Steady State Phenomenon in Muharraq Before
This is the invention of a spectacle. The verge of fungible wealth, dirigibles
of electricity. A thunder of dust and rickshaw sermons in Muharraq before
the rain. We are lost in the streets where they used to weigh pearls,
where the women wailed on the shore. Sharks were waiting and monks
worked the air. Today there are museums, long museums
of the street. Sometimes the word has only one syllable. You lose me
at a walk. We are lost in Muharraq and I will no longer walk. A vault
of pigeons, beware. Spores in the air. Spores in the air
where used to be monks. The work of monks. An entire wall of ferns and monks.
It is the face of the biggest man. Woman here wailed. It was an island of women
when the men were gone. To sea, they went
to sea. In the museum eardrums and blindness and gums
losing teeth. Women waited before they wailed. I comment on the permanence
of this organization. My hands on the walls. Seashells and the teeth
of sharks. Ropes around ankles and the rheum of cataracts. Sea water in its original form
is a kind of poison. You say we are not lost. Refusal comes
easily. We have invented this pageant of the street. People are looking.
A little boy waves. It is always easier without you, is what you say. Streets and pulp
and the patient work of monks. A memory of monks in the shine.
