Blog – Page 4 – Clara Hsu

Carlos Ramirez

Here is a poem for Carlos Ramirez, who is in dire sickness. He was one of the founders of the “Poetry Hotel”, a hotel of the imagination serving the real poet community of the San Francisco Bay Area. Carlos has been hospitalized since mid February and now in the ICU. May blessings be upon him.

Langston Was Found

Langston was found in El Salvador
great big frosty beard
discovered on the library shelf
Langston, Langston Hughes
dances in schoolyards, they called him
Santa Claus
silver liquid drops, he loved the rain.

Pete Seeger was found in Dolores Park
white sleeveless undershirt
Mime Troupe on the Fourth of July
Pete held his arms up
turned turned turned
sun on his brown skin
sun in his brown eyes.

El Poeta de la Treinta
shy in front of the midwife
she penciled a question mark
a spark, a mite
each leaf a time.
“Carlos, Carlos
don’t be afraid.”

He came out
who-ooo, who-ooo
swore not to grow up
El Zipote
met an angel
rolling down the slope
pushing an ice cream truck.

Notes:

“silver liquid drops” April Rain Song by Langston Hughes.
Carlos named himself “El Poeta de la Treinta” in his book, My Heart in the Matter.
Photo credit: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle

Moving with Tangents

Dore Stein’s Tangents Radio on KALW (91.7 fm) is a music show. Beginning with American roots music, Tangents takes the listeners on a four-hour global trot every Saturday from 8-midnight. The art of Tangents lies in Dore’s ability to set one piece of music against another, no matter the style and genre, and you find yourself moving from portal to portal seamlessly, sometimes with a surprise, but the transition is always musical. Magic happens not only in the songs but also at the moment between songs. Most of us don’t realize: a piece of music can sound better when “framed” by another. The juxtaposition on Tangents is always improvised (That means Dore doesn’t know what song he’ll play next until the last moment.) Tangents listeners often comment on how they are moved by the show.

Photo credit: Jennifer Cheek.

Empowerment Or Entitlement

My friends laughed when I said, “Everybody is a dentist until proven otherwise.” I told them I can pull all sorts of things, but strangely they balk at the thought of me pulling their teeth! Why then is it so believable when someone said, “Everybody is a poet until proven otherwise?”

The time artists spend in advancing their skills is no less than someone who goes to school and earns a degree. Just as law students have to pass their bar exams before becoming lawyers, the arts have standards too.

It is of course important to share the joy and encourage others to create. But empowerment is not the same as entitlement.

John F Kennedy famously said, “Ask not what your country can do for you–ask what you can do for your country.” Substitute “your country” with “poetry”. Isn’t advancing the course of poetry the job of every poet?

Image taken from: Boycott Bad Dentists.

Everyone’s a Poet?

He was colorful, charming, inclusive. He read beautifully, to a roomful of friends and admirers. Alejandro Murguia was celebrated at the Koret Auditorium as the sixth Poet Laureate of San Francisco.

Alejandro was certainly pleasing. He accepted the title “in the name of the community” and kept reminding the audience that “Everyone is a poet until proven otherwise.” Perhaps this can be said to a group of people who have no interest in poetry. For those of us who work hard and dedicate our lives to the art, his was a very curious statement. It is like saying you are an architect or a surgeon until proven otherwise. Poetry, then, is meaningless, if we were all poets.

We are definitely all poetic and capable of self expression. But then we should draw the line right there.

Photo from SFPL.

True Frog, the Poem

True Frog

When maid met frog in nature’s place
The world was innocent and fine
But Mama named a tasty dish
That drew a cruel, unkind line.

Deep in the woods in an ancient slimy well,
Forgotten, spurned by man and beasts alike
Except by miracle a frog did dwell,
Alone was he who’d never thought to hike.
But once a while would sit up on the dike
To greet the sun and croak a little song.
Though not at all sure if his name was Ike,
His heart was pure his tongue and spittle long;
His spotted green coat gleamed, his armor subtle strong.

A puckish wind sent forth a maiden fair,
Who wandered freely from her family
To find a well so old and lacking care,
With moss and flies and smelling gamily.
She had no fear this dainty Emily,
Soon took a stick and poked around the ground
With pretty hands so smooth and dreamily,
And laughed full blithely when she heard a sound
From something green and small that crouched upon a mound.

Four dark eyes, nostrils and two mouths did meet.
They liked each other’s look and furthermore,
One leapt, one jumped, both showing off their feet
Around the well, behind the sycamore.
The games they played could go forevermore,
And then she held him on her palm to kiss
A big smack on the mouth as ne’er before.
The sky turned mauve the trees gave out a hiss.
What miracle could happen to a frog in bliss?

The maid was maid and frog remained a frog.
There was no change as changes all abound
When nature cleared its way out of the fog,
For maid and frog to frolic all around.
But lo, cried mother, “Daughter, lost and found!
To Oakland’s Binh Minh Quan we go to eat.
They serve great food that’s ready to astound.
That frog with lemon grass is quite a treat.
They make it hot and spicy…HONEY? Don’t you bleat!”

image taken from http://www.elimoody.com/tag/frog/

The True Frog

There is a bakery somewhere near Mariposa and Byrant. The aroma that fills the block reminds me of Hong Kong in the 1960’s, when in the evening you could buy fresh bread from the corner store. I used to roll the soft warm bread back into a doughy ball before I put it in my mouth. Like cream soda, stir-fried spaghetti and Neapolitan ice cream, certain foods always taste wonderful in my childhood memories.

Frog was another staple food. The sweet and delicate meat, almost translucent, steamed and flavored with scallions or with black bean sauce, resting on a bed of rice, was one of my school-lunch favorites. Many years later I was ecstatic to find frog in a Danville grocery store. But when I cooked the meat it emitted a horrible smell. That, unfortunately, became part of my frog memory.

When Jack Foley discovered frog dishes in Binh Minh Quan, a Vietnamese restaurant in Oakland, my desire for frog returned. It was important for me to erase the bad memory and preserve the good one.

“Have to try it,” I told him.

They offered the frog in butter, with lemon grass or curry. I chose lemon grass.

It was delicious.

Call for Originality

How much originality does one have? A cousin and his wife in their younger years invented a language that could only be understood by them. As original as it might seem, it came from the concept of pillow talk, sharing something intimate between two people.

Have not all melodies been written? Have not all that needed to be said, said? Music is actively borrowed, modified and incorporated by composers of all disciplines. Painters are encouraged to imitate the styles and techniques of the great masters. “Innovation” might be the word to use in place of “originality” when it comes to new work.

Poetry competitions call for “original” poems by one author. After years of learning the English grammar, reading books, hearing and speaking the language, everything I think and write is influenced by something and someone. It makes me nervous to think that my poems might be original. I don’t think they qualify, but I send in some.

Image taken from Klementinum Library, Prague–Czech Republic.

Threshold

It’s the anticipation and what to do leading up to the New Year, and what to do afterward that consume our mind. Fireworks, parties, new clothes, liquid of all kinds…

The moment that turned 2012 to 2013 came and went quietly–at least, for most of us–unless you were born or dead at precisely that time, that marker has no transformative quality but to acknowledge a new beginning, a regeneration in the dying season, that we are given another chance (hooray for another chance!)

It’s a good reason to clean house, tie up loose ends, and file the past away. Excitement of the newness comes from the blank canvas, where anything is possible.

New Year

At the stroke of midnight

We are the Magi

we cross over into a vast space

arriving with gifts

with objects unformed

for that which we do not

and names unknown.

understand.

Only desire is made stronger

Desire

by the presence of a star

leads us

the same star

and ignorant Love.

that has been guiding us

We are the unknowing

since all the forgotten years.

monarchs of nothing

It is bright in the new night

arriving in the morning

ever enchanting.

of the New.

We have far to go

We have far to go,

and much to do.

Magic drives us.

Clara Hsu/Jack Foley

Image taken from: thechristianclipart.com

Poem “New Year” first published in Tower Journal, Volume 4, no. 2

Sleep’s Labor

He sleeps with his mouth opens. What comes out sounds like a torrent of water, followed by a screech of the tire, a clap of lightning, rolling “r”s, a clogged pipe gurgling. Sometimes, silence. When it is, I wait, in my bleary state, for the next big gush of crashing tongue, lips and teeth inside the cavity, and the machinery is once again jump-started.

Curious, this oral acrobat shows off when he is least conscious. My cousin once said banging on a door would stop the snoring. It might work when my father was younger, but he is deaf.

His carers said they are used to it. They can sleep through the non-stop assault. I don’t believe them.

image from http://www.yournaturalsleepaids.com