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This poem is also one of my favourites (by the same author):
KISS AND QUARREL IN WHISPERS
1.
When your house borders a thoroughfare
and your innate and consummate desire
is to escape the arrows of future songs
and the cobra fangs in their chorus lines
you learn to kiss and quarrel in whispers,
conscious of neighbours and passers-by
with feline footfalls and amebo mouths –
their rumour-metres factory-set
to the speed of chameleon tongues
out to feast on swarms of rainflies,
roused by the first rain of the year
ordained to end the reign of an obdurate dry season.2.
If you allow cracks on your firewalls,
all manners of uninvited crawlers
will wake from their slothful slumbers
under damp and mossy rocks
with hands and mouths unwashed
to demand pride of place
at the head-table of your by-invitation-only banquet.3.
For your own protection
erect perimeter walls with no conscience
around your sanctuaries
to keep out the green eyes
and foul mouths of rubberneckers,but remember to keep those walls
low enough for you to pass your offerings
of unblemished fruits, scented oils, and colour-coded flowers
to wake up those ancestors napping in heaven
to their duty of care to those of us still here in the struggle on earth.Remember too to build secret exits into your houses
in the unlikely event that Sango’s vengeful thunderbolts,
confused by the sameness of modern city streets
and an inability to read directions on Google Maps,
should mistake your shuttered homes for your enemies’ bunkers.