Jamaican rose

She graduated from university, a young woman full of mirth and bold dreams. 

Her two closest friends described her as the one with belly laughter, and vision to change the world.

It was raining so hard that fateful night that the subway trains screeched, metal striking, rousing the commuters blissfully napping.         

Her smiling face framed on the coffin and missalette, she did...  starting with her family and community.     

~0~0~0

She was the second of his three children, and the one who proudly shows her long scar from a heart surgery when she was 4 years old.      

With a robust voice, her father spoke through folded notes and photos:  celebrating her life full of courage, fun, love for music, and most of all, laughter. 

The jaimaican pink rose, cusp of womanhood, bloomed with the sweetest fragrance.

In the funeral hall teeming with unanswered questions and somber suits, the father wore his frail heart on his coat, beaming with gratitude.     

Posted for OpenLinkNight of Real Toads (Monday) and D'verse Poets Pub (Tuesday) ~

We attended the funeral over the weekend for my colleague's daughter (22 years old, after a tragic car accident).

Koan poems: Sepia sky and faded lace

the red silk embroidered robe
bereft of buttons, wide sleeves edged of gold. 
a white swan walks in salty mud-stained shore,   
her graceful neck arched to the sepia sky.    


~0~0


she was simple farmer's daughter,
living on goat's milk, eggs and sweet purple yams. 
a black swan glided with bright red bill, crooning softly, 
the buttons of her dress fell into cornfield and sun.  


~0~0


she keeps a jar of odd buttons, fabric squares and 
torn lace from old dresses, along with faded ribbons.     
a man in the street plays a violin by an empty cup.      
she knits a quilt, one square a day, till she is whole.        

Posted for:   D'verse Poets Pub:  Poetics : Button, Button 
and Imaginary Garden with Real Toads:   Chinese Koan poetry form - In four lines

Line 1: The first part makes a statement about one's subject.
Line 2: Continue to describe the subject of the poem with a new image:
Line 3: Start a new subject. The third line of traditional Koan poetry leads the reader away from the subject of the first two lines into a completely unrelated topic.
Line 4: Relate the lines. The fourth line unites the themes of the first three lines. Think of it as a circle that comes back.