Day Four

so many dream tracks
this one night
the bath runs
kettle boils
away

outside the chanting
more melodic than ever
voices of women

sleep leans in
these many tracks

climbing stairs like a young man again

dreaming the sea,
of sea levelling
billow bright

sun slanting
wake to the full orchestra
mist lifting, cymbal

then cloud smog grey
in the highest

then
traffic’s dull rhythm
the all accompanying
modernity of place

so tiring to talk

leaves the tourist annoyed
how cold was your shoulder?
disappointing to find foreigners
in Lhasa

meet them on stairs
descending to breakfast
I’m the man who wasn’t there
tomorrow – won’t it be the same?

they’ve taken the complaint
against their kind
to the highest level

won’t even avert eyes
throw back more of accusation
against fellow feeling
too tough for the suffered comforts round here
shouldn’t they be staying at the Cesspit Hotel
or the La Du Zi Lu Dian?

the Lonely Planet tells such a story:
a woman lost her footing, fell in the pit
and a day in the bath
new clothes head to toe
had a hard time thereafter
parting with her shit smelling money

we fortunate others
keep puffing as if
there were merely
bad air to expel