Daniel Paul Marshall lives on the island of Jeju, where he runs a guesthouse & bar that he built with his wife. He has had poems published in a few journals, including Four Ties Lit Review, The Contemporary Haibun Online, Underfoot, and The High Window.

danielpaulmarshall.com

∞

A handful of prayers & the day’s work is done.
Time to sip expensive Yemeni coffee
& build an online presence with their iPhones
& cheap | superimposed wisdom they’ve yet to fully grasp
the complexity of. Seeing them | it tires me
to hear people defend Buddhism as a philosophy not a faith |
as if that somehow discounts them from the usual charges
pitched against contesting branches of ideology.
It is an ideology: has drawbacks & is led by powerful men
with slot machine eyes & a thirsty wallet.
Their cartoon image | bright crystal-ball heads |