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

Tag: creative writing

  • Just One Day

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    “Dearie Me. I only wish I could be anywhere but here today…” Sally talks to herself as she sits down on a chair after setting up her popcorn cart for a day’s operation of her business. She has been selling popcorn, chocolate-covered bananas, frozen fruits, and French Fries for three years. Sally loves her job because she likes to interact with folks of all walks of life and hears their own stories of life and themselves. It gives her a new fresh point of view on her own life, which helps her look at her existential problems with a variety of possible solutions. Sally feels a sense of community and finds her existence  in her daily dealing with her customers, which can’t be materialized simply by reading books and internalizing the knowledge in the abstract. But Today is different. That is, only today she feels out of place, misplaced,  and  discontent with her sweet establishment.

    IMG_3987The proximate cause of the vagary of  her state of mind is her inability to go to see the outdoor music concert held in Elusian Park today at 12:00 PM. It’s a classical music event in which her favorite Regal Philharmonic Orchestra will play scores of music from the Baroque to Romantic periods. According to a program Sally has read from the Calico Times, the orchestra will play her beloved “Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 in G Major” By Bach, “Fledermaus Waltz” by Strauss II, “Trumpet Voluntary” by Hendel, “Radetzky March” by Strauss I, and so forth. Sally’s soul leapt up with effervescent joy and her spirit sprang from the dormant mode of cultural activity upon reading it and wanted to attend the concert in a heartbeat. So she checked the onlie ticket booth to get a ticket, which was sold at $3.00 each yesterday. But alas, all were sold out as there were many more likely-minded spirits wanting to enjoy the festivity of music – the festivity of art in the same place at the same time. A phantasm of a basking herself in the gorgeous feast of elegant music is vanquished.

    IMG_3995Nevertheless, Sally is not sulky or soaked in a miserable feeling of being left out of a cultured crowd. It’s just one of those moments when you feel like doing things that you feel most comfortable and familiar with differently just for one day. Being a responsible and sensible being she is, Sally tries to take the image of the musical concert in her mind’s eye  and the music that plays in her ears off her mind by gently forcing herself to turn to a different subject. “I should have nice brunch with a cup of fresh Americano coffee at Snoopy’s now. It will make me awake again!” So she goes to the cafe that is just around the corner of the street with her cart being attended by her fellow street vendor Randy, the fruit guy. “Randy, thanks much for your help as always. I will come back in an hour with a nice take-out set from the cafe.” And when she goes into the cafe, to her pleasant surprise, Bach’s “Bourandebourgh Concerto No. 3 in G Major” welcomes her lovely entrance. This is sufficient for Sally to make amends for her failed hope of going to the concert today, and what with a cup of warm Americano coffee accompanied by her beloved brunch meal set and what with the customary cozy ambience of the cafe, Sally desires nothing more and becomes content with such simple joy of the moment she’s in.

    porky

  • Blank Slate

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    Vincent van Gogh (1853-1890) The Starry Night 1888 from google

    A Hypothesis of Reality;
    A Wilderness of Sensibility;
    and a World of Multiple Incident
    tell many lies in the Likeness of Truth.

  • Alone Again

    Don’t know why
    I’ve been thinking of you all day
    I’ve been pretending; it’s all I can do
    My heart isn’t making it thru to your heart

    I never cared till I saw you alone
    ‘Cause I could get by on my own
    But the secret is my own for ever
    My heart for you is unknown evermore

    But you’ve been gone, gone forever
    Never letting it show nevermore
    Leaving me in the sound of silence
    That grows loud and louder in tears

  • Trammin’ Along with Hans

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    When a tram was first introduced in town of Avonlea, Karl Hans, a retired school teacher, was thrilled to apply for a position of conductor/operator because he had always wanted to become one since his childhood in Frankfurt, Germany, where riding a tram was part of his family life: His father used to take trams to commute  to  and from work; his mother would take a tram to go grocery shopping, and so did Karl for going to and from school. A tram was their paid means of livelihood that spun many a memory with laughters and adventures in the Old Country. So the image of a tram in Avonlea was enough to induce Karl to think of his childhood in Germany and his eyes to be welled up in tears soaked up with a nostalgia of those lovely moments of the past that are now bygone and bygone.

    photo (1)

    Naturally, the  news that the city council had finally approved the city’s real estate tycoon John Elephant’s proposal of establishing a tram line in order to accomodate to the increasing number of the residents imbued Karl with a certain feeling of hope that had been buried under layers of time and forgetfulness as Reality Check had called upon through the years. Karl decided that he wanted to become a conductor of a tram in a heartbeat against his wife Hannah’s disagreement. “Why don’t you enjoy the rest of life in the comfort of armchair with books you admire and music you love? We can manage to live quite comfortably with our Social Security Benefits and your 401 K Plan.” Hannah’s remonstration with Karl was, however, weaker than his determination rekindled by his deep nostalgic infatuation with another ew hope in life. “Hannah, surely our income will be sufficient to maintain comforts of life, but it’s what I really want to do, and I want to make it happen. Besides, we will have extra income to double our monthly budget. So it’s a win-win situation! We are not losing anything at this stage of life.” Karl’s reasoning with his dear wife Hannah won her support of the cause, and the rest of it was history.

    photo (2)Intelligent, civil, and good-heated Karl is now Avonlea’s beloved conductor of a lovely tram that almost everyone uses  on a daily basis, even if some of them owns a car. Karl operates a tram 5 days a week except Fridays and Sundays from 7:00 AM to 6:00 PM. But he does not feel exhausted or overworked. He loves the way his passengers smile back to him and greet him when boarding and getting off his tram. Sometimes, he has not-so-good days for being only a human, especially when Hannah nags for no apparent reason or fault-finds with just about anything with him in the morning or the night before. Nevertheless, the facts that he is living his dreams in memory of his childhood memories that are dear to him and that his age does not mean anything to him to achieve his dream are the mainstay of fulfilling demands placed on his daily tasks at work, at home, and with himself. Hooray for our magnificent Karl and his continuous endeavors in life!

     

    thanks-for-reading-Rok-Hardware

     

  • From PBS Masterpiece Theater – Mr. Selfridge

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    This Masterpiece Theater Mini-Series of “Mr. Selfridge” produced by ITV is a tour de force of excellent performances of the actors, the finesse of drama scripts, gorgeous costumes, and classically elegant settings coordinated as truthfully as possible. It chronicles Harry Gordon Selfridge’s business adventures from the onset of establishing Selfridges & Co in 1908 until his farewell to his labor of love twenty years afterwards.

     From Episode I of Series 1 to Episode 10 of Series 4 (Final Season), we get to see a man named Harry Gordon Selfridge (1958-1947) who was something of a Napoleon Bonaparte knowing no word in his dictionary for “Impossible.” We see the man build a one-of-a-kind department store in London’s Oxford Street as an adventurous American tradesman against the British aristocratic chauvinism. Selfridge was a man who set a standard of modern department store; by placing the cosmetic/perfume counters on the lobby, Selfridge intended to sweeten the atmosphere of the floor in attempt to use it as a magnet for passers-by, especially women. In effect, Selfridge broke down the class-stratified fashion wall guarded by the rich/privileged by democratizing the luxurious items and making them accessible to common people as well.

    Moreover, the ace portrayal of Selfridge would/could not be possible were it not for the fine acting of Jeremy Piven whose quintessential American accent doubled with inescapable American can-do attitudes triumphs over the transatlantic cultural differences in working with the British peers. The viewer will be left with a feeling of heartfulness of the characters upon finishing all of the episodes in this series and cannot help but applaud to Mr. Selfridge for his entrepreneurial effervescence and Mr. Piven for portraying the man in a stellar performance that evokes both pathos and respect.

  • Dead or Alive

    monet-train-station-painting-monet-the-gare-saint-lazare-smarthistory
    “Train Station” by Monet

    We’re gone with the departing;
    You know, they depart, and with them we do.
    We’re seen with the departing;
    You know, they come back, and with them we do.