Film and Portraits

P and Michelangelo

my painting storage
on which painted my childhood memories:
when I first sketched Patrick T-when I wanted so much to be a painter

remember how I had my drawings of P on the wall of my room?

then one day
I went to study painting, in Canada
then in Scotland, and finally in Italy
like what P used to tell me
oneday you would get married to an Italian
so it did happen
like what he said
before I left Hong Kong, at his House the Villa of the Rose

forty some years later
I still remember those days
vividly
Then when I could not make myself home
I started watching old films
starred P, and slowly
I finally was able to individualise
those photos with P's signatures, given to me
when I was his fan
one photo was related to the film the Rose in tears
another, from Brotherhood
then another, from Love out of the window

Know why P is still in my mind
For those who love the Sistine Chapel
by this time
you should be able to
recognise
P in the quality of a Sibyl
when the Chapel has been renovated
that Sybil
from underneath
looks so bright, in his orange cloak
as if it is painted in gold

I often wonder why and why
P has been so important to me
maybe a memory
a visual memory
already planted in me
when I was little
maybe I did not realise it
but when I see his face from films
I seem to relate to that of the Sistine Chapel
the spiritual Sibyl

visual memories
perhaps
are related to recollections
stored within

I still remember that day
when he was in our house
perhaps I was about eight
how I , behind the curtain,
tried to see that face
that eternal face
like the moment
in the Film Prince of Broadcast
that the girl was surprised to know the Prince so much talked about by her classmates in school, was there

it is that face
that quality of Michelangelo's Sibyl
eternally stays with me
that keeps me forever young
at heart
forever filled with hope
and forever like a very little girl
who sometimes says
Ah, Tai Paul
Oh, Great grandma
a secret way of hidding my star from being discovered
during my everyday conversation with teenage friends
by giving him a strange nick name
so my mum would not get to be overworried
about my too constant attachment to the face
of this sibyl

works done on the external part of my storage in Rome, 2016