Cave Of A Cackling Smile Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(based on a night visit by soldiers of death)

(i)

A rose-sprayed grin
to laugh off
a world of potholes
and bursting cascades?

Or a lily swinging
cheeks bolting a rising fire
from scarlet drips
left by fleeing soles of boots?

Do I smile roundly
with a glassy plastic screen
spreading butterfly wings,

a begonia's gaping mouth
carving out an oval grin,
its milky teeth
unbolting a child's world,

my sun-sprayed home
for the rest of the jerky day?

Or, do I wince, gripped
by a wasp's sting,
hands clasped,
arms tight sisal clicking ropes;

the edges of my cheeks
unlocking a grin

seeking feathers to spray
into a bird's
giggling song, my mouth
too short for many rounds

of grins, when children
have strayed outside
the gates of chatting parrots?

(ii)

The children have fled
the sun-lit furrows
of the garden to shelter

by a popping fire place,
everyone hopping
to tell a cackling story
with little pinhead light.

And no flower beam
to replace a night
of death wrapping them

in a cloud-sealed crater
cementing gasps.

And short gusts of air
from choked mouths,
when boots

broke into brittle plank
houses, leaving behind
only wood shavings

and no carpenter to frame
the house back
to stand with clawed hoofs
on rock and boulder

made of stones and cement
from a rooted inner bowl.

(iii)

The padauk root
bearing the spray of children
giggling all day
is melted into clouds,
so the thin voices say.

And a smile spins
no deep paint pot
to build up the inner bowl
of a carpenter
thinned out into mist,

while feathery children
with no more padauk pillar
to lean on, spray smiles

drifting like unfiltered smoke
through heavy cheeks.