simounwrites

[simounwrites]

lost

As you turn to where two roads meet, the streets get stranger. The faces blur and you forget where you’re going. But if you’re looking at the right signs, you might find your way back or get even more lost.

[simounwrites]

Monsters of Manila #1

Milos is bored.

Amidst the groovy music blasting from his earphones, the tub of ice cream in front of him, and his workmates buzzing around, Milos still finds himself bored. He wants to melt, slither out of the canteen, out of the building and into the sewers.

“You okay, Milos? You’re so quiet.”

You’re so quiet, that’s what they always say right after yanking earphones out of his ears. Every frigging time. 

What’s so bad about being quiet? What are people’s obsessive need to be yapping all the time? Why aren’t long silences and still movements accepted as a norm? Why? Why?!

These are the words Milos wanted to scream to Daisy, her mousy little workmate. Dark hair, wide nose, and face caked with whitening cream. Everyone has a Daisy in their office.

“Oh, sorry. What were you saying?” Milos whispered.

“You were just standing there in front of the ice cream. Why won’t you scoop some and join us at the sofa.”

“Oh, okay. I’ll just --” Milos reached for a Styrofoam cup and watched as Daisy laughed raucously at a picture in a phone one of their workmates is showing her.

As Milos scoops out watery ice cream to the tub, he can’t help but think why is he even standing there. He’s like a robot, following their commands just to feel normal. This office does this thing every Friday, hours before time out. People would bring food that are either fried, pasteurized, and crunchy and they would talk about things that don't even interest Milos. Who cares which celebrity couples broke up? Who cares about the new Starbucks promo? Who cares about you losing weight? Who cares?

But Milos doesn’t dare say these things.

He just quietly smiles to everyone. He giggles a little. Make little jokes. Send smileys in the office chat. 

He is not himself in this place.

Not one bit.

But there he goes, walking towards the sofa that feels like the biggest hole in the earth that once he sits, he’ll fall into an abyss of sticky skins, lips talking nonsense, and ideas that don’t matter. At least to him.

Already his workmates are talking about the new superhero movie that just came out. At least he likes that movie but then they started talking about plot holes that weren’t there or allusions that the movie didn’t even imply and Milos is reduced to licking ice cream out of his fork miserably as they occasionally ask him about his opinion.

“Yeah, I know.” He would say and then he’ll laugh at a joke that he didn’t even find funny.

Milos is usually the first one out of the office and today is no exception. As he gathers his things and put it into his pack one by one, he can’t help but gaze past the floor-to-ceiling windows of their office. Good thing he’s by the windows or he’ll be mad just the first week. At least he can see that there still is the world out of there. The expanse of freedom. Where it's okay to be left alone. Where you can wear whatever you want. Say whatever you want. And no one will force you to do things you don’t want to.

As his eyes traced the large buildings, the narrow streets, and the Lego-like figures of other workers bustling in the streets of Makati, he muttered something under his breath. “I hope something exciting happens. You know, something that disrupts my time here.”

Milos reached for his mouse and logged the computer out. He then slung his pack and started hitting the bowels of the office that is already dim-lit because most are huddled in the cafeteria or gossiping in the restrooms. No one knows Milos is about to go home. And it favored him because no one is about to stop him asking again why he’s so quiet all the time.

It’s Friday and he’s inches away to two days of liberty.

He pushed the glass doors open and found himself in the elevator hallways and alas there stood Carl.

Carl is the guy in the office that everyone loves. He’s tanned, has tattoos snaking its way out of his biceps to his wrists, and has wavy jet black hair that is tied into a ponytail. He’s puffing a smoke and to Milos it’s intentional that he billowed a fresh whiff into his direction.

“Milos! Where are you going, bro? It’s only 6:30! What you going home early for?”

Right from his tone, Milos knows this “dude” is judging his oversized trousers and the large pack hanging on his back.

Carl rested his arm onto Milos shoulders and shoved the white smoke machine into his mouth.

“Uhh, I don’t smoke.” Milos said.

“Why?”

“I just don’t.”

“Hmmm, okay.”

Carl moved away from him and glued his back at one of the elevator buttons.

“I like your name. Milos. What is that, German?”

“French.”

“Ah, French. Bonjour, monsieur!”

“Yeah.”

“You’ve been here for nine months, bro. What’s your deal?” Carl asked, smiling. The sudden change of topic felt like a forearm that appeared out of nowhere and hit his head as he was walking.

“Wh-what? What do you mean what’s my deal?”

“It’s like we don’t know you. You don’t smoke. You don’t drink. You don’t even eat lunch with us. Come on, bro. What’s your deal?”

“I have no deal. That’s, uhh, that’s just me. I mean, isn’t that enough? To be just me?”

“Well.” Carl put the cigarette by his feet and crushed it with his toes. “Surely, there must be something more.”

“Nope. That’s it.”

“I know your type. I know guys like you. Usually you have something in you that’s like a ticking bomb, you know. Something that is just about to explode any moment. And that’s bad, bro. You have to let it out. Or you’ll be reduced into smithereens. See what I did there, I’m sort of a wordsmith, my man!”

“Can you move away from the buttons, please?”

“Oh! Oh, there it is. Real Milos surfacing.”

Milos let out a simpering sigh. “No, bro. I’m sorry. I want to go home, please. I didn’t mean to sound --”

“What? Real? Like a person? A human socializing? We’re not going to eat you, Milos. We’re humans too. We’re your buddies. We want to know you. Come on, man.”

“Easy for you to say. I mean, everyone adores you. You know, Carl the hottie of the office.”

Carl bit his lips and chuckled. “Seriously. I don’t get these people too sometimes. They’re too shallow, I can see that too. Maybe I’m just better with putting up with them. But you, you can’t. You can’t take these people anymore. Trust me, Milos. I understand. Now, it’s your choice.”

Now, Carl had moved out of buttons and strode at Milos’ side. “Are you with us or not? Or for now, me?”

“What are you doing?” Milos asked. This close he can smell the nicotine out of the dude’s maws and he wants to sneeze himself. “I have to go home. I need to feed my cat.”

Carl is not answering. He knows he doesn’t have a cat.

And so Milos chose.

He chose to get out of there.

TO BE CONTINUED

[simounwrites]

The Doors

The First Door appeared three years ago and it brought famine. Suddenly, crops were depleted. Cows, chickens, and any other livestock started dying. Water became scarce. Like the world stopped, like it stopped spinning to reproduce, like it forgot there are people relying on it. Everyone was baffled, unsure, and more than that, afraid. Scientists tried to find out what happened but they can’t find any explanation especially since the time of its discovery, the Second Door appeared.

Sickness is what the Second Door brought. Due to severe non-existence of food and water, humans are easy targets of any disease. You wouldn’t cross a hallway without someone coughing, without someone retching, and without someone having seizure on the floor. And to make it worse, medicine mysteriously dried out and doctors and nurses started contracting diseases too.

The first two Doors took a great toll to humanity. More than a quarter of the world’s population died out...or just disappeared.

Now everything is quiet.

The forest is dead.

The mountains are stark.

The air is pain.

What’s left of the survivors are nothing but people who are barely breathing. We began turning to each other. Cities were ransacked. War escalated. Innocents were killed. No human trust another human.

And this was only three years ago since the first two Doors appeared.

It’s all because of people opening what they do not understand. Those Doors floating in the midair, just a simple turn of the knob and desolation was unleashed.

I was fifteen years when I first heard of the chilling news of the First Door. There was the bony lady on the screen, talking about sudden death of livestock in different places in all of the continents. Her voice was sickly, that’s what I remember. She’s on the verge of breakdown and it’s evident by her soupy voice.

I remember just being inside the house, for weeks. My parents would go out and me and my two siblings are sometimes left for the entire day without knowing what’s happening outside. Bloodcurdling screams from my neighbors became a common occurrence, large trail of smokes from distant towns also became a customary sight. Our parents would return from almost a day of a trip with bloodshot eyes. They wouldn’t speak to us, like the horrors they witnessed were unspeakable and I expected it to be. However, my father said something to me one time after their trip, “There is hope.”

But this didn’t stop the Second Door. Soon, the disease caught up to our family. The youngest of us, my sister, just four, suddenly fell ill and without warning she died two days after catching the disease. A disease we don’t even know what. My parents decided we should leave the house as from their last trek, they’ve seen men on trucks patrolling, looting, maiming, and killing people.

It was dusk when we left. Father and mother deduced that it’s better to venture out at night as the patrolling men might be resting. Without even shining our torches, we walked in the darkness, our feet trying to grope the paths that we’re taking.

Fortunately, we didn’t encounter any of the patrolling men, and in a day we finally reached the city.

And we were quickly relieved.

There are people here, decent people. The city has been barricaded, tall gates made out of metal with barbed wires at the top of the perimeters. Armed men point their lights on us and asked who we are, if we are sick or if we are bad people. If we’re bad people, they’ll shoot us where we’re standing.

“Not bad people!” My father croaked, his hands in the air, shivering. “Just hungry.”

Two armed men at the top of the fences nodded at each other and soon the gates were opened. There are bright lights everywhere. And more grilled fences. People are huddled in corners, draped with blankets. There are tens and people in white accommodating people lined up. Might be giving shots? Or handing out food? I didn’t bother to know because the sirens rang. Everyone screamed. Everyone at the street that was made as an outpost started moving. The Siren.

The Siren, it only means one thing.

After The Siren, followed the voice of a lady.

“The Third Door has been opened. Found in Vanuatu. I repeat, the Third Door has been opened.”

Men gasped. Mothers tightened their embrace on their children. The armed men started communing. No one knows what the Third Door will bring but everyone’s sure it’s worse than the two first Doors.

My parents, my brother, and I glued our backs on a wall, hugging each other, looking at the sky, waiting for whatever the Third Door will bring.

“Everyone not panic!”

As if on cue, the noise died down. I turned and saw a man in the middle of the clearing. He’s balding with a gut but he’s imposing and he’s wearing a fine suit.

“We shouldn’t panic, everyone! Haven’t you heard or read about Pandora’s box -- pithos, rather? There will always be hope. But I think before that, annihilation will come but it won’t be long until we will be saved. And I believe one of the Doors in the future will bring it. These are only trials. Let us persevere! Hope will come!”

People started hooting then throwing stuff at him but he didn’t flinch. He only stood there, looking at the desperate people.

And then it happened.

People coming together, in pairs, in groups. They started attacking the armed men, screaming “Let us out here!”, “Do something!”, “Save us!”, “You didn’t even give us enough food!”

My family and I didn’t join them, we only held hands. My father whispering, “There is hope. You are hope.”

Riot. Bodies hitting each other. Gunshots, people on the ground. The man in the suit now on the pavement, blood oozing from his head. Molotovs were thrown. People who looks like they belong to the same group fighting each other. Knives out. Raging strikes.

Disaster.

Disaster is what the Third Door’s storing.

And it came, hard. It came, excruciatingly.

White cracks shot from the sky. There were explosions, blinding light, fire, charred remains of the rioters. And then followed the rain, hard, blistering rain, like bullets on our skins. Everything was a blur, my father held my hand and tugged me. We ran, we ran, and we ran. I heard him say it again, “There is hope.” But the water and the wind is stronger. A giant wave consumed us, I remember being underwater, the water choking me, my insides being turned inside out.

And then I woke.

The place is white. Reeling, I stood up and found myself at the same place. Only the buildings were gone, there were only bodies, buried in snow. Yes, snow. It is trickling from the clouds, fast burying my face. I struggled, my head snapping everywhere, screaming my parents and my brother’s name. But it looks like everything was wiped out in mere seconds and quickly replaced by white snow. I didn’t how long I walked but I know I fell a lot of times and every time l fall, I lose unconsciousness and every time I wake it is the same thing.

The next time I opened my eyes, I saw it.

A rectangular oak floating in the air.

I never thought I could see it up close.

Against the snowfall, it is a sight to behold. I inched closer. Should I open it? There is the knob, unaffected by the freezing state.

The Fourth Door?

The man in suit said annihilation will come. It means death, right? But what do I have left? Everyone’s dead already. But this could also mean hope. But what does hope mean?

With shaking hands -- not just from cold, I grasped the door knob. I had to tiptoe as the door is in midair.

Annihilation or hope?

What’s the difference?

They felt like the same thing.

I turned and the door swung open, almost hitting me. I stepped backwards, my shoes sinking in the deep snow.

Inside the door I saw a young girl standing in the middle of whiteout. Behind her are piled up bodies in the pallid field.

I moved away, my whole body trembling and the girl inside the door did the same.

And that’s when I realized.

We had opened the doors a long time ago and it showed us that we’re both hope and annihilation.

END

[simounwrites]

A Dog’s Letter

There was a tight battle.

I still seethe on anger every time I remember how you picked me up that day, when I’m finally on the victory of having some of my mother’s milk and when I can finally ease the hunger that has been longing on my stomach for days. I rolled and delved in what seemed to be an infinite roll of fur and skin. I was still partially blind but I know you were something when you gathered me with those trembling fingers of yours.

I yelped when I felt my soft and feeble paws leave the dank floor of my owner’s garage and you stared at me and I know I stared back even with my faint sight.

It was love at first sight, though I will never forgive you for terminating my chances of proving it to my brothers.

You are a kid of the tender age of ten, there’s sparkle in your eyes and an uncontrollable babble from your mouth. You were this snotty little kid who smirks every time your mother makes a remark of how dirty you are. It was really amusing. I can’t remember how the deal went, I just know that you’ll be going home with me.

I can feel your jagged breath when you clutched me with your armpits. You were running, running out of the garage and into your owner jeep, screaming at your father about your new puppy, me.

We went home. I can’t think properly, considering I’m a dog, I shouldn’t be able to think normally, even so, think properly. The fresh paint of your new house really hot ironed something on my brain that I’m up to something. Something that will change my life forever.

The puppy days are the most carefree phase of my otherwise short life, I can say. There was nothing much to do really. No responsibilities. No weights. You’re served as a king. That night you and your mom fed me with a sour bottle of milk. And even though it’s sour and completely beyond my Mother’s milk, I still chugged on it like a criminal. Afterwards, you tucked me on a makeshift bed made out of newspapers and cartons. I had nightmares that night. I missed my Mother, my brothers and the whole new environment suddenly scared me. My endless cries woke you up and groggily you lifted me up and kissed me on my nose. That surprised me but it also made me feel tranquil.

I was fine a week later. I would run on your newly arranged carpet, bite down on tables’ legs and nip on your fingers whenever I had the chance. It was fun, until I pooped on your mom’s shoes. Ever since then, coming from school, you would take me out and train me to poop on your patio. The thing is, your family doesn’t have a dog door to slink into. Go figure.

Days and months passed and I can feel my body growing. I can finally emit something out of my mouth besides occasional moans and groans. I can run faster and I can bite harder on your tables’ legs which made your mom even furious. But you protected me, your surfed the Web and told your mom that it’s natural for me to bite things to sharpen my teeth. Was that the scientific explanation for that? Coming from a dog, I just think wood is tasty and crunchy and even though I impale my gums with splinters its worth a munch.  

Then comes the longest time we’ve been separated from each other. You went into this summer camp and I remembered how you were crying nonstop on the way to the car, insisting that you take me with you, your parents disputed that beasts of the forest could come and eat me. That scared me too as much as it scared you. After this so called summer camp, you returned home with lots of stuff from the woods and you were smiling and telling stories to your Mom and Dad. You had fun. That’s the first of the instances that I realized you can live without me.

Your family said you’ve been changing but you look the same to me, just longer and hairier. You’re growing up and I’m growing old. I remembered your first heartbreak and the numerous girls you took home whenever your parents are out. One girl named Mandy hated me so much she kicked me. You dumped her the next day. You love me, that I knew even more.

However, time isn’t kind. It’s like this force that aims to tear us apart. Suddenly, I feel things inside my body, gurgling and bubbling. Whenever I stand up, there’s this aching pain that is suddenly on my thighs. I feel hot a lot of times. I didn’t understand what’s happening. What is this? Why am I feeling this? You and your parents took me to a building of white walls and I saw your sad faces as you talked to this person called Vet. You cried and you hugged me and I only wagged my tail, I didn’t understand.

But now I do, curled on my bed, I can feel death close to me. I peed on the fabric but you didn’t yell. You silently cleaned it up. The last time I saw you you were going to this place called college and I’m about to go to sleep forever. You were crying and I’m reminded of the time you were about to go summer camp. However, this time it looks like you can’t live without me and I feel the same way. The day arrived, we went back to the building of white walls and we laid down together on a mattress as Vet and another person that is also called Vet prick my skin with needles. You were hugging me as my breath slows. I hear sniffling behind but it’s not from you. You were only whispering to me the words “See you again, buddy.”

These are the words I wish I can tell you. It’s fantastic to see your world expand and create new ones but this one thing I tell you, you were my only world. And I won’t trade it for anything. 

[simounwrites]

The Lone Circus

TRIGGER WARNING!

The Lone Circus (Free Verse) by Simoun Marsada

A prickly summer started the boy's interest, a sudden thought gushed from his brain to his heart. The boy posted an inquiry for everyone about a circus he ought to build sometime Grief seemed to be his friend as his parents slept and never woke

With his cart of loops and majestic insects The boy took off on his first show and then met his first member A young Englishman who uses illusions asks to join the circus And the boy agreed without hesitation

Together, they arrived at a sleepy town and gave entertainment to everyone who has valuable pennies

As time went on, they met their second member, a bright girl who fancies ribbons The boy found love, he thought and the three of them arrived at another town to give smiles to anyone who likes

The boy and girl fell in love on the verge of meeting their fourth member, a dog who roars like a lion And so they welcomed him on their now popular show

Time became an enemy, as the boy knows his circus friends will not last forever Every glimpse is a treasure and every show is a wonder The boy and girl fell in love even greater But the young Englishman has another plan

One night, the girl and the Englishman disappeared from their tent, only leaving a note that said that they are the true lovers

Heart wrenched, the boy decided to close the circus and the dog died due to his symptoms

Now the boy is all alone, only reminiscing what he thought is his chance Behind those shows and smiles are betrayals The people he loved most left him without him knowing

The boy decided to have one last show on a town that never rains At the start of the show, the people are startled realizing that the event of the night is the boy with his neck hanging on the ropes.

[simounwrites]

Your Life is a Musical

YOUR LIFE IS A MUSICAL

(a free verse)

by Simoun Marsada

 Your life is a musical

Only it’s without the songs and the dance numbers

So you’ll probably wonder how is it a musical

Our dreams

Our heartbeats

That’s what create music

And every good musical is about

People reaching for their dreams

About people engulfed by this thing called love

You’re the performer

You face the people

And sing the songs of your dreams

And tap dance through the path of hope

And like every good song

There’s the silence

And the crescendo

This is your chance

This is the time to give it all out

Shout, sing, bop and act your way to it

And so at the end you’ll have the grand musical

number you deserve.

[simounwrites]

Words

It’s funny how words

are so powerful we are changed by them.

In a single event, with a single

word, everything changes. From birthdays to

graduations to weddings. It’s surreal

how our mindsets are changed by a single

decision, decisions uttered through words.

An “I do.” creates a family.

A “Happy birthday!” advances a person’s age.

A “You’re nothing.” either motivates or puts down a person forever.

Words create worlds, and worlds are enriched by words.