TWO CONMEN OF OLD

You well-connected poets,

monks and samurais,

playing poor in Kyoto or Edo,

pretending you wouldn't

know from where to get

your next meal; all

an act, an artistic statement

for men who could afford

to turn themselves into actors

with the city and the street

their stage; no wonder

Baisao wrote about

young gentlemen buying

his tea, not of beggars;

no wonder Bashõ

though a small abandoned child

something he could leave

to die on the roadside

and write a poem about it.

Never in their lives

did they experience poverty,

which they mistook

with poetry.

19.02.2019