| InterBoard Poetry Competition | |
THE ROAD Melissa A. Resch (BOSTONARTIST) THE HUNCHBACK OF THE WORLD TRADE CENTER Mustansir Dalvi Robert P. Beveridge (XTERMINAL)
(#4 from the series
Seven Wonders of One Woman's Existence)
A pilgrim loves the road.
Or rail.
She thinks the train more romantic.
The swing and click spills stories
From a lonely widow about the old days in a kibbutz.
The clack sways theories
From an atheist who glories in logic.
Within hours the universe is settled.
Nowhere to be but here,
Till she’s there.
Then it’s one foot before the other to
Learn the secrets
Of gondolas that skim canals,
Castles that stand firm on windy moors,
Birthplaces of voices like Dickens and Mozart.
Turbulence rises, though,
It bubbles up a deeper secret;
That mankind is often unkind.
Within wire fences of a puzzling locale
Such as Dachau,
Electrified by her own terror,
She laid to rest her pure trust in goodness.
On the trail again,
When confusion of conundrums
Steal sleep and borrow time,
Some bit of beauty pierces clarity into reality.
Maps are unfolded,
Destinations chosen,
A new journey is begun with wide eyes and curious strains
To seek secrets that please a pilgrim.
Myself Mondo Qasim. Address Tower One,
denizen since 1978. Formerly Mass'oud al Qasimi,
of country I not naming. How I come here?
Same as you, on raft from Quba Junction.
I dress uniform, many numbers and colours
with photo batches. And hump on my bump,
shape like Liberty bell. Is batch of honour,
so 'Smrelda on 1/87 tell me. Also Korea Kim,
medic on 1/64, she say don't worry,
you don't need no steenking batches.
I freewheeler in One. Not wanted as much
in Two, but as I like, I comes, I goes.
Sleeping on Top minus 3 floors in One.
Waking with sunrise, pointing bottoms to Phoebus
praying five times daily for blessings
to mother Marica. Sweet land of Statue of Liberty,
country of free, home of twin tower.
Each morning I look through pointy arches
at objects in sky making motion like Calder mobile.
My desire fly. Is it bird, I aks. Is it plane?
Here, I supreme (after 11.00 pm)
I monitor lightings. Oversee parkings,
also count trains going in and out of bottoms.
Here, very good, very warm in NY cold.
Soft carpetings like pashmina, remind me of mudder
who I sends dola on regular basis. I makes many dola
gophering, minding store, fetching coffees.
Much preciated, Mondo, you say, thank you kindly.
Hoot Mon, say Mcivery on 2/36. Mansion not,
I say as taught. Dutifully, by GI Frollo of G. I. church
in earlier life. RC Fadder in battle gear teach Marican,
also Cobol and Unix systems. Give me Coco cola,
read for me from Superman Book. By this I know
Marican falsafa much same as five daily prayers.
Now I squatting kerbside and
One and Two becoming powder.
I sitting, whiteface, Coughing
like tuberculotic, lung full of gypsum talc,
with paper, paper like tickytape parade,
like I hero contemplating kismet.
Haid ringing and ringing until posse
in blue uniform telling me loudly to put
between laigs. Haid between laigs.
Why, I aks. KYAG, ya friggin gargoyle,
he say, and exit, pursued by white cloud.
I know better, I just wait
for Caped Crusader to come,
make all this again OK.
I speak troot. I seek jushtish.
v
I have lived the Marican way.
Tower One my house. One and Two my country,
why they take my home away?
THE GUILTY HAVE NO PAST
Bolivia is full of old men
who have traded their German
Shepherds for Chihuahuas.
None of them resemble
Orson Welles; all have taken
Jewish surnames. Ernst Rohm
and Heinrich Himmler pose
as brothers, run a watch repair shop.
They have founded
their own church, Our Lady
of the Immediate Stranger.
Their patron saint is Henry,
the saint of hitchhikers,
homosexuals, serial murderers.
Their plantations raise bananas,
except for that of Stefan Schwarz,
the caterpillar-mustachioed man
who raises rubber. The whole country,
on oppressive days, smells of cherries.
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