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from DESERT VOICES
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QUATRAINS
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When powerful Sultans mingle with the Clay
As Death demands of all, maybe their lot
Will be remoulding to some Coffee Pot
From which we drink to them some future Day.
***
'The grape juice is forbidden', say these folk,
But they the law will for themselves revoke;
The sheikh tells thee he is without a garb,
When in the tap-house he has pawned his cloak
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A lusty sheikh had fifty times as much as
His quota of the harems of the land.
Once sloe-eyed beauties lend a tender hand.
But now take turns repairing fifty crutches.
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(Those Weapons of Mass Destruction)
An arms inspector stealthily doth probe,
scans my oasis for some deadly power.
My Third Wife must destroy this very hour
The phial of Castor-Oil within her robe.
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The Veil, the Veil, efface the Look beneath!
For once the Mufti's law is fair and right.
So let it be the Rule until the Night,
That I gaze not on the Absence of her Teeth!
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