But Not Here

The rice field looks like a golf course.
A gentle loamb* puffs out a plastic
bag tied to a stick about a five iron
downwind.


Where I grew up the wind
is now racing across snow fields
with the cruelty of a minister
whipping himself in his dark closet
. . . but not here.


I toss a pinch of grass in the air
to judge which way the wind is
blowing and see Takhli’s golden
Buddha looking down at me from
a Wat high on a hill.


Like a poem, the Buddha’s serene smile
only gives a sense of things. It seems to say
today is the place you've been travelling to
all your life.


I’m an old man. It’s the beginning of winter,
. . . but not here.


12/15/2011 FG

All rights reserved by the author Forrest Greenwood.

*loamb is my transliteration for breeze or wind.
There are probably more apt Thai words, but
this one will have to do.

Popping up from the table-top flat rice fields
are many steep hills. Many of them have a statue
of Buddha – sometimes in almost inaccessible places.
The giant Buddha in Takhli is about four stories high.