A Poem For Today - Lao-Tzu's Day Job
kdick...@aol.com
Lao-Tzu’s Day Job
...may have held the position of archive-keeper
in one of the petty kingdoms of the time.
Stephen Mitchell, trans., Tao Te Ching.
Just the fact of it, the daily going there
and rummaging in records or
waiting on the arrogance of some princeling –
I see it as if lit by east-facing windows, and so
growing darker as the day goes by, the aging Master
servant of papers and pigeon holes.
Dust is the medium. Scrolls of it, stroked and looped
by the inked brushes of scribes, and maybe
by his own hand too, chronicling
the strut and chaff of history
marked down as if it mattered,
a hundred troops here, a thousand there.
It is not his day job but the fact of it
that liberates me. How in pauses
of long afternoons growing shaded,
darker and darker as day outside brightens
like paradox around him, perhaps stillness
brings his hand to another page, some notes
for writing out tonight. He knows the habits
of the lords he serves, when they steal off for naps
or dalliances. He sees this as his freedom.
But then, he sees everything as freedom.
He does not chafe at the meager men
with expensive silks and foolish demands.
He bends, he allows, he thrives
like a plant of the deep forest, content
under their highnesses.
- David Oates
Monica Brocco
--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "A Poem For Today" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to poet2+un...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/poet2/1696003527.2027726.1764787957202%40mail.yahoo.com.