Oral II Spring 2004 original poems

We wrote these ourselves!!!
Original poetry by Karen Chung's Spring 2004 English Oral Training II class
Poems from: Spring 2002 Spring 2003 Spring 2005

1. Alas, writer's block
Brooke Liao

Voices buzzing, buzzing in the head,
Sounds mumbling, mumbling in the ear.
Words, flying all around
Like flies in the air.
Thinking, grasping,
Tearing out the hair.

Suddenly the fly stands upright,
An electric shock!
Inspiration, Holy Grace
Ecstasy.

2. The Line
Daisy Li

Wounded, defeated, incomplete,
are you willing to accept this me?
Drifting for so long
I finally found
a place so warm in which to drown.

But all is an illusion
yes, it is.
For no one dare
cross that line.

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3. From a Volcanist
Sandra Liu

I’m telling no lie because
I’ve been observing it for days.
What danger there is I can’t tell you for sure,
But it’s surely one you shouldn’t ignore!
And when you see it, yes, you will find
Why it’s a huge one of its kind;
It seems to be growing every day
Taller and stronger in a secret way.

It hurts you when you see it,
Even worse if you can feel it
Keep your hands from its top –
The devil is ready to whop!

Attention! The volcano is about to erupt!
……………………….
But, well, it’s no big deal to you I suppose.
It’s just a pimple on the tip of my nose!

4. Personality Test
Alexia Chen

In our little garden we don't flower,
We like to meddle in the pool.
And yet, to swim we know not how,
Thus we struggle like fools.
We drink to have a sober mind,
We dream to found our home.
So help us God, we swear, one day
We shall rebuild a Rome.

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5. Life Companion
Alice Kao

What brought us together,
The experience of a similar situation
Or thoughts of a kind, I do not know
Two people alike, with feelings subtle
Which maybe did not become infatuation.

But I can feel and tell
At every eye contact and exchange of smile –
It is not love, yet it is more than friendship.
May all these moments transform to eternity,
And our tacit understanding last forever.

6. Funeral
Erica Mou

I found myself trapped inside
a casket, of solitude and lies
Friends come to lay their flowers
and smile through their wailful cries.

Lying awake, eavesdropping the fake
a tear I shed, on my own deathbed.
I pray for an angel's voice
deliver me to the holy place.
"Now," says the priest,
"Ashes and dust, all in darkness.
Down you shall go, may you rest in peace."

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7. In Memory of Mosquito
Agnes Chen

It's flying near the window,
Waiting for its food,
And here it comes, my shadow,
Foreshadowing its doom

I grasp a fatal racket,
From which it cannot hide,
And then it kicks the bucket,
Lies down by my side.

8. Beyond silence
Ivy Liu

I gazed statically into the pond,
from which the fish did not respond,
The reflection showed a flock of geese,
Fixed like a canvas lying in peace.

The clouds at once came to a stop,
Stuck on their long way up the hill,
Trees resided on the mountaintop
Listened to the streams humming still.

Universe and sky echoed east and west,
With desperate calls crying for attention,
The earth trembled after a good long rest,
Stretched itself to an unbounded dimension.

I smiled and sniffed, at the idea of time
When the world halted, sloth was no crime.

Once I walked with my eyes closed in a dark immensity.
In a few steps on my face blew some threatening uncertainty.
I lost my balance, my feet were tumbling, I froze with fear and doubt.
A dreamy constraint, a sense of insecurity filled the air about.
My ankles were chained, my wrists were bound, and my body petrified;
my thoughts grew dim, my strength drained out, I stood still thereby.
Then my dear friends took my hand and the magic was dispelled.
I had no more fear at all, for I trusted them so well.

10. Lament
Nicole Pan

Flaxen curls and ivory face,
Wasted limbs in elaborate lace,
Sunken cheeks with dashes of gray,
Lashes curled envelop her gaze.

Lifeless fingers so frail they amaze
One who remembers their glorious days.
What dance`d in key on the forte so gay,
Now remains silent forgetting their ways.

Her tender lips parted so slightly in a daze;
I seem to capture the sounds my love says,
The sigh she let slip when whisk'd away;
Forever entrapped in death’s breathless maze.

Now she lies cold in her frost-glazed case,
Accompanied only by cold, empty space.
Slowly my heart sinks as quietly she lays,
Forever held in that grave where she stays.

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11. Shallow
Tina Shu-Yin Yu

A quavering in the hollow of my chest
Qualms have no rest
Drifting foundations of some quest

In this vacant cage resides no thing with feathers
Movement no more flutters
Vanishing shreds of these tatters

In these parts none will wallow
None resides here, creature nor fellow
Swallowed in a hollow.

12. No Goodbyes
Chantelle Lee

I promised to be strong,
Unfaltering,
Strained my eyes so that no gland
Dared release the cascade of tears
I well sought to conceal.
Every breath aches
Each nerve and muscle screams
Unwillingly,
My throat too taut to speak
Only swallowed.
We enveloped each other
Unrelentingly
A tight eternal bond
So intense we both hurt
"Someday," my eyes told yours
"We'll meet again"

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13. Torment
Bryant Zhang

He lives in darkness and
Cannot fall into slumber.
Endless drifts in drowsy land
Only bring flames of anger.

The world is a black hollow
And no one hears his yell.
Being fated to endure sorrow
Life is Inherently so cruel.

14. Untitled
Vic C.K. Lin

Night comes gently
And I bathe in tranquility.
As zephyrs ruffle the coffee,
I gaze at the sky.

Amazingly,
The crescent moon, Alcyone,
Three magpies in the mulberry,
Are what I see.

Motionlessly,
White clouds hide behind a withy.
The crescent moon shines distantly,
Brilliantly.

On a settee,
I meditate deliberately –
What will my unsure future be?
What is the innermost of me?

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I bumped into a world the other day,
an amusement park I found there.
I took the Ferris wheel and the roller coaster
with whom I can not remember
I liked the fresh air all the way
up

to the sky where the eagles flew,
the clouds flowed and the moment froze.
With the peaceful transport of
the wheel was I brought

I leave my sorrow to myself
your men, your swords
yours to take away
I made my stand for your people
your gate, your fate
yours to give away

Once they shivered with both cold and fear
Upon sighting me with your fathers
Now they hop up and down freely
Gaily, as if spring were here

Don't try to save me from their spitting and carving
With your useless signs and warnings
'Cause spit they do and carve they do
I'm tired of the days without warring

I was a soldier once
I don't fight just to stand
I stand only to fight
Let me vanish into the night

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17. A Hate Poem
Sharon Chang

I want to write you a hate poem,
before I forget how.
as if it mattered,
you won't see it anyhow,
though I do secretly wish,
you might find it someday somehow.

I hate you when I see you around.
My chest-dweller would turn into a mob,
beating so strong and hard.
My tender rosy pipe would explode
Flooding hasty and wild.
I hate finding myself lost in this chaos.

But when I don't see you,
everything is wrong,
mob dead,
flood frozen,
the peace now seems unbearable.

I decide to let you free from my prison,
for you have no idea what's going on,
and now the poem must end,
for the petals tell me so.