Tag: Caribbean Poetry

                 
             Rajiv would catch the train, morning dew through country cane;
             ferry 'cross the brown river; find walk ways
             through the big market square & squall into a clearing:
             our school (pate bald Jesuit Fathers chalking,
             amo amas & ferulas hawking) his classsmates:
             our treasure isle so far from home; far ago as hic et nunc.

             That afternoon (circa '64) breaking city riots tapped shoulders
             hunched over the Cyclops; a part of him between breaths jumped
             to the window sill searching Ulysses-like for home.

             Smoke in the sky, furies undoing, on stand by grave shovels - 
             noise in such tearing hurry we all assumed our parents'
             patience with stilts and mud had snapped again, estate
             racked hands called out again; though
             Rajiv's eyes kept parsing
             fear and his heart whirred like whishing rotor blades.

             We watched him take off for in dangered streets, the plank walk
             ferry; his train, what station names?
             stuff of bold adventure!              

             He stopped at the corner, looked both ways; he looked
             back, pulled a smile like lotus or a boy scout knife
             from pockets we knew nothing about. We waved
             and cycled home.

             Next day he didn't show up. The day after he seemed
             quieter, well templed – as if from now on
             laugh or talk in class
             so close to city fiends was Brahmin-like forbidden;
             he'd done his homework; found what rules.

             We've kept in touch 'cross fabled cities around the globe.
             Back then we owned no iShare wires, no tongue
             to tweet "r-u-ok?"
             Students of old cracked worlds, bright
             suns from town & village, we just assumed.
                                                                      – W.W. 

                  L'ANGOISSE DE LA PRAIRIE
                           iv: Sketch

                  Not only the sky and wind but nothing
                  can be drawn save this becoming, something
                           always only beginning
                           to know itself. The rest is
                        the grotesques of a blind man switching
                        on and off his face his own hand's light.
                      (from "Gift Of Screws" by Brian Chan)

                 
               They came to the city park – the heat that windless day,
               browning up the grass! – to hear the grandmaster sing
               kaisos up from the islands. Was heritage week. Round
               the bandstand home hungers blazing, sun spot powdered
               body pasts chafing, people shaking hip in half
                                                                             a moon of devotion.

               "But why he sitting down to sing?"  "He getting old, you know."
               "And where he party clothes?"  "He getting on, you know."
               "And why words dropping out from that song? I getting old,
                       I remember every word from that song."

               When he wobbled or he fluffed, the horn crew grinding stopped
               to pick him up, didn't miss a beat, thank God
                        for  lay lay, lay lay, aie aie, aie aie
                       and  pim pim, pim pim, bambamyuhbumbum.

               Booming the master of ceremonies asked over and over,
               Areyuhready?  And once:
                   Any driver who park their car inside the park
                       better move their car outside the park
                           rightaway   is a NYCity violation   Are you ready?

               Off at the tree shaded south end this road torqued woman,
               her life close by in swollen plastic bags, slept through
               like yorkie on rug; till the anchor line. How you jammin'
               so. She jump up, rub she eyes, look 'round,
               then start one wining bad beside she self.

               Scattered on the fringe los verdes ramas, unlucky to be hired
               that day, pulled down dream hiding baseball caps
               and watched. The sound system pounded
               their haze, with treats seasoned for fiestas, and tricks
               like wrapped hot burritos for the route-crossing soccer ball.

               Inside the high fenced basketball court the rim rattled
               & rang from misses; black sweat gleaming torsos huddled
               feinted, twisted through reverbs & scrimmage, raked
               back, then, with drummers'  wrist, swished for the rain withholding sky.
                                                                                                           – W.W.

               THE CANADIAN OCTOBER TREE

               in this lobby knows
               no season but a standardised summer
               to oblige with greenish branches. Only
               a few leaves puzzled
               by the tree's seed-memory of autumn
               have drained their colour. A few others, less
               unsure (more faithful)

               have already leapt
               down into their new status of rug-stain.
               But the tree, a mother by now resigned
               to her solitude
               of an eternity in soil without
               depth, stands well-clad still, saving nature's face,
               if not her full fire.
                               (from "Gift of Screws" by Brian Chan)