One day, I'll quote myself

"Clear thinking requires courage rather than intelligence."


Thomas Szasz (born 1920), author, professor of psychiatry

Today 709

What is it that you want from us, Officer?

Do you want us to remove our shirts?

Is the yellow colour offending you?

We could have chosen white, you know,

As we wanted people to see how clean life can and should be.

But yellow means something more to us Malaysians, isn't it?

Do you not remember, Officer?

You who was born in the same country as us?

The same blood runs in our veins,

No matter the colour of our shirts or of our skins.

The dark of our pupils remains the same.

We tread the same earth.

We may not speak the same language, that is true,

But that is because we were confused.

This can be mended, quite easily.

 

So Officer, brandishing his truncheon at us,

What is it that you really want from us?

Do you want to confiscate our Identity Card?

Do you want to snatch our home, our wife and children?

Do you want to take our job, our salary?

Or do you eye our nasi lemak?

We'll gladly share our plate with you, Officer,

But we cannot give you what makes us who we are.

Perhaps we are mistaken: it is our life that you want.

So many of our brothers have been silenced,

Imprisoned, exiled, beaten to an inch of death –

And beyond, sometimes.

Warmongering dwells in the hearts of those who lead us.

Vanity poisons their thoughts.

Those are transient feelings though, they will pass.

 

Those who lead us, Officer, those who command you,

Are guilty only of letting the fear of tomorrow take hold of them.

Taking away our eggs before they're hatched,

Fining us whilst we have done nothing,

Sheltering us on the bare ground with just corrugated iron

Above our head while our leaders need splendid homes of stone,

All this needs no retaliation. We understand it was done out of fear.

Yet fear has never saved anyone from harm.

Fear must stop ruling their heart. Hope must emerge.

 

Officer, beating your bludgeon on your shield won't scare us off.

No. We will march nonetheless, so what do you want?

What are those orders you were given?

Our Identity Card gives us rights:

The right to speak, the right to vote, the right of assembly,

Among others.

We strive to exercise those rights, yet our leaders want something else.

They want us to bear the yoke in silence.

They want us to see what and how they see.

They want to have us believe theirs is the only way out,

The only way to defeat tomorrow and its lures,

Its pitfalls, its graves.

They want the bumi to think they are the chosen people,

They have them believe they can eat out of their neighbour's plate.

And who wouldn't take a little extra, the leaders permitting, enticing even?

But bumi are not the chosen people.

Malaysians are. And Malaysians only.

For if Malaysia was not chosen,

It would only be another Sudan.

Yet Malaysia is different. None could tell otherwise without lying.

 

Now, Officer, has come for us the time to fight.

But you were mistaken, for our fight will be fought in peace.

We have no need to clench our fists, our tongues only shall we use.

 

We told you our rights, Officer, now we will tell you our duties.

We, like you, have the duty to seek and maintain peace.

We, like you, must help and guide anyone in need.

We all have the duty to decide on our own future and to balance

It with the future of the Nation we are constituting.

Both must stand in equipoise and our duty is to exercise

Our best judgement to keep the scales level.

 

Now take a good look at us, Officer.

We may not be the poorest people here in Malaysia.

But sometimes the poorest forget they still have something to lose,

Despite having lost their home, their dignity, their purpose.

Yet we are no different. It could be us.

It could be us burning on that motorbike at the dead of night.

It could be us on the way to the gallows.

It could be us mourning a murdered relative.

It could be us fighting to put bread on the table every day.

It could be us quarrying stones to buy our child's copybook.

It could be us starving and begging and sleeping in the streets.

It could be us losing our sense of direction.

Yet we are all, in one way or another, striving to make ends meet.

God willing, we have different fates,

God willing, we can alter our course.

 

So Officer, what do you expect from us?

Do you want us to go quietly back to our homes,

Forgetting our own fate, our neighbour's fate, even your own fate?

Do you want us to accept this state of things?

Do you want us to turn a blind eye to the future of our children?

We cannot, and we are sorry.

Today is the day we start opening people's eyes.

For you may have cracked down upon us

For these past two weeks already, Officer,

Yet you are only showing Malaysians,

And also the peoples of the world,

That something that should be white is darker than the night.

Some things should not have happened, yet they did, yet they do.

Finding a culprit is not our intent, pointing fingers is futile:

We just want to tread the path we should have taken long ago.

We just want people to stand an equal chance.

The judgement of a few should stop deciding the future of many.

 

Yet these are orders you follow, Officer.

It seems that you have no other choice.

We do not know what thoughts race through your mind

When you embrace your wife and children, back at home.

We do not know if you fear punishment or shame,

Or if you feel like betraying the country you love and serve

When you are ordered to quell our 'rebellion'.

Yet we too love and serve our country,

Or we wouldn't be here, on that side of the fence.

And rest assured this is no rebellion at all, Officer.

For you can see our hands open in the gesture of friendship.

 

We know that some seek war, anger festering in their heart.

They cannot see how things can be changed,
They cannot see other means to fight than fire, stone and blood.

They have lost faith in words and ideas.

They must be guided back to the road we are all taking now,

For they taint our message. This method cannot work.

 

So Officer, handcuffing us roughly with our head on the pavement,

What do you expect from today?

What do you expect from tomorrow?

Malaysians are waking up, can you not see?

Will you arrest them all?

We hear the sirens booming in the streets

And the helicopter hovering in the sky,

Yet they draw the attention of more and more people.

 

And you, men and women leading us?

What do you want from Malaysians?

Will you have them all flee their own country?

Will you have them grunt and sweat under a weary life?

Will you have them starve? Will you hang them all?

Will you ban the yellow colour from our memory?

You cannot, for it glows bright on our flag.

Will you see only gold in the blackness of your heart?

 

If you could just open your eyes,

You would see the blazing sun and the pale crescent of the moon,

You would see the swinging palm trees and the opened coconuts,

You would see the quiet sand and the quiet turtles,

You would see the grain of rice sticking on your fingertip.

You would see the rain clinging on the frond of the banana leaf.

You would see Malaysia as many have dreamt it.

You would see Malaysians marching hand in hand, today,

In peace, trying to reach harmony and mutual consent.

You would see the readiness to discuss and not to accuse,

You would see the willingness to move on.

You would hear, at the end of this day,

That Malaysia has a voice of promise,

That Malaysia has a choice to make, today,

Between what has been and what may be.

Yesterday was painful, we know it more than anyone,

Yet we will remember it as a lesson.

From today – and do not fear today – things will forever be different,

Because tomorrow needs not fear a new dawn

Because tomorrow we will all be Malaysians, again.

Today, noon, July 9th 2011, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Nothing but quote

"The world looks with some awe upon a man who appears unconcernedly indifferent to home, money, comfort, rank, or even power and fame. The world feels not without a certain apprehension, that here is someone outside its jurisdiction; someone before whom its allurements may be spread in vain; someone strangely enfranchised, untamed, untrammelled by convention, moving independent of the ordinary currents of human action."


Winston Churchill, politician and statesman (1874-1965)

Thanks Marilyn for the quote :)

"The belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary; men alone are quite capable of every wickedness."

Joseph Conrad, Under Western Eyes, 1911.

Demented

"Dreaming permits each and every one of us to be quietly and safely insane every night of our lives."


William C. Dement, professor of psychiatry (born 1928)

Status quote

Why is it that one can look at a lion or a planet or an owl or at someone's finger as long as one pleases, but looking into the eyes of another person is, if prolonged past a second, a perilous affair?


Walker Percy, author (1916-1990)

Night Declensions

Affronting the night

closing in around the house

cup of tea in hand

The night confronted

enveloping all but the

steaming cup of tea

Sleepless night settling

on the forehead of the moon

vapourous cup of

Insomniac moon

strutting down and up

within the rim of the cup

The Encounter

He was one inch, perhaps two, under seven feet, which was of course quite unusual as people went, but one had to consider that he was a dragon-cum-monster slayer, and that in his line of work midgets indeed had an undeniable advantage at hiding, but in deeds they had that terrible drawback of being slow-paced and slow-witted, ergo of being chewable in one snap, fact that made them unqualified for the work – midget dragon-cum-monster slayers died out for lack of suitable candidates. Provided you found a small enough dragon or even a remarkably puny hydra, even your regular man was as good as mince pie.

He was not your regular man. His shining armour was the first clue. Brightly polished for a whole full-moon night by a dwarf – jolly good polishers, by the way, dwarves are, for they have that almost sexual attraction to metal that verges on devotion. The second clue was his steed. No one could ever call Stallion a horse. He was a magnificent pure-breed, white from muffle to tail. Even his hooves were white. Of course, Stallion was a magical warhorse, bound to him by a magical spell only Destiny could cast. Together they had roamed many a kingdom and fought many a battle. The third clue was his size. 'Towering' was by any means an adjective that befitted him like a gauntlet, but his bulk was mountainous. He could encompass the head of a man in his hand and he covered with one stride the same ground as a man would do in four. Muscular, mighty, masculine. In all humbleness, he could say that he was the ladies' favourite wherever he went. The claymore faithfully hanging at his side was the last clue to his über-manliness. It was a fathom long, i.e. the width of a man's extended arms, from tip to tip. Only him could wield Swörd, for he had been chosen by the Gods to unsheathe it from its rocky, two-thousand year old resting place. Swörd glowed with a special shimmering aura, parting the darkness at night and glowed red in the midst of the fray.

On a day-to-day basis he was feared by his enemies, loved by his countrymen, favoured by the Gods for his ruthlessness, for his courage and for his loyalty respectively.

So when he heard that he was being challenged to a duel, and when he set eyes on his 'enemy', he first laughed. But he had fought too many wars and killed too many monsters and evil men alike to overlook the stare in the herald's eyes. He was then told that his opponent had killed nine hundred and ninety-nine men in single combat. But the fame didn't quite match the figure. The herald must have been mistaken, they must have all consorted to play some prank on him. He knew the King of these lands very well, he had been a companion in peace and in war for many a year.

So on that fateful day, as he was passing by the village, he was stopped by his antagonist who was blocking the road, legs extended in an inverted V shape and his fist resting on his hips in a defiant posture. He set foot in the muddy ground, let Stallion wait by the corn trough and, after being warned by the herald, gave him his sheeny helmet and walked up to the warrior. Such was the scene in the early hours of the morning. It was the first days of Spring. Luck had it that he was in a perfect form.

He bent over his foe, towering and confident, hands on his knees and told him, in the sweetest possible voice he could: “And what are you going to do, precisely, kiddo?”

***

He was definitely two inches under five feet, which was quite unusual as people went, but one had to consider that he had yet to complete his eighth school year, kindergarten excluded. When he was woken up by his friend, who was dishevelled from all the running up and down, telling him that a knight was in sight and that he would arrive in the village any minute now, he jumped out of bed, put on his best suit and rushed to meet him, panting a little – he had almost slipped on the mud. That would have ruined his carefully crafted effect. He affected his usual posture in the middle of the only road in the village. He was born there. His parents and his parents' parents were born there. He knew everyone and everyone knew him. Luckily, today was a day off school.

So he was standing there, as proudly and vain as possible, and he quite liked the effect on the people around him. Everyone had gathered and was holding its breath. Expectant eyes were going from him to the knight and vice versa. Yet, and this was quite unusual, the stares seemed to linger more on the warrior – he had to admit that this one was, well, nothing short of statuesque. The...man, for lack of a better word, surely measured a staggering seven feet at least.

When he came up to him and bent over him, he could not see anything but him, as broad his shoulders were. This was the first time ever he was confronted by such a mountain of muscles and metal. The mud at every one of his steps seemed to be squashed into a pulp, on each side of his ironclad feet.

He just hoped the herald had not said too much, or too little.

***

Now he was much closer, he could distinguish the child's features: the unruffled hair, the pimples he should resent, the freckles that one could not really distinguish from the said pimples, the sleep at the corner of his blue eyes, the chubby cheeks. The school garments. Light blue shirt, black and blue striped tie, dark blue shorts, light blue socks, black shoes that had not seen a good polish in years, perhaps at all. Then his eyes were suddenly drawn to a glittering pen which was sticking out from the child's pocket.

***

They usually would come very close to him, talk to him perhaps, spur him on, observe him for a time then they would become interested in his pen. That was the time he would usually put it to good use. This one was like the rest and now was the time. Right on the cue. He had had doubts, looking at that gigantic man, but he just had to remember the story of David and Goliath to feel safe.

One day he had heard at school that quote from a French bloke: “If you kill one man, you're a murderer; if you kill millions of men, you're a conqueror; if you kill them all, you're God.” He was currently undertaking stage two. He was still in two minds as to pursue further after taking the life of millions of men. Being God seemed to him quite overrated.

The pen had been the top prize at a poetry competition earlier last year. A little less than a foot tall and entirely made of iron. The Provost had said it would last him a lifetime if he used it carefully. It was this same pen which he now swiftly took in hand and which he was thrusting into the knight's right eye, very deeply, until his hand knocked onto the man's orbit. As usual, the title of his winning poem would flash before his eyes: The Unexpectedness of a Pen Right into the Eyeball. The defeated knight fell dead in the mire.

He then cried, triumphantly, the last line of his epic: “The pen is mightier than the sword!” Blood and humours dripped abundantly from the glistening pen. With one hand clenched around the body of the pen he swiped it clean, then put it back into his pocket. With that he turned on his heels and walked home to get his breakfast. He was starving. “Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder” was also one of his teacher's sayings – “unless there's a pen sticking right through it”, he sarcastically added, with a grin on his face, from ear to ear. The carrion would be carried at the edge of the forest and left to the vultures and the wolves. Such was the fate of the defeated. Vae Victo.

***

The herald, for the thousandth time, was shaking his head as he and seven other sturdy men were carrying the body of the unfortunate...why didn't any one of those knights believe him? Couldn't they see the Evil in the child's eyes? Lucky the kid paid him well, otherwise he'd have cleared a long time ago.

The sound of the Trees - Mountain Interval (1920)

Robert Frost (1874–1963).  Mountain Interval.  1920.

28. The Sound of the Trees

I WONDER about the trees. Why do we wish to bear Forever the noise of these More than another noise So close to our dwelling place?         5 We suffer them by the day Till we lose all measure of pace, And fixity in our joys, And acquire a listening air. They are that that talks of going         10 But never gets away; And that talks no less for knowing, As it grows wiser and older, That now it means to stay. My feet tug at the floor         15 And my head sways to my shoulder Sometimes when I watch trees sway, From the window or the door. I shall set forth for somewhere, I shall make the reckless choice         20 Some day when they are in voice And tossing so as to scare The white clouds over them on. I shall have less to say, But I shall be gone.         25 The poem can be found at this address: http://www.bartleby.com/119/28.html

Quote on Happiness

Thanks to Marilyn for the follow-up on the Happiness piece.




"Happiness? That's nothing more than health and a poor memory."

Albert Schweitzer (14 January 1875 – 4 September 1965) Franco-German philosoher & theologian.