REMEMBRANCE

Some of my readers were wondering about my alleged obsession with death as evidenced by the last couple of poems. As a matter of clarification, I am just speaking an inevitable truth. More importantly, the subject of death should serve as a reminder to how we live our lives. 

Steven Covey quite appropriately sums up living life - to live, to learn, to love and to leave a legacy. Just finished reading biographies of Steve Jobs and John Lennon, two individuals I admire, who seem to have fulfilled all conditions of the above mandate albeit with all the frailties that go with human nature. 

To dwell on the last part of the mandate - to leave a legacy, how can we achive this? By touching people's lives and maybe starting with those closest to us - our families, friends - those who we take for granted and hurt. It is easy to feel emphathy for the beggar in the street, the sick in the hospital, the mentally maimed, so long as they are just that - people at a distance, far removed from any direct impact on our lives. It is tougher to deal with those closer to home. and therein lies our means to leave a legacy. You may say I'm a dreamer.......

So here's an ode to one who left a legacy.....   

REMEMBRANCE

(to Constance Uncle for all those childhood years)

Wonder what it's like?

Never remembering, always forgetting!

Where do happy memories go?

And the sad ones too?

Do they hover at the edge of the universe?

Only to hurtle into the ink-black void of nothingness!

No, they do not!

They live in the heart’s portrait gallery,

a nameplate of burnished gold below

Illumined by the brightness

of noble thought and nobler deed,

and stay there.

Always remembered,

Never forgotten,

Forever touched!

                                                            Antonio

                                                            (Bunu Boy)