buddha,
your head is bowed.

i see
the trouble
in your eye.

unseen
by the one-eyed pirates,
your priests.
unseen
by the cross-eyed prophets,
the boddhisattvas
with eyes of glass,
the blind
who beg for truth,
who worship sight,
as if seeing were all,
and pass the broken mirror,
mistaking
what they see:

beauty for truth,
their face for yours,
your face, my smiling buddha,
for a thousand years
of tears.