In a twinkling of an eye, three years passed since the debut of my egoistic, semi-biographic, pseudocumentary writings entitled Charcoal. Memories engraved, moments recalled, many of which are lost with time. Actions indeed speak louder than words. But words, with no visuals to accompany it's ramblings, are still worth delivering. For these 27 personnels listed below, defined poetically to avoid any disclosure, life back then was just another piece of canvas, charred with therapeutic colours no one in the world would give a damn about. Until somebody with hot sweats and bated breath shouted for help, we Medics were images of random men filling the voids of an empty space.
The Playboy
Once in my wildest imagination
I recalled your motorbike resembling:
(a) The morning ambulance speeding to camp, and
(b) The night stretcher caught in the jams
As we skipped the evening roll call
And talked cock under my block.
The Smiley
The hidden meanings behind your smile
Was not an agenda
But a facade erected
To cover the many intents
In a game of Blackjack
Or the cheating of Bluff.
The Fly-Catcher
The techno harmonics in your car
Were the notations of a migraine
The white that shines your car
Matches that of the Sick Bay’s sheets
And that car, that car itself -
A legend unexpressed.
The Clown
You went to the rendezvous without realizing
Her existence was a mirage
And you might have known sooner or later
By looking twice in the sterile water
That the caller was no better than
One of them.
The Wonderboy
Scrambled puzzles in your PDA
Is not the life you possessed
The emotions you hold in your sweaty palms
Is larger than life itself
And what seems to us a Biohazard waste
Was for her, a life story.
The Fat-Boy-Slims
We understood when you explained that
Hyperventilation and panic is a vicious cycle
We knew when you said that
The graph paper of the Lifepak is not for the BMI machine
But we could never make out why
You broke down when the oxygen tank was empty?
The Eviltwin
Was it three months or more
When you succumbed to your knee?
Or was it three months or more
When you decided to vacate and
Entrusted me for three month or more
While the Piritons went missing?
The Big Bob
The chopper, we all debated, was imaginary
The shares, that you invested, were unexplained
But true were the tunes that you composed
Behind docket compartments
Beside sweaty uniforms
Beneath duotone X-rays.
The Rectorman
Never was there a much tender picture
Of you sleeping in the Treatment Room
Snoring and ignoring the autoclave’s tang
As your saliva animates a pool on the pillow
It was you, I believed, who had just co-created
In an instant wake - the epitome of rest.
The SM
You shouted when I used up the A4 papers
But I am a history student, not geography
You demanded that I refrain
From the Xerox machine that I had just abused
The least you could do was to appreciate
The art that bloomed thereafter.
The Hair (Apparently)
Six out of six chicken wings were gone
When you came back from the Doctor’s den
So was the cream puff you left in the fridge
The milk, the mango pudding, even the plastic spoon
What remained were banana skins in the sink
The vital sign of sympathy
The Hermit
Ignorance was the game of fools
But to be involved was ignorant too
True enough there was no escape
From the facts that were embedded
Quite briefly in your cortex
As deep inside as Mandai Training Village.
The Cokebloater
People, I don’t recall knowing, used to say
That you can practically die without Coke
Or was that a practical joke
Several times poked
From the cannula against
The sanctuary of your bloats?
The Tamasek
Your Adidas windbreaker that vanished
Was Charcoal-black in colour
With Panadol-white stripes
Which had no hints of a zebra
But a slight apprehension of
The detention barrack our minds reside.
The Psychologist
You were sitting, cross-legged, right above left
You were reading a psychological book
Your head tilted down, poco-a-poco
Your spectacles assumed your eyes
Your mouth zeroed
You slept.
The Drug Baron
Between the asking of names and drug allergies
Was the sound of bottles clanking in the background
Between the stock checking and replenishing
Were the constant smoke breaks in secrecies
Between the forgeries and carte blanches
Was I - Laurel, and you - Hardy.
The Mopa-Pa-Bear
Why oh why, every time I analysed
It would be better done in spare parts
For you are made in pieces
Like the Vespas, Piaggios and Lambrettas
A thick rear body, a narrow slim waist,
Which contra-indicates you, but balances you?
The Rastaputin
It was factual when they wrote that
Cough mixture makes you high
When what you heard are reggae funks
Remixed to the tunes of Procodin
Stirred in the stolen cookhouse mug
Became the airy guilt of a urine test.
The Queer
‘To jump or not to jump’
It was neither a question in the first taking
Nor was it in the end
An answer to the dismissal
Of what we didn’t know
Of what we didn’t ask.
The Gong
Why ‘Blur’ became your moniker?
When you don’t actually wear glasses
Or personified an unfocused squid
A cloudy vaccine
An apparition
A haze?
The Cafergot
Silence was your middle name
But it was never golden
For there were times when you injected
The power of reflexes
The quick moves and urgent volitions
In a simple battle of Tetris.
The Silverspoon
The hues on the Ishihara plates
Encircled the center of your retina
Hypnotising slowly
Almost bluetoothly
As sinful colours turning harshed
Video of thoughts - products of crude.
The Evangelist
The term ‘Kitajima’, my friend
Should not be treated for a name
Cause that name was merely
A case of mistaken identity
For truly the source is not a name
But a town in Japan.
The Flowerpower
What was it that led you astray
From the orientation of truth?
Who was that in your opened closet
Privatizing the unconfused self?
When was it during the early diagnosis
That my position keened your interests?
The Nice One
On a swab is your short story
Square and fast dry
Even in favours you spoke quickly
Trying to serve
If anything at all
The presence.
The New Guy
Tell me your name
Tell me
Cause I don’t even know you
But we do share that name
With that name tag
That name.
The Entrepreneur
The lack of intention
Except only with the decision
To complete a mission
Is perhaps the reason
That makes you here
The resurrected leader.
