Norbulinga
summer palace of the Dalai Lamas

the playground in ruins
the prayer flags still fly

first chapel features
Tara
that girl
with her head
in a tizz
and
her hands
full of cash,
turning made easy
with that many arms

midtemple the bee loud buzz
meditation finding its public

which next on the circuit
accosts authentic
peasant songs
work chants
they chew gum while they’re singing
you try it

they’re rebuilding the palace
beating the mud roof home

I catch
outpouring of these lungs
with MP3

silence of bicycle
below feet of passage

they’re noted
on paper
and blog into book
the great museum of mind
files all

precincts of temple
just next door to zoo

where cruelty finds objects truly other

how can compassion take human form?
What other form would it find?

*

so many palanquins, carriages
gridlock in the garage

marigold, sweet William
unknown flowers
grace the paths
time is strange here

incense and butter lamps
make rancid faint breath

two tiny stone pandas
supplicate for our rubbish

*

the summer palace
just as he left it
bath still running
BBC in its walnut static
Mary Celeste of
the eastern theocracy

whence the 14th Dalai Lama (the present)
fled into the self help wonderland of the West

*

small boys tugging robes between cartwheels
monks good humoured in their roles
as tolerance insists

stuffed tiger in the temple
the devoted lamps
burn on

prayers butter gods up

experience is appropriation
what else can machines of desiring do?

the playground is at prayer with its ages
flags fly ruined in the sky