Drawing by Judith Wolfe

Bernard Gadd /

Poem



RENGA AS HAINAN

the bus reels towards Hainan porno
movies groaning us through rattletrap dark

as always dawn's its calligraphic original
struggling to unflap sight's scrolls

ocean's paparazzi flashing
from its worn out deck chair sky

white arches furl unfurl over pool
blaze unsmudging noon's air

starving hills lean about me
and their deer quiver to empty fingers

within shadow of forests inklings of ghosts await
a festival moon and lapping at silvering bowls

girl gauzed in scarlet laughs from strata
she turns to mocking embrace

in my hei ho and still in the clang of night
my high ha hainan singes along bone nerve