I've been searching for Alexander again,
drifting from ruin to ruin with only
the vaguest of currents to guide me,
and now they’ve blown me to Alexandria,
where I’m feverishly descending
in a wrought-iron bird-cage
from a room that has clattered all night
with the unending street noise of Egypt,
a room that is slowly disappearing
above me in a rising and falling
of snakes, and then I’m
somewhere outside in a
side street or alley, turning
this way then that, trying to find myself
on a map, and then five or six streets
are suddenly coming together and I’m thinking,
This must be it, the ancient crossroads,
where the great library was, and the tomb,
but there's nothing, just a mosque, and some
mustard-colored tenements and a clutter
of shabby, Arabic bookstalls, and then
someone behind me is whispering,
Come, Come, it is one of those guides
who appear out of nowhere in Egypt, he is
pulling me into the mosque, to a huge,
cylindrical well, there is a tomb at
the bottom, I can see it,
(Con’t.)
it is simple, almost spare, in the Moslem way,
I can see the four doors of the Koran
circling it like a ring, and although I know
the tomb is not Alexander’s, one of the doors
is pulling me down, making me dizzy, and then I suddenly sense Alexander off to the east,
just beyond the door to Mecca, and the guide is
whispering, Anixander, Anixander, like he’s
reading my mind and then I’m
standing up on the lip, trying
to keep my balance and he’s hissing
in my ear Go, Go, and for a moment
I almost do, but the drop is too far,
the ladder too rickety, and then I remember
my shoulder bag, I'd have to leave it, everything
would be lost: tickets, wallet, journal, and I
suddenly become afraid, I don't know
who I can trust, thievery has such
a deceptively smiling face
in this country that I wave him off: No, No,
Baba, Baba,Too old, Too old, I say,
but I can tell by the look on his face
he knows it is not a matter of age,
but of trust: Yes, Yes, Baba, Baba, Too old,
he says back, in whatever mixture
of Arabic and English he can muster,
and I suddenly become ashamed,
there is something about the geniality
of these people I don't understand,
and then he is leading me back
to the mosque, it is filling up
(Con’t.)
with men, they are gathering around
the high voice of the Iman, there is a
huge sorrow rising from their throats, it is
moving through me like a knife, and then I’m
on my knees, pouring myself out like water,
and all I can think about is Joan,
that she should have been here
to guide me, Joan of the many arms
and the many weapons, Joan
who loves me and hates me, Joan,
who is driven by shadows, Joan
who would have flung herself
against the door until she entered
every chamber of your body, Oh you
who I am looking for,
you who know only honor,
Oh vain and brave and beautiful,
Oh murderous, murderous heart.