Too Crowded For Emptiness

My phone rang in the middle night.

It sits right beside my head so I can shut off the alarm as soon as possible.

Dreams sometimes envelop the reality around your bed.

The ringing phone, for example, became the song I was listening to while chasing the robber out of a fish tank. Well, I suppose I was swimming after the robber. For all I know I was probably flying after the robber with wings made of loose imagination. Nevertheless, the phone was ringing. The urgency I felt to catch the criminal made me ignore the music and continue my pursuit. Then, my conscious brain wrapped it's fingers around the dream and squeezed it until I realized that there was no robber, no fish tank. Now there was only the caller who was robbing me of my sleep.

I threw back the blankets in a hurry; I didn't want the caller to think they had woken me up by letting it ring too long. Too late. 1 missed call. Who could it have been? Should I bother looking? Doesn't matter who it is, I'm not calling back until morning anyway... Unless its an emergency. Then maybe I should check... just in case it is an emergency... In case maybe.. it was the robber.. fishing wings.. of swim tank...

1 New Voicemail!
I'm awake again...

I suppose it wouldn't hurt to just listen to the voicemail, figure out who it is, and then decide if it can wait until morning.

The automated voice blared momentarily, "You have one unheard message."
So I've heard.
"Message one:"

The blood in my veins stopped instantly. I knew this voice. Soft and familiar. It had once brought tears to my eyes. Symphonies have been written trying to match its melody, yet fallen short. And now is my dream-soaked mind fabricating this too? Will the fish tank suddenly implode and turn into jello squares that recite poetry from prison? This isn't my mind. This is reality. This is music. Or perhaps pain. The last time I heard this voice it was pain. The sharpness of it still fresh in the muscle memory of my heart. Still trained to skip a beat when I hear the voice, in an effort to spare the pain.

"Hello. I know you must be asleep... Its been a long time since we talked last. I've talked myself out of this for a long time now. I'm sorry, I probably shouldn't have called... I understand if you don't return this call... I

I need to tell you something. I won't be able to sleep until we can talk... Just for a few minutes... I know... I'm sorry. Please call me back."

Just like that. Back into my life. Her last plea drifted back and forth in my mind like a feather in the breeze, not coming to rest, just rocking back and forth. I'd rather it had been a dream. I'd rather not live this reality. The soft melodies are replaced now. Instead of summer symphonies, winter coats stained from the dirty snow covered roadsides. My life is different now, there is no room for past mistakes. It's too crowded for the emptiness.

The Inner Side of Expression

On the eve of the explosion, in the quietness, there was a thirst for noise.
The universe needed a Big Bang.
There was too much nothing and the void needed something .
The emptiness was intended to be filled, the galaxy dust yearned to spread its arms around space. Absence was intolerable. The void invited the bang.

Without the void there would have been no Big Bang.
Without the Big Bang there would have been no void.

Now embracing one another, their beauty spattered across the sky.
Stars clamour back and forth sharing their affection publicly.
The darkness only visible as it hugs the bright satellites.
The contrast evokes character and smiles.

Looking up into a dark night sky
The fireworks stuck to the ceiling and the moon looking on with one eye shut.
One can't help but to read the stories on display.
To see the action, the drama and romance.
You reach out to insert yourself into the plot,
Unify with the Universe.

I'm Quite Poetic as I Dream

Third time is a charm, a lucky charm; which means you should have 3 bowls of cereal for breakfast before taking a test or before requiring luck, ever. How lucky do you have to be? Or do coincidences count? Coincidences have taught me a lot about luck. Coincidentally, luck has taught me a lot about nothing. Consider this irony:
I met a girl I didn't know
yet loved her my whole soul over
She was the silhouette of my desires
and from her hand
came the brush strokes
of my dreams.
The shadow cast then darkened
the painting in my mind
and when the light shone bright again the flowers had wilted dry
Once bright petals
faded remain
a reminder of what was


Again I met a girl I didn't know
and she loved more than I returned
in her eyes
I painted beauty and danced true joy
she hung on my every word
Illusions were the medicine
healing both our hearts
Both seeing what we wanted
and believing what we saw


Another petal hits the ground
it bursts into darker colors
Two
Loves
are hung on brittle hopes
Neither recompensing

Whose love will last
or be dispelled?
Both go on un-squelshed
and pending
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Is there something lucky about love? Fortunate? Even coincidental? Ironical?
Tell me what causes it.

Chinese Poem

天星

每夜中眺於星旻
星漸次諸創杳晨
吾之來夢杳星同
夜中來去一時賓


하늘의 별
밤마다 하늘의 별을 바라보고 있어
별은 하나하나 새벽 빛에 사라진다
나의 미래의 꿈은 마찬가진데
밤에 갔다오는 일시적 소님이다


Stars that fade
Each night I gaze to heaven
Slowly, the stars disappear by morning
So with my dreams of the future
They come and go as a visitor in the night

Loving betrayal

I sat in the barber shop this morning waiting for a haircut. It's been a little over a month and my hair was getting annoyingly long and shaggy. Just to the length where it falls awkwardly down my forehead and the disheveled sides scraggle over my ears, the grey hairs showing through just slightly. The grey hairs are the primary signal that a cut is in order; a fresh cut burying them away for at least another three or four weeks. There was a man sitting in the chair engaged in conversation with the barber. He was in his mid to late thirties, balding slightly with glasses. The barber called him by name as they chatted. His clear blue eyes spoke to me the moment I saw him. There was character in his eyes, a kind purity in them. They talked comfortably with one another; starting with pleasantries, moving to recent comings and goings and then something unexpected. The barber asked about Sarah. Rob's eyes moistened. As he spoke, his eyes seemed to be doing the talking, articulating his every emotion. This was clearly unexpected for the barber as well. The elevated chair, smell of shaving cream and pictures of hot rods hanging on the walls certainly wasn't the place most men, if any, talked about their feelings.
Sarah is two and half years old. She shares her father’s clear blue eyes and bright smile. Like clouds surrounding a rainbow her blonde hair with its darker roots lies softly on her head and falls gently down the sides of her face. She is full of life and into everything. Her mother, frequently reprimanding her for making messes throughout the house, reluctantly scolds her. The innocence in her face cries for mercy. What does a mother say? She wraps up her precious daughter in a loving hug and helps her clean up the mess. A child at this age knows only two things, smiles and tears. There is no greater joy to a parent than to arouse one of those toothy smiles accompanied by an excited giggle. Conversely, you avoid at all costs anything that would tug the tears from those wide, trusting eyes.
Rob’s misty eyes silenced the barber shop. Clearly the barber’s friendly inquiry had incited an unexpected response.
Rob began, “Sarah has had a rough past couple of weeks. She came down with a fever about 3 weeks ago. We took her to the doctor and got some medicine for her. The pediatrician said that she would back to her boisterous self by the end of the week.”
“So what happened?” asked the barber.
“Well, turns out that Sarah is allergic to the medicine we got from the doctor.”
A single tear streamed down his cheek. The guys sitting, waiting for cuts with me sat rigid in their seats. Rob paused in an effort to gather himself.
He continued, “We gave her the medicine and put her to bed. I woke up the next morning and went to work. I had just pulled into the parking lot at the office when my wife called me. I couldn’t understand her at first, her voice was frantic and muffled by tears. I tried calming her. Finally, she spoke clearly. She told me that when she went to wake up Sarah she wasn’t breathing, her face was bluish…”
He broke off again. His emotions were full in his throat, choking out his words. Now there were more than just a few tears coming down his cheeks. The love for his daughter was evident in his tear filled eyes. The barber reached over to the counter and grabbed some tissues. Handing them to Rob he put a hand on his shoulder to comfort him and said quietly, “It’s alright Rob, take your time friend.”
Rob wiped his eyes and cheeks. He put on a brave smile to hide his embarrassment. He cleared his throat and continued, “Thanks Bud. Her face had turned blue and my wife didn’t know what to do. So I rushed home and we raced her to the emergency room. Luckily they were able to resuscitate her quickly before she had any brain damage.”
“That’s a relief!” the barber interrupted.
“I thank God that she’s still alive. At the hospital the doctor informed us of the allergy and told us that they put her in the ICU just to be safe. We expected Sarah to bounce back after a few days in the hospital but after two days things took a turn for the worse.”
“No.”
“The doctors were sure to check her for various other allergies and to be certain that in helping her out of the allergic reaction they didn’t trigger any new reactions. The problem was that they misdiagnosed her fever. Turns out it wasn’t just a regular fever.”
“What was it Rob?”
“I’m not exactly sure, some kind of virus. It started out in her stomach and then it spread. For a week the doctors couldn’t figure it out. My poor Sarah, lying in bed, looked at me one day and asked why her whole body hurt so much. Those trusting little eyes couldn’t hide the pain. She cried often during that week. The blue in her eyes nearly overwhelmed by the surging red from the constant crying. I had to look at my baby girl, and just put my arms around her. I couldn’t say anything to her that she would understand. The doctor walked in at the end of the week with his chart in hand. He told us the nurse would be in soon to administer some medication that would eradicate all of Sarah’s problems. They had finally pinned down the exact virus and had something that would clear everything up.”
“So she’s fine now, huh?”
“Well, she’s back home now; smiling as much as ever, but I’ll tell you what, the hardest thing I’ve had to do in my life happened when that nurse walked into that small hospital room.”
“What happened?”
“My little girl was lying there, holding onto my hand, still red-eyed and scared. The nurse asked her to roll over on her side. She clenched my hand with her little fingers. Her lips were trembling and her eyes begged me to make everything better. I reached down and helped her roll over. She squeezed tighter and some tears of fear started to well up. The nurse pulled out a large needle and bent down to stick my baby. When Sarah saw the needle she cried out. Her screaming pierced me to the center. I wanted to step in front of the nurse, grab the needle and throw it out the window. I wanted to literally shove the nurse down or push her out of the room. What was she trying to do?? Could she not see past her nurses uniform or name tag? Sharon Hicks?? Couldn't she hear my little angel screaming in terror?? Sarah was squeezing my hand so tightly. Her little voice ran shrill as the nurse punctured her skin. She screamed out, ‘Daddy!’ and tears flooded the small hospital pillow. She cried endlessly, her sobs echoing through the small room, betrayal in every choked breath. How could I do this to her, those blue eyes were pleading for an answer. After all the pain she had felt the past week, the trauma, and now I stood by and let a stranger stab her. She rolled over, burying her face in the bed, betrayed by the only faces she really even recognizes, the ones she used to trust. How could she understand that in order to overcome all the pain of the previous week and a half she had to endure this momentary prick? There was no way to tell her, no way to make it better for the teary-eyed beautiful blonde baby of mine.”
The barber placed his hand on Rob’s shoulder. He was in tears again. The barber wiped a tear off of his own cheek. I could see the internal agony surfacing again; the struggle within a man to love someone in painful ways. Tough love. Paternal love.

the Top-Soil

I believe there are words buried in us all. Whether we write them down or speak them or whether we plan them out elaborately just to conceal them in a moment of fear or shame or doubt. These words form the story we want to tell; the story defined by our deepest emotions and clearest memories. Some people tell a funny story, others tell sad ones of loss and buried pain, still others talk in circles, never telling their story at all, simply avoiding the truth they haven't told themselves yet. In one way though everyone's story shares a common element, we all tell a story about ourselves. Selfish you say. That is the only story I can really tell convincingly, that is really the only story I know. I may adapt it to be more exciting or suspenseful but, in the end, its just about me. Selfish? Only if I don't convey the story in a way to capture you, in a way that makes it your own experience, your own life as well.
Mine is a love story. I hate to admit it. Love is why we live; to get it, to give it, to feel it more. A string of thoughts connected by conjunctions and punctuation in my mind, pulled together in my waking hours, and exquisitely portrayed on my dream's canvas in the night; all a painting of love. A painting yet to be uttered. How does one speak art? Would you know Michelangelo if you heard it or read it? Even now the words I have inside me are buried beneath the words that you are reading. I'm telling you about them without telling them directly to you. Michelangelo simply peeled away the outer layers of the stone to reveal the image underneath. Forthcoming posts will determine if I can shovel away the earth to reveal the words, the story, the love? buried within me.

Samplings of my poetry and a short story

This is a poem about my Ganglion cyst, located on top of my right wrist. Written when I was 14 or 15 years old.

Ganglion Cyst
People are always asking about this bump on my wrist
How many times do I have to tell them it’s a Ganglion cyst?
Indians used to have them so you could say that they are tribal
If you think its ugly then just smack it with a Bible
When people started staring I’d slip it in my pocket
And just because it fit, I’d put it in my eye socket
I always joked that I was growing knuckle #6
But then Frony grabbed a Bible and took a couple licks
The procedure was painless, I didn’t feel a thing
Except for the Good Book and a mighty giant sting
Before I knew it one wrist was like the other
I missed it so much I felt like crying to my mother
What people called a deformity I called a gift
My little miracle was a boost, an uplift
Everyone was jealous though they claimed that they were not
It even helped me to improve my jump shot
So now that it’s dead and gone, I don’t know what to do
My jump shot has disappeared, but the gawking quit too
My eye feels naked without its protective shield
The Bible is supposed to save people, but to me it didn’t yield
It came crashing down with all its mighty force
It took my cyst away like taking glue from a horse
I’ve strived to grow a new one, I really have tried
But I’ll live my life cystless and Ganglion deprived.

This is a Shijo (Korean form of poetry) that I wrote. Inquire within for the translation:

떠나간 마음
마음이 떠나갔으니 이생에 가치 있나
눈물이 사라졌어도 흉터가 남아있네
새벽에 빛나는 해가 어둠에서 앞선다.

I wrote this a long time ago when I was in High School about a girl who was hitting on me while riding the bus home:

MCfilthy Experience
The load on my shoulders goes on the seat
I pull out my ears and prop up my feet
Losing myself and winding down, the bus rides away.
Bouncing behind me is a twisted leach throwing out her poison, trying to catch another stallion
I put down the cereal ice-cream as the leach tried putting the hook in
I ain't the fish to be caught, so get off the bus
Next rolling session and there's the filthy leach
Elaboration on her fishing poles and I nod, I nod my head while I'm complaining inside
The yellow mobile is where the leach attacks, I can take that.
But holding on a minute she's taken my arm
She's adding to her fish farm
She's the large mouth leach and filthy at that, if she says that again I'm gonna grab a metal bat
H + B is false
I'll write it on the walls
She tries playin with my mind, she gets so unkind, being blind, not knowing that I'm holding the strings.
She's a psuedo-empty bucket all melted inside, mad amounts of spoons and nasty house flies.
The filthy bus leach tried attaching to me, I burnt her off with a match but I still haven't got free.
The Argentine Chocolate growls loud at the parasite.
On the scheme of wheels I'll look into the light, excuse myself from the table and melt the spoon outta sight.

This is a two part story that I wrote during my leisure time as an Intern at LG Electronics:

Gilbert’s Tale
Once upon a time there was a fish named Gilbert, people just called him Bert for short (funny, I'd probably call him Gil for short, I mean, he is a fish, but anyway, that's what people called him) And Bert didn't read very well because when paper gets soggy it eventually disintegrates and gets to become a useless mess of pulpy matter. So Bert looked for stuff coated in plastic (or more commonly known to us landlubbers as 'laminated') However, poor Bert could only find menus from local restaurants that were plastic coated and all the local restaurants were seafood places and so when he would read them it was horrifying to him! So that is why Gil... I mean Bert didn't read very well, it gave him nightmares. So instead of reading Bert would practice the fine art of twirling sand into little funnel sand clouds on the bottom of the ocean floor. Then one day an otter saw Bert artistically expressing himself in the sand and ate him. Bert was only 3 weeks old.
Think that's the end of the story?
You thought wrong; Bert was a resilient little fella. So he twirled the Otter's innards right up into a beautiful array gut tornado and the Otter thought it was so wonderfully imaginative that he let Bert free! As a new man (or fish actually) Bert changed his name to Gil as was his destined fate to begin with and never had otter problems again. He then spent his days doing service in the underwater mental institution for marine life gone psycho. What a big heart.
The End :)

Gilbert at the Tute
Gilbert awoke suddenly to the sound of gurgled throat clearing. 6 hours at the Underwater Mental Institution for Marine Life Gone Psycho (UMIMLGP) or as Gil liked to call it, the Tute, and who wouldn’t be choking a throat gurgle? Well, Gil wouldn’t be and he wasn’t, it was the creature under his care sitting opposite of him. Gil had spent hours staring at this creature’s features. For example, the wrinkles surrounding his fins that seemed to be the lips on a catfish, screaming for help, “Please save me from this giant flapper thing that is moving back and forth crushing my lips! Mmmm, tastes kinda delicious.” This creature’s mouth was very small. Gil often wondered how he sang so well with such a small mouth. Gil had lots of time for wondering because he had such a good imagination. “My imagination is so good”, he always thought to himself, and by ‘always’ I mean every moment not spent wondering, using his imagination; which is why its so surprising that Gil got the UMIMLGP award for best diver/mental patient care facilitator. Not that he ever facilitated mental patient diving lessons, but that he was a skilled diver. Gil could often be found imagining himself diving deeper and deeper into the ocean, and then deeper. Sometimes he imagined himself diving shallower, but ne’er once had he successfully executed such a maneuver, even in his mind. The creature before him, under his watchful facilitated care cleared its throat again, this time minus gurgle, plus hacking wurple. Gil braced himself. The creature’s mouth gaped open wide, exposing his viciously jagged tongue. You see the creature had tried eating metal scraps discarded in the great deep only to realize that sharded metal disfigures ones tongue when its sharp parts are pressed too firmly against it as is a side effect of chewing. It also lost its one and only tooth in the process, thus rendering it insane and in need of mental facilitation. Fortunately the Tute’s finest mental diver was there to assist. There was a deathly silence post hacking wurple that caused Gil to ponder the vastness of the ocean and the depths of his wondering mind. He was doing an ocean of good at the UMIMLGP, but with his skills, he could be doing so much more than tending insane toothless fragmented tongued creatures with small mouths and a future in show business. No, he could be spending his time in much more meaningful ways, such as saving those wrinkled lips from delicious imminent and utter destruction. So Gil promptly swam head first into the creature’s fin rendering it paralyzed and aiding the imaginary lips. Then as the creature gathered its remaining forces of strength to retaliate Gil burst upward shallowly diving for the first time ever, up and away in a beautiful array of motion and lights and bubbles! He was on a mission; he was off to wonder no more where no fish hadn’t wondered before.

Not my Poetry (Shijo)

Murmuring Stream

A night ago the mountain stream shed tears as it flowed sadly
Reflecting on my lover's death t'was his tears sent flowing to me
That water too my tears may bear upstream to he who left me.
- Won Ho
(Translation by Bryce Johnson)


간밤에 우던 여흘

간밤에 우던 여흘 슬피 울어 지내거다
이제야 생각하니 임이 울어 보내도다
저 물이 거스리 흐리과저 나도 울어 보내리라.
-원 호(元昊)


A Loyal Heart
Jung Mongju (1337-1392)
(Translated by Bryce Johnson)

Though I die and die again, revived and killed a hundred times
Bleached white bones return to dust, though my soul perish or go on
No part of my heart, loyal to the end, will ever turn away from my Lord!

단심가 (丹心歌)
정몽주 (鄭夢周 1337-1392)

이몸이 죽고죽어 일백번 고쳐죽어
백골이 진토되어 넋이라도 있고 없고
임향한 일편단심이야 가실 줄이 있으랴

Shackles and Fetters

There is a love that binds so tightly it suffocates your impurities.
Somehow it leaves you with only one thought-- she. is. _______.
Then there is that word that you only feel for her, that isn't actually expressed. There probably hasn't been a word articulated by man's tongue except for love, and that doesn't nearly equate to that feeling. This feeling or emotion actually binds my heart to her, it confines my thoughts to her and embraces her in a way that discards everything but her pure goodness and ________. That word again. It is a compelling word, it compels me to act, to do everything I can to show or express that word somehow. Too often I'm left however not expressing it. I'm left to simply feel it and cry out silently "________". Why would we be allowed to feel things and not be allowed to express them? Is there a more frustrating mortal limitation? Is there something more mortal than to feel these emotions and something more human than to desire to express them? Why then the unbreachable limitation between the two, the human and the mortal. This wouldn't be such a problem if she felt the same way of course. Then we could just both revel in our inexpression together. We would cry out silently in beautiful harmony, written by our hearts and sung by our lives but never uttered, only felt. Our bodies have 3 separate feeling/sensory organs. The first is the skin. It feels needle pricks and cold wet floors as well as sunburns and sitting too long on hard surfaces. The second is the heart. Here you feel heartburn, heart attacks, and other pain associated with running too fast or exercising too hard after years of laziness followed then too quickly by sudden bursts of motivation to get into shape. That is all that can be felt by this organ despite every poets misguided pen. The third organ is deeper than the skin yet superficial to the innards. It resides somewhere between the mind and the imagination. This organ feels warm embraces and kind deeds accompanied by a smile and twinkling eye. This is where ________ lives. No wonder most people don't know about this third organ. There isn't a way to describe it let alone describe what it holds, so why even go there? I go there because that's where I find her. She is always there. I can count on her presence there, like it or not. Mostly like it, except when I remember that she isn't anywhere else, the only remnant of her existence is there and I can't even tell anyone about it because what would I say? "_________"? Not very effective, I know, I've tried. I tried saying that to her once before she left. I tried saying it with time, with a hug, with an affectionate touch. All of which failed; she didn't hear my third organ screaming out "I ________ you!" I even tried sarcasm, which is often used to emphasize how strongly I mean the opposite... surprisingly that failed too. For now, until that expression makes itself known, perhaps through other organs more relevant, that emotion will just have to remain buried in words.