I Don't Know (The Equation of Life)

I've had just enough time to...   answer with "I don't know"

Taken during a lecture in Dongguan, China when I don't know the equation

I don’t know the equation of Life

Presented on the white board

To the last two decimal

Neat and tidy

My mind is blank

My emotion in turmoil

Everyone were nodding their heads

But mine was violently shaking

“Life is a formula!”

But mine doesn’t equate!

I follow the rules

I read the books

I listen to the experts

And experts don’t lie

Do they?

They show me the path we should take

They have a shortcut

Only experts can make

When I asked why?

I got an “F”

And shown the door

Now I cannot be an expert-like

I’ve lost the Equation of Life

No certificate, no certificate

Condemned to die

_______ 

I don't know what you smoke or what countries you've been to

if you speak any other languages other than your own

but I'd like to meet you

I don't know if you drive if you love the ground beneath you

I don't know if you write letters or panic on the phone

still I'd like to call you all the same, if you want to, I am game.

Lisa Hannigan - I Don't Know

I Breathed In the Fog that Obscured my View.

I've had just enough time to...   try to hold in my breath.

Taken one hazy October morning in Dongguan, China.

“The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes

The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening

Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains

Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys

Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap

And seeing that it was a soft October night

Curled once about the house, and fell asleep” 

― T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock and Other Poems

_______

Last october, I woke up to a hazy morning

And could see just beyond to the river

at chimneys poking up through the ground.

Where their tips could not reach,

Dense smoke spew lazily from it

just thicker than the thick fog.

And the smoke became the fog

And I breathed it in.

For I could not hold my breath for more than a minute.

This October, I went back.

The chimneys are still there.

The fog still as thick.

And I still could not hold my breath for more than a minute.