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Beyond the Soapstone

Standing in the Aboriginal Arts Gallery,
my eyes lock on
a carved soapstone.
Behind thick glass case, the haze
rises—
an old man’s sealed code
cries for the last person of his tribe,
nothing left but sand,
no dust to hold the chief’s tears.

Now the rain
is tapping on their dead land,
their broken arrows,
and droplets
drift through our revolving doors,
evaporate among soaring skyscrapers.

The gallery becomes his last
treasure holder,
his freezing island;
No matter how deep history sinks
in a long        and hidden river;
no matter what
currents wash up.

 

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Valentine Love

You are supposed to buy roses
in such a pink atmosphere,
as if they flourish only for us.
The store owner, busy with
other customers,
hands out plastic wrapping.

With this little fortune,
I hold the roses’ destiny;
when the day passes,
who else will care for their petals paling
somewhere else?

Poem from “Wings Toward Sunlight” (Mosaic Press 2011)

in 2010  my love poems in Chinese  情人节

之二， 之三。。。(2009 随机写９９首情诗…)

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Visiting the Emily Dickinson Museum

Today, CBC FM 99.1 talked about Emily’s poems.  http://www.cbc.ca/thesundayedition/shows/2011/01/23/anat-hoffman—emily-dickinson—word-jazz/

I was glad to listen since I liked her poems very much.  I admired Emily Dickinson and the epigraph for my new book “Wings Toward Sunlight” is a line from Dickinson, “The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience.”  Here is one poem I wrote last year and it will be included in the book.

Visiting the Emily Dickinson Museum

I came across the ocean
to seek you at the old Amherst garden
where you drew night woods,
birds perched mute in their deference.

I wandered in your walled world,
far away from fame.
Where you mused on pallid sheets,
a lamp stood tall in your dim room.

Death drove in and out.
On your gravestone he carved,
You outlive.