LILIA LOPEZ-CHUA

SONG OF THE KABUKI PLAYER
There is a pain aimless in the air tonight
and it finds me
as I am thinking of you
I tighten my robe a bit
thinking this way I shall be closer
to what I suffer
closer still to all that shame
that once gathered arms against me
then I hum to myself the odd song
of the beggar maid to the storm
knowing that something terribly old and ancient
has been passed on to us by way of this air
we breathe
and it is not saying anything

DARK
What will I do with a fountain
of time
my silence
is a well without a drop of water

I can weep in the dark
weep and its silence will hear me
but it will close its eyes
it will not speak
the evening will tread on
quietly an old man

it will walk on without looking back
without seeing where its shadow
sleeps
and I can say wait where
are you going

and I can think of all the places I can think of
I can think of walls walls walls
of walls behind which anything lurks

I can lock myself
in a closet full of clothes not my size
fill my pockets with dust
or take off my clothes and imagine
my skin is ice

and I will be standing here
where I am standing stepping on moments
that sharpen into hours like thorns
into my feet
the wound in my heart is deep

the pain does not answer to any name
where is the door
the window the door

CHANCE
I do not remember who you are
everything escapes from my hand
through the spaces between my fingers
into this nameless land

My life is woven out of water
noting stays and everything goes
my memory is a river
forever running its way out of history

I am nothing desired
I am nothing stopped
I come and go any time and any way
alone and ten times alone
I do not have a single breath to mourn for

And always I give out myself for souvenirs
each time passing for something else
for you and those like you
and what I am will be
what I will be for each one of you

~ by saikow on January 16, 2008.