Lama in NY

Padmasambhava,

Susan Fuchs

was murdered with a rock in Central Park

and laid there cold for hours

her cries ignored again.

John Kennedy is dead on channel 5.

I recognize the jewel in the lotus.

I strike a fire for lunch and draw

steaming water for an afternoon bath.

Lama wears a Rolex.

Sun eclipsed by moon is sometimes total

darkness laying on the land

there is no dark side really

it’s all dark when Irish eyes are sleeping.

I will not drink liquor.

I will not eat grease.

I will stay away from dairy.

I honor father and my mother

whoever they may be.

I love my neighbor

when she takes her clothes off in the window

makes believe that I can’t see her

draws curtains against the night.

Hunan hot and spicy

duck and warm brown rice.

In the back I know they’re spitting in my dinner

because the old man cowers from my sight.

Tara is mother of all compassion

gracious guiding day and night.

I rest inside the sunlight blowing through a fish bowl

watch the gold ones go for flakes.

North Star spins across another planet.

There is no birth and no cessation –

Allen Ginsberg knows this in his tired graves of ashes.

Gere and Giuliani boy in blue bravado.

Columbine returns to school on 8/16

with bullets in her daughter’s flesh

shot nine times she still holds five like silver souvenirs.

Breathing out I calm the activities of my body.

When I’m walking I know I’m walking.

So you will think of all this fleeting world:

“A star at dawn, a bubble in an stream

A flash of lightening in a summer cloud

A flickering lamp, a phantom, and a dream…”

 © 1999 John Chorazy