English

Black A, white E, red I, green U, blue O--vowels,
I'll tell, some day, your secret origins:
A, black hairy corset of dazzling flies
Who boom around cruel stenches,

Gulfs of darkness; E, candor of steam and of tents,
Lances of proud glaciers, white kings, Queen-Anne's-lace shivers;
I, deep reds, spit blood, laughter of beautiful lips
In anger or in drunkenness and penitence;

U, cycles, divine vibrations of dark green oceans,
Peacefulness of pastures dotted with animals, the peace of wrinkles

The bitterness of days like these we know;
Much, much we know, yet cannot understand
What was our crime that such a searing brand
Not of our choosing, keeps us hated so.
Despair and disappointment only grow,
Whatever seeds are planted from our hand,
What though some roads wind through a gladsome land?
It is a gloomy path that we must go.

And yet we know relief will come some day
For these seared breasts; and lads as brave again
Will plant and find a fairer crop than ours.
It must be due our hearts, our minds, our powers;

Among our country's outlaws
There are some lusty names,
But many a voice would make a choice
Of Jesse Woodson James.

No wishy-washy man was he
Of milk and aqua pura .
He shook the ground for miles around
His native soil, Mizzoura.

" Allow me! " said his brother,
His helpful partner, Frank.
Then out they'd sail to rob the mail
Or polish off a bank.

The sheriffs found, unlike the hound,
His bite worse than his bark.
He shot as well as William Tell
Though apples weren't his mark.

A bit of East within a Chinese wall
Of magic, color, smell and sound —
Enclosed, and yet forever bound
Unto the west; an alien, bartering all
Its Asian mysteries in coin of trade;
Sharp, yet hidden as a sheathed blade.

A town of fantasy, pagoda hung;
Of flowered balconies with lanterns strung,
And slant eyes beckoning from balustrades.
A young town wrapped in dreams of dead decades;
A weaver making garment of the woof
Of commerce, wound with vision of Lao Tzu
The mystic; and the sad songs of Tu Fu;

I

In what place is one most free of bonds?
At Hua-yang, eighth of the Heavens.
The wind in the pines carries dew in all its clarity;
The moon, through the bearded lichen, is cleansed of mist.
Suddenly startled—a crane at the gemmy altar;
Humming in season—cicadas on the jeweled tree.
I long to post my thoughts from a thousand tricents:
“My only love is the spring at Phoenix Gate.”

II

The torrent-iris on the stone puts out purple floss;
The dark blue hills clumped in seclusion—the waters swollen full.

whoever has Cold Mountain's poems
is better off than reading sutras
paste them up on your screen
and read them from time to time

ever since I left home
I've developed an interest in yoga
contracting and stretching the four-limbed Whole
attending intently the six-sensed All
wearing rough clothes all year
eating coarse food morning and night
hard on the trail even now
I'm hoping to meet the Buddha

reading won't save us from death
and reading won't free us from want
then why do we like to be literate
the literate lord it over others
if a grown man can't read
where can he live in peace
squeeze garlic juice in your crowfoot
and you'll forget it's bitter

the unfortunate human disorder
a palate that's never weary
of steamed piglet with garlic sauce
roast duck with pepper and salt
deboned raw fish mince
unskinned cooked pork cheek
unaware of the bitterness of others' lives
as long as their own are sweet

raise girls but not too many
once born you have to train them
smack their heads and yell watch out
beat their behinds and shout shut up
and before they learn how to work a loom
they won't touch a basket or broom
Old Lady Chang advised her young jenny
you're big but no match for your Mother