ode to my batch

we've tried to wash our hands of all of this we never talk of our lacking relationships and how we're guilt stricken sobbing with our heads on the floor we fell through the ice when we tried not to slip

i have lived my 21 years of existence trying to reconcile all the shity unfair things in life. i have lived and survived, and yes, twas not that easy. together with the pains that came along, i had to wrest the idea that somehow, people have to go.

life is a big moving river. you can never step on the same water on two different times. you may choose to fight the flow and hold on to the people you dear most, but somehow, along that river, they have to slip off. you cannot make chicken salad out of chicken shit. and moving on is the chicken shit that i have long been trying to sniff in the hope that it wouldnt hurt that much when it stings.

creepy and doggone corny as it may sound, my world was put into a temporary halt when i graduated high school. my world of laughter, pains, love and downright insanities. the audi-gym where we held our graduation was packed not by men and women, but rather by dreams and desires of becoming who we dreamt we would become. little did i know that behind the cheers and triumphs of that day is a sadness that spoils the fun. i never wanted to stay too long at our school that day for fear that the pain im keeping would show. i never wanted to bid everybody goodbye for i know there wont be another high school day. to some it was adieu. twas the last indeed. the end has been cast. we had to move on from the saturday trainings, formations, sumpitans, pasa masid, tanay, tukneneng and gulamans, rifle planting and rifle throws, inspections and delinquency reports, tok tok tok maam-cdt-lt-col-blah-blah-blah-requesting-for-permission-to-enter-blah-blah's and most difficult of all, batch masikhay....

for the life of me i cannot remember what made us think that we were wise and we'd never compromise for the life of me i cannot believe we’d ever die for these sins

four years after that, the pain is no longer around. the animosity of how to live life after high school has subsided and we have grown up. some became successful, some are yet to succeed. some tasted defeat, some have conquered it all. the weak became strong, lovers became alone. its a different world now. i no longer dread the idea of losing them all. for i know that despite of the distance that we have created among each other after high school, one thing will keep us bound together.... our sense of brotherhood....

college made me become who i am today. from then on i must say that i have gone far. tomorrow ill go farther. in tow are my past, batch masikhay and the memories that we all made together. a large part of who i will become tomorrow is because of them. them who i could say are my brothers... my sisters... (gives me the creep. im sorry if im writing mushy bullshit).... and college showed me what i thought, i would never see.. the rarity of batch masikhay, the genuineness of our friendship and the love that clothed us all.. we may never show it, but i know it exists. so to you my brothers and sisters in sabers and swords, long will this friendship live..

we were merely freshmen