I love writing poetry every week, and this week, it’s about our home planet – Earth. For the last #MYWritersPoetryPrompt for February 2016 in the ##MYWriters FB group, it is haiku writing time. I put up the word prompt EARTH, and we shall pay homage to Mother Nature, on which we all depend on for our survival. 🙂
Scorched Earth
Mother Earth watches
As we scorch the land with greed
Riches to ashes
Khor Hui Min
24 February 2016
For Ronovan Writes Weekly Haiku Poetry Challenge #82, the word prompts are ‘star’ and ‘child’. I imagined stars in the universe, the milky way, and children born full of potential to make the world a better place than their parents and grandparents before them.
Star dust
We are all star dust
Children of the universe
Radiant unique beings
Khor Hui Min
6 February 2016
For the first #MYWritersPoetryPrompt for February 2016 in the ##MYWriters FB group, I put up a photo of frangipani flowers, which I took on a marine biodiversity education trip to Terengganu in June 2014.
I thought of writing a poem in Malay, because the photo was taken in Terengganu and frangipani flowers always reminded me of local and traditional culture. So, here it is: 🙂
Kemboja merah jambu
Kemboja merah jambu menawan
Di laman rumah senyap sepi gunawan
Tepi pantai riuh ombak samudra
Penuh dengan bisikan hati bergelora
Tiada siapa mendengar rintihan pilu
Yang sunyi menanti kepulangan mu
Khor Hui Min
3 Feburary 2016
Here’s the translation for the poem:
Pink frangipani
Enchanting pink frangipani blossoms
In the quiet gardens of the virtuous
Beside the beach where waves crash unendingly
Full of the passionate whispers of the heart
Nobody hears the melancholic sighs
Of one who awaits your return in loneliness
Khor Hui Min
3 Feburary 2016
This poem is about the fathers, mothers, grandfathers and grandmothers in the little villages and quaint towns, who await the return of the youngsters who, attracted to the bright lights of the glittering cities, have migrated to the west coast to make it big. Enshrouded by the excitement of city life and materialistic success, the youngsters live their days busy with their work and newfound life, and memories and thoughts of their loved ones on the east coast are pushed further and further into the recesses of their consciousness.
January 2016 was a wonderful month for me, publication-wise. Besides a short story of mine getting published in AnakSastra.com, a poem of mine, entitled ‘Under the Orange Tree‘, which I wrote on 27 February 2015, was published in the The Hourglass (Issue 1).
Edited by April Mae M. Berza, the inaugural issue of The Hourglass promotes the creative works of emerging and 
established writers from different parts of the world. The writers featured in this issue are Stephen Godfrey, Nicolet WW, Sidney Bravo, Khor Hui Min, Strider Marcus Jones, Gregory Terrance Crockatt, Robin Crane, Sunil Sharma, Nick Boreham, Michael Verderber, Jim Newcombe, Nilankana Das, Wanda Morrow Clevenger, Anjana Basu, Jessica Evans, PW Covington, P.J. Reed, Joan McNerney, Mandeep Kaur Heer, Bruce Colbert, Kushal Poddar, and Ceri Naz.
Some of the proceeds from the sale of the magazine will go to the schooling of underprivileged children in the Philippines. Virlanie Foundation Philippines was chosen to receive the proceeds. Established in 1992 by Dominique Lemay, a French social worker, with the help of his Filipino friends, Virlanie Foundation Philippines cares for children in need of special protection – those who are among the poorest of the poor, the abandoned, abused, exploited, neglected, and orphaned. Some of the proceeds will also be donated to a family support group in Philippine General Hospital. Books are donated to the patients every Christmas.
You can purchase a copy of the print magazine by clicking here.
Project Prose 