Flame, Glass and Ink are Poems, essays, and reading notes by Stefania Joori Suh

Author: Stephanie Suh

  • Prompt 81

    Can you share a positive example of where you’ve felt loved?

    I love you Toro ❤️🥰

    I feel love with Toro, the Tabby General, the only one I can say, ‘ I love you.’ It’s emotionally taxing to work human’s love to be loved as if it were a quid pro quo deal or a meritocratic reward. But with Toro, it is anything but.

    Of course, I also love Camille, the Puss in Black Socks, but Toro is the center of my existence. He is all love and life. Toro is the only one who sees me gladly and greets me with his little head, bunting my leg and hand forcibly, even when I am sulky and miserable. He also sleeps at my feet or sometimes next to me when I sleep as though to dispel nightmares. He knows what I am feeling inside and who I am. Looking at his eyes is seeing my soul reflected in the emerald sea sparkling with curiosity and soothing with lullaby.

    I confide in Toro the maladies of my heart and secrets. Shakespeare said, “Love All, Do Wrong to None, and Trust a Few.” Toro is one of those a few I trust. I read a letter written by Elizabeth Taylor to her beloved cat who went missing after they moved to a house in California from England. I could feel her love toward her missing cat so much that it almost felt physically hurtful for the sorrow she expressed.

    Toro will turn four years old this August and is in good health now, but I am also worried that he will leave me someday. I can’t imagine a world without him and life without his love. So I always ask him to live with me as long as possible and to leave this world together when our times on earth are due. There’s no one like Toro who is as kind and affectionate as he is. He is my friend and my brother. I love him so much in every universe.

  • prompt 80

    Bloganuary writing prompt
    Where can you reduce clutter in your life?
    View all responses

    I am a person of paradox. I like decorating my tiny room, but I also like it minimal to make it spacious. And there are piles of books to read that I haven’t read yet. I am a vain reader who wants to read a lot but also wants to read only the ones I feel strongly about. Like the faces of Janus, Frivolity and Austerity, Comedy and Tragedy. Very human.


    I rearrange things and organize the room when I am either under dark clouds of mood or the weight of the narrowness of the space. I do not hesitate to throw things that I no longer need because those things are like trendy guests hurriedly leaving the host’s house when feeling no need to stay long. Since my cats’ tower and hammock are the mainstays of our room, creating maximum effect for the minimum capacity is my responsibility and mission to keep our den as enjoyable and livable as possible.


    I wish I could reduce the clutter in my mind’s space that Lord Byron called “the palace of the soul, the dome of thought.” There are so many things occupying it; honestly, I don’t think I will miss them if wiped out. That will be my cleaning Aegean stable. Hercules cleaned it with streams of the river. Of course, he got help from his godly side, but that’s cheating, not by himself alone. Hence I am doing it myway with the habit of writing be the fresh streams of the river to clean my Aegean stable.

  • prompt 79

    What is your favorite animal?

    Toro and Camille from L to R

    I am of Cat People by birth. It is said that the ones born in the year of the tiger are independent, resilient, headstrong, and adventurous, all of which are the characteristics of Cats. Rudyard Kipling called a cat a creature that walked alone, and there is no better epithet than this. All three of us, Me, the Tiger, Toro the Tabby General, and Camille, the Puss in Black Socks, love to be alone but also hate to be alone when together.

    We can be merry and demanding, charming and aloof, affectionate and timid. We are also picky eaters, not in favor of trying new things but adhering to each of our favorite food articles. As Lucy Maud Montgomery, who loved cats very much, said, cats are so lovely, so friendly, and so selfish, which makes them all the more humanlike. When I see my Toro and Camile, I sometimes wonder if they think they are humans, especially Toro, who is not an iota interested in other cats but humans.

    Cats are also for the poor. In ancient Egypt, cats were considered poor men’s lions at home and kept as chief snake catchers. In Europe, cats were chief mousers on the farms. I am grateful for my cats to live in such a tiny apartment with me and my mom.

    My Sweeties 💕❤️🥰🧚‍♀️⭐️

    Many people take pride in publicly announcing their dislike of cats as if there were some virtue in doing it. They compare them with dogs and are peevish about cats’ independence and capriciousness. But that feline tendency suits me, and that’s why I like cats. And my cats are also bilingual, understanding Korean and English when I tell them, “I love you so much in every universe.” Precious. ⭐️✨🌟🧚‍♀️

  • Prompt 78

    In what ways do you communicate online?

    I love writing everything from jotting down To-Do Lists to journals to columns for my blog and emails on and off work. And I write non-discriminately, using pen to paper and computers, including iPhone and iPad.

    I used to love Twitter before Elon Musk took over with the name “X” because when it happened, my ten-year-old Twitter account was hacked, plastered with scammed business messages with all my writing prompts, including little poems, vanished into a digital void all of sudden. I took it as a divine sign to avoid the X, which I gladly followed.

    I have always loved writing letters about the favored articles I read in magazines, such as BBC History Revealed, where my letters have been printed, because they reflect my thoughts and feelings unadulterated, which could and might have been misinterpreted in speech. Speaking is the most direct and fastest way of communication like cutting the Gordian knot with one fell swoop of a sword. Still, it can be discriminating in judging the speaker in a biased way by the external aspects of the speaker, such as appearance and accent. What’s spoken cannot be retracted. There is no way of editing what you have said pace writing. Writing is more generous and redeeming than speaking. Forget the fear of perfect grammar that will stifle your creative energy. You can write short flights of fancies as they spring from your mind and resculpt them with chisels and hammers later.

    My nine-year-old blog is where I can be myself without exposing myself blatantly, although I resist regarding a blog as a social media. So, I defy being called a blogger, which gives a sense of being on par with a YouTuber. As mentioned before, by writing, people can perceive me truly as who I am, not what I look like, which reminds me of an anecdote about a Turkish astronaut from Little Prince by Antone de Sain-Exupery. When the astronaut attired in the traditional Turkish costume presented his brilliant discovery of unknown stars at the international conference, no one took him seriously. Yet when he appeared again in a tailored suit at the same conference the next day, the attendants recognized his achievement and esteemed him highly.

    The invention of writing has a relatively short history, dating back to around 3400 B.C. by Sumerians. Socrates hated writing because he thought it could take away one’s attention to listening or was not an effective learning method. But I thank Sumerians and Phoenicians for inventing and developing writing systems as my favored means of communication.

  • prompt 77

    Think back on your most memorable road trip.

    Beautiful American Scenery: Image from Google

    It was in late October of 2018 when I took my first road trip from the East of the Atlantic Ocean to the West of the Pacific Ocean by bus. I was a would-be Antonia from O, Pioneer by Willia Carter, who wanted to claim better luck this time in the West. I wanted to do it in the original pioneer spirit, having read By Ox Team to California by Lavinia Honeyman Porter and Overland Journey by Horace Greeley. So I took The Hound of Troubadour, aka Greyhound Bus, from Port Authority Bus Terminal in NYC to Los Angeles, Califonia.

    What I knew as a non-stop Greyhound to Los Angeles turned out to be six days of transferring to 3 other buses at transfer stops and five nights on the bus without heat in the shivering temperatures of the treacherous Mid-Western climates. I befriended an elderly lady who got on the bus with me from NYC to our mutual destination. So I wasn’t all alone, but those young passengers who constantly talked for two days on the bus were the only carbuncles invading the peaceful orderliness of the bus. Naturally, when they got off the bus to their stop, everyone applauded.

    After the arrival at my destination, I felt like Julius Caesar, who said, “Veni, Vidi, Vici.” (I came, saw, and won). And I crossed the Rubicon River on a steel wagon, even if it was not driven by six oxen like Lavinia’s wagon. Following Horace Greeley’s advice on moving to the West in the fashion of Lavinia Porter made me on par with these brave 19th-century souls who had made it thus far to the outpost of their comfort zone. And that’s not the end because I still see the West, particularly California, as the Wild West with all those place memories that envelope the region and possess the inhabitants’ souls. And I am a frontierwoman trying to claim my happiness among the swashbuckling cowboy-wannabes, glittering demimondes, and hostile nomadic dwindlers. ✨⭐️🧚‍♀️

  • prompt 76

    What snack would you eat right now?

    Snacks are like faerie food comprising chips, crackers, nuts, and sweets, an airy guilty pleasure gratifying but vanishing at one fell swoop. And I would eat the following faerie food if it materialized now.

    Gummy Worms – Not by Haribo, which is too hard to chew, but by Black Forest, which is Delight.

    I love it 😍

    Keebler’s Reduced Fat Club Crackers – I love this! I have been in love with this faerie food for 20 years. Softy, buttery, and airy! It’s a pinnacle of faerie food.

    Wheat Thins Reduced Cracker – It’s 100% Whole Grain, and I love the texture of it, not to mention the taste.

    Last but not least wholesome nature 😅

    Lightly Salted Cashews – Almond is too hard, pecan too big, but cashew is the fittest. I can see why the nuts were popular snacks during the Elizabethan period in England, especially for theatergoers.

    So these are my favorite faerie food I would eat right now. My lunch hour in the office is also beginning to end. Signing off. 🤓