The Traveller / The Road Less Unravelled

Poem in English, written at Poesiaeuropa 2023

The City glistens
closely, pressing Their
ear to the ground, where
this particular Dragon just does not lie:

I refuse to be unpaid labour.
I refuse to be buried in time.

The City regards the Troubadour
in an all new, and very ancient Light:
who allowed this Kristang boy of Darkness
to grant himself a full, unbridled, redefined respite

from causality?
How comes he here, to Isola Polvese
completely free of trauma, and anger, and a functional
life expectancy?

How comes he here to this event;
I thought we stipulated
that he would never be able to generate
recognised poetry?

But the City does not see
that Time's hands have curled around Her gently;
that Life's lands have arrived with the tiger boy,

and all his quiet, unsung
neo-minstrelsy.

I am not singing of any other time, my sayang, my lovely, my City;
I already promised you quadrillions of times.

I will only sing of you
when you are manifest.
When you, truly, are
Destiny.