[Mel] The Harlot's House by Oscar Wilde

We caught the tread of dancing feet,
We loitered down the moonlit street,
And stopped beneath the harlot's house.

Inside, above the din and fray,
We heard the loud musicians play
The 'Treues Liebes Herz' of Strauss.

Like strange mechanical grotesques,
Making fantastic arabesques,
The shadows raced across the blind.

We watched the ghostly dancers spin
To sound of horn and violin,
Like black leaves wheeling in the wind.

Like wire-pulled automatons,
Slim silhouetted skeletons
Went sidling through the slow quadrille,

Then took each other by the hand,
And danced a stately saraband;
Their laughter echoed thin and shrill.

Sometimes a clockwork puppet pressed
A phantom lover to her breast,
Sometimes they seemed to try to sing.

Sometimes a horrible marionette
Came out, and smoked its cigarette
Upon the steps like a live thing.

Then, turning to my love, I said,
'The dead are dancing with the dead,
The dust is whirling with the dust.'

But she - she heard the violin,
And left my side, and entered in:
Love passed into the house of lust.

Then suddenly the tune went false,
The dancers wearied of the waltz,
The shadows ceased to wheel and whirl.

And down the long and silent street,
The dawn, with silver-sandalled feet,
Crept like a frightened girl.

[Mel] The Art Of Poetry by Jorge Luis Borges

To gaze at a river made of time and water
And remember Time is another river.
To know we stray like a river
and our faces vanish like water.

To feel that waking is another dream
that dreams of not dreaming and that the death
we fear in our bones is the death
that every night we call a dream.

To see in every day and year a symbol
of all the days of man and his years,
and convert the outrage of the years
into a music, a sound, and a symbol.

To see in death a dream, in the sunset
a golden sadness--such is poetry,
humble and immortal, poetry,
returning, like dawn and the sunset.

Sometimes at evening there's a face
that sees us from the deeps of a mirror.
Art must be that sort of mirror,
disclosing to each of us his face.

They say Ulysses, wearied of wonders,
wept with love on seeing Ithaca,
humble and green. Art is that Ithaca,
a green eternity, not wonders.

Art is endless like a river flowing,
passing, yet remaining, a mirror to the same
inconstant Heraclitus, who is the same
and yet another, like the river flowing.

[Mel] Be Drunk by Charles Baudelaire

 Always be drunk.
 That's it!
 The great imperative!
 In order not to feel
 Time's horrid fardel
 bruise your shoulders,
 grinding you into the earth,
 Get drunk and stay that way.
 On what?
 On  wine, poetry, virtue, whatever.
 But get drunk.
 And if you sometimes happen to wake up
 on the porches of a palace,
 in the green grass of a ditch,
 in the dismal loneliness of your own room,
 your drunkenness gone or disappearing,
 ask the wind,
 the wave,
 the star,
 the bird,
 the clock,
 ask everything that flees,
 everything that groans
 or rolls
 or sings,
 everything that speaks,
 ask what time it is;
 and the wind,
 the wave,
 the star,
 the bird,
 the clock
 will answer you:
 "Time to get drunk!
 Don't be martyred slaves of Time,
 Get drunk!
 Stay drunk!
 On wine, virtue, poetry, whatever!"

[Mel] Having A Coke With You by Frank O'Hara

Having a Coke with You

is even more fun than going to San Sebastian, Irún, Hendaye, Biarritz, Bayonne
or being sick to my stomach on the Travesera de Gracia in Barcelona
partly because in your orange shirt you look like a better happier St. Sebastian
partly because of my love for you, partly because of your love for yoghurt
partly because of the fluorescent orange tulips around the birches
partly because of the secrecy our smiles take on before people and statuary
it is hard to believe when I’m with you that there can be anything as still
as solemn as unpleasantly definitive as statuary when right in front of it
in the warm New York 4 o’clock light we are drifting back and forth
between each other like a tree breathing through its spectacles

and the portrait show seems to have no faces in it at all, just paint
you suddenly wonder why in the world anyone ever did them

I look
at you and I would rather look at you than all the portraits in the world
except possibly for the Polish Rider occasionally and anyway it’s in the Frick
which thank heavens you haven’t gone to yet so we can go together the first time
and the fact that you move so beautifully more or less takes care of Futurism
just as at home I never think of the Nude Descending a Staircase or
at a rehearsal a single drawing of Leonardo or Michelangelo that used to wow me
and what good does all the research of the Impressionists do them
when they never got the right person to stand near the tree when the sun sank
or for that matter Marino Marini when he didn’t pick the rider as carefully as the horse

it seems they were all cheated of some marvelous experience
which is not going to go wasted on me which is why I am telling you about it

[Mel] The Second Coming by William Butler Yeats

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in the sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

[Mel] Saddest Poem by Pablo Neruda

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight. 

Write, for instance: "The night is full of stars,
and the stars, blue, shiver in the distance."

The night wind whirls in the sky and sings.

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
I loved her, and sometimes she loved me too.

On nights like this, I held her in my arms.
I kissed her so many times under the infinite sky.

She loved me, sometimes I loved her.
How could I not have loved her large, still eyes?

I can write the saddest poem of all tonight.
To think I don't have her. To feel that I've lost her.

To hear the immense night, more immense without her.
And the poem falls to the soul as dew to grass.

What does it matter that my love couldn't keep her.
The night is full of stars and she is not with me.

That's all. Far away, someone sings. Far away.
My soul is lost without her.

As if to bring her near, my eyes search for her.
My heart searches for her and she is not with me.

The same night that whitens the same trees.
We, we who were, we are the same no longer.

I no longer love her, true, but how much I loved her.
My voice searched the wind to touch her ear.

Someone else's. She will be someone else's. As she once
belonged to my kisses.
Her voice, her light body. Her infinite eyes.

I no longer love her, true, but perhaps I love her.
Love is so short and oblivion so long.

Because on nights like this I held her in my arms,
my soul is lost without her.

Although this may be the last pain she causes me,
and this may be the last poem I write for her.

[Mel] In Paris With You by James Fenton

 Don’t talk to me of love.  I’ve had an earful
 And I get tearful when I’ve downed a drink or two.
 I’m one of your talking wounded.
 I’m a hostage. I’m maroonded.
 But I’m in Paris with you.

 Yes, I’m angry at the way I’ve been bamboozled
 And resentful at the mess that I’ve been through.
 I admit I’m on the rebound
 And I don’t care where are we bound.
 I’m in Paris with you.

 Do you mind if we do not go to the Louvre,
 If we say sod off to sodding Notre Dame
 If we skip the champs Elysees
 And remain here in this sleazy
 Old hotel room
 Doing this or that
 To what and whom
 Learning who you are,
 Learning what I am.

 Don’t talk to me of love. Let’s talk of Paris,
 The little bit of Paris in our view.
 There’s that crack across the ceiling
 And the hotel walls are peeling
 And I’m in Paris with you.

 Don’t talk to me of love.  Let’s talk of Paris.
 I’m in Paris with the slightest thing you do.
 I’m in Paris with your eyes, your mouth,
 I’m in Paris with... all points south.
 Am I embarrassing you?
 I’m in Paris with you.

[Mel] Nothing Gold Can Stay by Robert Frost

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf,
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day
Nothing gold can stay. 

[Mel] The Last Hero by G. K. Chesterton

See the flying French depart
Like the bees of Bonaparte,
Swarming up with a most venomous vitality.
Over Baden and Bavaria,
And Brighton and Bulgaria,
Thus violating Belgian neutrality.

And the injured Prussian may
Not unreasonably say
"Why, it cannot be so small a nationality
Since Brixton and Batavia,
Bolivia and Belgravia,
Are bursting with the Belgian neutrality."

By pure Alliteration
You may trace this curious nation,
And respect this somewhat scattered Principality;
When you see a B in Both
You may take your Bible oath
You are violating Belgian neutrality.

[Mel] Love After Love by Derek Walcott

The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life. 

[Lisah] The Terror Years

Our house is Auschwitz,
So big and black. So black and big.
Petals of skull are hidden,
Strewn amidst the tall grass.
Prayers rise up and fall back
Beneath the ashes, beneath the dream
Searching for a door, a road out.

House so big. House so black.
Lightless house, hopeless house.

As I arrive at our house
My lips turn blue.
These terror years are my path;
Their names are the way-stations.

Our house is Auschwitz,
So big and black. So black and big.
This is where our tears flow,
Destroying our sight.
This is where they crushed our pleas
For no one to hear.
This is where they turned us to ashes
For the winds to scatter.

Listen, Adam! Listen, Simon!
Eve and Mary, too!
The twenty-five thousand shadows
That watch and follow me:
These terror years are our path;
Their names are the way-stations.

House so big. House so black.
House with no street, house with no address.

-Rajko Djuric (Translated by Julie Ebin)

[Lisah] The Boy Who Danced WIth A Tank

It was the same old story
Story of boy meets State
Yes the same old story
Story of boy meets State
The body is created by loving
But a tank's made of fear and hate

Armoured cards and heads in helmets
Rank on rank on rank on rank
The hearts of the soldiers were trembling
But the eyes of the soldiers were blank
And then they saw him swaying -
The boy who danced with a tank

The tank moved left
The boy stepped right
Paused like he was having fun
The tank moved right
The boy stepped left
Smiled at his partner down the barrel of its gun

You remember how we watched him
Dancing like a strong young tree
And we knew that for that moment
He was freer than we'll ever be
A boy danced with a tank in China
Like the flower of liberty

- Adrian Mitchell

[Lisah] The Little Black Boy

My mother bore me in the southern wild,
And I am black, but O! my soul is white;
White as an angel is the English child:
But I am black as if bereav'd of light.

My mother taught me underneath a tree,
And sitting down before the heat of day,
She took me on her lap and kissed me,
And pointing to the east, began to say:

"Look on the rising sun: there God does live,
And gives his light, and gives his heat away;
And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive
Comfort in morning, joy in the noon day.

"And we are put on earth a little space,
That we may learn to bear the beams of love,
And these black bodies and this sun-burnt face
Is but a could, and like a shady grove.

"For when our souls have learn'd the heat to bear;
The cloud will vanish; we shall hear his voice,
Saying: 'Come out from the grove, my love & care,
And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice.'"

Thus did my mother say, and kissed me;
And thus I say to little English boy:
When I from black and he from white cloud free,
And round the tent of God like lambs we joy,enthincity

I'll shade him from the heat till he can bear
To lean in joy upon our father's knee;
And then I'll stand and stroke his silver hair,
And be like I'm, and he will then love me.

-William Blake

[Lisah] The Schoolboy

I love to rise in a summer morn
When the birds sing on every tree;
The distant huntsman winds his horn,
And the sky-lark sings with me.
O! What sweet company.

But to go to school in a summer morn,
O! it drives all joy away;
Under a cruel eye outworn,
The little ones spend the day
In sighing and dismay.

Ah! then at times I drooping sit,
And spend many an anxious hour,
Nor in my book can I take delight,
Nor sit in learning's bower,
Worn thro' with the dreary shower.

How can the bird that is born for joy
Sit in a cage and sing?
How can a child, when fears annoy,
But droop his tender wing,
And forget his youthful spring?

-William Blake

[Lisah] Street Boy

Just you look at me, man,
Stompin' down the street
My crombie stuffed with biceps
My boots is filled with feet.

Just you hark to me, man,
When they call us out
My head is full of silence
My mouth is full of shout.

Just you watch me move, man,
Steady like a clock
My heart is spaced on blue beat
My soul is stoned on rock

Just you read my name, man,
Writ for all to see
The walls is red with stories
The streets is filled with me.

-Gareth Owen

[Lisah] When You Are Old

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,

And nodding by the fire, take down this book,

And slowly read, and dream of the soft look,

Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

How many loved your moments of glad grace,

And loved your beauty with love false or true,

But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,

And loved the sorrows of your changing face;

And bending down beside the glowing bars,

Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled

And paced upon the mountains overhead

And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

-W B Yeats

[Lisah] For All The Years

Sometimes I know the words to say,
And thank you for all you've done.
But they seem to fly up and away,
As quickly as they come.

How could I possibly thank you enough?
The one who makes me whole.
To whom I owed my very life,
And the forming of my soul.

The person who tucked me in at night,
Who always stopped me crying.
The only one who was the expert,
At picking up if I was lying.

You always dropped me off to school,
Then spent sad days alone.
Yet magically you always produced a smile,
For the minute that I got home.

You had to make some sacrifices,
To always put me first.
You helped me test my broken wings,
In spite of how much it hurts.

Are there really any words for this?
I find this question tough...
Anything that I choose to say,
Just doesn't seem like its enough.

How ever can I thank you,
For your heart, your sweat, your tears?
For ten thousand little things you've done,
For god knows how many years?

For changing with me as I changed,
Turning a blind eye to all my flaws.
Not loving me because you had to,
But loving me 'just because'.

You never even gave up on me,
On days your wits had reached their end.
You were always oh-so proud of me,
You were always my best friend.
So in time I've come to realize,
The only way to say.
The only way I can thank you enough,
Is possible in just one way.

Look at me standing in front of you,
Look who I have become.
Do you see yourself in me?
The things that I have done?

All your hopes and all your dreams,
The bond that no one sees.
Transferred for over twenty years,
Your best was passed to me.

Thank you for the gifts you give,
And everything that you do.
But thank you mummy, most of all,
Because you helped my dreams come true.

-Sophia Haq

[Lisah] Closure

My heart is breaking,
What have you done?
Isn't falling in love,
Supposed to be fun?
There are a few things,
You will never know.
Like how you take my heart,
Wherever you go.
You're perfect to me,
In every way.
The feelings get stronger,
Day by day.
These things you don't know,
But I feel you should.
As I'd do anything for you,
If you said I could.
However I know,
That you never will.
So patiently I wait,
Sitting so still.
I am down,
I am blue.
I don't think,
I'll get over you.

- Sophia Haq

[Lisah] Silent Witness

Did you ever notice mum,
The tears roll down my face?
The day you took an overdose,
Puking all over the place.

Did you ever notice dad,
The lump that was in my throat?
The day I had to pack my things,
You handed me my coat.

Did you ever notice sis,
The way my hands would shake?
When you used to knock me around,
Convinced I wouldn't break.

I guess you guys just never saw,
The torture you put me through.
God forbid I ever become,
As selfish as any of you.

It's because of you I'll never die,
Because I'm already dead.
The torture inflicted by you lot,
Has affected me in the head.

But still you never noticed me,
And the things that I went through.
To close my eyes and cover my ears,
To get away from you.

Everyday something would break,
A table or a chair.
The knives, the fists and the blood,
You forgot I was standing there?

I was only a child how could you do it,
And destroy me the way you did.
How could you do it to anyone?
Least of all, your kid.

-Sophia Haq

[Lisah] Mirror Image

Look at my reflection,
     Tell me who you see?
     Do you see Sophia Haq,
     Or do you just see me?
     Do you see the pain inside,
     Through the twinkle in my smile?
     Do you see a stable adult,
     Or see the shattered child?
     Can you see the tears I've cried,
     Through the sparkle in my eyes.
     Those passionate kisses upon my lips,
     You spoke a thousand lies.
     Can you see a depressive adult,
     As the manager of a store?
     Can you see my heartache,
     When laughing with people I adore.
     Can you see straight through me,
     Or just see mirrored glass?
     My face is but a jigsaw,
     Of pieces from my past.
     Can you feel the fear I've felt,
     Through the love within my touch?
     Do you love me, or Sophia Haq?
     Tell me just how much.
     So take a good look at my reflection,
     And tell me who do you see?
     Do you see smiling Sophia Haq?
     Or now do you see me.

- Sophia Haq

[Winifred] The Cradle

Sweet dreams form a shade,

O'er my lovely infants head.

Sweet dreams of pleasant streams,

By happy silent moony beams

Sweet sleep with soft down.

Weave thy brows an infant crown.

Sweet sleep Angel mild,

Hover o'er my happy child.

Sweet smiles in the night,

Hover over my delight.

Sweet smiles Mothers smiles,

All the livelong night beguiles.

Sweet moans, dovelike sighs,

Chase not slumber from thy eyes,

Sweet moans, sweeter smiles,

All the dovelike moans beguiles.

Sleep sleep happy child,

All creation slept and smil'd.

Sleep sleep, happy sleep.

While o'er thee thy mother weep

Sweet babe in thy face,

Holy image I can trace.

Sweet babe once like thee.

Thy maker lay and wept for me

Wept for me for thee for all,

When he was an infant small.

Thou his image ever see.

Heavenly face that smiles on thee,

Smiles on thee on me on all,

Who became an infant small,

Infant smiles are His own smiles,

Heaven & earth to peace beguiles.

- William Blake

[Winifred] the coffee house, cockpit hotel

not a daily occurrence:
a bride waiting, 7.30 pm, at a coffee house.
you, shifting eyes, forkfuls into mouth,
stop. stop & watch the bride,
2 bridesmaids & an elderly chaperon
at the little round table
having a respite before the dinner.
her eyes, downcast, become modest behaviour.

immediately one floor down
dragon room is taken for the reception.
relatives line up at the entrance,
the men clutching proffered tins of rothmans.

twice, a hand gently steals out & pats
any suspected flaw of coiffure into perfection.
most of the time, looking at her gloves,
her eyes are downcast, cast downwards
one floor immediately below.

at the end of an elastic hour
will she rise, raise her eyes,
descend one floor, ascend the low platform
elevating the tabled 10 courses,
smile gently at the groom, post-sharksfin
& pre-crispy chicken & mark out clearly
her domain, right here & right up there?

-Arthur Yap

[Winifred] We Are Seven

A simple child...
That lightly draws its breath
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death?

I met a little cottage girl-
She was eight years old, she said;
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered 'round her head.

She had a rustic, woodland air
And she was wildly clad;
Her eyes were fair, and very fair;
Her beauty made me glad.

"Sisters and brothers, little maid,
How many may you be?"
"How many? Seven in all," she said
And wondering looked at me.

"And where are they? I pray you tell."
She answered, "Seven are we;
And two of us at Conway dwell
And two are gone to sea."

"Two of us in the churchyard lie,
My sister and my brother
And in the churchyard cottage, I
Dwell near them with my mother."

"You say that two at Conway dwell
And two are gone to sea,
Yet, ye are seven! I pray you tell,
Sweet maid, how this may be."

Then did the little maid reply,
"Seven boys and girls are we;
Two of us in the churchyard lie,
Beneath the churchyard tree."

"You run about, my little maid,
Your limbs they are alive;
If two are in the churchyard laid
Then ye are only five."

"Their graves are green, they may be seen,"
The little maid replied,
"Twelve steps or more from my mother's door
And they are side by side."

"My stockings there I often knit,
My kerchief there I hem;
And there upon the ground I sit
And sing a song to them."

"And often after sunset, sir,
When it is light and fair
I take my little porringer
And eat my supper there."

"The first that died was sister Jane;
In bed she moaning lay,
Till God released her of her pain
And then she went away."

"So in the churchyard she was laid
And, when the grass was dry
Together round her grave we played,
My brother John and I."

"And when the ground was white with snow
And I could run and slide,
My brother John was forced to go
And he lies by her side."

"How many are you, then," said I,
"If they two are in heaven?"
Quick was the little maid's reply,
"O master! We are seven."

"But they are dead; those two are dead!
Their spirits are in heaven!"
'T was throwing words away; for still
The little maid would have her will
And said... "Nay, we are seven!"

- William Wordsworth

[Winifred] The Merlion

"I wish it had paws," you said,
"It's quite grotesque the way it is,
you know, limbless; can you
imagine it writhing in the water,
like some post-Chernobyl nightmare?
I mean, how does it move? Like a
torpedo? Or does it shoulder itself
against the currents, gnashing with frustration,
its furious mane bleached
the colour of a drowned sun?
But take a second look at it,
how it is poised so terrestrially,
marooned on this rough shore,
as if unsure of its rightful
harbour. Could it be that,
having taken to this unaccustomed limpidity,
it has decided to abandon the seaweed-haunted
depths for land? Perhaps it is even ashamed
(But what a bold front!)
to have been a creature of the sea; look at how
it tries to purge itself of its aquatic ancestry,
in this ceaseless torrent of denial, draining
the body of rivers of histories, lymphatic memories.
What a riddle, this lesser brother of the Sphinx.
What sibling polarity, how its sister's lips are sealed
with self-knowledge and how its own jaws
clamp open in self-doubt, still
surprised after all these years."

"Yet...what brand new sun can dry
the iridescent slime from the scales
and what fresh rain wash the sting of salt
from those chalk-blind eyes?"

A pause.

"And why does it keep spewing that way?
I mean, you know, I mean..."

"I know exactly what you mean," I said,
Eyeing the blond highlights in your black hair
And your blue lenses the shadow of a foreign sky.
It spews continually if only to ruffle
its own reflection in the water; such reminders
will only scare a creature so eager to reinvent itself."

Another pause.

"Yes," you finally replied, in that acquired accent of yours,
"Well, yes, but I still do wish it had paws."

-Alfian Bin Sa'at

[Winifred] Funeral Blues

1. Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with the juicy bone.
Silence the pianos and, with muffled drum,
Bring out the coffin. Let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling in the sky the message: “He is dead!”
Put crepe bows around the white necks of the public doves.
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my north, my south, my east and west,
My working week and Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song.
I thought that love would last forever; I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one.
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun.
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can come to any good.

-W.H Auden

[Winfred] i carry your heart with me

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

-e.e cummings

[Winifred] ULYSSES BY THE MERLION

I have sailed many seas,
Skirted islands of fire
Contented with Circe
Who loved the squeal of pigs;
Passed Scylla and Charybdis
To seven years with Calypso
Heaved in battle against the gods
Beneath it all
I kept faith with Ithaca, traveled,
Traveled and traveled,
Suffering much, enjoying a little;
Met strange people singing
New myths, made myths myself.

But this lion of the sea
Salt-maned, scaly, wondrous of tail,
Touched with power, insistent
On this brief promontory . . .
Puzzles

Nothing, nothing in my days
Foreshadowed this
Half-beast, half-fish,
This powerful creature of land and sea.

People settled here
Brought to this island
The bounty of these seas.
Built towers topless as Illiumâs.
They make, they serve
They buy, they sell.

Despite unequal ways,
Together they mutate.
Explore the edges of harmony.
Searched for a centre,
Have changed their gods,
Kept some memories of their past
In prayer, laughter, the way
Their women dress and greet.
They hold the bright, the beautiful,
Good ancestral dreams
Within new visions,
So shining, urgent
Full of what is new .

Perhaps having dealt in things
Surfeited on them,
Their spirit yearned again for images,
Adding to the dragon, phoenix,
Garuda, naga, those horses of the sun,
This lion of the sea,
This image of themselves.

- Edwin Thumboo

[Winifred] Edmund Spencer Sonnet 75

One day I wrote her name upon the strand,

But came the waves and washed it away:

Again I wrote it with a second hand,

But came the tide, and made my pains his prey.

Vain man, said she, that doest in vain assay

A mortal thing so to immortalize,

For I myself shall like to this decay,

And eek my name be wiped out likewise.

Not so (quoth I), let baser things devise

To die in dust, but you shall live by fame:

My verse your virtues rare shall eternize,

And in the heavens write your glorious name.

Where whenas Death shall all the world subdue,

Out love shall live, and later life renew.

[Winifred] The Eagle

He clasps the crag with crooked hands;
Close to the sun in lonely lands,
Ring’d with the azure world, he stands.

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;
He watches from his mountain walls,
And like a thunderbolt he falls.

- Alfred Lord Tennyson

[Winifred] One Art

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster,

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three beloved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

-- Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) a disaster.

-Elizabeth Bishop

[Sarah] Chinese Workers on the Evening Train

their tongues are rough, but fluent. They carve

our silence into syllables that explore the crowd,

fingers scouring thick curls in search of roots.

there is disquiet at this intrusion. leave us alone,

our lips say. we are pressed and drained by the office;

you are from a different world.

but they stay, and continue speaking, voices raucous

and very dusty. the safety patches on their vests

 ring loudly against our suits.

we have learnt your words before. Our lips open

in protest. We have no time for them now; they

are so full of bad memories.

still they take no notice, even joking among them

selves. some of us turn to look, but dare not stare

too long. they are an island in our sea.

we lower our eyes. what do you want, our lips ask.

take it, and then leave. we are a generous but tired

people; you are strangers on our way home.

the question passes unanswered, beneath the breathing

of the train. their steady chatter never stops,

and is unnaturally loud.

we censor them with pretended sleep, soon

our lips fall silent. we cannot comprehend them;

they speak only our mother tongue.  

Theophilus Kwek

[Sarah] The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd

If all the world and love were young,            
And truth in every shepherd's tongue, 
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee and be thy love.

Time drives the flocks from field to fold,
When rivers rage and rocks grow cold;
And Philomel becometh dumb;
The rest complains of cares to come.

The flowers do fade, and wanton fields
To wayward winter reckoning yields:
A honey tongue, a heart of gall,
Is fancy's spring, but sorrow's fall.

The gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses,
Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies
Soon break, soon wither, soon forgotten,—
In folly ripe, in reason rotten.

Thy belt of straw and ivy buds,
Thy coral clasps and amber studs,
All these in me no means can move
To come to thee and be thy love.

But could youth last and love still breed,
Had joys no date nor age no need,
Then these delights my mind might move
To live with thee and be thy love.

Sir Walter Raleigh

P.S. This poem is in direct response to Christopher Marlowe's "The Passionate Shepherd to his Love"

[Sarah] The Passionate Shepherd to his Love

Come live with me and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That valleys, groves, hills, and fields,
Woods or steepy mountain yields.

And we will sit upon the rocks,
Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

And I will make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle;

A gown made of the finest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of th purest gold;

A belt of straw and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs:
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me and be my love.

The shepherds' swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May morning:
If these delights thy mind may move,
Then live with me and be my love.

Christopher Marlowe

P.S. Please see the direct reply to this poem, "The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd," by Sir Walter Raleigh

[Sarah] What Is It To Write?

It is not a vacation

from your life

when you weary of meetings and rain,

waiting for the bus

and cursing your luck

It is a vocation

that curses your life

and can’t wait for luck

but must meet head-on

the bus weary and rain.

It is not to scribble

a granted sky

by a tree

in the evening park

with your dog running free.

It is to run the dog inside,

scribble the evening into the sky and park

your tree between

the granted and the free

Felix Cheong

[Sarah] Tick-Tock

There lived a couple

who lived by a couple

of clocks beside their bed

As newly wed

as two could be,

things soon turned otherwise,

the problem being

splitting hairs between

promise and compromise.

Now being so civil

and servants to time,

naturally they were upset

when, hard as they tried

they couldn’t get

their two clocks synchronized.

No matter how

they altered their rhythm

just before they slept,

she’d go through periods

when she’d still be

two hours in the red.

They re-paired the clocks

and pillow-talked

but still couldn’t agree

whose clock was off

and, on that count,

they figured time was ripe

to call it quits

and leave, let leave,

a match unstruck, unwon.

The sting in this tale

of a vow that failed –

love is more than the feel

of being together

in the same room

but never at the same time

Felix Cheong

[Sarah] From a Railway Carriage

Faster than fairies, faster than witches,

Bridges and houses, hedges and ditches;

And charging along like troops in a battle,

All through the meadows the horses and cattle:

All of the sights of the hill and the plain

Fly as thick as driving rain;

And ever again, in the wink of an eye,

Painted stations whistle by.

Here is a child who clambers and scrambles,

All by himself and gathering brambles;

Here is a tramp who stands and gazes;

And there is the green for stringing the daisies!

Here is a cart run away in the road

Lumping along with man and load;

And here is a mill and there is a river:

Each a glimpse and gone for ever!

Stevenson, Robert Louis