yuanspoetry©: [archived]: autobio poems by changming yuan -2©

2014, 6, 29. sunday.

Well, Well, the Well

(for Yuan Hongqi)

In the lowest terrain of

My father’s native village

Used to be an old well

As deep as the memories

Of last century, around which

Boys would be running

At noon in summer

And girls dancing under the willow

At midnight, where my father

Often sat, listening to his sick mother

Telling stories about his unknown ancestors

The well finally ran dry

After God knows how long, and

Since electricity came across the hills

And ponds, nobody has returned to it

Except mosses and lichens that have colonized

The whole territory, where only my grandma’s ghost

Shines down from time to time

Trying to guard its walled-in secrets

Now as dry as its mouth

Village Accent

Growing up in a remote Chinese village

I can never get rid of my country accent

Even since I began to speak Mandarin

As those in big cities or on television do

While attending college in Shanghai, I felt deeply hurt

Each time a teacher or classmate made fun of my dialect

But inside of my own home, I feel truly delighted

Whenver my wife or son imitates my English speech act

To make myself sound less foreign in a foreign land

I often hope to wear a mask covering my voice print

Like a big soil-colored birthmark near my mouth

Or perhaps, to have a tattoo formed around this area

Yellow Joke: A Chronicle Poem

The first three years of age reveal all in a lifetime –Chinese Proverb

Age 1

Born to a heliocentric species

You have accomplished your very first

Revolution in the solar system, like the sunflower

Growing behind the fence

Of your father’s front yard

With no milk from my mother or a cow

I had to live entirely on flour soup

Not so nutritious to my legs and hands

But helpful with the growth of my heart

Though it is congenitally ischemic

Age 2

After numerous assisted trials

You start to walk alone, walk along

Constantly tumbling,

Hurting yourself hard,

But you have to stand up

On your own, since you can now

Cry, scream, speak, give orders, ask for help

Even though it’s just a 2 word sentence

Age 3

A time of temper tantrums

Imaginative fears, nightmares

When you begin to touch shadows

With your chubby hands

With the even chubbier fingers

Of your hypertrophic heart

Kinship: For Yuan Hongqi

Yes, we are father and son, but so often

Did I doubt this simple small biofact:

We could never say more than three short

Sentences to each other when we met, nor

Did we meet more than three times per year

Before I managed to flee a thousand miles

Away from you, and later ten thousand away

From your village on this world’s other side

Like other Chinese fathers, you never said

You loved me, gave me a hug, or touched me

Unless it was a cutting pinch in the arm

Or a heavy hit on the butt, (always in surprise)

While my peers kept bragging aloud

About their great fathers, grandfathers

I looked down upon you, not because of

Your slight stature, but because of your

Smaller personality, constantly calling you

‘A Buddha outside, a Devil at home’

(Of course behind your back), so I used to

Feel guilty, fearing I could never shed

Any teardrops when you die, just as every

True Confucian son is supposed to

Unlike me and my son, with a big store of

Co-memories ready to share, to cherish

We were born enemies, karma-determined

In our former lives, just as you had explained

To my mother, (who would be busy filling

In each new crack on our wall, with a big pail

Of muddy mixture every time we met)

Yet ever since your death at the dawn of 2012

I have been haunted by your image, kindly

Smiling, and even sobbed my heart out

While dreaming last night: are you there, Dad?

Tomb Visiting: For Yuan Hongqi

Last year, before burying your ashes

Right beside Grandma’s grave site

(To guard her Buddhaship, as you had

Wished), I opened your urn for a peek

And found your biggest bone chip

Glistening against the January wind

As pink as a piece of charcoal

Now, too far to attend your anniversary

Like every other good Confucian son

Burning joss sticks and fake money

Lighting a huge pile of firecrackers

Before your tombstone, on Big Wok Peak

But I did make three loud kowtows

Towards the east, and in so doing

I saw a little rosy cloud drifting around

Like an inflated bird beating its wings

Along the horizon, amid evening glows

And wondered whether that’s your spirit

Still lingering between earth and heaven

What was it tightly holding in its beak:

A heirloom, or simply our family name?

Recalling: For Yuan Hongqi

‘Wait a while!’ Mother would shout, ‘they say

There might be more showers this afternoon.’

So I recalled, from time to time

How he would turn a deaf ear to her

And continue, dragging out quilts

Sheets, pillows, blankets, padded coats

One pile after another

Like moving forests

Hanging them on thick ropes

Tied to deformed poplars or lamp posts

‘Not again! This old man of mine just wouldn’t

Want to waste a single ray of sunlight.’

And remembered, for nearly half a century

My dad had tried each time to empty the whole house

And sun-wash everything, more like a grandma

Than like a father, even during the Cultural Revolution

Now realizing how I have been haunted

By his stark image, smiling, in blue, ever since

He nodded his head to Mother for the last time

About 5 pm on January 2 last year

I find myself choked again with gratitude:

It was my father who gave me so many a chance

To smell fresh sunlight in my boyish nightmares

January 2: For Yuan Hongqi

That was the day when my father died

Before finishing the longevity noodles

Mom’s trying to feed him below our feet

On the other face of the planet, where

He had persisted long enough to allow

Us to celebrate another new year’s day

In Jingzhou as well as in Vancouver

When my brother’s only son managed to

Travel all the way to Grandpa’s dying bed

To report how he was doing in New York

This was also the time when I and Hengxiang

Felt like making love again after another

Cold war, when Iran successfully testfired

Two long-range missiles in the Persian Gulf

To deter the invasion to be led by Uncle Sam

And his running dogs, when the very first

Plymouth Neon was made in 2000, when JFK

Became a senator in 1960, when a stamped

Took 66 human lives after a soccer game

At the Ibrox Park Stadium in Scotland

Even earlier, and when God was taking

A long overdue nap, since he knew

All was well with this wild wild world

On that day, I became the oldest male

In my entire family, ready to take my turn

To deal with death in a masculine manner

You love ‘Y’, not because it’s the first letter

In your family name, but because it’s like

A horn, which the water buffalo in your

Native village uses to fight against injustice

Or, because it’s like a twig, where a crow

Can come down to perch, a cicada can sing

Towards the setting sun as loud as it wants to

More important, in Egyptian hieroglyphics

It stands for a real reed, something you can

Bend into a whistle or flute; in pronouncing it

You can get all the answers you need, besides

You can make it into a heart-felt catapult

And shoot at a snakehead or sparrow, as long

As it is within the range of your boyhood

13 May 2012: For Liu Yu

This is the very first and last time

We celebrate a non-Chinese holiday

Here in a chosen country

At a chosen time: Today, I have had

A chance to treat my mom (visiting us

From the other side of the world

After my dad’s death) to a dinner

At Southsea Fish Village, where she tasted

Dishes like abalone and shark fin soup

Finally affordable, all freshly served

Out of my poetry, before my poet son

Cut my wife a single lilac flower

From the front yard of his teenager heart

Family Reunion: Once, and Forever

Yuan Hongqi, may your spirit, Dad, come

And join us from Pure Land in this poem

(Conceived in and dedecated to Vancouver)

With Liu Yu, my mother, who is paying us

A visit from the other side of the world

Let’s gather together behind these thin lines

Where I and Hengxiang Liao, my old girl

Have prepared a big dinner according to

Our own recipes. Please, sit here with Mom

Above my central metaphor. First, take a sip

Of Luosong Soup, our only family specialty

George Lai and Allen Qing, my two sons

Always love to drink, even Hyunjung Lee

(George’s Korean wife) finds it agreeable --

By the way, the young couple has finally

Decided to buy a condominium in Sunnydale

Now, try some consonance, and this assonance

Fried with Tofu, a course you never heard of

In your lifetime. Look, right beside you is

Julian Han Yuan, your most favored grandson

The pride of our family who’s doing his PhD

In New York, and across the table are Liu Yun

My brother and his current wife Chen Jing

Still working far away in Jingzhou, China

Dad, since you were a vegetarian, a Buddhist

Let’s have internal rhyme instead of wine, let’s

Celebrate our grand family reunion. Cheers!

Telephone Ring: A Double Century Lament

You most imprudent trespasser

On a private lawn, you most

Tyrannical ruler of

The household, each time

You ring, you sound like

An old dying father making

A loud name call

No son or daughter can

Turn a deaf ear to you

Nor can I afford to wait

Just a single moment

Even when I am busy

Sowing seeds in my girl’s most fertile field

Dreaming about winning the biggest jackpot

Making an e.transaction to avoid bankruptcy

Writing the best line for the poem of my life

Or fumbling my way directly to heaven

Yes, you are the most disturbing invention of humankind

Most necessary evil in the heart of my home

Brotherhood: For Liu Yun

how fortunate I am

to be your brother

(only occasionally visiting you

from the other side of our planet)

rather than your wife: I can never

stand your snorting

not because I would have to

choke myself constantly with insomnia

but because I would be worried to death

about the way you might stop breathing

while we are still dream-chatting

about how we were often deeply trapped

in the frog pond

of our naked boyhoods

etc.

we, yuan ii, by the grace

of god, emperor and autocrat of

all english words, king of dreamland

grand duke of assonance and

consonance, author of

allen qing yuan, architect of

george lai yuan, last scribbler of

poetic lines, et cetera et cetera

et cetera et cetera etc

herein proclaim ourselves as no extra ordinary line

but an ellipsis...

friday: 8 december 2012

above a bushy valley

i rose, without a body

under a sky shining blue

with moonlight, all muted

it is definitely not my imagination, rather

it is my consciousness gathering together

at a transparent, shapeless spot of time, gliding

like a bird along the bank covered with reeds

drifting around until it entered, invisibly of course

a three-storied house walled with dark glass

almost half planted in a big pit, where i met

a group of children, playing hide-and-seek with them

then i retreated through the back window like a smoke

flowing into the air, vanishing into another universe

a vision neither wakeful nor dreamy

is this ultimate meditation?

parcenary

my destination was preset

you will receive a parcel

by express. It turns out

all too expressly, and

the sender was my parents

who had wrapped themselves

inside already

[meditating in marpole]

you hear him listening to the song

of another universe...

discordant ecstasy as you visualize

before he wakes up

to the flowering of lilac

in his front yard

after the hibernation

[h's heart]

not unlike a lost cat

her heart is ready to stalk

behind the walking shadow

of the first angler it happens to see

on an empty street

who always has

a few leftover baits

in his fishy basket

while returning home

Red

seeing the strange belts

like little mouth masks

hung on bamboo poles

I often wondered:

what kind of clothing was that

so funny looking

in front of almost every straw-thatched cottage

but you boys don't bother about that

until one of my aunts told me

on a showering afternoon

it was only until I began dating

with a girl in a major city, so close

to beijing many years later

did I get to know them

to be no other than menstrual rags

(a taboo of human blood?)

although they actually looked

more like shrunken flags

than thick masks

that's all I remembered about my boyhood

my native village, my motherland

Father’s Soliloquy: For YCM

The other night, before the cock crowed, or

The crow cocked out of darkness, a yellowish

Shape stalked in vision, as in blank verse

‘Mark me,’ it says, sounding almost exactly

Like my late father. ‘Lend thy very serious

Hearing to what I shall unfold.’ Suddenly alerted

I got up among figures, between dream and sleep

‘When you were a teenager, I hated you so much

For looking at me always with your eye whites

Giving me an ugly face each time I talked to you

So much so that I cursed you numerous times in

My dream for being such an unworthy son; I often

Doubted if you were my own flesh until you grew

Into a normal loving adult, making me feel guilty

All my life; also, I was suspicious of your mom

Betraying me, not only in heart but also in body

I almost caught her making love with some guy

On our own bed - -You still remember that small

Apartment we used to live in? Among all my dadly

Secrets, these two I want to reveal to you first

Next time, I will tell you more about the limbo

Between hell and heaven, with the lightest word

Which might harrow up thy spirit, burn up thy

Blood…’ now the cock crows, and I must vanish

Entering Adulthood: To George and Allen

The most important tip for you, Sons

Is to forget all the tips any father

Any book, any computer can give you

About this world, but just remember

This: the moment you step

Out of the boundary of our little home

You will have to remain

On high alert, even while dreaming

What you will cross is a snakeland, where

There is as much sunshine, fresh air

As many blue skies, green leaves

Fragrant flowers, handsome

Human figures, as cobras, mambas

Taipans, adders, kraits and vipers

Notice to End a Tenancy: for Steve Mondor

Hi there, I am publishing this short poem

Not because I truly need to bribe you

Into moving out of the house of my heart

(As you proposed – I am not sure if you

Meant what you were saying), but because

I want to voice my tribute to the way

You have served 2 terms for the country

We both love, and kept fighting against

Posttraumatic stress disorder we both hate

Indeed, by becoming part of my poetry

Will you give me more time to focus on

My poems as you on your customers’ cars?

Personality Overdrafting

Born with a deformed heart muscle

You are as timid, introvert and cowardly

As a little quiet chick, but all your life

You have been trying to play tough, forcing

Yourself to be tough-minded, tough-bodied

Like an iron fighter rooster in the legend

Until now your worsening ischemia

Drives you into your old premature selfhood

With cardio neurosis, trembling, all

Thanks to a tenant, a sociopath, a rattlesnake

More evil than Satan, whose greatest joy

Is to destroy you as a petty landlord

Of a rental property full of foreign words

My Fortune Teller Says

According to the eight Chinese pictographs

Set right at the moment of my birth

My original being is actually a huge body

Of water, predetermined to move

Around like a strong stream, with an

Ambitious and transparent heart, I was meant

To find great joy in traveling through woods

Absorbing metal elements along the way

Until I join the western sea, but I should

Avoid earth, which hinders my progress

Preventing me from reaching my destiny

Water-fated as I am, let me keep flowing

Forward, among words, woods, and worlds

2013

Black is this year, both because

The ominous number has flooded the world

With America’s QE3, Snowden’s dark secrets

And war threats from Obama, the Nobel peace

Prize winner and, more important, and because

This is the year of the snake, the most difficult

Year in my entire life when I have been badly

Bitten by 3 vcious vipers; one has run away

With a piece of meat from my heart

Another trying to strangle me

Into a slow death, and the third still waiting

To swallow my hardened body

With its young and ambitious mouth, all

Sloughed out of the attractive terror of white

September 7

The other night, I dreamed I carried my teenager

Son in a big brown-colored paper bag under my

Left arm, trying to plod my way to the hospital

In the rain in a strange town; as I trudged forward

I found him somehow shrinking into two femurs

And vanishing into the sky, like the yellow crane

In a legend of my native land. In grief, I cried my

Heart out, until I saw him returning to my mom’s

Mud-floored, straw-thatched home, big and strong

Smiling in his boyish face. Suddenly thrown into

Such ecstasy, I could not help kneeling down, kow-

Towing to him as if he were my Buddhist master

When I told my mother the next day, she laughed

Aloud on the world’s other side: it was good omen

Meaning our Allen Is going to survive and succeed

Twilight: for Liu Yu

My heart muscle contracts, excruciatingly

Like an overly-wound spring, ready to break

Each time I imagine my mom walking alone

Towards the dusty evening, while she used to

Go downstairs first, waiting aloud for my dad:

‘Grandpa, what are you still busy doing there?

It’s time to take a walk outside, along the moat!’

Now without a companion, my mother does not

Have to wait or hurry for anyone, but how she

Just misses the days when her shadow and my

Father’s became longer and longer, side by side

As they strolled slowly, until the sun set lower

And lower above the blurred horizon of autumn

Walking with Father: For Yuan Hongqi

One thing I forgot to mention, Dad

Is I intentionally moved either before

Or behind you, each time we happened

To be walking together. That way, you could

Neither pinch my arm not slap my face

So readily; otherwise, you would have to

Embarrass yourself if you ran forward

Or waited to do so, as you tried to

Educate me in anger. Since my departure

From my home town beyond the pacific

How often have I hoped to walk again, just once

Side by side with you, getting or offering support

Whenever either of us needed it

But now I could only follow your footprints behind

Step by step, while you wait to beat me in heaven, smiling

First Touch of Femininity: For Chen Yeqiong

I do not remember how it started

Nor am I sure about how it ended, but

It was on almost every evening

Of that summer, you would answer

My secret signal by waiting there for me

Beside trembling reeds, on a sandy dune

Wrapping my entire boyhood

With your girlhood, tightly

While I buried all the 13 years

Of my life between your bloated breasts

Although we both held our breaths

In nervousness and tranquility

We had no more urge

Than to take a break

In each other’s teenaged tenderness

Saying not a single word

Not even knowing how to make love

But just letting the breeze flirting with our feeling

Between sleep and wake. That’s as early

As half a century ago, on the other side of

This world, until now you find yourself called

Softly, in a foreign tongue after your death

Inviting My Father’s Spirit

Never did we get along, Dad, before

You gave us all up, and seldom did

We even talk, so you had no idea of

How your son really felt about you

As a father, in particular, about your

Grooming habits: each time you

Returned from your office or trips

You skinned us off and washed all

Our clothes, sheets, towels, mops

Cleaning furniture (including

Every foot’s bottom), polishing

Lamp covers and cooking utensils

Though you often forgot to put them

Back in good and tidy order; true

I learned to love your cleanness

But never the way you were so busy

Doing all this like an old woman

Now you are taking a long break

Up there, (where I supposed all

Is perfectly clean); do you, do

You enjoy watching me cleaning

Everything down here to keep

My home and heart dust-free?

Memo to Yuan Hongqi

Another thing I forgot to mention, Dad

Was I always believed you to be an

Extra-ordinary father, but in a highly

Embarrassing way: each time you saw

Me hanging around with my buddies

You kept saying this like a big broken

Gramophone: “Follow Chairman Mao’s

Teachings; Follow the Party’s great

Lead,” just as you drove me crazy

By trying to convert me into a true

Communist like yourself, even

When we happened to be eating

At the same table. Still remember?

You once forced me to kneel down

On the hard ground until I finished

Reciting Mao Zedong’s “Three Old

Essays.” It was then I began to defy

You blindly, to follow no other than

My own heart, in a boyish rebellion

Against your fatherly dictatorship

Against any other form of tyranny

Private Talk: for Yuan Hongqi

Show yourself, Dad, I know you are around

Always trying like a true angel to protect

Me; let it be like those days when I was still

A teenager, but I will tell you all you wanted

To know about my feeling; for instance, I don’t

Like you to force me to recite Chairman Mao’s

Quotations, and I hope you would put Jin Yong

Rather than Karl Marx under my young pillow

Yes, let it be as if we were both younger, healthier

Suffering from no ischemia, our family curse

But having plenty of blood flowing behind our

Yellowish chests; let it be that we have no secrets

As father and son, and work together to help

Our offspring survive and succeed in this degrading

World, so full of snakes, snares and snobs

Intimacy: in the Name of Art

Once upon a long long time ago

At a drab karaoke corner in the far far east

Half-heartedly, without knowing this was

Actually a prearrangement made by

His old mischievous schoolmates

He climbed upon a colt-like girl

From his small native town

Squeezing several drops of yellow syrup

Into a tiny plastic bag embedded

Between her thick legs, like a primitive robot

Fulfilling a domestic task; there was

Neither foreplay, nor after-joy,

No orgasm, no dirty talk, no eye contact

No exchange of names, feelings, experiences

Except a big-solidarity, as red-faced

As the muted memory of his red pasts

When they departed in a dull evening

Did he eventually write a poem about this experience

As he had hoped?

Song of a Tone-deaf: for Allen and George Yuan

There is often such a time when you, a no-songster

Would want to sing aloud to yourself, a song

That everyone else might also love to sing; the song

Whose lines you never remember, nor can you

Control your pitch as it rises and falls randomly

On its own, nor will you keep the tune on the

Right track; the song whose rhythm you do not

Care to follow, while lost in your little privacy

The song that has an evasive melody

Deeply encoded in your heart

Although you sound like a duck or donkey

Your voice is full of euphonies

Marpole, Vancouver: for Liu Yu

It rains a lot in Vancouver

Often does this rain remind me of

The days when you sojourned here

With my family, after Father left all of us

While walking in the rain, you would

Recall, under my big umbrella

How you once waited in a drizzle

With me in a broken basket on your back

To cross the widening river, not far

From our village when I was crying hard

For a large spoonful of flour soup (you were too

Weak and too hungry to produce any milk)

Seeing you do nothing about my hunger

The ferry man asked, Where is its mom?

I am his mother! You replied, tears rolling down

With the raindrops on your childish face

How old are you then? – Almost 17.

It is raining again in Vancouver, and beyond this rain

Your voice echoes aloud on the other side of this world

Childhood Secrets

When I was three or four, I buried

Several hard-gained marbles

Near our rented room, hoping one day

They would grow into magic trees

Half a century later, I dug them all out

On a dull afternoon. The moment

I put the first one on my table, a flock

Of crows flew up; when I thought of

The second, it burned like a forest fire

Now I hesitate to write the word ‘immortality’

Lest my last marble should melt with diamonds

Cock-A-Doodle-Doo

Born in a year of the rooster

You were fated to crow

But not so high in the sky

Like any other bird flying fast by

Rather, you perch low

Low on a broken fence

(Still reserved for ghosts and spirits)

Crowing as aloud as you can

To welcome every sun

Looming above the dawn

Yes, you are vociferous, both because of

Your breed, and your personality