Madhuri

The short-bladed knife
slices pirate bread
Candles light cheeks
round above the fur
like eggs in straw.
We live in a boat’s duck-belly,
six of us frying onions
slicing bread by candlelight
Oats falling like stars
onto the green wood.
The dull knife saws bread
like flesh has been sawed
for hundreds of years.
Our eyes by candlelight,
and the words from our dark mouths
are as sharp as the wind
that tears leaves like stars
out of the zodiac,
wheeling everyplace far.

Nov. ’70, Amsterdam