‘Living Buddhas Need Passports’ by Florence Major

To incarnate legally─

No reincarnates can be found
In Beijing’s atheist compound─
In this city where dead is dead─
A reincarnate could lose his head!

No passports may be issued now
To souls returning once again─
The Dalai Lama must disavow
That he remembers more than men─

The frightened leaders in Beijing
To guarantee their full control
Are sifting through the afterbirth
To weed out any twice born soul─

Millions of Buddhists look askance
When oxymorons start to dance─
Once Herod dared to stake out polls
But Jesus too escaped the rolls─

What fun, the Dalai Lama laughs─
These Chinese leaders try to kill
What does not die, what is reborn─
Tibet still lives though it was shorn─

All tyrants try to kill the past
Erase the goodness that was done─
Defile compassion as a mask
To rule with fear and loaded guns─

Now even Heaven is under rule
By Beijing’s tyrants all reborn─
They sharpened all their buried tools
And donned their attitudes of scorn─

O mothers can you guarantee
The babe you carry is quite new?
And got its passport in your womb
(That will expire when life is through).

Florence Major©8/9/2007

Note:
From The Times
August 4, 2007
Jane Macartney in Beijing

“Tibet’s living Buddhas have been banned from reincarnation without
permission from China’s atheist leaders. The ban is included in new
rules intended to assert Beijing’s authority over Tibet’s restive and
deeply Buddhist people.

“The so-called reincarnated living Buddha without government approval
is illegal and invalid,” according to the order, which comes into
effect on September 1, 2007.”

Chinese Communist Party is officially atheist. The real reason behind it is
so that when the Dalai Lama passes away, the Chinese regime will be able
to choose their own Dalai Lama to further lead Tibet and the Tibetan people
into subjugation.

Florence Major: I am an artist/poet born in Montreal, Quebec, and live in New York City.  These are some of the publications in which my poems have appeared: Chaffey Review, Cerise Press, Qarrtsiluni, Willows Wept Review, Moonshot Magazine, Anatomy & Etymology, Mythic Delirium, Illumen, Strange Horizons, The Germ and Spark, A Creative Anthology.

Featured Image: Tibetan painting of Amitābha Buddha in Sukhāvatī