China Driving

8/3/2019 China Driving

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/china-driving 1/30

China DrivingPoems from a Journey

Glenn R. Burney



Death by Lao Tse

Yesterday, death advanced

and breathed heavyright down my neck.

I couldn’t gloom or fret or cry, not here,

but laid down on a bench for rest

where old Lao Tse turned into a boy

with two goats for haggard company.

Just to show ‘em who was who.

Here I paused, my eyes half-baited

and waiting for the shut-off signs;I was so convinced of death

but lapsed instead into a sleep

on a bench too hard for love

for all but the couple

torso-locked beyond a fire red azalea.

Then at a bark or a man’s great sneeze

back to life I flashed, still tired,

weary to the center bone.

“China days begin here,” I thoughtand stumbled off the bench for food.

Taoist Temple

Chengdu, Sichuan

25 May 1997

2



People’s Park Haiku

one man hacks some phlegm

another sweats his muscle shirt,

here at the People’s Opera

a retracted hand

can’t apprehend

a jerky butterfly, little boy

in a pansy patch

a 4-year-old

snakes for butterflies

People’s Park

Chengdu, Sichuan

24 May 1997

3



Generations

With hands on his hipsthen hanging from the limb

of a low-growing fir tree, a miniature old man

in a Worker Party uniform limbers

himself, not enough to touch

the ground, but persistently.

Four boys rush past--

a KFC bag filled

with pond water and pond fishin the lanky leader’s hand.

While one executes pull-ups from

the limb of another tree,

one two, one two,

the leader drops his line into the pond.

He uses a radio antenna as a rod

and a bare hook decorated with silver tinsel

as a lure. Sure fooled me.

The boys give up in minutes and dart away.The old man winds down his exercises.

China heat hasn’t settled but he sweats.

He holds a straw hat with a loosened arm;

the hat drags on the ground.

Renmin Gongyuan

People’s Park

Chengdu, Sichuan

23 May 1997

4



Lijiang Market

To make a good stock

Buy lots of tomatoes,

Leeks and garlic,

And skins of potatoes

A couple of peppersFor a sizzling bite

And maybe a fish head

To set it off right.

The market in Lijiang

Is home to all things

To fill up a pot

With a stock most appealing.

Lijiang Market

31 May 1997

the People’s blue cap

on a Naxi woman

in her people’s blue apron

the life I left behind

is there in front of me--

an indigo cloth

5



in the midst of a drizzle

I find myself--

watching the rain

now something tells me--

watch the changing

light of water ripples

the rain increases tempo

but through the pines

Nothing touches

an ecstatic Pekinese

in high grass—

flailing legs and tinkling bell

not yet 30

but sitting on a bench

with hands on knees

Black Dragon Pool Park

31 May 1997

6



Night Watch

There’s just no sleeping

at the Red Sun Hotel.

Last night it was off-key karaoke

barreling out of a bad dance hall

and tonight

in a two dollar and fifty cent dorm room

shared by four Yanks who don’t snoreit’s a mind that won’t quit.

Pulling myself out of the covers

I sit up on a folded pillow

and notice out the window

sixty-foot high Chairman Mao,

rock solid,

keeping watch over his sleeping minions

who bustle by day for dollarswhile here on the 4th floor

a sleepless failed capitalist

keeps watch over him.

Red Sun Hotel

Lijiang, Yunnan

31 May 1997

7



Words From Tiger Leaping Gorge

A hundred moths flicker evening lychnis white

on a dust green terraced hillside.A fellow hiker jumps, screams, shakes

this four-inch armored centipede from his leg.

Invisible, a Naxi farmer

urges on a mule. His cries rise with

the mocha Yangtze’s far below, invisible.

And the Jade Dragon Mountain

supports these sounds, the river

and the sky. It makes the clouds hold still.

I’m peeing off a cliff.

Yangtze rapids growl below, out of sight.

Unseen workers reel off explosions

slowly scraping a road along one wall

of this impassable gorge.

Ten thousand years and never an engine to deafen.

Is this why I came to hear?

On the far side

a silent waterfall, ancient glacial melt,

dips into a circular pool.

peeing off a cliff above howling rapids,

the silent dragon watches

8



Thinking of a seven year old poem,

Letting its words run relays

To the cadence of hiking steps

And syncopated blasts of a road crew,

A poem about paltry words

Building barren pathways of understanding,

Enjoying the rhythm

Of a hundred time repeated line:

Putting seven words in a row makes Little sense to you or I And just then a flying cicada

Squeaks over my head.

right at sunset

the clouds give up

and leave the peak

a bend in the trail

quick-silences

the roar of water

then, a glory cloud

hails us—

the journey’s end

in dying light

we walk along

white marble lanterns

cloud shadowscrowd light

from a mountainside

Tiger Leaping Gorge Trek

2 June 1997

9



Leaving Lijiang

Leaving Lijiang

and here I am

having thoughts of home

After an afternoon nap.

a dream of my mother asking,

How much money is left?

Another of my ex-wife breathing

the air out of my lungs.

These cobblestone streets meander

like my inclination but aren’t

barricaded, hung-up, convinced

of location that fear won’t release.

I am still young enough to change.

By the canal an old woman

wears an indigo Naxi apron

and Chairman Mao’s navy hat.She is still possessed by beauty.

Right above her shriveled ear

a wisp of gray hair flutters,

as if to say goodbye.

Now to Dali

Where a girlfriend waits;

We’ve met in India and Kathmandu so far.

On the trail today

An impulse of paternity struck.

10



There’s a first time for everything.

Aaron, my companion,

offered congratulations

while I savored this warmth

and the glow of alabaster marbled mountains

dancing with the stars.

That they have a different form

can’t be all to their appeal.I watch my eyes

follow their moves

and center on their center.

That hidden home returns

a piece of grace

to a roving, angular fellow.

Along the Old Town Canal

Lijiang, Yunnan

5 June 1997

11



Dali by Night

quiet Chinese couple

squat behind a pancake cart—

no business tonight?

the woman with

the goose-flesh smilegives me the creeps

in her fingers

a broken feather

spins erratically

late at night

laughing at goodbyeis nobody’s way

the past crushed in

the future did the same—

no pain at all

12



a stone lion lurks

over last night’s couple’s

midnight snack

all over China

i solemnly find

stars in the sky

stepping on a curb,

the sound of my slipper

slapping new cement

Late night, MCA Guesthouse

Dali, Yunnan

11 and 12 June 1997

MCA Addendum

People discussing jealousy,

what’s behind it.

Listening to Leonard Cohen,

an album called The Future--

“When they said ‘repent’

I wonder what they meant,” pressing through the background.

13



Across Erhai Lake

Dogwood

The clear waters of Erhai Lake

had us both poised to jump.

A Chinese couple in love on the bow,

knotting their hands and entwining their feet,

the rhythmic driving engine makes them quiver.

There are many ways to move.

On your challenge of last nightI wrote a new style love song

while you traced waves like Seiji Ozawa.

In a typical burst of joy

you quit your job on this boat

and called yourself a flying flower

to compliment my flying tree.

approaching Wase village

on a boat’s prow,

boot brown above wave green

14



Feet of Bai Women

Plaid cloth slippers with elastic tops Worn maroon leather shows with

one inch heels and rhinestone racing stripes Lavender plastic slip-ons

full of fly swatter holes The ubiquitous green cotton sneaker of the

People’s Liberation Army In the shape of a Holland clog, ornamental

Bai-wear And for the toothless peasant woman gossiping with friends, the

simple rice straw sandal The woman’s toes grace the dirt The straps

wear calluses on thickened field ankles that have come to town

15



Haiku in Wase

shoe repairman’s view—

the passing, passing

frayed rubber soles

what’s their basket say?

heaps of eggplant

mounds of aubergine blue

framed by a backpack’s strap—

three China reds

before the sky

you support a poet,

you Dali mountains

with your cloud mantle

they splice me to life,

those old sages

stroking their beards

Wase, Yunnan

15 June 1997

16



Kunming

Searching for guitars in a fruit market,

bald frostless incandescentssuddenly burst out

beneath firecracker red umbrellas.

First pomegranates since New Delhi

with green and orange mangos, mixed in cardboard trays.

Then bouquet after bouquet of rubberbanded lychees.

Change of stalls—

Belt fish and bras and belts and turtles,

a version of Tetris made for a Levi’s key pocket,

roadside stools for some grilled meals, skeweredtofu and eggplant and shrimp, some scorpions to boot.

When a hawker hoists a steaming pot,

intense surges of heat.

The elusive royalties of black market CDs and women for sale.

Our guide inquires of a local for an instrument shop,

“Sorry, they’re all closed for the night.”

rubber mallets whapping

marble tiles into place—

peasant worker rhythms

over fruit and yoghurt

our host inquires,

What is China’s greatest problem?

June in Kunmingfull moon obscured

only static on the radio

Kunming, Yunnan

21 June 1997

17



The Train to Guilinon a footpath

a dancing girl greets

a grazing water buffalo

stone pillars at night

stone pillars at dawn

China’s slow moving trains

watching tea leaves

settle to the bottom—

a glass of green

Kunming to Guilin

22 June 1997

18



A Series of Sights in Hong Kong

One: Four Chinese Poems

To say goodbye forever

To walk or swim away

To step into the current

And not cling to the shore,

Here is where I’ve headed.

Looking at the Hong Kong skyline

Millions of watts of power Blazing opportunity built on bedrock

A soft drink cup floats by

Its straw a flagless flagpole.

I haven’t got a clue.

I haven’t got my act together.

I put a message in a bottle.

Dropped it into Hong Kong harbor.

Made clueless acts my own.

Some man in a striped shirt

Walked behind a man in plaid

Who walked behind a white-shirted man

Who carried a portable phone

And saw neither patterned shirt.

I finally saw

a woman with red flags

practicing Taichi

26 June 1997

19



Two: Microcosmos

a beesees an orchid

and thinks it’s itself

a rain-stormed cricket

covered with mud—

what air conditioning here!

the moon reflects

as well

in a frog’s left eye

not much more

than a mosquito

holding down a pond

Hong Kong Cinema

28 June 1997

fireworks at midnight,fog on the windows

at the Hilton’s top

Hong Kong Hilton

30 June 1997

20



Three: Hong Kong Illusions

A line of lights

red, gold, green, electric blue and white,

buildings turned by night into neon billboards,a feast of dragons and five-petalled flowers

highlighting the errant son’s return to the motherland,

much richer than expected or sought,

a dream beyond the glorious greed of

capricious Chinese capitalists.

While the son prospered, the mother fought

tooth and nail with fathers, daughters and sons

never determined to go any course

but the least predictable one.

No sky as bright in China as this one.

No train or bus or hotel lobby as clean.

No pockets as well-lined as these.

And me, in flip-flops and an 80 cent muscle shirt,

I look like a peasant but come from

this same world.

If my name meant Cellular Contact

instead of Wooded Brook perhaps I’d fit right in.

Some German-looking fellow stops and smokes—

the rooms behind those lights his day home,

the lights themselves his dream.

Hong Kong Harbor

30 June 1997

21



Four: On The Boat

People doing what they’ve always.

Grinding life into dust until done…

The old sad story.And don’t I not want to tell it.

Quick to admit though

that I failed into myself.

On the split, tarred roof

of a Chinese frigate

in the bay of Hong Kong

on the third of July,

Independence has struck in the eyes of old, dead Deng

and now you’ll be jailed

just for saying the word /Tibet/

Departing like Charles did

two days past,

this American moored

on the endpost of freedom

and (happy to add)

the eve of Helen’s marriage to Chuck on the Upper West Side.

“Fragrant Harbor” it means.

An epithet for the incense produced.

The scent I’ll recall though

is McDonald’s home cooking—

the cheapest eats in town.

They’ve lowered the boomof the loading dock crane

and soon we’ll be ready

to leave these waters

to their swift destiny.

On the Docked Huihua

3 July 1997

22



on the ocean

rain sounds

like winded leaves

En Route to Shanghai

4 July 1997

23



Portrait of a Young Man by Andre Derain

Starting at his part.Two bold, bowed curves

cross a pale brow,

withdrawn or drawn with worry.

His look subsides into a vacant

Sombrero or Stetson

(the angle lies a little)

until his chin plucks

your attention

first to its dimpled self then to its hollows.

In grays and slates

his torso skates away,

growing colder by the stroke,

down his blazer and his sleeves.

And when his hands evaporate

you know you’ve seen the boy.

He vanishes,

legless but completely.

Shanghai Art Museum

8 July 1997

24



They Fly Kites, Too

A hazel crescent sits atop Tiannamen Gate.

It’s July and the sky’s hazy in the Square.

Beneath the heavy tofu heated night where it’s easier to breath beer than air,

neon spills a slow glare

across this giant swath of cement

like bare bulbs in a steamy locker room.

The boys are out.

Banging shoes on shins in dozens

of fly-by-night soccer games—

contests of oily sweat and bruises on concrete.The ball takes them to the ground.

We can’t believe we’re here.

Two Americans on rented bikes

in the world’s bike capital

told rolling over, “Meiguo is best.”

That dream at least is not covert.

Down a street of food stalls,

on a dare we eat deep-fried skewered scorpions

thinking ourselves legendary back home.Then wash them down

with Nanjing beer,

camped on a curb until

a parking Audi pushes us away.

Riding no-hands past Mao’s impassive eye

we have a laugh

then cross a boulevard wide as a football field.

Tiannamen Square, Beijing

11 July 1997

25



Hong Kong ’97

All I remember is

two men

hand over handlowering

the heavy leaden pipes

of sidewalk scaffolding

above the heads

of trepidatious walkers.

Forbidden City, Beijing

13 July 1997

Jin Jin Noodles

From the street it looked so clean.

But I should’ve known that

a toilet in China is just that.Squatting behind a one-meter high particle board wall

with torch marks from men killing time

while their bizness’ getting done with,

the air hovers. Dead.

The door’s in my face,

I mean right there

like the thick air,

but Western modes of decency keep it closed.

I would so much like to find a breath.

Rising to leave what I find is that I cannot find my legs.

All that squatting has done in my knees.

So there I am, squatting, waiting, composing verses.

Jin Jin Noodles, Beijing

13 July 1997

26



Pennsylvania Watermelons

A poplar-lined road

between The Great Wall at Simitai and Beijing

and that stretch of route 209on the way back from Gifford Pinchot’s house in Milford

side by side could be the same.

That’s where I am anyway.

Shifting from world to world and car to car

as tree after tree speeds by and away.

Watermelon vendors line the road,

parking flatbed trucks between the trees.

Six-foot high wooden slatshold back avalanches of fruit.

We rush by in a hired mini-van

driven by a Chinese guy

who doesn’t speak a lick of English,

but has a business card saying, “MIKE”.

Truck after truck all selling the same line;

no one’s a more dire capitalist than a Chinese.

Back home on a return trip

I stopped for a piss and walked past these hawkersto the bushes and sheep behind,

where young aspen trees rooted in rows.

Another time, falling asleep at the wheel,

I pulled over and sprinted

up the road and down, up the road and down

to wind myself awake.

It worked and 209 led to I-80.

I don’t know this route number, but Mike knows ours and slides the van to the side.

He pays for a great big oblong fruit

and the vendor slices it into pieces on a two-inch thick slab

of pulp-slicked wood.

We eat ‘til it’s gone and spit seeds left and right.

The vendor and his teen son play Chinese chess

27



on a homemade plywood board.

Aaron takes on the father and gets beat quick.

The other vendors come to watch and get a laugh.

Going far down this road was

a trip to Scholastic Scrimmage

when Dan Machalick slid across the back seat

of the advisor’s Jetta

and took a two-inch pin in the ass.

He flinched his way through a trivia loss

to some high school smarties on AM radio.

Our entry tickets read,

“Simitai—The Great Wall’s Most Dangerous Section”.

It curves on the humped back of precipitous slopes

and falls away where the land has left.

You can glimpse the Taoist Dragons

curling through the clouds.

They’re vanishing as they appear.

Through the wind we can’t hear the Mongol cries.

Or each other.

From a long gone lookout’s post, China calls.

It says, Peking Duck and Great Wall Red Wine are waiting.

MIKE knows a good, cheap place.

Mike’s Van, Beijing

16 July 1997

28



China driving—

a series of honks

on a laneless road

29



30

China Driving

Documents

Transcript of China Driving