Category: Poem

During my second trip to Bali in August 2007, I had the great fortune to work with Australian singer, comedian, writer and director of Writer’s Journey, Jan Cornall, during a creative writing workshop as part of the  Bali Institute for Global Renewal. Jan had us do a timed writing exercise as we sat around a common table under a pavilion beside a rice paddy. Next to us a farmer chased a monkey chasing ducks across a bund while an old man bathed naked in an irrigation ditch, thinking he was invisible. I recently rediscovered what I had scribbled down during that quick write.

“Anything that turns up,
 just let it turn up.”
 Like the volume on the stereo
 or a guest at the door?
 Turn up, turn it up
 Wake up, wake it up;
 to night and day,
 to light and shade,
 to eager change.
 
 Hearsay’s distant storm
 forewarns,
 from someplace else 
 to where I am, 
 an approaching wreck to life and limb,
 that circulates among our kin.
 
 But out of sight is out of mind
 and brings a carefree
 separation 
 from what could have been 
 the weather’s fickle pilgrimage.
 
 Despite typhonic rumors wraith,
 adventure calls
 to an unknown place,
 a chance
 to release this somber state
 of what comes next 
 or what should be.
 
 Alone, not worried, sounds
 of life and ice in glasses rattle 
 while monkeys watch and wonder 
 what it is we’re doing.
 
 Quiet heads bent over pages, 
 writing words in random phrases;
 thoughts in stages
 at the center
 of this query.
 
 Souls and hearts or in between.
 “Two minutes to go.”  When
 was that said?  Two minutes to go,
 we’re at the end. 
 
 Ubud, Bali, 2007

I happened to be in Bali many years ago during Galungan, the celebration when spirits of deceased family members return to visit their earthly homes. I appreciated how the daily offerings in small palm leaf baskets, Canang Sari, were placed everywhere, on sidewalks and on top walls, on steps and in doorways, up high and down low. Those placed up high were for the benefit of good spirits, while those on the ground for evil—the hungry ghosts. In addition to the colorful flowers—frangipani, hibiscus and marigold—and incense sticks, these baskets also held rice, fruit and other morsels. I’d notice how the many stray dogs would devour the food left in the offerings at ground level, food meant for the spirits, in this case, the hungry ghosts.

Ubud dogs roam streets
in search of morseled offerings
of rice and sweets
and burning sticks
and find delight, or so it seems,
in scattered grains and ash and seeds,
that one might think
no need to feed
these ill-bred dogs of Bali.
 
With food for gods and spirits gone
these canine beasts as hosts become
a dwelling place, the sacred space,
for hungry ghosts of Bali.
 
From day to night these mongrels lure
their parasitic spirit herd
down streets that curve
where traffic lurks.
They’re barely missed,
though some are nicked
by cars and trucks, the motorists
do try to dodge the roving dogs of Bali.
 
The streetlights glare
for drowsy mutts to settle down
in fields, on roads or on the ground;
but at the gate
no master’s face,
no whistle’s call,
no beds await,
no leashes tug to safely lead
the homeless dogs of Bali.
 
For a strangely blessed cur,
in desperate heat,
with matted fur,
it’s understood
there is no cure for
the holy dogs of Bali.