Nowhere have I encountered such a dull, monotonous
fabric of life as here.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX— Henry Miller
Long before the sun has risen
Behind the International Finance Centre,
In the formal ‘Sitting-out Area’
Of the Western District Community Centre,
From the only tree that grows on Third Street
An Asian cuckoo cries its mating call
Through what’s left of the sleep of the night.
This morning he was still there, singing
Through the day and into the evening, as he will
Tonight when I go to bed, annoying
As a car alarm, useless as the wolf whistles
The construction workers in the street below
Do not blow at the passing women they know
Only mate with their own raised hands.
And there’s nothing I can do about it,
And the next morning it will be the same,
All the day long and the same tomorrow,
And there’s nothing that will make it change.
Today the sun rose hot as hell
On the heads that hung down on Third Street.
So I closed behind me the balcony door,
Turned on the air-conditioning unit
And the dehumidifier too, and they’ll
Both stay on for the next seven months at least.
The cops are so bored, last night I threw
My smoked cigarette butt into the street
Just to give them something to do.
Tomorrow I’ll buy a 12-bore shotgun,
Sit under the tree and wait till morning
For the bird I’m dying to kill.
— Hong Kong, March 2025
• • • • •
The epigraph is from Henry Miller’s book, The Air-Conditioned Nightmare, which he wrote on his return to the USA in 1940 on the cusp of World War Two after a decade living in Paris. The bird is the Asian koel, a long-tailed member of the cuckoo family, and well-known in Hong Kong during Spring for the noisy and annoying mating call of the male, the increase in intensity and pitch of which has earned it the moniker of the ‘orgasm bird’.
A Communist in Hong Kong 