish you had given me a warning that you're leaving. You know I can never deal with silent partings and sudden disappearances for weeks on end. Or maybe you did, and I was too preoccupied to hear you.

Because that's all I am these days. Preoccupied. Emptiness spreads like a plague through my mind and I feel a hint of terror at this apparent lack of emotion. I've begun dreading staying home and being in my room because that is when I'm at my dead-est. I need to go out, somewhere, anywhere. I'm forever forcing myself to replay scenes or conversations in my mind because I can't bear this blank canvas of a mind I've been having. I can feel the dullness seeping into every crevasse of my body as if I have zombie poison in my veins.

But I do miss you. And I miss me.