Tag: life

Phase of Life


The realisation that I am getting old and tired comes from the cynicism. Many things once were adventurous and exciting, now are like chores.

Taking a walk in the light rain is overrated. Nursing a cold afterwards kills all romantic notion.

Love making on the beach is overrated. Dealing with cleaning the collected sand is a chore of the century.

Staying up to watch the midnight firework at a vantage point is overrated. Fighting a spot to lay on a picnic rug to wait for hours to watch the fireworks is time consuming and value inapt.

Real comfort now comes from resting a cuppa on my gut and watching true crimes in my pajamas.

成熟 (Maturity)

他曾说
我把时光
耗在呆望
身边的世界

我曾说
他把时间
花在建立
理想的世界

我们
曾经
都那么
黑白分明
不能明白
生活的真意

He used to say
I wasted my life
by watching the world
going around me

I used to say
He spent all his time
on building an ideal world

We were both
so black and white
couldn’t understand
the truth about life

Restoration

I have been enjoying jigsaw puzzle again. This is one of the jigsaw puzzles I completed recently. From the experience, this poem was created.

It was beautifully whole
A sudden storm broke it into pieces
I could only make out the outline
While the foundation was crushed

Tracking the fragments by their edgy shapes
my unskilled hands perform no miracles
The only hope in restoration lies in time only
It is the time I invest in patiently
which bonds the shattered reality
and make it whole again

And now the beauty is in
both the holder and the beholder

Frozen Smiles

It was just yesterday
We bid farewell 
to our glorious youth

In my naiive optimism
I thought of many reunions
coming our way

Last night
I heard of your passing
Life startled me

I hurried to that yesterday 
snapped a photo of your smile
attached it to my prayers
hoping you remember us
once shared that celebrated chapter

– dedicated to Amanda B. (November 1960 – March 2021)

桑树下的恋人 Under the Mulberry Tree

记得那年仲夏的傍晚
漫天的青绿彩云见证
桑树下我们互相许愿
我们的爱情果实累累
如今我独自旧地重游
透熟的桑果额前嘲讽
三十来年的果盛果落
黑发的恋人如今鬓白
我们的爱情早已消失
如桑果从纯白到紫黑
Remember that summer evening
under the mulberry tree
sky full of green and cyan clouds
witnessed our pledge of love
would be like the ripen mulberries

Now I am revisiting the scene alone
the heavy mulberries dangling on my forehead
laughing at my naiveté

We were once young and pure
three decades of success and failure
we are now with silvery temples
our love had long been bruised
like the dark purple mulberries