She drank a glass of wine and walked out of the bar. He noticed her a second too late. Then everyday, he waited for her in the same bar, sitting on the same stool. She never appeared again, while he, killing time, fantasized over and over again how everything could have been different.
Showing posts with label Chee Kam. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chee Kam. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
Friday, September 18, 2009
Love Song For A Vampire by Annie Lennox
Come into these arms again
And lay your body down
The rhythm of this trembling heart
It's beating like a drum
It beats for you,it bleeds for you
It knows not how it sounds
For it is the drum of drums
It is the song of songs
Once I had the rarest rose
That ever deigned to bloom
Cruel winter chilled the bud
And stole my flower too soon
Oh loneliness
Oh hopelessness
To search the ends of time
For there is in all the world
No greater love than mine
Love O love O love
O love O love O love
O love still falls the rain
O love O love
O love O love O love
O love still falls the night
Love O love O love
O love O love O love
O love be mine forever (be mine forever)
Love O love O love
O love O love O love
O love O love O love
O love O love O love
Let me be the only one
To keep you from the cold
Now the floor of heav’n is laid
With stars of brightest gold
They shine for you
They shine for you
They burn for all to see
Come into these arms again
And set this spirit free
YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhG8zC4npsE
And lay your body down
The rhythm of this trembling heart
It's beating like a drum
It beats for you,it bleeds for you
It knows not how it sounds
For it is the drum of drums
It is the song of songs
Once I had the rarest rose
That ever deigned to bloom
Cruel winter chilled the bud
And stole my flower too soon
Oh loneliness
Oh hopelessness
To search the ends of time
For there is in all the world
No greater love than mine
Love O love O love
O love O love O love
O love still falls the rain
O love O love
O love O love O love
O love still falls the night
Love O love O love
O love O love O love
O love be mine forever (be mine forever)
Love O love O love
O love O love O love
O love O love O love
O love O love O love
Let me be the only one
To keep you from the cold
Now the floor of heav’n is laid
With stars of brightest gold
They shine for you
They shine for you
They burn for all to see
Come into these arms again
And set this spirit free
YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhG8zC4npsE
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Flying Inside Your Own Body by Margaret Atwood
Your lungs fill & spread themselves,
wings of pink blood, and your bones
empty themselves and become hollow.
When you breathe in you’ll lift like a balloon
and your heart is light too & huge,
beating with pure joy, pure helium.
The sun’s white winds blow through you,
there’s nothing above you,
you see the earth now as an oval jewel,
radiant & seablue with love.
It’s only in dreams you can do this.
Waking, your heart is a shaken fist,
a fine dust clogs the air you breathe in;
the sun’s a hot copper weight pressing straight
down on the think pink rind of your skull.
It’s always the moment just before gunshot.
You try & try to rise but you cannot.
wings of pink blood, and your bones
empty themselves and become hollow.
When you breathe in you’ll lift like a balloon
and your heart is light too & huge,
beating with pure joy, pure helium.
The sun’s white winds blow through you,
there’s nothing above you,
you see the earth now as an oval jewel,
radiant & seablue with love.
It’s only in dreams you can do this.
Waking, your heart is a shaken fist,
a fine dust clogs the air you breathe in;
the sun’s a hot copper weight pressing straight
down on the think pink rind of your skull.
It’s always the moment just before gunshot.
You try & try to rise but you cannot.
The Black Art by Anne Sexton
A woman who writes feels too much,
those trances and portents!
As if cycles and children and islands
weren't enough; as if mourners and gossips
and vegetables were never enough.
She thinks she can warn the stars.
A writer is essentially a spy.
Dear love, I am that girl.
A man who writes knows too much,
such spells and fetiches!
As if erections and congresses and products
weren't enough; as if machines and galleons
and wars were never enough.
With used furniture he makes a tree.
A writer is essentially a crook.
Dear love, you are that man.
Never loving ourselves,
hating even our shoes and our hats,
we love each other, precious, precious.
Our hands are light blue and gentle.
Our eyes are full of terrible confessions.
But when we marry,
the children leave in disgust.
There is too much food and no one left over
to eat up all the weird abundance
those trances and portents!
As if cycles and children and islands
weren't enough; as if mourners and gossips
and vegetables were never enough.
She thinks she can warn the stars.
A writer is essentially a spy.
Dear love, I am that girl.
A man who writes knows too much,
such spells and fetiches!
As if erections and congresses and products
weren't enough; as if machines and galleons
and wars were never enough.
With used furniture he makes a tree.
A writer is essentially a crook.
Dear love, you are that man.
Never loving ourselves,
hating even our shoes and our hats,
we love each other, precious, precious.
Our hands are light blue and gentle.
Our eyes are full of terrible confessions.
But when we marry,
the children leave in disgust.
There is too much food and no one left over
to eat up all the weird abundance
After Great Pain by Emily Dickinson
After great pain a formal feeling comes--
The nerves sit ceremonious like tombs;
The stiff Heart questions--was it He that bore?
And yesterday--or centuries before?
The feet, mechanical, go round
A wooden way
Of ground, or air, or ought,
Regardless grown,
A quartz contentment, like a stone.
This is the hour of lead
Remembered if outlived,
As freezing persons recollect the snow--
First chill, then stupor, then the letting go.
The nerves sit ceremonious like tombs;
The stiff Heart questions--was it He that bore?
And yesterday--or centuries before?
The feet, mechanical, go round
A wooden way
Of ground, or air, or ought,
Regardless grown,
A quartz contentment, like a stone.
This is the hour of lead
Remembered if outlived,
As freezing persons recollect the snow--
First chill, then stupor, then the letting go.
As I Walked Out One Evening by WH Auden
As I walked out one evening,
Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
Were fields of harvest wheat.
And down by the brimming river
I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
'Love has no ending.
'I'll love you, dear, I'll love you
Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the mountain
And the salmon sing in the street,
'I'll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky.
'The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world.'
But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
'O let not Time deceive you,
You cannot conquer Time.
'In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.
'In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.
'Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow;
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver's brilliant bow.
'O plunge your hands in water,
Plunge them in up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you've missed.
'The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.
'Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer,
And Jill goes down on her back.
'O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress:
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless.
'O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.'
It was late, late in the evening,
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.
Walking down Bristol Street,
The crowds upon the pavement
Were fields of harvest wheat.
And down by the brimming river
I heard a lover sing
Under an arch of the railway:
'Love has no ending.
'I'll love you, dear, I'll love you
Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the mountain
And the salmon sing in the street,
'I'll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky.
'The years shall run like rabbits,
For in my arms I hold
The Flower of the Ages,
And the first love of the world.'
But all the clocks in the city
Began to whirr and chime:
'O let not Time deceive you,
You cannot conquer Time.
'In the burrows of the Nightmare
Where Justice naked is,
Time watches from the shadow
And coughs when you would kiss.
'In headaches and in worry
Vaguely life leaks away,
And Time will have his fancy
To-morrow or to-day.
'Into many a green valley
Drifts the appalling snow;
Time breaks the threaded dances
And the diver's brilliant bow.
'O plunge your hands in water,
Plunge them in up to the wrist;
Stare, stare in the basin
And wonder what you've missed.
'The glacier knocks in the cupboard,
The desert sighs in the bed,
And the crack in the tea-cup opens
A lane to the land of the dead.
'Where the beggars raffle the banknotes
And the Giant is enchanting to Jack,
And the Lily-white Boy is a Roarer,
And Jill goes down on her back.
'O look, look in the mirror,
O look in your distress:
Life remains a blessing
Although you cannot bless.
'O stand, stand at the window
As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
With your crooked heart.'
It was late, late in the evening,
The lovers they were gone;
The clocks had ceased their chiming,
And the deep river ran on.
Mirror by Sylvia Plath
I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
What ever you see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.
I am not cruel, only truthful---
The eye of a little god, four-cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.
Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.
What ever you see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike.
I am not cruel, only truthful---
The eye of a little god, four-cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.
Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.
Messy Room by Shel Silverstein
Whosever room this is should be ashamed!
His underwear is hanging on the lamp.
His raincoat is there in the overstuffed chair,
And the chair is becoming quite mucky and damp.
His workbook is wedged in the window,
His sweater's been thrown on the floor.
His scarf and one ski are beneath the TV,
And his pants have been carelessly hung on the door.
His books are all jammed in the closet,
His vest has been left in the hall.
A lizard named Ed is asleep in his bed,
And his smelly old sock has been stuck to the wall.
Whosever room this is should be ashamed!
Donald or Robert or Willie or--
Huh? You say it's mine? Oh, dear,
I knew it looked familiar!
His underwear is hanging on the lamp.
His raincoat is there in the overstuffed chair,
And the chair is becoming quite mucky and damp.
His workbook is wedged in the window,
His sweater's been thrown on the floor.
His scarf and one ski are beneath the TV,
And his pants have been carelessly hung on the door.
His books are all jammed in the closet,
His vest has been left in the hall.
A lizard named Ed is asleep in his bed,
And his smelly old sock has been stuck to the wall.
Whosever room this is should be ashamed!
Donald or Robert or Willie or--
Huh? You say it's mine? Oh, dear,
I knew it looked familiar!
Ethics by Linda Pastan
In ethics class so many years ago
our teacher asked this question every fall:
If there were a fire in a museum,
which would you save, a Rembrandt painting
or an old woman who hadn't many
years left anyhow? Restless on hard chairs
caring little for pictures or old age
we'd opt one year for life, the next for art
and always half-heartedly. Sometimes
the woman borrowed my grandmother's face
leaving her usual kitchen to wander
some drafty, half imagined museum.
One year, feeling clever, I replied
why not let the woman decide herself?
Linda, the teacher would report, eschews
the burdens of responsibility.
This fall in a real museum I stand
before a real Rembrandt, old woman,
or nearly so, myself. The colors
within this frame are darker than autumn,
darker even than winter-the browns of earth,
though earth's most radiant elements burn
through the canvas. I know now that woman
and painting and season are almost one
and all beyond saving by children.
our teacher asked this question every fall:
If there were a fire in a museum,
which would you save, a Rembrandt painting
or an old woman who hadn't many
years left anyhow? Restless on hard chairs
caring little for pictures or old age
we'd opt one year for life, the next for art
and always half-heartedly. Sometimes
the woman borrowed my grandmother's face
leaving her usual kitchen to wander
some drafty, half imagined museum.
One year, feeling clever, I replied
why not let the woman decide herself?
Linda, the teacher would report, eschews
the burdens of responsibility.
This fall in a real museum I stand
before a real Rembrandt, old woman,
or nearly so, myself. The colors
within this frame are darker than autumn,
darker even than winter-the browns of earth,
though earth's most radiant elements burn
through the canvas. I know now that woman
and painting and season are almost one
and all beyond saving by children.
Stepping Into by Cyril Wong
the flat this evening,
something strange happened;
the veranda became a veranda,
the yellow lamp on the wall
a yellow lamp on the wall,
the mat on the floor turned red
instead of its present blue,
the woman who looked up
from the shelf of potted plants -
now a shelf of mangled bonsai -
became a woman with subtler lines
underneath her eyes, speaking,
as she had once spoken,
'Never forget.' I nodded,
as I had always nodded.
'I won't.' But that was then.
something strange happened;
the veranda became a veranda,
the yellow lamp on the wall
a yellow lamp on the wall,
the mat on the floor turned red
instead of its present blue,
the woman who looked up
from the shelf of potted plants -
now a shelf of mangled bonsai -
became a woman with subtler lines
underneath her eyes, speaking,
as she had once spoken,
'Never forget.' I nodded,
as I had always nodded.
'I won't.' But that was then.
For The Record by Adrienne Rich
The clouds and the stars didn't wage this war
the brooks gave no information
if the mountain spewed stones of fire into the river
it was not taking sides
the raindrop faintly swaying under the leaf
had no political opinions
and if here or there a house
filled with backed-up raw sewage
or poisoned those who lived there
with slow fumes, over years
the houses were not at war
nor did the tinned-up buildings
intend to refuse shelter
to homeless old women and roaming children
they had no policy to keep them roaming
or dying, no, the cities were not the problem
the bridges were non-partisan
the freeways burned, but not with hatred
Even the miles of barbed-wire
stretched around crouching temporary huts
designed to keep the unwanted
at a safe distance, out of sight
even the boards that had to absorb
year upon year, so many human sounds
so many depths of vomit, tears
slow-soaking blood
had not offered themselves for this
The trees didn't volunteer to be cut into boards
nor the thorns for tearing flesh
Look around at all of it
and ask whose signature
is stamped on the orders, traced
in the corner of the building plans
Ask where the illiterate, big-bellied
women were, the drunks and crazies,
the ones you fear most of all: ask where you were.
the brooks gave no information
if the mountain spewed stones of fire into the river
it was not taking sides
the raindrop faintly swaying under the leaf
had no political opinions
and if here or there a house
filled with backed-up raw sewage
or poisoned those who lived there
with slow fumes, over years
the houses were not at war
nor did the tinned-up buildings
intend to refuse shelter
to homeless old women and roaming children
they had no policy to keep them roaming
or dying, no, the cities were not the problem
the bridges were non-partisan
the freeways burned, but not with hatred
Even the miles of barbed-wire
stretched around crouching temporary huts
designed to keep the unwanted
at a safe distance, out of sight
even the boards that had to absorb
year upon year, so many human sounds
so many depths of vomit, tears
slow-soaking blood
had not offered themselves for this
The trees didn't volunteer to be cut into boards
nor the thorns for tearing flesh
Look around at all of it
and ask whose signature
is stamped on the orders, traced
in the corner of the building plans
Ask where the illiterate, big-bellied
women were, the drunks and crazies,
the ones you fear most of all: ask where you were.
A Glass of Wine by Andrew Motion
Exactly as the setting sun
clips the heel of the garden,
exactly as a pigeon
roosting tries to sing
and ends up moaning,
exactly as the ping
of someone’s automatic carlock
dies into a flock
of tiny echo-aftershocks,
a shapely hand of cloud
emerges from the crowd
of airy nothings that the wind allowed
to tumble over us all day
and points the way
towards its own decay
but not before
a final sunlight-shudder pours
away across our garden-floor
so steadily, so slow
it shows you everything you need to know
about this glass I’m holding out to you,
its open eye
enough to bear the whole weight of the sky.
clips the heel of the garden,
exactly as a pigeon
roosting tries to sing
and ends up moaning,
exactly as the ping
of someone’s automatic carlock
dies into a flock
of tiny echo-aftershocks,
a shapely hand of cloud
emerges from the crowd
of airy nothings that the wind allowed
to tumble over us all day
and points the way
towards its own decay
but not before
a final sunlight-shudder pours
away across our garden-floor
so steadily, so slow
it shows you everything you need to know
about this glass I’m holding out to you,
its open eye
enough to bear the whole weight of the sky.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
On reconsidering Crime Fiction
A friend argued with me that Crime Fiction would always be a second-class citizen to other more “serious” or “literary” fiction because it is formulaic and repetitive. “There is no character growth in this story, unlike those characters in the classics” he argued. “There can’t be any depth in these books because the authors are more interested in making money, and thus prolonging the franchise of a successful character. There is not much literary merits in these books.”
I don’t want to comment on the fallacies in this high-brow argument because I was once someone who believed in the same logic, who fastidiously read Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick to impress, feigning interests in a genre that did not appeal to me at all. It was after two years of working in the corporate world that I decided to pick up a crime novel again, partly to distract myself from reality, and to car-chase criminals on a busy American street again.
How wrong I was that it would distract me from the reality. Crime fiction, though focusing on crime as the genre suggests, is sometimes more realistic than some realist fictions. This is a group of writers who pay attention to tension between class, families, communities and individuals more readily, and who do not hesitate to expose and expostulate these tensions in the realm of crime.
“Personal is political”, or so proclaimed the feminist scholars in the late sixties and seventies. In that sense, criminal is also political. How does a crime happen? There should be a motive behind every single instance of crime, be it money, love, or mental issues. Even crimes of passion have motives – which is passion, in every sense of the word. However, these motives allow us to see a bigger social picture.
It is no longer a case of middle-class people trying to find their identities, or fighting for soul survival. It is hard-boiled survival. It’s about people working on the street, taking grimy jobs to earn a small paycheck. It’s about you and me, or the neighbour who stays next door, who is struggling day-to-day to make ends meet, who is wiling to do anything within his/her means to provide hot food on the table, and good education for their children.
Crime writers are more concerned about these individuals. The cynicism that these writers are writing for money must be left at the doorstep the moment we open the novel. Not many writers bother to give a voice to lower-middle class citizens. We should appreciate what the crime writers are doing for people of that socio-economic strata.
We must examine beyond the motives of these crimes. How is it possible that a desire for fame and success propels someone to kill? Does that inform us of any prevalent ideology in that particular community or society? How does that compare to the society that we live in now?
If the narrator is a first-person, then we have to ask even more questions. In the case of Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, the first-person narrative becomes a point for contention. What is the degree of reliability of the narrator? Is the narrator showing a just account? If not, what is the narrator trying to hide or inform us? Is the narrator’s view representative of his society? How is his view different from ours?
There are so many ways to read, access and teach crime fiction. Let’s pay a bit more attention to this genre if we can.
Regards,
Chee Kam
I don’t want to comment on the fallacies in this high-brow argument because I was once someone who believed in the same logic, who fastidiously read Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick to impress, feigning interests in a genre that did not appeal to me at all. It was after two years of working in the corporate world that I decided to pick up a crime novel again, partly to distract myself from reality, and to car-chase criminals on a busy American street again.
How wrong I was that it would distract me from the reality. Crime fiction, though focusing on crime as the genre suggests, is sometimes more realistic than some realist fictions. This is a group of writers who pay attention to tension between class, families, communities and individuals more readily, and who do not hesitate to expose and expostulate these tensions in the realm of crime.
“Personal is political”, or so proclaimed the feminist scholars in the late sixties and seventies. In that sense, criminal is also political. How does a crime happen? There should be a motive behind every single instance of crime, be it money, love, or mental issues. Even crimes of passion have motives – which is passion, in every sense of the word. However, these motives allow us to see a bigger social picture.
It is no longer a case of middle-class people trying to find their identities, or fighting for soul survival. It is hard-boiled survival. It’s about people working on the street, taking grimy jobs to earn a small paycheck. It’s about you and me, or the neighbour who stays next door, who is struggling day-to-day to make ends meet, who is wiling to do anything within his/her means to provide hot food on the table, and good education for their children.
Crime writers are more concerned about these individuals. The cynicism that these writers are writing for money must be left at the doorstep the moment we open the novel. Not many writers bother to give a voice to lower-middle class citizens. We should appreciate what the crime writers are doing for people of that socio-economic strata.
We must examine beyond the motives of these crimes. How is it possible that a desire for fame and success propels someone to kill? Does that inform us of any prevalent ideology in that particular community or society? How does that compare to the society that we live in now?
If the narrator is a first-person, then we have to ask even more questions. In the case of Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, the first-person narrative becomes a point for contention. What is the degree of reliability of the narrator? Is the narrator showing a just account? If not, what is the narrator trying to hide or inform us? Is the narrator’s view representative of his society? How is his view different from ours?
There are so many ways to read, access and teach crime fiction. Let’s pay a bit more attention to this genre if we can.
Regards,
Chee Kam
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