from: RAIN MOTH

Flight
©2006-Allen Sutterfield

and so I fly
against the unfamiliar unknown sun

pinions rush to bind
my rushing blood

a tree is such a simple thing
a cloud moving over the sky
a couple walking by
towards a song indarkness

sometimes the light blinds
brings down the flight
like stones into the sea


In the Midnight Hour
©2006-Allen Sutterfield

This sun so round
And perfect in its sky
Golden wheel on which you and I
Turn with our special sound

This bay this azure oval
Hiding nothing from the eye
Rolling ever in beveled motion
Open and un-sly,

This breeze profound
In the naked trees,
Along the ground
Among the leaves

Disturbs me to
A writing table
In the midnight hour
When I am unable

To be with you
To see with you
The things love should allow.
Cold, I need you with me now.

New Year Resolutions

“I will read from the first book picked at random from my book shelf…” I said to myself hoping for inspiration. “2007’s approaching and I have not made even the smallest list of New Year Resolutions.” I closed my eyes, meditated for a moment, my hands caressing the treasured rows. The book I blindly chose was not too big or small, its surface new, firm, as smooth as satin, I brought it close to my face, I felt its freshness and detected a subtle fragrance of sweet citrus…

I opened my eyes and read the title: “We miss each other even when we are together” a collection of poems by Sook Ryeo Kang. Originally written in Korean her poems were translated into English by the collaboration of Allen Sutterfield and Jong Nan King.

Like seeking scent in a field of wild flowers, in Sook Ryeo Kang’s poems and the excerpt from the Authors Preface, I discovered my new year resolutions.


JUDGING
©1997-Sook Ryeo Kang

Some of us are generous in judging, others are stingy.
Whether beautiful or poisonous, we say “That’s life.”

Even pursuing beauty our greed makes us suffer.
We want to be wild flowers but we do not leave our familiar gardens.

I don’t want to hurt others with my judgments.
I want to have a mind free of judging.


AS WIND PASSES
©1997Sook Ryeo Kang

We open our eyes but don’t see everything:
we don’t see what we should see.

We open our mouth: words flow eloquently,
Yet we don’t say what we should say.

We open our ears: sounds surround us
But we don’t hear what we should hear.

If we see properly we miss what we should not see:
It’s a lucky day.

Sometimes no response Is the best thing to say.

Often the best sounds are those not heard.
I’d like to live with eyes that know how not to see.

MIRROR OF THE MIND
©1997-Sook Ryeo Kang

Casual words are easily misunderstood –
In other minds
what colors reflect?

Late at night
I look at the reflection
in my mind’s mirror.

Dusty haze,
“residue of a busy life.”
I look again, intently,
embarrassed at my easy justification.

Spoken words –
they should be morning light.

I fold my handkerchief
carefully cleaning
mirror of mind


From the Author’s Preface:
©1997-Sook Ryeo Kang

“I don’t want to stumble over the pebble in a foolish way. We must let go of things in our past and even things of the world in our present. A new fullness is possible when we have empty hands. I want a life that is full in a way that is independent of things – full in emptiness.”

Christmas Lights

To Jesus of Nazareth

In the frosty garden of the night the moonlight whitens rooftops, glittering silently with the silent Stars.

I am here with night thoughts listening to the cold motion of he night; listening to the city sleep, knowing down the road, here and there, on old Vancouver streets there are Christmas lights, because it’s Your birthday…

Christmas lights and children with a million Christmas dreams because tonight is Christmas eve, the little Saviour’s birth Night.

…the lovely fright’nd girl and her devoted man, the old wise Kings… the bleating sheep, the words he gave the world to keep:

Love ye One Another… let the little children come to me, be good neighbours… treasure friends… yes, there are Christmas lights glowing down the streets…


Christmas Lights December 24/95
©2006-Richard Carlton

…Cathedral bells and city traffic, frosty breaths and winter jackets,Christmas parcels and tired feet, and windows lit with Christmas trees; Carol songs, that Christmas glow, maybe turkey and some mistletoe, a fire’s cheer, a glass of ‘nog and treasure of the hearts of home.

So many Santas when Christmastime comes all sharing their loves to make dreams come true, yeah all round the world a trillion hearts shine all giving something to somebody’s lives; So hang up the holly! sing out a tune, have a great Merry Christmas! it’s all up to you…

Australian Kristmus Pudding

Put 1 ½ pints milk, 1 ½ sqrs. chocolate or 3 tablsp. Cocoa in saucepan and bring to boil, add 4 dessertsp. gelatin (.Davis) and stir till dissolved, add sml. cup sugar and stir. Remove from fire, and when thickened add essence vanilla, ½ cup prepared dated, ½ cup raisins, few figs (if liked) and shredded almonds, ½ cup muscatels. Turn into mold which has been rinsed in cold water. When set turn out and decorate with holly and serve with whipped cream or custard.

From: The CWA Calendar of Puddings, 1930

A String of Lights

Christmas Morning Dec25
snowy-cold, brilliant sunshine


It flickers there on the stage of memory… laughter gleams scraps and scenes, the music of someone else’s life… And one by precious one, friends leave the stage of life… flicker out like a candle in a lonesome window… like string of coloured lights and vanish into endless, nameless Time, taking with them each one a little bit of youth’s sweet golden glorys, old love story, the feeling of the times… leaving those who’re left to watch the Morning the faint gold lilac of the dawning and memories that fade out into time like a string of coloured lights. /

©2006-Richard Carlton

The Antipodean Pagan

Anonymous Posting on a Brisbane Notice-board

“Oh, Kristmus is for kiddies.” Thus he piously intones while laying in the beer and wine and grub and maybe cones. He smiles anticipation of the coming Kristmus treat of warbling ‘Winter Wonderland’ in summer searing heat and singing songs of sleigh bells where the snow was never seen.

And there’s no heathen custom that could be quite so obscene as guzzling pud and turkey while the temperature is soaring, collapsing then as from every pore the perspiration’s pouring!

I try to point out to him that learned scholars say Jesus wasn’t born in winter. There is not a way that shepherds fed their flocks at night in freezing cold December.


It was the time for taxing by the Romans, you remember and they weren’t quite so stupid as expecting folk to travel in winter’s bleak conditions and on roads of roughest gravel.

The scholars know what time of year each sundry course of priest their duties in the temple kept, so there is not the least small shred of doubt that Christ was born (your patience thus permitting), September – Feast of Trumpets Day – so faithful, apt and fitting.

But ev’ry Yuletide custom is as pagan as can be. I’d shock you if I told you all about the Kristmus tree.

I tried to tell him all of this. Alas he isn’t listening, he is living in a dream world
Thinking what he does is Christian.

Early Morning in Chengdu

©2006-Allen Suttefield

Ha, Daylight! So thick is the cloud even daylight is late this morning. The rain, however, falls as it will; Water drops tap each awning in dark or light.

The concrete floors of the rising building glisten wetly: At present open to the sky they will soon be ceilinged never again to receive the rain until the roofs are destroyed.

In ancient Chengdu floors of new buildings also felt the rain, and construction was delayed by the same gathered clouds.

There! The first clang of dropped metal, like a bell announcing: the work day begins. Voices quickly follow unseen below and Friday, wet Friday takes place in the work week.

7:30 A.M.