When you get to unpack the
case, you’ll find
the folded river like a
paper crane;
the courtyard, the terrace
and the blind lane
have travelled with you,
nothing’s left behind.
In some garment, in the
collar or cuff -
the smell of rain. The lamppost
under which
the poor sold bargains
pressed hard by the rich
has come with you and can’t
be shaken off.
Each time you inhaled,
breathed in the air
and your lungs bloomed like trees of night jasmine,
the shapes of old yarns,
skeins of old chagrin
are coded in your baggage
tags somewhere.
The bends of roads, the blends
of diesel smoke,
a certain blur of traffic
and townsfolk.
