the old gangster

If fights and prisons didn't get him, the old reaper in the end will...

photo by Anthony-X at pixabay




the old gangster


where once his panther tattoo
had flexed on sinewy muscles
is now faded on weathered skin

he sits at the coffee shop
alone
the blinds on his mind drawn
his gold ornaments glistening
in the morning sunlight
last night's fallen leaves
at his feet
he closes his eyes
slowly
sipping his tea

waiting
for the last parang slash
to fall
on his head.


revised 23/02/2018
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"you are at the end of the alley
the metal in your hand heavy and cold
the sirens wail and wail
the hounds close in on the quarry"

-dsnake1, you are a starfish on a beach.

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© cheong lee san ( dsnake1 ) 2020

my father's clothes

there is always a strange silence at wakes.

photo by kytalpa at pixabay



my father's clothes



and i wonder if his work clothes
his heavy cotton jackets
                        slacks
                        boots
will ever miss his hammers
                        saws
                        and nails
and the sawdust lodged in the hems.

and there at his funeral, his wake
laid out on a wooden chair
in front of his coffin
         a white long-sleeve shirt
         a blue tie with stripes
         a grey pair of slacks, slightly frayed
         and a pair of black dress shoes, polished
a combination he seldom wear in his life.

how do you explain death to the clothes?
how to tell them how much we loved him?
that he is not going to come back to us anymore?
and as we, his children
sat around a table folding
paper gold and silver ingots
to ease his passage to the afterlife

his cloths sat still and silent
under the fluorescent lights
and the flicker of candles.


31/03/2019
**********

Written for the Golden Point Awards 2019 poetry competition. Never got around to submit it.

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"and a light
from an
oil lamp

to guide

the way"

-- dsnake1, hell notes

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© cheong lee san ( dsnake1 ) 2020

eating an orange

anyone wants leftover mandarin oranges from the lunar new year? 😁

Image by MichaelGaida on Pixabay



eating an orange



ORANGE
RANGE
RANG
RAN
AN
A

pip

spit
it out
among
wet soil
and grass
of the trail
will it be a big
tree when i am

gone?



25/02/2019
**********

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Food waste accounts for about 10% of the total waste generated in Singapore. [source : National Environment Agency]


Shared on Writers' Pantry #7 at Poets and Storytellers United.

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© cheong lee san ( dsnake1 ) 2020

and all i see are wet petals on asphalt

"And the days are not full enough
And the nights are not full enough
And life slips by like a field mouse
         Not shaking the grass"

-- Ezra Pound

Osaka, Japan, at night
photo by dsnake1



and all i see are wet petals on asphalt


the train doors close
like a breath exhaling

and i slip out of the station
to an empty street

a cold wind blowing
and a long way from home



01/01/2020
**********

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* “Where are the people?” resumed the little prince at last. “It’s a little lonely in the desert…”
"It is lonely when you’re among people, too,” said the snake. *

― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince


Shared on Writers' Pantry #1 at Poets and Storytellers United.

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© cheong lee san ( dsnake1 ) 2020

no one thinks of politics when he is hungry

somehow, there is order in chaos...

photo by darksouls1 at pixabay



no one thinks of politics when he is hungry



i feel like
i am the crab in the glass tank at the zi char stall
staring at the raffia strings tied around the pincers
and trying to escape.

the waitress comes holding the menu askew and recommends the song fish head in black bean paste. the same fish that caused the poisoning cases some time back, no thank you i don't want to be another statistic. i order a plate of hor fun, you don't expect me to finish that damn fish head alone anyway? she saunters off, shouts something towards the kitchen and hides in the smoking zone to steal a puff.

The beer lady is next, walks over, smiles and asks how many bottles of Heineken I want. I blink. In my not too distant past, i can drink like a hippo, but no more. i tell her i just want a teh, she says something like uncle join that queue at the counter for your teh and walks off, swinging her bottle opener.

i feel like
i am the crab in the glass tank at the zi char stall
scratching at the thick glass walls before the chef
comes with the cleaver.




revised : 07/04/2019
*****************


actually, this is about politics. sorry, my foreign readers, lots of local terms.
This is also an intended entry for the 2019 Golden Point Awards poetry competition.

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some foreign notes :

zi char - a hokkien term in Singapore (literally cook and fry) describing a Chinese food stall which provides a wide selection of common and affordable dishes, found in most kopitiams and hawker centres.

hor fun - Cantonese rice noodle strips stir-fry over high heat and served with seafood or meat.

teh - tea, from the Malay language, which was in turn taken from the Hokkien dialect.

song fish - Asian Bighead Carp, a freshwater fish.

uncle - no, not about relatives. any middle age or elderly man

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© cheong lee san ( dsnake1 ) 2019

Sengaku-ji

"The reputation of a thousand years may be determined by the conduct of one hour." - Japanese proverb.

photo by dsnake1



Sengaku-ji



Who would like to visit a graveyard when on a holiday tour? Not many, I guess.

But here I am, in one of the largest cities of the world, somewhere in Tokyo, on a cold balmy morning. Around me, are weathered gravestones with wooden votive plaques. Incense smoke rises from some holders. But this is not any graveyard. This is the resting place of the 47 ronin. I will not go into their legend. There are books and plays and movies. Yes, Hollywood has shot a movie about them with Keanu Reeves and though embellished with fictitious additions, it still try to stay true to the original incident. To the Japanese, the story of these ronin stands for duty, honour, courage and loyalty, the things that drive their psyche and soul.

I stand before these weathered stones, like the thousands and millions before me, bowing to them, trying to understand their courage and fears and sacrifices.

Perhaps we will never truly understand. Just like I do not understand how I navigated the chaos that is Shinjuku Station, the largest and busiest train station in the world, where I earlier had taken the train from.

An old lady comes, clutching a handful of incense. She walks with slow but determined steps up the stone stairs, to the graves. There are a couple of businessmen type there, in sharp black suits, and holding briefcases. They are sombre, silent, heads bowed before the graves. Perhaps they are seeking guidance on some difficult decisions?

The sky is threatening to rain. I walk down the stairs, out of the graveyard, and back to the main temple compound. Workers are trimming the ancient pine trees there. A teacher is bringing a group of young school-children, speaking in rapid Japanese. I do not understand his language to his charges. I just need to understand why I was here.


overcast skies -
a red maple leaf
falls from a branch.



written 21-11-2019
revised 07-12-2019
*****************

photo by dsnake1

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It is 8°C in Kyoto when I leave for Tokyo. It is warm in the shinkansen train. I watched the countryside of Japan flashing by as I eat my bento meal. Power pylons, houses with satellite dishes, squares of tilled land, rivers, mountains with autumn hues of red, orange, yellow and green. I do not want to sleep, like most of the other passengers, and miss all these. Soon, after slightly more than two hours, the train rolls into Tokyo Station. Back into the cold, and the rush hour of Japan.

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photo by dsnake1



© cheong lee san ( dsnake1 ) 2019

the stories are a bit grim

It's tough when you have almost nothing. No water. No electricity. Just a hut. And your wits.

colour pencil sketch by dsnake1
(a copy of Mondrian's Composition C)



the stories are a bit grim



In the morning the sun brushes our squatter huts
           with loving fingers of gold.

The politicians thump chests and assure us
      that our squatter village is safe.

An old man lives in an abandoned pill box
      and sells candy by day.

Aunt goes early to the market to pick
           discarded vegetables to make achar.

Little Brother is playing with the mothballs again,
           oh please not the mouth!

Some out-of-towners lost their way
           but we do not speak English well.

Me and cousins raid the pill box for candy,
           find only old books and blades.

The kind fisherman gives me and sister
           a big catch of wrasses, all for 30 cents.

Dad comes back from work and says
           someone is shipping missiles to Cuba.

Some nights, the groans and noises from
           the neighbours' thin walls are too loud

We get very paranoid when the police comes visiting,
           it has to be something big.

Surely, we are not having pigeon soup
           with wolfberries again, it's awful!

Mother says go back to sleep but the neighbours
           are fighting like wild cats.

Little Sister is out in the yard playing
           with the chicks, squeezing them.

Some shore-leave sailors lost their way
           and pretend to take pictures of us.

Uncle asks how does a man flies three times
           around the world, folding his paper.

For a week the cops come, plain-clothes,
           shoving mugshots into our faces.

We are expecting something better
           for dinner tonight other than missiles.

Government officials come and tell us
           that our huts have to make way for a port.

Dad says we are moving to the city core
           but the stories there are a bit grim.



10/09/2019
**********

A variant of a ghazal. Doesn't look like one? I think this is a better option for that damn poetry competition.

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Procol Harum - A Salty Dog

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© cheong lee san ( dsnake1 ) 2019