Lawrence Hall: Favorites

May 2020 Lawrence Hall

Yitkbel

Why must the Eternal Dreamer

Seek to sow his golden purpose

In a fickle poem, for a fickle world

Pleading to be a destined grain of late harvest

And not a seed of sand from the desert of abundance

Lost, like every other, in the wind

Drifting, fading, falling

Till only silence, with the lifeless dune

Remains.

Tuesday, May 5, 2020

#dreamer

Nov 2019 Lawrence Hall

The Seasoned Poet Reaps Truth with His Soul

Nov 2019 Lawrence Hall

Yitkbel

The Seasoned Poet Reaps Truth with His Soul

Chorus:

In Spring, from my poems, flowers spring
In Summer, a sum of everything green
In Autumn, foliage melancholically falls
In Winter,  my wintry mind gradually thaws

I. Spring:

Always one with nature
The Truth, my mind follows
A wave of pastel colors, returning swallows
Peck the hedges with petals of my soul
Blue and shattered, into the poetry it goes
What is without, escapes, imprints on the folds
Of time and space, as the stream of consciousness flows
Till, without me purposefully noticing
It captures within my thoughts an eternal Spring
And remains
Subtly felt but
Unseen

!

In Spring, from my poems, flowers spring
In Summer, a sum of everything green
In Autumn, foliage melancholically falls
In Winter,  my wintry mind gradually thaws

The Poet's Dream Follows the Season's Calls:

When the world exterior is abundant with
Life and the breathing, palpitating all
I capture in my mind, thoughts and words
With wonders and troubles
Of the nature
Without

When the world exterior crumbles and falls
Hidden and blanketed, asleep by the winter's call
The opening beyond Plato's cave gradually thaws
I am suddenly privy and drawn
To the nature
Within

II. Summer:

Always one with nature
The Truth, my mind follows
Between the boulders of lichens
Upon the emerald streams
Floats the vessel of my soul
Gathering seagrass and pollocks, it goes
What is within, the nature time briefly holds
Is now words of mine, to be told
Before the grass fields are eclipsed by the gold
It captures my thoughts evergreen
And remains
Brilliant with eternal warmth
Read and felt yet
Unseen

!

In Spring, from my poems, flowers spring
In Summer, a sum of everything green
In Autumn, foliage melancholically falls
In Winter,  my wintry mind gradually thaws

III. Autumn:

Always one with nature
The Truth, my mind follows
A twilight dance of leaves and boughs
First it blushes, ruddy, timid but bold
Then, it undresses, melancholy, bare in its fallen maple soul
A chilling gale gloats, pallid night wallows
In the anticipation of the impending revelation
What is without, dreaming its withering dreams,
Is now traversing through the wilting wintry plain
Soon to reach the delusive emptiness above
The hidden valley of invisible plenty
And be captured by my thoughts, reason and faith in harmony
With its dazzling orange and red, cerulean velvet behind emerald fringes
Forever vivid
In my poetry, to remain
Deeply felt, though
Unseen

!

In Spring, from my poems, flowers spring
In Summer, a sum of everything green
In Autumn, foliage melancholically falls
In Winter,  my wintry mind gradually thaws

IV. Winter:

Always one with nature
The Truth, my mind follows
The snow covered barren streets
A tattered overcoat suddenly greets
In a moment, by it I was brought to a place
BLOOMING with intrigue, I navigated this maze
And found the GREEN hedge of will and fate
Rich with HARVEST fruits of reason and faith
Like the SNOWFALL, that steals all
I became a glutton of light, in spite of the shadow wall
What is within, bursts from my mind's seams
And overflows
Not into the nature beyond, without
But nature of my mind and dreams within
And is captured by my words
Mirrored from my thoughts
In my poetry, it remains
Enlightened by and enlightening
All who seek and think, every being
With truth evidently felt
However
Unseen

Conclusion:

The poet of autumn, summer, and spring
To the exterior objective nature sings
The poet of winter, withered and plain
From the interior subjective nature, essence springs

The seasoned poet blossoms regardless
Whenever, wherever, timeless
Among
Fleeting fields of earthly gold
Or eternal pastures of souls

The Seasoned Poet Reaps Truth with His Soul
By: Yitkbel Yue Xing ****
Date of completion: Friday, November 15, 2019 1:38 AM
Started sometime after/around 10:00 PM Thursday, November 14, 2019

#theory #metaphysics #poetic #creation #philosophy

Nov 2019 Lawrence Hall

Be The Humble Invisible Yet Vital

Nov 2019 Lawrence Hall

Yitkbel

Be The Humble Invisible Yet Vital

Mindful of this:

Keep reason (logos) close to your heart, and keep faith closer. (pistis)
Aim not towards greatness, but what is within yet ever beyond: the truth.

I

The summit, lofty beyond climb, great envy
Wintry and pallid, marked by death
He gives naught but vanity, a mirage empty
Yet takes all, consciousness and breathe

The ocean, vast beyond hope, waves swell
Yet, only faint specks of stars seen
While, within innumerable creatures dwell
It quenches not, but devours every being

II

Suppose the shape of truth is thus
Suppose the shape of truth and greatness
Is thus
A gargantuan ring hovering within the dark
As if the sun and its shimmering halo arc

!

Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital
Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital
Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital

III

It floats above all, bright
Drawing envy, desire, and fright
This is greatness or great praises
And Truth is concealed in its midst
But greatness and truth are yet apart
Like the Copernican spheres and our star
Only the centre is a fiery near-eternal
Man, being a being, must be ever mindful
Only the truth of white heat beams
Pure yet humble
Could warm eternally the dreamer’s dreams
Perhaps, unnoticed, but vital

!

Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital
Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital
Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital

i

Springs, quietly flow, unfeasible to boast
For only few cherish and worship them existing
If they, being forgotten, with sorrow leave
Then only arid plain, hopelessness remain

Man, rids all the grass and woodlands
To give to the future all, but air to breathe
Till roots no longer bind the dust and sand
And all suffocate, decay and then, cease

ii

Suppose the shape of truth is thus
Suppose the shape of reason and faith
Is thus
One is the skin exterior to the other, heart
Neither will continue to exist, if apart

!

Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital
Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital
Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital

iii

Reason surrounds truth, plain unambiguous
Colliding, pulling, repulsing others of same
Gathering retort agreeable as well vicious
Harbouring within his *****, the faith safe
Though it must have eachother, never apart
As of the outer shell and the inner heart
It’s the ticker of life and love that’s most vital
Man, being a being, must be ever mindful
Only a belief of anything true to your soul
Pure, bare, and forever humble
Could prolong your existence with hope
Perhaps, untimely, but eternal

!

Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital
Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital
Be the water, light, air
Transparent, unseen, unnoticeable, but vital

Conclusion

Chasing greatness, Beings of Great Crawl,
Man always craves envy and praise
But the Truth Timeless is not lofty above all
It’s not unfeelable, unreachable
It’s not incomprehensible, undreamable
We should worship humility, most of all
Willing be the unnoticed, often forgotten
Yet, unforgettable and vital
Ever true to truth, true to self,
The Giving Light, Water, and
Breathe, none can live without
Not the glamorously bright, yet cold in its light
But the one unseeable in the sky, yet Ever Warming Life

The Perfect Torus of Truth: Be The Humble Invisible But Vital
By: Yitkbel Yue Xing ****
Written originally in Chinese: November 6, 2019 8:25 PM
Translated to English: November 6, 2019 11:20 PM
Date of correction: Saturday, November 9, 2019 1:00 AM

#truth #existentialism

Nov 2019 Lawrence Hall

The Torus of Reason and Faith

Nov 2019 Lawrence Hall

Yitkbel

The Torus of Reason and Faith

In my copy of J. M. Cohen's translation of Michel de Montaigne's Essays
Cohen wrote in the introduction: "Montaigne accepted a double truth; the sphere of faith and the sphere of reason were to him entirely separate."

If I were to describe my own double truth, of reason and faith,
I think my sphere of faith is surely placed within the sphere of reason.

Like a torus of Reason and Faith:
Though I can rationally navigate my way to reach the membrane of my faith
What is truly hidden within is still ever beyond reason.

Perhaps through this relentless search of truth, and the piercing gravity of love,
I can one day breach and reach
The nucleus of this ring or Circle
That is Perfectly spaceless
And
Timeless

The Torus of Reason and Faith
By: Yue Xing Yitkbel ****
November 5, 2019 2:09 PM

#torus #reason #faith #montaigne

Oct 2019 Lawrence Hall

Obscurantism - (Lyric Translation Version)

Oct 2019 Lawrence Hall

Yitkbel

Obscurantism - (Lyric Translation Version)

Verse:

Lofty darkness
Specks of obscured suns
Drooping light
Columns of lucid stars

Desert waves
I cannot tell if they are mountains
Or oceans
Desolate woodlands
We suffocate in the verdant and then
We’re forgotten

Chorus:

The desperation of the lost
Is not the emptiness of the barren
But unable to be found among the crowd
Obscurantist songs are rarely fully sung
For it may be above all, but none can reach
And none can teach
An incomprehensible truth
Is shapelessly hopeless
Is shapelessly hopeless
Is shapelessly hopeless

Bridge:

Like a pied enchanter, veiled and barely seen
With confidence unchallenged, he gestures deceit
As if waving alms of miracles so easily gained
Under dark carnival tents, quietly anticipating
The wonder of dazzling illusion, so fearfully arcane
The spectators kneel and bow to the ‘forged’ king

Verse:

Field of barley
Glares with gold utilitarianly
River of humility
Ever ready to fulfill all thirst and needs

Stars faint and hazy
Only the clearest is used for guiding
Sunlight warm and cozy
Never bares itself for the elite only

Chorus:

The desperation of the lost
Is not the emptiness of the barren
But unable to be found among the crowd
Obscurantist songs are rarely fully sung
For it may be above all, but none can reach
And none can teach
And incomprehensible truth
Is shapelessly hopeless
Is shapelessly hopeless
Is shapelessly hopeless

Bridge:

Like a pied enchanter, veiled and barely seen
With confidence unchallenged, he gestures deceit
As if waving alms of miracles so easily gained
Under dark carnival tents, quietly anticipating
The wonder of dazzling illusion, so fearfully arcane
The spectators kneel and bow to the ‘forged’ king

CODA:

I’d rather be the ragged elder of solitary certainty
With sifts of wisdom and time, real grains filtering
Under the pure blue sky, the orange field gleaming
Watch over these substances over form fermenting
Would you rather have too much sugar till aching
Or let spirits pure send you to more pleasant dreams

Long version of:
https://hellopoetry.com/poem/3381369/obscurantism/
By: Yitkbel Yue Xing ****
Original in Chinese written: Wednesday, October 30, 2019, 1:46 PM
Original English translated on:
Wednesday, October 30, 2019 9:44 PM
---

#obscurantism

Oct 2019 Lawrence Hall

Do you ever fear your words aren't original enough?

Oct 2019 Lawrence Hall

Yitkbel

Do you ever fear your words aren't original enough?

I am a soul of fragments,
Of the minuscule,
Of the details.
I want to be a great sea of ceaseless poetry,
But always focus on the small, the unnecessary.

I am touched by every soul,
And they live on through me,
Sometimes it's not just me, but
We are all afraid of seeing other's words
Other's mark on us,
But we must embrace freely
The past and the contemporary,
Just as we can't all reinvent LANGUAGES independently,
We can't have souls that rather be silent
Than to create.

I am merely the temporary vessel
Taking whatever is exterior to me
In the river of all the creations
Letting them combine
And
Flow together freely
And pour them back out again
Back into Creation.
Back into the great water of poetry,
Waiting to be fearlessly
Borne
Into another wave.

Thanks to Lawrence Hall for inspiring this!

I think I can safely say all of my poetry are written completely impulsively; I write them all completed in one sitting, from less than a minute, if it is the one-liner that I used to write more, and think might be quite clever, to a few hours if they are those long stream of consciousness that I enjoy more nowadays.

When the inspiration flows, and while I write, I am immediately transferred to a void of pure focus, and I write down whatever comes to mind, though not completely without deliberate structuring. In fact, I think, I am obsessed with making sure my literary technique follows as logical of a sequence of events as my unkempt and constantly confused mind allows.

My mind is quite filled with metaphors, motifs, and symbolisms formed from everything I experience, see, read, touch, or just appears in my mind spontaneous; when I am aware of their origin, I tried to link to them in the poems itself, as with the bees and flies from War and Peace from the last poem I posted, or I tried to explain my exact thought process in the notes.

Most times, as soon as I have written about something, I do not want to think or read them again, strange, as they are my own words, but I had always felt like vessel, with ideas always coming from beyond me, independent of me, and then passing through my hands into the world, and then I would feel completely strange to them, and utterly empty. Sometimes I do get outside inspirations, but then again, as soon as I begin writing, I seem to forget everything, even myself.

When it comes to writing, I mostly only feel fulfillment and pride at two close moments,  when I am totally immersed in the poetry and unaware of anything else, and right after writing.

Then, when around a day passes, I am already dillusioned and begin to itch to write something better.

I wrote down whatever feelings, and motifs, and metaphors that came to mind without much thought to why them specifically, whether or not they make logical sense, are they contradicting, are they original or cliched, or perhaps even overused.

What you see/read is exactly what went through my mind without much or even any editing.

In fact, I think all of my writing on here is exactly how it is in my mind, straight from the soul;  the poetry forms itself in my head and heart, and I just let them flow out exactly they are, formed by whatever is beyond me.

#anxiety #originality

Oct 2019 Lawrence Hall

Alive(Resurrection)

Oct 2019 Lawrence Hall

Yitkbel

Alive(Resurrection)

I

Men must slumber in the darkness
In order to be truly awaken
Men must be desperately lost
In order to look up at the endless stars

The young love to sing about death
While the old worship life like the sun
The young are hopeless on earth, dreaming of flight
The old fear to be parted from the land without a raging fight

II

Who wants to be from War and Peace
The Fly against the loft sky
But we are all just flies
Traceless, each life in a dream it lies
Always to be awakened, bringing nothing and taking nothing
Why must we seek truth in a dream?
If we will forget them when we finally open our eyes
With joy, with sorrow
We witness death
Just so we would strive to stay alive
But why are we alive?
To prepare us for what?

III

Is it just for that half asleep, half awake
Shadowy, faint, and veiled memory?
Is it possible that when we truly open our eyes one day
We would still feel all that we’ve felt in the dreams?
Yes, in my brief nightly drowsiness, I have felt
Despair and happiness
And existed so profoundly!

Slumber or Awake, Illusion or Truth
Reality or Dream
There never was any true death or an end
I was always
Alive Alive Alive

I

Life is the only route
Between nothingness and the endless
Our birth on earth, and our perishing to dirt
Are both equal ends for the existing

And fools will simply rejoice in the illusive brevity
While sages prepare for the everlasting dance
And fools will take comfort in the darkness obscuring his sins
While sages prepare for the brilliance of the yonder light
By already shining and basking in this life

II

I want to be from War and Peace
The Bee of such trivial and insignificant life
For we are all just bees
Unnoticed, but must exist
Why were we ever born to fly,
When true height is beyond this life?
Just for the pollen and nectar, taken and given?
Till bees return to the impermanent or the forever?
We will regret their absence then, bitterly and barrenly
Witnessing loss, just to learn to cherish
The existing.
But we exist, for what?

III

Is it just for that half asleep, half awake
Shadowy, faint, and veiled memory?
Is it possible that when we truly open our eyes one day
We would still feel all that we’ve felt in the dreams?
Yes, in my brief nightly drowsiness, I have felt
Despair and happiness
And existed so profoundly!

Slumber or Awake, Illusion or Truth
Reality or Dream
There never was any true death or an end
I was always
Alive Alive Alive

Conclusion:

Being alive
Is not just so we can die
That is completely meaningless
Being alive,
Is the only route
From nothingness to endlessness

Only having been once alive
Can you be resurrected
Only when you walk this road to the end
Will you find and continue the pave to the
Neverending Land

Alive (Resurrection)
By: Yue Xing Yitkbel ****
Original in Chinese written on:
Sunday, October 20, 2019, 6:20 PM
Translated on: Wednesday, October 23, 2019
11:43 AM
---
Notes written: 2019/10/25
This was originally another stream of consciousness written in Chinese in a much more organized lyric form spontaneously. Parts of it were a sort of commentary and reaction to poems, songs, and other works I read from both young and old, where the young tend to write about death with a fearless and almost welcoming embrace, and the old refuses to "go gentle into that goodnight."

The rest of it, I wanted to use two very striking metaphors from Tolstoy's War and Peace, the fly and a bee. I set up them as foils of one another, though both to signify insignificance; one represents the isolation of an individual, while the other is of the obscurity of the mass.

Both questions why are we alive? Why are we here just to leave so immediately? Then, both a revelation and answer came to me suddenly.

The revelation being life is the inevitable road between the nothingness of being, and the endlessness of being.
So the answer is, as this road seems to be the only and continuous road, we must cross it to the end of the section we call life, in order to reach the rest we call the neverending.

#theology #existentialism #existential #crisis