Tokyo, Mon Amour Poem by Bernard Henrie

He began going out dressed as a girl,
walking at night in busy places,
attending the cinema.

He haunted the Kabuki District
where his happiness was great;
passerby silhouetted against paper
windows, lanterns casting red
and green lights on new snow;
noodle shops under fiery clouds
of steam.

Sometimes he arrived home early,
rouged lip s dulled by singing,
powdered cheeks subdued by rain.

His parties were the best, he sang
in English using a falsetto voice
and pounded an old American
piano making us laugh and beg
for encores.

He often fell drunk on a divan
breathing on an even keel
with my rising cigarette smoke;

the shadow of his kimono sleeve
brushing my knee like the wing
of nomadic birds he fed,
birds exhausted by a long flight
from the Ryūkyū islands where
he too once lived.

All evening I sit mute before
his tea service touching
the pristine gloves he used
to protect his hands from boiling
water; a peacock shaped teapot,
sugar bowl and miniature milk
jug curved into a silver bird egg.

Around his chrysanthemum pyre
I set-out his popular still lifes,
14 brushes thin as an eyelash,
and fresh cigarette packs.

Fellow students serve guests
white hot noodles and tell
their favorite story.

The next morning is cowed
and painted in ash tones,
apparitions appear among
speeding motor cars and the
ear-splitting shriek of the
Tokyo express cutting cleanly
like a dessert knife.

I feed his birds,
but they refuse to eat or sing
from their clairvoyant depth.