"There is a famine of years in the land…
It always turns out that much is salvageable."
– John Ashbery, "Chinese Whispers"
At the airport they greet you with steel pan and home
made cake, forgetting you have your own black pudding
lady, unmatchable still (one day her daughter will send for her.)
And they counting you as 'tourist' now: all courtesy
of the Ministry of Everything you value.
So softly walk 'cross roads dust memoried, for the mercy
of tides lowered eyes. Word about you reached the city before
you cleared customs, courtesy of the Ministry of Everywhere (hey,
just remember who won, who controls now!) Hands that vend clap
roti paddle count years of little else. And check that
migrant accent, bai; you're welcome's bitter sweet.
A photograve honor guard full moons the nights
when life felt royal arse hard and folk blocked debt with singing.
Seawalling youth, stopped short of 'treason', resist the draft to Hail!
the mangrove raggedness of state: saplings blue (& empire greys)
drawn like fold refusing lines in the last Reich rubble.
Bold and best minds? gone. In sight no founding cranes.
Behind jhandis on the Corentyne lay low if you know
what's good for you: with maps & reptiles rivers run.
Bright tags on travel bags, the flash you're doing well
are village give aways. From liming pools the flightless
larvae whisper wait for halos game balls
tossed and intercepting play I stream you not.
And what's that shouting? gun mouths, party cries, a stadium six.
And who's that stumbling out the yard? ripped
blouse, scratched weeping thighs? ow, chile, the nation.
Run to help, or walk away; milk or lemon, you'll pay.
– W.W.
NATIVE STRANGER
When you step off the 'plane, you are another
but clinging to an idea of yesterday
and knowing which pocket holds your papers help
to prolong the useful fiction of a you.
Other familiar shapes of pictures and words
are waiting to pick you up and lead you across
the gaps between the impressions of a man
you must keep flashing so as to keep breathing.
The no-nonsense look in your eyes reveals you
to be a betrayed lover bent on revenge-
ful reconciliation with a city
that's still switching on and off as much as you.
When you stride through its tight streets you are floating
on the air of the knowledge that you don't have
to live here but in your stomach is a stone,
a mushroom tough to vomit that you'll have to.
Old loves and aunts are here to prop your fictions
and you've brought them the appropriate presents
to celebrate what you now call their courage
to have stayed in a place you still can't quite stand.
You keep opening drawers that smell of anguish
you recognise though it no longer fits you.
Yet you keep coming back as though to witness
that running from spectres makes them more solid.
But the surer you think them the stranger you
feel, for what you see most clear you're farthest from.
Near the hotel door closed your suitcase you keep.
Next to your heart your passport like a shield sweats.
(from "Fabula Rasa" by Brian Chan)
FARJOURNEY CARIBBEAN 