Somthing On My Mind

Happy Birthday

———

I am a winter’s child

Cold is my name

You can feel my heart

Frozen in the chamber

of yesterday’s sunlight

It was a different kitchen then, a paler and sadder place, and a different garden too, where roses were booming. Oh my entangled, estranged beauties!

Do you remember the poems I wrote, the songs we sang? They taste sour after sunrise.

Crush it, flatten it, fold it

Storm it, squeeze it, remodel it

Again and again

“Once upon a time, at the edge of the world, there stood a mountain, inside which was a cave. In front of the cave sat a monk holding a book. He had been reading for awhile. Lifting his eyes from the book, he started telling a story, which begins with, as you all know, ‘Once upon a time, at the edge of the world…’”

The bald man was speaking to a group of teenage students. His audience looked bored, whose chit chat grew louder, drowned the speech. Nathan cursed himself for having allowed his mother to put him in the school trip. Museum of Witchcraft and Magic, “a place where history meets cutting edge technologies”, revealed itself a dull place of the usual ruins and relics. The curator was tedious too--how a childish wordplay had anything to do with technology or magic?

The hexagon room was painted in mint, walls covered in mirrors, symmetric except the entrance door in the corner breaking the unison. The images of students reflected into mirrors endlessly, like a kaleidoscope. Nathan yawned. Leaning against the wall, he surveyed his reflection--tall, good-looking, smartly dressed. Not bad. His image in the mirror grimaced and it took Nathan by surprise. He rubbed his eyes, but he was only looking at himself. Fatigue, it must be. Too much video games, his mother would say. Nathan shrugged.

The buzz stopped when three adjacent mirrors hallowed out and a curved panoramic screen emerged. On the screen there was a rock cave, and sitting in front of the cave was a monk holding a book, clumsily nodding and swaying in repetition.

“The young man in blue t-shirt? Do come to the front.”  The curator raised his voice. Everyone stared at Nathan. The small crowd parted sideways to let him to go through. The curator smiled and patted on his shoulder, nudging him further next to the screen. For the first time after he entered the room, Nathan noticed the bamboo chair--identical to the one on screen--and sat down reluctantly.

“For ancient Chinese, ‘Magic’ and ‘Game’ are derived from the same word--’shu’, skills to deceive. Allow me to demonstrate,” said the curator.

The ceiling lights dimmed. The curator waved a ball pen awkwardly and began to recite the “Once upon a time” story. His tone started flat, gradually turning into a singsong. At first Nathan was indifferent, then he caught a smell of dampness; it made him dizzy. He frowned and tried to stay focus, but his lips began moving mechanically--he, too, was recounting the lines from the story. The cave around him looked so real. For a brief moment, he thought he had forgotten to take off his VR helmet. He touched the granite with his fingertips, and yanked back from the cold and rough surface. He struggled to stand up, but his legs were pinned to the chair and the chair was installed into the rock floor.

Nathan wiggled violently, looking for the curator, who was nowhere to be seen, yet whose omnipresent chanting speeding up every second. Now a drum had joined--it answered to Nathan’s heartbeat. He breathed heavily, lips moving in convulsion, unable to stop. Sweat poured down his face. His classmates looked distant, laughing and flirting, oblivious to his suffering.

Moments later, he felt someone poking at his arm. “Hey, you OK? We are leaving.” said one of his classmates. Lights were bright. No cave. No drum. He was still leaning against the wall, panting and sweating.

Last Night

Petals rained Like hailstones, Ancient poet cried In dreams.

A Deliriously Happy Day

Drifting through a white orchid in this black winter 

Warmth wafting above the snowy path 

The edge of the world 

The horizon, endless 

Nothing can stop me from loving 

I have smashed the identity 

The police

Merely an empty box 

Winter

Minimalism music usually is not my cup of tea. I could never enjoy Philip Glass, even a friend of mine loved his music dearly. Why limit yourself to a small dish with simple ingredient and simple flavour while you have a room of exotic materials and an army of chefs? Aren’t there already enough minimal songs and sounds outside the realm of classical music?

Until I came across Proverb by Steve Reich in Richard Powers’s novel Orfeo. Here is what Power says about Proverb:

“A solo soprano launched an open vowel on the air. The voice, like a sterilized needle.”

“An organ emerges from nowhere. It blends into the helpd pedal point while two tenors bob in parallel above. Els’s lips twist in unwilling joy. The ancient harmonies spread through his bloodstream like an opiate.”

I looked up the song on Spotify and it was an instant love.

How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life! The line is taken from Ludwig Wittgenstein, an Austrian-British philosopher. The text is an excellent explanation of the music, no other words needed - how small a thought it takes to fill a whole life, how minimal a music can be to move a listener to tears, to fill a heart with joy. 

For some people, it’s greed that fills their whole life. For others, it’s hate or creed. For a lot more people, it’s a nothingness. 

Autumn