People with money but no fortune
or stomach for the life of an albatross,
watch him soar on self-made wings,
fetch the dingy redness
of morning's first catch with
a long necked bottle
he calls the captain

[7]

As they are crawling up to you
think of Angor Wat
the sweating walls
cold in stone
steam broiling in the jungle
or, that most ancient of men,
the Chinese beggar
the thin rinds of his skin
like scented apples or
kimonos slipped off to dry

[9]

The most appropriate comment,
besides pig knuckles on racks
& rabbits skewered on prongs
or the Chinese lettering
playing tricks with your Occidental eyes,
is the Breakfast at Tiffany's
approach to suffering--
that ambience of egg rolls
& fortune cookies dashed aside with
mild dosages of rose-petal tea
amid such trappings and parodies
of the human experiment left stammering
in the too crowded sun

[12]

This little volume
was hand set in
Kennerley