I.

“What are you doing?” “I am praying.”
“What are you doing?” “I am praying.”
“What are you doing?” “I am praying. And what are you doing that you keep asking?”
“I am working and taking a break, and I saw you’ve been here for seven hours.”
“Then if you have a job so good that you have free time, spare me dimes to buy bread,” you said, “for this brother is so busy praying.”
 
II.

When I asked why you kept praying—
it is a sure way to heaven, you answered.
 
When I wondered what more I could do,
you said ‘do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’
 
When I probed, “then why we don’t let others build their prayer houses?”
when I questioned, “why we won’t leave alone those who are different,
for we all want a guaranteed safety and to pray comfortably?”

It was then the veins in your face took shape,
as you gritted you teeth,
and you declared,
“They worship the wrong God,
they took the wrong path,
they waged the war first toward our brothers in a faraway land.
We avenged fire with fire, blood with blood.”

I thought deeply to myself,
“But my friend, in the place where our numbers are less than them,
they claim the same thing, echo the same sermon,
that we are in the wrong, that we are the ones
who waged the chains of fury.

“But I won’t destroy one’s prayer house
just because some people somewhere,
who weren’t even our ‘different’ but kind neighbors,
destroy mine.

“Because I don’t want to do things
that I don’t want others to do to me.”

But those words didn’t even leave my tongue,
because I could see how you fumed,
and it’s already 7 p.m. I needed to go home.
 
III.
 
As I walked home, I saw another Brother and Sister
lining up for rations meant for those who couldn’t afford them.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Queuing for our portion,” they replied.
“But aren’t these for those truly in need?” I pressed.
“We got our tickets, rice in bags of seven,” they reasoned.
“Wouldn’t it be a waste not to use them?”
 
Strange, I perceived as I walked away,
there was so much waste on the table,
during your fancy fine-dining date
you posted on your Instagram account last night.
 
IV.

“Oh, there she goes again, bags worth millions, makeup overpriced,”
you muttered as soon as I sat next to you at the office.
You were busy scrolling your friend’s feed
that you keep checking so often.

“Why another pilgrimage so soon? Just seven months since the last,” you scoffed.
“Could her journey’s cost not aid those in dire need instead?”

Curiously, I asked, “Oh, what about you? Do you also want to go?”
“Well, of course I do. Who does not?” you quickly replied.
“Well, have you aided those in need?” I mirrored your words.

“Oh, I wish I had the luxury. I barely have any penny!”
you said so indifferently, as
you reached for the same brand of make-up
from the bag of the same brand owned by
the friend you obsess about.

V.

I went to the pantry,
for a speedy respite.
and found another soul.
Holding a cup of tea,
your smile full on.
Out of courtesy, I initiated
a conversation:

“Brother, have you seen the 7 a.m news?”
“No, what is it about?” you replied.
“One devout leader was arrested for assaulting women.”
“Oh, God will surely protect him, for his long service to Him,” you believe.
“But what about the women?” I quizzed, slightly livid.
“Well they might have donned revealing clothes,
that such a pious person could get tangled in their honey trap,”
you countered, and added, smirking,
“Even I would do the same thing,
because unlike the man, I am not as staunch.”
 
I shook my head, repelled.
“And what about the boys,
the innocent children,
touched and tarnished
the other day,
by another
dutiful man?”
I challenged,
“Surely, they did not tempt him.”
 
You have yet to answer.
 
VI.

Now, if I recall,
there was this one time
I feared humans most.

That was when the deathly virus
spread so quickly across seven seas.
That was when calls to stay home
were ignored early on,
as people chose to flock to the malls and shop,
that what I saw on the news was a sea of heads
and floods of shopping bags,
when some people breathed
their unexpected last breath.
 
And as more and more people started to fall,
the others became hoarders.
From face covers to hand cleansers,
everything was out of store.

Did they need that much
for a few persons?

And the used masks were littered on the side of the road.
I wasn’t sure whether they were contaminated,
but they surely would contaminate the soil, no?

People were willing to pay
fortunes under the table,
to cut the line, to get the
injections for protection,
or to rob someone else’s
bed, when they were actually
at lower risk than others.
 
VII.

What I also found daunting,
when I browsed the internet,
is the strength of unison.

Even when we are all wrong,
we are always in the right,
for our kind is united,
superior to others.

We are proudly greater,
in numbers,
in intelligence,
in skin colors,
in culture,
in history,
in mannerism.

Some are countable variables,
but neglecting other factors.
Some are baseless,
and not even comparable.
 
But we are born from power,
and others are ranked lower.

From petty things about
which nations or races
have better cuisine and
the world’s seven wonders
to our political moves
and economic prowess.
 
What horrifyingly funny is
how others have the very same thoughts.
Now, I feel like we are counting
the day when we start crushing and
destroying one another.
 
VIII.

How bewildering.
The more I talk to others,
the more I realize.

As the world is grand and unexplainable,
I have faith in God,
but what I don’t
is faith in humans.

I don’t even have faith in myself,
for I am not courageous enough
to voice my concerns.

But here again, I contemplate,
who am I to decide
what is right or wrong?

Perhaps I am no different
from the rest of them.

*still refining and that may take forever