Holding a varnished paper parasol, <br />the gardener-a shy man-off-the-street- <br />ripple-rakes the white sand, despite rainfall, <br />into a pattern effortlessly neat, <br />meant to suggest, only abstractly, the sea, <br />as eight weathered stones are meant to depict <br />Buddha and the hungry cubs he knows he <br />must sacrifice to feed. I sit <br />in a little red gazebo and think- <br />ast he Zen monks do-about what love means, <br />unashamed to have known it as something <br />tawdry and elusive from watching lean <br />erotic dancers in one of the dives <br />on Stark Street, where I go some lovesick nights. <br /> <br />Even in costume they look underage, <br />despite hard physiques and frozen glances <br />perfected for the ugly, floodlit stage, <br />where they are stranded like fish. What enhances <br />their act is that we're an obedient crowd, <br />rheumy with liquor; our stinginess <br />is broken. When one slings his leg proudly <br />across the bar rail where I sit, I kiss <br />a five dollar bill and tuck it in his belt. <br />He's a black swan straining its elatic <br />neck to eat bread crumbs and nourish itself. <br />My heart is not alert; I am transfixed, <br />loving him as tiger cubs love their <br />mother who abandons them forever.<br /><br />Henri Cole<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/buddha-and-the-seven-tiger-cubs/
