Victory

Victory

David hears the words and
doesn’t hear them. Absalom
is dead. He looks at the herald,
tinted with battle-grime, flush
with delight over war, over victory
won at no cost to himself.
How is it with my son, how is it
with Absalom? he asks and knows
before he asks but still
the room dissolves. All worlds
are stilled inside his mind, all suns
extinguished, but for one.
Outside no wind is sounding
on the porch; the trees are silent,
people, silent, streets, lights,
silent, silent. Victory is
the ringing of a silent bell,
a swinging pendulum
inside an empty glass, a smile
without a place to rest,
a face without a curve
to break the emptiness.

The Lotus Lantern: part 4: "Go Now!"

The Lotus Lantern: part 4: "Go Now!"

I’d sometimes thought, hidden away in the magic forest, that it would be nice to have company. Some nights, when the wind was high in the dark trees and the strange spirits were picking fights with my servants, and it took three thousand calming breaths to still my mind to concentration—at times like those I sometimes felt lonely for human voices.

The night Lingzhi brought Chenxiang to me was such a night. The wraiths had been troubling the dogs and the dogs had been worrying the white fairies and the white fairies had been flitting through my study doors, interrupting my meditation, spoiling my calligraphy. And suddenly a keening wail had sounded through the blinds, a sharp wail that sent the spirits scattering.

I got to my feet in haste and found a distracted woman at the door, bearing a weeping burden. -Holy Firebolt Immortal, I have come bearing the human son of Goddess San Shengmu, whose brother has trapped her beneath the mountain.

I stepped aside and gave them hospitality. The winds had been telling me of the sorrow of San Shengmu; the storms had been delivering messages of wrath from the Heavenly Hall. And I’d had a dream about a boy with black eyes and a heart that beat like the heroes’ hearts of old.

-Chenxiang, I said, taking the burden into my arms. My eyes met the eyes of the child and he ceased his crying. -I will teach you magic and power and strength, Chenxiang. I will teach you how to be a hero.

Lingzhi was bent over with grief and weariness. Her mouth trembled when she spoke. -Help me raise this child and send him out, when he is of age, to rescue his mother, and I will go with him then, and we will leave you again in peace. I do not know what else to do.

And I laughed until the empty house rang harshly with the sound, and the moss on the roof stirred nervously, and the animals hid themselves. I led Lingzhi into the kitchen and boiled the tea.

-I have been waiting for you two for longer than I can remember. Don’t threaten to leave me in peace. Not yet.

*

Years drop away like the petals on the lotus flower. I taught Chenxiang how to be a hero. But one night I woke with a cold truth settled in my stomach: with his quick-learning fingers Chenxiang had spun time into quicksilver and it had all but slipped away. He was fifteen now: a man. I would have to say goodbye.

And when I lifted my head from the pallet I saw him standing in the doorway, his mobile young face pale with dreams. -Firebolt Immortal, Chenxiang said, and waited for my permission to speak before continuing. -I have had a dream: a beautiful woman calling herself Mother was trapped beneath a mountain, begging for my help. And a giant calling himself Uncle came and stood in front of her. And before I could help her he’d swept her away. What was this dream?

I gestured for Chenxiang to sit before me, and motioned with my hand for a light to encircle us. -Your dream is true, Chenxiang. Long ago your mother, the Goddess San Shengmu, fell in love with your father, a mortal. And for this sin, and the sin of bearing you, your Uncle, the Divine Erlang, trapped her beneath a mountain.

Chenxiang’s uncanny dark eyes were fixed on mine. -I will rescue her, he said finally. -But how can I open the mountain with my hands? They are not strong enough.

I smiled at the boy. -You have wisdom and courage and the heart of the heroes of old, Chenxiang. These are weapons. Other tools will fall into your hands when you need them. But the power is in you.

Chenxiang rose; standing before me he seemed as tall as a mountain, and his eyes were luminous. -When shall I go, Master?

I knew in my heart that the time had come to bless him and send him out. I surged to my feet and threw up my arms, a wild laugh and a tide of grief rushing up from the depths of my house and through my aged frame like a mighty wind.

-Go now, son. Go now!

And Chenxiang went.

Oh, Canada.

Oh, Canada.

Sometimes you are impossible.
Look what you’ve done, or not done,
to your reputation—trailed it in fading shreds
over embassy rooftops, loaded it with a lack
of significance, hemmed and hawed and
bashfully pawed at the back of the Queen’s lace skirt.
You don’t even know what you’re worth:
you are the one to sit, self-effacing, tapping
your fingers on the smooth tabletop
while the others gossip around you,
or lurk at the back of the party, the only one
pushed by Mum to come, in hopes
you’d turn out alright. You don’t see
your own clear-eyed beauty, your swift
logic, quick love, your smile
which shivers out of you at every motion:
you don’t know what you have, that
your darkness is true black, your lights
are great flashes of green on an innocent sky.
Since you don’t know yourself, you haven’t
taught the rest to fear you, taught them
to lurk in your shadow, or held
the attention of a room. But soon,
soon.

Growing kind

Growing kind

Every time you plant a leaf
your heart grows bigger. Spin the blind,
see how the light cuts vectors through
the shadows on the sill
where things are growing
upwards with a green-tipped will.
Your heart will grow and grow
beyond its own height
in the soil, a sheltered hope
in something new, a scent or memory,
an infinitely tender shoot.
And it will dye the colour
of the air a gentler tone,
will strike a balance between known,
unknown, a metaphor for death
delayed, a proud green tower
in your mind, grown kind.

A room

A room

I took a hundred pictures of the room
from different angles, trying to catch
the way the sun crept on the floor, the fringe
of each scarf on the wall, the fall
of shadow on the carpet, books
in quiet celebration on the shelf—I held
my hand against the window, memorized
the edge of all my fingers on the pane,
the cars lining the lane, the colours
of the tree behind the glass.
I tried to stop time in my eyes, so that
the room would be there when I left,
so that my life would stop, revolve
inside a peaceful shell, so that I’d keep
a kind of refuge in my mind, preserve
a box of joy I could not rearrange.
But still the picture’s changed.
The minute that I handed back the keys
and gave away the room, I lost my right
to life inside. I could not freeze time
and should I have tried? Pictures do shift.
The glimpse of light inside them is a gift.

Solomon

Solomon

Solomon, how many miles will she travel
before she arrives at your gate?
She won’t miss it, that’s certain—
it’s the only one blindingly bright
with gilt and stones, and inside
the city is going mad with knowledge,
and everyone carries their paperback copies
of your collected works,
and eats up words mashed into jam
on bread studded with statements, seeds
divided into diagrams.
When at last her carriage pulls up
at your house, built in your signature
architectural style,
slathered with gew-gaws, public art
covered in scales and owls and silhouettes
of your powerful visage, she’ll stop
and gather all her courage,
shout at the slave boy dropping her train
in order to pick his nose,
and sweep inside. The Queen of Sheba
knows herself to be a stunner,
knows her questions to be strong,
and has her chequebook ready: she will buy
it all: encyclopaedias, poems, psalms, and even
the dictums, provided your answers impress.
“What must I do, what must I do,” she stammers,
broken at the sight of you,
your massive throne, the wisdom
emanating from your ears—
“what must I do to inherit eternal life?
Sometimes my riches burden me. The smell
of saffron in the air just makes me want
to buy things. But surely you know God on earth:
show me how you found your joy.”
And when she drops her brilliant eyes
will you be kind? You will.
You know your time is running out. The binding
on the books is new
but it will fail. You look at this small Queen
and at her slave boy, at the way she bows
to you as to a god, and then you sigh
the earth’s own sigh, and then you lead her off
and show her all your wealth,
and when her vacation ends, she goes:
but what you answered her, no-one knows.

Seeing is believing

Seeing is believing

Don’t allow yourself to suffer much.
The tree outside your window is a sign
that something stands outside your life,

unknowing of your inner strife,
a lack of memory strong against your fear
that pain recalled must be preserved,

or worse, perpetually deserved.
This naked tree outside your window
stirs her branches and a rush

of new green hides the woody blush,
shuts out the fiercest aspect of the sky,
deflects the spectrum’s restless parts—

so you must let your heart
burst out in green; so you must sink
the wound beyond its power to be seen.