ISSUE: Winter 1982
With age, the wise grow down,
they stop grooming themselves,
stop changing their clothes.
There is a village of them
on the other side of the ocean,
I left them there,
far away so I wouldn’t hear
their lamentations.
One is diminishing under the basket of potatoes
she carries on her head,
another curls over the barrow
wheeling her funeral outfit to the river,
and a man, wheezing, walks all around his horse
trying to put a harness on it.
Their stench is so strong
I could hate them for it
but I want the honey,
the wine, the crystal spring water
and the sweet smelling carrot
of wisdom
from their small, bone frames.
Look how their arms collapse
like a burning barn
as I leave them.
