Thursday, August 29, 2019

A new painting: Thunderstorm at Chek Jawa


Poems by William Henry Davies

Leisure
What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this is if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

Thunderstorms
My mind has thunderstorms
That brood for heavy hours
Until they rain me words
My thoughts are drooping flowers
And sulking, silent birds.

Yet come, dark thunderstorms,
And brood your heavy hours;
For when you rain me words,
My thoughts are dancing flowers
And joyful singing birds.

Footnote: Painting the dramatic dark sky of a stormy evening at Chek Jawa and remembering the courageous life of my mother whose ash were released in this very sea.

Thursday, August 22, 2019

The Singing Bird Returns: Ailanthes integrifolia

Here I am
Born to fly
A little bird
Returning
Singing
Beneath
A tree
Of my Heart
Aglee.

Footnote: The seed was amongst the many I searched for and found in March 2016 in MacRitchie forest. These were immediately sown and nurtured by the wonderful team of workers at Pasir Panjang Nursery. I subsequently planted out a 1.5m tall sapling in Pulau Ubin in January 2018. It has since rocketed four times in height - photo above recorded in August 2019. The blog post reporting the finding of the winged seeds can be found here.