another one
“DES PATATES PAS DU BETON!” – “PAS DE PAYSANS SANS TERRE” – “CHASSER LES SANS ABRIS OU LEUR DONNER UN TOIT?” – …
(Potatoes not concrete! – No farmers without land – To chase the homeless or give them a roof? – …)
I find him in the garden. Staked tomato plants are what
He walks among, the apples of paradise. He is eighty
And stoops, white-haired in baggy serge and braces. His
Moustache
Once warrior-fierce for quarrels in the small town of Zable,
Where honour divides houses, empties squares, droops and
Is thin
From stroking, he has come too far from his century to
Care…
This is his garden,
A valley in Lebanon; you can smell the cedars on his breath
And the blood of the massacres, the crescent flashing from
Ravines
To slice through half a family. He rolls furred sage between
Thumb and forefinger, sniffs the snowy hills; bees shifting
Gold as they forage sunlight among stones, church bells
Wading
In through pools of silence. He has never quite migrated.
– David Malouf
chameleonian times 