Morfydd 2

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Beyond India

 

 

 

        Beyond the orchids you might see the rubber flesh

of swelled fruit,  and in the central domed rotunda,

a counting table supports a lacquered ultramarine box

brilliantly inscribed with a naked pot-bellied child,

a rifle tossed over one shoulder.

 

 

       Also,  along the edge of the box was carved

an alternating series of silver bells and mangoes

the color of milk-tea.  It is always evening

when the triangular black hand

frosts upon the armchair

set in a corner behind a bead curtain—

an undersized monkey’s paw

holding a miniature silver bell

over a basket of mangoes the color of milk-tea.  All sensations,

even false ones,  repeat themselves like red ribbons

dropped about in the heat

that the town must swim through.

 

 

       The black hand is only a design on paper

formed of dark stamps from a distant civilization.

The remainder of this paper strip

seems at first to be filled with a great number of small teeth,

perfect in a way seldom seen in this region,  yet

they coalesce into a delightful piece of newspaper fluff

concerning the English Doctor’s rather difficult marriage.

 

 

        It is rumored that the syphilis medicine

is locked in the box

and that next to the inevitable syringe

lies a fountain pen with a gold seal

advertising a local bottled ale.  You see,

once drunk,  every stinking dullscaled fish

in the water appears

to be a chime on a long string of chimes,

and a sort of charm against these recurring bad dreams.

 

 

       The mangoes sit beneath a yellow silk umbrella, 

the air darkens them to blue eggs

and stretches their forms into a chain of crescents

up and down the greenhouse wall.  Like a birthmark

on the jungle,  khaki-colored

with half a dozen white bungalows

scattered along the perimeter like small,  perfect teeth.

 

 

       Beyond all this,  a one story wooden building,

a spiritual citadel stacked among the millionaire’s imported pines.

Then comes the incredibly tiny river

tucked over to the left as one leaves,

the waves hidden behind the pagoda’s aggravating

rash of roses.

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