Mauve

O Lord, when Thou didst call me, didst Thou know
my heart disheartened through and through
still hankering after Egypt full in view
where cucumbers and melons grow?
- "Yea, I knew."

But Lord, when Thou didst choose me, didst Thou know
How marred I was and withered too,
Nor rose for sweetness nor virtue rue,
Timid and rash, hasty and slow?
- "Yea, I knew."

 
My Lord, when Thou didst love me, didst Thou know
How weak my efforts were, how few,
Tepid to love and impotent to do,
Envious to reap while slack to sow?
- "Yea, I knew."

 
Good Lord, Who knowest what I cannot know
And dare not know, my false, my true,
My new, my old; Good Lord, arise and do
If loving Thou has known me so.
- "Yea, I knew."

by Christina Rosetti

Scarborough

“Beloved, we are always in the wrong,
Handling so clumsily our stupid lives,
Suffering too little or too long,
Too careful even in our selfish loves:
The decorative manias we obey
Die in grimaces round us every day,
Yet through their tohu-bohu comes a voice
Which utters an absurd command - Rejoice. ”
― W.H. Auden

Hearing the hopes, dreams, doubts of younger ones,

helping them discover their true voice in writing,

bringing forth the still inexpressible in a struggling speaker...

Just mainly, being involved in lives, 

dear, dear lives,

makes working a challenge, a joy.

Love is the heart of Your Kingdom,

may I never forget that in all of my being and doings.

Fatigue

sets in like a creek,
mental leak
of a bygone peak.

Seek.
The Meek.

Sempiternal

image by morgancottle

Knowledge of speech, but not of silence;

Knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word...
Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?

- T.S Eliot

It Burns.

Words burn within the soul,
sometimes a muffled whisper,
a deafening silence,
a long forgotten dream...

Creeping to be heard,
fighting to be spoken,
yearning to be written,
shuffling to be read...

in a restless, broken world.

Oh those searing words - deadly.
those hopeful words - timely.

The power of words,
burns.

*

Read it here, on a receipt :)
.

Lair

Life in a bubble,
coddled and fondled,
petrified when you tumble.

Hobble and wobble,
what's a risk w'thout
a bruise from a lil' stumble?

But oh, the simple joy of mud on your face,
and autumn leaves entangled in your hair.

Reach depths,
that you might reach heights.

****

Written whilst waiting for an event to start at our horrendous Malaysian timing.

Remember

Remember me when I am gone away,

Gone far away into the silent land;

When you can no more hold me by the hand,

Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.

Remember me when no more, day by day,

You tell me of our future that you plann'd:

Only remember me; you understand

It will be late to counsel then or pray.

Yet if you should forget me for a while

And afterwards remember, do not grieve:

For if the darkness and corruption leave

A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,

Better by far you should forget and smile

Than that you should remember and be sad.

- Christina Rossetti

Dream Deffered

image by gregory fernando

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?

Or fester like a sore--
And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

- Langston Hughes

July 17th

Somehow, of all of the weddings I've attended, this was just different.

Maybe it was how we saw the relationship blossom from a very unlikely beginning,
thrive through many heartbreaks and misunderstanding, while we were silently cheering for them, the both of them.

One year ago, the then single bride told me,
"I love going to movies alone, I'm a loner. It's so troublesome to get a date where everyone is free. So why not just watch it alone right?"

She broke his heart and our hearts, when she 'rejected' his first proposal.

They didn't even talk to each other on the first 'date' we set them up and conveniently tagged along.

The endless tears and laughter that preceded this big day, made us feel like it was our big day as well, because they are so much a part of our lives, and how can it not be so?

*

I wrote them a simple poem in the lovely card Eunice made for them.

' Love seeketh not its own...." 1 Corinthians 13:5

As springs of joy,
burst forth amidst the noise;
Our hearts,
His throbbing love so pure unite.

To live, to fulfill,
A divine intent
so sure, so dear.
To become, to be,
together as one...

Heirs of God's marvelous Grace.

*

More than words.

It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.

-Teddy Roosevelt

****

'As the school bell chimes,
it was a crime not to shine,
in your presence all those wonderful times...
which all of us still dearly pine! '

Joined a simple poetry writing contest for Teacher's Day and won yummy book vouchers. :)

I wrote it having Miss Lillian, my literature & writing lecturer in mind.

Cloths of Heaven

image by alayna

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,

Enwrought with golden and silver light,

The blue and the dim and the dark cloths

Of night and light and the half-light,

I would spread the cloths under your feet:

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

-W.B Yeats

Turn.

Sometimes,
you just have to turn your back,
learn to loosen that clinched fist,
and move on.

To find out,
walking in a dress,
with crocodiles about your feet,
was not as bad as you thought it would be.

Teehee.
Say Whee!

Kids do this best,
adults tend to take things a wee bit too seriously.