“Everything that needs to be said has already been said. But, since no one was listening, everything must be said again.” – Andre Gide
Submitted to AllPoetry.com contest – perfection
Submitted to the AllPoetry’s Expressing Yourself course; write a two-stanza poem using metaphor and Poets and Storytellers United Friday Writings #137: At the Last Minute. Inspired by an old school friend called Justin who inevitably got called Justin Time whenever he was late for something. An added bonus of a boy’s name used in each line too.
Today I’m feeling:
Sleepy with sore eyes. Slept badly, with Tigger waking everyone up at 3 am for some unknown reason, perhaps complaining about the rain. Reset my alarm to get an extra 30 minutes of rest and skipped exercise.
It’s another grey day to dull my aching eyes and even the kids are less enthusiastic today, amplifying the dark, depressing atmosphere. Though kids will no doubt not be able to help themselves from being kids. Will the adults, this adult, be able to be an adult today?
Today I’m grateful for:
Nong Spain carrying half of the workbooks for me up to the classroom this afternoon.
The best thing about today was:
Doing a little catching up with my four free hours. I got another lesson finished plus more ideas along with some reading and writing. No one thing particularly outstanding today.
What was out of your control today and how did you handle it?
Nong Praew came over to me to help her in the morning class and I guided her to the correct answers. Weirdly, I can feel my Thai improving as I’ve been helping her as she generally only speaks Thai to me unless I ask her to read.
As I was helping her, we used her phone to look up things and I noticed that she had been searching for ‘die, dead, death’ in Google, which she quickly tried to hide. She brushed it off when I asked her about it. She had also told me that she forgot to take her meds in the morning.
Anyway, after she had finished the classwork, she wanted to play but ended up annoying me enough that I left to the cafe to keep working.
In the afternoon class, she was a little concerned that she couldn’t charge her phone and would run out of battery before being able to call her mom to pick her up.
Without being able to charge her phone, a few minutes later, she became teary and I tried to calm her. I looked at her phone and she still had 8% battery left so it didn’t seem like a big deal. In her fragile state though, she couldn’t see it like that.
We did a difficult spelling test and she got deeply involved in that and then I finished up the class and she disappeared quickly.
I messaged her later about why she reacted so strongly to not having her phone charged and she said that she had to walk home. She only lives a couple of blocks from school but it was raining a little.
I wasn’t sure whether to believe this but Kru Jern had mentioned to me that her parents indulge her in everything. In this context, her behaviour makes more sense.
Whilst I will indulge her in learning, I’ll make sure that she knows where are the boundaries.
Something I learned today?
Israel has managed to fire rockets and kill targets in other countries with remarkable precision yet somehow cannot do the same in Gaza, bombing the shit out of everything and anyone.
This clearly shows their intentions. Things are starting to kick off and I can’t see it de-escalating soon.
Submitted to the Ovi Poetry Challenge – joy and for an assignment at AllPoetry
Today I’m feeling:
Sleepy and bleary. I can’t quite focus my eyes on the screen, and despite killer coffee, I feel as if I could enjoy another few hours of sleep.
Nothing in particular to do today, and Amy and I talked about watching a movie later.
Today I’m grateful for:
Seafood buffet grill with Amy and Aun. I wasn’t going to go originally, but in the end I decided to. The food was average but cheap.
The best thing about today was:
A late morning nap after a little book and comic reading. I finally felt a little more awake after that.
What was out of your control today and how did you handle it?
At the seafood buffet, hygiene did not seem to be a high priority, highlighted by the maggot I found crawling across the ‘clean’ dishes. Hopefully, the spicy seafood sauce was able to kill anything that is likely to kill us.
9th May 2025 – That shop has now gone.
Something I learned today?
This evening we watched Furiosa, the latest Mad Max movie. It is big, dumb fu,n but not really that good.
Review your acts, Good and bad.
I messaged Lin to see how she was doing because after having some issues at home mid-last week, she then looked and felt sick on Thursday and Friday. Happily, she said that she was getting a little better.
A Dectina Refrain submitted to Living Poetry Monday Poetry Prompt
AllPoetry homework:
The Country of the Blind. – Stanzas 1 and 4 by C.S. Lewis
Hard light bathed them and a
whole nation of eyeless men
dark bi-pedals, not aware
of how they were maimed
A long process, clearly a slow curse
drained through centuries
Left them thus
If a man, one that had eyes
a poor misfit, spoke of
the grey dawn, or the stars
or green sloped sea waves
Or admired how warm tints
changed in a lady’s cheek
None complained he had used
words from an alien tongue
None questioned.
It was worse. All would agree
“Of course.” Came their answer
“We’ve all felt like that.”
They were wrong.
………………
1. What is Lewis saying?
2. Here he compares the poet to the masses who believe they have experienced the same feelings. Why does Lewis say they are wrong? Look at the first stanza.
3. What are your feelings in comparing the poem to society, today?
This has taken me a while to get to as I prefer to spend my time writing over analysing. Slowly I am starting to appreciate analysis though so as to better understand what a poet might be saying.
So, today I finally came back to this and interestingly I read this quote this morning which seems along similar lines:
That showed me in an instant that not by wisdom do poets write poetry, but by a sort of genius and inspiration; they are like diviners or soothsayers who also say many fine things, but do not understand the meaning of them.
– Socrates, The Apology
To attempt to answer the questions….
2. Lewis says that they are wrong because society as a whole blindly accepts what it may be told. (Does this connect with the phrase ‘the one-eyed man is the king of the blind?).
3. In comparing the poem to society, I can see the parallels but as a poet, I prefer to consider myself with the man with eyes. But then, maybe individually, we all do that. And thus we end up with society. Individually thinking and believing different things and collectively believing the same things.
And I think that answers question 1.
Today I’m feeling:
Pretty good again. I forgot to write anything this morning as instead of spending the first six hours of the day at the cafe I decided to sit with my old class and help some of them with their work though I also took advantage of this time to make some future lessons.
Sitting in that class made me look at the kids a little differently. I could see that they were more attentive to the Thai teacher and understood more (obviously). They still struggled when it came to answering questions and their comprehension but it made me feel a little more sympathetic with them.
The work Kru NumNim has been giving them is from the British Council and I decided to take it and reuse it for my reading classes with them. I’m hoping that they at least remember some of it and can draw on their learning in this class when it comes to doing it again in mine.
At House, I sat, read and wrote as usual and now felt that 4 hours was an ok amount of time to spend doing that, instead of the six hours of the previous couple of weeks.
Today I’m grateful for:
All the folks who ensured that my records arrived safely from Hong Kong.
The best thing about today was:
Everything again. It was consistently good from morning alarm, exercise, breakfast and driving to school to getting home, sitting back and watching videos.
I’m also feeling a little relief at having fewer hours to teach tomorrow than before too as another two hours got passed on to another teacher.
What was out of your control today and how did you handle it?
The parcel of Bennu The Heron records arrived yesterday but I had to go and pick them up from the main post office and pay 700 baht tax on them which is just about the end of my money for the month.
Still, it was better than paying what Amy originally thought was 4000 baht. If it had been that much then I would have sent them back.
Something I learned today?
I found Yurin sitting by herself today and she looked up at me sadly and said ‘No friends’. I talked with her for a little while and she said that she was quarrelling with Dena and Earn though I’m not sure about what. I told her not to worry and maybe it will all blow over.
Later I caught up with Dena and she said that Yurin was always causing drama and everyone was sick of it. Actually, I’m not surprised at this as Yurin was always causing problems in the first semester of grade 7 when she was hanging out with Hyper, who eventually got taken out of school by her parents. Somewhere inside, Yurin has some conscience, though sadly, I don’t think the future holds much positive for her.
Praew told me that she won’t be in school tomorrow as she has to go to hospital and when I asked her why, she explained that she has to get new medicine for depression.
I asked her how she felt after taking the medicine and she said that she felt better but it also made her more anxious. I noticed before that she has shaky hands. She’s a bright and funny girl and I wouldn’t have guessed that she was taking medicine for depression.
Review your acts, Good and bad.
I told Praew that she could talk to me anytime if she wanted.
For the last couple of days, I’ve been trying to encourage Baipad to do something kind for her friends. Yesterday she offered up that she lent her lip balm to her friend.
But then I asked her to do something intentionally kind today and she was stuck.
When I saw her in the morning she and all her friends were all just sitting playing games on their phones, with barely any interaction between them.
She told me that she will go to Chiang Mai tomorrow so I reminded her that she could buy a nice gift for a friend or something like that. Let’s see if she does!
Written for an AllPoetry assignment analysing friendship
Today I’m feeling:
Reasonable. I reluctantly got up with my alarm as my neck was sore but opted out of any exercise and after a shower went out for coffee. I wanted to be productive today so didn’t dilly-dally too much and when I got home I went to my room and caught up on some emails and a little bit of writing.
After lunch though I couldn’t help having a little nap but when I woke up I forced myself back out again to play some guitar.
The rest of the afternoon and evening have disappeared with some YT videos and helping some students with reading.
Today I’m grateful for:
Rain! Finally. Though it didn’t last much longer than 30 minutes and afterwards the humidity set right back in.
The best thing about today was:
Finishing my first erasure poem. The words came out well but the overall look is a bit messy. I need to study what others have done and get ideas from them.
What was out of your control today and how did you handle it?
I wanted to read more of my book today but watching videos won out.
Something I learned today?
There was a cosplay event at Central today. Baipad told me that she was going to check it out. She was a little disappointed that it wasn’t bigger but Chiang Rai is still a small city compared with Chiang Mai or Bangkok.
Review your acts, Good and bad.
I took some of Amy’s cookies to Utopia for them to try. I didn’t think much of it at the time but when I stepped back in home Amy had already received a message from Art wanting to order some! Amy was convinced that I did it just to try and get her busy at home but I laughed and she was being good-humoured too.
Later in the afternoon, she started working out how much they cost to make and what she could sell them for.
Write a poem about an object in five stanzas using sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch – in any order.
What is it?
This was a tough write and I don’t know if people can understand what the object is!
Today I’m feeling:
Pretty good despite almost swearing when my alarm went off. I got up and at it though and now, about two hours later, I’m wondering if I can increase my exercise time a little in the morning. Seems like I’ve already forgotten about how tired I am by Fridays and thinking of pushing it further now it’s Monday!
(10 pm) So tired now that I’m no longer contemplating pushing myself so much!
Today I’m grateful for:
The students in the sick room who bandaged up my fingers whilst taking pictures to show that they were working when required. Fixing the bleeding farang teacher is good optics.
The best thing about today was:
My first class, 3 hours with grade 12s was relaxing and fun. I didn’t push them too much and tried to keep everyone engaged as best as I could. I was quite impressed with their English skills and with their confidence to at least try their best.
What was out of your control today and how did you handle it?
Tokyo finally got me today and it was my own fault.
Usually, when I’m leaving House I don’t disturb her as she is sleeping, yet eyeing what is going on but today she was on her side and raised her paw for a belly rub.
If I had come round to her side maybe everything would be ok but I tried leaning over the bench which left my hand hovering over her until I got my balance to sit down. I know that she feels threatened by this and sure enough, she snapped her jaw around my fingers and me trying to pull away left a big gash on the inside of my forefinger and knuckle of my ring finger.
Weirdly, it didn’t hurt that much, though I knew I should be feeling pain. Due to the location of the wounds, they soon started dripping blood. Gui’s mum got out the medicine kit that they have to keep handy for these situations and I quickly cleaned up before heading back to school.
I got the cuts band-aided at the sick room and went off to class.
Something I learned today?
Praewa complained about her boyfriend, my grade 8 student Ten, smoking too much marijuana! I was not at all surprised to hear this.
She has been very unhappy since she met him and I don’t understand what his appeal is. Bad boy appeal maybe? All her friends keep telling her to dump him and she keeps threatening to.
Ten is immature and doesn’t have any parental guidance at home, living with his grandmother and his younger sister.
I’d be happy if I never heard his name again and I usually like the ‘bad’ kids.
What three words describe today?
Interesting
Inspiring
Tiring
1994ever 