‘A threadbare foreword to the fleshy book of living and dying.’

Prayer flags and dowdy dot coms.

Ma Dreams

“Get a job now, son,
got to build our house.
Get me a bride too,
one for you
and one for  your brother.”

Pouring hot tea
on the stale crumbs
in the Chinese bowl
for her cat, throwing
abuses at the intruding
dogs, the mother speaks.
Her words fall softly
on the feverish bottom
of my sinking heart.
“Got to build a brick house.
Can’t work anymore,
lying on life’s threshold,
waiting for the dark
word to drop
from the heavens…
Can’t bring water
from the distant wells.
Can’t carry heavy
water pots. Last time,
I fainted near the well,
fell flat in the slimy ditch
beside the water well…
aging you know!

Get a job now,
get me a bride too,
one for your brother
and one for you…”

The cat’s lucent
tail curls in the air.

Bridge

Rickety bridge
a lonely heir to my secret world

Rickety bridge
an abandoned leaf in forest of my gloom

quaking like
shoulders of a hillside porter

thrumming like
strings of a blind singer
 
waking from the sleep
in the slums of screaming cities…

Exasperated, I approach
wet spongy openings of your breezy body
 
moistened mouth
of a water spout oozing energy
 
rim of
a hotspring’s bellybutton

odor
of earth’s secret sex

waft of fragrance
stemming from a forest

buried
beneath centuries of snow

Rickety bridge
lonely heir to my secret sanctuaries

palaces of pleasure
in the hidden valleys,
 
and rain forests and plateau beyond

a threadbare foreword to
the fleshy book of living and dying.

Return,
(Taramarang)

Return from
the valley of the Buddhist flags

and singing monks

return from
the brass pitchers of millet wine

and silver pipes
singing songs of the hidden Himalayan canyons

return from
the fragrance of juniper

Himalayan maple
and larch and the forests of rhododendrons

return from wilderness and sweet potatoes

carrot slices drying
on the stone slabs of the monastery

beside a lurid chorten
aflame from a parakeet’s yellow tail

and singing thrush’s laugh.

Return from
a world of bright colors

Green, Blue
Yellow, Ochre, White, Black

to the cities
of noisy sirens and

drab,
dowdy dot coms.

 

Links of interest:

Author links:

www.yuyutsu.de

http://yuyutsurdsharma.blogspot.com/

www.niralapublications.com

Related links:

Prayer flags: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prayer_flag

Bhuddist Bhutan warns that felling trees (to make prayer flags) is a threat to happiness:
http://in.reuters.com/article/topNews/idINIndia-42386620090911?rpc=401&

Tibetan singing bowls: http://www.bodhisattva.com/about.htm

Chendebji Chorten: http://www.cs.unm.edu/~shapiro/BHUTAN/MIDSIZE/nepalesestupa.html