2023, 6, 15 [Thursday]
Winter Wait
With their most tender touches, snowflakes
Have painted the whole night white
Including the darkest corner in sight
Even within a forgotten dream
Except the plum tree, standing alone there
Under the eastern sky,
whose
Flowers are blooming boldly against
The entire season, more vibrant than blood
East vs West: A Mega Cross-Cultural Poem
During the great flood, Noah hid himself in the
ark
While Dayu tried to contain it with his bare
hands
Prometheus stole fire from Olympian gods
While Sui Ren got it by drilling wood hard
Smart Daedalus crafted wings to fly away from
his prison-tower
While Old Fool removed the whole mountain
blocking his way
Helios enjoyed driving his chariot all along in
the sky
While Kuafu chased the sun to take it down &
tame it
Sisyphus rolls the boulder uphill because of his
deceitfulness, while
Wu Gang cuts the laurel as a punishment for distractions
in learning
50 Years Ago
He buried his heart
Like a dead tadpole
Long before he heard of
Her obituary. Under
The village tree they used to cool
Their bodies & dreams
In the summer heat, but never
Thought
of making love
Let alone a baby who’d grow up
To sing like a real frog
Mayuhe Revisited: a 50-Word Romance
Behind the shadow
Of this tall pine
I left all my dreams
About your face &
Smiles for a bright
Future (with a rosier
Romance) ahead, but
Only to return here
Five decades later
To join you in body
As in spirit, from
The opposite sides
Of that wild world
Love Deplorably Delayed
It is not really
About sex, but for all my
Passions overfilled
With blood
My bloated
Selfhood can never
Become hard
Enough
For a solid penetration
Even with the help
Of the best Viagra
Even though
Both your
Body & heart
Are more than
Ready
To welcome me
Inside out
Following My Heart
Is it myself I’m trying to catch up with? Or is
Time retreating from here, second by second
With each cloud I’m flying over?
Driven as if
By my longing, the plane flashes
Across the Pacific to land where you are
Waiting amidst flowers, all blooming
Against
our heartbeats
To
join you in body is to join
Myself in spirit as each petal accounts
For the moment missed between our moves
How I Long
To perch Like
a rain sparrow
To sleep Like
a real log
To dream Like
a summer dewdrop
Within your dark mum Blooming against night
As my entire being Dissolves down there
Accounting
I have no idea how nostalgia
Was invented, let alone how
Memories are retained or
Reinforced
But I know how
Attachment works out:
As there’re fewer & fewer
Days left ahead, we cannot
Help looking more & more
Back to the past, where we
Can find plenty of time
As if to catch a raindrop
From each storm passing by
Left Corner Luxuriant
*
The
baby crow flaps
Light with feathers
Against the heavily
Snowy twilight
*
The left corner contrast
Between dark and white
Between tiny and vast is
So
vaguely sharp
*
All dreams are frozen
The season will melt
As we’re all warming
Up for the feel
Minimalistic Manifesto
So, I’ve let go of –
Not everything, but most
Of my belongings
Such as my car, my iPad
My house, my investments
(Financial or emotional)
I’ve let go of all
My luggage
As well as my furniture
I’ve let go of hope
Dreams, expectations
Regrets & worries
I’ve let go of my masks
Identities, failures
& achievements. I’ve let
Go of even love & poetry
Except the freedom
Of my mind, as
It allows me to
Fly high above
Imagination, or far
Beyond the cosmos
Where I can create
Everything, even
A meaning
Out of anything
Or nothing at all
Entropy
Just
as every death
Grows out of life
All darkness fades
Into light
As long as your mind
Remains open
Revolving
Around
the sun
Inpainting
I have spent
My entire lifetime
Trying to restore
& fill in all
Its damaged
Deteriorating
Or missing parts
But the picture
In the heart of
My soul turns out
A snapshot of someone
Taken from his behind
Feline Connectivity
Each time I look into
the eye
Of a cat, I feel as if gazing at
My wife – when she was younger
Each
time I see her long face
I’m reminded a cat never smiles
(& despite its handsome face
Quiet character, grooming habit
Soft movements, the cat keeps
Me lost in confusion. & alas, when
I video-chat with my soulmate
She looks even more like a cat)
I know neither was born in the year
Of the cat – there’s no such year in
Chinese zodiac, nor do I really have
A rat’s mind, but I
wonder
Why I wouldn’t want to play
Before either is really
away
Feline Connectivity
Each time I look into the eye
Of a cat, I feel as
if gazing at
My wife – when she
was younger
Each time I see her long face
I’m reminded that a
cat never smiles
Despite its handsome face
Quiet character,
grooming habit
Soft movements &
all its dignity
I know she was not
born in the year
Of the cat – there’s
no such year in
Chinese zodiac, nor
do I really have
A rat’s mind, but I wonder
Why I just wouldn’t
want to play
Before she is really away
Post ChatGPT Life
It’s not really a posthumous life
I’m
living as a cyborg
But since ChatGPT can do
Everything better & faster
Than me, I wonder if I
Can live on without writing
Poetry or fiction. In
Deed, I have no idea what I can
Do if I stop learning, thinking
Imagining, recalling. Perhaps
To live now is only to feel
2023, 5, 11 [Thursday]
Pardon My French: “The Whole World Hates
America”
As soon as the Indian summer is over
A newly old Turk
Who always talks in plain English
(About anything as American as apple pie)
Will put an end to this Mexican standoff
(By way of a deep French kiss?)
Before taking French leave
And then going Dutch
(With Dutch courage, of course)
For some real black Russian
Despite all those Chinese whispers
Which are totally Greek to him
Even if he has to take a slow boat to China
Where there’re simply too many chefs
And not enough Indians
About a Few Idiomatic Places
Grinning like a Chehire cat
You believe all roads lead to Rome
But if your destiny is Wall Street
You’re bound to meet your Waterloo
Even if you detour around Madison Avenue
This is because living in the land of Nod
Everyone carries coal to New Castle
With Flying Colours
Despite all the white lies I’ve told
I actually prefer to be a black sheep
Yes, I am yellow, but I got
My right to be blue, too
Though a green hand on the job
I have a purple heart
Not that I’m red with anger
But that I’m in the pink
In a gray area, every one of us
Enjoys taking a shot in the dark
Why Chinese Are So Hardworking
To fulfill your American Dream
All you need to do is to
Work hard in
English
The imperial language of
Both yesterday & today
But to
Achieve a Chinese dream, we
Have to 努力 [nuli], that is
To labor like a slave, doubling
Our effort all the time, just
As the two hieroglyphs suggest
When they were invented
Besides a stroke of
serendipity
The Tuner: a 50-Word Story
In the mid-teens
You gave me a tuner
In Mayuhe, which I’ve
Treasured as a love-token
For five decades (when
We remained totally
Lost to each other
On Earth’s opposite sides)
Until now after horizontal
Refreshments you clarify
You had just meant to help
Set the tune for my erhu
“So, in Mayuhe you didn’t give me the tuner
as a love token?” asked Ming after exchanging his love organ with Hua. “Nope, in
1974 I just meant to help you learn to play erhu,” she confirmed. Only until now
did they recognize it as a matchmaker for their affair.
Americans vs Chinese
You love to make
Friends, but we
Pay attention only
To interest/利益
(Which
you say is made
Of
“knives & blood”
As
illustrated by
The
root & radical
Of
the two hieroglyphs
In
the Chinese language)
Whereas friendship/友谊
In our mother-tongue
Means a friend in
A ship, who actually
Has no worth. What I say is, Pal
“Friendship”
is not even
A word without an “end”
Much less a real interest
10 Shortcuts to Immortality/Eternalization
- Sit
on a lotus position and begins to count your breaths
- Double-kiss
your soulmate (French kiss both up and down)
- Climb
high to look afar at the landscape
- Listen
to the symphony of your little private garden
- Embrace
a tall tree and let your mind flow towards it
- Watch
a star and catch its rays emitted millions of years ago
- Soak
yourself in a hot spring to become part of nature
- Take
a deep breath and let your qi join the energy field of a poem (or song)
- Lie
down & Imagine a blue dewdrop dissolving into your entire inner being
- Forget
your very self
First sight
No one remembers
What we saw exactly
When we first opened
Our eyes after birth
But there’s one
Thing in common:
However dim or glaring
It is the light looming
Among shapes and shadows
That we all sighted & would
Spend a whole lifetime
Trying to follow
In the heart of our soul
Last Sound
Our hearing is said to be our most enduring
Sense, as it is the last window of life
That’s to be closed before we breathe
Our last. So, what do you want to hear?
What can you, and what would?
--Not
The sound and fury from
The Shakespearean world, but
The heartbeat of a hill, the breathing
Of a tree, and the voice of a messenger
From the other//parallel world, or
The clicking noise from eternal darkness
Rain
Sparrow: for ll
Above this wild wild world covered
With layers and layers and layers
Of red dust, my selfhood
Has long been tired
Tired of flying
Flying alone
Day & night
But where can I perch?
Do I have a nest at all?
O for a solid
Respite before
Continuing my lonely
Flight, snuggling my inner-
Most being in the heart of your
Soul, and settling my weathered
body
Right at the A-spot of your tenderness
Short-cut to Longevity
Just as every human being is the totality
Of all social relations, every selfhood is
The aggregation of all mental events
Assembling within the mind.
Given this
To prolong, to deepen, to broaden
Some of those events is to live a life
Richer, longer and far more meaningful
We’re All Products of Ideas
It is neither the skin colors we wear
Nor the substances we intake
Nor the anatomic features we’re
Born with, but the ideas, or the stories
About them told & retold, that’ve made
Us all different.
So, once a new set of
Ideas is embedded within the framework
Of our minds, we can live in harmony
With ourselves, with one another
Even
with Nature, can we not?
A Modest Wish
Beauty withers, love fades, wealth
Cannot necessarily bring health &
Health doesn’t always guarantee happiness
While happiness is rare, just as life is short
So, all I wish is to expand this antlike moment
By placing an endless order with the universe
As I ease my selfhood down on the bed of
Mendacities and hallucinations, or simply
By watching how clouds
Keep changing their hearts and shapes
Purgatory:
A Note to Mike Lee
You know I love my husband, but
You don’t
know how much I also
Love you!
Tortured by a split heart
I wonder
if mine has to be a broken one
Or, maybe,
by putting the two halves
Together,
I can somehow make my
Suffering
soul into a larger whole? [2023,
4, 10 9:00pm]
2023, 01, 12 [Saturday]
Body Politics: Left vs Right
1/ Brain
My left brain has everything right
While my right one has nothing left
2/ Heart
My left chamber’s been reserved for someone
Right, yet my right one’s for nobody on the left
3/ Foot
My left foot takes the position for the right
But my right one stands firm against the left
Living by Watching Pictures: forll
She
cherishes a cheerful heart
All the time, looking & feeling like a
generation
Younger than me. Why she hasn’t aged a day
For the past forty years is all because of her
son
She explained.
Mom, you should really
Live by looking at your life as selfies,
viewing
Them selectively from your album, where every
Photo was shot from the best angle at a happy
Moment; if you keep watching it like a movie,
you
Would see it nonstop, in every detail, as close-ups
Full of dullness, as if in slow motion, he told her
When he
was still a tenth grader. So she does
Physiognomy: To My First Crush ll
For the first twenty years of your life, your facial
Features were all that you’re born with, a
Bio-collage of your parents’ genes, but
For the rest of your life, they were a picture
Progressively drawn with your thought patterns
Living habits, personality traits & life
experiences
The most faithful expression of whatever you’ve
Internalized.
So, the
moment I saw you, I knew
You’d been living a happy & healthy life
until
Retirement. What I say is, I fell in love with
you
Again (during our encounter after half a
century of
Separation), not because of your good looks,
but
Because of your inner features that are
stunning
Khöömei
A deep double-
Throat, singing
From beyond
Heaven or hell
Echoing in nature
As it finds itself
Heard in
A human voice
Like a whale’s call
Perceivable
By its like
Even afar across
The whole Pacific
Stars Or Quanta: forll
I thought we were two
Stars that would never collide
Within each other’s light
(In this world)
However
According to new science
We are actually two
Quanta, deeply entangled
Even until after our death
(In a parallel universe)
The Dog-Walker in the Neighborhood
With a tiny shit-like plastic bag
Ready to pick after Teddy (Your
Granddaughter’s dog), you think
About nothing in the moment
As if lost in meditation about how
He sniffs at each rose, imagined
Or real, on the roadside
While marking his territory
With his urine smell, or tracing
Your train of thought, zigzagging
Along, close to the leash. It
Makes you wonder if you’re
Walking the dog or vice versa
Most Innocent Question to ChatGPT
Though
omniscient as God, & more
Versatile than all Renaissance genii
It gets a cat on the tongue …
… When
Asked by a hungry lion watching from
A senator’s seat in the colosseum:
Why, just why those humans keep
Hunting & killing each other if they
Needn’t
eat them, dead or alive?
Time & Space: Oriental Worldview
The ancient Chinese world outlook
Was the perspective from which to see
How 宇 (time)
& 宙 (space)
work
Together.
To
them, there’re always
More dead than living, since (past)
History is always longer than the
(Present) moment in the human reality
As in nature.
So, time
doesn’t’ exist
In the moment, how can space expand
Over it? Or, if space is nothing but a
Human invention, how can time extends
In it? Indeed, if both time and space
Are pseudo-concepts, how can we gain
An authentic insight into this universe (宇宙)?
Sleep Unlike a Log
You
wanna sleep without plague
Of dream or fear of never waking?
For one, I don’t! Because a dream is
A God-given gift to enrich my life
While never waking in a sleep is
The ideal way to transcend death
Even insomnia can be most creative
Intervals between dreams & deliriums
For ll: The Highest Manifestation of a Man’s
Love
For a woman is to
present his soul totally
Naked in front of her, just as I’ve done
With my inner being
to
you, peeling
Off all my masks, eradicated each and
Every identity I’ve ever had, telling you
My most shameful secrets
confessing my
Most evil deeds, disclosing my most
Contemptible whims
as if you’re my
Eva before you gave me the fucking fruit
For ll: The Highest Manifestation of a Woman’s
Love
For a man is to
offer him her own body
Without covering any parts, to the public or
In privacy, just as you did
allowing
me to
Appreciate your corporeal beauty inside out
Inch by inch, with my eyes
tongue, nose
Fingers besides my heart, ready to accept me
As I keep invading your feel
with
all
My synapses of love at each depth
until
I claim every bit of your being
Spring Attachment: for ll
At the first sight of
cherry flowers blooming
Against the chilliest moment of last season
I fell in love with spring, again (as I’ve done
With you), where I can
Expect to enjoy your
Warmth of summer, your abundance of
Autumn before another winter sets in, which
We know would be
as cold as death, but which
Would freeze our love for a posthumous life
Zenning at Night
In the depth of darkness
Sit straight
In the full lotus position
With your palms facing upwards
& you will receive
Not only photons from beyond
The Milk Way
But messages coded
With human love, turning your whole being
Into a Buddha in Samadhi
While all lost
Souls keep fluttering around like tree leaves
