#stainedglasswords

[criticalcriminal]

[instruth]

SCHOOLDAYS

Schooldays are a garden growing wild

Bushy shrubs busy in a playful child

A mansion with many rooms, a palace

For a game of chess set up in good pace

Be the pawn prince calling the shot

Just need a pen, paper and an ink pot.

Write well and please the school master

Lie true to him, confess all to the pastor

Polish the chalice shiny for holy wine

Kneel at the altar, pray sweetly divine

Help the good padre run his godly race

In confession box take his priestly place.

Hear the sins of ones not so my friends

Hold them at ransom, favors without end

Siphon donations from the church retreats

Give the hungry and beggars a fuller treat

Kind to the vagrants and the poor dullards

Out of school to roam, well remembered.

Strict but humble is the school master

Striding along with his feather duster

Tilted tipsy house on stilts he duly resides

To ward off the flooding from the riverside

His stern look portrays his predicted mood

Good humor when he is out of the woods.

Learned poetry he drills by wits and skill

Reciting three hundred verses for the kill

Honorably well, swells me on to persevere

Respect sweeps my breast to fully endear

Stern, bent hot on hell but he is truly kind

Firm discipline begets a future in mind.

It hurts him harshly pushing us to the slog

Result speaks for itself as an obedient dog

A short man with the fullest head I know

An encyclopedic library therein to show

A true mentor even to a truant untold

A fine example of love that I duly enfold.

- J. P. Lee

[instruth]

A CHANGE OF MIND

I remember an event when I was in great distress. I had been terribly upset by reports I read regarding corruptions in the government, lies, greed, denial and clever manipulations. I set about hurriedly scribbling a nasty accusative essay on my immediate thoughts and feelings.

I was about to send it by fax to the parties concerned when suddenly, I felt an inner surge of calmness - having written that letter, rising from within, followed by a pleasant memory of my childhood days, being born, raised and studied in Kuching, Sarawak (East Malaysia). I felt an overwhelming emotion of love. It was like there was a sudden change of guards all around me.

I sat back down to write again, pouring out my true grief and sorrow, spilling my true feelings of anguish and frustration and inking it on paper, transferring every thought in mind and soul onto a piece of writing pad. It is hard to explain the sudden change of emotion, from rage to collective concern over something that was important to me. However, the original rage was gone.

The result was this poem:

FAREWELL TO HARMONY

- by J. P. Lee

O fair land of bliss, birth place that helped groom my fragile youth ,

Of tales better remembered than sermons on unspoken truth,

Where poor emigrants had mingled well with the hornbills and the natives.

Alas! From afar, rich explorers arrived to rule and lord over their lives,

Plundering fields and habitat, cursing the blessed harmony.

Wounded, the sacred ground bled and moaned in loathsome agony,

Paving the way for the rise of a brand new breed

To overthrow this folly of pure foreign greed.

But history shall repeat itself, sadly I must say,

For the rule is no better today than yesterday.

Rivers of greed, bribery and deceit still meander and burrow;

Bends and hidden tunnels have replaced the straight and narrow.

Prejudice and Power now possess the upper hand;

Fairness and Equality have vanished from the land.

Remembrance sweeps my mind to console my heaving breast;

Fond memories freeze my grief, comfort and put my pain to rest.

Near yonder bend on rocky road stood the sturdy devoted school,

That taught the virtues of saints and values of man-made rules.

Discipline and obligation had not known exception;

Truants and the disobedient must bear the rod of correction.

Constant prayer and hard work - its motto shall remain

Unchanged, to ascend the rugged path towards future gain.

Sports and athletics had carved endurance with sharpened strength,

To hurdle obstacles, to conquer heights, by width and by length.

It was the standard then and pray today is still the practice

To endow in Hope with fortitude, be one learned or apprentice.

Yet be not like the charging train but a constant contemplative,

Never to plunge head-on to desire but be wisely imaginative.

I had been there, unnoticed, apprehensive but not fearful.

In silence did I perceive the true lesson and learn to be grateful

For what I have become today in spirit, body and mind

To cherish the abounding grace and blessing I now find.

[criticalcriminal]

In the future - when we look back on ourselves today like barbarians of old - there are great grass lands in place of once pillaged earth where lions roam like house cats for they are equally as loved as every being on this planet.

The rivers flow, the oceans churn; many a-billion are alive; they live in prosperity as I cannot dream of and under the mountains and seas, the oil age is gone, unforgotten but distant, like the era of the dinosaurs, when creatures roamed like mobile homes and the mammal’s reign was incomprehensible.

The wild west and the roman empire live in the same breath as out time; the all occupying presence of doom and the conquering forces of the west are not punished for their inhumanity, but shown their place in an act of mercy, its empathy unheard of in all human history save for then - when mankind forgave its crimes.

- chey brabo

[criticalcriminal]

“If it tastes bad, don’t eat it.”

But it had been years, and she had been sweet, intoxicating and sure like sugar and honey, hot chamomile tea and almond milk candy; a hundred sacred tokens of relaxation lived within her and it was the lack of her presence that hurt me.

With her by my side, all suffering went mute but she took that alleviation with her when she went. She balanced my heart next to progress and creativity; my women rose me up as she held me down, drowned me as she breathed life into my heart.

So what could be the lesson here? The hardest lives are given to the eldest souls, and our destinations are decided prior to birth - what I mean to say is that there is a purpose but I haven’t the slightest idea of what is is.

#napowrimo19 day 3  Chey Brabo

[criticalcriminal]

all the opportunity in my life existing line raw potatoes in a stew, cooking into something soft and unusable because so I waited too long to turn the slow cooker down

over my shoulder, third-person-shooter style, a thousand years of generational trauma passed down and taught by well intentioned mothers like inherited cardiomyopathy.

I once thought of trouble as something unexplained, like white lights on the sky or infant deaths, but I know now that there is a bright red thread connecting my mind to everyone else’s.

- chey brabo

[criticalcriminal]

I kept my eyes on her, never dared look away, let the tears fall down my cheeks so my ever loyal gaze could stay locked on her’s forever.

the world turned around us, that much I know; a blaze engulfed our house but nothing was real if she said otherwise so the ash crawled down my throat and I gagged up my heart in penitence.

in the summer, she said, “don’t eat, I’ll feed you.” though nothing she could gave me tastes anywhere as sweet or satisfying as the desire for freedom I inherited at birth.

perhaps I would have wasted away, been carried off by some kindly gust of wind, but I nailed lead to the soles of my shoes, decided that if I stayed on the ground at least the weight of my life was with me

not somewhere in the stratosphere where she could judge my soul next to the mass of a lifeless feather that she can cast away with the wave of her hand as easily as shouting down a co-equal.

from #6 of @avolitorial love prompts!  - chey brabo

[criticalcriminal]

my guilt comes bubbling in like the ocean’s tide into a freshwater estuary where my happiness is a wetland of reeds, sweet grass, and blooming wildflowers that I’ve been trying hard to regard with love for the last ten and half months.

all progress feels washed away and poisoned as if my efforts were all for not; like the honesty of darkness rolling in as an escort of the night  or the presence of death no matter the glory a soul might have felt while they were living. what lesson am I meant to learn from repetition?

last year, self loved looked childlike. then, the Earth swiveled on its mighty axis, gravity pulled on the bright side of the moon so out went the water and the misery with it, reclaiming shimmering abalone and stripping meat from the putrid carcasses I’d been collecting.

guilty - chey brabo