Dear World,
I lost a little bit of myself in the last two weeks. After being bed-ridden because of a muscle tear from heavy weight lifting, I finally made it back to work and stepped foot back into the gym. As I made myself to the employee's lounge in the back, I stood in front of the free-weights area momentarily stunned for what seemed like a timeless paralysis of movement, thought and comprehension. The battlefield in which I had come to love so dearly struck quite an intimidating shock to me as I stood speechless with caution staring at all that iron, the weight benches, dumbbells and weight plates. I felt so futile, weak, and fragile. Somehow, the pounds and pounds of metal that I thought built my confident character over the course of years of training deserted me and at that very moment I felt completely naked.
I whispered to myself,
"Get a grip Khanh, you're going to be okay. Everything is going to be okay."
But who was I fooling? Something happened to me during these past two weeks and it wasn't the torn middle and upper trapezius that had a story to tell. It was my world, somehow broken and shattered and here I was left behind puzzled in a leery limbo of time attempting to put these broken pieces back into place with one another with its ridges and sharp edges. It is going to be painful but like everything that hurts, this is going to make me stronger. This is going to complete me.
Probably one of the biggest reasons why I stopped pursing racing cars was because I met Maurice. I saw him deteriorating and all he had to live on was his memories of the past; his lifeline was his memories of when he was that world, soccer, star player for Egypt back in the 1930s. Not an hour went by when I was volunteering with him where he did not boast about the days when he would have given David Beckham a run for his money. But guess what? It all apparently didn't matter after all. He was self-insufficient, unhealthy and desperate to die with no one to talk to other than the ashes of his recently deceased border collie, Napolean III, his third one all physically identical to one another. One and a half years of spending time with Maurice taught me to make sure I would die early but more importantly, it taught me to never put myself in a state where my happiness solely resided on the accomplishments of my past. One of the things I learned from Maurice's curse of old age was to live in the happiness of the moment; live in the happiness of your present accomplishments. So that was exactly what I did.
I honestly do not know of anyone else as talented in as many things as me and up until my recent injury, that made me happy; that made me confident and because of that confidence, I continued to succeed. In any case, "I came. I saw. I conquered." Life was bliss and unlike Maurice I wasn''t living in the past. My confidence was a result of the present; the accomplishments I made day by day.
However, when I recently became injured, as I painfully dragged myself out of bed time after time, I kept looking at myself in the mirror, slowly watching my muscles deteriorate, shrink and vanish into thin air. All those years of hard work started to feel as though they were in vain and after about day three of being a crippled, of being pathetically insufficient to my own standards of confidence and success, I broke down. My confidence was tested and it dwindled into nothingness with unbelievable haste like a flame suffocated by quenching pinch. At one point, I saw my own reflection in the mirror as an old degenerative man very much like the one that surrounded me from every mirror of every angle in the weight room when I finally made it back to work. And that was when it all made sense to me. The confidence I built based upon my physical strength and accomplishments in my endeavors was as superficial as the meat-heads sneaking a peak at their flexed abdominals as they lifted their wife-beaters in the back corner of the gym to look at themselves in the mirror. My confidence was previously built on something that would not be around forever. What I realized that very day was that I am only human after all.
The two, confidence and success, goes hand-in-hand, for better and for worse, like a pimp and his prostitutes. They both exist and survive on the exploitation of one another. Similarly, to succeed one needs to be confident but without confidence one would find it difficult to succeed. This is the reason why it is extremely difficult to sever the relationship between the two. However, it needs to be done because only true (and a safer) confidence will occur. If you do not sever the two, what will happen when your superficial confidence ends? What happens when an athlete is no longer able to compete? What happens when a professional defined by the accomplishments and the success of their careers loses their jobs? The success, which mistakenly and unhealthily have come to define the confidence of the individual can no longer be sustained. What I am trying to say is as competitors within this world, we must find a way to be confident and gain confidence without relying on the merits of success to build it. If we do not do that, what will happen to our confidence when we are no longer able to succeed?
Like me, your confidence will shatter because for example, my inability to maintain or gain physical strength began to negatively affect my confidence as a strong person.
A friend of mine suggested that instead of relying on accomplishments and success to be the fuel for our confidence, we should simply be confident in the fact that we have attempted; that even before we know how well (or bad) we will do in whatever it is we are pursuing, be confident for trying and be content in our confidence regardless how often we succeed if any at all. In taking my friend's advice, this idea of confidence is still new to me as I have always used the merits of my success to correlate to how confident I am. Although I have no doubt in my mind that I will continue succeeding, I need to start all over and build my confidence from scratch again. I need to build my confidence without relying on success because when I am 38, I am no longer going to be able to dunk a basketball. When I am 50 (if I even live for that long) I will not be able to be as strong. Or when I am 70, I will not be able to race cars as well because in the end, I am, we are, human after all and no good thing lasts forever.
So before you go to bed tonight, I would like you to stand in front of the mirror and take a long look at yourself. Try to realize what it is that makes you confident? Is it your looks? What car you drive? How well you can play sports? If you can do something exceptionally well more than others? The money you have? Your past? Your present? Your future? Etc.. If your confidence does not come from within; does not come from simply knowing that you can instead of wanting or needing to know, then you suffer from superficial confidence. I urge you to as soon as possible purge yourself from it and seek out a source of confidence that will continue to last well beyond your years through the biological decay of the human body and its depreciative worth through time.
So for those of you reading; for those of you that are listening; for those of you who really care; this is me, Andrew Vo, an ordinary person with an extra-ordinary gift of caring for humanity making an out-of-the-ordinary effort to change the world for the better.
-A12
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Saturday, June 12, 2010
A Difficult Battle
Saturday, 5/22/10
Dear World,
Today I hung on rim, with both hands, still standing at 5'7 1/2''. It has been nearly two weeks since I have touched a basketball and everytime I get back on the court, I simply amaze myself of how fast I am improving. I know it is only a matter of time before I am well above the rim dunking. My squat and deadlift is not even twice my body weight yet and I haven't even incorporated power or plyometric movements into my workout program. However, it appears as though the sky still remains as the limit for me whether it was reiterated like it was today playing ball or - as in the past - everything I have dedicated myself to: automotive racing, karting, hip hop dancing, poetry, writing, and strength training.
Unfortunately however, the one challenge I disappointingly and painfully have to admit that I have not quite been able to excel at is explaining to people the need to give back to the community; volunteerism. The mass majority of people I talk to simply do not understand the dire need of helping others; that the world desperately need each and everyone one of them in even the smallest of ways. Those values - at the most fundamental level - of being human seem to continue to be washed away by the norms we so comfortably and mundanely live by and motions which we follow within this society without question, without cynical criticism. We wake, work, wear out, and finally quietly wither away. It's heartbreaking.
It makes me think whether we were born to live or to just survive in the first place?
-A12
Dear World,
Today I hung on rim, with both hands, still standing at 5'7 1/2''. It has been nearly two weeks since I have touched a basketball and everytime I get back on the court, I simply amaze myself of how fast I am improving. I know it is only a matter of time before I am well above the rim dunking. My squat and deadlift is not even twice my body weight yet and I haven't even incorporated power or plyometric movements into my workout program. However, it appears as though the sky still remains as the limit for me whether it was reiterated like it was today playing ball or - as in the past - everything I have dedicated myself to: automotive racing, karting, hip hop dancing, poetry, writing, and strength training.
Unfortunately however, the one challenge I disappointingly and painfully have to admit that I have not quite been able to excel at is explaining to people the need to give back to the community; volunteerism. The mass majority of people I talk to simply do not understand the dire need of helping others; that the world desperately need each and everyone one of them in even the smallest of ways. Those values - at the most fundamental level - of being human seem to continue to be washed away by the norms we so comfortably and mundanely live by and motions which we follow within this society without question, without cynical criticism. We wake, work, wear out, and finally quietly wither away. It's heartbreaking.
It makes me think whether we were born to live or to just survive in the first place?
-A12
Monday, March 29, 2010
Monday Morning
Dear World,
Today I wrote a song about you.
And all that I felt..
As I sat staring out the Wall St. window...
Clutching a heart that never ceases to melt....
It was stormy on this Monday work morning.
At the beginning of spring in March of 2010..
And my world has just started flipping and turning...
In a whirlpool of trapped emotions I just can't seem to amend....
Hustling and bustling the streets became crowded with professional commotion.
Endless numbers of people, insignificantly hurdling to their destinations..
The taxi horns, the dress shoes, and clatter ringing a new day of work...
Sounded to me, like a melancholy melody that brushes happiness aside with no
hesitations....
Have you ever heard a tune that plays pitches only in octaves of survival?
I have and it sounds like a New York City street at 8am Monday morning.
-A12
Today I wrote a song about you.
And all that I felt..
As I sat staring out the Wall St. window...
Clutching a heart that never ceases to melt....
It was stormy on this Monday work morning.
At the beginning of spring in March of 2010..
And my world has just started flipping and turning...
In a whirlpool of trapped emotions I just can't seem to amend....
Hustling and bustling the streets became crowded with professional commotion.
Endless numbers of people, insignificantly hurdling to their destinations..
The taxi horns, the dress shoes, and clatter ringing a new day of work...
Sounded to me, like a melancholy melody that brushes happiness aside with no
hesitations....
Have you ever heard a tune that plays pitches only in octaves of survival?
I have and it sounds like a New York City street at 8am Monday morning.
-A12
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
What Am I Doing?
Tuesday, 3/23/10, 5:15pm
W Train in Soho heading southbound to Wall St. in New York City
Dear World,
Today on my hurrily way back to work, I stumbled upon a middle-aged Italian man. He had a grey blazer on with black worn out pants drooping over his brown leather shoes. Just another person I presumed. So I obliviously dashed my way pass him to get into the W subway train from Soho as if that second really made a difference in how early I was going to be to work. I was not even late; however, I had no idea why I was in such a tremendous rush. I guess New York City is subtly grabbing me into its tight, quenching grasp.
As I was just about to sit down, he said something, in broken English to me from the platform. I couldn't quite make it out but I focused my attention on him and his three-level wheeling plastic food cart. He needed help carrying it onto the train he somehow signaled. It must be heavy I thought. So I ran over - knowing how every second counts with how sporadic subway train doors open and close - to help him. I waved him to go into the train as I picked it up with both arms. We sat across from each other and he looked at me, with his bushy dark eyebrows and gratifying eyes, nodded, and said in the clearest English he possibly could, "Thank you."
I smiled. After about two stops, he looks at me and asks again in his broken English if I was getting off of the last stop, White Ferry. I told him no and that I was to get off at the one right before, Rector St. He then nods, gives me a thumbs up and said "thank you" once more. As the train was coming to my stop, I got up and felt his fixated eyes on me, following me and piercing through my brown sweater like a chef's steak knife slicing through an unripe tomato as I made my way to the sliding doors.
"Okay" I told myself.
It's only 5:20pm, I have time to bring this up to street and hop back on the train, if not, I guess that would be my cardiovascular sprint for the day.
So I walked over to him, asked him for his name and shook his hand. It was warm, soft; however, not too affirmative. It made me wonder the kind of life he has been through.
"I'll help you carry it upstairs," I said.
He gave me the thumbs up again and continued to thank me. It's just a cart, no biggie and it's only stairs after all. Well you know that saying that goes something like "you give someone an inch and they take a foot?" Well this man, did just that and more. After carrying it up five flights of stairs onto the street from the subway at White Ferry station at the southern tip of Manhattan, I told him I had to run. Nonetheless, he pointed towards the ferry station, insisting that he needed me to carry it to the ferry. I looked at him, checked my clock, 5:24pm and forced out a smile.
"Alright old man, I am here, I might as well," I told myself.
So here I am, most likely going to be late to meeting with one of my clients now, pushing and carrying a food cart to the ferry. Not a bad way to experience downtown Manhattan I thought, as a bum. I quickly ran it up the stairs to the top of the escalators leading to the checkpoint of the ferry, looked back, and the man was nowhere to be found. After about 2 minutes, I saw his bushy eyebrows and gratifying eyes moving up the escalator.
"This man is killing me!" I sighed out in disbelief.
After what seemed like a decade, he finally reached the top of the escalator.
"I have to go" I calmly exclaimed.
"Thank you my son," he said as he pulled my handshake towards him, kissed me on the forehead, gave me an akward fatherly hug and bidded me goodbye.
I felt momentarily stunned as he advised me to make haste. I rushed down the stairs, ran to the entrance doors, looked back and there he was still looking in my direction.
"Goodbye" I whispered.
I started running back as quickly to Wall St as I could as the rain started to come down. About midway back to work, I stopped, thought to myself,
"Why am I rushing again?"
"What am I doing?"
Sure training my client was important, but I just helped someone and it made my day, it made me feel alive again; it was a feeling I have recently been heavily distracted from. Even if I was a few minutes late, it would have been for a good cause and that to me was worth it. It was worth it to feel like I really existed as a human being within this world and not just another number branded on another cattle within our societal flock. It was worth it to me to be reminded that I have been wasting my time and I now need to get my act together, once and for all. The world needs help, I have the capacity and compassion to make a big change, so what am I doing? Why have I been wasting my time?
-A12
W Train in Soho heading southbound to Wall St. in New York City
Dear World,
Today on my hurrily way back to work, I stumbled upon a middle-aged Italian man. He had a grey blazer on with black worn out pants drooping over his brown leather shoes. Just another person I presumed. So I obliviously dashed my way pass him to get into the W subway train from Soho as if that second really made a difference in how early I was going to be to work. I was not even late; however, I had no idea why I was in such a tremendous rush. I guess New York City is subtly grabbing me into its tight, quenching grasp.
As I was just about to sit down, he said something, in broken English to me from the platform. I couldn't quite make it out but I focused my attention on him and his three-level wheeling plastic food cart. He needed help carrying it onto the train he somehow signaled. It must be heavy I thought. So I ran over - knowing how every second counts with how sporadic subway train doors open and close - to help him. I waved him to go into the train as I picked it up with both arms. We sat across from each other and he looked at me, with his bushy dark eyebrows and gratifying eyes, nodded, and said in the clearest English he possibly could, "Thank you."
I smiled. After about two stops, he looks at me and asks again in his broken English if I was getting off of the last stop, White Ferry. I told him no and that I was to get off at the one right before, Rector St. He then nods, gives me a thumbs up and said "thank you" once more. As the train was coming to my stop, I got up and felt his fixated eyes on me, following me and piercing through my brown sweater like a chef's steak knife slicing through an unripe tomato as I made my way to the sliding doors.
"Okay" I told myself.
It's only 5:20pm, I have time to bring this up to street and hop back on the train, if not, I guess that would be my cardiovascular sprint for the day.
So I walked over to him, asked him for his name and shook his hand. It was warm, soft; however, not too affirmative. It made me wonder the kind of life he has been through.
"I'll help you carry it upstairs," I said.
He gave me the thumbs up again and continued to thank me. It's just a cart, no biggie and it's only stairs after all. Well you know that saying that goes something like "you give someone an inch and they take a foot?" Well this man, did just that and more. After carrying it up five flights of stairs onto the street from the subway at White Ferry station at the southern tip of Manhattan, I told him I had to run. Nonetheless, he pointed towards the ferry station, insisting that he needed me to carry it to the ferry. I looked at him, checked my clock, 5:24pm and forced out a smile.
"Alright old man, I am here, I might as well," I told myself.
So here I am, most likely going to be late to meeting with one of my clients now, pushing and carrying a food cart to the ferry. Not a bad way to experience downtown Manhattan I thought, as a bum. I quickly ran it up the stairs to the top of the escalators leading to the checkpoint of the ferry, looked back, and the man was nowhere to be found. After about 2 minutes, I saw his bushy eyebrows and gratifying eyes moving up the escalator.
"This man is killing me!" I sighed out in disbelief.
After what seemed like a decade, he finally reached the top of the escalator.
"I have to go" I calmly exclaimed.
"Thank you my son," he said as he pulled my handshake towards him, kissed me on the forehead, gave me an akward fatherly hug and bidded me goodbye.
I felt momentarily stunned as he advised me to make haste. I rushed down the stairs, ran to the entrance doors, looked back and there he was still looking in my direction.
"Goodbye" I whispered.
I started running back as quickly to Wall St as I could as the rain started to come down. About midway back to work, I stopped, thought to myself,
"Why am I rushing again?"
"What am I doing?"
Sure training my client was important, but I just helped someone and it made my day, it made me feel alive again; it was a feeling I have recently been heavily distracted from. Even if I was a few minutes late, it would have been for a good cause and that to me was worth it. It was worth it to feel like I really existed as a human being within this world and not just another number branded on another cattle within our societal flock. It was worth it to me to be reminded that I have been wasting my time and I now need to get my act together, once and for all. The world needs help, I have the capacity and compassion to make a big change, so what am I doing? Why have I been wasting my time?
-A12
Monday, February 8, 2010
From Your Son
One Republic - Apologize
Never has there been a morning where I wake up without the realization and consideration of the sacrifices that you two have made; sacrifices that unfortunately I can never make to repay for the lives you have given up in return for a life I can truly live and mold for myself. And although you never once mentioned the suffering, loneliness, and pain you have felt from the alienation you have willingly chosen for yourselves, deep down I know. I understand. And it is this sole epiphany that I come to love you with an insatiable and exponentially-increasing intensity of love day after day.
For every moment I live happily, I also bear the burden of knowing you are not. I hear your whispers of sadness, I vividly see the black void you dwell in within this society and culture and I never cease to cry with you as the tears roll down your heroic souls. As lonely as you feel, I would like you to know I sometimes cast myself in a lonely state and punish myself in hope that I can alleviate the heat from the burning inferno that binds your circumstantial responsibilities, obligations, and unfair sacrifices to me.
Your forfeits are profound, heart-felt, and simultaneously heart-breaking. Your bodies often work themselves to exhaustion but your minds tirelessly automate and continue on with even more valor and energy. Your strength stretches endlessly and your willingness to abundantly provide cannot be measured by none other than the sensational sympathies of the heart; of my heart. You hurt, tire, and silently cry but you always persist on.
When a mother is on her death bed, every child should run to her side without any hesitation, without any other thought other than her beautiful face. And to not be able to is an indescribable hell not even the most cruel and disgustful person should ever feel. But for you to have witnessed firsthand, such an event, is an endless sorrow and reminiscing reminder I promise to keep with me, forever. I know you cried heavily and loudly that night and although we were distances apart, I raised a havoc of storms, monsoons, and downpours of my own tears because I understood then and I still understand even more so now.
Please be patient with me. I am trying my best everyday to become the man I was destined to be so that your sacrifices were not made in vain, your tears unheard, nor pain unremedied. Every time I procrastinate in any endeavor, I punish myself for the time I have lost and more so for how I cannot afford to lose any more. I want you both you see and realize that I set my goals boundless by realistic and practical notions because before I allow you to leave me, this world will know of my name and the reason why I succeeded beyond any measure or logical explanations.
That very reason is because of you.
I will give you your brightest smile for having long taken it away from you.
You will be proud of me.
-Vo Dang Khanh
Never has there been a morning where I wake up without the realization and consideration of the sacrifices that you two have made; sacrifices that unfortunately I can never make to repay for the lives you have given up in return for a life I can truly live and mold for myself. And although you never once mentioned the suffering, loneliness, and pain you have felt from the alienation you have willingly chosen for yourselves, deep down I know. I understand. And it is this sole epiphany that I come to love you with an insatiable and exponentially-increasing intensity of love day after day.
For every moment I live happily, I also bear the burden of knowing you are not. I hear your whispers of sadness, I vividly see the black void you dwell in within this society and culture and I never cease to cry with you as the tears roll down your heroic souls. As lonely as you feel, I would like you to know I sometimes cast myself in a lonely state and punish myself in hope that I can alleviate the heat from the burning inferno that binds your circumstantial responsibilities, obligations, and unfair sacrifices to me.
Your forfeits are profound, heart-felt, and simultaneously heart-breaking. Your bodies often work themselves to exhaustion but your minds tirelessly automate and continue on with even more valor and energy. Your strength stretches endlessly and your willingness to abundantly provide cannot be measured by none other than the sensational sympathies of the heart; of my heart. You hurt, tire, and silently cry but you always persist on.
When a mother is on her death bed, every child should run to her side without any hesitation, without any other thought other than her beautiful face. And to not be able to is an indescribable hell not even the most cruel and disgustful person should ever feel. But for you to have witnessed firsthand, such an event, is an endless sorrow and reminiscing reminder I promise to keep with me, forever. I know you cried heavily and loudly that night and although we were distances apart, I raised a havoc of storms, monsoons, and downpours of my own tears because I understood then and I still understand even more so now.
Please be patient with me. I am trying my best everyday to become the man I was destined to be so that your sacrifices were not made in vain, your tears unheard, nor pain unremedied. Every time I procrastinate in any endeavor, I punish myself for the time I have lost and more so for how I cannot afford to lose any more. I want you both you see and realize that I set my goals boundless by realistic and practical notions because before I allow you to leave me, this world will know of my name and the reason why I succeeded beyond any measure or logical explanations.
That very reason is because of you.
I will give you your brightest smile for having long taken it away from you.
You will be proud of me.
-Vo Dang Khanh
How Can You?
How Can You?
How can you?
Sit there and be herded through school
like mindless zombies aimlessly wandering around
like manipulated fools
you might as well just mOO
like the cow meat that you eat
starved of conscious mind food from the dry academic heat
that make your feet move
with quickening haste
through an institutional cycle of American POP culture
that makes you selfishly concerned only about your own upward, social pace
How can you?
Wake up every morning and get dressed
just to impress
to receive a minimal salary
you make grudging hourly
the repetition
boredom
suppressed anger
and depression
of a job that left you
robbed
stripped naked
by a legitimate and systematically
subtle mob
of
individualistic principles and broken promises
that leave you unaware
of the human decay
you suffer day by day
40 hours a week
making you meek
frail
and derailed
in a temper, bipolar-ness tantrum of frustrated defeat
so that you can look towards the short weekend for
relief
and before you know it
in 2 days
it’s once again a Monday sometime in May
of NEXT YEAR
and you’re in the same spot
without a plot to break free
of this working-to-survive epidemic disease
How can you?
Live out the rest of your life
concerned only about you own well-being and personal strife
as you progress towards a materialistic and empty goal
weaved together by false securities
fueled to burn by capitalistic charcoal
that is generic and corrupt as they come
because whatever the system feeds you,
you take,
opening your mouth wide
consuming as much meaningless pleasures of life you can possibly rake
And at the very end when you finally have a chance to sit back and relax
in your multiple-financed home
as fragile as hot wax
your reflection back through life
now conclude at your old age
realizing
all the institutionally selfish mistakes
you have foolishly made
have not been justified because you were
moving through the world so fast
enabling yourself
unable
to stop and smell the flowers for the
brief
moment that their beauty truly last
but at age 80 learning the humanity lesson can be hard
as this society now hold your wrinkles and bones
in complete disregard
your existence no long matters as you
slowly and quietly disappear away
personally apologizing to your guilt for your younger and clueless days
where Facebook
beer pong
one-night stand hookups
that BMW 3-series
your 2.3 kids
and prosperous
American Dream
was your complete world
now comes shattering down in a lonely, climactic whirl
So how can you?
Go through life the way you do
when people are cryin’
dyin’
mystified by the lyin’
that puts life in body bags
contorted in different shapes and sizes
families separated
genocide and war
international human rights faltering
corrupted foreign policy
and the American Dream popular galore
that makes you desensitized
to the victims who are blind
bleeding
fearful to breathe
undeserving of torture and the endless pain they receive
EASY
just turn your head the other way
close your eyes
and
plug your ears
and act like nothing is wrong
or in the words of Rihanna,
“Just live your life, Ay a Ay a Ay a”
-A12
How can you?
Sit there and be herded through school
like mindless zombies aimlessly wandering around
like manipulated fools
you might as well just mOO
like the cow meat that you eat
starved of conscious mind food from the dry academic heat
that make your feet move
with quickening haste
through an institutional cycle of American POP culture
that makes you selfishly concerned only about your own upward, social pace
How can you?
Wake up every morning and get dressed
just to impress
to receive a minimal salary
you make grudging hourly
the repetition
boredom
suppressed anger
and depression
of a job that left you
robbed
stripped naked
by a legitimate and systematically
subtle mob
of
individualistic principles and broken promises
that leave you unaware
of the human decay
you suffer day by day
40 hours a week
making you meek
frail
and derailed
in a temper, bipolar-ness tantrum of frustrated defeat
so that you can look towards the short weekend for
relief
and before you know it
in 2 days
it’s once again a Monday sometime in May
of NEXT YEAR
and you’re in the same spot
without a plot to break free
of this working-to-survive epidemic disease
How can you?
Live out the rest of your life
concerned only about you own well-being and personal strife
as you progress towards a materialistic and empty goal
weaved together by false securities
fueled to burn by capitalistic charcoal
that is generic and corrupt as they come
because whatever the system feeds you,
you take,
opening your mouth wide
consuming as much meaningless pleasures of life you can possibly rake
And at the very end when you finally have a chance to sit back and relax
in your multiple-financed home
as fragile as hot wax
your reflection back through life
now conclude at your old age
realizing
all the institutionally selfish mistakes
you have foolishly made
have not been justified because you were
moving through the world so fast
enabling yourself
unable
to stop and smell the flowers for the
brief
moment that their beauty truly last
but at age 80 learning the humanity lesson can be hard
as this society now hold your wrinkles and bones
in complete disregard
your existence no long matters as you
slowly and quietly disappear away
personally apologizing to your guilt for your younger and clueless days
where Facebook
beer pong
one-night stand hookups
that BMW 3-series
your 2.3 kids
and prosperous
American Dream
was your complete world
now comes shattering down in a lonely, climactic whirl
So how can you?
Go through life the way you do
when people are cryin’
dyin’
mystified by the lyin’
that puts life in body bags
contorted in different shapes and sizes
families separated
genocide and war
international human rights faltering
corrupted foreign policy
and the American Dream popular galore
that makes you desensitized
to the victims who are blind
bleeding
fearful to breathe
undeserving of torture and the endless pain they receive
EASY
just turn your head the other way
close your eyes
and
plug your ears
and act like nothing is wrong
or in the words of Rihanna,
“Just live your life, Ay a Ay a Ay a”
-A12
Lonely Leadership
Lonely Leadership
Lonely it feels
to be this way
I let myself catch my breath
but at a standstill I am still here today
The pressure on my shoulders
feels unbearable to carry
and although it hurts
it is a life I have chosen to marry
But strong as I have taught myself to be
even this unimaginably, heavy burden can feel light
because at the end of night before my eyes close
I recognize the leadership within me
Half of the fun is the hard road ahead
half of the fun is in the ride
whether it be a group or simply just me
my life I will live, selfishly-free
Because I still hear you in my sleep
I always hear you in my head
you beat twice for every single heartbeat that thumps in my chest
reminding me of your pain that refrains me from unproductive rest
You are like a sweet tune
My personal melody of pain
That only I can seem to hear
Throughout the day
That keeps me going
Keeps me alive
To that very day
When I'll be dying
I promise you all
I will always continue whole-heartedly fighting
-A12
Lonely it feels
to be this way
I let myself catch my breath
but at a standstill I am still here today
The pressure on my shoulders
feels unbearable to carry
and although it hurts
it is a life I have chosen to marry
But strong as I have taught myself to be
even this unimaginably, heavy burden can feel light
because at the end of night before my eyes close
I recognize the leadership within me
Half of the fun is the hard road ahead
half of the fun is in the ride
whether it be a group or simply just me
my life I will live, selfishly-free
Because I still hear you in my sleep
I always hear you in my head
you beat twice for every single heartbeat that thumps in my chest
reminding me of your pain that refrains me from unproductive rest
You are like a sweet tune
My personal melody of pain
That only I can seem to hear
Throughout the day
That keeps me going
Keeps me alive
To that very day
When I'll be dying
I promise you all
I will always continue whole-heartedly fighting
-A12
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
My Life
Life was "mighty grand," back in my late teens and early twenties too
The entire world was in my hands; my dreams stretched as far as the sky's blue
I learned. I grew. I fell. I cried, all at the expense of becoming strong
Because everytime I got up, although roughed a little more than before,
my accomplishments made me feel no wrong
FasTrak it felt like I was on and I was waaaaaaaaaaay ahead of the pack
For when I looked back
to see the slack
none of my competitors I saw were able to make the necessary hacks
In layman's terms we call them sacrifices these essential decisions I had to make
Like an impenetrable, elitist machine I had to, at every second, superiorly
emulate
That is the price you have to pay I learned to be the best at what you do
Like that race car instructor in the UK my racing friend talked to,
"You must lie, cheat, and steal" more often than you comfortably want to
So no prisoners I took, I only answered to my goals and lived for the exploitation of the talents God blessed me
to be the best that I can be with nothing nor anyone in my way
running straight past the "finish line" scot-free
BUT as I gradually made my way to the top and found the American Dream -
to my surprise -
just dangling there
A light within also began to ignite
and slowly, I started to no longer care
As much as I loved to race cars and karts to test the mortality of my short, human existence
There was another man within me dying to break free from his rusty shackles,
fumed with compassionate persistence
He told me the joy of going around a curve at 100+ miles would be nothing compared to what I was about to see
and slowly I really began to learn life's greatest lesson
and this new me desperately needed to give back to humanity.
-A12
The entire world was in my hands; my dreams stretched as far as the sky's blue
I learned. I grew. I fell. I cried, all at the expense of becoming strong
Because everytime I got up, although roughed a little more than before,
my accomplishments made me feel no wrong
FasTrak it felt like I was on and I was waaaaaaaaaaay ahead of the pack
For when I looked back
to see the slack
none of my competitors I saw were able to make the necessary hacks
In layman's terms we call them sacrifices these essential decisions I had to make
Like an impenetrable, elitist machine I had to, at every second, superiorly
emulate
That is the price you have to pay I learned to be the best at what you do
Like that race car instructor in the UK my racing friend talked to,
"You must lie, cheat, and steal" more often than you comfortably want to
So no prisoners I took, I only answered to my goals and lived for the exploitation of the talents God blessed me
to be the best that I can be with nothing nor anyone in my way
running straight past the "finish line" scot-free
BUT as I gradually made my way to the top and found the American Dream -
to my surprise -
just dangling there
A light within also began to ignite
and slowly, I started to no longer care
As much as I loved to race cars and karts to test the mortality of my short, human existence
There was another man within me dying to break free from his rusty shackles,
fumed with compassionate persistence
He told me the joy of going around a curve at 100+ miles would be nothing compared to what I was about to see
and slowly I really began to learn life's greatest lesson
and this new me desperately needed to give back to humanity.
-A12
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