On My Altar

Buddha sits, belly rounded with laughter.

I bargained for him fiercely,

pinned beneath an angry sun.

The hot dust sticking in my throat

tasted of sandalwood and poor men's bones

and a camel leered at me, salivating.

(as camels do)

I wanted something to take home,

to say: I have been here,

poised on the knife's edge

that cuts the breathless heights

and divides civilized from un- so clearly

you can see it from the mountains of the moon.

(swirling in clouds)

There were folding tables:

cheap formica on uneven metal legs;

They belonged in my grandmother's backyard

holding up translucent domes of jello

with improbable bits of canned fruit salad

floating, like maraschino cherry stars.

(but not here)

Merchants leaned over them

in the shade of crudely improvised tents --

flowered bed sheets on swaying mazes of uneven metal poles --

their voices rang crazed and desperate,

as they offered up their sacrifices:

incense, orange soda, t-shirts, cheap souvenirs in tiny boxes lined with silk...

(like my Buddha)

No, five yuan is too much.

There are a hundred other tables.

There are infinite Buddhas.

And I do not trust his brown plastic stand

or his sleek, manufactured shine.

I am sure that is not jade.

(I'm in love)

No, no, no, lady! Don't go.

Pretty foreign lady. Golden lady.

Throw a poor man a dollar.

Four yuan. A single dollar.

So little to you. So much to me.

For a Buddha made of jade.

(no, not jade)

In the sighing coolness of a tourist bus,

his smooth heaviness cradled in my damp palm,

we rushed away from ancient battlements

winding sinuous through the miles of mountains,

built -- brick by brick -- by thousands of hands long dead:

protection from a vanished enemy.

(hordes of ghosts.)

Twenty years, ensconced on various altars, he surveys:

the peeling wallpaper, the teen's posters,

the dorm rooms, the cheap apartments, the true homes.

The boyfriends, girlfriends, lovers, husband, children.

The parade of other possessions dancing by

straight into the arms of Salvation Army truck drivers.

(and Buddha laughs)