like outdoor kitchens
and laundries and pantries and even bedrooms.
An old squatting grandma was stirring a wok.
Another was washing vegetables. They paid no
mind to the stranger shadowing by. Kitty
cats and a big pig and chickens—swine flu,
bird flu—slinked, lumbered, scratched,
came and went into and out of houses.
That alley jigjagged into another
alley that opened on to the public square.
La plaza at the center of the pueblo. And at the center
of the plaza was the waterworks, not a fountain
but two porcelain troughs with PVC
pipes above and below, and faucets in rows.
Cupping water in worship-like hands
(turn off tap with elbow), quaff
as if welcoming myself with ceremony,
joining myself to this place. Drinking,
aware that I, a citizen from the wealthiest,
squanderingest country, am taking precious water.
Unpurified tap water. Aware that I
risk my life, I throw in my lot
with the health of this common village. Sit
right down on the curbstone on the east
side of the square. Face the last of the sun.
Unpack notebook and pen. Write:
arrive
adobe
China
home
At home in a civilization kind with plazas,
containing me and the sky and a square of earth.
Father Sky
Mother Earth
It’s not only Native Americans who pray
Father Sky Mother Earth. Chinese
say Father Sky Mother Earth too.
In the almanac of stars, moons, luck, and farming:
Ba
T’ien
Ma
Day
Doff sneakers, doff socks, feel
the ground with naked soles. The floor of the plaza
is warm and smooth; skin meets skin.
Chinese generations walked
barefoot here, sweated, oiled,
spat upon, tamped the black soil,
which they could’ve planted, so rich. Now,
the farmers, men and women, homeward plod.
A goatherd following his goats and sheep,
a duckherd his ducks, light and long shadows
of many legs oscillating. They came upon
the writing man—poet!? retired philosopher!?—
in the act of public writing. Quietly,
they peered over his shoulders, peered over
his right (writing) hand, peered over
his other hand. By calligraphy, they can tell
character and fate. Readers jostled
one another for the spot directly in front,
looked at his writing upside down,
craned their necks to see it from his point
of view. English! The Brave Language. But
his Chinese! A boy’s Chinese.
The man draws like a boy. “Read, la.
Read, la-a.” Our not-so-ugly American
dared recite loudly, in his best language
and second-best language, the 4-word
poems. Audience clapped hands, and laughed,
and mimicked, and asked, “You’ve come from what
far place, aw?” “I was born in the Beautiful
Country.” “Aiya-a. Beautiful Country.
Is Beautiful Country truly beautiful and rich?”
“Well …” (
Well
, English, American.) “Beautiful
Country People are like me, not too
beautiful, not too ugly, not too
rich, not too poor. But some
too rich, too poor. Most,
my color skin, tan. Our color
skin.” Actually, the color skin of the people
around was darker, darker from working in the sun.
“I live in Big City. Eighty
out of one hundred people live in the cities.
But I am not like everybody.
Everybody has cars. 2 cars.
I don’t have one car.
I don’t want one car.”
Have
and
want
, same sound, not
same tone. They pitied him, poor man,
no car. Audience grew, 50
souls hearing the sojourner who’d seen the Beautiful
Country, who’d learned to write their horizontal alphabet.
People vied with one another, please,
dear writer traveller teacher, come
to our home for rice, and stay the night.
A confident village, the people not shy
to bring you home and see their hovel.
He chose a solid-seeming man, mine
good host, and comradely put himself in yoke.
The farmers, washing up in public, showed off
the on-and-off faucets and the pipes. They filled
wood buckets and plastic buckets and jars.
Wittman asked for a carrying pole across
his neck, above his backpack, which steadied
and cushioned the bouncy, springy, sloshing,