Category Archives: Poetry

I remember the quiet

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I remember a train to Meiji Jingu
I remember uncertain eyes
I remember a chapter ended,
in the quiet dim of her place in Hakusan

I remember a hero’s mission
I remember his weakness too
I remember a chapter opened,
with bright white at his room in Vaucluse

I remember the author’s depictions
I remember onyx deep nail polish and eyes
I remember the heroine’s Eartha Kitt voice,
timbre thick and warm as a purr

I remember a two-city backdrop
I remember vibrant neon and high-rise skyline
I remember where sleeping sailboats rocked gently
on moonlit harbour waters too

I remember each act in the story
I remember each page that was turned
I remember the plot only deepened
with Hie Jinja’s Shinto rites.

I remember a character’s sacrifice
I remember her alien and displaced
I remember a life newly formed of them
the next story foreshadowed in love

I remember each turn and each dip in this tale
I remember each hope and each loss
I remember, I remember the quiet dim
of Hakusan, where in story they were wrote.

I am your name is

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A poem written for the Equatorian Community Welfare Association, but dedicated to all the people of South Sudan.

 

I am your name is  

by Mark

 

I am Nation

World’s youngest nation

Take my hand, guide my heart

Set me safely on my path

 

To me you are everything

Only with you do I begin

Turn fonduk and nourish

Safe rokuba shelter me your wish

 

I cry when you scold

Lose my fear when you hold

Grow strong I will

And all your dreams for me fulfil

 

You are my mystery

Today you’re so near to me

We are one it does seem

Sad tomorrow it was just a dream

 

I love you, though of you I’m frighted

My faith we will be reunited

Too briefly our fingers entwined

I lost you before you were mine

 

I am Nation

World’s youngest nation

Not my sister, my daughter, my aunt, wife or niece

You are my mother, your name is Peace.

This ring I wear for you

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Take a close look at it, what do you see?

Just a declaration to the world that I am taken?

Could it be more?

A symbol, a circle? Two ends joined to make a whole?

Look closer.

There are ten thousand tiny scratches on its surface

And a few deeper ones

Each one of them capturing a day’s event

A cricket ball thrown, a flower pruned

A spanner turned, a door opened

A guitar chord changed, a jar opened

A keyboard struck, a door closed

The earth tilled, a child caught

A document shuffled, a child lifted

A hand held…

Your hand.

All together a testament to life. My life with you.

Ten thousand otherwise meaningless occurences etched on its surface

that only have meaning

because I shared them with you.

This particular ring…

…is my ring.

It has become a part of me.

It takes quite some effort to remove it from my finger.

When it is gone you can see that it’s missing

I feel a part of me out of place.

Hold it in your palm it says nothing but me.

Throw it far out in the ocean and it says we’re through

Cherish it right there on my hand and it’s the closest we will ever come to eternity.

This ring I wear.

This ring I wear for you.

This ring I wear for you.