ACT I: Collecting Jigsaw Puzzles

My life has been a series of jigsaw puzzles, the first as pretty a picture as you could wish to see.  It never occurred to anyone that anything could mar the image of a bonny baby in all her glorious honey-hued, gurgling perfection.  

They never found out who crept into the playroom and stole the first piece. It was only one little piece – the size of a sixpence on the baby’s left ankle.  Hardly noticeable. A pity though that such a pretty puzzle should be incomplete.

The next piece to vanish left a leaf-shaped hole in the baby’s back. Did someone accidentally knock over the board? Perhaps the lost pieces are on the floor or down the back of the sofa.

But if that is so, why could they find no trace?  Surely it had to be the work of a thief because it did not end there.

The next puzzle was a toddler.  How strange that the same pieces were missing here too.  Not only that, but a third and fourth piece had gone – the other ankle this time and now a tiny gap at one corner of the child’s mouth.  Why would anyone want to remove random pieces of the puzzle? And how did they do it without getting caught?

No one had any answers.

Successive puzzles depicting a panda-eyed schoolgirl, a shy adolescent, a carefully groomed young woman – all plundered by unseen hands – revealed more and more of the blank surface beneath and ever less of the subject herself.

One day I opened a new box and asked myself “Is this puzzle half here or half gone?”

There comes a point when a puzzle ceases to be a picture with gaps and becomes a blank space strewn with fragments like the excavated remnants of an ancient mosaic.

Would some archaeologist dig me up and fill in the blanks to show posterity what I once looked like?

The jigsaw of a woman in her 40s would have been quick to complete, since so few of the pieces actually connected. Scattered across the board, it was impossible to decide if they, or the space between them, were the real object of the exercise.

I suppose it all depends on how you look at it.

Over the course of 50 years my unplanned jigsaw collection progressed from Bonny-Baby to Can-You-Tell-What-It-Is-Yet? What would the next puzzle be called… The-Invisible-Woman perhaps?

If you think jigsaws are frustrating, try my next hobby…

ACT II: Painting by Numbers

Number 1 was the original skin tone, a light golden beige, my favourite pigment.


Number 2 was the colour of nettle rash, mottled and roughly textured.


This was closely followed by number 3, a stark white, applied almost symmetrically in random patterns, some clearly delineated, others splashed carelessly across the canvas like spilt milk. (No sense in crying over it. There is no cure. It won't **** you.)

There’s nothing quite like summer for bringing out the colours of a painting.  A hat and long sleeves were no match for the persistent sun and by the time the picture was finished, the numbered paints ranged from 1 to 20 with a different abstract brush stroke to go with each one. My canvas contained a tortoiseshell patchwork of shades from brilliant white to violet, golden ochre, burnt sienna, chestnut and scarlet.

And yet this was the height of my blue period.

I had to paint by numbers for 50 summers before I could enjoy my third (and final?) pastime…

ACT III: Joining the Dots

By sheer fluke, at the age of 51, I discovered the secret of the missing jigsaw puzzle pieces. They were there all along – just not visible to the naked eye.  


They had been starved into transparency but, as I began to feed them, atoms of them materialised like specks of golden ink on blotting paper.  Tiny dots like pixels on a grainy satellite image, jostling, overlapping and joining together until they looked something like the missing jigsaw pieces - if a little mottled with mildew.  

And gradually the mildew has faded - along with the sense of loss - to reveal glorious, even colour.

Of all the activities I ever found in the playroom of my life, the most cherished, the most miraculous, the most deeply longed-for and appreciated has been this game of Join the Dots - an unremarkable pastime, you may think (if you have never walked in my shoes), but one which has brought me on a return journey along a jigsaw road from
Almost-Invisible
via Can-You-Tell-What-It-Is-Yet?
past Half-Here-Or-Half-Gone?
by way of A-Pity-That-It’s-Incomplete
and finally – if not quite back to Bonny-Baby – then at least back home to a grateful woman of a certain age who can look in the mirror and smile to see her whole self.


   Vitiligo: A Play(room) in 3 Acts © August 2013 Vitiligo Protocol

I remember you telling me before that you saw yourself as a jigsaw puzzle.* I never understood you then because why would you compare yourself with a thing that requires pieces. You explained that you have 6 pieces in you, pieces that made you, created you. Pieces that were the reason for the person you are today, pieces that helped you function, in other words, pieces that made you whole. That was why you called yourself as a 6 piece jigsaw puzzle. But then one day, you told me all of those pieces were missing. You said someone or something took it away from you and you have no idea how to get them back. You explained to me thoroughly how they were removed from you. The first piece was removed when you were in your room one night, hearing your parents fight, yelling and arguing, telling hurtful things to each other. So you decided to put some headphones on and played some music so you wouldn’t hear their shouts but then they barged into your room saying one of them is leaving and you have to decide which one of them you are coming with, you pretended to not hear them but deep inside of you, even though how loud the volume was, it suddenly stopped without you muting it, because all you could hear was their love for each other slowly fading away. The second piece was removed when one day some unwanted visitors came into your house and they told you they call themselves as demons and that they brought you things that you cannot possibly return; you opened the boxes and see that those things were called depression and anxiety. The third piece was removed when your so called best friends told you they were always there for you but when you were sitting on a bathroom floor filled with blood and hopelessness nobody came to pick you up.  The fourth piece was removed when you someone told you they will help you find those lost pieces but one day she was just not there, and instead of finding the missing ones, one of the remaining was lost again. The fifth piece was removed when you saw him, the love of your life, loving another being that wasn’t you and when you asked why he told you he just couldn’t deal with someone who was like a puzzle that wasn’t solved, you were about to tell him you were once the one he was looking for but then he told you, oh scratch it, a puzzle that could never be solved. And the last and final piece was removed, because life took it away from you. And then suddenly all of those pieces were lost.


I want to help you, i want to do everything just to find those pieces. But you’ve got to help yourself also. You are the biggest help you need, and maybe, just maybe, those pieces can be found in the most unexpected places. Perhaps the first piece can be found when you’re listening to your favourite song and the lyrics felt like blankets that comfort you when it’s cold and suddenly it felt like home. First piece found. Perhaps it’s the feeling of waking up at 5:30 in the morning, feeling ******, and when you went outside, you saw the sunrise, and realised that somehow you can rise again like that. Second piece found. Maybe it was sitting in a cafe, sipping unnecessary caffeine, looking at the people who were passing in front of you, thinking of how much they’ve been through, and still surviving like you, and somehow that made you feel better, that’s why your face formed an unnecessary smile. Third piece found. Maybe it was when it rained so hard, but it doesn’t compare to your tears, you cried and cried, as the rain poured and poured, then the rain suddenly stopped and the sky formed a rainbow, you looked at it and think that maybe your tears can form colours too. Fourth piece found. Perhaps it’s when you can’t sleep at night, so you just look at your scars, before you thought they were ugly and disgusting, they did nothing to you but made you remember how much of a mess you are, but now you look at them in a different way, they weren’t battle scars, because battle was an understatement on how difficult the things they had overcome. And now you see them as a reminder of how much of a soldier you are. Fifth piece found. And maybe, it was when you decided to go to an art museum, you were fascinated by the wonderful paintings, then you thought, you used to be like those works of art; beautiful and important. But then you suddenly heard one painting, whispering you something, it said, a masterpiece is still a masterpiece no matter how broken it is. Sixth piece, and final piece, found.


So, darling, If by means life took those away from you, you should do everything to get those back. And yes, you will tell me, nothing can bring back those pieces anymore, but you can be a puzzle piece that is solved without the pieces you had before, you can find those pieces without asking for help, you can find those on your own, you can make pieces all by yourself. It doesn’t matter how fast you puzzled it out, the only thing that matters is that you solved it. *You solved the jigsaw puzzle. You solved you.  **And guess what? You will be whole again. You will realise you always was, and that is the reason you will not let anyone or anything, change that again.

we were puzzle pieces that fit perfectly...
but just belonged to different jigsaw sets..

Eyes stare...
Into nothingness,
The jigsaw of to be’s,
Arranges and rearranges;
Into an appeal of mirage...
Swelling the oasis of life!

And when the glare pierces,
Eyes blink;
The jigsaw settles,
Synchronized with reality;
Strengthening my mind...
To derive the quirky balance -
Between the could be’s ;
And the one that is!

The world is
One huge
Jigsaw puzzle.

Everyone is a puzzle piece.
And just like how
Every puzzle piece is unique,
How the puzzle would be incomplete
Should even just one piece go missing,
Everyone on earth is unique,
And the world would be incomplete
Without any one person.

Except me, of course.
I'm merely
An extra piece.

I wish to see
The color of your eyes
The expression on your face
At dawn when you said goodbye..
A handwritten note good bye
Left on the side table...
This jigsaw puzzle
Took years to solve
Why did you say goodbye?

I wish also
Time would heal all wounds
But only time would tell...
Forgiving might be easy
Forgetting crawls while time passing by...
When will the clock stop ticking ?
I just wish to die....

Last week I was taught that
no matter how complex an expression may seem
if you multiply it by its conjugate pair
you will always end up with a non-negative real solution.
That is a metaphor for how we have learned to love.

I used to like mathematics, as strange as it may sound,
because memorising the value of pi was
somehow easier than forgetting the notion of you
and I thought maybe comprehending the mechanics of the universe
would lead me one step closer to cracking the combination.

In a world that spins at the rate of 27,900m per minute, a constant can prove tricky to find.
Hence, there is solace to be felt in knowing that even when it is all said and done –
when the final bullet has slipped from our tongues and we are left trembling
upon nothing but the rubble of our own destruction,
two plus three will still be equal to five.

In an attempt to clarify a theory to the class, my teacher analogised
that mathematics is like one big giant jigsaw puzzle:
everything always fits together perfectly in the end
Since then I have learned it is the method without the madness,
the passion for the predictable; it is everything - that love is not.

Not even the greatest mathematician in the world
has been able to measure how much a heart can hold.
There is no algorithm for how to make you come back;
I cannot draw a line graph on the speed at which love left
and even if I could, our gradients would never be the same.

I may have both halves of the bed,
but there is never enough space to fill it with.
If a task takes four hours for ten people to complete
and the same job takes five people twice that time,
how long will it take for a human to feel whole again?

Sometimes I think we are nothing more
than two parallel lines that accidentally crossed paths.

Me and you
are broken
in different places
so that we
fit together
like a jigsaw puzzle

You so frenetic
so open
you are a hurricane
people always remember
when you pass through
venting your insecurities

Me so passive
not a care in the world
always out of touching distance
I am a rock
covered in moss
always numb

we fit together
like a jigsaw puzzle
and together
through our flaws
we make a picture
which is so beautiful

navigator’s balcony cocktail hour
rocket orbit ocean liner rising
clenched no teeth no guernica no bam bam bam
correspondent notary republic
address book dial figure 8
charred with a thousand jigsaw pieces
false as a beach chiaroscuro black
on black graveyard womb naked milk glass lit
footprint tourism by candlelight and flare
vaccination fatigue puke fingernail fish
moving a bandaged echo **** him **** her
familiar bell music **** them both **** them all
stretched shirtsleeves spanish toffee slashed tires
(failure as a painter he shaved his wife’s fur coat)
bust your ***** Barcelona red alert
knock-kneed broken squeezebox no hands
standing room only ladies first (please)
unbuttoned interrogation coffee rolls (stop)
marine’s vegetation (stop) early morning tea (stop)
armless menus (stop) pink cathedral fingers (stop)

and (begin again) move

we move

moving inside an eye this eye
that advances step
by step

the people whose job is to
understand the multiverse
can't figure this world out

rid·dle                      ˈridl/noun: riddle; plural noun:   riddles
1.                                 | a question or statement intentionally
          phrased so as to require ingenuity
    in ascertaining its answer or meaning,
               typically presented as a game;
a person, event,   or fact that is difficult
  to understand or explain.
"the riddle of her death" [puz·zle
ˈpəzəl/verb: puzzle; 3rd person present:
puzzles; past tense: puzzled; past participle:
puzzled; gerund or present participle:
                                             puzzling
1.                          cause (someone) to feel confused because
             they cannot understand or make sense of something:
"one remark he made puzzled me"
synonyms: perplex, confuse, bewilder,
       bemuse, baffle, mystify, confound;
        faze, stump, beat, discombobulate
"her decision puzzled me"
perplexed, confused, bewildered,
       bemused, baffled, mystified, confounded,
                             nonplussed, at a loss, at sea;
             flummoxed, stumped, fazed, clueless,
             discombobulated
"a puzzled look on her face"
baffling, perplexing, bewildering, confusing, complicated, unclear, mysterious, enigmatic, ambiguous, obscure, abstruse, unfathomable, incomprehensible, impenetrable, cryptic
"his explanation was rather puzzling"
antonyms: clear
think hard about something difficult
                   to understand or explain;
"she was still puzzling over this problem
                     when she reached the office"
     | [      ] think hard about, mull over,
muse over, ponder, contemplate,
                                     meditate on,
consider, deliberate on, chew over,                     wonder about
"she puzzled over the problem"
  solve or understand something by thinking hard;
synonyms:                       work out, understand,
   comprehend, sort out, reason out, solve, make sense of,
   make head(s) or tail(s) of, unravel, decipher; informal:                figure out
"she tried to puzzle out what he meant"
noun: puzzle; plural noun: puzzles
1. [                 ], [           ] (                 );
a game, toy, or problem designed
    to test ingenuity or knowledge;
short for jigsaw puzzle                    (see jigsaw)
a person or thing that is difficult to understand
or explain; an enigma:
"the meaning of this poem will always be a paradox"
synonyms: enigma, mystery, paradox,
       conundrum, poser, riddle, problem, quandary;
                     "the poem has always been a puzzle"
  late 16th century (as a verb): of unknown origin:

synonyms: puzzle, conundrum, brainteaser, problem,
      unsolved problem, question, poser, enigma,
                       quandary; informal:       stumper
"an answer to the riddle"
                   verb/archaic
verb: riddle; 3rd person present: riddles;
past tense: riddled; past participle: riddled;
         gerund or present participle: riddling
1.             speak in or pose riddles.
"he who knows not how to riddle"
solve or explain (a riddle) to (someone).
"riddle me this then"
Origin

Old English rǣdels, rǣdelse ‘opinion,
conjecture, riddle’;   related
to Dutch raadsel,
   German Rätsel,      to read

december 2011:
soulmates? something out of a fairytale!
handsome Prince Charming and the sweet Princess
are unlikely childhood sweethearts
their scripted fate tucked away under my bed.
april 2012:
soulmates? it’s just like in the fairytales.
we flirted with chance but knelt on destiny
my eyes were bright and wide as
true love’s first kiss hangs promised in the air.
april 2013:
soulmates? the fairytale wasn’t mine.
I tried to fill in the gaps with ice cream and picnics
but we were a jigsaw puzzle missing half its pieces.
don’t worry, I thought, I am still so very young.
july 2013:
soulmates? the fairytale forgotten
I threw myself at people hardly worth the toss
mistakenly discarding pieces of myself
I didn’t expect to need later
november 2013:
soulmates? a fairytale of treachery.
you sleeping beauty, wide awake
I tore myself to shreds on your wall of thorns
tread carefully, for fate is a dangerous game.
january 2014:
soulmates? a fairytale, for now
I cast that suffocating doctrine out of my mind
frozen in time, I decided now was what mattered
a love like one I’d never felt before beckoned
may 2014:
soulmates? a fairytale assured
I don’t know what the future holds, or how my story will unfold.
happiness is everything and care is not for this world.
love is abounding and soulmates can wait.
october 2014:
soulmates? they belong in fairytales.
chipped and damaged hearts don’t become more whole
just by finding comfort in another broken soul.
all the world’s a playground
these grown-up children
just playing pretend
because nothing’s really meant to be
after all.

I am a jigsaw puzzle…
Packaged, broken down and oddly pieced.
Vivid colors. A curious captivation.
Although… with time they have faded…and creased.

Handed down like an antique quilt.
Fragile and warn, only portions of my picture complete.
Left wondering if I will ever be seen as one.
Admired as whole, even with corners somewhat oblique.

So I set out on a journey:
Re-genesis of the soul.
Craving colors unimagined:
An apocalypse of the world of dull.

Along the way I caught a glimpse.
I unearthed Utopia.
A world lent only to dreams and fairytales.
Yet I couldn’t seem to give in and face this phobia.

I continued along my search.
This time with a new groove in my step.
Part of me wanted to turn back,
But that could’ve meant loosing the little I had left.

I felt something flowering within.
I may have looked away, but that moment a seed was planted.
Roots of strength embedding themselves into my soul,
A new chance at life finally granted.

Fresh oxygen to inhale,
As this life grows inside of me.
Battling with worry and yet no panic at all.
Something so charming and enormous, the world deserves to see.

Branches of love breaking through my surface,
A bungee cord tugs, than allots some slack.
Leaves of unwritten memories begin to evolve.
This budding life needs nurture…I need to turn back.

Before I can set foot to turn around…
Utopia at my fingertips.
Life, nurture…a wonderland unsought.
And that is all before the meeting of our lips.

Civilized life is rigged, O land-dwellers!
With landmines hidden
in trails of Society's doctrine,
'Too often is it stepped on,
Too often does it explode.'
Blowing constitutions to smithereens,
Where you then rummage within your nucleus
to piece together your scattered jigsaw,
Misplacing your natural elements,
Overcasting your ability to side with beauteous aspects in simplicity—
Of those ethereal-resplendent butterflies.
Disillusioned on land thus is you (the complex you).

Let go—
Rise above your materialistic graves—
Walk on air!
My kindred wisps
Walk on air!

Fiddly bits and
Mismatched shapes;
Come into my house,
Shut off the drapes.

I'll piece them together
This one and that.
But you don't believe in board games
So it's bound to fall flat.

So let us start from the beginning,
The corners and the bottoms;
Work inwards.
But do not be surprised
If you are not that missing piece,
But just a part of another's
Puzzle.

It’s the tail end of fashion week in Paris, the busiest week of the year for fashion buyers.

When I meet Clodagh Shorten, owner of Samui, the game-changing boutique that put Cork on the fashion map, she’s already been here four days and is on her tenth buying appointment — there’ll be at least another five before she leaves in a couple of days time.

These appointments, private bookings with designers, allow her to get up close and personal with the clothes that have just been showcased on catwalks.

She’s deciding which pieces will best suit her customers.

Today, we meet at Schumacher, the stunning German label known for its easy chic look.

A beautiful white space, with lush cream velvet sofas, bare walls and white rails (nothing here to distract from the main event — the clothes), this room, prime space in Paris, is rented by the designer year-round just so they have the right venue to sell at Fashion Week.

It gives some indication of the power Fashion Week wields.

Clodagh is here with her right-hand woman, Samui manager Mary-Claire O’Sullivan.

There are two rails — the keepers and the ‘ones that got away’.

They’ve already seen this collection in London.

Today they are here to fine-tune.

This is unusual, Mary-Claire explains — at most appointments, they are seeing the clothes for the very first time.

“This is a big spend,” they tell me, and they’ll stay as long as they need “to get it right”.

Piecing together a collection is something akin to a jigsaw puzzle.

All the items are photographed — later they will be analysed back in the apartment they rent during Fashion Week.

The mix has to be right.

So the coats, a sleeveless waistcoat, are moved to the rail on the right.

They won’t make it to Cork.

Coats were already picked up this morning at another appointment.

Like I said, a jigsaw puzzle.

Two models are on hand to try on clothes when requested — I hear ‘can I just see this on one more time’ a lot.

There’s no haggling over prices in these sales negotiations — it’s all too civilised.

The price is set, as is the instore mark-up. These lauded designs must cost the same the world over.

Clodagh and Mary-Claire share a language and a wavelength. They can finish each other’s sentences and, while I don’t so much as sniff a hint of tension, they tell me they can disagree on buys.

“Clodagh doesn’t want a yes woman,” Mary-Claire says simply.

From Schumacher, Clodagh leads the way through the Parisian cobbled streets, phone held aloft, Google Maps to direct her.

Her wheelie bag is constantly behind her — inside there’s the laptop for orders and a camera for instant access to photographs of collections.

Her calculator is another permanent fixture in the showroom.

Today, Clodagh is dressed in an Australian label coming soon to Samui, Ellery. The lush black fabric sways and moves with her body; an outfit like that makes you really appreciate her eye for fashion. It’s sensational.

For this 5.30pm appointment we are heading to see another new label for Samui — Paskal (Clodagh will wear a piece from this line tomorrow).

The Ukrainian designer is looked after by an agency so in this showroom there are pieces by a handful of brands.

Again, the setup is the same — private appointments, models on hand.

Clodagh and Mary-Claire have to be more careful here — this is a new label and it’s more fashion forward so black is prioritised.

Not every client at Samui will wear this line. Every purchase, I realise, is a gamble.

“We’ve made mistakes, of course we have,” says Mary-Claire though you get the feeling that could be a rare event.

Pieces bought by these two women rarely end up in Samui’s sales rack.

They know their customer, plain and simple.

There is so much trust there, some clients are simply sent collections each season, allowing Clodagh to make the call for them.

So much of their day is spent discussing various clients (never by name in my presence) — what they might like, the best size.

It is effectively the ultimate personal shopping experience.

The number of items and sizes are limited, so customers know they are truly getting one-off pieces.

As we leave, kisses over, the agency head tells them, “you’re our favourites” and you just know it’s not empty fashion talk.

People genuinely love Clodagh and Mary-Claire. And they respect what they do.

Samui is open 16 years now. Clodagh mastered her trade at Monica John before stepping out on her own. Mary-Claire joined her eight years ago.

It has been one of the few boutiques in Cork to not just survive the downturn but to positively thrive.

As the economy spluttered around her, Clodagh very masterfully decided to go high end.

First came Moncler — the top people here had to come and view Samui to see if it was the right match for their esteemed label.

It was — and, increasingly, doors began to open.

Carven, Marni, Rick Owens — people really began to sit up and take notice of Samui.

Now labels are often vying for space on the shop floor. Still though, it takes work to secure the big new names.

Clodagh spends a lot of time on planes, networking, meeting the key players. And it’s not as simple as a visit to Fashion Week twice a year either.

These days pre-collections are key too: these pieces will be on the shop floor for longer.

So Clodagh and Mary-Claire travel in January to Paris for pre- collections, Milan in February for Moncler, Paris in March. The same cycle begins again in June for A/W pre-collections, with S/S Fashion Week in September.

Clodagh is always pushing, always striving for new.

She was devastated to say farewell to Transit, the brand with her from the very beginning. It was simply time for a change she tells me.

They love seeking out new labels, nurturing them, sharing them with their customers.

The next morning we meet at 9am for Dries van Noten.

Clodagh stocks around 50 different labels, most exclusive to Cork. This Belgian designer is one of them.

Here again is a very fashion forward line.

There’s a minimum €20,000 spend here, and that’s the amount Clodagh and Mary-Claire can play with.

This is a much busier showroom, a slick operation. Buyers are everywhere, the models weaving between them.

They are assigned a seller and a table, laptop at the ready to secure the sale.

Sophie, today’s seller, walks them through the long rails and talks to them about the collection, the fabrics, the colour, the catwalk, the vision.

Clodagh and Mary-Claire repeat the process a second time alone, a third time again with Sophie.

There are little standing breaks for coffee — refreshments and lunch are provided by the designer.

Clodagh and Mary-Claire know to carry snacks everywhere. The buying process can be a long one; Dries could be an all-day event.

The price point is much higher here so, again, each piece has to be carefully thought out. Checked and checked again.

These A/W deliveries will land in store in July.

Watching them make their Samui edit on that March morning, I just know the Dries selection will be a show-stopper this Autumn.

I leave them to sign on the dotted line, wishing them success for the rest of their gruelling schedule as I head for Charles de Gaulle.

“People don’t realise what goes into this,” says Clodagh. And she’s right.

None of us can possibly grasp what it must have taken for one woman to put Cork on the fashion radar.Read more at:http://www.marieaustralia.com/short-formal-dresses | www.marieaustralia.com/red-carpet-celebrity-dresses

We're two one-sided cardboard pieces
Segments of a cloudy sky
It looks like we would fit together
But we won't
But we try.
But we try.

To my innocence, naivety, and viridity
Childish ways, high school days.
A mere three weeks, I say good bye
With a cry, a tear, a sigh.

To blue slacks, and a polo
Black shoes and white socks
To my pink skirt, and white blouse,
Pleated, soon to be folded.

To the OHS rooms of our first and second years:
The broken windows, and tantrum-kicked chairs,
The broom box behind the spider webbed chalkboard,
Messages on the wall hand printed in red and green.

The broken doorknobs, and broken floorboards,
Carved armchairs, and eaten chalks,
Missing brooms and dustpans and garbage cans and rugs
That show up in who knows where
Stolen by jani- we know who.

The witnesses and victims
To our random laughter (from some Chinese-looking girl’s corny joke).
Our random tears.
Our not so random learnings.
The pillars of our memories.

To the PF rooms of our third year:
The storage room turned gigantic garbage can and dressing room (maybe because ours keep being stolen)
The exploding socket causing sparks to fly (and us to fly away from it), and
The amazing “alambre” lock; who knows who installed (as if that could keep us away).
The earthquake resistant rooms would be missed.

To the New High School Building of our last years:
The kicked door (not our fault!), and cancerous blinds (like hairs falling after chemo),
The jigsaw floor (not sure if better than broken floorboards),
The “Halayan 2012”, and
The mind-boggling “no key needed” lockers.


The UTMT with its fair share of mango sentences,
The old guidance office now turned “tambayan”, and
The Computer lab with its fragile yellow chairs and bruised bums.

To Ibong Adarna plays, and the half cooked uncooked Teriyaki,
Generation X (and Generation NOW! and Generation Facebook),
Jai ** dances, and cheerleading,
Kalagon Kamo Namon,
And Mickey Mickey Mouse Kabit-bintana memories.

To the NikJep Tandem,
Kanlaon Boys Behind the Flowers,
D.H.A.I.N.G. (not sure if they remember this),
Fred vs Gino version
And DewBheRhieTart.

Keep the volcanoes of memories burning.

To blue paint, and blue shirts,
And Geometry teaching us
“There are a lot of solutions to a problem.
We just have to find one that suits us.”

To saying “***”,
And cooking imbutido.
And wearing (for some designing) reduced,
Reused, recycled clothing.
And dissecting.
And parrot-Filipino teachers (she gave me P30 for load though).

Keep the river of rumination flowing.

To being scared of one whole sheet of paper,
Two becoming one,
Party rocking to make up for the tears,
And knowing we should have won.

To the hand sanitizer girls,
The Cream-o-holics,
The Canterbury Crusaders,
The Valenciana eaters.

May our tree of friendship continue growing.

To our winnings!

The glow in the dark madness,
The Lakan at Mutya clutch-heart-moments,
The Sports Fest *******,
Basketball girls’ coronation!

To the fieldtrips and failed trips,
To air conditioned crammings,
And space and time bending
To comparing notes (and sometimes other things)
Copying notes, sometimes photocopying
(Not Xeroxing)
Sharing words, phrases, sentences
And giving pictures (via Bluetooth).

May you keep walking on the right direction,

To the expectations achived,
Broken, overtaken.
All the skepticism,
Constructive criticism.

All of it.

The in-your-face-we-did-it-baby-
We-are-awesome-you-can’t-bring-us-do­wn-
Coz-we-rise-back-up-attitude.

To Arielle
And Mhae

To Amica
Marie
Narzcisa
Cyan
Fred
Theo
Alvinson
Anthony
Faith
Karmil­la
Matt
Jeffson
Lourince

To Carolyn

To Makayla

To the thirty-five castaways in this room
The thirty-five castaways who struggled
The thirty-five castaways who persevered
The thirty-five castaways who fought, cried, made up, laughed, shared, gave, back-stabbed, and front-stabbed, celebrated, suffered, passed
Thirty-five
Thirty-five castaways who loved,
Thirty-five

Thirty-five castaways who made it, who did it.

To Nikki
Hazel
Alyssa
Gef
Veni
Alex
Jaykee
Bernard
Myra
Vince
Chanta­lle
Josen
Jerian
Shaira
J
Uriah
Ihra
Renz
Bless
Steffany
Angel
Fl­orey
Bernadine
Antonette
Rency
Owen
Majah
Gino
Marcelo
Ney
Keith
­Joselle
And Jessa,

We did it guys.
We really did.

There are 1,013,913 words in the English language, and not one of them describes how I feel about you, about us.

I used to say you were my strawberry jam, my little preserve that I would lay and spread on the table each morning, and I would lick my lips and say 'my God isn't she magnificent'.

I was your hero, your savior, your Christ that you had at Sundays Eucharist, and thank God you did. You dissolved in my mouth like that little piece of bread called a body but you tasted of everything instead of nothing, and **** me for thinking of you instead of God, thinking of you as my altar as I said 'hail Mary' and I worshiped you like a school girl with an orange full of candles in her hand, and for that God will **** me. He will **** me to hell but I don't care as the Universe lives under your tongue and everything I had ever dreamed of was right there in the right hand corner of your mouth.

You were my Wendy, darling. You stuck a thimble on my heart and said now you can never hurt me. But you did. We did. And the never of Neverland drifted away like a ship sinking into the sky, enveloped by darkness, smothered by a torrential rain of tears that washed away your fears that we were perfect, as there's no such thing as perfect when you can see your heart in the mirror with a target fixed to its center,

There are no words to describe how I feel about us. I still lift up my shirt and see your name inscribed on my chest, I still wake up and transcribe the words you wrote on my breast. I still touch myself up and think of you bribing me to undress. I still think about us.

If I could re-write my world to involve you in it I would. I would leave a piece of the jigsaw for you to carry around in your pocket so you knew you always fit in the world some where. I would make the sun rise each day through your window so you knew that life was worth living, that life was worth living when you were so what I am saying is I am forgiving. I am forgiving those days you swore at my reflection, and that day I slept on the sofa till three in the morning chain smoking till I was choking, remember? You said 'what are you doing' and I said I was in a smoke straight jacket and I was dying. You went back up to bed and I started crying. I am forgiving myself of those days I lay in bed just sighing. I am forgiving us for not trying.

But most of all, most of all, I am forgiving us for lying.

There are not enough words in the English language that can say I'm sorry like I am.

Or that I want you to move on. But I don't want you to move on.

Or that I want you happy. Because I want you happy.

I want you happy.

Just stop
you may not know it
but you are taking me apart

Piece by piece
unraveling me with your tongue
until nothing is left

Not this
all I want is you
in every way but this one

The door to your heart is a horrifying puzzle
Your Jigsaw pattern I can't put together
The pieces I hold don't correspond
So I take parts from you
Which is making me Leatherface
And giving you a flatter taste
And the ****** chain I saw placed
Was pressed to your door with haste

You're a killer doll like Chucky
How could I have been so unlucky?
I can't even cut through your curtains
I become a cold corpse before the movie can start
Like a careless Jamie Lee Curtis
How long can such a curted courtship last?
Before I contrive the courage to crush
The Killer Croc in your rib cage
But the corrosive corrections officer
That is your puzzle piece door
Impedes all progress to your horror heart
Because the improper placement of pieces
Will make me think you're The Witch
When you tell me Don't Breathe

As my theater's lights dim
I scramble for an exit
But my only escape from the cinema is through your door
I grow cynically situated to the pitch black pictures
How could I expect to solve the riddle
Now that I need to?
Doors that can't be opened are walls
Speaking softly turns to brawls
As your pieces scattered like change
Your door completely wrapped in chains
I feel stupid and ashamed
Your puzzled movie's to blame

life is like a jigsaw the pieces you must fit
has you walk through life you will find each bit
each and every corner that you around
each and every place a new piece will be found

put them all in place a picture you will see
and jigsaw of your your life how its meant to be
everything in life is there for you to take
to make it all come true this jigsaw you must make

the cupboard held many things.
the large cabinet sat to the right of drawers full of mystery, climbing the left side and bottom, just big enough to hold small things like paper and office supplies. but it did not hold what most people deemed regular.
the knobs were made of something out of a dream. candy like almost- no,
candy glass. and they paired very well with the midnight brown wood of the cupboard sat in front of them.
the top left drawer held small things. coins and sewing string. the wonderful jingle of coins and the comforting touch of silky yarn drew in the curious searcher. nothing much else sat in this drawer.
the middle one was more unusual than the previous. holding small trophies and metals, why, there were so many! how did they all fit in the shallow drawer? all of them for different things: sports, pie eating, spelling bees, you name it. but the names on the awards were all scratched out. who would do such a thing?
the bottom drawer was sure to hold more promising items. squaring down they open the drawer to find a puzzle. a puzzle with a few pieces missing, but a puzzle none the less. it looked like it was put together right in the drawer, years ago, as the jigsaw was covered in dust. as they try to wipe away the dust, it appears they cannot. the puzzle has no picture, it is merely a grey puzzle, completely grey. how boring! and not even completed! they shut the drawer in confusion and move on.
finally it was time. time for the cabinet. once more the glassy knobs call to them as they open it to see what treasure awaited them. a look of wonder smiles back at them as they open the cabinet, then it drops. a mirror. they were looking at their own reflection! out of all the things it could have been! they turn away from the cupboard, betrayed and upset, and when they turn to look back at it, the
mirror. what was wrong with the mirror? they weren't putting on that face were they? it smiled too wide, and a look of mania shook through the eyes of their reflection. a knife. where? oh wait, no! the smile only grew as the reflection drove a knife into its own neck, velvet blood flowing out as their eyes turned to black, but it felt like staring into the sun. quickly, they slam the door, horrified of what they've seen: their own body mutilated. it felt like something was dying in their chest. but only because it was. a hole sat in their chest where their heart used to sit. it hurt. not much, but it felt like something was leaking out of them. and as they look to find their heart, the realize that it's gone.
quickly and desperately they scour the drawers.
the bottom drawer was first. maybe it was sat on top of the puzzle or the puzzle would give a clue. it didn't matter the reasoning, the drawer was already open and nearly empty except for the missing pieces from before. just as dreadfully grey as the rest of the puzzle. suddenly, the memory leaks out of them. confusion rains down on them as they try to remember where they are, what they're doing, why their chest hurts. the puzzle pieces are no longer grey, but red from the blood pouring out of their chest. why are they bleeding? what are these jigsaw pieces doing here? as they lift it up the red and grey mix, becoming a flesh color, the same as their skin. the pieces fly up and clamp against the hole in their chest, trying to crawl inside. then it clicks, their heart! they kick the drawer shut and the pieces scour across the floor with the deep red of blood, lifelessly. they needed to keep searching! what was the next drawer? ah yes, the middle one!
they always hesitate on the middle drawer. and they hesitate, because they forget what is sat in it. but they think it can't be worse than the last one, right? how foolish they were. they look down and open the drawer and as they see the faux gold and stiff red ribbon they remember. awards. they forgot the awards. suddenly metals of all kind, old and new, bronze and gold, spring up and latch around the throats of their unsuspecting victims. weighing them down as they're choked endlessly. they fall the their knees and the cupboard seems to grow a hundred feet. oh if only they could reach the drawer to shut it! panic runs through their body and the floor sways beneath them, the achievements of others dragging them closer to death and failure, when suddenly the drawer shuts. the metals around their neck (now dented and *****) limply release their grip on their neck as they realize, it was their hand that shut the drawer. it still sat their, burning with grief as they realize, they shut down someone else's achievements. they rub their hands to try to shake off the regret, lingering in their mouth and hands. or was that the metallic taste of blood? when did they start bleeding? then, they get an urge. it pushes them up, up to where the top left drawer is. everything inside them says no, but the regret and pain in their finger tips needs to know what's in the last drawer, needs to feel more pain to replace the guilt. more pain than was already emitting from the hole in their chest and their bleeding hands. more.
as they desperately reach inside the top left drawer again for anything lovely at all, they're left with nothing but pain. as the sewing needles ***** at their fingertips so too does the feeling of greed. the feeling to need money. the elegant cupboard seemed to whisper, "money is everything, you are nothing without money. money is everything, you are nothing without money." over and over again. and in horrifying agony they close the last drawer, the last of they wonder that once filled their body: drained. they step back from the cupboard and it's viscous ways. and glance at the handles again. the very knobs that lured them in.
then, they realized the knobs were not candy like, but more similar to the glazed eye of a man found dead, or of an abusive father, drunk again. they were cold to the touch like the abuse of a mother and spat acid that burned like the tears falling down their face as they realized, the tears were real.
they close the drawers and release their hands in horror as they vow to never touch those nightmarish handles again, running away in fear to realize, they never found their heart. their run turns into a stumble until the suddenly slump over against a wall. the only thing they can think about is the pain, the tears, the cupboard, the drawers, the cabinet, their reflection. and just like that, they're gone.