An Award & More

by DS Maolalai (June 2025)

An award
–
the boss calls me in
to his office. listen: he says
catalina put us in
for an award. it’s a 300 plate
and we have to send someone.
someone from property
and someone from ops
and from finance. you’ve been here
the longest. you don’t
have to do anything. you just
wear a suit. it’s this thursday.
I said ok. and then thanks.
I appreciate it.
money hands off things
like clothes at a laundry.
men strangle chickens
for less than the minimum
wage.
–
–
–
On haiku and iambic pentameter
–
o – I know enough
to know
it’s not just
counting syllables.
–
not enough, though,
to know
what it is
beyond that.
–
–
]-
Spider-horses
–
you could be more or less
in clonakilty a lot of the time –
just endless green countryside
and scrub to horizons;
pieces of bush sticking
from shovel-dug ditches to all over
angles, like hairs from the head
of an overused toothbrush. then you turn
some corner and a giraffe
–
is unremarkable – reminding you
you’re somewhere else, like a rag
on the equator. it really is shocking
to see them, these wild spider-
horses, picking their way
over unirrigated grass
as if worried about turning an ankle.
a few times there were lions – they aren’t
so like housecats when you see them
from a window. our driver
shared locations by the radio
with other drivers. this was one of kenya’s
most visited national parks. buffalo
standing about as if they were waiting
for a horn to sound – men on corners
taking short breaks from roadwork.
vultures like anoraks on coathooks.
our photographer friend took photos
of everything – gazelles and leopards
and a couple white rhino. even the huts
=
like piles of playing cards
dealt clumsily on the sides
of the public highways, hanging
with second-hand trash. that made it
much less like clonakilty. the country
was full of scars and fresh air
and kids driving skinny cattle – they really
do it, and kept waving at our car.
another thing – more real than any lion
and it makes you feel disgusting
being rich enough to be there
=
and that you are somewhere else
and that other things are possible.
I waved back every time, feeling friendly
and one of them turned the wave
into a smooth middle finger
with such practice
you could hardly see the change.
that was best of anything.
who hasn’t been that kid?
=
=\
=
Getting married 2nd
–
already a hangover. not been
to sleep yet. god this white wine
is so awful. like biting black rats
who bite back. today in work
they told me I’d woke up
for around the first time all week
around lunchtime. I suppose
that was true. got back
from my wife’s parents’ place
after getting married
second time, in chinese
tradition for those who couldn’t
travel and privately didn’t
believe that the first wedding
counted. a hangover
after a week of jetlag
is not something
I’m worried about. actually
I could really go for a hamburger.
–
–
–
Shark fin soup
–
look – it was there
so I tried it. you wouldn’t?
this was a wedding in kuala
lumpur – a close college friend
of my wife. we’d been sat at the designated
white people table, and the waiters made sure
that our glasses were constantly tipping:
I had a whiskey, a beer and a wine out
in front of me, and this guy at my elbow
kept topping me up. I think they had instructions
for our table and my wife told me later
that we’d been the core of their compass:
our left was west of the white men
our right was the east – a directional shorthand
for service. there were four hundred people
and a set menu set. I wouldn’t
have ordered it, but since it was there
I decided it was better to know:
a pretty smooth texture
and a flavour a little like chicken.
personally I can’t see myself
killing the world to keep
drinking it, but then,
I can’t see myself either
killing cattle or pigs
or a sheep.

Table of Contents

DS Maolalai has been described by one editor as “a cosmopolitan poet” and another as “prolific, bordering on incontinent.” His work has been nominated thirteen times for BOTN, ten for the Pushcart and once for the Forward Prize, and released in three collections: Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden, Sad Havoc Among the Birds, and Noble Rot.

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