The Poetry Marathon

(#11/24): “Breathlessness”

I see you first.

 

The fiddler plays.

The dance begins.

 

We approach warily.

Not quite in sync, yet.

Sizing each other up first.

 

Determining the tempo of our feet.

The cadence we will take.

What will be the resolution of our caper?

The modulation we will make?

 

Even before we engage,

My heart’s relentless rhythm,

Already pounding incessantly,

Drums its way into my every fibre of my being.

 

In full swing we now go,

Matching each other in staccato,

With every beat and every step.

 

And in the end, where do we stand,

Staying apart, coming together, and drawing apart again,

 

In this inexorable dance of life?

 

© 2017 S Phua

(#10/24): “Prejudice”

What first do I see?

 

The bearing of your stature,

The timbre of your voice,

The brilliance of your smile,

The respect in your manner,

The warmth of your handshake,

The content of your words?

 

Or is it, the colour of your skin?

 

© 2017 S Phua

Goddess Freya in my Garden (24th hour)

Wondrous weeping willows wallow near my windows

Outstretched reaching out to me, inviting me to explore the outside festivities

Frogs are hopping about croaking loud and free

Crickets chirping their way through the grass

Little Sparrows singing songs of solace spring searching for food

The Spring sprinkles are quenching our natural thirst

For hydration, saturation and satiation

Leaving us with a rejuvenating vision of Mother Earth

This magical moment of the year is where all once dead

Rises back up again

The sun is just careful enough to brighten our days

Without scorching our souls

I am at my most happiest during these celestial stages

Then Mother moon appears meandering about my garden

Shining her moonbeams across the pavement, sending dancing shadows across the gray stones

Wrapping her bright stars around my waist lulling me to sleep

But the storm makes its way beating against my window panes

Its thunderous clasps are to remind me that she is energetic as she is soft

I open my windows to her clamors

I welcome her showers

I bathe my spirit in her streams

As the moon cloaks my inner bearings

I learn all of their secrets

I learn the mournful roars and rumbles

I now know what it is to endure

Hour 20

Peace settles early

A true blanket which covers everything

Even after vividly dreaming

Why always the dreaming

In color and with full body purpose

My heart and my mind go to sleep from this place

And I wake up in my dreams

 

Crossing over in my waking life are their memories

I have access to two different realities

The same input data but a much different take

On who and what my role is in this place

A habit I imagine formed from childhood

Funny how God shapes you

Into something no one else can be

Taking that which would have taken you out

And turning it into the answer to “consecrate me”

How, at so young

Who gave me the desire for perfection

Not the veneer

The real desire to exist with the Holy

I failed year after year after year

And these memories, the waking life just twisted

Is another pattern to follow

Expressing hidden emotions

And so, my subconscious forms new memories

I have access to in my waking life

 

No where to run and no where to hide

I feel all my filth

And know I feel all my hope

And I know I am not alone

And I know peace settles early

God is gracious

And His mercies are new every morning

HOUR21

Separation

 

Mountains of lies and of garbage,

that’s all that I get from you.

Are you not willing to change anything?

 

Don’t shed crocodile tears because

I won’t receive you back.

You let go of my arms and now you

are on your own. Life sucks, right?

Ode to the oldies

The 5 Stairsteps were the bomb to me

Lead singer Clarence as cute as can be

When he sang Baby come back to me

I melted and dribbled, got weak in the knnes

Billy Stewart, another idol sitting in the park

For a girl who never came

Sitting in the rain, crying from the pain

Ooh baby baby, why you treat me so bad, you make me so sad my love.

Laura Nyro, dead and gone, one child born and the world to carry on.

(#9/24): “Arachnophobia”

Couched in my Lazy-Boy,

Beer in one hand and

Remote in the other,

I channel surf idly,

And chance upon this ridiculous movie,

Of giant lava-breathing, fire-spewing spiders,

Spawned from the depths of hell,

Ludicrously called “Lavalantula”.

 

Starring the cast of “Police Academy”,

Playing it with tongues very much in cheek,

The cheap production values, poor ‘special’ effects,

And laughable CGI tarantulas were a hoot.

What’s worse, it was so well received,

Because it didn’t take itself seriously,

A sequel ensued, I discover,

Imaginatively titled “2 Lava 2 Lantula”, LOL.

 

© 2017 S Phua

#24 FINALE View from the window

Thirty glass panels in a grid make my view a visual quilt of my deck.

The doors has framed the cast gatherings, surprise parties, happy hours and graduation open houses.

The bench, the dining set the chair and ottoman are matching wood, each gifts from my family who know my love of bringing people together.

The flowers have grown leggy in the August heat and this hints at the blowing leaves and eventual snow that will pass these panes in the months ahead.

The lower glass is smudged from where my dog perfects her sorrowful “Little Match Girl” look at us while we gather around the dining room table and share meals,

or I set up temporary camp and write for hours.

It’s where I see my little slice of the world and one of the best vantage points for the world to observe me.

window

I have been looking out that window

Forever and ever

There were flowers nd shrubs

Duststorms and rains

People and cars

Today atlast

There is you.

Standing at my gate..

 

(#8/24): “Loneliness”

Overwhelmed, overwrought, overawed am I

Alone in this prayer cell, on knees I bend

Reverently and humbly, I reflect, “Oh my”

Before God, I dare not lift my head

My form prostrate, I contemplate, and

Yet, all I can do is think

Unceasingly of my family and of

The life I left behind at home.

 

© 2017 S Phua

 

(“I bend my head and think of home” from “Thoughts in the Silent Night” by Li Bai (701-762); translated by Yang Xianyi & Dai Naidie.)