Unpolished

I am so tired

October hasn’t been very kind to me. I’ve been plagued by all sorts of maladies. My health has declined. My vigour slowly sucked away, illness after illness, pill after pill. My mind has been dulled by the routine and rigours of work. My heart has been out of rhythm, and due to a loss of passion, and perhaps, a loss of appetite, has been murmuring its little pains more than usual.

My body’s dependence on medication has rendered much of it useless. The lungs are tired. The feet are worn. The fingers crackle. The eyelids weigh down. The nose clogged. The abdomen twisting and turning with the cocktail of vitamins, antibiotics, steroids, and a cocktail of supposedly healthy food. The back has been creaking with every long step, with every squat or stretch, straining to keep a grown man’s body straight in a city that has never been amiable to the physical strengths of an individual.

Yes, this city tires me. Manila exhausts me, suffocates me, consumes me. This city and its cars. This city and its people. This city and its smog. It has made me sick. It has battered me hard. And, afraid as I am to admit it, has pushed me to a losing end. I have grown weary and old, disillusioned, and prone to indulge my disenchantments. Manila has been nothing short of relentless.

So for the first time in a very long while, I just want to say, to this city, to its faces and places: Leave me alone, even for a moment! Leave me not in a pool of questions! Why should we? Where are you going? What is wrong? No! There is nothing wrong, see? Just leave me in peace and quiet. Just let me be. Just let me cry.