noreply@blogger.com (wanda) — Fri, 29 Nov 2002 08:02:00 +0000

Sometimes I feel that God has pinned me down
like a lover to a bed
and I am helpless beneath him

And the weight of eternity
rests on my fragile wrists
and I have lost my worth.

noreply@blogger.com (wanda) — Fri, 06 Sep 2002 04:34:00 +0000

The sky was awash in a burst of color, like a fireball exploding into the once serene sky. Heaven was an abstract painting worlds away, an eruption of golds and reds in the horizon. In a moment this display would be forgotten, and twilight would take its place. A moment more and and that would be gone as well. And then day and night would slip into each other like the beads of a rosary. As always.

There they were. Little girls running on the sand, playing tag with the waves. College kids posing with the retreating sun as backdrop, a postcard perfect picture. Oblivious to the throng was an old man busily fixing a tattered old fishing net, stained skin and gnarled fingers working their way through the sharp nylon thread. After three days in paradise, the underside of bliss was coming undone.

I folded the batik sarong I had been lying on and picked up the bottle of Italian tanning lotion. My feet felt their way to my soft leather sandals, and I stood up and shook the soft powder sand from my once pale skin, darkened now to a golden amber, like the color of delicate tea. My friends had gone to the ocean’s edge for a final dip before we trudged inward of the dumbbell shaped island. Smiling to myself, I watched them jostle each other in the water. On the beach a young local girl – dark brown skin, long black hair, deep velvet eyes – smiled prettily into the sweating heavy-set face of a white man. I turned away.

The afternoon breeze rushed towards me from the sea as I waited by the sanctuary of a cluster of coconut trees. It ran through my hair and rushed through my skin, a low rumble far away at first, and then it hurled at me like a cascade of a thousand whispers piled on top of each other. My body tingled from the contact.

“Hey, we’re back.” Des and Maita ambled towards me, smelling of oil and saltwater.
“To the room?” I asked with a smile.
“Yes, please!.” They both answered, before bursting into giggles. “Who’s got the keys?” Maita looked at me expectantly.
“Yep, girls, safely in my bag.” I replied, as we walked in collective step to our room.

Our room was an air-conditoned two-storey nipa hut. On the first floor was a small rattan dining table with matching chairs, a bamboo sofa with white cushions facing a widescreen TV, and a personal fridge in a corner. Sliding doors opened into a nice hammock hanging in an interesting back porch, which stepped out into a pretty garden. Upstairs were three beds and a bathroom. A rough abaca rug covered the floor, and a cozy balcony overlooked a view of the tiny islands that dotted the sapphire blue sea.

Nighttime in Boracay was something else. All around me were skimpy tops and sheer sarong skirts, beads and patterns of cloth, men naked from the waist up, coconut trees dancing in the wind. Right into the frenzied pounding of drums that seemed to echo my own heartbeat.

All around me were people I recognized from Manila, but whom I hardly knew. Here it seemed we were all old friends, laughing and sharing everything we had – cigarettes, alcohol, even drugs. My hands were never empty, glass upon glass of beer and cocktails were pressed upon them even before I had finished whatever it was I was first drinking. The fire on the beach flashed through my eyes. I couldn’t remember where Des and Maita were. It seemed I had been left alone, amidst the chaos of people, bikinis and sarongs, beads and drums, poetry and song, white man and brown, all mixed into the powder soft sand of paradise.

And so I joined them all, and danced myself into the heart of the island’s hedonistic rhythm.

Only torches and fairy lights glimmered in the constant swirling of bodies and cackle of voices. A fire on the beach, and sand lanterns were mirrored on the dark ocean. Everything else was bathed in the night and the dim glow of faraway stars. I was folded into the crowd, and felt hands around my waist, bodies pressing against my body, soft hair on my mouth.

My feet touched the water as we climbed aboard the wide raft that was anchored to the pier. Girls were dancing, and the fire on the torches barely showed their faces. I saw the eyes of a man watching me as I walked to the edge of the bamboo. Like a predator stalking his prey, moving and surging with the crowd.

I felt myself float into the nothing.

Brown Girl