Author: violeteye

Gratiagusti Chananya Rompas was born in Jakarta, 19 August 1979. She studied English Literature in Universitas Indonesia, Depok (2003) and received her masters in The Gothic Imagination from University of Stirling, Scotland (2005). She is one of the founders of Komunitas BungaMatahari, a mailing list-based Indonesian poetry community that have embraced many poetry enthusiasts with its catchphrase “semua bisa berpuisi” or, roughly translated, “poetry for all”. She is also involved in Selatan, a literary journal, and Paviliun Puisi, a monthly open mic event--both managed by her and her like-minded friends. She currently resides in Jakarta, trying to find balance between writing and day-to-day living.

unclear

Posted on by violeteye in English, Poetry

my purpose has grown a bit unclear

if that is not straightforward enough i don’t know what is
but you know i am never an open book so you decide not to accept everything as it is

which is very wise

i walk like a native through avenues that not long ago i saw for the first time
but the skies are amazingly blue

i speak in an accent nobody understands, not even those whom i try to imitate
but the air is amazingly fresh

i dream in a foreign language that i have known since childhood
but the smiles are amazingly genuine

i try to reach you
by sending both short and long messages
containing obscure phrases
and terms i know both of us
will only pretend to comprehend

but you might never know that
i feel a contraction in the muscles of my cheeks whenever you let out a laugh thousands of miles away from me
i feel a twitch somewhere in my insides whenever somebody or something silently pierce your dignity
in a land where my mother and grandparents were buried but which has now become a part of my dream holiday itinerary

i have become sharper than ever
i have become someone you know i would eventually become but you just do not think it would happen this quick

i have new secrets now
i have liked many wonderful things without sharing them with you
i have taken thousands of pictures but you were never in one

i have cried many nights
under the thing translated as blanket where you are but actually known as duvet where i am

i have conversed many times
over a pint of what is understood there as beer but is coined here as lager

and suddenly the lyrics to every song i hear illustrate clearly
all the vague emotions that took me twenty-nine lines of melodramatic ramblings to even begin to decipher
surprise surprise the band is called the postal service

i have four boxes
full of my summer clothes (ha! it was not until i got here that i started to classify the items in my wardrobe according to the season!)
and some trivial treasures that would always remind me of the year-long pseudo-independency
all sealed addressed and ready to be shipped across the waters

of course, i did not forget to put in them
artefacts of my love for you, proofs that i have never let you out of my mind all the while we are apart

so will you let me know when you receive them?

but sadly i know i am nowhere to be reached

standing still in my new room in my new flat
wiping the drops of water off my window i realize that they feel cold
for the temperature behind the glass must be lower than my room’s

it is terribly apparent that the days of clear blue sky have come to an end-
exchanged by a never-ending sequence of long afternoons that does not feel very long at all

all i have now is chaotic visions of familiar faces, each of them bears different ethnic traits from the other,
of familiar furnitures,
of familiar means of transportation,
of familiar lingos,
of familiar coffee shops,
and of that familiar bottled iced tea
which remind me so much of home

while the word itself
stays ambiguous

sometimes i would rather see the ugly green walls of my old room when i wake up in the morning
sometimes i would rather be standing at that ‘unofficial’ bus stop, my hair is all messy and my eyes are all teary, when the cold does not even bother me at murray place
sometimes i would rather receive a warning call from dad when i am out pretending to have the time of my life at a nearby club

but all the news you ever sent to me was of loss and decay
while i know the sun is always up over there  

i guess no matter how stubbornly the world insists that it only knows one sun
the one that i have here is different from the one you have there
i know you know i know you know that it is
the truth

now have i made myself unclear?

barnton street, 22 october 2005

wonderful world

Posted on by violeteye in English, Poetry

you’ve had a terrible night.
you’ve lost everything you thought you had.
it’s now 11.32 and you wake up in your office room – still in yesterday’s clothes and without a toothbrush or soap in the toilet.
you stare at the window and at the empty grey sky beyond.
and you start seeing yourself as a child.

small round face with rosy cheeks and a halo of dark brown curls
happily pedaling your brand new mini tri-cyle around the backyard of your parents’ first house while they happily watched you
somehow you knew that only your strings of laughter could remind them of how wonderful the world was

it was just as simple as that

your mobile phone beeps and its screen blinks “new message”.
you see your incredibly tidy desk.
you see your shiny black shoes.
you see your name engraved with silver ink on a polished black plate.

you know that you’ve never had that kind of childhood.

but the child in your window never stops smiling
and you know he knows that smile only could remind you of how wonderful the world is
somehow you feel like the only thing that you’d want to do now is give him a hug

it seems so fuckin’ simple

barnton street, 22 october 2005

Log #10

Posted on by violeteye in Dream Logs

i was walking up this hilly road with my cousin when we passed a gate. the sign said “exit”, but strangely i couldn’t find another gate with the sign “entrance”. this “exit” gate was open and there was a moderate space for parking. beyond that, i saw a small winding road – i couldn’t see where the road is going but one thing for sure it is going downwards. trees and bushes were almost everywhere. it seemed like a proper walking and picnicking area for tourists.

my cousin was trying to tell me a story about the gate and the place behind it but i didn’t listen to her as i saw two of my high school friends inside. R was parking his car and [i-forgot-his-name] was standing and giving instructions. i was excited and R was all smiles but [i-forgot-his-name] had this serious and stern look on his face. i wanted to get in but they told me not to – R with a nice and friendly tone, [i-forgot-his-name] with a deadly one.

my cousin urged me to go on so i told the guys i would meet them again later. my cousin was still telling me the story about the gate and the place behind it – it was supposed to be a chilling one but i couldn’t make out the plot. it seemed as if she was babbling along although she knew i didn’t understand and she also knew that she wasn’t making any sense.

we entered a village – it was so much like collobrières but not as colorful. then, all of a sudden, we heard a commotion from behind us. something awful was happening. we ran back to where we came from, together with most of the villagers.

it was dark. the night had begun to settle in.

we heard piercing shrieks. they came from the behind the gate. there were several people there and all of them were attacked by some invisible entity.

my perspective then shifted into a bird’s-eye-view and shared that of the entity. it was like i was flying along with “it”.

“it” hovered above the village, as slowly and surely as the darkness of the night. lights started to lit up and the bright areas seem to be resistant to the dark. you know immediately that those are the areas where the thing’s power cannot cover.

each one of the villagers seems to be fully aware of the thing’s presence. they know when the thing is so close to their back and then they will walk into a bright spot.

i saw a child crying with horror, his face was staring at me and his eyes were full of fear. but right before the thing could get a grip on him, somebody pulled the child and brought him into light. he was saved.

then i saw an old man sweeping the road with a broomstick. i was getting closer to him but he didn’t bulge an inch. i was getting even closer and i began to feel afraid for him. exactly on the very last moment – i could see the back of his neck very clearly – he stepped into a circle of light on the ground. he turned his head and shot me a defiant look. i rocketed up into the dark sky with the thing.

my perspective changed again. i was back into the story and i was standing in front of an old building. it was built on top of a hill. it was a museum.

i ran into the building. it was pitch black inside. all i could see was the silhouettes of the museum’s collection. i knew the thing was behind me so i ran like hell.

i arrived at the very last room at the very end of the building. i opened the door and i found a bunch of people inside. they were obviously students, listening to their lecturer, who looked like a 30-something woman. one thing for sure, they weren’t from the village because they didn’t seem to realize the importance of having the room fully-lighted after dark.

the thing was still behind me.

i informed them of the danger as quickly as i could and demanded that they turn on the main light. one of the students did but to my dismay, it was a very old lamp. the lights were very dim and it only gave a small and shady circle on the floor.

i told everybody to gather in the circle. it barely fitted us all but it was better than nothing.

i remember one girl was still standing by the window, smoking. she was in the dark. i told her to move into the circle but she told me she didn’t believe that there was such a thing as the thing.

then her cigarette was taken from her fingers by something unseen and the window slammed shut. she ran into the circle and joined us immediately.

i don’t remember much details of what happened next. things happened very quickly and the thing was taunting us badly.
somehow, it let us see its face. it took a mirror and we saw.. a girl’s face.

i don’t know how and why, but she assured me that she wouldn’t hurt me. and this other guy. i don’t remember his face clearly but he was lean and taller than i am.

she asked me to tell everyone in the room to go to the yard outside.

there were a lot of students there. it then occurred to me that they were freshmen on an initiation trip with their seniors. the people who were with me in the room were some of the seniors.

she-thing wanted to play around with those freshers. funny, i could sense, or rather, see where she was in the dark. she let me warn the people and inform them of her position – but if anyone wasn’t quick enough to run from her, he or she would become her prey.

it was a deadly game.

cries filled the night air.

at last, she felt tired. she put her arms on my and the guy’s shoulderd and walked with us.

“let’s go.”

we were standing in front of a gate. there were still several freshers lingering around. tears and fear decorated their expression.

“i promise i won’t touch you later on if you let me have some more of those freshers without you warning them. now do you let me? remember, if you don’t, there’s no guarantee of your and his safety. plus, you can choose some other people to go with us in the car. they will be safe, too. but, you have to let me do it without you giving any warning.”

i said ok.

i heard some more screams and the freshers who lingered at the gate were crying hysterically.

we drove away.

Log #9

Posted on by violeteye in Dream Logs

i dreamed of “Friends”.

i lived with them although it wasn’t in any of the flats featured in the series.

rachel was pregnant with a demonic baby. she was frightened and i was the only one who knew about her feelings. both chandler and ross were really afraid of rachel.

one day, rachel wanted ross to accompany her to go somewhere. but she was manic and ross refused for he didn’t want to put himself in danger.

i was the only one who knew and understood.

berita hari ini

Posted on by violeteye in Bahasa Indonesia, Poetry

seperti berdendang

mengikuti nada-nada klise sebuah lagu pop yang terlalu populer

lalu kau gigit bibirmu sendiri


hari ini matahariku terik, sayang. begitu terik sehingga hujan pun tak
mampu mengusirnya ke balik awan. kulihat rintik-rintiknya menari di
balik jendela dapurku, berkilauan di bawah langit biru. sementara di
balik jendela ruang makan, pelangi membentang gagah. membuat
tetangga-tetanggaku berteriak kegirangan sambil mengeluarkan kamera.
tetapi aku,


aku


duduk diam menghadapi sepiring nasi berlauk daging sapi yang ceria
ditemani paprika merah hijau dan biji-biji tauco. aku rasa aku sudah
terlalu kenyang. kenyang karena menelan bulat-bulat rentetan kata yang
dulu sering kucerna; bukan karena aku mau, tapi karena aku ternyata
telah berbincang dengan orang-orang yang salah. ah, berita jaman dulu
yang dengan begitu ajaib menemukan jalannya untuk termuat di koran hari
ini. pikirku,


persetan


dengan semua itu. memang, tidak ada yang baru di bawah matahari. juga
pelangi. karena hujan selalu turun, tak peduli apakah hari terik atau
tidak. hujan orang mati, katanya. ya, orang-orang memang harus mati satu
per satu. bedanya, ada yang ditangisi ada yang tidak. ah,


apa hubungannya dengan makananku?


maaf, aku tak mau lagi menghabiskannya. lidahku bilang, semua sudah
basi. dan yang basi harus masuk tempat sampah. bersama koran yang
melulu mendramatisasi kisah hidup para penggede dunia sampai-sampai
yang membaca bisa lupa kalau yang seperti itu juga bisa ditemukan di
rumah sebelah, atau malahan di kepalanya sendiri. atau parahnya lagi,
terlalu sering melahap yang basi juga bisa membuat orang lupa untuk
membuangnya. akhirnya, merasa sama dengan penggede-penggede itu dan pantas jadi berita. berita basi. ha ha
ha. dan orang-orang sepertiku terpaksa kembali lagi makan makanan basi.
ha ha ha. aku memang harus diet dan berhenti langganan koran.

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mengikuti nada-nada klise sebuah lagu pop yang terlalu populer

lalu pingsan