NO FIFTH MAN

No Fifth Man
by A. K. RAMANUJAN (1929-1993)

Then there is the story
of five brahmans
who go abroad to learn
all the sixty four arts.

When they meet again
in the woods outside
their town, of course
they want to show off.

The first man picks up a bone
at random, not suspecting
it's a tiger's femur,
and blows syllables on it,

surprises himself
by having on his hands
a tiger's skeleton,
when the second man

does his thing: gives it
liver, lungs, arteries
inferior and superior, veins
blue and red fountaining
out of a heart, paws,
claws, a mouthful of fangs, a womb
and a gender though
it's still a sorry thing

looks flayed
though it has never known a skin
makes a tiger, a tiger,
fire and velvet,

that pelt of stripes
and gold, which is what
the third brahman give it,
crowing almost with glee.

Now, there!
stood a tiger on all fours
on the forest floor, shawled
with the dotted shade,

about to spring if only
its heart could beat,
its eye could see,
its mouth could water.

Engendered, lifelike but
incapable, as it stood
still, a mere effigy,
it could neither live nor die.

The fourth brahman knew how
to breathe life into it,
was about to do so
when the fifth one,

their boyhood buddy
who had learned nothing,
suddenly said, 'Stop:
Don't. It may eat us all up.'

The fourth one said,
'Of course, I'm giving it life.
I'm its papa. This is
my pussycat. Just watch'.

The fifth man, the coward,
cried, ' Wait, wait
just one second',
and climbed up a tree in a hurry

while the fourth chanted a mantra,
gave the tigress life,
death, a heartbeat,
an eye for prey and

a raging hunger all
at once inspiring
terror in beauty, changing
a nothing into a thing never before,

and the creature pounced on him,
his three friends rooted
in their fear, killed them all
and ate them up for starters.

Nothing was left of them,
Not even a bone.
Poetry too is a tigress,
except there's no fifth
man left on a tree
when she takes your breath
away.