Before anything else, Happy, Happy, Happy Birthday, Peter and Daddy!

Fire From Heaven is my first (and, at the moment, sole) Hunter X Hunter fanfiction.

It was conceptualized and initially penned in November 2002 but has been rewritten and revamped fairly recently. The fanfic is of a semi-epic scale and attempts to introduce Alluka Zaoldyeck, the mysterious child of the assassin family who is yet to play a role in Yoshihiro Togashi’s anime and manga series.

The devastatingly sexy and rather androgynous Illumi Zaoldyeck also figures prominently in the first chapter, where he drinks jasmine tea and clear wine and dresses in semi-formal dinner wear, contodos slacks.

Allow me to share with minna-san the lyrics to a song that is so very apropos for Fire From Heaven. Too apropos, in fact, it is creepy!

Lonely is the Hunter
by KISS

My eggs in one basket, but she threw me a bone
She was dealt a full deck, but she likes to live alone
Ain’t just talkin’ to myself, need a reason to stop
With a flower in her teeth, she drained the last drop
I said girls love money like bees the honey

But lonely is the hunter
You’re my one and only
And lonely is the hunter

Asked her for a refill, sweat flew off my face
She’s a legendary figure, kept me in a cage
She’s a torture chamber, when I seduced her in my bed
She gave a cold reading, success went to her head

In the heat of the battle
The heart cannot rule
I’m such a fool

But lonely is the hunter
You’re my one and only
And lonely is the hunter
Lonely is the hunter
You’re my one and only
And lonely is the hunter

More of my mostly animanga-related fanfiction pieces are available for your reading pleasure at Fuhen, my fic site.

This site is the repository of yours truly’s sundry fics written over the years. So far, I have works on Fushigi Yuugi, Hunter X Hunter and Virtua Fighter.

I have been working as a freelance author and copywriter since I was, literally, a kid.

As a professional in this field, I always keep careful tabs on my published and unpublished works. That is why I have an online portfolio, hard copies of my articles where available, and, naturally, a running list of work to my credit.

It came as a great surprise when, while cleaning up old files off my laptop’s hard drive, I found 22 pages of unpublished poetry. Yes, folks, nearly two dozen poems just waiting to be part of a collection, over and above the ones already compiled.

Now, I can recall very clearly that I actually wrote them way, way back in 2002 at someone’s request, to be the chapter bookends of his autobiography. The manuscript was being edited then and I was given a copy to read and write “hard-hitting” poetry for.

However, the autobiography project was never realized as the author got distracted by other priorities of a highly political nature. In 2003, my working relationship ended with him and off I went to serve in other sectors.

I got to keep all my poems, though, which was fantastic.

A teaser-sample is definitely in order:

I journey on, dauntless
Not heeding
The threats and taunts
Never succumbing to weakness.

This is my destiny
The unyielding road
I traverse with no apologies
Now, then and evermore.

HEAT

I feel my heart steaming towards you
I am wrought with the flames
     Of passion
     Consuming me
‘Til I am nothing more
     Than smoldering ash

I feel my body steaming towards you
I am drawn without resistance
     To your fiery seduction
     Burning deep into me
‘Til I am nothing more
     Than trembling desire

I feel my mind steaming towards you
I am controlled by this irresistible fascination
     And unrelenting obsession
     Taking over me
‘Til I am nothing more
     Than sheer madness

I feel my soul steaming towards you
I shall sweetly surrender
     All that I have
     And all that make me
‘Til I am nothing more
     Than your wasted possession

The poem below was written by yours truly for the child of a co-worker back in 2006. I found a copy lying around in my hard drive.

The instruction for the kid’s Math project was to write a five-stanza poem on scientific notation, place value, arithmetic mean and order of operation.

Herculean, but never impossible. Go me, I say!

Math is the Word

Simplification is the word
As scientific notations are used to denote
Those large and small sums
Too many zeroes are reduced
To exponential expressions
Making, for all, easier computations

Uniformity is the word
As place value notations are used to denote
Amounts related to the base
    Or radix, if you will
Symbols are used to identify positions
Each of their values
Multiplied by the power of the base

Averaging is the word
As arithmetic means are used to denote
The quotient of all given values
All amounts are added then divided
    Depending how many addends there are
The result of dividend over divisor
Commonly, “Average” is the name we call it

Universality is the word
As precedence rules are used
For the order in which operations in expressions are evaluated
These notational conventions apply
To many programming languages and calculators
As we keep moving toward technological modernization

These are not mere numerical theories
But are practical ways and means of organizing figures
Giving a semblance of order to the complexity
Of numbers and calculations and results
That define aspects of the world we live in
For all these, Math is the word

Hello, everyone. I started my new job last September 26th and am already out and about undergoing training!

I am in Metro Manila right now, our nation’s capital region, undergoing an Integrated Library System seminar for Information Technology Specialists.

We are currently billeted at the University Hotel of the University of the Philippines – Diliman. Our training proper, however, takes place at the facilities of the Advanced Science and Technology Institute across campus.

Our computers at the training center have Ethernet, so while I was browsing through various Philippine-based online public access catalogs, I managed to come across Philippine eLib, a collection of bibliographic and full-text information materials from numerous sources all over the country.

I tried out the aforementioned site’s search function and was utterly surprised to find out that I was, in fact, listed in the archives.

My listed work is Other, one of my poems published in The Philippine Star back in 1998.

Coolness.

This is a form of, I strongly believe, poetic drabble. If it could pass off as poetry of some acceptable sort, of course.

It was written last Monday while I was eating tinanok corn. Afterwards, I encoded the words into my cellphone and sent it to random friends as a highly disturbing text message.

Wishing Three

I wish that we may be together
In a way that we fear nothing
And believe in everything that we have

I wish that we may both be stronger
In a way that we do not hold back the tears
But cry freely to let the pain out
So what’s left inside is happiness
And hope, perhaps

I wish that we may love as purely
As the spring rushes over the rock
That the years will wear our faces away
But our hearts never stop flowing
Towards eternity

Just

Just don’t listen to me
I lie
Time and again
Until the falsehoods
Fall from my lips
As easy as breathing

Just don’t say a word
I won’t heed you
As always
You ask for nothing
You give everything
Without doubt

Just don’t come any closer
I will push you away
With every moment
I am weaker
I am afraid
That I can no longer hide

Just don’t look at me
I can’t bear the promise in your eyes
That you will fight for me
Without question
When asked to
But we are not just meant to be

Just walk away
Before I hold you back
Just leave
Before I run towards you
Just forget me
Before I learn to love you
Even more

Just stop

Shall I?

Shall I wait for you?
I ponder and question
The moments when you are not by my side
You wander endlessly
Seeking for eternity

Shall I look into your eyes?
I fear and dread
The time when I could no longer lie
I pretend uselessly
My will is futile and bent

Shall I touch you?
I do not wish to
Because the moment I do
You will know the truth
That I hide

Shall I speak to you?
My words are the fruit
Of an ever-proud mind
I shall say
The things that I do not mean

Shall I love you?
My heart could never lie
Even if forever I persist
To deceive it, and deny
That it has long since belonged to you

I have to try

Dark Hope

I hope you will see
Right through the blankness
That is my countenance
It is not emptiness
But a mask of pain

I hope you will hear
Right through the quiet
That is my outward self
It is not silence
But a rage no one will understand
Hence I keep

I hope you will feel
The beating of my heart
That no one knows is still there
I am not stone
Nor darkness, nor torment
I am shadow
Wanting light
I am my unknown self
Needing you