White Hair

White Hair

A strand of white, of my father’s,
grew among my thinning black
One line of silvery white under the sun
flickers like that fishing line beside the childhood pond
My dream back then
was the swimming fish in the water

White hair mustn’t be plucked
or more would grow!
Let it, I said, and
save a strand for mother
one for wife and children
One to be buried in the soil
and grow into the tree which my father planted
One to be waved willfully in the air
and fly away chasing the wind

I dreamed of father last night
He walked further and further away, smiling
His hair was black and shiny
like the undried ink back in those years


Originally in Chinese《白发》

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Chiew Ruoh Peng

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