By Sayed Gouda
Art is self-expression, a mirror to reflect your thoughts, feelings, character, and even your temper. Without that, it can carry any name without discerning the difference. Bearing that in mind, we find that David’s poetry is indeed a mirror of his own self and it cannot be written by any person other than David McKirdy. It tells a lot not only about his life but also about some of his friends, relatives, and even some passers-by in his life. From his poetry, we know that he builds motorcycles, races, and plays drums. The cover shows a bowl of ink with a Chinese brush dipped in it and the poet's name is right above the brush. If not for his surname, one may think he is Chinese. The title, however, reveals it all. The poet is western raised on Chinese soil with Chinese blood running in his veins from blood transfusion as he mentions in his poem 'Ancestral worship'. He finds himself in a dilemma as to which part of the world should he belong. Is he Chinese or English? He answers this question by saying:
Maybe I’ll just give thanks pay homage to an eternal Mother and the universal Father.
Though David is western by his looks, he is not a product of the western media. On the contrary, he criticizes the west whenever he considers it to be wrong, sometimes sarcastically but without a tone of sorrow flowing between the lines and hiding behind the jokes he cracks. 'A game of marble', 'Missionary Position', 'Ozymandias 2004', and ‘Revolution’ tell more about this aspect of the poet. He wonders at those who endeavour to bring freedom to others when they have enough problems of their own:
Look closer to home, open your eyes The crisis is at your front door.
The first poem 'Abroad in England' shows how homesick he is upon arriving to the land of his ancestors, smelling the air is not enough for him, he wants to taste it after these long years of exile. But his longing is soon to become disappointment. He wonders, where is the spirit that held the world at its feet? Not there any more, he feels. He continues to relate his observations about life in England. In the end, he decides to return to where his heart is, to the Far East as an accidental occidental. His poems ‘Sepia’, ‘Driven’, ‘Gifted’, and ‘Inspiration’ are family poems full of nostalgia and emotions. He says in his ‘Sepia’,
My sister is gone but forever alive Conserved within the amber of our hearts and living memory And I still see my father daily, as a younger man Staring back at me through the mirror of time!
Though simple, they are touching words. For David, language is a vehicle to carry his thoughts through the shortest shortcut. For many, that is a defect. But you do not feel that in Daivd’s poetry. He manages to weave his ideas in a direct language but deftly enough to leave the reader convinced that he has just read a fine poem. These family poems are not only full of nostalgia but of wicked sense of humour as well. He admits that a writer needs to suffer and to feel pain. His parents were ideal in raising him. Grateful? No! He would rather to be tortured by them in order to have inspiration for writing. His humorous side is shown in many places throughout his poems. In his 'Cod philosophy', he toys with words by saying something innocently and hinting at another mischievously. He writes about his friend who was descending deeper and deeper into a black hole of no return. He offers him a help, yet he admits that he is not in a great shape himself and acknowledges his own delusion of control. His poem ‘Old friends’ is a wonderful piece about meeting an old friend but not as they used to be in the old good days, this time when they meet, they are both somebody else. A lack of empathy, the poet explains it. His old boyhood dreams, enthusiasm, and expectations are now rumbled and creased but still serviceable. They part with a forced hypocritical embrace and walk away, not looking back. In this poem David skillfully describes how time can separate two old friends who used to be inseparable, how disappointed they become of each other. I believe many of us if not all of us have experienced these old dreams returning to us with new disappointments. His poem ‘No regrets’ is another reunion but this time with his first love. In this poem he says:
We’re good friends after all these years but some wounds remain heavily overgrown with scar tissue yet alive to the touch.
It seems that the poet cannot escape from his old dreams. He can still see them even with his eyes closed.
I can still close my eyes and see our missed possibilities, lamented but unblemished amidst those infinite potential scenarios which came to naught. The sweetness and perfection of what might have been undiluted and unsullied by what actually was.
He is happy for her after all even that she is not with him. It suffices to treasure her memory, to have her spirit haunting him just like his old dreams. His first love here is his dreams visiting him and though not accomplished yet, they still haunt him:
I’m glad she married another. They never talk, they’re out of touch But she’ll always touch me, haunt me.
He writes about Shuk Wah, a simple soul, found wanting in wit and wherewithal, lost at twenty-six. He says about her:
A graceful flower fatally flawed. But blessed with love in abundance; the love of music the love of life and the love of anybody who meets her. The worries of the world wash over her softly flowing, touching briefly in passing like a wise and well-worn river stone and she in turn touches us. Naïve, unworldly, noble and trusting she challenges us to meet no expectations but our own reflected in the mirror of her soul.
David writes his poetry from real life and collects his images from the street. H does not mind using any word if it is the right word. Sometimes he uses dialogues to liven his poetry. His poem 'My old man' shows his compassion towards an old man living in the street. He talks to him and acknowledges that showing kindness to him is showing kindness to our future selves. This is not the only street man David talks to, he also talks to twin homeless European ladies roaming the streets of Hong Kong. But that should not surprise us for he talks to babies, dogs, and trees! He is the poet of the poor and the homeless souls. He tends to use historical and literary references like likening himself to Dorian Gray but only in reverse. He looks at his photo when he was nineteen and he feels nineteen in spite of twenty-five-years standing between him and his photo. He knows that kids grow fast these days, but for him as a kid, he cannot cross a quarter of a century in a day. For him, he is still a kid and will decide what he wants to be when he grows up as he says at the end of his book. In his ‘Epistle to my unborn child’, he addresses his unborn child apologetically and says:
You missed your chance at life because I jealously nurtured mine.
Though he is in his middle age -a fact he is reluctant to see-, he calls himself a middle-aged teenager. As time passes, he starts to see his unborn child more often. Notice the musical flow in the second line created by the words ‘appear’, ‘appeal’, ‘daily’, ‘me’:
But now, as I more often put my thoughts on paper you appear daily and appeal to me.
David writes about a woman giving birth on a tree in Mozambique, about Italian surgeons who tried to separate two babies joined at the chest, sharing one heart. He asks whether we are worthy of taking care of this new life born on a tree, and wonders how for a baby to go on living with a heart he once shared with his dead brother. He captures these two images and turns them into a moment of meditation to contemplate our own selves and lives. ‘Hospitality’, ‘Doctored’, ‘Another God’, ‘Rebirth’, ‘Silver Lining’, poems David wrote when he was in hospital. A hard time he used to contemplate his life, his pain, and his relationships. He came out of it saying:
Life can be good when things look bad.
He says in another poem:
Heed the wake-up call open your eyes and embrace life pamper yourself. Love a little and treasure a moment or two. For we pass this way but once.
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