#2136 - Serendip

 

2136

6.308

5.xi.25

Serendip

 

Taprobane, to edge a map

Tambapanni, of the copper palm

 

Selim, Ceilão, Eelam

look back again, another name

Lanka, first they say

 

silk road led past

 

tear of the sea this

 

placid slapdashery

 

so much grown in

salt and pepper,

nutmeg and tamarind

every spice

coconut and mountain

coffee, much later, tea

 

and all of this must be connected

 

the road is a dodge and weave

dog with a death wish lies down for it

 

white flags a funeral petal strew

 

so there’s a jungle of ghosts

 

a diesel run country

dusty with

 

blue smoke

rings gone

stubble fires

 

that’s just what we breathe

on tour

 

here’s the middle class

view of dawn

of money getting into the sparkle

 

and fishing the mud

sat up on a pole

 

crimes of the past make a pile

still, most of the world and of time is unseen

 

this is the land of mosquito

 

the monkeys see, hear, speak their evil

 

hari hari

they say

the ghosts I mean

 

and that dog, lain bitumen flat

no bark, no bite

that dog’s not really dead