A wanderer I
reach this quaint village where I
read master Li Po
who made the most of
violent times. I can not
concentrate on mine.
Sometimes a little
thing—-a fly, a sparrow, a
breeze—-is the last straw.
That I am at all
and that I’m as nothing fuse
to my confusion.
I’m beside myself,
a coin found in the street, both
sides rubbed out smooth, or
out beyond myself
with the fly, the sparrow, the
breeze, though sitting here.
Whereto next, Li Po?
In your time of troubles you
took your dodgy raft
as far as Tung-t’ing
Lake. You died in its depths with
China on your mind.
The poems you left
behind are now taught in schools
by the faint of heart.
Metaxyturn Diaries 