i hope.

you say you want
diamonds and a ring of gold,
your story to remain untold,
your love not to grow cold.

but all the promises we make, from the cradle to the grave;

when all i want is you.

the colour of the corn.

* * * * * *

So the little prince tamed the fox.

And when the time for him to leave was approaching:

"Oh!" said the fox. "I am going to cry."

"It's your own fault," said the little prince. "I never wished you any harm; but you wanted me to tame you..."

"I know," said the fox.

"And now you are going to cry!" said the little prince.

"I know," said the fox.

"So you have gained nothing from it at all!"

"Yes, I have gained something," said the fox,

"because of the colour of the corn."

* * * * * *

~ the little prince.

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

fumbling (hopefully) no more.

thank you junyu.

your gallery of work showed me beauty;

simple and honest art.

you had one, pure, sincere emotion - and you expressed that magically.

it was beautifully humbling, in one phrase.

arguably,

i've tried too hard,

thought too much,

played too carelessly.

i attempted growing a great tree without finding the proper soil.

more than ever, i feel like a little child fumbling mindlessly in a playground.

a big huge, visual arts playground.

perhaps it was necessary; it was fun whilst it lasted.

but you've pushed me further.

thanks.

the last.

one boy whistles,

the other patters paint onto his canvas.

it is the last.

let us go out quietly then.

Great No. 14

in the art room:

tonight the great race ends.

i shall complete Great No. 14 and rest easy.

zants.

there was an ant track in the art room.

i destroyed their path by flicking water from my brush bottle all across their path.

now they are dead ants in dilute acrylic.

gotta get my head out.

naptime.

  2pm-330pm.

dream one:

i wake up and clamber out of under the table. my huge square canvas was supposed to have my painting. but now there was a huge sbs-colour scheme truck face. david says, "ahah ryan while you were sleeping i painted your painting! Now you can't diss junyu and i for painting for each other!"

dream two:

we're all invited to a gala dinner. not before david and i scramble and fight in the newly renovated year 5 art room, second storey. a couple of new art students are looking at us but we do not care.

dream 3:

we're all gathered in the year 5 studio room. Z is in a summer dress. very nice short hairstyle. looks strangely like emma watson. sien asks, "hey ryan, ryan! (bites lip, raises eyebrows) should i tell her about my point system?"

"yeah sure."

(sien runs off after her.)

a week left.

today, i woke up at 9.40am.
all i recalled at that moment was dreaming about junyu and the rest of the art gang at wahchee.
i don't remember the plot of that dream.

i finished cooking and eating breakfast at 11.40am.
i fell asleep again for another 1 and a half hours.
this time i dreamt again about the art people and the art room.

i woke up at 1 to have lunch. it was hearty.
fell asleep again at 140. short nap till 2.
can't remember what the dream was but it was about art. again.

over-saturation?

david's right; let's take this slow.

anyway i'll miss it nonetheless.

35 more days.

; i am overtired

of the great harvest i myself desired.

~ after apple-picking | robert frost.

beauty.

only in subtlety do we appreciate strength.

slowly dissipating.

i love it when they seem so distant, vast, and magically still,

that they make the sky seem even more so.

observation.

i think a child just might have the best observation skills around.

when we're born into this world,

everything is fresh, new, unfamiliar, and most of all,

uncomfortable.

by sheer instinct babies react to anything they're not comfortable with.

they're on high alert for just about anything, albeit their mother's embrace.

all too often when i see babies, or even young children, their eyes are wide, alert, and darting.

and it is this unfamiliarity, this sense of fresh exposure, that allow their traveling eyes to capture their surroundings.

as we grow, antiquity and familiarity moss over the world, like a veil of dust.

our eyes droop - we look at our feet - and the child-like shine we once had disappears.

and perhaps only returns every once in a while we play tourist.

even the artists, as much as we strive to observe,

grow bored,

grow tired,

grow old.

we attempt to observe the usual in unusual ways,

but might fail to re-capture the freshness, magic, and enchantment little children all too plausibly see everyday.

as children, we observe what we genuinely want to, what we need to.

as we become old, it is likely we observe what we think we want to,

what we think we need to.

conditioning is inevitable, yet somehow necessary.

we shall make do.

let's not grow too fast.

elitism.

if we should seclude ourselves,

build our walls,

sensationalise our hermit ways-

what is this all then?

melodrama?

pretension?

romanticism?

elitism?

i consciously claim that it is mere difference that separates us.

perceived difference leads to elitism only when it causes elevation.

but perhaps elevation has resulted from our constant tendency of over-sensationalisation.

is it then not just child's play?

or does it reach into far more malicious, self-conceited depths?

then the question lies if we are too obsessed with the all too common tumblr-driven hormone,

or if it is a genuine need/issue that one cannot deny.

i would argue the latter, but i cannot deny the effects of the former.

hah but eitherways we're enjoying it aren't we.

so many dreams.

i want to do too many things with my life,

i can't decide on one thing to solely focus on.

- the adolescent tempt to immortality;

too sweet, too sweet.

got to get out.
this generation

-painful, painful;

fury like a hornet's sting

quick to point; and fling

-impulsive adolescence

hides its face behind an orgy of

misplaced hormones

dance, dance

till the sweat of your pits

turns to drunk fits

and the nausea swirls up, up

from the deepness of your being

which you question

from the very

beginning.

get out, get out.

wake up, wash up.

- begin again.

everything.

it is time.

we have waited,

we have yearned;

purposeful freedom duly earned.

smiling we thought we had it all,

yet realise there's time to learn.

- everything has it's due turn.

the littlest task should never refute its call.

for all that

pistol of passion fires

in our unborn desires,

(they creep across the white,

in our cubby hole they hide);

we cannot lie-

or pretentiously deny-

the weight of each moment,

the essence of each laugh,

the pang of nostalgia

the languor of hysteria.

do not brush these aside,

everything has its due turn.

for as long as we create our pride;

you prepare-

purposeful freedom.

are you dying.

switz: how many a'ya are dyin'!

fud: i'm dyin!

switz: are ya' dyin!?

fud: i'm dyinnn'!

suspension.

loosely dappled,
silkily sewn,
carefully plumed,

suspended against;

the upper blankets tempt me away

suspended against a wash of colours

it is never known;

i despise this suspension.

blend not.

i like how

the sky is blue on one side

and purple on the other.

my favourite part is how they don't even blend into each other

but just change.

- please keep me alive

strange dream.

i had a dream that i was deeply, deeply bored.

not just like, "i need to play a great computer game now" kinda bored.

but a, i'm bored of this reality,

i'm bored of this life,

kinda bored.

throughout the dream, i was in my room,

trying to do work,

but each time i tried i just couldn't focus.

it was a strange dream, because

i woke up today and realised i never had a dream more real.

my life before.

Time it was, and what a time it was, it was
A time of innocence,

a time of confidences.

~ bookends | simon and garfunkel.

recognise.

art is not paint on a canvas,

smudge on an apron,

it's not detachment where we retreat to our little cave

and indulge away with our little brushes, colours, palettes.

we don't condemn the mathematician for formulating,

neither do we judge the scientist for experimenting,

in the end no one can say that these things aren't art either.

art is when you confess that you're daring to challenge-

that you're willing to not just follow but explore for yourself.

if the mathematician destructs the 1+1,

or the scientist offers the radical hypothesis;

likewise on the other hand if the painter paints the perfect mona lisa-

who's the artist?

art is a jungle exploration with scimitars, not a guided hike with insect repellent.

it is a passionate confession, recognition, that you're an individual.

just you, not this whole "collective entity which gives you your identity" schmitz.

everyone should be living art in whatever they do.

down to earth?

and tom said- "do you or do you not want sugar?"

i replied- "i want the salt."

note to self.

" For what it's worth -

it's never too late, or in my case too early,

to be whoever you wanna be.

there's no dying limit, you can stop wherever you want-

you can change or stay the same;

there are no rules to this thing.

we can make the best or the worst of it -

i hope you make the best of it.

i hope you see things that startle you

i hope you feel things you never felt before.

i hope you meet people with a different point of view.

i hope you live a life that you're proud of.

if you find that you're not -

i hope you have the strength

to start all over again. "

~ the curious case of benjamin button.

paradox of a man.

i want to do everything yet dislike so many experiences.

i want to go everywhere but i want to stay right here.

i want to be immortal but have a time to die.

i want it simple; i want it complex.

i want to destroy; i want to create.

i am transitory yet i attempt stability.

i am a paradox of a man.

over-fantastical.

psychological nuances.

"accept that the reality of this world does not fit your psychological nuances." - toj.

definitely true.

hard to accept.

i am feeling strange now. i am not at the deepest region of the pit like i was in my last post.

i am feeling strangely calm and peaceful, like everything's alright.

yet distant, like my seeking is still a wild dog on a leash, pulling far ahead, away from me.

and like this wild dog, my identity seeks to mark its territory everywhere;

i enjoy collecting my experiences.

like my wild dog,

i'm always excited to find a new place;

yet not content enough to settle there.

i think at the center of ourselves we are all still children -

intuitive enough to follow the heart's curiosity,

ignorant enough to believe that there can ever be a settling - a true contentment.

but always full of the energy to keep skipping along.

the same dream.

it's more than just the fatigue of daily living;

it's more than just the drudgery of routine in life.

it's a striving, a seeking;

a yearning that caves down on itself in a realisation of hopelessness because maybe we're all just too fantastical.

my greatest fear, is living a normal life.

we are too ignorant--ignorance that leads to fear--to admit reality's grasp over our imaginative idealism.

not talking about the reality of making a living, i have no fear over that,

but the reality of living.

in years to come, it is possible that i'll look back on this and laugh, seeing some folly which the present self fails to realise, the folly of a dream.

but i fear who that man might be.

and that right now, this moment, dream-like as it might seem in the future, is everything in absolution at its purest form.

"...that they might go the fools among."

life as of now.

whether its ignorance or strength

its hard to tell; could be an intertwining of both.

maybe ignorance is strength.

i could be better off not knowing.

transitory.

I’m gasping in a dream
but the dream itself isn’t suffocating;
I’m just gasping in one.

delicate, surreal.

delicate.

Why is it all transitory.
where am I going;
where I am going-
What If.

gah.

ib's not getting harder;

i'm getting lazier.

second home

Art room

we’re all just mad; inadvertent
the speakers’ blast
harmonious melancholy;
what’s future, present, past
gets tangled up all in the strings.
like finely selected hair; dab, dab, dab;
as we jab, jab
our way through gelatin glass
like raindrops in near-stop motion
all round us
a little bit mad.

- a poem dedicated to the only subject i enjoy.

in and out of cocoon

i ate my way out of

cocoon to see that

in a special place-

transitory, many-faced,

i am one in all,

weaved together,

hanging precariously

on a thread of existence.

i laugh

at how i dance

with it ever so frivolously.

i am in cocoon.

i am eating my way.