The Beauty of Between

介於的美麗

介於暖與熱之間
春末夏初
介於涼與冷之間
秋後冬至
介於露珠與暑氣之間
介於夕陽與幽暗之間
介於睡與醒之間
介於盼望與失望之間
介於澀與熟之間
介於苦與甜之間
介於生與死之間
有許多美麗
那時盼望裡有許多夢想
未來使現在喜歡
寒冬中有聖誕樂音
雪地裡也可以尋梅
夜深時或有蝴蝶飛翔
醒來有踏雪的驚喜
介於兩者之際
有多少想像的空間
燦爛總在葉落之前
淡綠是羨人的年輕
濃豔是美人遲暮
夕照是少女眼波回眸
似醒未醒是作夢的良機
介於是忘懷與記取的時候
是拆毀與建造的經歷
在過程與目的之間
其實有許多美麗

The Beauty of Between

Between warmth and heat,
Late spring and early summer,
Between cool and cold,
After autumn winter arrives;
Between morning dew and noon breeze,
Between dusk and darkness,
Between sleeping and waking,
Between hope and disappointment,
Between sour and ripe,
Between bitter and sweet,
Between life and death,
There is plenty of beauty.

There are dreams in hope then,
And the future makes present rejoice,
When Christmas bells ring in cold winter,
And you seek plum blossoms in the snow-covered earth,
And butterflies dance in your dreams at night,
You wake up glad when your bare feet touch the icy ground.
So much space of imagination lies between the two:
How glamorous are the trees before leaves fall,
When light green is envious youth,
Dark emerald is mourning for beauty lost.
Eventide is a backward glance cast by young Beatrice;
And the best time to dream is between half-awake and half-asleep
Between is the time when forgetfulness and remembrance meet,
Where destruction and erection reside;
Between journey and destination
There is plenty of beauty.

漣漪

“我幾次流離，你都記數。求你把我眼淚裝在你的皮袋裡。”
詩篇56: 8

水珠落在湖心
畫下一個無聲的圓
瞬間波面又如鏡
遺忘曾經的蕩漾
好像慢慢止息的心跳
欲語還休的句點。

有時浪花飛揚
漣漪不能畫成圓圈
不論方圓到底都會消失在水面
記憶都會沉沒
故事無人傳說。

其實淚珠的漣漪寫在天空
藍天賜予湖面顏色
也記取湖心每一波蕩漾
每一聲無奈的嘆息
每一線消失的水徑
每一張紋路漸深的臉。


Ripples
- “You number my wanderings; put my tears into your bottle…”

In the middle of the lake a drop of water fell,
It drew a circle that silently grew
And suddenly vanished from the surface,
Forgetful of the stir it once created
Like a heart beat that slowly ceases,
As a period that can’t quite punctuate.

Sometimes the wave was high,
Keeping ripples from forming perfect circles
It mattered not though, whether square or round
All would vanish from the face of the water,
Like all memories that sank
And many stories left untold.

Ripples of tears were written in the sky
That gave the lake its color
Also remembered were every tremble on the water
Every fainting sound of a deep sigh
Every line of tears that that was dried
And every face with crossed wrinkles
Which were growing deeper still.

Mother

母親

我早起給母親打電話
她已睡著
我的晨曦趕不上她的夕照
無法為她接軌一個完整的世界
彌補日夜之間的殘缺。

我的關心時常把她驚醒
從夢裡帶回實際
不能活在熱鬧的過去
睡眼見到床上隻身的陰影
今夜恐怕又要無眠。

Mother

I got up early to call my mother
She was already asleep.
My morning light caught not up her eventide
Thus failing to pave a full circle of the world,
Patching up the chasm between night and day.

My concern often alarms her from deep slumber
Forcing her back from the dreams of her past
Filled with a life of bustling noise;
Waiting for her is another sleepless night, I fear,
As she gazes at the lone shadow she casts on the bed.

Victory

“…after he has destroyed all dominion, authority and power.”
1 Co 15:24

We are free, but are we, really. The Son of God has set us free from eternal condemnation, but we are in many ways still under the domination of the evil one.

We are free, yet we are still in the processes of being freed; we have been liberated, but true liberty is yet to be obtained.

Therefore we groan and mourn, longing to be freed from the bondage of the flesh, yearning for our flesh to be united with our spirit as one harmonious entity.

At least we were consistent when we were entirely in the flesh, when we were free to do whatever we desired and weren’t afflicted by feeling of guilty.

Lord, destroy all the dominions that dominate me, all the authorities that terrorize me, and all the powers that control me. I have tasted the sweetness of freedom being the child of God, but with the sweetness came the bitterness of falling far too short in meeting your expectations for me.

Lord, holiness is what I seek; yet what I have achieved are filth and corruption beyond measure. I know what goodness is, but lack the power to achieve it and am constantly bombarded by a sense of guilt and inadequacy.

My accuser is forever before me, reminding me that I am a hypocrite, an imposter who claims to be what he is not, and who pretends to be what he can never be.

The accuser laughs. I am ashamed of myself.

Am I the only one that feels this way? All other Christians seem to have achieved their goals and are marching merrily to heaven, yet I am still wallowing in the mud. Am I a dog that returns to his vomit and licks what he has thrown up?

Am I as bad as I have described? A lot worse. I can’t possibly expose my entire being and unveil all the filth that is hidden in it. The Lord only know how deep I have sunk and how desperately I need his forgiveness and redemption.

The deeper I have fallen, that much deeper will God’s grace be for me; the farther I have strayed away from God’s love, even farther will he reach down to bring me back. My accuser will try to dominate and to bind me with his chains, but my Savior will deliver me from them all.

I am not as bad as I can possibly be; and I am not as good as I aspire to be. Aren’t we all in the same boat? We have been freed, yet are yet to enjoy complete freedom. We have leaned to soar with the aid of the divine wind, but will always come down to earth.

I am fully assured, however, I will be what God wants me to be in the future; I will be liberated from all dominion, authority, and power and will soar and dance like the angels. What you see in me is not really me, and though you may be disappointed about what I am, give me a little time and you will see the difference. Don’t look at what I am, but behold what I will become. This curled worm trapped in a black cocoon will surely break free someday.

A Softball Game

There wasn’t really a good reason to go to the Aggie softball game against Tech except to prove to my Aggie sons that their father is a true Aggie t-shirt fan. I happened to have two hours to spare on my otherwise busy Saturday, so to the game I went.

I didn’t wear my favorite aggie apparel to avoid putting extra attention on myself, and it turned out to be a good thing. The ticket taker didn’t accept debit cards and I was out of cash, but assuming that I was a Red Raider, the lady let me get in for free. That wouldn’t have happened had I been wearing Tech’s hated Aggie maroon.

While I was walking toward the field, I was pleasantly surprised to run into Carl, Justin and John’s beloved father, who was walking to his car to get a hat. It was almost like running into your old friend in a strange land, which is considered by Chinese people as one of the four happiest things in life (他鄉遇故知.) I sat with Carl and Jana for about an hour, talking mostly about our boys.

The game itself was quite innocent, reminding me a lot of little league baseball games. The dimensions of the field are about the same and the small crowd was quite passionate. I guess a lot of the people in the stands were related the players one way or another so their cheers were loud and personal. The players were mostly adults, but there was still an air of innocence about them, which was breath of fresh air compared to other sports.

“They just can’t help cheering,” Carl said to me, seeming to be amused by the cheering moves our girls were making.

“Well, they are girls,” I responded, but felt a little uneasy about what I had said. Certainly I am no sexist, I tried to assure myself.

Carl told me some other things about his boys, which I am not free to share. We were just a couple of proud fathers, sitting in the stands watching our little boys perform, who couldn’t keep ourselves from cheering for every little move that our boys made, even though they weren’t playing. We were watching the game, applauding occasionally out of politeness, but we were more interested in our boys who had quit playing ball years ago, and would have been embarrassed had they realized we were still rooting boisterously for them. “Good eye, son! O sorry, girl,” we bellowed out after Megan May held back her swing. She struck out.

By the way, the Aggie girls won the game, which didn’t really matter that much to us. We had other concerns.

Resurrection

“…that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.” 1 Co 15:4

The seventeen-year-old boy with long dark hair was charged with the responsibility of pushing the bottom that sent his mother’s body to be cremated, which he did with the greatest sadness and reluctance. I walked away from the scene quietly to avoid witnessing the inevitable. It was so final and cruel.

My dad wasn’t there, even though his body was still there in the main room of our country home. I was exhausted when I got home after twenty plus hours of flying and hardly had enough emotional energy to deal with all the things involved in the Buddhist funeral. Nothing was more final than the final moment when the workers lowered my father’s casket and covered it with fresh dirt.

Death takes a thousands forms but its color and texture are always the same. It’s so dark and dense that we hardly can look at it without having a sense of oppression and repulsiveness. I just wanted the whole thing to end while I was there, but it would never end. The ritual was over in a day or two and the sorrow might have sunk to the bottom of one’s heart, but that’s where it would remain forever.

“Jesus wept.” The shortest verse in the Scriptures resonates in our hearts a lot louder and longer than all the other verses. Resurrection was never a doubt for Christ, but the agonizing process of death still caused the Son of God to weep openly. There was no need to weep over the dead man’s death since he was going to raise him up moments later, was there?

Death is death and any effort to beautify it is laughable and unnecessary. Why do we coin it as a “celebration of life,” not a “mourning for the dead?” What is there to celebrate? I wonder. We may be trying to “rejoice always” so hard that we have forgotten how to mourn and, consequently, we do neither very well.

That particular burial wasn’t final at all. In fact, that was the only burial in human history that wasn’t final. He was wrapped from head to toe and was placed in a cave and nobody, even his closest disciples, was expecting Christ would come back to life again. It was all good and interesting when the issue of resurrection was brought up and discussed casually in their small circle, but not a single one of them believed it in practice or in reality. I am afraid we may fare no better compared to all of them. Fantasy and reality will always collide if we consider our belief merely fantastic, which may be the case in many ways.

I sometimes think about the two babies that we lost in miscarriages and wonder whether we will get to see them someday. Unfortunately I have found it very difficult negotiating between theology and reality, theory and practice.

In Vain

“Otherwise, you have believed in vain.”
1 Co 15:2

“What if all these things turn out to be false?” “Will all the time and energy that I have invested in my religion be in vain?” I sometimes question myself.

“What would have been the alternative if I had chosen not to commit my life to Christ and to his cause?” I try to come up with an answer from a purely pragmatic perspective. “Would my life have been more satisfactory and fulfilling had I not followed the Lord?”

There is no possible way for me to figure out all the things that might have occurred had I chosen another course of life, but I can at least make a knowledgeable guess by looking at the lives of some of my peers whose world and life view and ambition for life was similar to mine before I knew Christ and how their lives have turned out. A few of them have become successes in their academic pursuits and, with reasonable effort and luck, I might have turned out to be just like them. They are professors in literature who are most likely similar to most college professors I have come in contact whose lives I had absolutely no desire to emulate. Would I trade my life and beliefs in for theirs? This is a silly question, isn’t it?

Don’t most of us consider our lives ideal? Perhaps not most, but some do. We have no right to place other people’s lives on a balance and determine their value as such. Some homeless people in the city of Los Angeles may be perfectly happy and content and who is to say their quality of life is inferior to that of other people.

If, for some reason, Christ turns out to be false and there is absolutely nothing beyond the portals of death, I am still victorious because I have lost nothing by leading a Christian lifestyle, since I believe being a Christian is the most joyful and fulfilling life, far better than a pagan lifestyle. I know this to be true since I have experienced both. The pleasure of sin pales greatly compared to the joy of the Lord.

Am I intellectually honest? How do you know that you, like millions of people in the world, are merely superstitious and believe in pipe dreams? This isn’t the case, for I have considered the alternative and it is utterly bizarre and discreditable. The Darwinian evolutionist insists that I am material and nothing more. However, I believe, albeit not entirely intellectually, but emotionally and spiritually, that I am far beyond material since I have the amazing ability to love and to write beautiful poetry. This earthen vessel may not be very impressive looking, but it surely can do a lot great things that my next of kin in the evolutionary process have never dreamt of doing, if they dream at all.

You may claim that I have wasted my life by being a fanatic about the Lord, but just let me be fanatically joyful and, contrary to what you may think, I am not envious of your life.