Such loneliness!
if I could crave in stone a giant,
bound, wordless, standing
Month: October 2013
a haiku: a stain on the heart
nothing sadder than
kindness taken for granted
a stain on the heart
poem by Charles Reznikoff
Of course, we must die.
How else will the world be rid of
the old telephone numbers
we cannot forget.
The numbers
it would be foolish–
utterly useless—
to call.
the days, the nights
blend together
one into the other
and sleep
my foreign cousin
eludes me
instead the past creeps in
obliterating what should be thoughts
of a future
and regret eats chucks of my heart
leaving crumbs not worth sharing
in a world
bereft of hope
standing on a foreign shore
watching ships sail the sea
the taste of whiskey
lingering on my tongue
The Key by Ceyhun Atuf Kansu
Look! I am but a road to you
The road you tread every morning
I am a tree to you, the acacia
In whose shadow you wait for a bus.
Tell me who you are
Let me write at the corners of streets
I’ve lost myself in your town
Your name is my street.
Tell me where your house is
Do you like afternoons or evenings?
Let me knock on your door
Unlock and show me the secret garden.
Give me the padlock of your eyes
Let me close us off from the world
Look, this is my key
Unlock yourself, there is love about to emerge
Please do not hide it.
the definition of being special: for RK
this is not so easy to define
a quality like this
almost too ephemeral as to be invisible
except our senses do feel it
our brains register it
there is magic in the air
and our eyes
so accustomed to what is ordinary
are momentarily nonplussed
what could it be
we wonder
that holds us captive so
and someone like you
flutters by on wings
apparently
like an angel
and we know
finally
though we may not understand
what special means
just who in the physical universe
defines that foreign word
The Woman with a Pigeon in Her Soul by Tekin Gönenç
first came your voice
half-opening my doors
then you emerged leaving behind
a blind alley of puzzled clouds
o woman with a pigeon in her soul
your pitch-black hair streaming
you ran to and fro days on end
in the cross-currents of my being
shedding over me
the thousands of stars
concealed in your dimples
now tell me where your journey leads
should we all henceforth
each taking his own poem by the hand
enter from the opposite direction
the dead alley of butterflies
and yet you still abide with me
o woman with a pigeon in her soul
where I stand
as I stand poised on the edge of heartbreak
your name on the tip of my tongue
there’s no such thing as redemption
and nothing left of pride
Your Hair Dried Last by Yehuda Amichai
Your hair dried last.
When we were already far from the sea,
when words and salt, which mixed on us,
separated from each other
with a sigh,
and your body no longer showed
signs of terrible antecedents.
In vain we forgot a few things on the beach,
as a pretext to return.
We did not return.
And these days I remember the days
on which your name was fixed like a name on a ship.
And how we saw, through two open doors,
a man thinking, and how we looked
at the clouds with the ancient look
we inherited from our fathers
waiting for rain,
and how at night, when the world had cooled,
your body held on to its heat a long time
like a sea.
a tanka: the expat 2
standing once again
feet planted on foreign soil
voices surrounding
words incomprehensible
battles fought futile for him
Leonard Durso 