Poems : August 2019

******

Who is this man who cannot see beyond his ego,

Whose soul is wind, whose wind is foul, who fouls

The nest of everyone he visits, who does not know

The way of compassion, the rumblings of his bowels?

Where is the voice that speaks compassion, that bows

Before adversity, not submission, but faith,

So that he feels the pain, whose heart that glows

In sympathy provides the warmth that sayeth

You are worth my breath, and in your life, your death,

My ego burns away? The hatred does:

It never goes away in noises worse

Than silence, in boasting more than curse;

The blindness and the numbness, from nose

To toes, from selfishness to something worse.

Who before has ever reached such lows?

*****

In times of grief and mourning, thoughts and prayers

Are not enough: where is pity, piety and remorse?

The crawling worms among the golf-course players

Undermine the platitudes of the Boss,

The me-me meme, the nation’s bleeding loss

Unstaunched, the tricky call to politics

Where bathos beckons, thickens on the moss,

No caddy-drawn executive, he licks

The boots of anyone who trod on him, the gloss

Of empty words and sentiments, he kicks

The beggar on the street, the victim, you’re fired,

Aghast at the sight of losers, hatred sired, desired

Of nothing but his towers and lackey’s numbed face,

Of migrants’ screams and cruelty at the base.

*****

He hanged himself, the records show his corpse,

Unlike the others hash-tagged and obstreperous,

Defiant to the end, as they are shackled into cells,

Once high and mighty clowns of cinema, now pus

And putrescence is their lot, life less glamorous,

No longer golden boys, no longer than a pin

At the end of a donkey’s tail, a piñata’s  leak

Of favours and coercion, what was sleek

And seductive on an island, in a glass

Of haze-inducing drink. So the seraphim

And principalities who  look through lenses

Of a suicide watch, bloody now with menses.

A life cut short in circumcision, like a bris

Entangled in an outraged victim’s kiss.

*****

They ride and howl the whole night dribbling like wolves

In ancient forests, they raid the villages

And kidnap children in the fields: the grooves

Along the ceiling guide their path on stages.

Then shadows creep from wall to wall and wails

Linger in the limelight when velvet curtains fall,

With one who steals her final bow, and tails

Alone disclose their presence, like a scrawl

Across the pages, some naughty children’s prank.

On little unicycles they suddenly emerge,

Bearded ladies and three-legged men, plank

And shovel when they chant the purple dirge.

Until fairy maidens swoop and swallow dust

As clowns with ugly shoes cavort in lust.

*****

Wear no garments during meticulation and sex,

build no sewers in the bet ha-midrash grounds,

always spit before you utter holy words,

and vomit after meals in private. Ex-

crement in perfect beings sets the puzzle

our teachers had to deal with. Converse

with angels as you would with wolves, muzzle

to muzzle, and seek the mazel of the universe.

If their eyes are round, they can wear tfillin sewn

of silk, if not, of wool or cotton, not both;

if tails are showing, rush to the privy. Let no stone

fall and splatter on your shoes, for He is wroth

and rumbles on the mountains, like the wind

that snakes inside your entrails where you sinned.