The drawers
In the rented rooms of
those drawers
Out of the top drawer
would be full of awe
if sketched awkwardly
by the warder
only for reward
during the war
&SEPA rated
Tire dof
Havi ngto
Actc onstantly
Then
ewly
Oldc ouple
Fina llyreturned
Toth emselves
Whil ethe
Stag esstill
Rema in
Betw eenthem
&Should ‘I’ Join the
Word: An Anagram Poem
The flute would become
futile
The printed could turn
intrepid
The gale might grow agile
The glue would feel like
guile
The stratagem might smell
like a magistrate
The brush could look like
hubris
The barter would sound
like an arbiter
&Partner Perspective: For
Hengxiang Liao
When we were younger
My wife and I used to
Look at each other as true
equals
Since we were both 1.64
meter tall
No matter where we stood
Now we are getting newly
old
She begins to look down on
me
Because I have been
shrinking
In every conceivable way
She can perceive
&Power/Fame/Wealth
Does exist like water:
It has a solid form
It certainly can flow
And it also evaporates
&Husband and Wife
Whether made of bamboo or
ivory
They are a pair of Chinese
chopsticks
That have to function
together every time
To taste the dishes put on
the dinner table
&Worldly Affairs (1): The
Bare Truth about the USA
You are truly the world’s
greatest country ever
That is because you are
the only superpower in time
[Because] you can print as
much money as you want
[Because] you are ready to
hit anyone you are sure to win
[Because] you have the
hardest fist and the longest arms
[Because] you have all the
smartest people on the earth
[because] you offer the
most attractive beneficial packages to new comers
[Because] your
sociopolitical system is the most impressive to the senses
[Because] your founding
fathers were the best designers of human society
[Because] your designers
were inspired by humanity’s noblest ideals
[Because] those ideals
were developed out of suffering, injustice and slavery
Because all this is from
the darkest age, the darkest part of the world
&Worldly Affairs (2):
Warning America
This is the 2nd
battlefield rule for American GIs: “Don’t fuck with the local, or
you’ll be fucked!”
You used to be the hope of
the human kind
You used to lead our
modern civilization
You used to be seen as a
Christ-like hero
You used to stand for
freedom, democracy, justice and equality
But ever since you dropped
that big boy of yours
Over Hiroshima and beyond
the iron curtain
Thus having had your
fullest taste of sweet blood and bitter victory
You have been fucking
around
Yes, you have been fucking
around all the time
Across the table and the
globe alike
Treating all others and
othernesses as Hyenas
Tricking the strong
Bullying the weak
Setting fire in every yard
you can find
Playing the big boss in
front of your friends, neighbors, followers, admirers
And behaving like a wicked
villain behind the backs of your rivals and the unsubjugated
Wherever you have been
You leave it in a filthy
mess
Like a startled rapist
Forgetting even to pull up
Your own pants
As you keep fucking
around, America
And enjoying all the
thrills of
Being the only superman
for the moment
Your friends’ grudges
are growing behind your back
Your victims are grinding
their teeth at night
You admirers are getting
half-hearted on a daily basis
Until the weak become
strong
Until the east wind
depresses the west wind
Until the road finally
turns around the mountain if not otherwise
You will then have to pay
all the debts
To those you have been
borrowing from
With insults and injuries
Even though you have no
such intention
If you keep fucking around
like this, America
You’ll be fucked by the
whole world one day
Sooner or later
&Worldly Affairs (3): Fuck
Off, You America
You believe you are the
savior of the human world
While you are the
destroyer of most living civilizations
You say you represent the
biggest peace-keeping force on earth
While you are the most
shameful and shameless trouble-maker
You act as if you are a
highly respectable cop
While you behave like a
despiteful criminal
You stand out among all
nations
While you try to keep
everyone else down
You claim to uphold
freedom, democracy and human rights
While you treat all other
fellow beings worse than animals
You feel proud of the way
you have been able to live
While you forget your
lifestyle is based on the suffering of all others
You enjoy setting fire in
everyone else’s yard in broad daylight
While you prohibit all
others from lighting a lamp at midnight
You encourage your own
people to be unique or different
While you force all others
to convert to your tastes
You never stop throwing
stones at others’ windows
While you yourself live in
a big glass house
You seldom hesitate to
strike against anyone you dislike
While you are always ready
to duck down before the valiant
You call yourself the
greatest leader of humanity
While you are nothing but
just a new member of our community
You allege your economy
and high tech have made the world more livable
While the world might well
have been a more peaceful planet without you
Fuck off, you America
&Worldly Affairs (4): A
Zeugma Sketch of Uncle Sam
Every time you stage a
play or an election in your own yard
You cannot wait to shake
hands with your audiences and their wealth
No matter whether it is
the passage of a new bill or an old dilemma
You excel particularly at
manipulating public will and private property
With your weeping eyes and
hands
You keep waging war and
peace far beyond your boundaries
While you kill
non-Americans and their hope together
To turn all others and
othernesses into biblical dust
More often than not, you
selfish intentions prove
Much more destructive than
your smart bombs
You invisible fighter jets
strike far farther
Than your visible arms of
peace effort
You are simply too great
for a small criticism
Too super-powerful for a
weak opposition
Too democratic for a
totalitarian competition
And too single-minded for
a double standard
&Worldly Affairs (5):
Japan: A National Portrait
A damned, doomed snake
Not only wants to swallow
the elephant
But also tries to bite
At the eagle flying high
in the sky
The bear swimming far in
the northern sea
And the dragon dreaming
deep in its sleep
&Foreign feast/ Worldly
Affairs (6): Today’s Special
Appetite:
North Korean pickle soup
Iranian hard nuts
Venezuelan sour coffee
Main Courses:
American democracy steamed
with socialism
Chinese communism fried
with free market
Deserts:
Sushi with Oettinger
Curry with Brigadeiros
Fortune Cookie Slip reads:
Libya
There is a second one:
s-i-r-y-a?
&Nine Paradoxes: An
Autobiographical Poem
Born to a homeless family
from one of China’s poorest villages
But now living in the
richest area in the world’s “most livable” city
Used to be considered a
quasi-dumb boy incapable of talking
But now making a living by
talking myself to death all day long
Failed to pass every
English test in a remote Chinese high school
But now holding a PhD in
English from a Canadian university
A laugh stock because of
my bad compositions in teenager years
But now having achieved my
family, career and even fame through my writing skills
Always living like a
puritan doing everything possible to maintain good health
But now seeing doctors
everywhere for genetically-carried on diseases
Desired to live a high
profiled life as a political leader
But now living like a
totally marginalized recluse
Published hundreds of
poems in as many journals in 15 countries
But never won a prize to
have a collection put out by a book publisher
Dearly loving my wife, my
sons, my country and my fellow humans
But never experienced a
sense of being ever loved or even liked by anyone
Possessing a supposedly
strong character with a high IQ and EQ
But could not even find a
decent position in either Asia or America
&Karma-Converted
A few evenings ago, a monk
in orange
Came to pat on my left shoulder
Identifying me in a muted group of
Stranger pilgrims journeying to nowhere
As the one having a doomed heart
Came to pat on my left shoulder
Identifying me in a muted group of
Stranger pilgrims journeying to nowhere
As the one having a doomed heart
On that clear
moon-cleansed night, my heart
Was beating like a horse wildly running around
As he assured me I could definitely live
For at least another five years
But no more than nine or ten
The next morning, I conveyed this truth
To my wife, who readily shrug it off
As just another quasi dream of mine
But I took it as an oracle or miracle
Because right then I became a Buddha
Was beating like a horse wildly running around
As he assured me I could definitely live
For at least another five years
But no more than nine or ten
The next morning, I conveyed this truth
To my wife, who readily shrug it off
As just another quasi dream of mine
But I took it as an oracle or miracle
Because right then I became a Buddha
&Spring Breaking
Hark! The very first
cracking laughter
In the ice on the unknown
river
Far beyond the prairies of
last winter
Is so much louder
Than it is wide to the
beholder
Is it because it is
resonating
With our own heartbeats?
&Flying over the Pacific
From Vancouver to Shanghai
I lost an entire yesterday
From Beijing to San
Francisco
My son gained a double
today
As we keep flying across
the globe
We find our tomorrows
Will never be the same
As between the east and
the west
&The Last Snowflake of Last Winter
Fell as if a whole century
ago
To the heart of all
hardened shadows
But it has never melted
there
With the least lukewarm
dream
Even when summer is
arriving
Is it simply because it is
white as wish
Rather than red as blood
Or because its name is not
writ in water?
&Orange
The swirling light of a
setting sun
Turns every pip of summer
Into a halfmoon-shaped
dreamer
Dreaming
About a full and golden
wheel
Keep running towards
another season
Wrapped within the rind
are ten fleshy carpels
Ten thousand juicy
associations
&Parallel Poems (9): You
function with me
You function with me
Like the other Chinese
chopstick
Together, we taste
Every dish put on our
dinner table
&Husband and Wife
Whether made of bamboo or
ivory
They are a pair of Chinese
chopsticks
That have to function
together every time
To taste the dishes put on
the dinner table
&Parallel Poems (10): Your Frontyard
This frontyard in your
heart
Has a spot where I yearn
to dwell
But around it is there a
tall fence
Between light and shadow
That protects your inner
house
Against anyone wishing to
trespass
On a windy afternoon
Behind this fence is a
residence
Within a light shadow
without shadow light
&Sorghum
Swarms of baby bees
Attracted to the head of
every sugar cane
All busy sucking the sweet
from mother earth
Or collecting sunlight for
a rainy day
Far beyond the fields of
late summer
They stand tall above
evening arrays
As if to salute the new
crescent moon
Like red reeds, with red
seeds
&Ischemia
In my line of people,
especially on my father’s side
There never seems to have
been ample blood
Running within the
arteries behind our Chinese chests
No matter how warm-hearted
we actually are
As in the case of my
father, who used to
Accuse me of being an
ill-hearted teenager
My heart muscle is
imbalanced
As one side is less
infused with blood
Than the other, thus
causing palpitation
Short breath, and a strong
sense of
Tightness, heaviness or
tiredness about life
To diagnose my
cardiovascular
defection
Neither an echo nor a
stress test is needed
For I am keenly aware of
my own doomed
Arteries that have been
clotted
With too many syllables
Voiced or voiceless
And to make all these
sounds flow out of my heart
Is already stressful
enough
Nevertheless, I will keep
pumping out these words
Be they ever so
blood-soaked
&Living a Posthumous Life
The moment it is confirmed
I could die any moment of
my newly
Discovered heart disease,
I began to
Perceive a dull wall
between my senses
And the world around me
I write, so I still am,
but this distance
Or lack of feeling of
immediacy
Has caused me to die
Well before my heart stops
beating
Like a dripping tab
&Curse in Verse: An
Ischemic Tradition*
As if this had been a
family curse
You have all the symptoms
of ischemia:
Palpitations, short
breaths, irregular heartbeats
Although no test results
show you
Having a physiological
cause of the problem
While your family doctor
keeps wondering
Why you do not have enough
blood
Flowing around behind your
Chinese chest
You know your heart muscle
as a sponge
From which you have
squeezed out
Too many of your
blood-rooted words
Like your father, like
your son
* While my dying father Yuan Hongqi has
never been able to get his poetry published, my 16-year-old younger
son Allen Qing Yuan, who suffers greatly from disc problems, has
already had his poems appearing in a number of countries.
&Part of You Are Dead
Hardened like a stone in
the kidney
Cold like the steel watch
frame on the wrist
That part of you have
finally died
A long and slow death
After battle after battle
Against infection
Against disappointment
But you still carry that
part within you
Until the day you bury it
together
With your whole dead body
&Baby Wife: domestic
democracy
She is always in perfect
health
Except she is
super-allergic to criticism
Indeed, even a suggestion
about a small error
Would cause her to resent
against you for a whole month
If you say this dish
tastes a bit too salty
She would yell: “From
now on, you do the cooking!”
When you advise her not to
buy junk food for your teenager son
She would buy more for the
months to come
After you hint that she
might have written another wrong check
She would refuse to make
love for an entire season
Before you attempt to have
a nice chat with her
She would make a sarcastic
remark
That she has been refining
since last year
So you keep communication
at the minimum level
Just to maintain normal
family functions
Until you two feel too
happy to continue the cold war
About how much more assets
you have newly accumulated
Never make
any negative hints about your woman
Or you will be drowned to
a slow death in this swirling cycle
&At an Autumn Auction
This pair of human hands
used to belong to
Neither da Vinci, nor
Mozart, nor Napoleon
Nor Newton, nor Van Gogh,
nor Thomas Edison
Nor Shakespeare, nor Doug
Henning, of course nor Li Bai
Look, the blood is
still dripping!
But it once warmed the
heart of a frozen crow
Opened the door to a
stranger starving to death
Added a handful of soil to
a withering rose
Waved to a breeze blowing
from nowhere
Wouldn’t it be a big
fool to buy these hands?
Most important, the hands
carry with them authentic spirits
Inherited from gods though
still unknown to us, and the owner
Has cut them off to donate
to an honorable human cause
Our initial price is set
at ten hundred thousand
200, 200? 300, 300?
350, 350? 400,400?
&Within the Rain Zone
&Within the Rain Zone
On the local screens, one
beside another
It shows low clouds
drifting like fog
That can be seen on the
walls of highrises
Here the rain downpours as
if all the tabs
In the heavens have been
turned on
Curtains of beads, giving
us more privacy
More freedom, more
serenity
And what can we do? Let us
remain indoors
Listening to the raindrops
beating together with our hearts
Watching our entire
neighborhood cleansed, taking on
A fresh look, while just
five streets east, to us
Is never far enough, a
place of sound and fury
A vanity fair all too
familiar to our old selves
Here our children playing
with us, innocent and full of joy
A new surrounding where we
are still strangers
A corner where there are
neither friends nor frenzy
Where we can always sit at
a distance, observing
&CY’s
Obituary
Born in an
impoverished Chinese village
with the
makings of a poet
to hongqi and
liu yu
who
predeceased by true lyrics
Fondly
remembered in facebook, body art, heavy metal music
Passed with a
last line struggling fiercely
in a heart
without enough blood to nourish his words
A celebration
of word’s worth
will be held
at the http://bquest-yuan.blogspot.com
from 9:57 am
to 9:59 pm
Bionote
googleable on any computer
&In
Memoriam
In loving
memory of
Beauty Good
Truth
000,001 –
100,000
We miss you
each and every day
Art History
Religion
&Heart
Room for Rent
Newly painted
with fresh blood
Furnished
with pure feelings
No blocked
arteries
One score
poems per month
All
understandings included
&Help
wanted
Are you
sensitive
Or do you
enjoy writing?
Up to 800
poems /wk
No
obligations!
Work with
words
No public
intended
All word
processing positions avail.
Start immed.
No experience needed
Editor
1-800/888-9999
&10
Public Prohibitions
No smoking
No trespassing
No drinking and driving
No speaking in a language
other than English
No fucking in public
No lightning a lamp at
night outside the United States
No writing poetry
No talking beyond the
virtual reality
No masking while
masturbating
No thinking as long as
there are media
&English
vs Chinese (1)
All the most significant
differences
Between the English and
Chinese
Languacultures originate
from one little fact:
In English, the first
person singular
Has only one letter, is
always capitalized
And can never be omitted
in a sentence
While in Chinese there are
at least
108 interchangeable
expressions
To stand for the
personality
Speaking or writing behind
a human figure
That may or may not be
presented at all
In a meaningful utterance
&20
Imperial Imperatives
Come on
Let there be right
Don’t be afraid
This above all: to thine
own self be true
Speak the devil
Watch your thoughts, your
words, your actions, your habits and your character goods
Pee eight glasses of water
every day to keep yourself fit
Never ascribe to malice
that which can be explained by impotence
Don’t fart in front of
her Majesty
Those who believe in
telekinetics, praise my hand
Be the ex-change you wish
to see in the world
Beware of hog
Do not seek to follow in
the footsteps of the men of bold
Say you love me
Do not dance with a pig –
you’ll both get excited, but the pig will not enjoy it
sit
Forget yourself and write
only for the public
Do not fuck with locals
Let a hundred flowers
gloom
&English
vs Chinese (2): Similar Similes
As bitter as wormwood as
goldthread rhizome
As bold as brass as the
city wall
As happy as a cow as a
lark
As old as the hills as the
sky and the land
As tall as the Maypole as
the wire pole
As cunning as a dead pig
as a fox
As drunk as a mouse as mud
As thirsty as a camel as a
dragon
As dumb as an oyster as a
bottle
As hungry as a bear as a
wolf
As industrious as an ant
as a bee
As timid as a rabbit as a
mouse
As stupid as a goose as a
pig
As stubborn as a mule as
an ox
As hardworking as a horse
as a water buffalo
As wet as a drowned rat or
hen
As listless as a hen or
ant on the girdle
&English Irrationalities:
Outlining a Formal Essay
Introduction:
There might be love in
between gloves
But no egg in eggplant, or
ham in hamburger
Body:
- English muffins did not originate from England, nor French fries from France; sweetmeats are actually candies while sweetbreads are meat though not sweet at all; readers read, singers sing, but typewriters do not type, nor fingers fing; a mouse can multiply into mice, but a grouse never into grice;
- People may recite at a play and play at a recital
Their
noses run while their feet smell
They
park on the driveway, or drive on the parkway
Ship
by truck and send cargo by ship
- Teachers may be taught, but preachers are never praught
One
goose may stand between two geese
So
may one tooth between two teeth
But a
booth can never between two beeth
Conclusion:
If vegetarians eat
vegetables
What would some
humanitarians do to humans?
&English Irrationalities
There might be love in
between gloves
But no egg in eggplant, or
ham in hamburger
English muffins did not
originate from England
Nor French fries from
France
Sweetmeats are actually
candies
While sweetbreads are meat
though not sweet at all
Readers read, singers sing
But typewriters do not
type, nor fingers fing
A mouse can multiply into
mice
But a grouse never into
grice
People may recite at a
play and play at a recital
Their noses run while
their feet smell
They park on the driveway,
or drive on the parkway
Ship by truck and send
cargo by ship
Teachers may be taught,
but preachers are never praught
One goose may stand
between two geese
So may one tooth between
two teeth
But a booth can never
between two beeth
If vegetarians eat
vegetables
What would so-called
humanitarians do to humans?
&Semantic
Absurdities
When stars are out, they
are visible, but when lights are out, they are not
When your wind up your
watch, your start it, but when you wind up a poem, you end it
Houses can burn up as they
burn down, where you fill in a form by filling it out
A slim chance is the same
as a fat one, but a wise man is by no means a wise guy
Quite a few and quite a
lot are alike, but to overlook is not to oversee
The weather can be hot as
hell in summer and cold as hell in winter
Before we die, our alarm
clock goes off by going on
&Talking
about What Is Absent Only
Have you ever seen a
horseful carriage or a strapful gown?
Met a sung hero or
experienced requited love?
Run into someone
combobulated, gruntled, ruly or picable?
Who are those that ARE
spring chickens or who would actually hurt a fly?
&My
Dates
Between
1957
And
2021
Is
A
Line
Short
But
Containing
Numerous
Dotted
Words
&Individual vs Society
You are an island
Entire of yourself
But never really far
From a continent
&Winds vs Trees
The most annoying sigh of
nature
The wind keeps bugging
every tree
Into taking its shapeless
shape
&Every I Have a Triple Me
There is one me
As I am
A second
As I see myself
And a third
As I am seen
&Actual
Lifespan
There are those who
Are buried long before
they die
Or right when they die
Or long after they die
There are also those who
Die but are never buried
And those who are buried
Although they never die
&Private Assets
The past is a closed
account
The future is a postdated
check
Only the present is the
cash
That you can spend right
now
&Parachuting in Twilight
Since he was dropped
Into the enemy airspace
He has been falling down
Down towards an unknown
land
But with a parachute
Weaved with elastic words
He is sure of a landing
Safe and sound
Even in a swamp
Of rotten syntaxes
&Steeper See-Saw: Another
Parallel Poem
(for John Hollander)
The higher the income, the
lower the morals
The taller the building,
the shorter the attention span
The bigger the house, the
smaller the family
The more wealth, the less
joy
The more conveniences, the
less leisure
The more knowledge, the
less judgement
The more medicine, the
less health
The more protection, the
less security
The faster the
transportation, the slower the communication
The closer the network,
the looser the relationships
The cleaner the
environment, the dirtier the mind
The wider the highway, the
narrower the perspective
&Afternoon Reading
A crow’s shadow
Falling down onto
His widely opened book
Like a white seagull
Trying to peck out a fish
From the foamy wave
He closed the collection
To catch the shadow
But it fled far away
As a sudden gust of wind
Flipped through the pages
Where the fish survived
The printed words
Under the cherry blossom
tree
&My
heart Is the Only House I Have
My heart is the only house
I have
Where I spend most of my
free time
Ordering, straightening
the inner spaces
Clearing out the old shoes
and ragged clothes
As well as other
nonfunctional utensils
To make room for the new
or newer, dusting
All the surfaces except
the attic
Where I keep the toys,
school reports
For my two sons, where I
have never returned
My heart is the home to my
soul
It is mortgaged against my
whole life
Changming
Yuan
1550 W 68th
Ave
Vancouver, BC
Canada V6P 4V5
Snorting in the Sky
Flying between sea and sky
Between day and night
Amid heavenly or oceanic
blue
I lost all my references
To any timed space
Or a localized time
Except the non-stop
snorting
Of a stranger neighbor
Then, beyond the snorts
rising here
And more looming there
I see tigers, lions,
leopards
And other kinds of
hanger-throated predators
Darting out of every
passenger’s heart
Running amuck around us
As if released from a huge
cage
As if in a dreamland
&A Parallel Poem: Face &
Mask
Masks are the
only garment that never goes out of fashion – Anonymous
Your masks
Are
All so much
Like
Real faces
That
Nobody
Can tell
Which face
Is
Or
Is not
A mask
&A Parallel Poem: Time vs
Space
Divided into narrow cars
Time is where
All men and women
Get on or off
As the train keeps
Running forward
Along the rails of
An endless space
Except one butterfly that
can fly
Freely from one car to
another
&We Are All Being Watched
Hanging above the horizon
Or rather, below the thin
borderline
Between light and darkness
Are billions of human
skulls
Like so many lanterns,
stars
Simply too far to be
noticed
Each emitting no more
light
Nor any more darkness
Nor any vision held there
But each is full of holes
Like so many eyes, minds
That used to contain
thought
They are all looking down
upon us
Speechless, as if
observing
&Americans Advertising
America: Free Verse Found on I-39
MADISON
GUNS 533-0320
EXIT
149 MIGDNIGHT SPECIAL
$TRIPPERS EXIT
“NEED
WE SAY MORE” NOW
TRUCKERS
WELCOME LEFT 2BLKS
MC SUPER SIZED
&25
Luxuries to Enjoy
Sipping from a glass of
dews collected from unpolluted petals
Watching clouds for the
whole morning
Listening to unknown birds
chirruping outside an opened window
Imagining flowing with the
sparkling stream water jingling along
Feeling pitiful to those
busy with seeking name or making money out there
Eating a big favorite meal
with neither health nor figure concerns
Walking among rape flowers
in full blossom
Experiencing a moment of
no desire, no idea, no feeling, or no selfhood
Reviewing the secret
recipe for being happy
Practicing your personal
religion
Rebuilding part of
yourself with heavenly light
Treating yourself like a
god
Doing some volunteer work
Setting free a fish or
bird
Crying your heart out over
nothing or anything
Speaking out what you
think, and thinking what you would speak out
Refusing to do anything
you would prefer not to
Playing like a chimpanzee
in the open for a good evening
Fulfilling a promise made
to yourself when you were a child
Letting go your deepest
concern
Becoming one and same with
the cool and soft moonlight for ten minutes
Smelling the sunshine from
a freshly sun-bathed quilt
Breaking your inner being
into the smallest pieces possible
Getting a new birth by
using sunlight to rebuild your entire body
Dreaming a wildest dream
&Inner
Window
Deep in his heart
Is there a small closed
attic
He has ready access to
But seldom goes for a
visit
Let along order things out
there
On a leisurely weekend
With no door of any kind
This attic has a big
window
Facing towards the rising
sun
But it is sealed tightly
With his spirit’s
secrets
Or hidden behind his
secret spirit
Always ready to be opened
Before it is too late
&Self-Meditating: A Puti
Poem
Imagine
Sitting under a tall pipal
On a vast stretch of
prairies
Where you transform your
entire selfhood
Into the little marigold
in front of you
Then, the running stream
water
The gliding bird
The drifting cloud
The morning light
The summer sky
Where you are
The universe
Where the universe
Is you
&A Puti Poem: Meditating
Imagine
Just imagine
Sitting under a tall pipal
On a vast stretch of
prairies
Where you are transformed,
transforming
Your entire physical being
Into the little marigold
in front of you
Then, the running stream
water
The gliding bird
The drifting cloud
The morning light
The summer sky
Where you are
The universe
Where the universe
Is you
&Hi-Fi
Recording
Your outer being is the
most faithful
And most comprehensible
recording
Of all your pasts in the
present:
Your eyes containing every
sight
You have or have never
seen
Your nose storing every
odor
You have or have never
smelt
Your ears stuffed with
every sound
You have or have never
heard
Your hands impressed by
every surface
You have or have never
touched
You tongue holding every
utterance
You have or have never
made
Your mind slated with
every thought
You have or have never
produced
Your heart carved with
every feeling
So, I am actually what I
appear to be
&Puti Poems (1):
Mind-Clearing Mudra
Stand straight
Stand still
Eye to eye
To a pipal or oak tree
Communicate with it
In the mother tongue of
love
And imagine
Opening every door and
window of your heart
Irrigating every cell of
your liver with dewdrops
Bringing your vision from
the horizon afar
Slowly and progressively
Back to your inner being
Above a lotus flower
Pure, fresh, crystal
&Puti Poems (2): Dewdrop
Mudra
On the open stage of her
mind
She finds herself standing
alone
High above a crystal lotus
flower
Where she bends down
gracefully
To collect a dewdrop
From its most tender petal
Like a drop of elixir from
heaven
Which she can use
To soothe, to purify
Every part of her body
Every corner of her heart
Only if she likes
&Puti Poems (3):
Flower-Picking Mudra
With all your tenderness
Bend down gradually
And reach out your left
arm
To pick up your favorite
flower
From the inner garden
Behind the fence of your
thought
And bring up the flower
Close up to your face
Where you can see its bold
brilliance
Melting into a pool of
fragrance
Where you and the flower
Become one and the same
&Puti Poems (4): Infinity
Mudra
Stretching my hands
Along the horizon
And beyond all boundaries
I try to hold the entire
universe
In my two arms
Slowly rising
Like the ocean
And gather all the energy
The spirit
The light
And the inspirations
From the very infinite
&Puti Poems (5):
Sky-Reaching Mudra
Like a universal dam
broken
Vast bodies of heavenly
light
Burst, bursting out
Pouring right onto my body
Splashing into myriads of
inspirations
Falling, penetrating my
inflated selfhood
Cleansing each cell of my
brain
My chest, my belly
every corner of my inner
being
filling in my whole body
as it gets thicker and
thicker
Until all my cells and
senses
Dissolve into nothingness
Under the lightfall
&Puti Poems (6):
Round-Reaching Mudra
As her arms keep moving
Around an invisible sun
In front of her belly
From the smallest circle
to the biggest
From the biggest circle to
the smallest
In alternative directions
She finds her body of
celestial light
Breaking into ever thinner
and smaller pieces
Like cloud shreds
Flowing, drifting around
Vanishing into the sky
Vanishing into heaven
&Puti Poems (7): Authentic
Fire Mudra
Purest energy
Purest spirit
Keeps burning
Inside her womb
Like a bold and brilliant
ball
Like an inner sun
Its light evaporating her
entire body
Into a thin mist of light
Slowly vanishing into the
heavens
Although its shape still
remains
Around her tiny spot of
consciousness
With her palms put
together against her naval
She witnesses her own soul
Spiraling, dancing
Between the fire and the
light
&Puti Poems (8): A-Mi-Te
Mudra
Palms against each other
Fingers pointing to your
central forehead
Keep yourself upright
And from under your lowest
vertebrae
Drive out of a
gourd-shaped mouth
These heavily voiced
syllables:
A-
Mi-
Te-
As well as all the
negativity
Within your body
And every evil spirit
Trying to possess your
fate
As a wide curtain of light
Reddish and yellowish
Shoot up high to the sky
From behind your lower
back
&Self-Rebuilding: Another
Puti Poem
Let the seed of fire grow,
rising
Above your inner horizon
Like the most glaring
summer sun
Let the ball burn
brilliantly
Burning out every cell
within your body
And shooting its light
through your skin
Then, let the light from
heaven fall
Filling in each blank
within your shape
Until all the light starts
melting together
To stuff your entire
selfhood
&Convection
Relax your body inside out
Stand in front of the tree
And pour out all your love
From the pool of your
heart
Through your
energy-focused eyes
To each and every leaf of
it
As it pumps all its green
spirits
Into your entire inner
being
Through its strong but
unseen roots
Like a passionate couple
Making love wildly
Under a broad rainbow
&Living a God’s Life
Were you Jesus Christ,
Would you try to gain
A bit more information
Simply to bully all
others?
Were you Buddha
Would you prefer to
Become better known
Through cheating alone?
Were you Allah,
Would you want some
More wealth than you have
For the sake of one more
woman?
You are neither Christ,
nor Buddha nor Allah
But just as you have given
them these godly names
So you can also name
yourself as such
And live like any one of
them
&Inner Landscaping
With its whim-bladed
diaphanous scissors
The west wind arrives
simply too early
Trimming the edges of late
summer
Pruning the few overgrown
branches
Of frenzy afternoons, like
an artful hairstylist
Eager to enhance her
patron’s charisma
Next year, when the season
returns
It will grow greener, with
stronger boughs
More tender buds, like the
lilac tree
Trembling with muted
laughter
In the front yard of my
mind
&Patient’s
Complaint
With all due respect to
your noble
(And handsomely paid)
profession
I have been longing to
say, dear doc
I am tired of your
hopeless helplessness
Each time before I sit
down, you’ve already
Doodled a prescription for
my running nose
Or feel at a loss as to
what to say when I
Have a little more
puzzling pain in my jaws
Your sense of achievement
seems to depend
More on the specific
amount you get paid
Than on any vague
assistance you might offer
To reduce my unexplainable
suffering
Really, what can you cure
at all, my savior
Surely neither cancer, nor
aids, nor even a flu
So, for God’s sake,
pretend no more you’ve
Entered this profession
for cure instead of silver
&Manhood
When I was a little
country boy
My father used to yell at
me:
Men sow blood, not tears
And my mother would try to
correct him:
Boys do not cry, but try
to sweat
So I knew tears are never
manly
But ever since I left my
parents
I’ve never shed a single
drop of blood
Not even much salty enough
sweat
Indeed, holding a pen
rather than a gun or spade
Most of my life, I have
been busy
Copying, writing,
copyediting
Observing with my naked
eyes
Feeling with an ischemic
heart
I’ve scattered more
tears than sperms
With my own sons all
growing taller than me
I begin to wonder if my
parents are painfully
Disappointed as I am in
myself about the way
I turn out to be neither a
man nor even a boy
&The
Lilac in Front of My House
Leaves hip-hopping to the
music of early summer
One long branch flirting
with every passer-by
Trunk shaking with
laughter from last spring
But behind the fence, your
roots remain firm
Never budging a single
inch, between day and night
While I feel sorry for
your confinement all your life
You winged seeds keep
travelling in the whole neighborhood
&The Second Departing
(for William Butler
Yeats)
Going, going away in an
ever retreating bay
The ebb starts below a
quickened sun setting
People swarm here,
watching, picking, fighting
Over the fishes, shrimps,
crabs, shells, weeds
All left stranded,
struggling for waters on the beach
They do not care if
darkness stalks right behind
Their shadows, rolling
like a tide upon their souls
They care only about the
benefits they can gather
The sea produce they can
trade with one another
Surely some ignorance is
still in proper place
Surely the second
departing is taking place
The Second Departing! The
very idea stirs in the minds
A whole flock of crows
beating their darkening wings
Flapping into the narrow
skies of the prolonged history
It’s these crows, these
very unidentifiable black birds
That are driving the light
beyond the horizon, inner or outer
(Where they have found God
as a redundant re-creation
When they believe they are
the right gods for themselves)
&Student
Responses: Use the Word in a Sentence
Acquire: I long to sing in
a quire
Arrest: After working 10
hours, you need a rest
Apparent: He will bring a
parent to the Open School Night
Column: If you want to
talk to your friends, you call ‘em
Headlights: When driving
at night, you need to turn on your head lice
Information: Some chickens
can fly in formation
&In Defense of Canadian
Mediocrity
Just
as a tree will be cut down once it tops over all others, so will a
hog be slaughtered when it becomes the fattest in the pen. - Chinese
Proverb
The tallest, the fattest
The most thickly-feathered
Have all migrated
To a much greener pasture
Or a warmer climate
Where they would
Never frozen to death
Like an arctic rock
By following the rule
Of the golden mean
We retain our
Canadian-ness
In a small mosaic
Where each line looks
Visible though it may
Lead to nowhere
Rather than in a big
melting pot
Where all bubbles are
bound to burst
&By Now: A Parallel Poem
By now, the words like
good
Beautiful,
and truth have been so
abused
They are meaningless
Reduced to blanks or holes
And the whole language
becomes
Insufficient, deformed,
absurd:
People are trying to
communicate in a dialect
Or, rather, in a series of
utterances
Whose meanings are yet to
be invented
We have a syntax as
powerful as before
But we have no more proper
word in the proper place
&Echoes Rolling
Across the valley of life
I shouted at my voice’s
top
And heard every syllable
of mine
Bouncing back to my tongue
tip
Who are you? --
who-are-you
You are a failure! –
you-are-a-failure
You are a hero! –
you-are-a-hero
With my hands shaped like
open wings
I receive whatever I try
to give out
The louder I shout, the
faster it comes back
But when I begin to sing,
nothing returns
Except the trees, the
bushes, the grasses
All remaining silent, like
audiences in a hall
&Noon
Epiphany
As the mid-summer sun
reaches the vertex
I open every door, every
window
To let as much sunlight as
possible
Into this house of my
inflated heart
But alas, even when I
remove
The entire roof, even all
gods come down
To shed their light upon
my shoulders
My inner spaces are still
as dim and dull
Is it not because my
residence is too small
Or, rather, because it has
too much furniture inside
&Inner Mirror
Deeply embedded
In the middle of his mind
Is a glowering glass
Through which his unseen
eyes
Could see the entire
universe
Except himself alone
As the dusts of pasts
Keep accumulating on one
surface
And become silver-hardened
Like a mercurial film
His mind begins to see
To observe, to reflect
Not only the outside world
But also his own selfhood
Though he does it
From behind a hidden
mirror
&Inner Lake
In
the valley of her heart
Lies
a walleyes–filled lake
Its
waters folded with murmurs
From
every stream
Flowing
afar or nearby
Only
on a windless midnight
When
the water becomes still enough
Can
she look inwards
And
see the reflections of
Trees,
bushes, grasses, rocks
Hills
loom in the moon light
All
surrounding her soul
&Pidan
Or Century Eggs, China
According to
CNN iReporters (28 June, 2011), century eggs are one of the most
challenging foods they have come across on their travels.
Often served with pickled
ginger
As a pungent appetizer
Century eggs have been
popular
Among all adult Chinese
For centuries and
centuries
Though to their children
they taste
More archaic, more rotten
Than they actually sound
Having been preserved in
clay
For longer than an old
season, these
Devil-cooked black eggs
are
Readily welcome
In my native country
Where the older are always
better
Mixed black is more
attractive than pure white
Where what is ugly
Eerie, stinking
Can be cool, fresh
And damned delicious
&Truncated Truths (1): My
Crow
Each crow you have seen
Has a quasi white soul
That used to dwell in the
body
Of one of your closest
ancestors
He comes down all the way
just to tell you
His little secret, the way
he has flown out
Of darkness, the fact both
his body and heart
Are filled with shadows,
the truth about
Being a dissident, that
unwanted color
Hidden in your own heart
is there also a crow
Much blacker than his
spirits
But less so than his
feathers
&Truncated Truths (2):
Butterfly
From the darkest corner of
his heart
Flapping out a giant
butterfly
Three-legged, tailless
Like the crow in the sun
As a Chinese myth has it
Shadow slowly measuring
Every inch of the ground
route
The highway of human souls
It flies surely towards
the rising sun
Like a cadaver dog trying
desperately
To find the decomposed
body
Of a murdered history
&The Man with a Plug
From early morning to late
night
All day long he has been
testing
Every socket he could find
On the wall, the ceiling,
the floor
But never able to get his
bulb lit
In ever thickening
darkness, he begins
To wonder if there is
something wrong
With his plug, his bulb,
or the socket
Or perhaps there is no
electricity running
Along the wire in the
first place
Perhaps he has a wrong
plug
for the right outlet,
perhaps the right outlet
but for a wrong plug?
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