wo Poems from an Ashram in India

First

All this talk of nectar and bliss is starting to piss me off.

I don’t know about you, my friend,

but my path to God ain’t no sweet waft of incense.

It’s a cat set loose in a pigeon pen,

and I’m the cat—

but also them who yell like hell when they get pinned.

My path to God is a worker’s uprising,

won’t be peace till they unionize.

Their picket is so fearsome

the National Guard won’t go near them.

My path was beaten unconscious before me,

by a small brown man I never got to see,

who chased God through India, shin-deep in mud,

barefoot and famined, malarial blood,

sleeping in doorways, under bridges—a hobo.

(Which is short for “homeward bound,” you know)

And he now chases me, saying: “Got it yet, Liz?

What HOMEWARD means? What BOUND really is?”

Second

However.

If they’d let me wear pants made out of the

fresh-mown grass from this place,

I’d do it.

If they’d let me make out

with every single Eucalyptus tree in Ganesh’s Grove,

I swear, I’d do it.

I’ve sweated out dew these days,

worked out the dregs,

rubbed my chin on tree bark,

mistaking it for my master’s leg.

I can’t get far enough in.

If they’d let me eat the soil of this place

served on a bed of birds’ nests,

I’d finish only half my plate,

Then sleep all night on the rest.