Shifting Bali

Tender ebb and lilting flow,

Water’s slow to move the silt, in shifting

    Bali.

MacDonalds’ salt; processed fries.

    Tastes of

Villages that, bunker, hide

From hotels airing sweat. All lives

    Baste the

Sins, come to be, in jingling

    Bali.

Slender tree and coconut,

Terraced gardens bear the rut of

    Summer heat:

Paddied rice prickles up.

Rama chased Sinta

      Here,

Through Subak wide and tunnel, veered

Maroon pagodas, timeworn brick.

All the spirits left, from wilting

      Bali.

We lost our murals to the Dutch,

Gapura buries itself in mud.

Sand moves tender our tear-salt,

In shifting

      Bali.