Passage To America

I. On the day of the feast death had its celebration the teevees and the movies told us the same story death in the morning death in the evening death in the cellar death in the alley death on the highway the boy returning from the rally death in the cornfield the girl going to the grocer's death in the valley and high on the mountain death from pollution and great disillusion death in the mind in the womb in the cradle death from belief and its comic relief the winds from the north and the winds from the south sowed the seeds of death and waited for the harvest death was riding nightmares on the streets of civilization someone had coughed in the women's room and kleenex caught her vaginal sneeze while history knocked at the door and waited in the winter outside the computer counted the errors and discounted others a woman had died but it was a mistake someone wanted to undo it learned it was too late and walked to the seashore and watched the tidal waves death was riding the receding waves death was roaring in the generation gap and lying in history's lap was sucking on its sap on the day of the feast death had its celebration knocked out of sleep by the casualty list someone was still groping in daylight but it's christmas and new year time to stop worrying over those that are dead time to start thinking of living yet while the sun is still hot and the day not done perhaps a mistake to suppose it so it's easy enough to suppose it so and it's easy enough to die in these circumstances but think of the horror and the glory of having to live II. My sitar my guitar from east or west i do not care whatever i dare is for the best fingers of the left tripping on nipples fingers of the right strumming the ripples around the lotus bud as we set on the bed each petal quakes as the raga awakes raises in dizzy spirals towers and gyres steeples and spires domes and minarets pagodas pyramids fabled hoofs trot on gabled roofs as the tala quickens we rocket to the heavens to gather the starlust and then we fall falter and fall like flakes of feathered snow sprinkled with stardust o my guitar o my sitar III. Having learnt in a short lifetime that chalk doesn't write on chalk he turned to look for sunflowers in beds of roses IV. Twice-punctured silver belle suspended in the cerulean her sea of tranquility disturbed by hymen penetration her darkness filmed and douched unable to recover her cherry nights fears yet longs for the next assault in sweet dread of periodic stress her bashful beams dreaming downward for a metallic man-thrust V. The poet chews the afternoon like his moustache he drones on about a new civilization his mystic beard points to the seed of time his tongue trips on the syllables of a sutra my girl she sleeps and slides on to my shoulder her breasts rise and fall where the words of the poet rebound her dark green shirt exudes the smell of sweat her golden hair the sinuous oily flesh of hair curves creeps and curls into my veins words wary sliders reveal their mystery my girl she stirs turns around her bellybutton shows a foetus face a snake tongue smacks her swollen lips the soft hairs on her upper lip now moist and alive a dog walks in and lies down at my feet he listens to the poet reading chanting enchanting like a dream called off in the middle the poet pauses poised for breath between the mantras the tangled thighs of minutes the dog gets up stretches himself walks away wagging his tail in total agreement soft nervous fingers touch me from the side they keep me from the poet a dog is dignified by his tail i wish i had one VI. Time to say farewell Pale faces after a nightlong wake do not need to kiss Before another nightfall sometime during the day we have to say farewell How shall we part then Write an autograph and put a period after it Take a long walk and sigh in the wind Recite a few verses and smile at the end Perhaps a last smutty story to leave a scratch on the memory Look how the spring sun Struggles with the rain! VII. It's as if i suddenly meet you on the way when i go for my usual walk in the evening the earth that begins at your feet seems to end at mine the air you breathe out enters into my lungs and the light that escapes from your eyes focuses on mine america i see your map like the palm of a hand stretched out on my lap mississippi traces your lifeline to the south while the great lakes draw circles along the st lawrence headline but where is your heartline on the mount of jupiter new england cocks its eyes at europe your venus is still in heat in the far south of florida and the mount of moon shimmers on the california beach but america where has vanished your heartline has some test explosion sucked it underground i remember river phalgun that goes dry in summer defying our prayers where once the buddha got enlightenment and learned to take the earth for a begging bowl but here the fission and the fusion your scientists envision offer your palmist nothing but confusion sailing back from mescalin to marijuana someone said there never was such a line in this ancient newborn land where we grow corn and PL 480 and make cover tv sets in plenty till our chests are nearly empty and brains spout tons of TNT it's christmas again the shape of a heart neatly pinned to a cross that stands on a hill we have set up with skill (Translated by the author, with the help of J.O. Perry, Dakshinamoorthy, K. Satchidanandan, and Esther Y. Smith.)