Torch Ginger painting By Erma Maser
Gingers Poem By Don Blanding
White Ginger is like scented wings of moths
Shell Ginger is a mermaid's dainty chain
Torch Ginger is a staff of petal flame
Burning, defiant of the quenching rain
The Yellow Ginger yields a sweet perfume
To catch and hold the heart in woven leis
Red ginger is the warm blood of Hawaii
Spilling its laughter through the tropic days.
Ylang-ylang Flowers poem By Don Blanding
ylang-ylang...
ylang-ylang...
hear the bells of China clang!
Burning incense, joss and musk,
weaving perfume in the dusk,
weary pilgrims kneel and pray,
leave a gift and go away...
ancient Priest intones a spell
while a guilden temple bell
rings...y-lang...y-lang
Y-lang!
(Pan Art by Don Blanding)
Moon Rainbow By Don Blanding
Staid people say that Pan is dead
But they are wrong. His shaggy head
I saw but yesterday at noon,
And once before when shone the moon
Across Manoa Valley where
The ginger blooms. The evening air
Was still…so still it made me fear
That if I shivered He might hear.
I waited while a silver mist
Skimmed down the sky. A moonbeam kissed
The gauzy veil. Pan looked around
And piped. A magic arch of sound
Curved out upon the misty air…
A lunar rainbow shimmered there.
Gold By Don Blanding
My tresure chest is filled with gold.
Gold...gold...gold...
Vagabond's gold and drifter's gold...
Worthless, priceless, dreamer's gold...
Gold of the sunset...gold of the dawn...
Gold of the shower trees on my lawn...
Poet's gold and artist's gold...
Gold that can not be bought or sold--
Gold.
'Aloha House' Art by Don Blanding
The Midas Touch By Don Blanding
A clear October day with all the world
A blaze of gold where frost had touched the leaves,
The goldenrod's tall scepters by the fence,
The harvest's gold in heaps and stacks and sheaves.
My eyes were gladdened by the friendly sun,
My thoughts were gay as melodies of birds,
I walked along the road, while in my heart
Was golden song that sought to find the words.
Some thought... I can't recall it... broke the spell,
Some memory with hate and hurt imbued,
Rose up like fog to gray the radiant scene
While in my heart dark distillations brewed.
My swinging stride slowed to a dragging plod,
My pleasant dreams and happy musings fled.
The world itself was golden as before
Until my thoughts had turned that gold to lead.
I had reversed the Midas touch of old.
I practice now to turn dull lead to gold.
(Web Art by Don Blanding)
Night Flowers of The Tropics By Don Blanding
Sometimes the strident reds and burning blues,
The raw vermillions and magenta hues
Are all too harsh…they persecute our eyes.
So then, like pallid ghosts of butterflies,
White Ginger blossoms float above a pool.
Divinely fragrant, silken-soft and cool,
Or Stephanotis, mimicking the tropic skies,
Flaunts gleaming waxen stars before our eyes;
Sheer webs of lace the Spider-Lilies weave,
So frailly delicate, we must believe
that pixies, skilled in magick, spent the night
With nimble fingers spinning "Queen’s Delight";
Magnolias tilt their carven ivory cups
To catch the moon-wine that Titania sups.
I cannot name them all…I have not room
To praise each flower that with sweet perfume
Beguiles my lazy fancy with it’s fragrant white
And floats a web of glamour on the magic night
ALOHA OE
(it's meaning)
By Don balnding
It's more than just an easy word for casual good-bye;
It's gayer than a greeting and it's sadder than a sigh;
It has the hurting poignancy, the pathos of a sob;
It's sweeter than a youthful hearts exquisite joyous throb;
It's all the tender messages that words can not convey;
It's tears unshed, and longing for a loved one gone away;
It's welcome to Hawaii and it's lingering farewell;
It's all the dear and silent things that lovers's lips can tell;
It's woven into flower leis and old Hawaiian songs;
It's frailer than a spider-web and strong as leather thongs;
It's fresh as dew on ginger blooms and older than the moon;
It's in the little lullabys that native mothers croon;
It's said a hundred differnt ways, in sadness and in joy;
Aloha means "I love you." So, I say "Aloha oe"
Torch Gingers Painting By Hale Pau
Torch Ginger verse By Don Blanding
The Kings are gone and gone are kingly ways
With rituals of ancient vanished days
When shark-skinned drums throbbed thunder in the night
And royal torches flamed with crimson light
If ghosts of Kings and stately Queens return
Their sad remembering eyes will brightly burn
With joy to find a loyal flower remembers
Torch Ginger petals flare with phantom embers.
Reply to the advice of the pompous ass by Don Balnding Your way is your way and my way is mine. Mine is the foolish way, and your way is fine. You follow your way and get what you're after. I'll get nothing but sorrow and laughter. You'll be wealthy, filthy with money. You'll get limousines and not count the cost. I'll have adventures tragic and funny. And I'll get nowhere except maybe lost. You take the highway, the strait-narrow highway. You'll get to heaven in a slow sure climb. I'll shun the highway for paths that are way And I'll go to Hell but I'll have a fine time.
