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David Wojahn

Rajah in Babylon

We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof
--Psalm 137

Rajah doesn't like Nirvana but he seems
to tolerate Jimmy Cliff: "The Harder They Come"

is Rachael's little joke, and it's chuffing from her boom box
as Rajah paces, his planetary back-

and-forth, manic orbits, exactly like Rilke's
panther. The bars and his stripes run parallel

and fuse, head abob like a marionette's,
the snare drum of his paws on the cement.

He's fasted for three days and thinks that Rachael's
brought ten pounds of horse meat in her pail,

but his flared puzzled nostrils don't smell a thing
and Noelle bends down to the tranquilizer gun

while Rachael coos endearments meant
to slow him down so Noelle can get a decent shot.

Good Rajah Pretty Rajah Big Rajah-
Eyes wide, he turns, and Noelle aims and fires

and he shrieks and circles faster and we wait
while Jimmy croons that we can get it if we really want.

"Two minutes, tops," says Rachael, and by the time
the song is over he has wobbled and gone down.

He is one four-thousandth of the world's tigers.
To save them takes some drastic measures

and so the cage door's opened and we file
in, Bob and Noelle and Rachael

and me, and the tape slurs on to "Pressure Drop"
while Bob and Noelle strain to turn him on his back,

heaving till he's sprawling belly up,
the Maytals moaning as Rachael wipes

her brow and fumbles with the electro-jack,
a miniature land mine, a low-tech

bristle of hose and wire. The down-sheathed penis
sprouts, pink and man-sized in her rubber gloves

and now the Melodians lay down beside
the Rivers of Babylon. Oh the wicked

carried us away, captivity....The motor's
started, the penis clamped, the tiger

bright burning, his fearful symmetry
sprawled incandescent on the scat-pocked floor. Gingerly

I touch the ribs, the whorled sleeping flank,
stutter of heartbeat, Rachael scowling as she works,

and there we wailed as we / remembered Zion.
And slowly the liquid pearls the flask, churn

and sputter as Rachael grins. Buttermilk
gold, and there we wailed, it streaks

the beaker's glassy walls, brimming and bound
for dry-ice burial, for resurrection in the wild,

Sumatra and some sleeping tigress. By Babylon
we wailed. Applause and the Melodians

fade. The bright liquid flares. Oh Jerusalem,
in this strange land we sing our song.

(from The Falling Hour. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1997)

Comments

[seamusd.livejournal.com]

He's one of my favorite poets, often mixing the personal, public and historical in surprising ways. I strongly recommend any of his books, but especially this one and his latest, Spirit Cabinet.