requiem
ˈrɛkwɪəm,-ɪɛm/
noun
noun: requiem; plural noun: requiems
(especially in the Roman Catholic Church) a Mass for the repose of the souls of the dead.
a requiem was held for the dead queen
- a musical composition setting parts of a requiem Mass, or of a similar character.
Fauré's Requiem
- an act or token of remembrance.
he designed the epic as a requiem for his wife
Even the description for requiem is poetic justice.
A dead queen. An epic for a wife. Here I am trying to convince myself I am not secretly a shade of Sylvia Plath but through my favorite word, my true miserable self tears through triumphantly.
Watching Inside Out with Gabriel was pretty enlightening.
Yes he imagined a scenario where Riley grows up. Yes he imagined her seeing a sword for the first time and the differing emotions that'll kick in when she discovers, in sequence, the fear of seeing a big sword and the sadness of the first blow and the joy of the penetration and the anger at anal hahah.
Digressing, the framework for this movie was set in 2009.
It all started when the director noticed changes in his budding teen daughter's personality.
He was worrying about her ever-changing emotions when his mind started to personify the emotions he imagined she was going through. That was when he realized he had the next up-and-coming-(again) hit (he directed Up) on his hands and ran off to the studio.
When I first read it, my reaction was this: ???
Imagine being his daughter.
One minute your dad's like 'awww what's wrong honey, are you oka- HOLY SHIT! PIXAR! DISNEY! GUESS WHOSE SALARY IS BALLOONING UP AGAIN? Geddit darling? Up puns never get old, do they! Okay hold that emo thought, daddy's gotta make a run for the studio."
Wait what was my point.
Okay oh yes, so there was this part in the movie where Joy and Sadness gets sucked into a portal and ends up in Long Term Memory. And there was one part where Sadness almost falls off a cliff and Joy rescues her.
Gabriel got into such an uproar.
"Why!!! She should've just let her die!"
And I laughed and said, "Then she won't ever be sad again!"
"Isn't that good? Then all she'll feel is Joy!"
"But how do you know what's Joy without Sadness?"
Yep it is official I am wise as fuck.
I also thought my epiphany would turn out to be the core message of the film, but it was, "Sadness's true importance is alerting others when Riley needs help," but hey I was going for poetic, not suicide hotline.
Still, I believe in my message.
How can you know what's light, if you don't know what's night? How can you know what's adrenaline, if you don't know what's boredom? How can you be happy, if you don't know how misery feels?
So going way back to the original point.
Requiem means a lot to me.
Partially because god, have you seen it's definition? Is it not a beautiful meeting of tragedy meets art?
But secondly because once upon a time, I woke up with a marquee of 'requiem for the relentless' across my mind, tailored for a man. But then I met Gabriel who revolutionized my life and it faded away. Still it remains that it defines two of the things I always had trouble grappling with: death and remembering.
“I wish for a moment that time would lift me out of this day, and into some more benign one. But then I feel guilty for wanting to avoid the sadness; dead people need us to remember them, even if it eats us, even if all we can do is say "I'm sorry" until it is as meaningless air.”
And so I will stand vigil over the ruins of our relationship, till my guilt kills me.
I think I have my next text tattoo on my hands.
Alright rant over.
Told Gabriel I was still disappointed and so he wrote me a poem!
Under the wide and starry sky
A requiem for the relentless
Without wings we try to fly
An experience not for the faint-hearted
Into a relationship we plunged into
Never holding back to improve
The souls of two worlds now complete
The hope for all eternity
My honey
Let's intertwine our bodies
And create a new baby
I did my necessary awws and oohs before pointing out that this poem technically had nothing to do with requiem. And he went 'heh heh was hoping you wouldn't notice' but still A++ for effort. This is why I love him.
If I had to write for requiem, this would be it:
Requiem for the relentless
May we take a minute
To remember his wretched soul
It is about a woman who wanted a song
And a man who tried till the end
Here, my broken darling,
Here are all my words
The things that matter to me
My memories
And my heart
To write a song that's never been played
You have to feel emotions that's never been felt
'Here, my broken darling,
Here are all my words
The things that matter to me
My memories
And my heart
To write a song that's never been played
You have to feel emotions that's never been felt
And I've done it darling
I've bloody done it
This is my symphony
The greatest the world's ever heard
Maybe now
You'd be able to say you love me
With the lights on'
With trembling fingers
He picked up his guitar
And played
One,
He dragged his fingers across the strings
He thought of the first time he saw her
She looked so very angelic
How lovely it was back then
Before the pain and the misery
Her eyes remained empty
He felt his insides lurch
Two,
Again he strums
This one was for the first time she said she loved him
So simply and so absolutely
As if she never knew another truth
The memory lingered sweetly on his tongue
She wasn't looking at him anymore
His heart beat slows
Three,
It was a chord he liked
He named this chord after their first kiss
The way she breathed him in
Before drawing her arms closer
Before her lips changed him forever
She left the room
His legs gave way
Four,
It was their favourite lyric
'Will you forgive what I've done
To give you four white horses'
He wonders if she remembered
How excited she had been
That he found their perfect song
She dropped her keys
His hands started to perspire
Five,
It was a guitar riff she loved
A song played in Taiwan that reminded her of him
She hummed it to him that night on the phone
She was overseas then
But she came back to him in the end
She always did
She came back in the room
But still his head continued spinning
Six,
The hurt and the betrayal
He never held it against her
It hurt, oh yes did it fucking burn
He had the scars to show for it
But like a veteran
He knew no battle could faze him from his mission
And it was to make her laugh, always
She was saying something
He can't hear her anymore
Seven,
Seven was her favorite number
She wanted to marry at 27
He had their whole lives planned together
She wanted two kids
And he named them
'I'm sorry. I need to do this alone.
I hope you'll always be happy.
Goodbye now.'
He fell to the floor
And the world faded away
There was a yellow glow
Then red
Red, like the color of her hair
He smiled
The universe is all her
It has never been anything more
Every word he's ever whispered
Every song he's ever played
Was just a lead up to her
She was his muse
She was his obsession
And in the end
She will destroy him
But you are my masterpiece
So if it makes you less sad
I'll die by your hand
She nodded
And so here the eulogy ends
A final thump of dirt slices the silence of the night
His mind lays awake
And all he sees is her
And he smiled one last time
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