the mustard seed

This poem is essentially a tale about a friend of mine who struggled to quit smoking, but in order to do that he had to change his life and the people who he associated with in order to finally quit. I guess it's trying to convey his loss and somehow how

 

sometimes you need to be alone

(which is not unlike sinking?).

tho this is no indication of the drugs in your system

or the state of your friends, calling you ‘bush-pig’

behind your back, spitting on your photo.

rather, that, on rainy days, your thoughts

become rivers

darker than what breeds inside you

thick as blood tasting of loss

so different in each sitting.

 

originally you swim, black brackish waters,

a night like September like an inverted sieve

straining for stars.  y’keep company:

widowers and housewives,

who opt for public transport and see early on

the irony in using habits in order to break them.

this succeeds for a while unlike the mustard seed.

 

succession stretches for days like buses and midnight,

until infinite becomes complex and complex becomes infinite.

as a group you numb against elongated structures,

the ebb             and disintegration of inertia.

 

‘there is no aphrodisiac like loneliness’ the radio moans

and when abstinence shakes your fingers it breeds

neither household nor mustard seed,

both things suddenly complex and infinite,

like weeping hearts beating beside seas of moss

or children talking back tides.

instead

what happens

becomes as simple as our fingers entwining,

each open to the sweep and blur of pen

life becomes a class we are drawn to slave

capturing only countless commuters in Rodin-like

poses, which produces some good portraiture

but not necessarily good poems.

both neither infinite nor complex

quite unlike the mustard seed

Author's Note

the Mustard seed is a buddhist story which deals with the concept that no one is immune to loss. In it, an old woman loses all her sons and her husband in a freak flood. Suddenly alone the woman stricken by grief, she seeks out the buddha and beseeches him to bring him back. Compassionate to her cries he tells her he will bring her back if she can bring him some mustard seeds and a pinch of salt. However, there is only one caveat, she can only get the seeds from others who's households have never been affected by death or loss. She goes to all the houses in the village searching for a home that had not been affected. Obviously she realises that she is no different, that we are human and that we will all have loss in our lives.

Reviews

[Raef C. Boylan]

That Buddha, he a tricky one yo...

I really like this; not only is the topic close to my disease-candidate heart, but it is beautifully written.
However, I think it's going to take quite a few reads before I understand many of the references and how they slot into the poem. Forgive me if I keep popping back, typing in my murmuring thought processes and then meandering away again [like a drunk at a party lol].

Smoking can be like an exclusive club; a gang, composed of strangers, can be found outside the back door of every party and a bond is formed before you even speak. Very fucked up and yet sometimes comforting too. That smoking bizness, it's a tricky one, yo...