Celestial Cattlecall Cowboy Yogi Poems by Lee Harris
According
to Sutras, Sufi
mystics and
The Farmer’s Almanac
everything
is going south
during this
Degenerate Age
this Sid
Viciousness, this
Kali
Yuga...in front of me
on Dirt
Street between the
Great
Stupas of Swayambhu
and
Boudanath—a stunted rice
diet Nepali
kid suddenly squats
squirts out
an ocher cow pile
and smiles
quizzically into my
fat Yankee
face, a flashlight
tells all,
at 40 he will be
skeletal
with stretched parchment
for skin,
rotten betel nut teeth
lilac
stained lips hacking up
bloody gobs
of TB into a spit
cup...and
perhaps in dreams
still
wondering about that one
magic
night...Tibetan monk robes
fluttering
like prayer flags
over Mickey
Mouse, the face
of a cheap Japanese watch
TUMBLEWEED
TANGO
Cowboy
monks don’t dance
because
they’ve never been
to Cuba,
yet up in the
Tiger’s
Nest an old Lama
used to
mambo with Lion
Headed
Dakini, long before
it burnt
down—a hot spot
for
unspoken words. When
I hear the
guitars of the
Gandharvas,
robes fly,
even my
wheelchair reels
and through
the eyes of my
black-eyed
peas I see
shangshang
birds who tango
like
tumbleweeds crying out
“no-self,
no death”
to the
endless clang clang
clang of their bold cymbals