April 10, 2021: Impatience

Impatience
 
I want it now; I don’t want to wait.
I’ll never have time if I go at this rate.
I need to fill my heart’s desire!
I want to run and never tire;
To excel to a rate that will leave me behind!
Then stop to transform the whole of mankind.
I think I can do it.  There must be a way!
But there can’t be a cost, ‘cause I don’t want to pay.
I want it now;  I don’t want to wait!
Serve up my dinner on a dirty plate!

April 10, 2021: Regret by Yuan Chi, in "Chinese Poems translated by Arthur Waley, Page 73.

 Regret

When I was young I learnt fencing
And was better at it than Ch'u-ch'eng (famous swordsman).
My spirit was high as the rolling clouds
And my fame resounded beyond the World.
I took my sword to the desert sands,
I watered my horse in the Nine Wilds,
My flags and banners flapped in the wind,
And nothing was heard but the song of my drums.

War and its travels have made me sad,
And a fierce anger burns within me.
It's thinking of how I've wasted my time
That makes this fury tear my heart.

April 9, 2021: The Jovial Bird

The Jovial Bird
 
Our jovial faces smile from a bridge
That crosses a canyon near the top of the ridge.
It’s a passage about which we had been told
By friends who went searching for wisdom and gold,
 
But they met a giant who got in their way
And said that there’d be a price to pay.
A half ran off, and forgot their intent.
Three fell off the trail in an accident.
 
There were only two who came back on the trail
And besought our help when they told their tale.
We set off to help those caught in a bind,
Knowing that we only had limited time,
 
And being aware:  We might fall into danger
Or be visited on by an unfriendly stranger.
Yet also, what beauty!  What specters of hope!
We carried machetes and a large roll of rope.
 
At the end of the bridge was a road to the sky,
And another that passed by the giant’s castle.
To have the best view, we would need to get high.
Plus, we didn’t want to run into a hassle!
 
Then the clouds rolled in like a blanket of fog.
A storm was brewing, and the wind grew chill.
To warm ourselves up, we began to jog
To the nest of a bird with a golden bill.
 
It was a monstrous bird with massive wings:
So large that two of us mounted its back.
The rest sat in its nest and began to sing,
Beneath a tarp in one of our packs.
 
The bird became a very good friend,
Though two of my buddies he had for a meal.
Still, the others found safety, and in the end,
He fetched the lost ones and helped them to heal.
 
So I was sad for the two, but I could see he was kind,
And flying on its back fairly blew my mind.
So far I could travel, and so much to see!
Never in my life have I felt so free!
 
Still, the rest of my buddies said they had to return.
Some had jobs, or they had family concerns.
We walked back to the bridge, and the clouds all cleared.
Then the road to the sky simply disappeared!
 
I walked back to town, and I’m not sure why.
I guess I just needed to say goodbye
And now, in spite of my family’s wrath
I head back to the bridge, in search of the path.

April 9, 2021: To a Waterfowl by W. C. Bryant, in Oxford Anthology of Amer. Lit., page 332

 To A Waterfowl

Whither, midst falling dew
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,
Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue
Thy solitary way?

Vainly the fowler's eye
Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As darkly seen against the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats along.

Seek'st thou the plashy brink
Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,
Or where the rocking billows rise and sink
On the chafed ocean-side?

There is a Power whose care
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast --
The desert and illimitable air --
Lone wandering, but not lost.

All day thy wings have fanned,
At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,
Though the dark night is near.

And soon that toil shall end;
Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest,
And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend,
Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest.

Thou'rt gone, the abyss of heaven
Hath swallowed up thy form; yet, on my heart
Deeply has sunk the lesson thou has given,
And shall not soon depart.

He who, from zone to zone,
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,
In the long way that I must tread alone,
Will lead my steps aright.

April 8, 2021 -- Blind, Deaf, and Dumb

Blind, Deaf, and Dumb
 
By secrets suppressed and hidden away;
By aiming to be what we can’t become;
By social assumptions that block our way,
We all are blind, and deaf, and dumb.
By guilt, I have become a slave
To conflicted desires that keep me numb.
Still, I seek what is right and I will to be brave,
For we all are blind, and deaf, and dumb.
And vaguely, still in the shadows,
I march to the beat of my different drum.
I search my silence in fragrant meadows,
To remember where I’m coming from.
 
There comes the time of awakening,
When faces of phantoms are once seen clear.
There comes the time of awakening,
When we accept the past in the love that’s here.
There comes the time of awakening:
Alive to the sun and the scent of the air.
There comes the time of awakening:
To be, to heal, to touch, to care.
 
Cut off the bonds of propriety,
And let the lions come,
To roar at the gates of society
And let the walls fall down.
Tear off the yoke of our tyranny,
And let all people come.
Let us choose our destiny;
Rise from the underground.
We rise together beyond the machines
That hypnotized with a sinister hum.
Now reach to fulfilling our deepest dreams:
Love, and justice, and freedom song.
 
But people I see are just milling around,
And it’s still the same old place.
I spoke my truth, but the words were drowned
In puling tears and waste.
For all that I’ve dreamed, and all that I’ve known
It seems a useless game.
With all I’ve attained, I still stand alone
With the degraded, disheartened, disabled, insane . . .
With people who can’t take their load off their backs,
And so many tragic pretenders,
Oppressed by feeling that their cards are stacked;
Molded into their anger!
 
In all that we’ve done, and all that we’ve said
We strive towards a wiser intention!
We honor the prophets; the screaming dead
And are not swallowed up in convention.
Yet now, I recall – I’ve just opened my eyes,
And it’s a personal journey for seeking the source.
Gotta follow our hearts, with Love as our guide:
No need of self-pity, or fear, or remorse,
But believe in people; believe in the earth;
Believe in the hope that we can be one:
In touch with Life, with death and rebirth:
We’re the hope for the healing of the blind, deaf, and dumb.

April 8, 2021: A Psalm of Life by H. W. Longfellow in Oxford Anthology of Amer. Lit., Page 567

 A Psalm of Life

What the heart of the Young Man Said to the Psalmist

Tell me not, in mournful numbers
Life is but an empty dream!
For the soul is dead that slumbers
And things are not what they seem.

Life is real!  Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act that each to-morrow
Find us farther than today.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act, --act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o'erhead!

Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;

Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.

April 7, 2021: Beginning of a Telepathic Unity

Beginning of a Telepathic Unity

You’ve got a different emotional style,
That I don’t yet understand.
I just know I like seeing you smile,
And I love you for letting me be a child.
Will you let me be a man?

At times, I feel your assurance of touch,
And it’s deep beneath my skin.
You gently say, “I’m ready for trust,
And just for this thought, we can feel so much.”
Well, I want to let you in.
 
At times, I wonder what you’re all about.
I wonder what I’ve been missing.
I wish we could both just shine ourselves out,
Without out-shining or needing to doubt.
I wish I knew how to listen.
 
At times, I think I’m not good enough,
Yet you’ve graced me with your time.
I feel like the Shepherd, who’s gentle and tough;
Who humbly awaits you to call his bluff
To reach one another in mind.