Out an Old Town Window

The wind is blowing, I see it in the leaves
That rustle silently against the sky;
Where is it going? I ask, and it heaves
A sigh, an abrupt goodbye.

If I could but keep one sense of five
I would still know the wind alive,
Whether by the salt it leaves on my skin
Or the silent stirring of the wind within
Where no eye can see, no ear can hear,
No hand flapping greet the breeze;
Where taste is disability
And smell a sense too queer
To land into the trappings we put on with ease,
Thinking we know where the wind will go.

A large shoe produces a large carbon footprint--
Off with the tall!
And in this way we tithe our dust and lint
(Our herb and mint)
As if the universe were so small.


* * *


Written by 6.50 p.m., staring out the window of the Old Town up Bukit Pantai.

Photo from the Pangkor trip, July 2009.