25.5.2014 • Fantasy on the Waste Land (I)

[25η Μαΐου, στο δρόμο για το Ρόττερνταμ]

Ο Απρίλης είν' ο πιο άκαρδος μήνας
Ανακατεύει τα νεκρά λουλούδια με λάσπη ζωντανή
Παγώνει τις εστίες και ξεραίνει το χώμ' απ' τη βροχή
Αδράττει ρίζες με τη βία της άνοιξης
Σ' τις τυλίγει γύρω απ' το λαιμό
Και σταματάει το χρόνο μέχρι το καλοκαίρι
Το Μάη το αίμα παγώνει
Δείχνει τα χρώματά του
(κόκκινο, πράσσινο, κυανό,
κίτρινο, ανθρακί)
Πάνω στα πρόσωπα των θνητών ενώ
Τα πτώματα χλωμιάζουν και σκληραίνουν μες στα λουλούδια
Κι ο Ιούνης έρχεται γεμάτος δώρα κι υποσχέσεις κενές
Γεμάτος δόξα και καλοκαίρι
Κι άλλα μέλλοντα άδεια και κούφια
Και τον Ιούλη απλώνεται η ψυχή στην καυτήν άμμο κι ανασαίνει
Ήρεμα και βαθειά
Τη ζεστή αρμύρα.

[the 25th of May, on the train to Rotterdam]

April is the cruellest month
mixing dead flowers in mud still living
freezing hearths in place and drying up the rained-on soil
seizing the roots like violent Spring
coiling them all round your neck
and suffocating you till summer
in May blood congeals
shows its colours
(red green cyan
yellow anthrax iron)
on the faces of mortals while
carcasses grow pale and hard among the flowers and the thorns
and June, June
comes bearing gifts and empty vows
full glorious summerlike as the bright dawn
and other hollow things to come

and in July the soul spreads out its limbs on the mild-burning sand
and breathes
calmly
deeply
the warm briny breeze

6.5.2013 • Inside of me

to you—
whom to
I surrendered much too soon and
much too much—
hush

Inside of me,
like a buzzing bee-hive
like the thrumming of rolling pebbles
                   at the wake of a wave
like the water before tea
something is stopped as it wants
    to splash the horizon of words
Inside of me,
like the lips of a sobbing child
like the door to a tornado
something is stopping my trembling bones
                from becoming words
                  my trembling words from
being said
                   from spilling out
Inside of me, you are apples
and rose-petals and thorns
and red apples and red-rosepetals
and rosethorns
and thick brushstrokes
and lazy and harsh
           brushstrokes
And inside of me
you are
and you shout with your
          ringing voice
and you grimace with your
              imperfect
            perfectly emotive
lips, and
   cheeks, and
          eyes, and
                lips and
               blood-red
                           lips
and inside of me
I am at last
       again
      moved
        after all
         this time
and— feel— feel— and
feel—no just kiss me
just kiss me and it will
be alright, kiss me and
it will be alright
I promise I don’t know
                  shit but
it will be alright

5.5.2013 • We talked too much

to a certain very dear friend—
and partly, at first perhaps, to a misendeared aquaintance;
a transformation of address.

[We talked too much]

We talked so much
but I wanted to give you
                                      a poem
I wanted to ask you to
           hold me awhile
just for a little while

We talked so much
but I wanted to write
                          you a kiss
                         on your lips
with a mortal, fading ink
—we have no need for vows
me and you (nor anyone else)

We talked too much
though it will never
                 be enough
Even when it’s too much
it will never be enough

I wanted to draw a bird
                         in your eyes
                    your irises to fly
—maybe they will, it doesn’t
have to be me,
doesn’t have to be me
but I wanted it all the
                                    same

We talked too little
& too much
& only fleetingly embraced;
next time maybe I’ll ask.

29.1.2013 • Ghost world (Love is)

a skeletal finger
writhing through the cold
transparent mist
of our visceral routines

(heart pumping
translucent
blood flowing
lightless
warm)

it comes from pain
pain produces it
suffering infuses it
with little crystal shards
of fragmented dew
ah the evening dew
that makes me sigh anew
at every glance
given or taken

it comes from pity
mercy inspires it
thanks and gratefulness
fill it up
paradoxically icy water
engulfing icepacks
from within

an instant's gaze
give or take
and the tongue is inverted
the eyes rolled
like thunder
white and terrible

white
and terrible
like a new notebook
a beautiful bunch
of papers strung together
prettily immaculate
defiled with the first drop of ink

here here
have a peek
give some take some more
charity or mercy courteousness or politeness
crunched ice rises like carbon dioxide

If love be different to lust it is in this,
That lust is hot like red iron melting the snow,
While love is cold like butterflies and moths,
And moths in the dank cellar of forgotten wines.

10.8.2012 • The Game

The Game

There is a game, no, more a sport, where the throwing of balls is of paramount importance. Yet it has nothing to do with all the sports and games that are commonly known, such as football, soccer, basketball and so forth; this game is unique. And rare, for very few know the rules. But it is more of a game, as I said, than a sport, and so competition runs like iron in the veins, thin yet vital, metallic, certain. In this game there are two teams, or in fact more like three, I don't quite remember the exact number, but the world never goes by numbers, the numbers go by the world. A player of the first team throws the ball, in a chaotic fashion, or not, but at any rate so that its course is not straight. Then another, of the second team, throws the other ball, always on the ground, so that it overcomes the first only by a little, passing above it, or slightly below as it were, and coming to a stop by it on the grass, for this game is always played on the grass, and if no grass is there then hardly is the game ever held, should the grass fail say, fail to appear, but everyone goes away or starts playing another game, a more sportslike game perhaps, which requires less of its players and of its grass. Then a third player, possibly from the third team if there is one, throws his own ball which must rest in between the other two balls, and if he succeeds he gets to start the next round. This process continues until everyone has failed or everyone has succeeded, or no-one has done either, which is just as well since failure or success are very vaguely defined in this game, so that competition and a noble spirit are paramount in being motivated to play it. Let alone learn it, for it is not a game apprehensible by logic or by experience, but only by self-transcendence, in that way it is not quite dissimilar to God. Then after everything is completely in place, or out of place, or at any rate when everyone has had enough, or rather more often more than enough, when everyone has as they say quite had it, then does the game begin.

8.8.2012 • terra cotta

terra cotta

sweat is so cunning
he thought
so able
as he watched it deftly pick its way
through the landscape of his rough skin
a hue of terracotta burned into it by the tireless sun

but he too had been tireless
he too had been able and cunning
and the mountain also was scorched earth
and their distant monarch
their impotent god
all-powerful in his monotonous course
was the same for them all

and unlike the sweat, he had always reached his destination
at the top of the mountain
always striving against the odds
and never succumbing
never defeated
never evaporated into nothingness
mid-way

and so he took a slow lungful of the still hot air
and pushed on
cart bricks and all
up the barren summery slope

uphill (the island wasn't of the size
that might accomodate any real mountains)
the house awaited half-built
a disharmonic protrusion in the dull brownish scene

his steps (it was always like that)
started off slowly
then sped up rather abruptly
then slowed gradually
as the road winded tirelessly upwards
and the man still and still resumed his course

in the sky (as often happened) a bird appeared
rather close
too close for comfort
a big black bird
and every time the bird appeared
he shivered and hid his face in his palms
and let the cart slide jerkily onto his torso
the support of his hands suddenly and unreasonably gone
and the bird come
come bird
come black bird
come closer come claw at my eyes
the little voice seemed to whisper
and the bird cawed terribly
terribly louder
and louder

on the ground (as sometimes) an ant was tracing the cart's
tracks in the rocky dirt
the ant was disproportionately large and friendly
its head alone was like a golf ball
its length exceeded his large palm's
and it licked the wheel now and then
with a long black tongue
as if to say
that the action of the wheel dug up a pleasant mineral
perhaps some sort of stimulant
and that the ant was very happy
almost intoxicated with the substance
its tongue looked harsh
but seemed to be soft

6.8.2012 • έλα

έλα

είπε το κορίτσι
έλα εδώ
είπε το αγόρι
έλα έλα είπε το κορίτσι
και πήγαν μαζί
το βράδυ κοιμήθηκαν μαζί
και το πρωί ήταν χειμώνας
ήπιαν ζεστό μαύρο τσάι
μαύρο σαν τη νύχτα
κι ο ήλιος σκαρφάλωνε τον ουρανό
σαν το φεγγάρι μες στο τσάι
και τα φυλλαράκια σα δέντρα
φυλλοβόλα το φθινόπωρο
τα ρεύματα του αέρα τα πηγαινόφερναν
δεξιά-αριστερά
το απόγευμα έτρεξαν μες στην πόλη
μέσα στα χωράφια
μες στο χιόνι
που απ’ τον ήλιο ιρίδιζε λίγο

το βράδυ
έκαναν μπάνιο
μαζί
άγγιξέ με
είπε το κορίτσι
έδειχνε σαν
κάτι ανείπωτο
το αγόρι κοίταξε
άγγιξε κατά λάθος τη σωλήνα του ζεστού
είπε ά! στο διάολο
συγγνώμη είπε
εγώ φταίω
που σε άγγιξα
ενώ ήξερα
ότι έκαιγες τόσο

6.8.2012 • woman crossing the street

It seems we are entering into an era of narrative poems. It may very well be as brief as the narratives of same, but it definitely does, with two poems to its tally after two days passed, have the air of an era.

Woman crossing the street

A woman crossed the street
but it was as if the street crossed her
as she walked on the warm damp asphalt
her footsteps formed gradual tracks on its malleable freshness
her feet left harshly their gradual tracks on its black infantile softness
like a baby’s skull
which pressed against firmly
changes shape and morphs into
another mammal
a bird
or a reptile
with oblique eyes
the woman walked on and the street passed her disinterestedly
trudging heavily below her feet
she heaved each leg before the next
with unequal toil
and sweat trickled through the trenches heavy across her face
false witnesses to inexistent years
—the girl appeared obviously older than she was
I could see it in her eyes, her inexorable eyes—
the pavement reached her with a crash

5.8.2012 • Mr. M.S.E.’s Moustache

Of Mr. M.S.E.’s Moustache

Sir, your moustache, it is not a contemptible moustache at all. Indeed, if ever I were to say anything whatever of your moustache, it would have to be something rather in the way of praise, if at the very least of a relative praise, taking into account the tendencies that pervade our current world and your rather young age, which both would and do normally obstruct the evolution of such a moustache as yours, or comparative, as to your peers in age and profession who seldom if ever cultivate such a dignified and respectable moustache, a moustache as it were which is worth of mention, at least when the discussion inevitably (as it does, does it not?) strays into the rather shady if not murky grounds of facial hair. And indeed within the subject of well-worn facial hair it must be said that a moustache well worn (if I may once again use this expression) is the rarest of all cases, and especially so in this day and age. And thus one so concerned at times, and so neglecting at others, yet so conscious and so various in his situation (a state of affairs which, though prompted by the interchange between carelessness and care, brings unparalleled experience and a much refined taste) as to the matter of the grooming of the beard, one so seasoned (I say) as I in the matter of beards would have no choice but to offer you a word if not two of congratulation, and so honouring my honest and most firm opinion on the matter at hand, allow me to do so now in this brief yet meaningful discourse on the same matter, that is facial hair in general and moustaches in particular, or to be even more specific almost to the point of candour, your own moustache, which as I did allude to before is rather remarkable in its condition and a clear indication of an especially refined taste on your behalf.

5.8.2012 • Man in the Rain

Man in the Rain

There  was a man stooping in the rain
He had lost his keys in the rainwater
And while he thought he was looking for them
It accumulated in his coat
A darkly yellow raincoat
Obscured perhaps
and its colour deformed
by the rain
which fell gray against the black sky
The moon
a pale reminder of some impending ill
shone almost round through the granite clouds

The man's hat was black
Perhaps the kind of black that originates in a brown by day
or perhaps just that, black
And his eyes were nowhere to be seen
The rain fell like elongated spheres through a sea of emptiness
It seemed to replace every once clearly defined grain of the asphalt
with its own fluid inconstant shapes
The shape of droplets distilled backwards through time
to their perfect, immobile and imaginary state

The man stood there
looking faceless at the falling water
quiet
still
calm
only his lips spasming a little with a silent cry
CALL ME CALL ME BY MY NAME
call me by name and I'll respond
call and I may reply
the lips cried in a calm inexistent twitch
and the man slowly sank into the pitch-black earth
his eyes ever staring
blank, relentless
at him from every inch
of the shallow ground

6.7.2012 • A letter

A Letter
to a most deserving recipient,
in the form of
an Analogy.

I do quite like to think of these capricious downpours of mid-July rather not as a deliberate mischief of the heavens but as an inadvertent or even accidental choice—an act of weather as it were sent mistakenly at the wrong hemisphere or at the wrong time of the year—and not without cause :
There was much wisdom I believe in the ancient and Mediæval notion that each man in striving for perfection ought to seek the analogy of the cosmos and its universal forces and heavenly bodies on one hand to his own personal body and soul on the other, achieving thus the brave and noble aspiration to the true heavenly Harmony of the World’s Design. And in the same attempt, though crippled by the spirit of our times and my own deficient nature, I too am well invested; and my investments have paid off no higher interest than would their ragged constitution entitle them to.
And yet that is a great degree, for I have in my lame and earnest industry managed to resemble the perfect wisdom of such chancy errors of the earthly heavens as I above describe. And, even as these heavens in their established perfection as part of the Universal Design do sometimes err concealing from their rightfully entitled lands and seasons the constant and irrevocable calm and glory of th’unblemished skies, so do I by stumbling tongue or by deficient attentiveness or memory (which both do afflict me) o’ershadow the true gratitude and frank, naive affection due to such kind and generous people as one has only just met.

to D— and I—

28.4.2012 • [antie]

[antie]

today the ants
were swarming
down his tie–
that comical
crotch-pointing device
that ironically
underscores
our dignity

{not mine

I don’t have a tie
and I don’t have ants
nor cockroaches
nor rats nor mice
I’ve a machine
that makes those chirping noises
that drive them away}

–like rotted screws
rolling down
the crowded
alley of his mind
with sloth-like
agility

bending
denting
their thread
beyond
any hope
of future use

wrinkling
rumpling
their antennae
(isn’t it funny
that ants should have
antennae)
trampling the smaller ones
into the cobbles
all rust-brown
like dried blood
their juices
transparently edging
on the insane

there’s nowhere for them to go
of course
only
they fold
around the tie
like a tender hand caressing another
and when they clash
they cross in fury
or cannibalise indifferently

10.4.2012 • 18:18

In all probability starting a series on my obsession with symmetry in digital clock displays.

18:18

It’s 18:18
and the proud sun
but vaguely veiled above the clouds
(the fluffy ministers of Autumn
who now in Spring maintain a thriftful presence
in the sky’s abundant court)
approaches his daily
little-death

18:18
a time that cries adolescence twice
that shouts for joy
that moans for pain
exclaims for ecstasy
and drinks the dreams of passion
for his daily drink

18:18
and the clouds are grey, and
everything obeys their dim hue
grey and muffled
in the pre-dusk gloom

18:18
and I paint and paint
colours in my words
all in a little rough envelope
of imaginary brown paper
to send to you
and perhaps make you crack a smile

if all my art can muster that,
I will forget the misty firmament of clouds which hides the sun
and mourn only for the few tonnes of mass and distance and stories and life
that daily hide
your smiling face
from me.

29-31.3.2012 • Good mornings

I’ve been working on my rhythming and rhyming skills. Getting better versed in poetry, you could say–that is, hopefully.

•

Good morning I

Good morning, sweet my darling, sweeter still
With ev’ry hour the clock doth tick away;
Would I could ev’ry worldly hue distill
Through thee, and with thee sweeten ev’ry day.

(29.3.2012)

•

Good morning II

Good morning, sweetest sweetheart of my heart
Whose thought takes daily still my world away;
Would it would take me too, and swift impart
Me whole to you, thus ending my dismay.

(31.3.2012)

•

26.3.2012 • insidious spring

This year spring has hit most insidiously
Or was it you?
I was walking across my neighbourhood’s park
when the Sun tore through the winter’s rags
as if with a thousand swords of light

And then there was silence
because his searing flames engulfed all
and I couldn’t see
I couldn’t hear
I couldn’t smell
I couldn’t taste
anything but
you

And it burned through me
it soared through my body
and my being was created into light
light burning with your absence

You'd think it was summer
the way all my tears evaporate before they form
the way my tongue burns with ecstatic song
all ready to envelop you
all in vain

So close and yet a world away
you smile and sigh,
but in your absence I am blind
and cannot see you

26.3.2012 • hey there you

hey there you
little girl in those
perfectly fitting
baggy adult clothes
you don’t fool me
I could see through them from ten leagues away

hey there you
transparent little girl
who swallowed the sun
and pretends to be a stone-hard opaque
you won’t fool me ever
the sunlight pierced straight through everything it shouldn’t
and now I carry it always inside

14.3.2012 • Shall I compare thee to a summer’s night?

My first sonnet; very much an exercise (and I must admit it shows), but a useful and pleasant one.

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s night?

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s night?
Thou art much fresher and much less subdued.
Shall I compose for thee a sonnet bright?
My skill with verse and rhyme’s but harsh and crude.

Shall I attempt to jest without respite
Or make pronouncements of great magnitude?
Few ever did such alien acts requite;
But fools and madmen ever thusly wooed.

Though yet if I the senses to delight
Were so much blest, that with both arts imbued
I could a single verse recite,
And to both compliment and jest allude:
 These lines were witty then, and full of praise,
 And not a feeble attempt to turn a phrase.

8.3.2012 • mens

Κάθε μυαλό περιτριγυρίζεται

από έναν ανεπαίσθητο, σπογγώδη εγκέφαλο

που περιπλανιέται μες στη νύχτα

ενός ιδιαίτερου, προσωπικού κρανίου

πορώδους και κούφιου, γεμάτου σύννεφα και

κάλπικ’ άστρα.

Ο ήλιος τραβάει στη σίγουρη πορεία του

το δρόμο συρτά στο στερέωμα·

τα πλατυά οστά βγάζουν μια συριστική κραυγή, έναν ήχο

που θυμίζει αυγού τσόφλι κλούβιου σαν

το γραντζουνάει ένα σκουριασμένο πιρούνι

κι οι πόροι αστρίζουν σαν τις πευκοβελόνες

σ’ ένα υποκατάστατο χριστουγεννιάτικο δέντρο.

Κι έτσι μέσα είναι πάντα νύχτα, πάντα

νύχτα μέσα στο κύτταρο της μοναδικότητας,

της ενικότητας, της μοναξιάς του είναι

μέσα στο κύτταρο. Αλλά με τον καιρό

οι πόροι μεγαλώνουν και η νύχτα φωτίζει,

κι άλλο, κι άλλο ολοένα μέχρι που

πιάνεται μια ηλιαχτίδα στο μεγαλύτερο

ή τον θρασύτερο πόρο, λυσομανάνε τα γρανάζια

κι οι βραγχίονες και σπάει ένας κρίκος

κι ένα κομμάτι ήλιος πυρωμένο γκρεμίζεται

μες στα βάθη του λυκόφωτος της γερασμένης νύχτας.

Ο εγκέφαλος λυγίζει αμέσως και το μυαλό ξεμυαλισμένο

απ’ το πίπτον άστρο δε σκέφτεται καν να φυλαχτεί.

4.3.2012 • φορές φορές

φορές φορές

μια φορά
περπατάω στο πεζοδρόμιο
σαν ένα μεγάλο πεζούλι
οι άστεγοι ρουφάνε απ' τα κόκκαλα
τις τελευταίες σταγόνες
ένα μικρό παιδάκι
κυνηγάει τα περιστέρια
σαν ένας γίγαντας
ένα πολιτικοοικονομικό τέρας
σίγουρα στην αφήγησή τους
καμμιά φορά
σε ένα ποίημα χωρίς ρυθμό
χωρίς κόμματα
χωρίς ρήμα
σταγόνες βρωμόνερο
όξινη βροχή
στο πορώδες στεγανό εσωτερικό του κρανίου μου
μια αδιάκοπη ρανίδα γυαλόχαρτου
κοινός τόπος
ρημαγμένος
σαν
απέραντη
έρημος

3.3.2012 • χορός από σας για σας

χορός από σας για σας

Ένα καλοκαίρι σαν όλα τα άλλα όλα φαίνονταν να σταμάτησαν–όλα· και τότε άρχισε να χορεύει. Η σιωπή σαν να άρπαξε με την καλοκαιριάτικη βία της χέρια, πόδια, μάτια και στόμα και να τα έσυρε στο χορό μέσα από αμμουδιές, χαλίκια και μαύρη ρευστή άσφαλτο.
Μπορεί να ήταν και το αντίθετο, μπορεί ο χορός να άρπαξε όλα τα μέλη και τις αισθήσεις και να επέβαλλε την απόλυτη σιωπή σ’ όλον τον υπόλοιπο κόσμο εκτός απ’ το χορό. Κανείς δεν θα μπορούσε να πει το ένα πιο πιθανό απ’ τ’ άλλο χωρίς ίχνος αμφιβολίας.
Όπως και νά ’χει, ο χορός κυρίευσε το πεδίο, κυρίευσε τον ορίζοντα, κυρίευσε τον ουρανό, τα σύννεφα, τον ήλιο και το φεγγάρι (το φεγγάρι ιδίως), ξερίζωσε τα αγριόχορτα και τα έκανε κόκκινο ζωμό που μόνο στη θύμηση δεν έμοιαζε αίμα, το λογικό, το θυμικό, το μυαλό και το κορμί και τα έριξε όλα στο απέραντό του πεδίο, όπου όλα μπλέκονται και όλα συντίθενται και τίποτα δεν ξαναβγαίνει ίδιο.
Και την επομένη, μ’ ένα ξύλο στο χέρι, περπάτησε το μονοπάτι μέχρι την κορφή του βουνού κι αγνάντεψε την καταστροφή, το ρημαγμό που είχε αφήσει πίσω της η ξέφρενη μανία της διονυσιακής νύχτας.

responding to: