He had to come back.

On a December afternoon
when the sun was more to west,
he landed on the most favorite place of his house,
the roof.

Just as he had imagined
the still winter air was abuzz with life.

Doves were pairing for a home
Green bee-eaters swooped on insects
Two herons kept following the grazing cow
Crows were busy with twigs and wires
High up beyond where paper kites could soar
Storks slow sunned their wings wet from the jhil
The cats warmed their furs before the cold night
The stray puppy gamboled with its mother.

Each piece had perfectly fitted the other
including the silently sleeping house.

He was tempted to walk down once
has she changed any little way?

He smiled to himself
then breezed away from the roof.

LOOKING FOR A GOD
( for Shyam )

I pray only
to the God
of this poem

for free passage
from word
to word

as I journey
through the vast space
between thought

& thought
speak to the sound
trying to translate

syllable by syllable
what the moment
is saying

what the moment
wants to say
and see that

it says it
in its own voice
or as near as

I can
get it
...******!

Who are you to take my
Life
between
your drive to
change the landscape?

Do you unholy man seek to
save me? Are you constant
and believing in the Rightness

of your sanctimony?

For What is your Purpose?

You misunderstand my wrath.

Not in this world are you

Anymore

The mute destructive act
was not from caring sprung.

But

from the tongue you spit
Out

the ordinance

of my destruction.


Be out of my Poetry

Forever.

Forgotten



Caroline Shank
January 29, 2025

I CHAMENI STIGMI
(THE LOST MOMENT)

the mountain
places a cloud
behind its head

dozes off
into the blue
of an afternoon

the father's shadow
watches his child
pedal a trike

chasing a chicken
in circles
laughing hysterically

this a moment
that will vanish
into a Greek sky

that only
a passing poet
will notice enough

in his head where
words will
re-enact it endlessly

even as time
fades and
years vanish

and the French lady
states that reality is
'les mensonges et les larmes'.

*

Finally got around to these fragments that came together in a moment after 40 years! But as the Greeks would have it. . . "Αγάλι-αγάλι γίνεται η αγουρίδα μέλι."

"Agáli-agáli yínete i agourída méli"

“The unripe grape becomes sweet like honey slowly-slowly.”

ZAK'S PRAYER

little Zak
(just a little scrap of a chap)    
with a deep Barry White voice

enquires(as he enquires
about everything) :
“Why is your hair white? ”

listens patiently to the explanation
how after a head injury
“I went white overnight! ”

being a good Christian child
tells me he will pray for me
for the “black to be back! ”

I’m very tempted
to dye it for the next day
just to prove his prayer right

when his fervent prayer
doesn’t turn the situation around
...he frets:

I tell him
God & me
are both happy

with it
…like this
“Really? ” he asks.

“Really! ”
I affirm.
he grimaces

“Have it your own way then
but man...
it makes you look old & grim!"

I grin
tell him that
I am what I am

but that I can live with it
"Ok..!" he sighs
"...have it your own way!"

*

He was a lovely sincere child who pitied my whiteness of beard and hair. I basked in his pity...it was so loving and tender. And just where did this tiny skinny little child get that Barry White/ Shaft voice! One of my nicest moments in teaching.