Bamboo Leaves

THAILAND A multi-layered world. Disabled beggars with plastic cups, a swimming pool filled with ice to celebrate New Year's Day; ghosts, Spirit Doctors, mediums, Buddhist monks...... Everywhere, temples thunder their disenchanting message that this teeming world, its glamour, excitement and misery, is impermanent, not-self and suffering.

DYING RACES OF MANKIND
When the rich see the very poor
they know it is time
to buy their valuables.
Cheaply.
This ancient people
were driven out of Tibet
by the Tibetans,
out of China by the Chinese
and out of Burma
by the Burmese.
Ah Kah people are very poor
and cannot offer much resistance
to economic assistance.
They make exquisite silver jewellery
and headdresses.
Treasure hunters
have been buying them.
Cheaply.
Ah Kah people have bright shining souls.
Christian missionaries
have been buying them.
Cheaply.