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His garden door of Chinese red's
unhinged. Not dead, for still
his ashes feed the lily bed.
I think they ever will.
His secret paths are now outgrown
by humble plants he loved, self-sown
by winds that lift a sacred moan.
Hong Shi enthrones his hill.
I shall recall the Hodmandod
with gumboots shod, his mind
in harmony with self and god,
a concept he defined
in terms of Nature. Still his soul
inhabits me and makes me whole.
When at his spring, I pledge my bowl,
consoled and re-aligned.
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Author Notes
(Revised version to comply with the contest rhyme scheme)
Hong Shi is the Chinese God of the Osmanthus, or Fragrant Olive. A variety known as Heaven Scent grew in my uncle's garden.
In his latter years, as age slowed him down, he took the name of Hodmandod upon himself, it being an ancient southern English dialect word for a snail, which - like age itself - is the gardener's enemy.
The Awdl Gynt is a modified Pantygynt.
Because the rhyme scheme is made up of a certain amount of cross rhyme a cycle can be shown graphically as follows with x being unrhymed syllables and rhymed syllables shown as usual with other letters. The metre is iambic throughout.
x x x x x x x a (tetrameter)
x x x a x b (trimeter)
x x x x x x x a (tetrameter)
x a x x x b (trimeter)
x x x x x x x c (tetrameter)
x x x x x x x c (tetrameter)
x x x x x x x c (tetrameter)
x x x c x b (trimeter)
The poem may consist of any number of these cycles. The line spacing between the components of the cycle is optional and can be omitted in the interests of enjambment.
Many thanks to Dick Lee Shia for the striking photograph that accompanies this poem.
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