Saturday, February 23, 2013

EARTH ~
 






Nanao Sakaki







 ____________________


If you have time to chatter

Read books

If you have time to read

Walk into mountain, desert and ocean

If you have time to walk

sing songs and dance

If you have time to dance

Sit quietly, you Happy Lucky Idiot


[ kyoto 1966]







SHARPENING A KNIFE


Nanao, keep your knife clean

Nanao, keep your mind clean



Sea breeze is bad for a knife they say

Sea breeze is good for a mind they say



Sea breeze not bad for a knife

Sharpen your knife, that's all



Sea breeze neither bad nor good

The ocean a whetstone for mind



A clean knife mind

A clean mind ocean

Nanao, sleep well tonight

Blossoming cranium lily as a shelter

The coral sand beach as a bed

The Southern Cross as a pillow.

[Iriomote, Japan
Under the Tropic of Cacer
February, 1976]






FIREWOOD


Looking for firewood in snowy mountains


  Carrying back firewood
      Splitting firewood
         Listening to burning wood
            Watching for dancing flame


               So joyous
                  You forget yourself
                      You forget a serious appointment
                          You become a piece of firewood



                               Warming up
                                   Flaming up
                                      Singing up
                                          Dancing up



                                              You become ash.

[Feb. '80]







TOP TEN OF AMERICAN POETRY


The United States themselves are essentially the greatest poem.
  — Walt Whitman


The government of the people, by the people, for the people.
  — Thomas Jefferson


You deserve a break today.
   — McDonald's


Where science gets down to business.
  — Rockwell International


Kick the letter habit.
  — Bell System


Crime hits everybody. Everybody oughta hit back.
  — Chicago Crime Commission


Without chemicals life itself would be impossible.
  — Monsanto


I think America's future is black, coal black.
  — Atlantic Richfield Company


Have a coke and a smile.
  — Coca Cola


Private property—No trespassing—Dead end road.
  —Anonymous

[Thanksgiving '79]







WHY DO YOU WRITE POEMS?



Because my stomach is empty,

Because my throat's itching,

Because my bellybutton's laughing

Because my heart is love burning.

[Mons Venus, NM
November, '79]









MEMORANDUM

1970:
Carlsbad Caverns, then I moved to
White Sands National Monument.
Dr. Albert Einstein,
government officials and the Pentagon
all watched
the mushroom-shaped cloud
right here in the Chihuahua desert
25 years ago.


1973:
Jemez Springs, New Mexico,
I met a Christian priest.
At Tinian Air Base in Micronesia
he held a service for "B-29" pilots
who headed for Hiroshima,
August 6, 1945.


1945:
Izumi Air Base in Japonesia,
100 miles south of Nagasaki.
Three days after the Hiroshima bombing
I caught a "B-29" on my radar screen.
Due north. 30,000 feet high. 300 m.p.h.
Three minutes later
my soldiers shouted,
"Look, a volcanic eruption!"
In the direction of Nagasaki
I saw the mushroom-shaped cloud
with my own eyes.


1946:
Hiroshima. There,
one year after the bombing
I searched for
one of my missing friends.
As a substitute for him
I found a shadow man.
The atomic ray instantly
disintegrated his whole body,
all — but shadow alive
on a concrete wall.


1969:
Bandelier National Monument.
Beautiful ruin
of ancient people, the Anasazi.
Dead of night, the earth
quakes three times.
Not by Jemez volcano
but by underground nuclear explosion
in Los Alamos.
More ruins, more churches!


1975:
The Air Base ruin in Japonesia,
south of Nagasaki.
No more "Kamikaze pilots",
now 3,000 cranes soaring high
in the setting sun.


1979:
Northern edge of Chihuahua desert,
Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge.
Sandhill crane, "Grus canadenis" : 1.7000.
Whooping crane, "Grus americana" : none.
As a substitute
for the extincting species
Mr. Kerr-McGee wants to dump
ever-existing nuclear waste
into "The Land of Enchantment".

[Sangre De Cristo Mountains
March 5, 1979]







   PLEASE



 Sing a song


        or


     Laugh


        or


       Cry


        or


   Go away.


       [January, '81] 





___________________

 NANAO SAKAKI
Real Play
(Tooth of Time Books, 1983)