A certain rebellion

Today, my pen decided to take a rest.
It was 5 past 10 pm.
He refused to be further instrumentalized
and denied his service.
I looked around, uncertain of what to do next.

Nothing
might be the answer,
as it is to all questions.
What can I do about him?
What can I do about me?
What can I do to help him?
To get out of this story?
To get away from it all?
To change? To be who I really am?
Nothing.

Today, my pen decided to take a rest.
It was 5 past 10 pm.

Contrabajeando (To Luciano)

Me gusta tu sonido:
A pitch-perfect flying carpet
heavy grooves on which we dance
with the lightness of clouds
losing their breath on a windy day in march.
Your greatest strength
is the steadiness of the horizon,
the substance to our sound.

Yet you depend on us:
on fluency, transparency, airiness.
We make you glow in the dark,
you embrace our heights with warmth
from inside your wooden corpus,
from your body filled with air, wakened by strings:
A litttle energy turns into bliss of the purest kind.
Me gusta tu sonido.

A child of our times

She is a child of our times

A reluctant reader of poems longer than twelve lines

She knows next to nothing

Only that she can find it online

She doesn’t count the time in chimes

But in the seconds it takes her phone

To tell her which way to go

She wonders where all this leads to

And if the world will ever make sense

She is, after all, a child of our times.

Antwort

„Es gibt Tage, an denen ist die Sehnsucht zu groß.

Dann möchte ich die Berge zwischen dir und mir

Voller Glauben ins Meer werfen

Und die Abgründe zwischen uns

Mit einem Kreuz voller Nägel überbrücken

Darüber zu dir rennen und mich in deine Arme werfen

Und dir endlich sagen, was du schon lange ahnst:

Dass ich dich liebe.

Es gibt Tage, an denen möchte ich, dass du mich siehst

Nicht so, wie du mich erdenkst, wenn du

aus Spuren meiner Existenz ein Bild zusammenkratzt,

was mir nicht im Geringsten gerecht wird,

sondern dass du mein zeitloses Panorama,

meine Unergründlichkeit, Unendlichkeit meinen Kern,

erspürst und erkennst, was du schon lange ahnst:

Dass ich dich liebe.

Es gibt Tage, an denen möchte ich Lichtjahre verflüssigen

Um die Zeit, bis wir uns wiedersehen, abzukürzen

Weil die Spannung, die dich zerbricht, auch mich zerreißt,

obwohl der Krieg längst von mir gewonnen ist,

und du, der du jetzt am Ende bist, in einer neuen Zeit

an den Anfang gesetzt werden wirst

und endlich ergreifen wirst, was du schon lange ahnst:

Dass ich dich liebe.“

Question

Daylight brings distraction, shortly.

Work to be done

Food to be eaten

Midday requires too much strength to carry on

I lay down. Will the pain ever stop breaking my bones?

I get up, carry on. With what?

I don’t know.

People. Paper. Pollution of thought. A disease.

No more food, please.

Night brings hell, again.

Again and again and again.

But

I conquer

The days

And try to oust the menacing darkness

From its power.

Who knows

Who knows where time goes when she’s gone

What love is when she dawns

Or death when he comes to get what is his

Who knows why music sometimes comes alive

How simple words cut throats like knives

Why treacherous handshakes start a war

Who knows how clouds look before they’re born

Why your young hands look old and worn

Why some men love small children more than justice

Who knows why you never give me enough room

What flowers think when they want to bloom

why the opium of some kills a thousand innocents

All those questions remain unanswered

Yet, are they all asked in vain?

One simple question lingers:

If we knew it, would we change?

This is it

What else do we live for

But to love and find truth

And leave before the lies dawn,

To walk barefoot on Leaves of Grass

Lose patience with the ever smiling sun

Not frown at the children in our yards

And embrace the aged, the rocks on which we stand

Tell me, what else is there?

Is it fame? Or money?

Even music fades.

What else do we live for

But to let our naked souls

Confess when darkness falls

Swim in seas of insecurities

Dive in the desert of broken desire

Not let our pens lie down to rest

Or close the books of our fathers

Tell me, what else is there?

Is it science? Or progress?

Even poetry fades.

What else do we live for

But to taste hope on Sunday mornings

try to walk on water, bathe in sinking sands,

Breathe the rage of a summer storm

And smell the earth after the rain has gone

Strive for knowledge, balance it

in the palms of our hands

With faith we don’t know yet

Tell me, what else is there?

This is it: a moment’s bliss.

Don’t cross out lines, don’t miss

To move the frontier to the west

To conquer your heart’s wilderness

Knit your mistakes into the text

Don’t fear the paths not paved yet

Nor the pain at the end of the road

Because this is it, no more no less:

A brief second of happiness.