As We Head Towards the Sun

When we have gone as far as we can go,

And we cannot turn back no more.

Assess what we have done,

There is nowhere else to run,

But head straight towards the lighted sun.

Let’s go and see what waits for us,

There is no reason to make such a fuss.

When it is really the end of the line,

Do not stop to look behind,

Head straight towards the brilliant sun.

There is a road goes on forever,

Takes us to a shimmering river.

No need to be gratefully dead,

Around the bend there's something to be said,

Head unrelentingly towards the reflective sun.

Be glad of the hedge that blocks the view,

Of every face that heckles you.

Left behind us when we leave,

Let’s find new pastures, dear Greensleeves,

Go straight towards the shining sun.

Our hearts of joy, our hearts of gold,

Changes not alchemy as we grow old.

It furthers us to go somewhere unknown,

Let’s travel, my love, in the afterglow,

Hand in hand brightly in the Taiwan sun.

An engine belches digging ditches,

For bastard slobs and filthy bitches.

As we turn the key to open doors,

At bed and breakfast evermore,

Let’s head straight towards that funny sun.

Come on, my love, the warm breeze sways,

On palm lined roads along our ways.

We carry positions of intuition,

Leads us naturally to fruition,

Headed towards the warming sun.

Back to a garden like Woodstock,

Fill our ears with roll and rock.

We have come too far to turn back pages,

Let’s drink the wine rich with ages,

With sweet sounds in the black hole sun.

Kiss me now and hold me tight,

We’re two wheels approaching a forked delight.  

The road not taken leads us low,

In tandem, higher, going slow,

Come what may, into the gentle sun.

January 18, 2020

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Temporary Solitude in Progress

Temporary solitude in progress

With traffic blocked and roads clear.

Jack hammers chirping incessantly,

Like cicadas searching for mates.

How much imagination must it take?

Before I realize coming here was a mistake?

Everywhere I hear disturbances of nature,

But I live in the moment till reality shows,

That machines have taken over,

And silence is only a reprieve,

A matter of time,

Until their world works forever,

And our garden falls into disarray.

What can I say to myself without lying,

When I hear the silence

And clear my thoughts,

Of weeds and leaves 

and fallen berries,

Strewn across the asphalt ground,
without a sound?

I hear time passing in ripples in the river,

A river that does not ask what is happening above,

Unlike me who cannot mask a stepmom,

Disturbing my peace, 

penetrating my void,

With angry words about my daughter,

The call of the wild devouring others’ offspring…

I would rather be that egret standing tall as a reed,

Without hearing mechanical sounds drowning daughters,

I do not think we ought to bend

To temporary noises of progress, 

solitude of dissatisfaction

So I put in my earplugs, 

put on goggles,

Find water deep enough to silence others’ discontent,

Humbly bending reeds in the way of changing,

Rather than sternly snapping.

January 7, 2020

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No Skating Away on Han River

No skating away on Han River

Paths to familiar places never frozen

Like Joni Mitchell’s Christmas tantrum

Where else can I harmlessly roam?

Get lost in the maze of her amazing grace

Ride the bike slowly and never skate on

Why would I miss the lover I harm?

The ride up the river became a highway

Though noon birds sing brightly with river reeds

Factory hum drowns their song like tinnitus

Inside or outside my head full of sound

Gets me into the mood indigo

Returns me forever to icicle bicycle

In silent winter air that cannot be found

Rest in peace with Fredriksson, please

End Per Gessle’s masterpiece of pain

Shatter the ice for the broken-hearted

No hard Joni River to skate away now

Transformative power of skipping stones

Pristine egrets in tandem’s winter epic

Must have been good if we lost it somehow.

Warm the hand of my pretty skater

Melt the snowflakes before saying goodbye

With swooping frost on my forest phoenix

Flying relaxed like egrets on a joyride

In the afterglow of a tamed typhoon calm

The river’s ripples flow gently by our side

Only sprinters have something from which to hide 

Highways and ice capades faster than rivers

Fish, egrets, feet and turtles defrosted

Get somewhere fast that must have been love

No pines to cut down and decorate

Or ice to slip on in the fast lane

Listen to your heart if she is calling for you

Treasure your best baby before it is too late

December 12, 2019

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I Know a Beach Where It Never Ends

The wind is blowing in the wrong direction,

But the sun still sets in the west.

We were called in to repair others errors,

Victim of their own superstitions,

But ended up discrediting ourselves.

They, forever deformed.  

In a vain attempt at treatment,

After the most careful consideration,

We strove upward, only to get bad names,

For lack of their proper fengshui.

There was no way out but resignation,

Property returned to its original state.

We set them adrift with their element,

In a current they will not see coming.

On our raft of vicissitude with disinclined neighbors,

Unable to pull together and cooperate,

Taiwanese culture, dilapidated and lost,

We, their foreign whipping post, never more.

Doing what we can to ignore ignorance,

By listening to music through ear buds,

Playing pinball, drinking tequila, reading books, 

But it invades us like seeping tea,

Stranded in HGTV, Travel Channel,

Watching baseball before we unravel.

Stay off the chaotic streets.

Find safe places to eat.

Me and my lady, will not be beat.

Ride my bicycle to the pool,

She to Pilates and yoga class,

Without  connections, it can be cruel.

Without close friends to be distracted,

Laugh and get drunk and high,

It is not easy in Taiwan.

Losing social graces conforming to the norm,

There is nowhere civil to go,

Never on a crowded weekend; oh no!

Only Mandarin textbooks reach me,

The dividing line to which I teach

And the pleasures of McDonald’s meet-ups

Far away from our condo

A place language can be exchanged

Without exchange, nothing to arrange.

Life for a retired expat can be strange,

With careless indifference everywhere.

Superstitious ghost money burning,

Uncooperative neighbors, sloppy drivers,

Cars and scooters road rules circumvented.

Walkers without sidewalks, parking how one pleases…

If only I had someone to make it easy,

Some face to face distraction,

To supplement my faceless Facebook friends...

Though I write in rhyme, I read alone

Like hash marks on a prison wall

Out of Taiwan must I go to a land I can believe in?

I am going to China to see for myself.

What have I got to lose?

But it would mean losing you, my love,

You would not join me ‘cross the Strait.

How could I go where you would not follow,

Or lead somewhere we both cannot feel better?

Another place in Taiwan, you cannot forget,

With clean breezy air and dry sunshine,

We stood on a beach at sunset, do you remember when? 
I know a beach in Penghu where it never ends.

Let the wind blow in the wrong direction,

The sun still rises in the east; sets in the west.

November 26. 2019

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No Rest until Every Apologist Deleted

Weather before a typhoon, so warm and calm

Even though it is out of season

What could be wrong?

That white sailing object is not an egret;

A sense of security has some doubt.

Like a younger child learning from the elders,

Mistaken Taiwan rain will pour out,

Wetter than blue puddles in Hong Kong,

Stronger than the Bolivian rightist coup,

Colder than the sleet that coats Midwestern States.

The sun shines bright before a typhoon storms.

Rain lasts into the night when it is gone.

The white object, floating, is a Christ supreme

Full of contradictory swirling blowhards,

Dead to nourish crops resurrection

What a privileged life is

Drenched through and through, a twisted point of view,

The coming typhoon will rip you from your staunches,

Throw you up and cast you out

 cleansing wind, and closure. 

Your corporate power usurped,

Your stock markets crashed

Like Dorothy’s house on your capitalist witch falls.

So clear the sky before the typhoon storms.

So different when typhoon winds are spent.

 The air so clean to see mountain’s majesty;

The throne of nature’s supremacy,

After God’s hand smacks your foolish faces

With hundred kilometer-per-hour debris,

Deader than an unfriended Facebook deletion.

November 21, 2019

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Sitting Between Two Cranes

Strollers pass on a lonely dyke 

Their chatting pausing, smiling back

Acknowledging I am here.

Sitting between two cranes,
Along the river

A river that does not care if I am here,

It does not stop to look
or care if it gets the connection

Do I keep rolling any differently than a river?

That comes and goes,

Through velvet mornings and midnight haze,

If you were here on this bench,

I would pass it to you;

I would not mind.

November 3, 2019

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Near the Rainbow Bridge

Birds enjoy the last full rays of sun

Bathing on the riverside

Or hunting sustenance for little ones

Till the sun dips low in the skyline

Between high-risers

Over reflecting water
 and when the sun is out of sight

Bats fly from under the bridge

Swooping and scooping up gnats that hatched

As orange clouds are silhouetted

Daylight is forgotten

The evening wedded to a neon rainbow

As the last lonely egret on the wing

Head tucked into her neck

Flies to the nest in the tropical brush

For a night long quiet recuperation

And the dawn of tomorrow’s song

October 23, 2019

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