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We can either do this the easy way -- I quote one whole
poem -- or the hard way -- I quote bits of each of the
poems in the book. You choose. Ah, you have chosen wisely,
grasshoppers, you have chosen both ways. First, one
poem. Note: If you’re suffering inklings of immortality,
suffer no more. Mankh has lifted up the Veil of Time
for you, and seen himself, seeing his grandpop, seeing
him, dimensionally folded-in:
JUST POPPED IN TO SAY
even the dead
sometimes walk the autumn sunlit streets
why just the other day,
two days past my fourty-fourth birthday
I saw my grandfather ---
our quick exchange of eye-glances
But who was I to him?
the living man who
appeared
looking like my grandfather
non-plussing time and space
with that delicate mustache
and early autumn leaves
too sparse to notice
yet noticing,
like the dead, living
taking momentary shape
between the sidewalk cracks
Now: some corroborating bits from other poems:
Though many years my elder
She understands when I say
I’m nearly forty-four years-old and gay.
- From “Though many Years” (for Jeanette.)
before another closet-door stays shut
before another child gets lost in the thick-dark of
night
before another bomb gets made and paid from your tax-dollars.
-from “Yet & Before”
They think the gods and goddesses
have turned their backs,
given them full license to deceive, distort, corrupt.
- from “Corpoliticos”
Grasshoppers, I hope you’re getting out of mankh
what I see is plainly there; Sincerity, Depth, Breadth.
Mankh writes that he’s a student of the Kaballah,
a poet, an essayist, calligrapher, and writing instructor.
You should all be getting that already. He’s not
hiding it, so much as using it. For your benefit &
mine. Pay attention. I am, so you should, too. No quiz,
of course; this is no test; Life is the test. -- Bill
Costley (billcostley@newsguy.com)
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