Room 607

By Virginia J. Pasalo

 

AS a child, I learned to focus on a purple dot in my mind with eyes closed. This dot expands in size as I enter it, gathering speed as I travel through its gossamer lining, and adding on an array of colors as I move past a gradually widening space. From there I reach a peaceful place of green dewy grass and grayish pink waters whose stillness is encroached upon at times by the scent of Baguio pine trees, the aroma of Ayik’s newly-baked bread and the long tail of a comet.

“Concentrate on the dot, close your eyes, it is there!”. That voice again, whose was it? I used to know that voice. I focused on the dot, without blinking, trying to recollect the 491 photos and videos which got lost while attempting to free space Messenger and Uber on my mobile phone.

The dot brings me to the world of images, which expands in color, texture and content with slow sips of Bangkok coffee on a quiet morning. It educes and seduces incessantly, like a magic stone dropping from the puso ng saging, bringing the seduction to a metaphysical stage. More dots emerge, and the dots self-connect to become a string of dots that transform into real faces and real skins. Each dot opens quickly with a soft touch, revealing faces of new friends and new experiences that are both virtual and real. Bangkok is alive again, at this moment, in my mind, including, that presence in Room 607.

On my first night in Room 607, I glimpsed, in a nanosecond, something white passing through, with a speed of lightning, but without the haste, almost like a dancing wave, in the space near the chair facing the mirror. I looked at the chair twice, to make sure I was not experiencing an optical illusion, and failing a plausible explanation, convinced myself to ignore it. The second night was uneventful. However, on the morning of the third day, a soft breeze grazed my foot. It felt so good that I decided to go to the veranda for the breeze to caress my body, but the door was closed. I shut the air-conditioning last night, so where did the breeze come from?  And then I realized, the direction of the breeze was from an opposite direction in the room. At that point, I could no longer ignore a compelling presence: a friendly, playful presence, eager to be felt, and acknowledged.

“I feel you. And I saw your white gossamer garment pass through. Thank you for this experience.”

 

The Hem of Your Garment

Perhaps.
I can only approximate your beauty
from the visual glimpses of your reality
with the limits of my vision
and the stirring of my senses
that you are She
to most, a He

at times, an apparition
in the eyes of the blind who long to see new colors,
feel new shapes in an elephant just touched
or in the smile of a drowning child smelling the shore
from the sea salt drying on her parched lips

at times, an inspiration, a Muse
in the hands of a felon carving art
or in the heart of a poet
singing poems, glimpsing hope,
from the hemline of Your garment

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