15.08.20

Back in Soka after 32 days on the road.  Nothing very different here, other than the smell of moulded tatami (actually not different at all, just more noticeable), and our vine plant that quadrupled in size.  Mailbox was stuffed tight, mostly with sushi flyers but a fair number of letters from my aunties and a postcard from Rod’s folks’ vacation in Alaska.

Tomorrow morning, I have to cycle over to Kawaguchi Kita Koukou, my new base school.  Japan is still a mad place.  Such a contrast to Cambodia and Vietnam and even Thailand.  All the corporate men keeping it rolling and their wives and children keeping domestic spending up.

I haven’t slept much for the past 2 nights.  Last night we flew from Bangkok from midnight to 8am.  My usual flying anxiety, coupled with cramped conditions and our position 2 rows from the central TV, made it impossible for me to get more than an hour’s sleep.  Our last evening in Bangkok, we stayed at D&D’s on the ever roaring KhaoSan Circus.  That place really is a medieval carnival, equipped with masks, transvestites, lepers (or something like it), and farang on full flesh display wearing the 3dollar handmade items sold by hard, mercenary Thais.  Not a lovely picture of life, but throbbing with it nonetheless.

All that travel, at least one good poem should come of it.  So far only 2 backpacks of clothing and trinkets to decorate the outside.  Send my message of alive and well, of prosperous and happy.  For the mostpart I am, but less so with all this shit weighing me down, obscuring the soulful view I need to develop spirit and courage.

Bought a bunch of CDs (copies) for cheap in Saigon.  Rod chose most of them, but I picked up a Tracy Chapman compilation, Guru’s Jazzmatazz (not sure which one), and an album by French rapper, MC Solar.  “And Talkin’ Bout a Revolution, it feels…. Like a whisper….” (Tracy C)

My candle has gone out.  Japan killed it?  The pointlessness of whispers on a war field?  The easy way that bombs can start to fall and the decades of cleaning up the mess?  Maybe this is a gestation period.  Dumbfounded silence, perhaps I’m taking the time to listen, to watch, to feel life on another side.  Can’t figure out which side I’m on.  So many shades of poor.  Brands of rape.  So many things we do to subjugate.  I’m not so convinced of my blameless state.

Like Siddharta, I gotta get weak to get strong someday.  Gotta learn to preach against myself.  Gotta know what it’s like to get outta myself.  And back in again.  I’m outta myself these days.  Trynna recognize this skin.
I den ti tee.  Watching months clock by, age shows on my face, victim of beauty’s waste.  Trynna hold on to years that run mad fast.  Ambition hot on my tail.  Or me on it’s.

Climbin’ mountains, can’t escape the clouds, sun washes buildings grey, asphalt, noone’s fault, apparently.  Covering mistakes comes easily.  It’s digging them up again that hurts.

xxx
 

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