Bird’s-eye view on a Chinese aeroplane

Hans Pienaar

Said the hop-along popjay: I went and I went
and I slipped, it said on the long branch
where the water buffalo crossed, tail
gripped by the man where the river bent

Chirped the wind-up birds: It’s true, it’s true
we all sit on the Great Wall of China,
where the vendors walk the unstolen stones
and show us the sky where we never flew

Whined the Flying Pigeon: My spokes sing-sing
and I crash into whitewashed tree lanes
where the water carriers hurry like scales
fleeing from the jumble justice of Beijing

Grumbled the dressed-up dragon: My bad eye
makes me cry in the incensed smog of the temple
where the candles droop and the firecrackers
snap, duck and dive like a discovered spy

Squeaked the jacked-up crane: I swing and I swing
and drop it all on the building site
where the workers’ packed bicycles jitter
in the staccato of the jackhammer’s sting

Hawked the populous aeroplane: I flew and I flew
across a sky where clouds frayed like napkins
folded into wings by passengers mimicking
birds and the secrets of the bird’s-eye view

Notes

* “I went and I went and I slipped”: what the popjay sang when young men went on travels to explore the world, according to nineteenth-century Xhosa tradition.

* unstolen stones: much of what remains of the Great Wall had to be rebuilt after Communist cadres began carrying parts away after the revolution in 1949.

* Flying Pigeon: most common make of bicycle in China

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