Autumn in My Garden - Visiting Autumn

I've had just enough time...  to reacquaint myself with autumn

I love autumn so much I planted autumn in my garden...

Memories hanging

Like the last leaf of autumn

Reluctant to fall

So I can be moody even when the sun is shining brightly...

After the last leaves -

Silhouettes of trees lined hills

Desolate beauties

Because sometimes, one just want to be melancholy...

I love autumn or I love the romantic fantasized idea of my imagined autumn. Melancholy, bittersweet, beautiful whether in glorious colors or gray outlines of desolated trees. I imagined sweet loneliness, long walks in snapping cold, chilly winds that cuts and reminded me to preserve this fragile body, time to go deep into reflection, to visit the boundary of depression and know that dark country, to slow time down and view the false promises of progress, ambition and speed; a time to gather, recharge and wait for the hibernation of winter and the rebirth in Spring. Maybe the actual autumn is none of these. Maybe it is just my illusion having never lived through an entire autumn though I have visited autumn in several countries over a long span of time. Maybe those living in autumn countries will laugh at my ridiculous notions. Maybe they are living too close to autumn. Whatever, I love my idea of autumn. So much so that I planted autumn in my garden so it can lead me there even under the tropical sun. And as fate would arrange, I'm going to reacquaint myself with autumn - tonight.

I am traveling again, flying off tonight. This time to Billund in Denmark and then off to Parma and Milan in Italy until the end of the month. So this is the last post until then. See you when I get back...

Reflection On A Quiet Christmas

I've had just enough time to...   enjoy a quiet Christmas

Taken in the park on Christmas day

This Christmas, I decided to do something different. Under a cool, overcast sky; I took a walk in the park and have it all to myself. Everyone is out there somewhere celebrating Christmas or visiting friends or be just at home with their family. I took a long, slow walk playing out the year that had gone before and relived that long journey as I walked, alone with my thoughts. I liked doing that sometimes. Long walk in lonely places and nothing was lonelier than the park today.

I chose a bench to sit down and savour a different feel to this Christmas. Surrounded by trees and the songs of birds, there was not a Christmas tree or blinking lights in sight nor any replays of Christmas songs. But I could not get away that easily. Among the greens, white Christmas rose to the surface and I could not get rid of it. So I might as well change a few words and sing a few lines.

I’m reflecting on a quiet Christmas

Not like any I used to know

Where the dewdrops glisten and I listen

To the birds singing in the trees

I’m reflecting on this quiet Christmas

With every Christmas wish I made

‘May your days be merry and bright

And may all your Christmases be divine’

A couple having their marriage photos in the park

I thought about the miracle this Christmas. A friend had a stroke and internal bleeding in his brain. A young man with an unemployed wife and a young child. What will become of them? The doctor told the wife to take him home and ‘get ready’. Within days, he is out from bed and moving around apparently on the way to full recovery. We are hopeful and fearful at the same time but each day is a blessing and a miracle.

After enough reflection and recharging of my soul, I went home to take a bath but decided to go back and took a shot to share my quiet Christmas on a day when I do nothing and yet felt strangely fulfilled. The bench I sat on was now taken up by a young couple with cans of coke, snacks and a portable radio. The scene I wanted to shoot was now taken by a couple taking their marriage photos in the park. I smiled at the change of the situation though it denied me my shot. So I went to another part of the park to take a different shot which is the one you saw. On the way back to the car, I saw the marriage couple going up the stone bridge and shot them. I was so engrossed in what I did that I did not take note where I was standing and a large weaver ant crawled up my leg and bit my upper thigh. With an instinctive flick of my hand, I sent it to Ant’s heaven.  

It was just an ordinary day in the park. It was also Christmas. Nothing happened yet a lot of things did. Even in reflecting, we should not overdo it. So I walked back, satisfied with how I spent my quiet Christmas. “Merry Christmas and May All Your Christmases Be As Nice.”

_______

In The Morning When The Moon Is At Its Rest

I've had just enough time to...   walk the mist in the morning

 Taken one early morning when the world is still shrouded in mist in Hanoi

In the morning

When the bird is still in its nest

And the world still at rest

Peaceful under a blanket of mist

Soothed by a mother’s kiss

I walk a path half imagined

Taking it all on the chin

The sun is not yet up

To serve reality in a cup

To sear through the mist

And smack me with its fiery fist

The sun did me no service

There can be no promise

With gaze as sharp as steel

Leaving no room to steal

An idea from the God

That he left for the poor sod

Who survive the bloody scrum

To retrieve from the squalid slum

I need the blurry landscape

I need the world of indistinct shapes

I need to silence the lambs

The silence to silence the violence

And this is best done in the early morning mist

In the morning when the moon is at it's rest, 

You will find me at the time I love the best

Watching rainbows play on sunlight; 

Pools of water iced from cold night, In the morning.

Tis the morning of my life.

Bee Gees - In The Morning

Reflection Part III – Where Have All The Good Times Gone?

I've had just enough time to...   try to see his reflections on the water.

Taken in the same Taiping Park in Taiping, Malaysia

What does he see

When he looks into the water?

Does he see the years that went by?

Does he see regrets floating on the surface?

Does he see opportunities lost?

Does he see paths that should have been taken?

Goals that should have been achieved?

Or does he see

The reflections of his grandchildren

And is contended with that

_______

Won't you tell me

Where have all the good times gone

Where have all the good times gone

Where have all the good times gone

Once we had an easy ride 

and always felt the same

Time was on our side 

and I had everything to gain

Let it be like yesterday

Please let me have happy days

David Bowie - Where have all the good times gone

Reflection Part II – Memories of the Way We Were

I've had just enough time to...   reflect on the way we were

Taken while strolling round Taiping Park in Taiping, Malaysia.

The reflections on the water

Sweep the memories pass

Its calm surface

To a misty land

Of ghostly images

That pulls at the heartstrings

Vibrating

And exciting

Emotions

Long thought dead

_______

Memories,

Like the corners of my mind

Misty water-coloured memories

Of the way we were

Scattered pictures,

Of the smiles we left behind

Smiles we gave to one another

For the way we were

Barbra Streisand - Way We Were 

Reflection Part I – Just Me

I've had just enough time to...   reflect on just me

Taken of the reflection found one early morning in the lake in Ampang Hill

There are two sides to me

Both sides are real

But which side is true?

Or can both sides be true as well

I sat on the water’s edge

And look at my reflection

Look at my reflection

For that is the only me I can see

But I know, I feel

Another me that I cannot see

It resides in me and argues

I feel therefore it is me

But the me who thinks

Spell in clear logical steps

Why without thoughts

Me cannot even exists

So I sat at the water’s edge

Gazing into my reflection

Gently coalescing all the me

Serenely, into just me

Reflection of A Red Guard.

I've had just enough time to...   ponder what a revolutionist could be thinking.

Taken in my favourite teashop in China where reflection is encouraged.

I reflect

On things I have done

Of things done to me

Of how I feel

When it happened to me.

Of how they feel

When it happened to them.

_______

Red Guard Song

Footprints In The Snow.

I've had just enough time to...   leave my footprints on snow.

Taken in Seoul, Korea on a snowy morning.

I would like to leave my footprints on the snow

Where there were none before

And leave a path

Where none can be seen

In the early morning

After a heavy snow fall.

Maybe, it makes me a daring explorer

Or a seeker of truth

A sad lover or a lonely traveler

A writer searching for his muse or

A man searching for himself

Or just a lost soul in the wood.

But then I wonder

Is the snow calling for

The boy in me or the man to me

And will my steps

Be heavy or light

On that blanket of snow?

_______

Some folks like the summertime when they can walk about

Strolling through the meadow green it's fun there's no doubt

But give me the wintertime when snow falls all around

For i found her when the snow was on the ground

When Evening Comes.

I've had just enough time to...   enjoy another evening.

Taken along the esplanade of Kota Kinabalu, Sabah.

At the break of the day
When my dreams have come and gone
The memories will fade away
But I wonder for how long
Not too long

For I know when evening comes
And I hear the night-birds' tune
I'll remember where it all began
As we danced beside the moon

-Ken Hensley - When Evening Comes.

_______

When evening comes, it finds me most reflective

As if racing for meaning before the last rays of the sun

Disappear and darkness envelopes everything…