Thơ Lưu Nguyễn Đạt

Thơ Lưu Nguyễn Đạt

Kinh thưa quý vị,
Kính thưa quý bạn hữu yêu thơ,

Thực là một vinh hạnh cho tôi khi anh Lưu Nguyễn Đạt mời tôi đọc một bài thơ của anh chuyến ngữ qua tiếng Mỹ tại Viện Việt Học ở Westminster, CA. Trước khi tôi đọc bài thơ chuyển ngữ đó, tôi xin phép được nói vài lời về ngôn ngữ, thi ca, và dịch thuật thơ. Đây chỉ là vài nhận xét cá nhân thô sơ và ngắn gọn của người yêu thơ, chớ không phải là quan điểm của một học giả.

Đã là một sinh vật thì có nhu cầu truyền tin cho nhau. Thực vật trao tin tức cho nhau bằng cách tiết ra hoá chất. Động vật thông tin bằng hoá chất và âm thanh. Con người, một động vật phát triển cao nhất trên trái đất nầy, có một hệ thống truyền tin qua âm thanh phong phú nhất, biểu hiện qua ngôn ngữ và âm nhạc. 

Con người có thể nói chuyện với nhau không ngừng suốt ngày hoặc một người nói mà cả trăm, ngàn người nghe trong im lặng tuyệt đối hoặc cười vui thỏa thích. Hiện tượng đó một động vật nào khác không làm được. Từ ngôn ngữ bình thường, con người đi đến thi ca khi cần biểu lộ nhu cầu tình cảm sâu đậm, động vào tâm thức nhưng cô đọng và ẩn dụ. Hiểu thi ca dễ dàng hơn sáng tạo thi ca. Điều đó ai cũng biết. Nghe hiểu một ngôn ngữ dễ hơn là nói một ngôn ngữ đó. Một bên là thụ động, không cần phải có trí nhớ nhanh lẹ và bén nhọn, và khả năng xếp đặt ngôn từ, như bên kia. Thi và Ca đi đôi với nhau. Do đó rất dễ phổ nhạc vào một bài thơ. Và mỗi bài nhạc là một bài thơ được đem vào nhạc cho phong phú và dễ nhớ hơn. Một bài thơ mà không có nhạc tính (musicality) không phải thực sự là một bài thơ. Nhạc tính trong thơ không hắn là chỉ là vần. Do đó có thơ "tự do" (free verse) và thơ trong văn (poetry in prose). Thơ có nhiều loại: hùng, bi, trữ tình, hài, và trừu tượng.

Thơ của Anh Lưu Nguyễn Đạt có nhiều nhạc tính lại vừa trữ tình vừa trừu tượng, do đó độc đáo và rất khó dịch. Nhiều từ ngữ Anh dùng rất ít được sử dụng. Ý thơ của Anh cũng thế. Người Pháp nói "Dịch là Phản" [Traduire, c’est trahir--Traduttore, traditore]. Tôi đã chuyến ngữ qua tiếng Mỹ nhiều thơ của vài thi sĩ Việt. Thơ của Anh Đạt cho tôi nhiều khó khăn nhất, khó khăn hơn thơ của Bùi Giáng và Phạm Công Thiện. Tôi mong rằng bài chuyển ngữ sau đây không phản nhiều ý thơ của bài nguyên tác. Tôi mong ước tôi có khả năng sử dụng tiếng Việt phong phú, sáng tạo, và trữ tình như Anh Lưu Nguyễn Đạt.  Do đó khi chuyển ngữ thơ Lưu Nguyễn Đạt, tôi mạn phép tiếp tạo những bài thơ "song sinh", cùng nguồn thờ, cùng ý thơ, nhựng tự nó có cá tính và nét thơ riêng biệt của nó. Cái chính là thơ chuyển ngữ tự nó cũng phải là một dòng thơ. Dịch chưa hẳn là Phản. Dịch có thể củng là Sáng Tạo "song sinh" nhờ cảm hứng của nguyên tác. Mỗi ngôn ngữ là một thế giới riêng biệt. Mỗi dân tộc có cách diễn đạt ý tưởng riêng tư. Hai dân tộc có thể đi song hành nhưng dấu chân không nhất thiết phải y như nhau. 

Dịch thơ là phải yêu vô vàn bài thơ nguyên tác. Khi chúng ta chuyển ngữ bài thơ qua một ngôn ngũ khác, chúng ta muốn kéo dài sự yêu thương, sự cảm xúc đó, và chúng ta ước mong sáng tạo được một sản phẩm như thể. Một bài thơ chuyển ngữ có giá trị là một trả lời cho sự ước mơ và thách thức đó.

Khi một vị cao niên nói với người yêu mới, ông ta có thể nói như sau:

Yêu em là đi ngược lại thủy triều của thời gian

T'aimer, c'est marcher contre la marée du temps 

To love you is to march against the rising tide of time

Tôi nghĩ rằng khi ông ta cho thêm tính từ (adjective) "rising" bên cạnh danh từ "tide", ông ta hiểu được rõ ràng cả hai ngôn ngữ Việt và Mỹ và ông ta biết nhạc tính trong thơ. 

Bây giò tôi xin mời quý vị thưởng thức sự trứ tình và trừu tượng của một bài thơ của Anh Lưu Nguyễn Đạt qua ba ngôn ngữ.

ĐUỔI BẮT MẶT TRỜI

 

ta bay đuổi bắt mặt trời

kéo đêm bừng sáng vợi vời bên em

cánh mây bát ngát gió mềm

vuốt ve giấc ngủ tụ xuyên bóng thừa

 

thân yêu thai nghén hạt mưa

rừng thiêng núi biếc vẫn chưa nối liền

quanh đây tiếng gọi triền miên

thời gian hé mở góc thiền trong tâm

 

LNDat

ATTRAPER LE SOLEIL

 

je vole pour attraper le soleil

tirant de la nuit

la lumière à ton côté

les ailes de nuages au vent immense

caressent le sommeil

sur les oreillers d'ombres

 

tu portes dans ton corps

un embryon de pluie

à l'appel incessant de la nature mystique 

les forêts sacrées s'éloignent des collines vertes

et le temps s'ouvre en béance

dans l'âme éveillée 

Traduit par l'auteur

 

TO SEIZE THE SUN

i fly high in the sky

to seize the sun

from the stillness of the night

to bring light by your side

vast wings of clouds 

take off in flight 

with the help of gentle winds

caressing the sleep in superfluous shades

you carry inside

a seed of rain

the sacred forests haven't linked with green mountains

in response to the unending call 

time unfolds itself 

in the Zen corner of the awakened soul

Translated by Roberto Wissai/NKBa'

canngon.blogspot.com

-- 

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving 

Every year when Thanksgiving rolls in, some people get on the soap box and air their thanks publicly. I suppose that practice does not really hurt anybody, despite its seeming corniness. The holiday, though originally Christian and American in inception and conception, is getting secular and now widely celebrated by all Americans, regardless of creeds and credos or racial heritage, perhaps with the exception of the American Indians who probably wish that their forbears had not kindly helped those poor Pilgrims in their first harsh winter in Plymouth colony. 

Thanksgiving, more so than Christmas, is a time of family get-together and a reminder to be thankful.

I grew up in a close family back in Vietnam. The childhood memories still delight me. I had a good childhood. Since puberty my life has sucked, mostly because of my doing. Still, every year, in fact, every day, I am thankful that I have not killed myself or anybody else, that I am healthy and still have money to keep body and soul together. In all fairness I must say I have been a very lucky man. I hesitate to use the word "blessed" because of the religious connotation. Luck is a better choice of word. I was born good looking, reasonably intelligent and intellectually curious. And my son and my women love me, even to this day. At least I fancy they do. Of course, I love them, too, mostly stupidly and hopelessly, but I love them nonetheless. I have a very big heart. I can't help myself. I have always been a dreamer. Dreaming is something I am very good at. So now, I am dreaming another impossible dream. I will soon find out if I am really dreaming or I do have some chance to actualize my dream. The reason why I love dreaming is that I get strong, disciplined, rejuvenated, and kind when I dream. 

Another Walter Mitty "Story"

"....Cherry, you don't have to tell me, I know what I'm doing. I'm treading on dangerous terrain and skirting on the edges of insanity. Everything has a price. To dance with the devil is to trade excitement and knowledge for potential eternal anguish. But I'm emotionally and intellectually curious so I don't mind taking a leap of faith into the unknown. 

Maybe I'm hasty and willing to take you at face value. I've a tendency to do that with the people I just met. I formed rapid assessments based on impressionistic situations and traits of character. I'm not cautious and prudent enough. But on the other hand, I believe my judgment has gotten better with age and my intuition traditionally has been quite unerring. I wish I had heeded more the whispers and murmurs of my intuition. I would be much wealthier and happier, though not wiser. So, now I rely more on intuition than intellect in my "analysis" of people. What drives me in thinking that you're a fine human is my experiencing a feeling of peace and serenity and acceptance and understanding whenever you are around. You're proud but not vain. You're good but not smug. You laugh quite too easily, however. That intrigues me quite a bit. So I need to watch you more. I used to know a woman who laughed quite readily, too. And she turned out to be a bitchy liar. I'm not saying you might be like her. I know you are an honest woman. In fact, it was your honesty that attracted me in the first place. And do you know that you were the impetus for the recent two stories and two poems that I wrote while being bewitched and enthralled by your being. So, if for nothing else, I will have those "literary" productions to look at while dreaming about you. 

I have a crazy feeling that you and I are very much alike. We make indelible impressions on people. We leave our footprints on their minds, if not their hearts. You certainly did on both my heart and mind. I have not been quite the same since I met you. I've come to believe that in order for me to get through the fog of war within myself I need to have faith in the ability of humans to surprise even themselves. In other words, to live authentically and to the brim is to learn to unlock the hardest hearts, especially our own. I'm unlocking mine. I hope you're unlocking yours.

I read somewhere that we must understand our own mind and our own predisposition and propensity for arrogance and puffed-up pride. We must be eternally aware that it is Ego, if not properly tamed, that will thwart our attainment of enlightenment and happiness

Cherry, I recently came to realize that you are a moral elevation to me. Somewhere in my mind a soft but persistent voice is telling me that I am into something rare, something good. By chance or by providence, I came to know about Ginkgo tree, a species having wondrous mythical properties, one of which is durability and hence symbolic for everlasting friendship and love. Love is just friendship caught fire. Before two persons can be lovers, they must be friends first.  I know I am a friend of yours. I hope you are one of mine. There are times in life we must seize the day, seize the moment when everything is in perfect alignment, and open ourselves to possibilities. I firmly think that one of the reasons why we read and even write stories is to expand our experiences and enhance our consciousness. We step outside of ourselves and get into the minds and souls of others. 

The beauty and magic of friendship is to realize that we need others and others need us. Our existence is thus less lonely and less precarious. We feel safer and understood in the company of friends. I just came back from the emergency room of a veterans medical facility. A friend of mine, an American veteran of the Vietnam War, called me up while I was sleeping and complained that he was not feeling well and he needed me to drive him to the VA hospital. He could have called a taxi or his adopted daughter but he called me instead, because he was much more comfortable in calling me, he explained, since I lived only half a mile away. He felt much more relaxed and at ease in my presence, he further explained on the way to the hospital. He divulged that he passed out for a few minutes after taking a shower. He had had chest pains for several days, he added. By the way, his blood pressure was 97/57 and the pulse rate was 37, he sheepishly and softly elaborated, and then promptly fell into a deep sleep. His head leaned over to the left side while snoring loudly. His snoring told me he was still alive. The seat belt held his upper body firmly in the seat. He could hardly walk when I drove up to the hospital. I told him to wait in the car while rushing inside to search for a wheel chair. The time was around three in the morning.

The emergency staff later told me Bob should have gone to the hospital right away when he experienced chest pains. He was in mortal danger when I wheeled him in because he hardly had any pulse and his blood pressure plummeted. But he was okay now and he would be kept in the hospital for a few days, I was told. 

This was not the first time I took Bob to an emergency room. I had done so twice before. Bob kept drinking and smoking despite having a heart problem. The guy obviously had a death wish. I kept telling him that he must find a reason to live. Dying is easy. Living is not, since we must deal with pain and disappointment, but still, we must find/invent a meaning for our existence. He kept silent while listening to my exhortations. Then he invariably said, "Roberto, I really appreciate your friendship." Bob is a die-hard Republican Christian who hates Obama,  and believes everything in the Bible, and whose only source of information is Fox "News" while  I am a dyed-in-the-wool Democrat liberal and atheist who reads and thinks and lives philosophy. But Bob and I are close friends because we were born two days apart and are both honest and true to our word, except when we are dreaming. 

Cherry, I think you, too, are honest and true to your word, not to mention kind and generous. That's why I've been attracted to you. This letter is long enough. I need to get some rest. I will think of you during my sleep. 

 

Roberto Wissai

November 30, 2014

Book Review of "Preparation for the Next Life"

PREPARATION FOR THE NEXT LIFE

By Atticus Lish

417 pages. Tyrant Books. $15.

Revised by Dwight Gardner of NYT

Atticus Lish’s first novel, “Preparation for the Next Life,” is unlike any American fiction I’ve read recently in its intricate comprehension of, and deep feeling for, life at the margins. 

This is an intense book with a low, flyspecked center of gravity. It’s about blinkered lives, scummy apartments, dismal food, bad options. At its knotty core, amazingly, is perhaps the finest and most unsentimental love story of the new decade. It’s one that builds slowly in intensity, like a shaft of sunlight into an anthracite mine.

One of this novel’s two central characters is Zou Lei, who works in the kitchen of a forgettable Chinese restaurant in Flushing, Queens. She’s an ethnic Uighur from northwest China, and the other workers don’t understand her language. She finds a blackened mattress in an overcrowded rooming house. She seems like the loneliest person alive.

Zou Lei slipped into America; she has no papers. Here are the first two paragraphs of Mr. Lish’s novel, which tell a shred of her story. They also show off Mr. Lish’s sentences, which are confident, loose jointed, strewn with essential detail.

“She came by way of Archer, Bridgeport, Nanuet, worked off 95 in jeans and a denim jacket, carrying a plastic bag and shower shoes, a phone number, waiting beneath an underpass, the potato chips long gone, lightheaded.

“They picked her up on the highway by a plain white shed, a sign for army-navy, tires in the trees. A Caravan pulled up with a Monkey King on the dash and she got in. The men took her to a Motel 8 and put her in a room with half a dozen other women from Fookien and a liter of orange soda. She listened to trucks coming in all night and the AC running.” 

So begins a particular kind of American story. It includes a scary stint in prison (the Patriot Act, in this novel, is a phrase of dread), and a series of dead-end jobs. Zou Lei rides the subway selling bootleg DVDs, which she fans out. She looks at the other riders and says: “Deeweedee, deeweedee. Hello, deeweedee.”

The other central character in “Preparation for the Next Life” is Skinner, an injured, tattooed, depressed and mentally unbalanced veteran of three tours in Iraq. He takes a basement apartment in Queens, with fitness magazines, pornography and pizza boxes spread around his bed.

There’s been a surfeit of wounded warriors in recent American fiction, and his arrival worried me; these men can, in lesser hands, be stock characters. Not here. The encrusted detail in Mr. Lish’s prose flicks the switch on in every sentence. Here is Skinner approaching his new apartment for the first time:

“One of the houses had its postage-stamp yard filled with statues and figurines — of elves, wise men, the crucifixion, leprechauns, animals, plastic flowers, a sleigh, a whirligig that spun in the wind. There were wind chimes on the porch and an American flag bumper sticker for 9/11 on the house. This was where he was going.” 

Skinner and Zou Lei — he calls her Zooey — don’t meet cute. He bumps into her while looking for an erotic massage. They bond in part over their shared love of working out, intense sessions that are like purification rituals, sessions that are almost the only thing that makes sense to them. They become one more unlikely couple in Flushing, “going home to open a Styrofoam shell in the dark, eat something hot together.” 

Skinner is a decent man who does bad things. He doesn’t trust himself. He sometimes treats Zou Lei badly. This is a love story with a lot of ache in it. He tells her to shut up and, Mr. Lish writes, “this pulled the power cord right out of her.” She accuses him of thinking she is “some garbage person,” just another piece of unwanted human biology. 

Mr. Lish has taught English in Central Asia, and he works as a Chinese-English translator of technical material. He’s a former Marine who, according to his biography, has held a long series of blue-collar jobs. 

I don’t doubt his résumé: This book is thick with the kind of sub-countertop-level detail that can’t be faked. He also arrives with a literary pedigree. His father is Gordon Lish, the writer and influential editor, most famously of Raymond Carver.

Atticus Lish has written a necessary novel, one with echoes of early Ken Kesey, of William T. Vollmann’s best writing and of Thom Jones’s pulverizing short stories.

His writing about Queens is superb. The graffiti-covered steel gates on businesses at night “resembled a thousand tattooed eyelids.” Flushing is where you see a hard glint in people’s eyes, “the knowing look of someone who wasn’t going to be fooled again.” 

He’s just as good on Skinner’s memories of war. “The explosion leaped out of the road and rose like batwings. In the following vehicle, Skinner’s ears popped and cut off like overloaded speakers.” 

Neither Zou Lei nor Skinner is particularly religious. Yet she is a Muslim, and “Preparation for the Next Life” takes its name from a saying on the doorway of a mosque she enters at one point. This novel helps one understand the appeal of ready-made answers to life’s vexations.

Zou Lei is optimistic, in the face of the odds, about where life is dragging her. After all, things are worse back in China. She is a fierce patriot of a sort. She thinks to herself: “The N.Y.P.D. would not stop her. If they scanned her, they would see an American flag under the scan.” 

The N.Y.P.D., as it happens, may be the least of her concerns. The final chapters of this indelible book pulled my heart up under my ears.

Cherry Baby

Cherry Baby

Once upon a time 

When I was young and green,

Barely in my teens, 

Love hit me really strong 

Day and night she occupied my mind.

Finally, I haltingly let her know 

How much I cared, 

But the way she said to what I had to say

Made my feelings evaporate into thin air.

Months and years went by;

I was no longer young and green.

Gray, not blue, was the color of my sky.

I looked old and sometimes talked mean.

Then I met you.

Something hit something in the air.

We both sensed it,

But we pretended we didn't care.

However, the thing didn't go away, at least for me. 

It lingered on and on.

The little things you did,

The words you said,

The way you looked at me, 

Made me change.

I feel young again;

Hot blood is coursing through my veins;

I now talk nice and I exercise.

Am I getting to be an old fool by dreaming of the moon?

At my age I should be content with tending my garden 

And reading books

While preparing for my death that's coming soon.

Instead, I am thinking of you

Day and night as I did before

When I was young and green, those days of yore.

I thought I was definitely through with Love.

Little did I know Love kept hunting me down.

This evening a feeling is turning true

And I know the feeling is you,

I now realize with exhilaration.

I want to shout:

Love has no date expiration.

But I won't say so to you,

Not directly, not to your face.

I've learned from my mistake:

Certain things are better off unsaid.

I want to preserve this magic

That I'm feeling deep inside.

Wissai

November 13, 2014

A Hot, Throbbing Heart

I have a hot, throbbing heart 

I don't believe

There exist

People who love only 

One person.

That's possible, but very rare. 

On the other hand

There are those who love nobody.

What's about me?

All through my life

Those I really love are fewer than five,

But I have plenty of amourettes.

I am a woman

So why do I dare love so easily, 

And open my heart far and wide?

Why say out loud

Things that should be kept inside?

Am I not afraid to be looked down?

A lady friend of mine

Recently kindly advised me 

That I should not be too free

In expressing my feelings, 

That I should not openly confide 

In writing poetry,

That I need to be discreet, subtle, and light,

And not too trusting and naive,

I would invite scorn and contempt, otherwise.

Truly speaking, her words hit me hard for days.

I was tempted to stop writing poems for good.

Like everybody else, I wanted to be cherished,

Not to be derided, for what I write.

But after a few days, 

My old defiant self arose. 

I now proudly proclaim

I am who I am

I write poetry the way I like!

If you like what I write, that's fine; 

If not, it's also all right.

I am who I am:

Sometimes humble and vulnerable, sometimes full of pride,

I've trained myself not to be discriminating

Between men and women,

Between hearts of women and those of men.

Everybody, men or women, 

Each one of us

Has a hot, throbbing heart!

Translated by Wissai

November 11, 2014

Một trái tim

Tôi không tin

Những người nói

Suốt một đời, chỉ yêu có một người!

Có thể 

Nhưng rất hiếm

Cũng rất có thể

Có những người

Suốt một đời

Đã chẳng yêu ai!

 

Còn tôi?

Một đời tôi

Yêu tha thiết, thắm thiết

Đếm chưa đầy một bàn tay

Còn yêu vặt vãnh, vớ vẫn, gọi là tình bạn, 

thì nhiều lắm!

 

Đàn bà mà

Sao dám yêu lung tung, phóng khoáng, nhiều như thế?

Sao dám mở trái tim mình ra

Nhét thật nhiều vào??

 

Sao dám nói ra

Những điều không nên nói

Những điều không cần thiết

Không sợ người ta khinh?

 

Đọc thơ tôi

Một cô bạn –có lòng tốt- đã khuyên

Tôi không nên…. phô bầy, san sẻ nhiều như thế!

Nên làm thơ úp mở, kín đáo, nhẹ nhàng

Đừng quá tự tin, khờ khạo

Vì có nhiều người sẽ khi dễ, xem thường, khi họ đọc thơ tôi!

 

Nói thật, tôi đã buồn vài ngày

Muốn gác bút cho rồi, làm thơ chi nữa?

Ai cũng muốn được thương yêu, quí mến 

Làm thơ để người ta “look down”, tội gì làm??

 

Nhưng sau vài ngày

Tính bất cần đời trỗi dậy

Tôi là tôi, tôi là thế đấy

Thơ tôi làm, theo ý của tôi!

 

Bạn muốn đọc, tốt thôi

Không đọc, cũng tốt thôi

Tôi là tôi

Đôi khi tự hào (?!), muốn khiêm nhường, đôi khi hơi yếu đuối (vulnerable)

Tôi tập cho tôi, từ lâu, chẳng bao giờ nên kỳ thị

Chẳng nên phân biệt: đàn ông, đàn bà

Chẳng lẽ tim đàn ông khác với đàn bà?!

 

Ai cũng có 

Một trái tim, nóng hổi!

 

AnneDeux

9/16/2010

A Dialogue

A Dialogue

  

"The way to despair is to renounce having any type of experience."

                                                                               Flannery O'Connor

-So, honey, we came to the scene. We saw each other. Something in each of us attracted the other. We investigated each other by making small talks and occasional heavy conversations while relentlessly observing each other's reactions. We fell in love. And the rest was history. Like Julius Caesar of yore, we came, we saw and we conquered (each other). The whole process sounded simple, but for me, after one disastrous encounter after another, and after so much water went over the dam, I finally figured out the dynamics of human relationships. This came after I had accidentally come across a principle taken from forensics which bears the name Locard's Principle of Exchange. 

Basically the principle states that whenever a crime occurs, the perpetrator leaves something of him and takes something with him from the crime scene. We humans are both takers and givers. We take something from the environment and leave traces of us behind. The whole process and purpose of living for humans, the most conscious and self-aware organisms on this planet, is leaving behind a legacy of durability and goodness. Every one of us aspires to do so, but only a few are able to realize their dreams. Most of us, at best, are only able to leave traces of ourselves via our offsprings. From that standpoint, most of us are no better than lower forms of life. Those who accept their inability to do anything more than just procreation are okay in the sense that they go through the motion of living and believing in the lies and myths peddled by their religious and political leaders. They are blissfully serene as they approach the end of their days. 

Others who know that life is more than just procreation and following the imperatives of biology would struggle to engage in acts of creation via the pursuit of power, love and charity, arts, or knowledge. Those who are successful in the struggle are the happy ones. There is nothing grander than self-actualization, being able to produce something of lasting value and goodness. Those who are not successful are miserable and afflicted with all kinds of neuroses: self-aggrandizement, delusions, chronic lies and slanders, self-hatred, envy, and self-destruction. The most horrifying and saddest feeling a human can have is an inability to accept that there are other humans who are better than he is. 

-Sorry that I have to ask you this, but what "type" of human are you?

-Don't you know? 

-No, I don't. We just met recently. This is our third time together. 

-I don't believe that you don't know who I am. You're testing me again. But that's all right. I don't mind talking about myself. Like all humans, I want to be understood, accepted and loved, but if that's not happening, I would not fall apart because after a long struggle, I have understood, accepted, and loved myself. I don't need anybody else to validate and confirm who I think I am. After having said that, however, I still find it at times very comical to see the stupid and the ignorant get on the Internet and expound their "opinions". But I remind myself that, as expressed in the Desiderata, the stupid and the ignorant have the right, as I do, to say what is on their mind as long as it is backed up by facts and sound logic. If they engage in malicious libels, there are always the courts of laws to curb their behaviors. The Internet should be the market place of ideas. May the most logical and sensible ideas triumph over the others. Censorship and thought policing are indications of a fear of the ideas of others and a lack of confidence of one's own. Censorship is cowardice. Thought policing reflects the poverty of intellect. Those who fear discussions about politics and religion don't really have strong convictions. They fear counter-arguments. They are afraid of unvarnished facts and truths. They are weak thinkers. I despise without reservation those who constantly cry for censorship and thought police. Those miserable, intellectual weaklings are latent and proto-fascists at heart while outwardly crying out for civility in discourses. Let freedom of speech flourish! That's one of the reasons you and I settled in the United States. She is one of few countries in the world where freedom of speech and freedom of the press are still venerated. 

-Do you think I am one of those stupid and ignorant intellectual slaves who pathetically don't know they are slaves?

-No, you are not. You are too smart for that. Your faith is just a means for you to get peace. Your faith is not an end in itself. Life itself is the end. The short life you are having. The joys your wealth is bringing. The love and generosity you are showing to the less fortunate. And the affection and love you are showing to me. Unlike the stupid and the ignorant, you understand that religion serves Man, not the other way around. After all, it was Man who invented religion. It was Man who made "God" in his own image, not the other way around as commonly taught and believed. Religion is not the end, nor are the empty and illogical and unverifiable promises about Judgment Day, salvation, heaven, paradise, reincarnation, and sundry other bullshit and lies. On the contrary, this very life we have is the end. Our very efforts to make the most and best of it are the end. Only the stupid and the ignorant would embrace religion as the end all and be all of human existence. They do so because they cannot think. They are too stupid and too ignorant to think. That's why they are willing to die for their religion, at the behest of their mind controllers. 

-You are sounding like a religious fanatic yourself. Please don't go around speaking like you just did. Lesser souls would think you are the Devil incarnate and burn you at the stake. Your words would be just like pearls before swine. Swine would only know the value of food, not pearls. Stupidity and Ignorance are the two worst things a human can have. Forget that I just asked who you are. Just hold me tight and rock me to sleep. 

Wissai

October 29, 2014

Lisbon, Portugal.

A Sixth Sense

A Sixth Sense

"For Hari,

My love for you knew no limits, nor has it dimmed with time. 

I miss you more than words can ever say.

                                                       Martin Jacques"

Once upon a time there was a woman named Harriet or was it Henrietta, I don't really know for sure. She went by both, but name is not important. It's just a means for designation, a way to differentiate disparate, discrete entities. What is important here in this story was her claim of possessing a sixth sense and her strange love for me. A word of caution and warning: this story is a work of fiction, a stuff of fantasy and dreams weaved with words. When "un poète manqué" speaks, he invariably inflates, exaggerates, stretches facts, and flirts with truths.

I met her through a mutual friend. I was boarding a room in a house of a woman named Yvette. Renting a room was much less expensive than renting a whole apartment. I always looked for ways to save money, yet I also flirted with financial self-destruction. I was a creature of contradictions. Maybe I still am. But I am not a freak. I don't think so. 

A few years ago---five, on a Halloween night, to be exact, with the full moon shining brightly up in a cloudless sky, and at the height of my midlife crisis, I came to believe that I could make a living by plying my poker skills. So I quit my boring, soul-stultifying job by means of an email to my bombastic boss; threw my clothes, a few essentials, and several books into a suitcase; and headed west on I-15 that very night, with my right foot firmly, not loosely, on the gas pedal of a Toyota Camry, while not feeling quite fancy-free. I was heady and anxious at the same time, staking my future---the remainder of my life, on the fickle nature of luck and my knowledge of poker in the gambling and sin capital of the world. I felt an urge coming over me. I just had to get out of Houston on that Halloween night. Maybe insanity was playing trick or treat with my mind on that night, but somehow I didn't really care. All I wanted to do was to leave every façade of stability and respectability behind and head for the unknown and the uncertain. I was shaking with excitement. Adrenaline was pumping. I drove non-stop until exhaustion overtook me and forced me to check into a motel in Flagstaff, Arizona, a resort town high in the mountains. 

By the time I made conversation with Yvette, I had stayed in a furnished studio apartment for almost a year on Tropicana Avenue, ten minutes walk from Las Vegas Boulevard, working harder than I had ever done in my life. But I was happy. I was in total control of my life. I had no boss to report to. I came to work and leave whenever I felt like it. I was no longer an unhappy office slave. I now regarded myself as an independent businessman, living entirely on my wits. In some grander moments I fancied that I was a commanding general and my poker chips were my soldiers. I fought all kinds of battles and skirmishes, employing various strategies and tactics. The objective was to capture as many of my enemies' soldiers as possible, increasing my wealth and respect and self-respect in the process. I discovered that I was hardly the only one in this monomaniacal pursuit of winning and respect. Players all over the world, of all kinds of backgrounds, flocked to Vegas to pursue the dream of independence and wealth. The poker rooms were the fighting arenas and the players were the financial gladiators. The contest was pure Darwinism in its most blatant form. Only the fittest and smartest survived. The losers went back to where they had come from or stayed on and became homeless beggars or thieves and robbers. Former lawyers, engineers, teachers, disenchanted white and blue collar workers, and retired businessmen as well as uneducated but street-smart hustlers all duked it out day and night, 24/7, month after month, year after year. Some rose to fame and became millionaires in a very short time, like Dan Coleman, barely 24 years of age, but already amassed a fortune of $20 million, yet refused to endorse the game despite entreaties from the poker establishment. He said that poker was a very "dark" game and he didn't want to mislead the gullible public. I admired him hugely.  

Either I had an incredibly long stretch of good luck or I was indeed good at poker as I thought I was, because by the time I met Yvette I still had plenty of money in the bank. In fact, my bankroll swelled, not by much but big enough for me to maintain a middle-class lifestyle and an air of social respectability. I ate well, dressed like a gent, and worked out at a first-class gym. I was sixty, but would easily pass off for fifty, and had a face that prompted unsolicited comments such as "good-looking", "handsome", and the like. 

Yvette and I happened to sit next together at a poker table in a Saturday evening at the Venetian. Previously, as a regular player, she had eyed me from time to time whenever I was in the poker room, but we had never talked until then. She was not ugly, but no raving beauty either. She was past her prime. That plus an obvious fondness for food made her physically not enticing, to put the matter mildly. I didn't think she was a winning player. At best she broke  even. But I could see that she had an addiction, a weakness for gambling. Almost whenever I walked into the poker room, she was already there, eyes bleary, and face grim with determination to get back the money she had lost. But that Saturday evening she was winning quite big. She had about $5,600 worth of chips in front of her. Winning made her talkative. She initially made the usual small talks about the weather of Vegas (very hot in summer, but very pleasant in the winter months) and then moved onto personal questions: name, country of origin, length of stay in America, and if I ever served in the Army. She was excited to learn that I was of Vietnamese descent like she was, separated, and educated. We at first conversed in English but quickly switched to Vietnamese. From her diction and syntax in both languages, I could surmise that she didn't go to college. She proudly disclosed that she had been a "business" woman (restaurant and jewelry) and currently married to an American ex-captain in military intelligence who had to jump through hoops to marry her and then took 24 of her relatives out of Vietnam in the waning days of the war when the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese troops were closing in on Saigon.

I could be charming when I wanted to. And I decided to turn on the charm that evening. I made eye contact, listened with rapt attention to everything she had to say, and asked discreet, appropriate probing questions. As the evening dragged on and became night, it became obvious to me that she quite liked me. She then asked me where I stayed and how much I was paying for the rent. Eventually she got down to business. She invited me to visit her at her house. She had a big house and was willing to rent out one of the bedrooms for a modest monthly amount.

I showed up at her house the next day. The house was big and nice as she described, in Henderson, one of the tony suburbs of Vegas. The house bordered a golf course and had a sizable back yard tastefully landscaped. I was duly impressed. We agreed to a rent which was a bit more than half of what I was paying. I moved in the following month. I met her husband who was at least 20 years her senior, quite affable but obviously very tired of his wife's gambling ways. He shared his frustrations with me over the beers one night. Four months later, he moved out of the house and into the townhouse of his new love, a Thai woman in her 40's whom he had met at a bar. Yvette sobbingly told me her tale of woe when I remarked that I had not seen Paul around for days. 

Soon after the ex-captain moved out of the house, Yvette started hitting on me. I was touched by her affection for me, but I could not reciprocate her feelings. She was not my type. She was coarse, calculating, and selfish. I didn't like her egotism and egoism. There was no evolutionary evolvement to higher values in her. We can only love those for whom we have respect and affection. For Yvette I had neither. She left me cold. She was animalism at its most extreme manifestation. Yet she was self-righteous, thinking there was nothing wrong with her. I felt I had to get out of the house. I was concerned that one night Yvette could not contain herself and might force herself on me in the middle of the night when I was sound asleep (my bedroom door was curiously not equipped with a lock). That would be bad and sad for both her and me. So I told her over one dinner that I had to move back to Houston as my son missed me and requested my being in the same town with him. He had just finished college and would start his first job in a few weeks. I still remembered her reactions when I broke the news. She laid down her chopsticks forcefully on the table and looked straight at me, visibly upset. She enunciated her words and they came to me like blows of sledgehammer.

-Roberto, your son is a grown man. He can take care of himself. You're making good money here. Plus you're happy here, right? So tell me exactly, why do you want to leave Vegas? To get away from me? Tell me.

-No, I just want to be by my son. He said he needed me. 

-Bullshit! I'm not buying that. Anyway, I don't want you to leave Vegas. Ever. Because if you do, I won't be able to see you again. But I can't force you to stay in this house. I can see that. There's a lady I want you to meet. If I must lose you, I'd rather lose you to this lady. She and I are part of a network of war brides here in town. I think you'll like her. But please, to win her over, you must not be stingy with your money as you've been with me. I'll call her and arrange for you two to meet.

So Yvette became a matchmaker. And Yvette was right. I liked Harriet right away. We met for lunch. Harriet did most of the talking. 

"I am of mixed blood. I am of French, Chinese, and Vietnamese parentage. My parents were quite wealthy. We owned land plus a jewelry business (not "jewelry business" again! It looked like every other Vietnamese middle-aged woman I met had some connection with the jewelry business in one way or another) in a district about 70 miles southwest of Saigon. Growing up I didn't have to worry about food as you did. I had plenty to eat. My parents even had the resources to hire musicians to teach me sing and play musical instruments, but I was lazy. I didn't persevere with the training. Only my sister stayed on with the program. I was not good with education either. I didn't finish high school. I would rather play with my friends than hit the books. Plus, I discovered that I was pretty and charming and the neighborhood boys liked me. They flirted with me, sending love notes and presents. Worse, I was bursting out with sexuality. My body was crying for fulfillment. Soon, I fell in love with a lieutenant of the Rangers stationing in the district. He was quiet and good with singing and the guitar. My parents were relieved to marry me off. I soon had two daughters with  the lieutenant who was later promoted to the rank of captain. People in the village looked up to him and to me. But to my sorrow, I found out marriage was not cracked up to be what I had thought it was. My husband was often away fighting against the Vietcong insurgents. I heard rumors he was sleeping around. When confronted, he admitted that the rumors were true. He said the girls were still in high school and they threw themselves on him. He couldn't say no! He didn't know when he would die, being in the thick of the war and all. He might as well enjoy life while he was still alive. I was mad and crestfallen. I had loved him. I married him because of love. He hardly had enough money to support me and the daughters. My parents had to constantly give me money. I was tired of being a dependent. So when the wife of a major in my husband's battalion suggested that I could make money by getting involved in underground currency exchange and working with the Americans, I jumped at the opportunity. I soon made more money than my captain husband. We drifted apart. I met a young American sergeant at a dance. He fell in love with me afterwards and bought me a 3-carat diamond ring as a birthday present. I was very impressed. I thought he came from a rich family. He told me his brother was a doctor. I divorced my Vietnamese husband in order to marry this big, handsome  American sergeant who was obviously smitten with me. When I came to America, I was hugely disappointed. We had to live with Bob's parents, paying them rent. In Vietnam I lived in my own house bought and paid for by my parents. Bob bought everything on credit cards. We were in debt, something I had never been in, and something intolerable to me. So I had to work, but my English then was not good, so I had to work low-paying jobs to help pay the bills. I even was forced to sell piece by piece of the jewelries I had brought with me to make ends meet. I was miserable. At one time I worked as a receptionist for a Vietnamese doctor. He was married, but he made it clear he liked me. He hinted that I should divorce Bob, then he would divorce his wife so he and I would be free to be together. But I didn't really like the doctor. He was short and quite ugly, unlike you. If he'd been like you, I might have jumped at his suggestion. I know, I have a weakness for tall, handsome men. Anyway, Bob caught on that the doctor was hitting on me so he forced me to quit. I stopped caring for Bob. I went to the clubs every weekend. I loved dancing. Men were hitting on me, left and right, but I loved none of them. Was I a bad woman? Tell me. Anyway, I slept with Bob less and less as time passed by. Then the inevitable happened. He found an American woman who loved him and did everything he asked for in bed, including things I refused to do. We got a divorce. I wrangled a monthly alimony of $1,000 from him. I survived on that in Vegas back in the late 1990's . Then a few years later, I ran into an old friend from the village. He was separated  from his wife. She lived in Garden Grove in California. He helped me get a job at a casino where he worked as a waiter. I first started out as a waiter assistant and then became a waitress myself after bribing the boss with a piece of jewelry. I made good money from tips. I started saving money for rainy days. The man from the village one day told me he loved me and wanted to move in with me. I thought why not, I would save some more money by his helping out with the rent. Besides, I would be less lonely. But I was wrong. He turned out to be a shameless thief, a chronic womanizer, and a losing gambler. I finally kicked him out six months ago. I don't know where he is and I don't care. He is probably back to his wife. By the way, I am now retired and living off on social security, my pension, and the alimony money. You probably are wondering what happened to my daughters. I left one with my parents. She was married young, had two kids and is now a grandmother. I love her, but I have a feeling that she loves her children and grandchildren much more than she loves me, if she does at all. I took the younger daughter with me to America. She turned out to be my heartbreaker. She broke my heart so many times for her acts redolent of insolence and ingratitude and indifference. She has made it clear that I mean nothing to her. She never bothers to visit me or takes me to shopping although she lives right here in town, only twenty minutes' drive away. Every year she and her Jamaican husband go on a vacation in Hawaii. They have some kind of timeshare arrangement there. They never once asked me to go with them. My daughter is the one who has made me feel very lonely. Do you feel lonely, Roberto?"

I looked at her. Tears were forming in her eyes. I pulled a paper napkin from the dispenser and gave it to her. Her fingers brushed mine. She said softly, "Thank you.". I heaved a heavy sigh and then went into a monologue of my own.

"Lonely? I can write a book about loneliness. I have lived with it for so long that it has become my middle name. But I'm okay now. I think we are lonely only when we want to be understood, accepted, and loved. But if we give up on finding love and we keep ourselves very busy, we won't have time to feel lonely. I was married five times. To this day I don't think I know what marital happiness means. But I've known intimately about loneliness while being in the thick of being married. I hope one day I am able to hold you in my arms so both you and I won't feel lonely anymore."

Harriet and I hit it off swimmingly. We talked on the phone and saw each other almost every day for five weeks before she invited me to move in with her. She didn't let me share half of the rent and the sundry household expenses for the reason that those expenses were fixed and didn't increase after I moved in. I just had to pay for food and drove her around in my car for errands. 

I never forget the afternoon we first made love. Without preliminaries, she just took off her clothes and asked me to join her in her bed. She was very patient with me and showed me how to please her. I was glad that I was able to perform to her satisfaction. No other woman had taught me so much about female sexuality. To my delight as time went by, I discovered that under her tutelage, my virility increased although I was approaching sixty-two then and I was losing my hair. I felt that I was rejuvenated. I felt and looked younger. There was a glow on my face and on hers, too despite the fact that she just stepped over to the other side of sixty. I would also have to say that for the first time in my life I knew what domestic happiness meant. She didn't press me for marriage because she wanted to continue receiving alimony money from Bob. Sure, we had fights, sometimes fierce, long drawn-out battles, because both of us were headstrong and domineering, but invariably we made up and we loved each other more after the fight ended. 

She was a strange woman, very much into mysticism and fatalism. She didn't go to college, but she read quite widely, especially about eastern religions and philosophy. From her, I learned of the following:

Importance of appearance: clothes make a man, you are what you dress. Forget about nonconformism and indifference to public opinion. If you dress shabbily, that means you have no respect for yourself. And that means you invite other people to show disrespect to you. 

Importance of speech: not only Man is an animal affected by what he sees, he is also deeply affected by what he hears. Think of the importance of music and powerful speeches or heart-rending cries. So when you speak, you must speak well. Pay attention to the delivery (tone and intonation) as well as the content. Be brief and laconic, direct, clear, and concise. Speak softly so people have to strain their ears to hear you. Be wary of using humor. it's a two-edged sword. 

Philosophy of life: everybody dies. To live is to prepare yourself for the day you are going to die. Be simple, truthful, and mysterious to others. Be mystical if you can. Be polite, considerate, and urbane. Be cultured. Don't be vulgar. Don't degrade yourself. Everybody deserves forgivenesses because everybody makes mistakes. Be gentle. Avoid criticizing others. You must exude cosmopolitanism and sophistication. Don't be a bumpkin. You can be classy without being rich. Don't be belligerent. Act with restraint. Be ready to apologize and ask for forgiveness. Your knowledge and intelligence must be shown only when absolutely necessary. They are like jewelries. If you display them in public too often, sooner than later somebody would harm you in order to get them. Very few humans can tolerate others who are more gifted than them. So silence and amiability are tools for a peaceful long life. Be gentle to yourself so you can be gentle to others. 

What are of importance in life are good health, love, and self-sufficiency in that order. Love usually begins with attraction but is sustained by respect. Respect yourself. A true man must be strong enough to support himself. Don't be a beggar. Accept help when you need help, but you must repay it. Be fair. 

The above is a synopsis of what I have learned from her. They were distilled from the long talks and exhortations she had with me. They were not exactly her words. She was wise and mysterious yet earthy and horribly profane when she got angry. But I knew she loved me because she refused to take money from me when I came home beaming with joy for having a good day at work. She also refused my offer to have her name on my will. She wanted to add and contribute to my personal wealth, not to subtract from it. Love was to give and give, she kept saying to me. She said her mission in life was to make me become a wiser person. She said she felt sorry that some people in the past mistreated me, showed contempt for me, and used me. She said the fault entirely lay with me for not really understanding human nature, despite all my sufferings, despite all my book learning. She pointed out that I committed a basic flaw in thinking: I assumed other people had the same thinking process as I did and that they looked at the world with the same values and knowledge as I did. But I should have known that, she added, I was never part of the majority. And the majority of humans were truly selfish, vain and vicious, power-hungry, hypocritical, delusional, and fearful of facts, truths, and logic, she concluded. 

We had stayed together for almost three years when one morning, out of the blue, she woke me up and solemnly delivered her "predictions":

"Roberto, honey, you only imagine things whereas I actually see things and know things, not only in the present but also far into the future. I don't know whether that ability is a gift or a curse. But I want you to listen closely to what I am going to say:

First, I will die soon. I don't know exactly when, but no later than six months from now. I will die in my sleep. I don't want you to be devastated and grief-stricken when that happens. No death is really unexpected or meaningless or untimely. Everything happens for a reason. It's always planned and preordained. We can feel and see the future if we open ourselves to it. Just like when we first met, we both knew right away we would quickly fall in love, and our love would be intense and incandescent. By the way, here's the key to the safe in the bedroom closet. Everything in there is yours after I die. I do love you very much, Roberto, more than you ever know or believe. Even though I know I'm a dead woman within six months, I know I'm going to love you forever. 

Second, within a year of my death, you will meet a lady who is much better than me in terms of wealth and learning, who will love you as deeply as I do. She will make you happy and serene in your golden years. But every time you're with her, you'll think of me. In fact, I'll be her. So I won't really be gone. Honey, did you hear what I just said? 

Third, because of the love of that lady---my love really---your strong constitution, and your ferocious will to live, you will not die until you hit 99. She---I really---and you will die within weeks of each other." 

Of course, I humored her by listening attentively to her "predictions" but I didn't buy any of those. They were all hocus-pocus and mumbo jumbo to me. I have always regarded those who traffic in predictions and prophecies, the so-called "prophets" as charlatans who take advantage of human predisposition to superstitions and wishes and far-out dreams. To me, Nostradamus and the like, including their "interpreters", were outright fraudsters. (The so-called prophecies were never in clear, unambiguous, specific language. The "prophecies" were always in vague, opaque language so they can mean whatever the hell the "interpreters" take them to mean). And those who believe in them are downright stupid and/or delusional, in my not-so-humble opinion. I always shudder with disgust when I read or hear about prophet this and prophet that. The word "prophet" has long been abused. We called certain historical figures like Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad as "prophets" instead of plain religious and political leaders, for no other reason than to invest in them, to shroud them with an air of "divine" connection to facilitate the brainwashing of gullible and stupid converts. I grant that we could extrapolate the present trends and guess what the future will be if the variables stay the same within the same parameters. But I don't believe in pinpoint predictions of the future. I don't believe there are humans who possess that ability, otherwise all self-declared "prophets" and "fortune tellers" would be enormously rich and powerful. They would corner the market on lotteries and all games involving chance. It must be noted here, however, that the "predictions" of Harriet, unlike those of Nostradamus and the like, were couched in clear, specific language. 

My rock-hard rationalism got a jolt when true to her words, exactly 180 days after Harriet uttered those fateful words to me, I found her in bed cold and stiff with rigor mortis one Sunday morning. It was an eerie sight of her lying there, mouth agape, face ashen, and eyes open and unfocused. I was shook up. I frantically fumbled for my phone. 

I didn't bother to inform Yvette of what had happened to Harriet. Yvette had given up on me after several futile attempts to drive a wedge between Harriet and me. I no longer frequented the poker room where she was a regular. 

The ceremony was brief. Only Bob, her daughter, and I were present when Harriet was cremated . Bob and I cried our hearts out, but her daughter did not. I elected to keep a jar of her ashes. It is now on the altar along with her photo taken in her prime, her mother's photo, and those of my parents. Every night before going to bed, I do the Yoga cum meditation routine. Then I light up the perfumed incense, take out a little polished granite stone ceremonial cudgel and strike it against the bell ten times then softly call Harriet's name along with the quotation at the beginning of this story. I don't believe that Harriet's soul still exists so that she could hear my voice. I do the incantation routine because I love her and I honor her daily routine when she was still alive. She used to pray for me in earnest every morning prior to my leaving for work. I do the routine because I feel peaceful when I do so. The chiming of the bell when it is struck by the stone cudgel reverberates throughout the condo, reminding me of her presence, reminding me of being fortunate enough to be loved by a remarkable woman, who taught and showed me what true love and ecstatic sex were really like. I have become a more rounded, more balanced, and happier person, thanks to her. I know I was a lucky man. 

After Harriet  passed away, i went through a daze, feeling unanchored, lonely, and lost. The only woman in this world who really understood and cared for me was gone. I stopped playing poker for a month. When I resumed, I found out I lost the passion for it. I played fewer hours and I got bored and tired quite easily. I still won but only enough to cover living expenses. My bankroll no longer was increased by the poker winnings as before. It was now only augmented by social security benefits and pension payments. Nonetheless, I had enough money to live comfortably till the day I would have to die. At least I hoped so. I took up writing and traveling to pass the time. 

I met Cherry, an Irish woman living in Chicago, on a cruise. She was a few years younger than me, she said, but I had a feeling that she was fudging the figures. She had never been married, she claimed, but I also wondered about that. Regardless, she was educated, spoke (I loved her Irish brogue to the point my own English now was tinged with that) and dressed well, and kept her youthful figure---quite an accomplishment for a woman of her age. Food is important to our survival. We eat to live, not the other way around. Obesity is an obscenity. It throws evolutionary development out of whack. It makes obese humans appear more as pigs than as humans. Nothing exceeds quite like excess. Overeating is not only unhealthy, but also self-degrading. A truly self-respecting person does not degrade himself. I once knew a fat woman. Out of the kindness of my heart, I urged her to eat less. She countered by saying for some people, her included, obesity was caused by glandular disorders. I said, "yes, I heard about that, but in your case, it is plain gluttony, not gland. I've seen how much you can eat." We must take ownership and responsibility for own actions. We must not shift blames. The same woman told me she would be okay because God would always take care of her. That kind of logic always ticked me off. So I wryly remarked that she must be really special while six million fellow Jews of hers who perished in the Holocaust were not. With my "infantile, primitive strand of logic", I strongly and loudly assert that if there were a God, that God must not be discriminating, otherwise He would be just a projection of Man's longings, desires, and wishes. Man is a clever animal. Man would do anything to survive. If he must sacrifice logic and self-respect in order to survive, he would readily do so. Most humans do, anyway. I always ask myself if I am like most humans. We don't know who we really are and what we are made of until and unless we are tested. I further submit that most humans think they are better than they actually are. Self-inflation while engaging in denial and self-justification, is something lesser humans do day in and day out. The world will be a better place if those humans cultivate more self-awareness and learn to be more honest with themselves and with others. Truths terrify most humans. They cannot deal with truths because that requires self-confrontation, an ability to come to terms with pains, and a capacity for change. So most humans live from one day to the next---without zest, without a program for self-improvement---"until the last syllable of recorded time".

As I interacted more with Cherry---a Catholic, of course---my respect for her increased after I observed that she was generous, compassionate, honest, pleasant, and not unnecessarily and absurdly self-impressed like other much less accomplished women I happened to know. She looked rich and acted as if she was growing up with money. She said she had inherited quite a bit of money from her parents. She wanted to appear mysterious and I respected her privacy. Unlike Yvette, I was not the type who wanted to pry into another person's finance. It was bad form to do so. Money, I learned a long time ago, was the prime reason for divorce and personal conflicts. It was also the quickest route to get to the bottom of another person's heart and character. We could tell who the person is just from the way he handles money. Love of money, love of power, and having a colossal ego are stumbling blocks to enlightenment. 

I realized I was standing on slippery ground when I wondered if I kept going out with Cherry and if things got serious between us, I might have to become a Catholic, at least in form, as she kept dragging me to church and I started experiencing a kind of serenity amidst the singing and incantation that I had not experienced before. I would never subscribe to the Catholic dogmas and doctrines, but now I would understand the faithful's strivings to understand the meaning and relevance of their existence. I also wondered how she remained unattached for so long. Surely, there must have men who would find her desirable. By our third date, I made up my mind that she must be the lady Harriet "had predicted"! So far I have not noticed anything about Cherry that would turn me off while I might already disappoint her. I have not even attempted to kiss her yet despite her subtle signs of encouragement. On the other hand, I probably have imagined things. The way I look at the situation is like this: if she likes me and cares enough about me, she would let me know, eventually. But frankly, I am not too worried about that. Qué será será. Love is Fate. Anyway, after the leave-taking at the end of our third date, I took out my iPad and hurriedly jotted down the following words in my notebook. I will never show them to her. Doing so would destroy the magic of what I feel about her. While I don't believe in predictions and prophecies, I have faith in the magical realism of imagination and dreams. Life would be too dreary otherwise.  

"Silent Snow, Secret Snow

The S by the power of 4 was the title of a short story of Conrad Aiken that I read almost five decades ago. I borrowed it for what I am going to say about what transpired to us, rather, more precisely, what hit me when you took my hand into yours on that fateful Wednesday morning.

You probably reached out and held my hand in a friendly gesture, bereft of any ulterior motive, but to me that moment when our hands intertwined---no longer than perhaps the all-too-brief three seconds---marked the quickening of my senses and sent me to a dreamy, wishful realm of dreams and fantasies. 

From that moment on, my world has been filled with a soft, secret, and silent snow where I would be the only person who knows of such snow. Don't you know I wished I would have had the audacity to draw you nearer to me then and there and hold you tight and whisper softly in your ears that I had waited for a long time for a moment like this to come? I always feel peaceful when you are around. I've been writing like crazy since I met you. Each night my reverie of you is like the landing of late winter's snow on my secret soul. There are times my longings for you manifest themselves in an aching tumescence in the morning that both makes me proud of my virility and painfully lonely at the same time. I just let the tumescence subside and try to get back to sleep. If sleep plays hard to get, I would get up, get dressed quickly, and head for the gym to work away my desire for you while wondering whether Harriet's second prediction ever comes true. Time is tickling away. Her second prediction has an expiration date in a month. You remember Harriet, don't you? I told you about her and her predictions in our first date.

Regardless, I think I love you, Cherry. I'm taking back what I just said. I know I love you, Cherry. And I loved you, Harriet. I really did. And I always will, till the day I die. Meanwhile I'm feeling strong, focused, and disciplined, like an invincible spy in a thriller movie, like an intrepid hero in a Walter Mitty story. The world looks fresh and splendid once more. My blood is coursing strongly. And I feel warm. If nothing else comes, I still have the memories of our times together to sustain me in the years to come.

I have come to believe that hell is not some physical location, as the scriptures for which you have a high regard would like us to believe, but an inability to love. So in a manner of speaking, since the moment your hand held mine in such an electrifying, passionate, and loving manner, I have been in a state of mind which must be none other than high paradise."

Wissai

November 5, 2014

Bermuda 

Postscript:

A Sixth Sense and Beyond

A narrative from the singular first personal pronoun's perspective is fraught and freighted with a singular problem: autobiographical fallacy.

I am not a poet nor a writer of short fiction. I just put words together for fun and release. I write because I feel I have to. I don't care if my words don't cohere or fail to reach a certain standard. The words were written because they had a personal therapeutic value. 

Poetry and fiction are the stuff of imagination and exaggeration which somehow has a semblance to reality. This semblance is what is appealing about literature. But I didn't fancy what I have written is literature. Rather, It is associational, free-flowing typing. Dilettantism is at the core at what I do, including living. I wish I had the ferocious will to live as mentioned in the story.

So, as I put the finishing touches to the story, I realized its narrative is like a Swiss cheese. It has a lot of holes.: there are many things unsaid about the characters; who is the focus/protagonist---the narrator or Harried, the possessor of a so-called sixth sense? and most importantly, what is the story "about"?

Rather than rewriting the story and damaging its "structure", the following words perhaps shed some light on the story. 

A human's consciousness starts with monism as an infant, proceeds to dualism as an adult and then comes back to monism for those who are metaphysically gifted. 

Some humans ("prophets", shamans, meditation practitioners, and lunatics) from time immemorial claim to have more than five senses. Hallucinogenic substances (mushrooms, cacti, juice from vines, and synthetic chemicals like LSD, meth, and crystals) have been ingested or smoked/inhaled to aid the attainment of altered states of consciousness and the expansion of awareness. We humans mock and fear, even hate, what and whom we don't understand. 

Life, after what's been said and done, is an attempt of self-actualization and pursuit of unconditional love, and rarely of efforts to obtain truths via acquisition of knowledge, reasoning and logic. Most attempts fail, however, accounting for all kinds of excuses, malaise, and even pathological behaviors.

The story was an attempt to address the above issues. 

Wissai