The fleeting cinema of urban feet

Child in Buddhic squat, palms between thighs

Folded correctly

Forlorn on a city pavement

They do not see you, mendicant child

But I do

And I know you too are on your way

Maybe you’ll be a rasta someday

Grace;

Like butterflies alighting on happy petals

Of yellow roses blooming amidst the spreading moss

Of time; so the gentle flutter of her wings

Intrigues and runs a ripple of waves through me

And I think how this warm patch from the rains

Tarries while all has gone to dust

And in the passing beauty of my reverie

I recall a life, fair and evergreen

Though dark clouds gather and moss spreads

To smother human hopes with grey hairs

I turn my eyes inside and find inspiration

In that delicate defiance of butterflies and roses

I sketch the lines of your face

And feel the contours of what you’ve seen

Now that your flower is full unfurled

And merely awaits a withering

I saw it from your first budding

That it would end so familiarly

I knew the half hope of truth denied

Demands its full measure in time

Now you have learnt how to love

Now you know the truth

And there is nothing I can tell you

Of the blight that feeds on us all

We died because we wore caftans

And faced east to pray

We died because we spoke a tongue

That differed from theirs who held the guns

We died because we didn’t have

The bribe to give the faulty rifle

At the police post

we died in a flow of red because

our parents refused that in us

they should be born again

And I

I hear of these related deaths

And I cradle my violin to weep bitter tears

For I am we

And We used to be human together

Not long ago.

Infernal pointsman destroying space-time

Shattering science in a million frissons of glass

This is the end of the fury – the mad scribbling

The chill of waiting to pen perfect roses

Whirlwinds rage on, but I am innocent of dust

My imperfect lines throb as if they still live

The market still pulses with life

I tell you

Fortitude and solitude are one

The same with wine and women and art

Cold mistresses teasing flames in temples

Parched with thinking, longing

And forgetting

So

Life shatters into a million frissons

And I step out into the light

Killing the man in the mirror.