Poem....Fat Man Walking (2013)

 

A fat man walked
Searing heat
Sweating
Along Khmer river
Drawn by gamelan
Icarus like
Moth like
Singeing wings in fires of ethnicity.

The large man
Sandal clad
Behatted
Besotted with difference
Plodded weighty foot
After weighty foot
Past sellers of bottled petrol
Motorcycle pig passengers
Pavement games of chalk and tile.

Fishers but not of men
Cast thin lines into brown waters in expectation.
Motorcycle taxis tooted
Cyclists whispered by
Tourists lugged Zoom lens
Weighty straps cutting into Sun reddened fair shoulders
Dollars pulling pockets
Guilt pulling hearts
Offset by tokens of perfunctory generousness.

The heavy man
ponderous man
Dragged his weight
Along dust sprinkled roads
thinking of Woody Guthrie
Allen Ginsberg
Jack Kerouac
And every kind of
Dharma Bum
Past and present.

The silence of the kingdom
Brought thoughts of kamma and metta
Saffron robes
Hands waving incense
Roasted insects
French baguettes
And delectable markets
Where gems of Khmers smile
At sweaty fat men out for a walk
Sauntering in sunshine not necessarily meant for them, or their forebears.