calling

Sipping Rhone wine under the flounces

of the massive Lime-flower tree

delectable aromas and intoxicating scents

trouble me unimaginably!

The wine at its best

the flowers at their peak

and yet my life’s absorption in

what fills my senses is being tugged at

its tension overstretched like used muslin.

The perfection of sky balanced on untouched forests

almost eludes me at this time

the gist of each of your precious words

dripping in the heaping flowers at my feet

for someone is calling me from

the white marble of Montpellier.

A mere dream in our shuttered salon—

alpine logs in the stove eavesdropping—

commands me to descend our mountain hairpins

the weekly bus alive with grape-pickers

suitcases slotted between purple stained baskets

to the North African haven of Montpellier.

You demand why and who and how I must go down from

this ultimate haven of Cathars, Catholics, shepherds,

but the gist of your question vanishes

in the evening sizzle of biftek

buried in an armful of Bay and vine twigs

for someone is calling me from

the vivid painted timbers of Montpellier.

The fierce row along the boards at bedtime—

your coarse tears extinguishing the candles

unbalancing the stable slab of incense—

propel me out of your faithless fleshy cloisters.

You hurl bells

burn sutras in your ashtray

denounce my path to this ‘borrowed’ deity Buddha

making last-ditch interrogations under a strong light.

But the gist of your spite is sucked

into the Lama’s Himalayan eyes

transformed in the flutter of his butter lamps

dredged over the ample of his saffron robes

as he welcomes me to the wooden temple in

a suburban orchard in Montpellier.

‘‘You heard my calling. I knew you would come in this very life.’’