On the seventh day of Christmas

My true love gave to me

An empty hotel room
A rainy city
A lingering kiss
And the faint smell of cigarettes

Leaving on a jet plane

"

so kiss me and smile for me

tell me that you'll wait for me

hold me like you'll never let me go

I'm leaving on a jet plane 

don't know when I'll be back again

oh babe I hate to go

"

________________________________________

A little souvenir from the streets of Melbourne.

coffee house

There’s just something about a coffee house.

There’s just something about the way pen on paper, combined with the aroma of coffee beans and the quiet rumble of background chatter over a few gentle jazz notes, that can make one begin writing about quiet and gentle and rumbly thoughts of internal conscience that wouldn’t normally come forth. Maybe it’s because music and writing and a good coffee just mix so well together, like some sort of immortal combination of literal inspiration that would never cease to motivate. Maybe it’s simply the traditional atmosphere at a place that one can drink coffee. Maybe it’s coffee itself that inspires this atmosphere and in turn inspires the creative mind: the hazy lights, the chatter, a warm concoction of bittersweet dairy in your hands and the agglomeration of well-loved sofas, invitingly squat and always ready to take in a new individual’s weary day of toil.

Maybe it’s also the people that inspires - the ordinary and unremarkable people that waft in and out of the coffee house. The mundane people who possess such remarkable details and these peculiar details have a nasty habit of jumping out at you from within their unremarkable stereotypes: There are always the couples that come to huddle in a secluded corner; the random assortment of coffee drinkers sprawled across the tables with a collection of books, paperwork, technological preoccupations and friends; also without fail are the foreigners, lining up at the counter and squawking loudly to each other in rapid and furious bouts of French or German or some other exotic linguistic twist.

And of course there is the writer, lest we forget. A solitary figure at a small table at the back of the shop, perhaps laptop propped open or perhaps accompanied by a fountain pen and its contents scribbled artistically (but also incomprehensively) over a wad of battered note paper.  An empty coffee cup would be sitting cold and neglected at the edge of the table; the pitiful last dregs of coffee already several hours into the post-mortem state.

For the writer there are so many things to observe in a place like this. So much distraction yet inspiration cruelly intertwined with each other that they will without a doubt find themselves drifting off, staring into space with a vacant expression every few rotations of customers, sometimes unwillingly fixated by the strangers drifting in and out of their line of vision, sometimes positively charmed by the strangers wafting in and out with such style and (assumedly) hidden quirk. 

the books

Most of all, the world is a place where parts of wholes are described

within an overarching paradigm of clarity and accuracy.

The context in which makes possible an underlying

sense of the way it all fits together,

despite our collective tendency not to conceive of it as such.

summer

I kiss your berry stained lips.

I can taste the strawberries and straw hats and the long grass we walked through yesterday.

A view of entangled limbs, tanned and sticky with perspiration. 

Memories from last night are sluggish. The only clarity I need is waking up to the sound of our mingled breaths.

Drawn blinds trap in the stifling heat. My eyes follow the shadows that are inching lazily behind streaks of late afternoon sun. 

Gold illuminates tiny dust silhouettes. Your hand is outstretched, trying to catch them.

Stale smoke and last night's cigarette butts litter the table. Our clothes and patches of sparse sunlight litter the floor. Bustle-bustle of the city wafts in through a crack in the window. But within these walls, time is sleepy.

Hot and lazy days stretch out in front of us like a summer road trip with no destination and no end. Just my hand in your hand and the open road.

Just each other's company in a summer when we were both young.

photo diary: belated july

 

 

 

 

 

Bloody hell I ate a lot in July.

musky

The musky smell

a soft graze

sound of breathing and 

the thump-thump of a heartbeat.

The muggy night

a whispered laugh

glow of streetlights and

prickly warmth of an embrace

"

Can you hear it? 

The lull of the city

Hazy bokeh of lights 

clothed in winter smog.

Footsteps and

distant voices.

Clattering of plates

and clink of glass.

From up here,

can you still hear it?

"

Sovereign Light Café

"let's go down to the rides on East Parade

by the lights of the palace arcade

and watch night coming down on the 

Sovereign Light Café"

a rainy night

I walked home in the rain today. This was the first time that I forgot to bring an umbrella to uni and I knew there would be no one whom I could call or ask to borrow a ride or a little shelter. So while everyone was conglomerating in front of IC, waiting for the rain to die down or for the familiar headlights of a car, I mentally gave a shrug and just thought, "fuck this", life's too short to use umbrellas anyway right?

Half-way home it started to rain really, really hard, the sort of down pour you hear from the inside as a sudden onslaught of furious pattering on the rooftops. I think I actually started laughing when it first came pouring down. Mother nature was trolling me today.

I'm not sure why but there was something satisfying about just walking slowly through the rain without having to care about how soaked I got. It was kind of nice. I almost felt like singing a sad song with a sad little melancholic smile and pretend I'm the protagonist in an old black and white musical.

It was beautiful, the gentle orange glow of streetlights shining through the rain.

My throat's a little sore though. I hope I don't catch a cold from the aftermath of my wild spontaneous romantic rain-walk.

Something about a story of distance

About 6am when the sun is rising and you're still hugging onto your phone with a small smile.

About 5am when your eyes are drooping but you just need to hear his voice for a little while longer, just a another minute, just another word.

About 4am when an annoying little tear escapes as you place the laptop on the pillow next to you. It's like you're lying side by side again, but your traitor heart won't agree.

About 3am when can't help laughing as you both try to sync tonight's movie with each other. It'll be like you're watching it together.

About 2am when the cold starts settling in and you give them a meek "Hey I wish you were here baby".

About 1am when you wrap yourself up in blankets, a hot cup of green tea in your palms as you try to remember the feeling of his hand hugging yours.

And finally about 12am, when you both know it's gonna be another long night ahead, and that night is only just beginning.

flightless bird

"Have I found you

flightless bird

jealous, weeping or lost

you..."

Wo xiang ni

你干嘛把我丢在这里.

你给我回来.

你给我回来.

marina and the diamonds

(Images: http://www.marinaandthediamonds.com)