Writer: Aaron Lee

Photo credits: Image photographed by Sharon Huang-Wok

Not the old wish-list again:
sun instead of the yearly haze,

a surging stock market,
the welfare of loved ones,

complete healing of body and spirit,
instead of the slow onset of illness.

The whole time the cat perches
on the shelf like a common truth,

nothing in its face betrays
this daily ritual of sin and forgiveness

Do this every time you drink it,
in memory of me, he said

to me benign and smiling,
larger than life. I wondered

what was the point of it. No
choice but to start over

at the beginning. See?
You are changing,

he turned up his hands
and showed me again.

first published in Five Right Angles, Ethos Books, 2007

Writer: Yang Ming

Images from a recent dream have been constantly running through my mind these days, regardless of whether I am in a state of consciousness or unconsciousness.

Dream sequences often don’t make sense. They jump. They don’t always follow clear narratives.

The Crying Girl - Photo credits: Courtesy of the METAPHYSICAL ART GALLERY

The last time I contributed a prose article to Createlevoyage was back in 2004. It was titled “Love Beckons”. I remember vividly how the article was birthed from thoughts about my strained relationship with my dad. Since then, thankfully, our relationship has improved.

Recently, I felt it was time to write another article in celebration of Createlevoyage’s website and magazine revamp. However, I struggled for a long time in search of a suitable topic. So, when the dream I related above came to me one night, I felt that the occurrence was no coincidence.

I have in the past months gone through a rough patch. It seems to me that I have gone through many rough patches in my life, and yet I never quite “grew out of them”. Unpleasant events come and go all the time and I’ve always gone through this emotional cycle: I grumble, sulk, complain and lament, and after that, I get better. But in the recent occurrence, a strange wave unexpectedly overcame my life. I hadn’t seen it coming and subsequently, I got sucked into depression, spending days crying non-stop without even knowing what the cause was. I got very busy but things didn’t go well with me. Whenever I stepped out of my house, the rain poured. Everything I touch turns to dust, I said to myself. This continued for a few days.

I realise I resembled that young man in my dream, yearning for living water to comfort my soul. But I continued to pray even though I didn’t seem to hear from God. After all, Romans 12:12 says, “Be joyful in hope, be patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.”

Then one morning I woke up feeling a sense of ease and peace in my heart. I couldn’t comprehend it. Meanwhile, the Word of God began to flow in my life and I could hear God’s voice loud and clear. This odd sensation of renewal and rebirth was simply amazing. I couldn’t help grinning and feeling happy about it the whole day — something very different from my usual downcast countenance. Subsequently, I found my view of the world beginning to change as well. I started to place God as my main priority, over my dreams and my work, and not long after, my life began to transform without my really knowing it. Now I know that the world we live in often doesn’t make sense but in God’s world, everything makes sense.

So now, I no longer view the rain as a hindrance or with a sense of bad luck. Instead, I thank God for the rain –- a symbol of His abundant favour –- a time of cooling in  the midst of scorching heat.