Archive for the ‘Poems’ Category
Tao of Now
Now is the past
For all things pass,
Memories shape
The present tense,
Tight wound clock springs
Tells us the Tao,
The past is never dead
Till now!
But a mere moment, ever fast,
Welcome there!
To our living past,
Lasting presence
Impressions quake,
Be dead or alive,
Both of fate,
Hand in hand,
More than we can make,
The living
Leave behind their wake,
Their future stare
Through antique eyes,
Yet sentiments are living ties;
Just now,
We’ve witnessed my passing,
But I’m alive,
Well and seeking,
In the making,
Glimpse progression,
Tao of now –
My sweet transgression.
Cheung-Ling Wong
Portent
Bats have flown and
Owls have spoken
All that’s left
Is what’s yet woken
–
Malignant night
Set clocks ticking
Soon the sound
Of alarms screaming!
–
Dawn be soon
From delusion’s fate
Mutants flee
Before the light rakes
–
Stretching muscles’
Complacent stake
Wisdom’s depth
In breadth, widely-wake
–
Capacious mind
Our fertile ground
From shadowed depths
Our most profound
–
Humbled by daylight
Clearings swept
Watered by tears
Our sorrows wept
–
Plant a new seed
And we will gain
From deep furrows
We live again.
Cheung-Ling Wong
Singing Trees
Eerily
The silent copse stand
Very soon
Dawn will pass this way
So feathered wings
Will have their say;
Faith in branches supporting all
Metaphysical shade befalls
Adding depth to our wanderings
As we cast our rings resounding
Around pine, birch
Gum and Cedrus –
Resonant with dreams resinous
’Neath fragrant shafts
Of sunlight calls
Guiding wings
To where nectar falls
Guiding souls
To where Hope restores.
Cheung-Ling Wong
Homeless
From the loving womb
Of our mothers
To the golden light of nursery
And blessed
Consecrated waters;
How can we not but be so sacred?
Even as the years pass
Knowing old
We make our beds low
On pavements cold
Consecrating bins
With faith untold.
Cheung-Ling Wong
Magnanimous
Magnanimous!
Measured only by light
And the years that pass;
Wherever I be
I am never alone
You precede me;
When you behooved
Animating our souls
The stars too were moved;
Wide, your footsteps reach
Between the gulf of men’s hearts,
I dare breach –
To realms known only to you,
I seek, but find,
Myself in you!
Your vast embrace,
Our mystery,
Deciphering majesty!
Knowing…
How small our problems are,
Before your Love – before ours.
Cheung-Ling Wong
Plural
A single tree is no forest
Nor grassy mead
Green blade’s behest
A solitary bird nay flock
A mount is just a pile of rock
Never the majestic range be;
What am I but a human being?
Singular is but insular
I cannot claim Humanity
Make virtue from plurality
When alone
Without the other
Like a child
Estranged from mother
Lone plover
With no flock to cove’
Nor discover
My brooding love
Until one’s other had embraced
A greater humanity graced
Love, I doubtlessly had unveiled
I welcome as brother, availed.
Cheung-Ling Wong
Night Journey
Look before
So as to look after
Live many years
Bar one hereafter
Hindsight lends me
Eyes into foresight
Such was my journey
Through the long night;
Now caught between
Bright waves of wisdom
Love’s inextricable
Idiom
It gave me care
That I may take it
Given many a chance
To make it
Lessons burnt
Into my flesh yet earned
Till the day my soul
Is healed and learnt
Not for relief
From scars now at peace
But of sweet contentment
And release.
Cheung-Ling Wong
Wavelength
Memoirs are
But echoes of life’s song
All be-loved
Is music to my soul;
Lines etched in sand
Patterns in water
Tint of leaves
The spectra of flowers:
Shapes of thought and
Its impression’s wake;
Our lives
But a tangle of sine waves
Orchestrated
To be conductive
Since birth and to our wake –
Symphonic
Yet in death
I wave, I wave farewell.
Cheung-Ling Wong
Waterhole
It flowed and coursed
As if water
Upon world
Where flotsam gather
–
Pond its mind
To rest and ponder
A pause to reflect
Life’s wonder
–
Miracles crossed
Its murky depth
Sending ripples
Across its breadth
–
With this truth
It sparkled with light
Myriad thoughts
Did surface bright
–
Mystery recalls
Source of life
On its shores, succours
Hope and strife.
Cheung-Ling Wong
Beauty
We’re enthralled
By your power,
Scythed for love
Handsome flower;
Caught by eye
Within our storm,
First be-felled,
Tall trees with form;
Beauty’s life
Always be claimed,
Plucked and ravaged
Sweetest game,
When consumed
Its virtues maimed,
Yet never did
Lend its name;
Goodness hungered
Where there’s none,
For beauty’s made
Never won.
Cheung-Ling Wong
