Couches of Love

Saki in the Bathroom
Sumi ink on wood panel by Rikki Kasso, 2008

ON MAKESHIFT BEDDING
—Vidya

On makeshift
bedding in the cucumber
garden, the hilltribe
girl clings to
her exhausted lover.
Limbs still chaffing
with pleasure, dissolving
against him she
now and again with
one bare foot
jostles a shell necklace
that hangs from a
vine on the fence—
rattling it
through the night,
scaring the jackals off.

__________________

FATE IS A CRUEL AND PROFICIENT POTTER
—Vidya

Fate is a cruel
and proficient potter,
my friend. Forcibly
spinning the wheel
of anxiety, he lifts misfortune
like a cutting tool. Now,
having kneaded my heart
like a lump of clay,
he lays it on his
wheel and gives a spin.
What he intends to produce
I cannot tell.

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AND WHAT OF THOSE ARBORS OF VINES
—Vidya

And what of those arbors of vines
that grow where the river
drops away from Kalinda Mountain?
They conspired in the love
games of herding girls
and watched over the veiled
affairs of Radha.
Now that the days
are gone when I cut their
tendrils, and laid them
down for couches of love,
I wonder if they've
grown brittle and if
their splendid blue flowers
have dried up.

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A LOVE POEM
—Vidya

The luck of yours that you can talk about
your lover's playful glance, his words and touch.
For me, I swear that once he puts his hand
upon my girdle, I remember nothing.

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MUCH TOO CLOSE
—King Amaru

Much too close to bear his eyes
I turn my own down to my lap.
I do not try to hear
the many soft words in his breath.
I make my hands stop both my ears,
then cup my cheeks that burn
at words he does not even speak.
I try so hard. But now
I feel my dress undoing me,
what do I do?

__________________

MY HUSBAND, BEFORE LEAVING
—Anonymous

My husband
before leaving on a journey
is still in the house speaking
to the gods and already
separation is climbing like
bad monkeys to the windows.

___________________

Today's LittleNip:

Man must have bread and butter, but he must also have something to lift his heart.

—Farouk El Baz, U.S. Geologist

___________________

—Medusa

Today's poetry was translated from the seventh-century Sanskrit by Edwin Gerow, Peter Dent, Andrew Schelling, J. Moussaieff Masson and W.S. Merwin.

Repose
Painting by John Alexander, 1895