So High Climbs the Price When You Want a Thing

Poetry month, day 15

So High Climbs the Price When You Want a Thing

so much you want it that you pay the price – Villon

Bali 1973.
Sanur beach.

A row of tiny shops.

The hollowed stump 

of a coconut palm

remade as bowl and lid,

painstakingly carved.

Bill saw my look –

fleeting, 

but he knew me. 

He began haggling.

I walked out.

Mustn't show

my huge desire.

Afterwards: "How 

are we going to get it 

back home on the plane?"

Clothes packed in

as well as around it,

inside our trunk.

Excess luggage fee.

Still worth it, 55 years on;

gracing my hallway,

holding my oracle cards.


For Serendipity and a poet at "imaginary garden with real toads".