I
Earth rifts slowly
tracing lines of weakness on ocean floors
rearranging its lands and seas.
A submarine volcano off Tahiti
is in ceaseless erection. Someday,
its desire shall overwhelm it
and sperms of molten ire shall decimate
old life and give birth to new.
Intently, earth is rearranging itself.
The mind knows – that nebulous intuitive thing
and all those who have known death by fire
that earth is not immobile rock
sleeping cute like a baby
that seas, land, molten rock at heart of earth
are restless with change and desire.
Change is a constant in space and time.
My earth is as unstable as the man it houses.
Every minute, my earth is still being born
Even now, nature is in labour.
In blood or fire, terror or joy
every birth is a death every death a birth
every road leads to a road that leads to a road.
And fire destroys and moulds:
everything is something else.
If we but knew that earth’s face
which we trample ceaselessly, irreverently
is a crystalline skin floating on a mantle of fire
if only we knew, how carefully we’ll tread
if only we knew, we’ll tiptoe through life.
Earth is a giant with a heart of fire.
And every once in a while fire seeks birth
from within earth to explore life on the surface:
mingle with air, be adored by sunlight.
When desire ripens like a fruit
ready to smash to earth with a bang
earth opens a channel
– it cannot but be so –
such is the insistent desire of fire.
Molten chamber bursts in an orgasm of liquid fire.
Earth shudders in monumental release.
There is light. There is darkness.
There is light. There is darkness.
At six feet man stands dwarfed by a hundred feet
Of flames dancing their freedom.
Icelanders know well their volcanic inheritance
at Hekla harbours a hell of furious demons.
There is light. There is darkness.
There is light. There is darkness.
Earth quakes in cataclysmic purgation
Exorcises unruly demons of desire.
II
But if Surtsey was born in fire in the middle of the ocean
and Vesuvius was unkind to Venidius
to Pompeii and Herculaneum
what say of the Philipines’s Mount Taal?
The fires of Taal have scorched two of every three on its
fringe.
Or of Mount Pelée in the Antilles?
Pelée burst from its side.
Drunk with freedom
fiery clouds danced down a broad valley
at hundred miles an hour.
Everything they touched,
they torched with death.
Only two of Saint-Pierre’s 30,000 were untouched.
Two to tell the story.
Sodom and Gomorrah had no such luck.
Nor did the trusting people of Krakatau.
Vesuvius, Taal, Pelée
Your incandescence pales against Krakatau’s.
Krakatau gave the world flames higher than any man’s ambition.
Krakatau
Your name is fright.
Krakatau
Your name explodes like volcano.
Kratatau
Your fame is wide.
Krakatau
Your mien is wild.
Krakatau
Your patience is mild.
Krakatau
Your belch is fire.
Fuming with anger of entrapment
or pleasure of release
or both
Krakatau exploded.
The 1000 feet island vanished into air.
A 1000-foot hole beneath sea surface
bore witness to that sudden departure.
A great column of liquid fire
dazzled briefly in the sky –
a terrible beauty to behold.
It came down, bathed earth.
Hundreds of miles in every direction
land became barren like earth four billion years ago.
Across the world giant Tsunami waves thundered
like a witch’s broom swept seaside villages
everywhere around, herded ships and dead crews
to make a long sea-caravan going nowhere.
And there was peace
as after a great storm
silence.
And my earth was made pure.
Krakatau
Your name is terror.
Krakatau
Your name is beauty.
Krakatau
Your joy is fury.
Krakatau
Your love is death.
Krakatau
Your laughter is the crash of glass.
Krakatau
What demons must you exorcise so hurriedly?
Krakatau
My heart pounds as I recall your angry brilliance.
Krakatau
Your fire still chars my dreams.
But every death is a birth every birth a death.
And every road ends in a road that leads to a road.
And fire destroys and moulds –
everything is something else.
And it goes on forever.
There is light. There is darkness.
There is light. There is darkness.
And it goes on forever.
From my forthcoming collection: Four Serenades: Water, Earth,
Wind and Fire.
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