silvae

how did we get here, i think i know

well now isn’t this just familiar. happens all too many times. what four? yeah maybe that’s just it. really can’t be bothered to fight it anymore.

so here we go
gotta get this right
padlock shuts this heart tonight

in other news, the prince has gone to join the king. and he said wouldn’t go out the same way. and i still haven’t seen him in concert too boooo. i wonder how families of the whole paedo hooha victims are feeling when they turn on every available channel to find people paying tribute to mj. not that i’m trying to desensitise it or be an ass but damn that must sting.

hyacinth

Ebb
I know what my heart is like
Since your love died:
It is like a hollow ledge
Holding a little pool
Left there by the tide,
A little tepid pool,
Drying inward from the edge.
-edna st. vincent millay

dare i say i’m growing up. or maybe just regained my lack of feeling, of never overstepping boundaries, of not dreaming (or rather undreaming the once dreamt if that makes any sense)

someone told me just that i’ve lost my rhyme. for awhile i forgot. maybe it’s a sign something’s wrong with life. well let’s try.

today i wiped myself clean
of them, of him, of her and you
of love, of lost, of letting go
of colours red, gold, black and blue

tonight let the curtains finally fall
once lovers, once friends take curtain call
as flood lights finally fade to black
slowly, softly

i regain my lack

wednesday's child is full of woe

the kids went out for music class again today and i went along. the music teacher taught them jaychou’s tingmamadehua for mothers’ day. suffice to say it launched thousands of tiny soliloquys in my head as i sang along.

so while i’m getting lost in my selfish thoughts one of my little girls starts to cry. she’s sobbing away while the song reaches it’s third run and i rush over to enfold her in my arms, thinking it’s something as simple as her missing her mum.

and when i ask her why she just goes (this is all i managed to get out from under the sobs)

“mummy hand got blood. i worried for mummy”

i dry her large, teary eyes and assure her nothing’s gonna happen to her mummy before sending her back, all the while fighting back my own tears from the sheer sweetness of it all.

they amaze me everyday. children are such wonderful, beautiful beings. they’re as close to angels as we’re probably ever gonna get.

but at least you're still my day late friend

and i don’t wanna risk losing that too so maybe i’ll just keep quiet and wait this out.

i’m a coward. i know. and all this just has to come slapping back when i’m finally getting life into order. sucks how life’s one big rollercoaster and you can’t always be on the upslope. or maybe i’m just addicted to the drama (heaven forbid) cos i can’t feel readily anymore. it’s either incredible happiness or immense sadness or other extremes of emotions. other times i’m stuck in limbo and maybe that’s fine. don’t know anymore.

and i used to be so disgustingly pleased with myself for my detachment.

oh mymy what you can do to me after all this while.

i can't tell you something that ain't real

“i miss you terribly”

“i do too”

it wasn’t a lie. i miss knowing for sure who i am and what i want. i miss me. cos i can’t feel anymore and it’s starting to finally worry.

you have been the one, you have been the one for me

looks like even friendship isn’t possible now. so i guess it’s time to try again to wave it all away.

goodbye.

my day late friend.

so many questions i need an answer, two years later you're still

i wish we were like amoeba. not only would that solve our population problem, it would prevent a whole lot of physical and emotional loneliness.

we could just up and undergo binary fusion. then the single entity becomes two and go on to lead lives apart that overlap maybe once in awhile, maybe fuse again. i’m sure they’ll be perfectly happy. but hot damn the separation process has gotta hurt.

besides. driftwood i can pull off. amoeba might be a little farfetched.

i have such queer thoughts at this time of the morning when my brain begins to shut down. ignore.

but i would change my life if you thought you might try

just another one of those days watching the kids play (: i realise how much potential each of them holds. i see a potential doctor, photographer, chef, engineer, architect, sportsman, teacher, leader, follower, mother, father. it’s magical really.

each and every one carries the hopes and love of generations before. such beautifully hardy beings these children are. to bear the weight of their world on still developing shoulders. maybe that’s why they cry. it’s the only way to keep from buckling under all that load.

do you hear me talking to you across the water, across the deep blue ocean

how apt it was and how absolutely wonderful was mraz. thanks for an awesome night pei, tay, jml and yangjian. oh and daen (:

how often do you find a singer whose songs can poke at you left, right and centre? it’s uncomfortably beautiful as you take all those lullabye arrows to the chest and try not to crack. but as mraz and us sang thursday night… “everything is gonna be alright”

choir has been going awesome too. jim asked me the other day “wah since when you so on about church?” well since a month ago. and i’m really liking it (:

anyway taylor swift was talking about fairytales on the radio. and i’m thinking it’s true. everyone believes in fairytales. they’re things of hope and dreams that may or may not come true. “may”. the mark of a dreamer. last night i dreamt i came home from a tired day at work to find you on the steps.

then i woke up. fiddlesticks.

cos when you're fifteen and somebody tells you they love you, you're gonna believe them

i remember i told myself once before i wouldn’t ever say it again without meaning it and being sure. lest i hurt another innocent person. someone asked me tonight how many times i said it that i actually meant it. hard to believe but i actually meant it most times. but at varying degrees? or it stopped?

well i don’t think you actually stop feeling for anyone. it’s like an energy and yes we love physics and we also know (thank you mrtaylor) that energy cannot be created or destroyed but merely converted from one form to another. maybe that’s why once lovers turn adversaries. the more the once love, the more the enmity. simply because we all find it difficult to switch off such intense emotions. so we merely change it to its most convenient form. until a year (depending on how mature you are) later you realise you don’t know why you stupidly feel such negativity towards the other then i guess it becomes friendship. i mean if it was good then why not?

nineteen and i don’t know if i’m very much wiser. change was inevitable. and ironically its the only constant in life. i’m rambling. work tomorrow. goodnight.

so for now goodnight
we fall to darkness, turn to light
saying prayers for children not our own

it ain't easy growing up in world war three, never knowing what love could be

thursday was an incredibly emotional day at work. just when i feel my aspirations making a shift a sign comes and slaps me in the face and sends me running to the staff bathroom so my kids and colleagues don’t see me cracking up.

another one of my favourite little boys always talks about spending time at mummy’s house or daddy’s house. so i kinda pieced two and two together and confirmed my fears with my class’s form teacher. i never understood the true ramifications divorce has on a child. and at such a young age, it’s really taken a toll on him and it’s heartbreaking.

he doesn’t smile as often as the other children or talk as much as them about their weekends and stuff they have at home. and it so painfully shows. and it’s simply cos he doesn’t have a fixed home and this shuffling from parent to parent surrounds him in an unstable environment that reeks of unwantedness.

he cries at mealtimes. because the favourite threat the teachers dole out to the kids who don’t eat fast enough is always “if you don’t eat faster we leave you here and go in without you” and obviously this frightens them cos nobody wants to be the last or left alone. so they eat faster. but this turns on his waterworks and he refuses to eat anymore because he doesn’t wanna be left alone. and thursday was the twins birthday so teatime was cake. he actually refused to eat cake because he was so afraid. and his big eyes started pouring out tears and he kept insisting he didn’t want cake. just think of it, a little boy refusing cake. i usually sit next to him because he begs me to at every meal and i picked him up and looked into those teary eyes and reassured him that i would not leave his side till he finished. only then did he start eating again. looking into his eyes was the most painful thing i’ve done in awhile because i know those tears stem from a deep fear of people leaving him that just reeks of insufficient love.

i felt like yelling at his mum/dad but none of them come to pick him up after school. how could you do this to an innocent child, let alone your own flesh and blood? how could you not love him? you’ve left an unerasable stain on his young psyche that won’t ever go away and you don’t even know it. cos you’re too bloody busy pushing him left and right and making him spend the night at different homes because none of you fucking want him enough to give him a stable environment. so here i am just wanting to hold him tight and be the one permanent presence in his life and there you pair of heartless arses are treating him like an inanimate object. people like you don’t deserve children.

it’s ridiculous, it’s downright stupid and painfully heartwrenching.

fools.

and my heart cries out as i slowly come to know his lovestarved world. and i can’t help but do the same.

so what am i gonna do when the best part of me was always you

he did it again today. “teacher leanne, don’t go” and this time i didn’t and he was so happy he played peekaboo with pei through the window grills (:

so maybe this time i’ll stay. because you’ve probably moved on and i’m still here still trying to decide if i should remain in limbo at the station listening out for the rattling of tracks from a discontinued train. or catch the first service out of here cos it’s been waiting on me and my fencesitting ways.

and he tries so hard to fill your shoes.

tomorrow is ashwednesday. one fullmeal and two halfmeals and giving something up for the lenten season. i think i’ll skip melancholy cos everyone’s addicted to a small dose once in awhile. and maybe cos i can’t forgo the one thing i need to.

hot damn. how?

oh just a lullabye to keep from crying myself to sleep

i adore these kids more and more each day and i’m getting used to the hours. they leave me too tired to think too much at night and heaven knows that can only be a good thing.

yesterday at naptime one of my favourite little boys had trouble getting some shuteye so with large eyes brimming from the lack of sleep he sweetly asks “teacher leanne (yes my name has been changed countless times to wind up here) can you patpat me to sleep?”

so i give him a hug and tuck him in so i can pat him to sleep. just as i brush my hands down his forehead and tell him to close his eyes the side of his pouting lips curl up to form what could only be a sleepy smile and he manages to get out under a yawn “don’t go okay?”

and i couldn’t help but want to hug him again. so after he’s drifted off i get out a book and sit at the foot of his mattress. but the rest of the kids were scheduled to head out for some excursion and i was apparently supposed to accompany them. so i reluctantly left his side and followed the rest.

when i got back they were playing with toys and he asked why i left and i couldn’t do anything but apologise profusely and try my best to explain to a fouryearold about how i had no choice. hurt does not look good on a face that adorable and he just walks away with furrowed little brows.

but today he ran up to me and hugged my leg like he usually does and i know i’ve been forgiven. he laughs as i pick him up and spin him around and he insists i sit with him for breakfast.

unfortunately we can’t be like children. and i felt so bad when he stopped asking me to play with his toys. because i know it hurts the world to go to sleep so sure of the fact that you’ll always have someone and wake up to find them gone.

because then what?

if you were the one who was spending the night

as if the video wasn’t bad enough. the lyrics are enough to kill. this used to happen just once in a very blue moon. but it seems to be happening far too often for it to be healthy (as if it ever was)

work has been hard but i’m getting used to it. some of the kids are really so adorable. of course discounting the messes they get into that i have to clean up. but when they smile at me and grab my hand it really does make it all worthwhile. shall spare you and me the details. cos you’re not here and i’m trying my best to resist initiating conversation so i can tell you all about it. cos i don’t know what else i can do to get this under control.

and heaven knows i need to.

oh won’t you walk through
and bust in the door
and take me away
oh no more mistakes
‘cos in your eyes i’d like to stay

never to return again, but always in my heart

perhaps there’s nothing more and this is all there is to it. makmur makes a lot of sense though (if you see this, take care and have fun in the land of wallabies and joeys!) and he said it so simply “just do what makes you happy”.

but if you don’t know what does then what? thinking too much again. ignore.

thank God work starts tomorrow.