Mashed potatos are delicious; Mashed poems too!

Today was a long day, somewhat.

I daren't describe it to you for fear of making that primary school english composition mistake that I, amongst most people, commit. the dull, sequential, factual listing of events.

I was at NUS the whole day, from since the sky was drizzling hesitantly unto the dewy grass, to when the sky concealed the only 'dews' left -- on sundews.

I went for the USP creative writing 3 day workshop (no no no I was not at the workshop for the whole day there. just for the morning only!). Missed the first day on Monday. Went for the second day today. Already looking forward to Friday. Oh and to state the obvious -- it was interesting.

There was this Nature Walk activity which is more of a stationary walk actually, hence it is more like Nature Stand/Sit/Crouch. It was actually at what is like a mini-park, for those who know, it is that place below the Central Library with trees and grass and benches... yup. So it is just 15 minutes, writing about your experience right at that one spot, then presenting them to the class later.

I thought it would be easy.

So I decided to write about how 'nature' purifies us as we lose all our superficial identities (college student, programmer, blogger, wadeva-er...) ... standing there, metaphorically naked and being who we truly and simply are.

To my horror, the words wouldn't flow. Damn.

I suddenly realised how long since I've written anything descriptively. Have my thoughts dried up over time?

Then an ant bit me... and so inspiration gnawed unto me, quite literally.

After the 15 minutes, I had nearly a paragraph, and was trying hard to polish up here and there, like tiling the floor and painting the walls once a house has been built.

Then, we were instructed to contribute only one sentence, or phrase, which we think is the best of all that we've written. Ahh I should have paid more attention earlier, then I could have just worked hard on one sentence and not try to perfect an entire paragraph.

At random, we were picked to contribute, and the lines were stacked to construct a poem. You would think it is impossible that the poem make any sense, considering that random lines by random people were just mashed together, furthermore, without sorting.

But hey, I was pleasantly surprised at how cool it was that it all made sense -- somewhat. Here goes:

Playing the drums for a tribal sacrifice

There are holes in the sky

Part of a wall of trees that shields me from the forestry beyond

A breeze slips among the branches and shakes them, and the ground is suddenly spattered with drops of water

Brightening dead leaves

Forming blood bars of steel

From my arsenal of five I pick the pinky and I remove the ant from existence

To the East, a forest gleams with the sun

The trees, subcutaneous, wind their tendrils outwards in an expanding vortex of heretical invasion

Life crawls by

I suppose life is like that, we live it, lose it, forget it and move on

From the short thick fingers above, that lock each other in place like a jigsaw puzzle that forms a partially permeable umbrella

Pendulous swaying to the passing breath

Charred the water with my figments of memory

Sometimes I tell myself it would be interesting to be a tree, and then I wake up

Life surrounds and stings

Then the whir of mechanical beasts resounds overhead, and the moment is gone

The gauze canopy phases in and out with the light sifting through

Beautiful ain't it?

Oh I'll leave the guessing, as to which line is by me, to you. A tiny blatant clue, I already gave.

Today was a long day, somewhat