maybe september

maybe september
i love again.
maybe a rainbow
will catch me then.
this little boy's eyes
will find his way once more
just like before.



when lips were tender
the sway of the willow.
when love was born
a face on the pillow.
when early moan
i still see that golden world
in all it's splendor.
maybe september
love will come again.

a taller tree, a sweeter log
a bluer morning sky above
and maybe come september
i will set these wonders
with my love.



(in the city of the dreaming spires)

no time ticking

this clock is located in one of the main streets in jogja city, java island.

one night i walked there and saw this unusual clock. i figured out that it has no rotating instruments inside it. the "jarum jam". i dont know what's the right term for it in this language.

and so i wonder if time was actually stopped. or if the artist who built the clock was intentionally make it so, so that when someone like me, or perhaps like you too, see it, they will consider about the same thing. that the clock is no longer ticking. that the time has been stopped. no time ticking. hmmm...

the rolling ones

oh boy, listening to this tune, new faces, sung by mick jagger, and probably written by his companion keith, makes me want to rush closer to my accoustic guitar and starts immitating both mick and keith...

parts of the lyrics goes like this:

"there's a new guy in town

he's been dragging around
he's the figure of youth
and his eyes are so blue
and they're looking at you

so tell me the truth..."

"well, well he's got stories to tell
he bites off more than he chews
well, well is he ringing your bell
my heart is breaking in two..."

well, well, i wonder if the singger is supposed to feel jealous or 'challenged' by the presence of the new face in town. did you, mick?

fragments

i entered this month of june like a man running hard into a heavy rain with no umbrella or proper shade to get sheltered under. and interestingly to me the rain is also different from any other kind of rain. unlike the ones you see and get you wet in autumn or spring afternoons. this kind of rain may typically come when you walk alone in a bright daylight and suddenly see someone you know from your past.

so the rain pours on you and showers you with fragments of images and noises from somewhere stocked in your brain cells. like a rain that suddenly fall when you come to a wedding of a friend. and old friendly faces, your mates whose names are recorded secretely or not in your diary books would then appear. sharing their stories and smiles. laughing at those same old hilarious stupidities again until your eyes get wet again. the silly things that used to make you very shy to admit are now becoming more tolerable as you begin to realise that everyone makes mistakes in their lives. and learns lessons from them too.

and so that rain, the shower of fragments, fell upon my head a couple of times in the past weeks. i dont remember when it started. but i recall rather clearly that last sunday was a stormy day. "reading lights" book shop in my hometown witnessed me in such a situation of trying to get escape. back to ireland with frank delaney. this time ireland as a novel.

noodle and little chinese seamstress for a laugh

welcome, my honorable guests. please sit over there for a while, before i assign to each of you some quality times to be on my bedside, when we will spend hours together reading.

first, you, "noodle maker" by ma jian. yes, you please sit there next to the red dust which i havent returned to its owner.

and then next... yes you, "balzac, and the little chinese steamstress" by dai sijie, please go with 'sang pemimpi', the dreamer, which i just finished yesterday.

and finally, by mo yan, "shin, you'll do anything for a laugh", please take your place on the left deck as i may i give you the opportunity to be read first.

well, thank you for coming from china. i hope with your companion, my weekends and my late night moments will be somehow more oriental. i know santo quite well, a good man who sent you here. maybe he wants me to read the three of you to convert me from a russian-and-irish-literature lover to a big fan of chinese stories. hoho... i cant tell for sure. but nevertheless i should give a credit to emily as well for introducing me to the red dust, a book which carried me to tibet in my dream.

so please feel comfortable in my room. stay as it will be your new home. and if you want some green tea, its available on the plastic box above the fridge.

the apple

ah, what a briliant solution. it was simply unthinkable for me to cut the apple into eight interesting pieces so we could share. i thought two pieces would be enough. you half, i half. but i was indeed so glad when you returned from the kitchen bringing a plate full of creativity and smaller cuts of the pink fruit i handed you.

small things, unspoken, yet real.

and you and i

the air now is moist. you can smell the earth just by breathing slowly. this damp after-rain atmosphere feels comfortably relaxing. it fills my mind with images from ganeca road, that in my hometown. through ganeca road, on fridays, i used to walk carrying old books i borrowed from a library whose collections were inherited from the already closed british council. if i walked after the rain was gone, i took a longer path to enjoy the scenery of two football fields, green with grasses, and with horses and carts, and fellow bypassers on their way around the campus located nearby.

that's how i planned the activity for my weekends. literary works mostly by british and irish authors piled up in my room for a week or two. if i was lucky i finished reading them. but if not, there was no imperative at all, nor even any form of deadline to do so.

the air now is moist. and it is friday already. i am not in my hometown. but it doesn't matter that much. as long as i have old books yellow by age to digest and some bunch of friends to play futsal with. and especially as long as cikini street is waiting for me. of course with your presence and a cup of hot chocolate this will be so perfect.

look

"one of the deepest pleasures in life is looking. simply looking. looking at streets, traffic,faces, windows, shops, parks, churches, books, newspapers, and all the creatures and creations of life itself. instead of looking long and steadily, we tend to get brief, quick looks at things before we hasten on, half-blind with purpose..."

shadow dweller

an illustration by will a
for a tale in my storybook, vahdventure, 2005

the shark and the crocodile

i just returned from a trip to east java. surabaya again, a city known in my country for its heroic history, also for its legendary tale of a fierce fight between a white crododile (the baya) and a white shark (the sura) in order to win the title of "the strongest and most powerful animal" in the area, according to a prophecy.

throughout my stay, i'd count myself lucky for being accompanied by a friend, widyarso. his knowledge about history is adorable. he obtain his degree in that field, actually. and as we both were not so familiar with the city, we decided to roam the city at midnight by a tricycle (becak).

widi and i visited some corners of the city which were looked dead. except for a part where a tomb of a saint, sunan ampel, was located, with sign on the wall saying:

"bezoekers van dit Gebied worden vriendelijk verzocht Islamitische Klederdracht te dragen". similar message is also mentioned in other languages. it means, more or less, that visitors in the sacred place are expected to observe and wear islamic dress code.

i have some interesting pictures taken in that place but i dont have the device to upload it here... pff...