As It Is Written

With a conversation that spans an advocacy, beauty and the in-betweens, a better, strong and wiser Nadine Lustre writes a new chapter to her story on her own terms

- Angelo Ramirez De Cartagena

Writing, when it comes down to it, is an exercise of exacting something (or someone) through a magnifying lens. With eyes trained to squint for anything interesting—a sudden movement, a flaw in the system, a growth unforeseen—there lies a great anticipation for smaller details rather than the cumulative whole.

While the inspection and careful study of the individual puzzle pieces is all too important to the process, the intrusive peering can make us complicit to understanding. Needless to say, there is a tendency to obsess over what could be unnecessary, sometimes blowing it out of proportion. Rather than incite a keen comprehension for the bigger picture, we often miss the greater point—the subject staring right back at you from under the lens.

“Come closer,” sings Nadine Lustre in St4y Up, her latest foray into music (which she helped write with James Reid. You know, her real-life amour). A sensual whisper set to an even rise and fall of beats and rhythm, it is as if she is daring the world to look deeper into her soul. With two fingers held together, she motions us, her audience, to inch closer, cooing in the same heavy breath earlier, telling us to “stay longer” and “go farther.” The promised trade-off? “I’ll show you how to open your eyes,” she says, without flinching her feisty gaze, naturally.