Good lord, I'm gonna cry.
I don't know what's happening to me anymore.
Curtains down. Show's over.
No matter how hard I tried to put on those smile, at the end of the day, the pain was still here.
Painting: Paolo Uccelo (1397 - 1945). St. George and the Dragon. The National Gallery, London.
I
Not my best side, I'm afraid.
The artist didn't give me a chance to
Pose properly, and as you can see,
Poor chap, he had this obsession with
Triangles, so he left off two of my
Feet. I didn't comment at the time
(What, after all, are two feet
To a monster?) but afterwards
I was sorry for the bad publicity.
Why, I said to myself, should my conqueror
Be so ostentatiously beardless, and ride
A horse with a deformed neck and square hoofs?
Why should my victim be so
Unattractive as to be inedible,
And why should she have me literally
On a string? I don't mind dying
Ritually, since I always rise again,
But I should have liked a little more blood
To show they were taking me seriously.
II
It's hard for a girl to be sure if
She wants to be rescued. I mean, I quite
Took to the dragon. It's nice to be
Liked, if you know what I mean. He was
So nicely physical, with his claws
And lovely green skin, and that sexy tail,
And the way he looked at me,
He made me feel he was all ready to
Eat me. And any girl enjoys that.
So when this boy turned up, wearing machinery,
On a really dangerous horse, to be honest
I didn't much fancy him. I mean,
What was he like underneath the hardware?
He might have acne, blackheads or even
Bad breath for all I could tell, but the dragon--
Well, you could see all his equipment
At a glance. Still, what could I do?
The dragon got himself beaten by the boy,
And a girl's got to think of her future.
III
I have diplomas in Dragon
Management and Virgin Reclamation.
My horse is the latest model, with
Automatic transmission and built-in
Obsolescence. My spear is custom-built,
And my prototype armour
Still on the secret list. You can't
Do better than me at the moment.
I'm qualified and equipped to the
Eyebrow. So why be difficult?
Don't you want to be killed and/or rescued
In the most contemporary way? Don't
You want to carry out the roles
That sociology and myth have designed for you?
Don't you realize that, by being choosy,
You are endangering job prospects
In the spear- and horse-building industries?
What, in any case, does it matter what
You want? You're in my way.
U. A. Fanthorpe (b. 1929)
--
In my Creative Writing class this morning, we discussed this poem by U. A. Fanthorpe which is written based from an old painting of Paolo Uccelo. This poem is so funny and I decided on that moment that I'm gonna put it here on my blog because I don't want to forget this poem. :D
I had a plan for this day. Me and my best friend would go out and meet at the park and hang out. I was really excited and I thought of all the fun things that we’re about to do. I pictured the two of us eating at a fancy restaurant, smiling, giggling, and laughing. And I thought of all those sort of things.
I arrived at the park a little bit later than we had planned but I didn’t find her there. Well, I thought that maybe she was just taking some time, you know, preparing. Maybe she’s trying really hard to look good for me. Maybe she’s putting on some makeup and erasing them afterwards thinking that she had put on a little bit too much. Or maybe she’s having a hard time deciding whether she would wear pants or a mini skirt.
But she didn’t come. And I was standing here for almost two hours.
My phone beeped, and clumsily I took it out from my pocket and it almost fell down. And yes, she texted me.
i love u and i knw u love me. i knw u had so many plans 4 ds day but i realized I cnt return ur feelings. so i dcided not 2 come and tel u dat ur my jst my bstfrnd. nthng more nthng less.
I dropped my phone. Tears fell. My knees touched the grassy ground. I had been watching her for so many years now. And I knew she knew that I had these feelings for her.
I picked up my phone. Tears stopped falling. And I stood up.
I closed my eyes. I felt the moist air brushing against my cheeks.
No. I’m not letting her go. There’s no way and never.
During Christmas seasons, a person would bother to buy his friend a gift only if he knew that he will receive one from that friend. Am I wrong?
On a friend's birthday, a person would only bother to buy a gift if he is invited to some sort of a birthday celebration. So if a person's best friend wouldn't throw a celebration, forget the gift, friend.
I find this attitude really weird and at the same time, funny. We, Filipinos, are people who never wants to be the "lugi" one. We aren't Alchemists but we would never defy the law of equivalent exchange. I remember Sheldon Cooper who bought many gifts of different values just to be sure he could give the exact equivalent of what he would receive, and he called it the "social norm."
I was disgusted by this attitude the moment I first realized it.
For me, gifts are given without expecting something in exchange. You give because you want to give. Simple eh? You give because your friend is special and you want him to be happy and be pleased. And you want him to feel that he really is special to you.
Am I bitter? Not really. I wrote this because I find this really weird. Not that I'm jealous of something or someone. (Truth)
So I don't really feel awkward whenever these circumstances happen to me. When I give and I feel that there's nothing in return, I don't feel awkward. And don't feel awkward too.
And know I'm wondering how it feels to have a friend who makes his or her friends feel that they're special.
