Poem of the Week: 12.22.22

"The Destination Wedding Reception" by Ricky Novaes de Oliveira

THE DESTINATION WEDDING RECEPTION

overlooked the beach, beautiful & full 
     of love

On the way back to the hotel 
a car full of foreigners and expats
wanted more from the local driver
who played popular music for us 
turned the air colder for us
joked for us and

We wanted more
more sleep in our king beds
more drunk from nice-cheap booze
more for our dollar (less) 
     though it all already cost so much
more like the movies 
more time in paradise 
     before returning to our western waste 

The driver tried to explain to us tourists 
the ease of this drive compared to rush hour 
the time it would take
the strangeness of our requests 

When we finished our polite
chats doing nothing to change traffic 
the driver made the foreign music louder 
than our silence 

Rubbing his face at the stoplight 
looking around at his home

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Thank you for reading the Poem of the Week!

I was going to send out a wintery or holiday-themed poem this week, but then I heard Michael Bublé for the millionth time this month and decided against it. Instead, this week is another (perhaps a tad too moralistic) poem of observation, similar to “On The Bus” from last week.

Over the summer, I had the fortune of being a +1 to a lovely wedding ceremony in Bali. A dream! But beauty stops shining when you get used to it. When the awe of a new country and culture wore off, I started noticing the frustration in the faces of hotel staff, the plastic litter in the rice fields, and the loud lobby complainers finding fault in the smallest hiccup in their fanciful vacations. While I would love to have written a poem that demonstrates how much I learned about Balinese culture and all there is to be valued in it, this poem popped out instead. I think I was also feeling frustrated at how the tourism industry exploits, but—moreover—I felt complicit.

“The Destination Wedding Reception” is a bit straightforward; I wrote it during the car ride home described, and so the events are essentially factual. (Can writing ever be truth? That’s a discussion for another time.) Notice, though, the lack of the lyrical subject: there is no “I” in this poem. Though it is written through my perspective, I purposely wrote without the first person and focused on the distinction between “we” and “the driver.” Anyone traveling and participating in tourism has a reason—friends, family, lovers, lawyers, running, hiding, looking—but I find that in all viewing on vacation there tends to be a lack of seeing. Or caring. Or knowing what to do. It’s all so complicated! Even though I try to evaluate my life with a critical lens and a progressive set of ideals, I couldn’t shake the feeling of complicity that entered me when I watched my Uber driver’s face shift in the streetlight. Is it my fault? Their fault? Bigger than us? Or us entirely?

The global, churning process of post-colonial tourism has obvious flaws but oblique solutions. Though this reality bogs me down, I turn to poetry. Not as answer, but as light—light to shine with, light to examine better, and light to reflect with / be reflected by. This is why I believe in poetry: we need to see the world outside of ourselves before we can realize and act on the ubiquitous impact of social change.

Merry, Ricky

outside the Arung Rai Museum of Art, Ubud, Bali