I imagine this time it will be different.

One philosopher talks about eternal recurrence, and asks, what if a demon slinks into your loneliest hour and tells you that this life, this life you’ve lived, you will have to live a countless times more. Then we would imagine the universe expanding and collapsing again in a billion years, bursting into a starry spectacle, and then inevitably there you'd be: living each and every moment in all its gory detail. He calls it the heaviest weight, when each second no longer flies past but must be willed, must be grabbed, must be told: I will you into an endless cycle. Then you'll be liberated in your your own version of eternity, eternity tucked within the value of every second. But past the romance you quickly see into the lie, because never in a million years would you care to live this wretched life a second time, with all its faults, with all its regrets. And you would rather slit your throat once and for all than recall the hurt of those whom you’ve hurt, and stumble where you’ve already fallen. Let yourself be saved just once you plead, and let the sinning stop.

Another philosopher talks about repetition, and asks, what if each moment was perfectly new, sparkling and untouched, and yet in your childlike wonder there is a bliss that runs deep, like dolphins that leap, joyfully repeating. Oh, and then you could imagine that in the music of life every movement varies except for one lovely chorus that never gets old. And because it begins even before you were born you do not sing it alone but with the ages, folding into time then unfolding, a precious sense of living in the Spirit that is always renewed. At the same time the noise of creation rises up into an angelic crescendo that reaches higher and higher. Soon it will become too high for hearing, and so will your words, and now you just have to hang on tight. Because you are saved only once, but you may repeat the tears of gratitude as many, many times you like.

She rises from her seat and takes the floor, or rather takes the narrow aisle. We are stuck in traffic with horns glaring, and with fumes invading through the open windows. The merciless sun streams through and lands on my skin. She opens her mouth but I do not hear her. People take no notice, and the world pays no mind. Past the traffic our bus moves and revs its engines. The metallic floor bangs and shudders, the seats rattle in their screws. The hot air rushes into the interior, forcing me away from the window.

She is aged and full of sad years, wearing a black skirt and a drab white blouse worthy of this Sunday. I see her eyes, they are a dull brown, and I see her hair, shabbily dyed black against a defiant gray. I see her thin wrists with veins marked on brown, crusty skin. She moves back and forth from the front to the rear, and I listen.

I hear her preach the Word while the world rushes by.

She holds on to the rails with both hands as the bus maneuvers and snakes through the road. I catch bits and pieces of forgotten promises, powerfully spoken in Tagalog, though barely audible in city's noise. The children stand on their seats to stare at the woman; the parents ask them to sit down. The sweating conductor shouts out the next destination. In the corner are two passengers laughing to each other. Then there comes the moment without any warning, and finally I see her. I see her at the edge of the time and the world, radiant and beautiful. I see her with a garland of golden flowers on head, a humble covering for her smooth and majestic hair. I see her dress sparkling in the sunlight, whiter than the purest white. I see her face with the smile of an innocent child, basking in the Presence. And I imagine that day when we will rush to her and cry, “You are beautiful, dear sister, so beautiful!” And we will dance amidst green fields around the One we love, and we will rush through the streams and skip among the stars. And she will tell me as I hold her hand, “It was a hard life, but now I am glad.” And I will only tell her that I met her on a Sunday, on a bus, so long ago.

We are on our way home. Above us is a rosy sky and a crystal carved moon. The heavenly canvas has been dabbed with lilac, with rising puffs of pink clouds in huge heaps. In the distance there is a lone star penetrating the deeper blue. We are walking now on the cracked sidewalk, and start hearing the faint chirp of evening crickets. On our right is a tall tree of frail bark and branches. There is the soft smell and the memory of rain. There is a blushing hope. I feel that I remember this but it is also quite new. I feel that you have been with me for very long.

The owner tried moving the puppies. They were born in a very inconvenient location, right in the middle of some large plastic bags that contained old clothes. So he wore a smaller plastic bag on his hand and took one, the spotted, dirty looking one. The mother was frantic. It started leaping, was agitated, though thankfully never thought of biting its master. It also started whining, and well, you could almost imagine her black, beady eyes turning moist as she cried in her distress. He laid the puppy on a spot at the back of the house, but the mother wouldn't have it. Too exposed maybe. She cuddled the puppy in her mouth, ran inside the house, and laid it in the secluded place once more. She guarded it like any mother would, on the lookout, alert. She licked it clean as it suckled on her breast. If any other person tried taking a pup, she'd probably tear him to shreds.

I think there is something terribly wrong when mothers start aborting their children. When they talk about negative rights and feminine empowerment, but what they really mean is that it interferes with sex, and a dog can do better.

Well here's a man with a truly revolutionary thought, and therefore someone who will remain obscure and forgotten. He provides a breathtaking view of language side by side with the history of Western consciousness. He traces out the dead-ends of linguistics, and the stubborn assertions of the evolutionists. For the history of words, on its own terms, reveals something very different. It points to a time when language had a very pregnant beginning. That as modern words become sharper and individualized through time, it harks back to a time when they coalesced. Like when pneuma meant wind, breath and spirit all in one. A time long ago when instead of dumb homo sapiens uttering random grunts there was a language bordering the spiritual, simply because it could hold so many things at once. When instead of the detached disillusionment of today, with objects and referents, and words specialized to a needle point, object and referent did not even exist, did not divide, and word was self and nature. Meaning is not created, it has always been there. And this same intuition is available to every man or woman before he puts his thought into words; there is a private language that goes deeper than the syllabic and the conscious. I recommend his deceptively entitled Poetic Diction: A Study in Meaning to anyone who has time to burn.

He has another book called Unancesteral Voice which goes farther than that, and which I'm not even in a position to recommend because I can't even grasp half of it. And I say that in a very humbled and refreshing way. It's like when you read something so far out it must be right. Just like when the priest takes it for granted that the Eternal Truth has entered into time, or when the literary-############ writer insists on finding the universal in the sensual, or when the scientists talk about mathematical particles that occupy zero space. It's fun thinking about these profound mysteries that dance right under our noses, and how the people in the know may actually have no clue of their real significance.

You can go ahead and tell me how life has been cruel. In fact you don't even need to say anything at all. I can feel every ounce of it. I can see it in the way you smile, how you stretch those wrinkles of sadness. I can hear it in the silence that hangs drearily in the air while I think of something to talk about. We talk a little about bikes and how frail they are on the road. I feel more relieved. I remember a vague and precious memory, when we visited your small apartment so long ago. I had a crush on my pretty cousin back then, she was about seven, and I was about nine. I remember her medals displayed on a corner shelf, and I remember how we played games until evening when were all tired. I even remember the taste of the nilaga we ate for dinner. Oh, but most of all I think I can still remember you, with your healthy smile, with your optimistic eyes, and the way you laughed. You smiled like my mom then. And I knew for certain you were my favorite uncle.

I never knew what happened until it had long passed. No one told me, I guess it wasn't something my parents would have ever liked to tell me about. Your wife was working in Japan and got into a relationship with some guy, then after that she somehow managed to convince you to send my cousin away for a better life. And then you never hear from them again. It was all downhill from there.

And now it's all about your gaunt frame, some drug issues, and a smile that feels like a pale reflection. Now it's about living alone, without a job, borrowing what you can from my mom. It's about being a broken man, with nothing at all to look forward to, and without even a pretty daughter to be proud of. And suddenly I am scared of growing old, because I know that happiness can be swept away right after the peak and then everything in the past won't matter. I am scared because I know that no matter how great the ride it can all still finish badly. I know that we hardly ever hear about those who have been cast down and never get back on their feet. But that there are countless people like you, so close to me and yet so gone.

The candles will wane. Will you not make Him carry you the rest of the way?

When you stop talking in first person singular what do you achieve? Nothing. Because whatever you do you can never get rid of that invasive "I", just bulging like a tumor in every word. When you stop talking about yourself and say, well, why don't we dive a little into the phenomenon instead of the man, you really go, let me first peel of my skin, and then we can exhibit something more vulgar. When you try, straining your eyes, to find the inscape in things, the me-with-it, the me-with-everything, you find that you are trapped... I suppose you expect me to say "in the body?" Well no, not really. In that case in this invisibly-metaphysically-intellectually-snobbish "I"? Well, duh, how invisibly-metaphysically-intellectually-snobbish. I'd much rather say "nowhere". Trapped in nowhere, in Sartre's nauseam, in the impulse to vomit your innards. You say no, I'm nowhere, but then really I'm all that matters, and in every single letter you can smell my scent, like how my body smells when I've sweat, and am still sweating, after a week without washing. But, pah! Then go ahead and construct your language without your I's scattered like a messy boy's room. Go ahead and ellipsify, but with a fuller body, with majestic presence! That's it. In fact, why don't you don't speak at all. Why don't you.. --dig this-- why don't you just knock on doors, real doors, and just stand there, open your mouth, form an "O" with your lips, say            and then leave. A-ha! So stupeed it's almost poetic! You can even imagine a fly buzzing over! Yes, your "I" bashful and yet also the strip-dancer, winding it's way into every letter, either marry her or kill her. Or... marry her and then kill her.

We will now be introduced to the hero of this novel. We will now be intrigued by the various physical features that capture his personality, and at the same time give us a sense of depth and multi-layered possibilities. We will be attuned to that sense of mystery behind the man. He will, most likely, have found a comfortable balance between excessive archetype and the sitcom-ish "ordinary guy". He will have been designed to arouse our interests, to help us identify, relate, connect. Every effort has been made to distance him from the typical cliche. He invites us into the privacy of his complex neural mind, into his literary sophistication. Therefore all through the novel we can expect to be a ghost floundering over his shoulder, as he drags us all around town slaying dragons, breaking hearts, and indulging in various philosophical reveries. We will see him from various angles, in different positions, much like a bikini photoshoot. It was the author's hope that through this character he will be able to capture life in its most essential form, to touch the lives of others, not to mention win the approval of not a few high-brow critics who've written their elite poetry anthologies. It is through this character that we will be able to live a different life, oh even for just a moment, as novels are often endorsed. That is why we are never introduced to the hero, or to the novel, ever at all.

I think this guy's really a genius! He's being hailed as the new American indie god, and I can't say it's undeserved. I started of listening to his latest masterpiece Illinoise, but I didn't get into the music and the motive until I listened to his more spiritual album, Seven Swans. It's really nothing I've ever heard before. Besides a ton of unconventional instruments, in-depth and imaginative lyrics, there are some rare emotions captured in the vocals that just send shivers down my spine. Since then I've listened to the first album that brought him general acclaim, Greeting from Michigan, something with a more personal feel to it. It's comforting to know that before becoming famous it took him two full-length and relatively unsuccessful albums before he really found his sound, meaning he's still human. I haven't listened to his pre-Michigan albums, but I hope to eventually. I'm a really amateur music reviewer so I won't even try to describe all the amazing technical accomplishments in his music, they're just too many to mention, and all I can say is that those textures make my mouth water (it's my frustration that I can't really convince people how good my favorite bands are). Now I like all the albums mentioned, but my present favorite is the one I'm currently listening to, his Songs for Christmas, which is what compelled me to write this entry in the first place. On a terribly hot and clammy afternoon it's a really refreshing experience. The irregularly timed "Christmas in July" is just perfect for the season. And his rendition of "Holy, Holy, Holy" is one of the most reverent, awe-inspiring pieces I've ever heard in my life...

 

There are three birds trapped and flying from floor to floor. It’s a high and open space from the ground floor to an octagonal ceiling. They flutter here and there, looking for a way out. We catch our birds in panicked conversation.
“Well, I’ll be! We’re trapped!” says the first, whom for the sake of convenience we shall name ‘Brownie.’ In truth it’s an inconvenient fact that all mayas look alike.
“Oh, this is so exciting! Looks like some kind of hi-tech bird cage, eh?” replies another bird named ‘Rusty’. “I always wondered what this huge rock looked like from the inside. I always imagined it as a gigantic ant hill, or a termite’s nest, with them people-animals lining in and out!”
“Any thing that feels like a bird cage is no place for us! Really, I’ve been here just a few minutes and this place is so disorienting! I can’t believe we can’t even remember how we got here!” a frantic ‘Amber’ chirps in distress.
Meanwhile a security guard laughs and speaks through his portable radio, he’s reporting something about birds flying about the central area. Someone through the radio tells him to take care of it himself.
“Hey, check this out on the top floor! Have you ever seen so many playful lights before? This is so cool, eh? If I knew any better this would be their amusement area.” Rusty has always been abnormally fond of people-animals, always trying to convince the others that they’re not so bad, oh no, even if they’ve replaced all the trees with skyscrapers and garbage piles. Deep down inside they’ve still got some good inside them. He considers himself a self-taught expert, a homosapiologist, and he considers this an unexpected treat. The ‘amusement area’ he’s just pointing out is nothing less than that grand exhibit of human technology called the ‘arcade.’
“What’s so cool about that? I can even hardly hear you through all this noise! And look at those young people-animals, they look so thin, so dazed, and it’s almost as if something’s sucked all the intelligence out of their eyes! Why, I’ve seen worms with more life and sparkle than that!” Amber meanwhile still has psychological scars from a traumatic experience when she was kept in a cage, dyed yellow, and sold to public school students. She was never sold.
“Oh don’t compare! Has no one ever told you that this is what the people-animals are all about? I mean, look there just behind you! That my dear is what these creatures call (right here he just couldn't resist a display of knowledge) a cinema. They come in through those doors, a couple of hours later they come out, and then you can see them filled with emotion, romance, excitement and zest! It’s almost their equivalent of our flights toward the sunset, or battling the strong winds of a storm, except it’s all done in the comfort of their seats. Now isn’t that just fantastic?”
“Not really. If you ask me it sounds more like cheating. And I prefer the open air anytime! Sitting only ruffles your tail-feathers.” replies Brownie. “How about those rectangular things on display? What are those?”
“Oh, those? As if you haven't seen something like them before. They’re called books.”
“I know what they are” says Amber. “We had a nest right on the roof of what they called a library once. People just look at them for hours on end, and then after that they feel a whole lot better about themselves. I just couldn’t see the point, except when I found a worm hiding in a book…”
“--Oh, but what don't know is that they collect only the very best books in here! They’re called, ahem, bestsellers. See those books with the glitzy sparkling covers? Yeah, this is the way it works: the very best books are only those books which are interesting enough to make a movie from. The second best are those which are just about as good as watching a movie. And the last are those which make you want to watch a movie right after.”
“Why don’t they just make the movie first and then the book then?”
“Well, they also do that.”
“Oh… I think I prefer the books with worms. Shouldn’t we be looking for a way out?”
“Hey guys, look down here!” Brownie shouts to the two. "They’ve got all these faces pasted on the walls, and even people-animals doing weird poses with hardly any feathers on!” Brownie settles right above the ground floor, which is that representation of a multi-billion dollar industry called the health, body, and beauty section.
“Advertising! Hey remember Amber when you used to admire Siena’s feathers, and always wanted to be as graceful as her when she spread her wings? Well, what if I told you that you’d only need to drink a drop of my rainwater and you’d have everything she’s got! Then you can choose any big bird you like, build a large nest, and live happily ev--”
“--I wouldn’t believe you one single bit, Rusty. I’m quite good as I am thank you. Just a little pruning of the feathers here and there and I’m fine. It's not like God didn't know what he was doing.”
“Ah, but you’re not a people-animal. See those guys there, staring at those glossy books they call magazines, well, they’re learning to go after beauty without the feathers. And those girls there, glancing at the same magazines, well you see how they’ve hardly got any feathers on themselves! That’s what makes their worlds turn, and not to mention it’s good business.”
“Ugh, that’s so wrong. I’d rather be a duck than strip my feathers in public! We should really, really, get out of this place now.”
“But I think I kind of like imagining you without your feathers.” Brownie gives Amber a birdie wink.
“That’s settles it, I’m flying up!”
“Hahaha, hey just kidding Amber. How will the people-animals ever learn to fly if they keep shedding their feathers. Oh, waitaminute! I think I remember something now… I think we came through a tiny hole right about here…”
And with that we watch them disappear through an imperceptible crack in the ceiling. We also decide that it’s time we left the mall ourselves. We wriggle through the thick crowds, through the chaotic milling, past the blaring lights and sounds. Finally we step through the glass doors and feel the hot air of the highway, the noise of the mall replaced with the noise of even more people, and buses and cars and loudspeakers. We look around, and seeing nothing beautiful we look up, and glue our eyes to a surreal sky just healing after a rain.
“Ah, this is so much better. Now we can breathe. I always say birds weren’t meant underground.” Brownie is the first to squeeze through the crack.
“The sky is so beautiful every time after it rains.” happily chirps Amber.
“Hey wait, did we really need to go so early? I mean there were so many things I could learn! I mean just wait til I tell the others, I’m even thinking of writing a book about people-animals, I was thinking of calling it ‘Bird Brains’, what do you thi--Oh my, that’s just a wonderful sunset..”
“Yes it is. We birds have such short lives. This is the thing to enjoy.” nods Brownie.
“I completely agree", coos Amber. Last one to the sun is a rotten egg!” And with that we watch the three birds fly fast toward the swirling clouds, through the gentle rain, and kiss the blushing sun.

Well I guess all these writing tips mean that the noun is the body, the flesh, and the skin. The closer and closer you draw your lips the more you can probe and sink in. It is what is palpable to the touch, with your gentle fingers cupping and pressing. It is nothing less than the sculpted body embraced. And the verb is the heat, the shudder, the motion. It is the restless energy rising to explode. It is the masculine and feminine locked and writhing together in passion. It is what gives and receives, what pushes and retrieves. This is the writer's blessed union.

There's nothing more I can say, past the worn out invitation, past the gospel you've heard a thousand times over. Because I cannot give you my eyes, and I cannot give you my faith. When I take it out it is like a fragile chalice, and I say, oh, oh, be careful with it please, don't break it. It is everything that is me, everything that I will care to hold. And though I let it rest on your fingers for just a moment I strain to take it back, to hide it, to keep it safe. It is more private than the heart, it is my sacred lover's kiss. It is not yours.

I would rather say look there, to the sky, to the light. It is everything that you do not see when they speak about Christ. It is the blinding piercing shriek of a new birth. It is words shattering too high for words. What did you expect? To find the meaning in your pretty little self? The lie in the mirror over and over. Would it not rather be something more like the eerie gasp and the "--Ahhh!" The burn and the tears all falling. It is the rocking back and forth that cries: "If I had only known... If I had only known..."

What do we have to do with each other's delicate faith? What do I have to do with you? The gospel is a fly circling above your head. I say, "I love you enough to beg you please." But I also say that I cannot tell you what your life means.

This band has got to be my best musical discovery since my ol' messed up days with Tool. Heavily lyrics-driven, swimming through suicidal frustration and salvation, lost in the collide of a painful old life with the exquisitely painfuller new. Indie art rock at its best. Will try my hand at a decent review when I digest all their albums. In the meantime, some song excerpts/special moments from their album Catch for Us the Foxes:

Rejoice, salvation of my soul!
But I still have a thousand half-loves
(Oh my God! I want to shoot myself just thinking about it)
And you think I don't mean what I say?
I mean every word I say.
I threw a stone at the reflection of my image in the water,
and it altogether disappeared.
I burst, it shattered me like a bullet through a bottle,
and I'm expected to believe that any of this is real.
-- Seven Sisters

Oh Christ when You're ready to come back I think I'm ready for You to come back
but if You want to stay wherever exactly it is You are,
that's okay too - it's really none of my business.
If I didn't have You as my guide I'd still be wandering lost in Sinai
or down by the tracks watching trains go by to remind me:
There are places that aren't here.
I had a well but all the water left so I'll ask Your forgiveness with every breath,
if there was no way into God,
I would never have laid in this grave of a body
So long, dear.
-- Carousels

She's like a hot cloth on a fevered head
And like a needle she leads me
(Well, I follow like thread)
But you untied me - didn't you untie me, Lord?
And now I haven't even thought about
Killing myself in almost five months.
-- Tie Me Up! Untie Me!

It's 5:30am and I haven't slept a wink, thanks to this crazy rooster crowing since around 4am. He doesn't even know how to crow properly, with his hoarse almost prepubescent kind of crow, really annoying. Anyway I just got fed up and discovered he perched on a tree right beside our house. Oh, man, I got a small pail of water and what satisfaction! I threw it at him and those pok-pok-pokaws were just sweet music to my ears. He came down the three and started running around the vacant lot until he shut up. So, after having quieted the racket I sat down to type this entry as a reminder of victory. But no, the rooster started crowing again, this time perched higher on the tree! I tried launching another water attack but he was beyond reach. So I decided to teach him the hard way. Meet my friend, rock, I said. Let me introduce it to that little sweet beak. They met, and oh what a friendship! Obviously I have such a demented sense of humor at the moment and I can't think right, but.. oh no. It's been just five minutes and he's at it again! Nooooo!

Well, here concludes my entry about that crazy rooster. In a burst of sense I realize it's exactly those who crow too early and just can't stop who get martyred with cheers and applause.

Would it not do, at least, to try and embrace me in this calm? I shiver so. Yes, my dear, outside is dripping like a rain-soaked goodbye. The scar whisked past me and missed. Past where? Into here: a sentence drenched with fake tears. You blew on me in my sleep with those wispy lips, and when the breath of God touched the face of the waters I parted. Now you walk on my dreams like an Arabic princess, with veiled eyes partly glowing in moonlight. A spirit swerves through the dunes and intones: this is the ever-present we roam. The rain creeps into the sand and leaves every trace of a hurt hardly remembered.

God resurrects my past and lets it breathe anew. Oh how He loves surprises! And oh how I've prayed so dearly for this! He shows me you and winks: "Now watch this, now she'll really dance!" And I thought I caught sight of the motion. He dips you low before He lifts you up, and He spins you around before He draws you close. And real passion is found in holding His hand tight and even tighter and never letting go. Don't you dare let go.

You see my words can't even express this sense of relief. Maybe it's something like this: now I can finally leap, and run, through endless fields and a warm golden sun. And I can hold my hands deep into my chest, and then raise them up with palms wide open. Now I can look up to the sky and whisper, "Thank you, thank you.." but with a smile that remains better speechless, and with tears glistening down my cheek. This is what my gratitude is.

Because you are my past and I am in yours, and how I almost feel forgiven a second time. And how wonderful it is to lean on His knees and cry, Oh God, how You make things right, how You make things right.

So I say again and will keep on saying, don't you ever dare let go. No, not when He lifts you up to the most frightening heights (kiss a star), or when He swings you back down to the floor (kiss His feet). Not when He spins your entire world around and you almost trip. It's right then when He pulls you back close to His breast to weep. Come on, who can dance with Him and hope to keep balance? Who can move with Him and not grow wings? You and I both know He is all the grace we will ever need.

 "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."
 (2 Corinthians 12:9)

The past few days we've been trying to look for a dead rat in our bedroom. The stink was too much, and besides anything dead where you sleep is sorely unhealthy. So we tried lifting the bed but there was nothing there. We looked amongst the clothes, searched the corners, but still nothing. I sniffed here and there, putting the sensitivity of my nose to the test, but to no avail. But I kept on wondering why it's exactly when I enter the room, right when a whiff of air greeted me that the smell was most overpowering, and why it's when the electric fans were off that I couldn't trace the smell.

Well, I just found out. Before rereading Kafka's In the Penal Colony (this is somehow relevant here), I rose to drink a glass of water and my face moved in front of the electric fan and boy the stench was just sickening. Right there, in the fan cage was a little decaying corpse just slightly bigger than my thumb. As it turns out particles of rotten rat flesh were being blown by the electric fan, sailing through the air in our sleep, scattering on our clothes, on our bedsheets, into our nostrils. (I had the suspicion I was starting to smell a little too "ratty"). The stench was so strong simply because the tiny rat managed to die, almost devilishly, in the best strategic position of all. It was the last place we'd choose to look.

As I was cleaning it up I noticed the corpse already had the consistency of melted chocolate. Or some kind of fruit where a little pressure makes all the juice run out. In addition, I think the fan blades had served much to beat the body soft and tender. Bon appetit!

I recall watching a documentary a few days back on the "Temple of the Kama Sutra". More precisely it was about the temples of Khajuraho in India. The main temple is built on a large stone platform with tiny carvings all around it depicting the earthly world. The temple erected on top of it was meant to be a representation of the divine world. In the middle of the structure, where the human passage comes closest to the chamber of the gods, you find the walls strewn with the most explicit erotic sculptures in all of India. It was supposed to encourage the general population to engage in sexual prostitution while worshiping their deities.

But it's nothing new. I was surprised to learn that it wasn't as old as I had expected. Only 10th Century A.D. I had expected it to be much more ancient, I guess since I was under the impression that everything Indian was ancient. As it turns out the Temple of Aphrodite in Corinth, which employed thousand of sacred prostitutes even during the time of Paul, is much older at 6th Century B.C. And of course this whole affair of "sexing the divine" goes even farther to the Patriarchs; it was approximately 1500 B.C. when Judah looked for the shrine prostitute who was actually his daughter-in-law in disguise. I'm no historian, but I guess it's been going on for a long time. And even in modern times it still holds an appeal, though somewhat commercialized, as can be seen in the Da Vince Code and the various Tantric manuals on the market.

But my point is this. Through the middle of the documentary I was rubbing my chin and wondering why there is so much emphasis on sex in pagan religions and why it wasn't so in Christianity. I was treading on a rather delicate topic I know, but it's not even provocative anymore. And then it dawned on me. And then it hit me with the force of a hammer dropping from the sky! I slapped my forehead and said, "What was I thinking! How could I not have seen it!"

Christianity is the most sexual religion of all. But in a way so committed and so pure that you'll hardly notice it if you've associated the sexual with the promiscuous. All throughout the Old Testament God is the husband of one wife, Israel. That is why prostitution and idolatry are always synonymous. That is exactly why in the book of Hosea God had the crazy idea of asking a prophet to marry a whore, just to provide the metaphor for the true spiritual state of things. In the New Testament the Church is the Bride of Christ. That's why all throughout you have these references to the return of the Bridegroom, or the marriage feast, the wedding banquet. It's always that, from parable to parable.

But it has taken me so many mentors to appreciate this fact: that in the sexual relationship what shines most brilliantly is the Husbandship and the Wifeship, and not the sexual act. And when it is a matter of the role, the promise, what is put to the fore is the person who strains to keep the promise with all his might. In other words it is the self, the soul, that takes the spotlight. That is why fidelity brings existence to life. This is what fidelity does to a person: it makes him or her singular, absolutely irreplaceable, absolutely unique. The wife is the one you love, even when she becomes old, unattractive, unfaithful. Her personhood lets her become more real, inside and out. It makes her the soul that God intended her to be. Sexuality is consummated even before any physical expression begins.

Compare this now to the shrine prostitute, and her veiled face, and to being only an incidental choice among many thousands. In the pagan religions the self is annihilated, is almost erased, and all that is left is the empty shell of a body being used. If Lucifer is the angel of light then there is no better device than to feign divine communion at the cost of a precious soul, rendering it nameless. The same tactic is also employed in philosophical abstraction with its "Idea of the Beautiful". You change your lovers like you change your clothes. You look for the next more beautiful thing that comes your way. And not to mention its counterparts in modern media, and the manufacture of artificial 'true love' in novels and movies and TV series. The "who" matters less than the romantic experience, or if not that, definitely matters much less than the sex.

But back to the sacred. It was the first bride of Solomon who implored him: "Put me like a seal over your heart, like a seal on your arm. For love is as strong as death, jealousy as severe as Sheol; Its flashes are flashes of fire, the very flame of the LORD." (Song of Solomon 8:6) This is what characterizes the sexual relationship in Christianity. This is why God is often depicted as the jealous God. Because there is only one God, ergo there should only be one wife. It is a closed union, and it brings out everything there is in the beloved. So much more than the physical, but also everything that the sense of being alive has to offer. It is precisely when Solomon completed his menagerie of 700 wives and 300 concubines that we see him fall flat on his face and end his reign miserably. You can also imagine what it did to his first bride.

The reason why Christianity can never give up marriage, can never sanction divorce, can never tolerate adultery or promiscuity, is not a legalism but spiritualism. For it believes that everything in this life is a shadow, a metaphor of the real. The sexual act is temporary, fleeting, in fact almost incidental. It is the loyalty of two living souls that is eternal.

My dreams are these. Elevators and escalators that rise and descend into secret passages, deteriorating restrooms, haunted corners. Sometimes I am chased, sometimes I meander. I dream of winding staircases, forgotten fire exits, that snake up, up or down and down. There are creatures that lurk at the turns, sometimes the doors are alive to a ghastly breathing. I feel trapped in this building or this mall. It is always a constricted and concrete maze. There is always a sense of urgency, but for what, I cannot tell. Perhaps it is the struggle to get out, before the living are overrun by the dead.

Sometimes I hop on trains that do not even wait for passengers. I cling on to the roof, or find myself walking on the tracks. Sometimes I wander through private subdivisions, sneaking my way through houses, leaping over fences, riding on bikes or trikes or a jeep to a blurry destination. Many times I am in the middle of the highway at night, running, and then driving, then commuting, then running on foot again. I feel there is a sprawling and endless city in my dreams, and I can never stay put. It is always a moving, back and forth to places so familiar and yet so strange. Every landmark is real but completely changed.

My companions never keep their faces. One moment the man beside me is an old friend, and then I turn around and then he becomes a vague she, then the scenery fades and he becomes an amalgam of two persons I know I knew. Sometimes I dream of people long forgot, and sometimes I meet people who make me forget. And even I, even I change in my dreams, like a fancy fluid. I am the hero one minute and then so cowardly the next. I am a boy running through an old neighborhood, and then I am the star.

My dreams are these. The mixing, mixing of the past and all my fears. It is a freedom that is constructed on suffocating walls. It is the escape that only keeps on escaping, but always in circles. If I could collect all my dreams in a story I would tell you what the world is. The haunted city, the haunted mansion, the never ending staircase, the tunnel, the mall. When I wake up sometimes I think I hardly ever leave.

I just finished preliminary listens of Hammock's albums Kenotic and Stranded Under Endless Sky. I feel like my initial instincts regarding ambient music have been confirmed. There is something about ethereal, aural soundscapes that manages to transport you into a different world. It's all about dimensions, about creating walls of sound, of building layers of thickness and density. It is a gentle stroll along a surreal, almost glacial, scenery. It took me a while to find musicians I can trust with this, musicians able to weave a safe and serene atmosphere. Unfortunately most of this stuff is New Age, and most of the New Age ironically lacks spirit, just random, even dangerous, patterns of primordial feeling. Also, I wasn't very impressed with such ambient classics like Brian Eno's Music for Airports and Biosphere's Substrata. The last one sure builds a world alright, but a world where danger lurks, and where the chilly air threatens your frail body. In this genre it's not just the skill or the detail of description, but the security of your space that counts. The musician must be there to hold your hand.

I think the real promise of ambient music is spatial experience, a journey through the unseen. See the mountains rise with your hopes, or the waves roll with childhood memories. Hear the wind blow like a solemn prayer, and every lilting note fall like a raindrop. There are already a thousand such worlds created, like the thousands of worlds built by imaginative fiction. But the question is, is there any other world I am willing to enter? Or will I be fully content under a gentle, endless sky.