[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

The Poet's Room

has nothing in it.
No comfortable furniture,
no TVs, voices,
clocks ticking, nothing
except beats of air and blood
pulsing through your lungs.

You take a clean breath
and quietness comes in.

Your favorite films start flaring
on theatres of walls, whenever
you are brave enough
to chase your images
with words.

In a future with few blank walls,
libraries are hushed museums,
where crowds devour your books.
Others enter,
startled, tremulous.

Back to the Poets Room.
The bare room,
friendly in a dismal
daring way.

Here you can eat rocks,
jump precipices
and always recover, provided
you have pen and paper
to catch you

By Judith Pordon

The River-Merchant's Wife: A Letter by Li-Po (translated by Ezra Pound)

While my hair was still cut straight across my forehead

I played about the front gate, pulling flowers.

You came by on bamboo stilts, playing horse,

You walked about my seat, playing with blue plums.

And we went on living in the village of Chokan:

Two small people, without dislike or suspicion.

At fourteen I married My Lord you.

I never laughed, being bashful.

Lowering my head, I looked at the wall.

Called to, a thousend times, I never looked back.

At fifteen I stopped scowling,

I desired my dust to be mingled with yours

Forever and forever and forever.

Why should I climb the look out?

At sixteen you departed,

You went into far Ku-to-en, by the river of swirling eddies,

And you have been gone five months.

The monkeys make sorrowful noise overhead.

You dragged your feet when you went out.

By the gate now, the moss is grown, the different mosses,

Too deep to clear them away!

The leaves fall early this autumn, in wind.

The paired butterflies are already yellow with August

Over the grass in the West garden;

They hurt me.  I grow older.

If you are coming down through the narrows of the river Kiang,

Please let me know beforehand,

And I will come out to meet you

                      As far as Cho-fu-Sa.

Leisure - William Henry Davies

What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this is if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare. 



[sharon]
note: I think this poem, though simple, can be put to use through all levels because of the meaning it encompasses. the secondary 4 students will need reminders like this as they drown in O levels preparations.