(for a customer)
(i)
I have tailored
leaves
and grasses
to fit
antlered beasts.
Customer,
to cut out
shirt and pants
and a tuxedo
for the tree
arms
and trunk
legs you carry,
I grab and size
you up
not for a punch,
but a breezy,
whispering tap
and brush
on the head
to place you
by a windmill's
filtering nook.
(ii)
It'll spin
and roll you up
in a wind
and storm,
as stormy
scissors
thread, along
chalked
lines with hands
of the gods
for a straight
stitch
to fit waist
and neck,
as a spool unwinds
thread
with a canary's
lyre
and a nightingale's
pulling song.
(iii)
Customer, you
molded me out
of earth
to be your tailor
often zigzagging
like a snake
going crooked
with brittle,
quaking hands,
the worm-spat
clay of fingers
bearing
head and shoulders
on tilting
walking feet
stretched out
on the thorny
carpet
of earth's
of jagged fabric
I cannot
tread on
without
a god-curled
slither
spun by tics
and wiggles.
(iv)
Your breath
presses
the treadle
of my machine
to the rhythm
of a bell
shrike to sing
my sewing hand
through
the edge
of life's fabric,
as the river's
ripples
of a smile flow
and float
on your face,
when I dress
you up with
a feather-in-wing
nymph fit
to fly you
back home
with a condor's wings,
as you walk,
lightning
and gale
spinning
and lifting your legs
in your
paraded strides
flanked
by the flames
of aloe
and gold sunflower.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem