Das totale Gleichgewicht
– from “Hullabaloo”
Das totale Gleichgewicht,
fast eine
Identität,
der man nie mehr
entflieht.
Das totale Gleichgewicht,
so eine
gefangene
Harmonie
Trade and Freedom of Movement
– from “Kaleidoscope”
The long, long queue in front of the US embassy
That is very curious
We have assembled mountains of treaties
And seas of trade agreements
We have waged wars in order to
Have goods moved seamlessly
Across the non-visible borders
At times we call ourselves
The villagers in the global village
But please
Bring your harvests with the ghost of machines
We don’t want to know the human hands
Behind the products that we consume
We don’t want the knowledge of the beings
That we call our trade partners
We want freedom
But we don’t want you
We even want you to be free
But please
Don’t be so free
That you come and knock at our door
The Shard
– from “Kaleidoscope”
The moon had goosebumps
Even though it had been sunbathing all night!
I felt a surge of sympathy
– maybe I could offer a hug!
I knew, if I’d just extend my arm
I could reach her
And maybe it’d offer some comfort
And a tiny bit of warmth too –
But I felt apologetic immediately thereafter
For peeping so closely
And for observing her discomfort
I wanted to reassure her I was no stranger
I just hadn’t been so close before
But then I wondered
Would silence and ignorance be more appropriate after all?
So there I stood
Lifted by the Shard half across the London sky
And put right in front of the moon
And feeling uncertain
About what the right thing would be to do
Maybe, if I could
I should keep her company
Quietly, all night
As she had always been there
Quietly, every night
Snowy Morning
– from “Kaleidoscope”
It came during the sleep
Quietly
Covering all the roofs, terraces, streets, lanterns, land posts…
Flake by flake
It threw a fine layer of crystalline blanket
Non-discriminatingly
Over all that was left behind to the night
So when the world woke up
To this white wonder in the morning
All was quiet
Not a whisper was heard
Not even a gasp of the wind
On this sugar coated morning
The world held its breath
And was still, at last
Winter’s Apology
– from “Origin”
Heartless winter
Raved with her piercing cold
Emboldened by the stronghold of January
Chased the guardless souls
When a brush of sunlight lit up a tinge of kindness
I cried out my guts to the silent woods
In the vague comfort of warmth on my cheeks
At the crispy leaves that sympathetically greeted my feet
I cried out
I cried out my bitter despair
You said liberation was near and the choice was mine
“Forgive,” you said, “and be elevated.”
But the wound was real
Real as Winter had breathed her biting cold!
“And which one comes first, apologies or forgiveness?”
“By example of history,” you said, “forgiveness.”
“Oh but history is brutal,
and insanity abounds.
And what’s the point of forgiving,
When no one even acknowledges a wrongdoing?”
I resumed my moaning
At the lost trust of the season
The season of reasons
But you pulled me into your arms
And whispered confidentially into my ears:
“Child, Spring will bring Winter’s apologies;
And you can forgive for the sake of Summer to come.”
At that I cried as a child
I cried to empty the grief of my heart
And through tearful sobs
I welcomed my Summer to come
There Are Two of Us
– from “Origin”
There are two of us
And you are not alone
I have always been here
I have gone through it all with you
Every unfair scorn of the mother
Every harsh remark of the teacher
Every biased treatment by the world
Every unforgiving blow of fate
Every struggle, every push back, every fall
I was there
To witness, to know, to understand
I heard every scathing word
I felt the pain of every blow
I was there
To hurt your hurt, to cry your cry
I was there
I have been through all that with you
Now cry, when you feel like
I will hold you
Fall, when you need
I will catch you
Tell me your thoughts
I will listen
Demand happiness
I will seek, together with you
Trust that
I will never leave you
Accept this
Unconditional love
I have always been here
I am you
And I am here, to love you
The Cauchy-Schwartz Inequality
– from “A Mathematical Proposition of Love”
When I first saw you
My heart nearly stopped
Your glance landed on mine
But didn’t linger long
I watched you in your graceful sway
Learned to worship from afar
And secretly practice
The steps of your favorite Balboa
Till I’d swing with you three months on
Your laughter my favorite song
I laughed with you and swung you more
Till the last note was struck and we were thrown
Out of the club I’d kiss you
Breathlessly I’d let you hear
By the moths battled lantern
The drumming rhythm
Of my heart
That you’d break seven years on
I couldn’t fathom in front of your tearful eyes
That my heart had to bleed
While it pounded for you all the while
I squeezed your hand for a why
But you only pulled further back
In a pleading whisper you begged me to let go
“Let’s pick up the broken pieces,
And mend our hearts.
There isn’t a together,
When there aren’t two independent souls.”
Away you turned and my world crumpled
Had you said something more?
The last of your words escaped me
Stolen by the heartless wind
In and out I searched near twelve years long
The seasons of the journeys roughened my feet
As I gathered rings of stories to my life tree
Then one day by the altar I’d stand
Watching the approach of a fragile looking girl
I locked eyes with her and saw her mosaic heart
Time had sculptured its own piece of art
She giggled while I said my vow
She knew I was lying, and I knew that well
“There isn’t a future, there is only now.”
Her eyes teased me and I had to laugh
A little suppressed chuckle
At the pastor’s raised eyebrow
Was all that was allowed
I took her hand and squeezed it in mine
She didn’t pull away but squeezed mine back
When I finally got to swing with her
How the summer breeze flirted with her hair that night!
I finally heard the last of your words
Unexpectedly returned by the wind in a sudden swirl:
“This is the Cauchy-Schwartz inequality
Of happiness in this world.”
Coordination Failure
– from “A Mathematical Proposition of Love”
You put down the mug
The coffee was already cold
And too bitter
To want more
“How did we get here?” you asked.
A purely rhetoric question
In the ever staler air
“Hmmm, not sure. A coordination failure?” I offered.
But it all started out so brightly…
Yes, we were, very much
In the neighborhood
Of a happy end
So near, so sweet, so tangible…
So we danced
That sweet spot in sight
Unstable, sure
But what if we don’t deviate?
We could stay there forever
Happily ever after
Who’s to argue that we won’t?
But there wasn’t an almighty invisible hand
Gently hushing us towards that
Jackpot of a happy end
So instead
We gravitated
At each further provocation
Towards an inevitable
Collapse
Oh sure
Now we can run million rounds of simulations
On how else it could have all played out
But the lost steam wouldn’t return to the cold coffee
And the fallen leaves had forgotten how
To swirl back towards the naked branch
Entropy, you see, so they say
We could only stare at each other
And settle
With the explanation
Of an unfortunate
Coordination failure
A Complex Number
– from “A Mathematical Proposition of Love”
“Would you like to meet me, Miss?”
Your message awaits
Your face pops up in my memory
A flash of possibility, once
In the infinite combinations of
Life trajectories
That had soon fallen across the night sky
Of fate’s constellations
Like a shooting star
Shooting obliquely
Failing to escape the gravity
Of the ever moving arrow of time
Now there isn’t much momentum
No
To lift another life of it
Although you are as you are
A complex number
And await for another
To multiply, to be real
But I
I’ve just surrendered
To another
My imaginary part
Oriental Bay
– from “Birdhouse in My Soul”
The evening breeze brings your familiar scent
The salted evidence of your day’s triumph
Let me light up the seaside town
Beaconing you in the rising moon
Till I hear the mellow murmurs of your quavering waves
And see the hurried feet of your ocean sprays
I will run my fingers of sandy beach
Through the soft curls of your white foamy hair
As you rush ashore towards my awaiting arms
Come home to me
Come home to me as the twilight dims
As the temptation of the world’s vastness
Turns into an unforgiving gloom
Drop the oceanness of your ocean and the seaness of your sea
Come home to me in your childish yearning
Come and be sheltered
By the serenity of my loving shore
Come, and let us cuddle
As the moon climbs higher
I will hug you closer
So you may be even calmer
When the darkness of the night grows more resolute
Be reassured of my tender care
In the shadow of the moon
Wash the last of your exhausted tides over me
And hum us a soft lulling tune
Rest, in my harboring chest
Dream, under my caressing lips
Come, and own it
Own it all
Count the grains of sand in my beach
Rock the idle edges of my timber piers
Embrace me, engulf me
Permeate me, if you will
As the night quiets down together with you
Your soft breathing that of a harmless child
Let me claim the complete possession of you
Truly, of all that is you tonight
Tonight, it must be
At the inevitable sunrise tomorrow
I shall know
You will ride the splashing waves of Pacific Ocean and Tasman Sea
Widened smiles on your excitement reddened cheeks
Rushing out in that same hurried heels
Towards the next adventure there is to see
As the day breaks at another dawn
I will have to behold again I know
You belong to the ginormity of the world
Your pulse pulled by an unseen string
Your irresistible Fernweh never ceases
So tonight, as all nights, I wish it be
Tonight when you still belong to me
Drop the oceanness of your ocean and the seaness of your sea
Let me claim you to the fullest by my heart’s decree
Oblivious that when the sun rises tomorrow
As the day breaks every dawn
I will again have to send you off
With a longing kiss of the farewell breeze
A good luck charm threaded of the melancholic dew
A wistful prayer in the lingering mist
That I whisper to your placid face every dawn
Just before you awake to ebb away from me
“Come back, please come back tonight;
Ride on that moonrise tide,
And come back to me every night.”
Many, Many Days
– from “Birdhouse in My Soul”
Many, many days, I thought about you
When I felt cold, small, sad, lost
I thought about you, and how
Love is to demonstrate
That I, will be a source
And not a sink
Of any
Positivity
Many, many days, I thought about you
When I was away, chasing
Some dreams that might have never been
Or no longer is
Mine
It doesn’t matter, but you
I can stop here
Or continue further
Some days I wanted
A tinge of sweetness
A touch of warmth
Surely, I said,
There should be something,
Something
Something for someone
Like me
I said, “Continue, walk on,
Until you reach the other side
Of Earth, you will see –
For it is spherical, somewhat –
There should lie something else
To discover.”
But all that, what I do
How I press myself to go on
I wanted you
To be the reason
The reason
I haven’t
Or won’t
Stop
Mid way
I
Want you
To be
Happy
Many, many days
Blueberry Fish
– from “Cafés Around the World”
If you swing by that Café Chuffed
Greet her the blueberry fish
When you see her swimming around there
And going “blu blu blu bluuu
blu blu blu blu bluuu…”
Oh, you will know it’s a perfect day
A perfect day
A perfect breakfast day
So come and sit
Yes you may flirt with the sunshine
Have you ever wondered how to fly?
And there comes the blueberry fish
Whistling her bubbles into your breakfast cereals
Blu, one is good
Blu blu, two even better
Blu blu blu, three the magic number
Oh blu, blueberry fish swims around you
Blu blu, she has to tell you a secret
So badly she almost blued into your latted coffee
Blu blu, blu blu blu
Oh huh, what did you say?
Blu blu blu, blu blu blu
But it’s too late, the last of her words waffled
Into your Sunday pancake
Oh yes, blueberry pancake!
Blu blu blu, blu blu blu…
Blu blu blu blu blu blu bluuuuu
Oh yeah, blueberry fish in a talkative mood
Oh blu, blueberry fish swims around you
Blu blu, she knows you love that girl
She sees you kiss her with the smile in your eyes
Blu blu, blu blu blu
Oh, the omniscient blueberry fish knows
Blu blu blu, blu blu blu
Why don’t you invite her over
Before the blueberries flood your table and flood yourself?
Oh, don’t you see?
Plenty blueberries
Oh yeah, plenty of blueberries –
A breakfast for two
A breakfast for two!
Blu blu blu, blu blu blu…
Blu blu blu blu blu blu bluuuuu
Oh yeah, the omniscient blueberry fish has plenty to say
Oh, don’t you see?
Plenty blueberries
Oh yeah, plenty of blueberries –
Breakfast all day
Breakfast all day!
海子， 我为你哭泣
– from “Impromptu”
海子， 我为你哭泣
为什么这个世界
容不下你？
美丽， 在你眼前
在你心里
在你笔下，成了我的回忆
你的笑脸, 在那个年代
多少单纯, 多少阳光，
撩在了我心里
而你，就在百度短短的一句话里
离开了我们
永远的， 那个青春的你
你留下了阳光
向往，渴望，和那么淡淡的一许 温柔
可就在那一刻里
我知道了，你也曾今
在挣扎中
纠缠不过，那内心深处
刺烈的嘶喊
而选择了，那忧愁的
永久的，遗憾的，从容的，
最后的安宁