Indran Amirthanayagam writes in English, Spanish, French, Portuguese and Haitian Creole. He has published thirteen poetry collections thus far, including The Elephants of Reckoning (Hanging Loose Press, NY, 1993) which won the 1994 Paterson Prize in the United States, Uncivil War (Tsar Publications, Toronto, 2013) and The Splintered Face: Tsunami Poems (Hanging Loose Press, NY, 2008). His latest books are Il n’est de solitude que l’île lointaine (Legs Editions, Haiti, 2017), Pwezi a Kat Men written with Alex Laguerre (Delince Editions, Miami, 2017), and Ventana Azul (El Tapiz del Unicornio, Mexico City, 2016), In music, he has just released Rankont Dout (available to download from all the music stores), a collaboration in creole with emerging Haitian musicians. He writes a blog on poetry and the arts at http://indranamirthanayagam.blogspot.com
Will He Cross?
Everyman went to the pearly gates and tapped softly
on the knocker. The door, on a remote sensor, swung
open, no Peter present—Heaven too has turned robotic—
but Everyman became flustered visibly. Should he just
stroll into the vacant firmament? Would a net appear
and catch him, a handmaiden break his fall into a rocking
chair endlessly whirring? The plans of God are inscrutable
to the naked mind, a voice started to hiss between
But Everyman knew this, knew it since his first holy communion—oh that fine-tasting wafer, husk of dark brown bread washed afterwards in wine at Saint James on Blandford Street. He wonders who has the contract now for the hosts? Some European bakery, French most likely. He doesn’t recognize the metropolis, London. Heaven. All changed. Yet, he must plough onwards, even if removed from farming implements, early metaphors, elephants, paradise burning. Everyman will be renewed, speak a half-dozen UN languages, taste bread and call it bread, drink wine and name the varieties of grape, and the vineyard where all the flavors come to rest. Everyman will clean himself, dress in a sparkling suit, quicklime, filigreed gossamer, spirit himself across the threshold.