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Sally A Bayan Aug 2015
Morning rituals make you rush
But someone gets up earlier than you
You never get the chance to be first
Ah, there's a wet towel on the sofa...again!
The tiny water puddles on the floor leading to the bedroom...

The kettle  is whistling now
You bump onto each other in your haste
And you both stop.....to look at each other
Eyes brighten up....slowly give out beamish smiles.

There's toast and jam on the table
Steaming instant coffee is ready, but first,
You make a cup of fresh brew, hand it to him
His eyes squint, while he sips his hot tea,
You sit, eat, without much talk...just looking,
Like, looking at each other, and what would follow,
Would suffice to complete the hours of the day...
But, you're both dressed up... all set for work...so
You start your day....he starts his...you always leave ahead...

In the office, you remembered:
"What's the matter with me?"
You forgot to charge your cellphone and ipad last night
So you look for the charger
Only to find out, both are fully charged...
Your eyes sparkle...with much longing
Ahh, you wish for time to fly
So you could head for home, fast!

He's usually very hungry when he arrives
You hurry...chicken afritada, it will be...
Wait...the frozen chicken has been thawed...gone!
Hey!
You see a *** of chicken adobo...you salivate!
You surmise, he must've done this after you left this morning,
You look up...thank God for this angel He has given you,
And for microwave ovens, too!...you tell yourself,
"Okay, okay....I'll do the dishes tonight! ...and the coming nights!"

Life is perfect with its mix of the sweet and the bitter
Blockbuster moments and flops...together...apart
Uncontrollable smiles, frowns... tickles, tears
Even the coming....and passing of life
Days don't always end up on a high note...yet, now,
You sit, and recall all that had happened this morning
And the past mornings, evenings, weekends...
All that he did....does for you each day
All that you did...do for him everyday
All the chats you share before bedtime...until he snores,
All these combined efforts are much better ways, better proofs...
He rarely says those three words most often said by lovers,
But, you soar to Heaven, when before falling asleep,
He puts your head on his chest, and whispers to you:
"You mean the world to me."




Sally


Copyright March 2015
Rosalia Rosario A. Bayan
**...My thoughts right now---why not a feel-good poem today? ...we can always create a perfect scenario in our daily imperfect world....***
Clara Mar 22
I fear smelling like the Garcia household,
I fear of walking through halls of gold, of diamond, of emerald, of amber,
And staining them with scents of aluminum, copper, and rust.

I’m scared of entering through the kitchen as I age,
With each step I take, utensils evolve from spoons, to forks, to sticks, to peelers, to scissors, to knives,
In the kitchen, where walls are stained with sauce, tomatoes, ketchup, and blood,
The kitchen, whose perimeter engulfs an unpredictable weather of hot and cold, of shrills and silences, of music and news, of laughter and accusations…

The kitchen table holds not just ingredients and tools,
It holds tupperwares stained with hard water and grease,
The very same water we wash our hands with before we eat, before we lie, and before we clasp our hands in truce or in resignation,
The very same grease that not only warms beings but also warns,
Warns us that our time at the table marks our calendars of the day when the wrong Mary* joins us in our last feast…

I’m scared of going outside with the same clothes I used to cook in,
I’m scared of having evidences of what happened in that house, of my lapses, of our mistakes, of their arrogance,
I fear of smelling like tradition—of poor execution, of living by definition, of the same old useless solution…

Menudo. Afritada. Mechado. Puchero.

I was taught how to cut, peel, segregate, saute, and appeal,
Generations of cooking bequeathed to me simply by inhalation,
This way, I could say that our family recipe was passed down to me by heart,
When in fact all I could smell was the smoke from the burning carcasses who drowned in their own pursuit of our identity,
And in my quest to find the smell of our cooking,
In my anguish and exhaustion of trying to know what our kitchen is supposed to smell like,
I then try to start each dish,
I try and rewrite the stories that once made my ancestors full…

But is it right to modify the taste of our dinner?
Or should I just let it be?

Let it taste like what it did decades ago?
When the people who cooked it first were still alive?
When the sins that marked the skins of the children of tomorrow’s relatives hadn’t been yet committed?
When we still worded words and still conversed in conversations?
When pages were still held together by the spine and not by the very feet that carried us?

If only life was as easy to mise en place in the kitchen.

I fear by the time I walk out of the kitchen door,
In my attempts to finish the crossfire between my past and my future,
I serve a dish so poignant, so red,
I can’t even tell if it’s from the tomatoes,
Or if it’s made from the dreams of escape that always simmered low.
* “the wrong Mary” pays homage to the Filipino dish, dinuguan. some locals call it bl00dy mary

— The End —