Under an oilskin tarp,
an old man sets up his table
with bags of boiled peanuts and soy beans.
He always tells his buyers
the brown paper perfects their taste
and is kinder to the earth.
The road stays quiet.
No travelers
except an armadillo
emerging from a field
of tall grass.
His body bangled in light bronze
matching the sun
that ripples on the river
and warms the skin of a girl
who boils something much different
in the distant hills.
* *
* * * * *
Trees form an alcove
where the tennyo
stands
stirring indigo leaves and oak ash
in her steel vat.
Strips of gauze
hang on the branches
waiting to be soaked
and saturated by length of time.
Meticulously
the maiden prepares her dye
knowing one grade of
mist
must be the deeper blue
of mountains where evergreens
are steeped in twilight ;
and the other, lighter gray
(like lint) where sea birds
steep their wingspan.
in a sky of filmy
brine.
Slowly, she dyes her cloth
and with limber hands
spreads smooth the colored swaths
knowing soon they must be stitched
and styled as bags. Sheer bags
for the scent of rain
and wood,
beach and billow; the
migrant awe
of dreams and drifters.
* *
* * * * *
and among those drifters, who did not buy
the boiled goods, but other things instead,
a woman and her son
turn from the surf -- leaving their own fog
along the shore. White litter
that flutters and floats
out to sea, only to rip
on a coral reef or slide
as luminous waste inside the throats
of turtle or seal. Their
songs
of longevity spliced
with plastic.
___________________________________________________________________
Note: In Asian/Buddhist mythology, "the
tennyo" is a female deity or celestial maiden who dwells on a
mountain to guard and reveal what is most sacred and splendid. In some myths, she
helps to craft natural phenomenon which is part of the climate, both in heaven
and on earth.
No comments:
Post a Comment