“And what is a kiss, specifically? A pledge properly sealed, a promise seasoned to taste, a vow stamped with the immediacy of a lip, a rosy circle drawn around the verb ‘to love.’ A kiss is a message too intimate for the ear, infinity captured in the bee’s brief visit to a flower, secular communication with an aftertaste of heaven, the pulse rising from the heart to utter its name on a lover’s lip: ‘Forever.’”

Watching the SMC tonight to support a good friend…but it wasn’t easy finding a companion along. Luckily there will be drinks, so I can pretend to be seriously interested in my alcohol during the 20 min intermission. It’s gonna be awesome, I can feel it.

From Anne Michael’s The Winter Vault

Thank you…

No matter where you are
or who you’re near,
we come up for air together.

No matter my pace or distance,
it’s you I surface to.

-excerpted from Sublimation, a poem by Anne Michaels

I don’t mean to sound contrived, cliche or plain tacky, but I am truly moved by the relationship that Mr and Mrs Lee Kuan Yew share. I can’t help but draw the link to the story of Baucis and Philemon.

The reports so far on the late Madam Kwa Geok Choo (her maiden name) have been luminous. Even the usually welcomed alternative voice sounds crass and ill-timed at this moment if it’s dissenting and questioning. Beyond politics, Madam Kwa offers a softer, human side to Mr Lee.  A simulacrum (LKY, MM Lee, Lee Kuan Yew) previous to her passing was he to me, but now I feel the need to refer to him with the politer “mister”.

Still we can’t deny that this is suddenly a little epiphany to all Singaporeans, Mr Lee Kuan Yew, like his wife, will pass one day. That perhaps is the sudden sobriety that has hit our nation…or at least the media. Needless to say that the scripted eulogies have been curated thoroughly by the press office in charge…but how we mourn our leaders, how we revere them, tells of the expectations of our society. That surely can’t be curated? I wonder how contemporary Singaporean women might feel about Mrs Lee being revered as the epitome of what the Singaporean woman would be – strong, beacon of the household, happy to stay out of the limelight in support of her husband.

Change and transformation will be underway. Bu for now, I’ll just bear witness to this lesson of experienced and kept love…and hope I can one day experience the same.

Metamorphoses is about change to me. Well at this moment at least. It’s really quite a layered, paradoxical piece about love, order out of chaos, chaos out of order, desire out of passion, passion out of death. It’s truly a magnificent piece as a whole. I’m not exactly sure how it will be received, but the feedback so far from our marketing efforts have been…so chim ah? I suppose if we have to boil it down to one thing that’s easily palatable and understandable, I wouldn’t know which poison I’d choose.

The play opens with an invocation to the gods to “change me” to experience an epiphany beyond ourselves. That perhaps is my own frame of reference, but those words can’t ring truer for me these days. I admit I’m feeling a bit like I’m back to square one ever since I moved back from LA. I daren’t nor think I am desperate enough to ask to metamorphose but I suppose like the half man half horse birth symbol I’ve been assigned to…I sometimes feel I have one hoof in and one leg out.

I’ve been insanely addicted to this song. Found it through a cover by the very uber cool Pomplamoose:

I suppose it’s a sign that the healing has progressed when songs begin to strike a chord.

I came across Helen Fischer while doing research for an article. She’s an anthropologist specializing in the study of love. She’s built quite a name for herself: a published expert in peer reviewed journals on the subject, contributes to O Magazine, a speaker at TED, the chief scientific advisor for Chemistry.com (a dating website).

I wonder what it’s like to study, to pick apart such a seemingly undefinable emotion. I brought her research up over a date, about how love is really just a rush of dopamine. I got a stare of disbelief tinged with slight disgust, so I quickly added, “but love is more than that right?”

In her TED talk, Fischer spoke of how she hypothesizes that our sex drive and love drive are controlled by two separate neuro-hormonal systems. And that evolutionary speaking, we’re suppose to be okay with having multiple partners.

If I ever get the chance to have dinner Fischer, I would ask her, sincerely and with earnestness, to tell me of her own story of love.

How do you look at your first crush now?
Like Neo in Matrix, do you only see a rush of neurotransmitters whenever you are attracted to someone?
When you’re cuddling, what happens?
Do you rationalize away the feeling of intimacy, perhaps to protect yourself?
Do you still fall in love?

If she has a partner, I will ask him/her:

How do you want to be loved? How would you describe the way in which Helen loves you?
Do you ever question if you’re just a wave of neurotransmitters?
What is love to you?
Do you love Helen?

What is it like to study such a magnificent feeling in such a cerebral way, which inevitably simplifies?