The dog who watched us take off our shoes
on the steps before the laying Buddha,
this is for you. You were at ease,
not guarding, panting from the heat, warming
your belly on Bangkok’s stones.
Our shoes in a bag, passports strapped to us,
photographing the twenty foot high
resemblance of the man who asked not to
be praised - cast in mother-of-pearl the
man who shook off possessions - I
suppose to a dog looking up,
gods and humans are the same, barefoot idols
shuffling through a hotbox corridor
looking up at another barefoot
human with an immobile face,
downy eyes and nearly a tear.
Later you found shade beneath an
archway at the end of a long
line of Buddhas, almost identical,
decreasing in age towards you.
Some ideas are so respected
they need repeating in the same
manner every year, the same sculpture
carved beside the last, an echo,
a silent chant, and you lay there
at the end, the chant becomes your
visible panting. For a moment
you look into my eyes because
you recognised my feet, because
you know you take the place of the
next structure, you know that busy
hands will build upon where you sit,
that where you go, humans follow,
as they do with gods, with shadows.