A postscript to Babur

I have received an email from a J.L. Borges of Buenos Aires who writes, in response to the post immediately below, to correct my historical facts. His email, in part, says:

”You are maintaining a fallacy. Cunnilingus was the delta port from which the Greek Fleet set out to sack Troy. The site of Babur’s skirmish before engaging his Indian enemy – a pre-dacoital interlude you might say – is generally accepted as having been Kunnilingam.

But even here, as I explained in some depth in Los traductores de las 1001 Noches, there are still grey areas. The original manuscript was transcribed so many times that there is some confusion as to whether Babur lost his tongue or his lung there.”

The rest of the email is spent explaining how he, Borges, has access to his late brother’s bank account in a country called Tlön, Uqbar, Orbius Tertius, & if I would care to provide him with some preliminary funding & my bank account details, we will both become incredibly wealthy.

In the interests of historical accuracy, I have changed the place name in the poem. & also, as accurate history, I wish to point out that it was triggered by the final verse of an untitled poem by Karri Kokko,

Aching
to make
the sweet felicity

between
your cunnus
and my linctus.

This poem was one of the finalists in Eileen Tabios’ just-judged pleasure poetry competition. There were some excellent entries going by the the work of the winner, Joanna Fuhrman, & that of the runners-up which are posted to The Chatelaine’s Poetics along with a delightful account of the judging which was done by Eileen & a group of her fellow pissheads wine connoisseurs.

The quality of the poems was undoubtedly provoked by the quality of the prize on offer, an exceptional & large selection of books, included amongst which I was incredibly honoured to see a couple in which I had a hand, the soon-to-be-published The First Hay(na)ku Anthology which I co-edited with Jean Vengua, & Poles Apart, a selection of my collaborations with Jukka-Pekka Kervinen.

&, though I have a couple of dear friends amongst the finalists, I am sure they will forgive me when I say I congratulate the judges on their ultimate selection of the winner of the competition.