The Market, and the Room of Coveted Objects.

(This is a short poem of vaguely Sufi or Buddhistic character.  The image above is of Paul Bowles in Morocco.)

 

There is a rumour in the squares

Of upheaval, of some great change

Undermining all the old foundations

So that they will crumble down

Around us, and never raise their

Familiar forms again.

But this, too, is an ancient rumour

Spoken each summer in the squares

Someday perhaps, the squares will

Be empty, and their fountains dry;

I cannot imagine such a time.

I have gone to the stalls, every day now

For many years, to see what is new

Beneath their awnings;

I have never tired of browsing among

The wares, seeking out some novel

Object that I might possess,

Or long to possess, dreaming always

More acutely of those things that were

Deemed precious beyond my means.

When my mood is low, I am apt to think

That there is never any new thing in the stalls

Only the sensation I experience of finding

Some novel object of desire, a sensation

I have experienced many times before

So that it is not like going somewhere along a straight track

But rather a kind of pattern, as is woven by a shuttle, or a melody

That makes no progress, and only returns to the beginning

One of the dervishes told me

That a place exists where all the things

I have ever desired, yet failed to

Acquire, are all gathered together

In a room, that I might partake of

them, to my heart’s content, if

Only I could find that place.

“If it were an object” he said

“That object is there.  If it were

A person, that person is there

Waiting to turn their will to

Whatever purpose you

Had designed for them”

I asked him how I might

Find such a place, or if it were

Possible to travel there, and

He said “That room is always there 

Filled with your heart’s desires, and

You go there only by ceasing to

Desire the things that it contains.

Each thing you cease to desire

Brings you a step closer to that room;

And as you cease to desire a thing,

It vanishes from the room, so that

When you have finally taken all the steps

To arrive there, the objects of your

Desire have fled, and the room is bare.”

A related poem "No More Street Shows."