HILDAGARDS DAUGHTERS Green Door Editions, Number 1
If this is an anthology then it is one without a poetic or political theory to propagate. Its purpose is simply to offer work which has the common bond of being written by women who share what the editor’s call, for the sake of easy reference, a ‘visionary attitude’. Beyond this they seek no common expression, form no common front. They are who and what they are without reference to each other but deserve to be seen together. They are presented in alphabetical order.
You find them where you least expect to find them Whose elegant disguise is that they have no disguise Whose ‘subversion’ is the most gentle of their arts Nothing needs to be explained Their poems rest like leaves on water Or in a cry history cannot shake off Not that it wants to or ever should Not that it ever will.
MIRA BORGHS
Is a Flemish poet, painter, photographer, and actress. Her first poems, written in English, were published in The Green Door. Nihilius is an extract from a work in progress; a work written in English and not translated into it. Though this is only her second publication the editors are confident that we are dealing with a fully developed voice and that more will be heard from her
Nihilius
I drink this glass of wine to you, Nihilius. I drink it because of the colour, the red, the blood. I drink it as if it would be mine, this divine water, a piece of the mind and the soul. It tastes sweet, Nihilius, a little bit of memories, a bit of nostalgia, a little bit like me. And now I drink myself to thee, my dear friend Nihilius.
In the middle of the cave lays a piece of untouched, rough clay. It's time for a new birth or shall I say a new death. A black creature enters the hollow stone. His task is to fashion the clay into a human form. Piece by piece he moulds it until it finally looks like a human being, a perfect statue, a piece of art. He lays it outside to dry and waits till the sun pears its sunbeams into the puppet. The energy spreads itself throughout its molecules so that body and soul can melt together. Now his work is really done. He's made a new toy where he can play his evil games with. At night he tortures it by whispering thoughts of freedom and captivity, sense and senselessness, about life and death. For he is the devil himself and his blackness is the embodiment of all our sorrow and despair.
Oh, Nihilius, you twisted and turned my untouched mind into something you call reality, life. But I call it death, my friend. But we mustn’t get melodramatic, must we, Nihilius? Let me first drink another glass of wine, a bit of taste of the good old memories.
A curious man enters the House of Wisdom. He takes the stairs to the upper room and goes inside. There's an old man drawing and writing something with great precision. The greybeard, already knowing about the uncontrollable curiosity of the man, suddenly looks up and says to him: 'If you want to discover the mysteries of life you may come closer and look, but only if your curiosity is bigger than your quest for happiness, because knowledge and pain go hand in hand. The choice is yours.' The man turns towards the door while the old man's words keep fighting each other: '... pain and destruction...mysteries of life...'. He tries to fight his curiosity but it's too strong for him. He approaches the old man very slowly and looks at his work. For a moment he keeps gazing at it with open mouth. But only a few minutes later he starts running down the stairs like a madman, pulling out his hair, screaming like a tortured pig, scratching the skin of his face until he finally reaches the outdoor to run away in his world without realising who he is and where he's going to.
Maybe he's still running today. Nobody knows for sure. It was knowledge that made him insane. For what he had seen was not an ordinary piece of paper, but it was his own Map of Life.
Nihilius diabolicus est.
I remember the day when you took me to your cave. You raped me in the most painful way and sucked the last light out of my body. Our marriage was blessed in your cave. Our child was born out of my eyes. Its name was Fletus.
The woman lies on the bed, the blood gushing out of her vagina.
She looks in the mirror.
Her image looks back at her and says with a devil's smile: 'The child has gone'. Like a ghost he wonders through the streets. He looks at me with his big, craterlike eyes. They threaten to swallow me into a lonely darkness which is unknown to me. He's tired and he still hasn't found a course, a destination. The world is like a film in slow motion to him. Reality hurts too much.
I find him beautiful and I want to cherish him and hold him in my arms. Then I'll kiss his eyes and his syringe. Because that's the only thing that keeps him alive. After the divine honey has been released in his blue, swollen veins he feels calm and peaceful again. He might even be happy for a moment or see Him, his god, his light. Sometimes he visits him three times a day. He enters his world like a flash and makes his body a tremble of excitement and he feels so light, so light,...
Let's open another bottle of wine, shall we? I love the taste. It's so familiar to me.
I once tried to escape Nihilius, with the help of an old friend, Fuga. But Nihilius was again much too fast for me.
At another time I assembled an army of my own. I had found the most trustful and strong companions: Furia, Domina, Flamma and Ira.
We surprised Nihilius while he was sleeping but again he took us over in no time.
I am the digger Dig, I dig a mountain, to see the sun But after years of labour I realise I am digging a pit A dreamer of black thoughts hears a crying in the night A man has fallen in the river because of a bad sight The dreamer reaches out his hand but then suddenly runs away for it was himself whom he had seen in this killing bay
A man is thinking about his origin. He compares his family to his country, his country to our planet and finally our planet to the universe. Then he compares a minute to an hour, an hour to a year, a year to a generation and finally a generation to the infinite time. Suddenly he stands up, inhales the fresh air, takes a good look around him at the vast landscapes and then reveals his conclusion: 'We are all born at the same moment in time and at the same place.' One day I met my love. He spoke to me with a kindness I had never seen before, so gentle, so divine and sweet. And his light, oh yes his light was so strong that I was completely blinded by it.
And for a moment I felt like I was being carried by soft, protecting hands throughout a world of harmony. And I didn't have to think of anything. I could finally rest. I didn't even think of Nihilius.
I was one with his world, with his light. But as time went by, he slowly began to remove himself from me and his light became weaker and weaker. I tried to touch his hair while the wind was wispering his name: Ilusia, Ilusia, Ilusia,...
And then there was only me and Nihilius.
Now my wine is finished
I have stories no more Therefore I will tell nor speak no more My friend Nihilius, I tell you goodbye, for my last bottle has been emptied. But I'll see you again by the time that the grapes will be filled again with memories.
FLAVIA COSMA is an award winning Romanian-born Canadian poet, author and translator. She has a Masters degree in Electrical Engineering from the Polytechnic Institute of Bucharest. Later she studied Drama at the Community School of Arts—Bucharest, Romania. She is also an award winning independent television documentary producer, director, and writer, and has published seventeen books of poetry, a novel, a travel memoir and five books for children. Her work has been represented in numerous anthologies in various countries and languages, and her book, 47 Poems, (Texas Tech University Press) received the ALTA Richard Wilbur Poetry in Translation Prize. Cosma was nominated three times for The Pushcart Prize with poems from Leaves of a Diary (2006), The Season of Love (2008) and Thus Spoke the Sea (2008). She was awarded Third Prize in the John Dryden Translation Competition- 2007, for co-translating In The Arms of The Father, poems by Flavia Cosma, (British Comparative Literature Association & British Literary Translation Centre) Cosma’s Songs at the Aegean Sea made the Short List in the Canadian Aid Literary Awards Contest, Dec. 2007. Her translation into Romanian of Burning Poems by George Elliott Clarke was published in Romania in 2006. Her translation from Spanish into Romanian of work by the Argentinean poet Luis Raul Calvo was published in 2009 under the title Nimic Pentru Aici, Nimic Pentru Dincolo. Her translation of work by the USA poet Gloria Mindock was published in 2010 under the title La Porţile Raiului. Her translation into English of Profane Uncertainties by the Argentinean poet Luis Raul Calvo was published by Cervena Barva Press in 2010. She was appointed International Affairs Chair for The League of Canadian Poets in 2008 and in 2009received the Title of Excellence for outstanding contribution in the promotion and enrichment of the Romanian culture within the European region and throughout the world, awarded by The International Festival “Lucian Blaga”, XXIX edition, Sebeş-Alba, Romania. Flavia was decorated with the Golden Medal and was appointed Honorary Member by the Casa del Poeta Peruano, Lima, Peru, 2010, for her poetry and her work as an international cultural promoter. She isthe director of the International Writers’ and Artists’ Residency, Val-David, Quebec, Canada Flavia Cosma: http://www.flaviacosma.com
Cradle-Song
Love, make a cradle for me Of your arms Against the stony nights. Submerge me in the waters of your eyes And let me sleep. I thirst for peace, For warmth, For the peacock feather Shimmering below the moon. Let the whisper of the breeze Breathe gently, soothingly, Until it stirs my fires.
But we must keep our eyes closed very tight, For past the hill I sense a foreboding breath, From morning’s clammy muzzle Like a death.
Impossible Summer
Leavening, the air becomes silted; It smells as though the city Has moved on the shore of a lake As if by magic.
Gulls with ruffled feathers Fall asleep on hot asphalts; A heavy miasma carries us brutally To other continents, to other coasts. In our mind’s eye we see murky lakes, Dark epidermis breathing desires, Soft blue and orange skies, Heart-breaking sadness, vast plains.
A bridge spanning the world, This alien love Consumes me wildly With its boundless absence.
Under the Cover of Time
Old age and demise Will catch up with them too; They will be buried in turn by others In the shade of illustrious ruins, Because all things come to an end When you truly know them.
Although we may say that The immortals-- the hibiscus trees Are continually in bloom, Their lascivious, ruffled flowers, Longingly waiting for me More than a year now.
To Be Sixteen Again…
How hard it would be To be sixteen again, To be suave, fragile and to keep Your eyes half closed under your lids; To embrace your knees with transparent hands, To wish you could return into the warm belly The one that not long ago Held you tight, giving you the air And the nourishment you needed To grow, to flourish.
How hard it would be To be sixteen again, To know, to sense, that your turn had come To bear fruit, to become a blue cradle; —The sky opening up at the blessed hour And letting you see in a flash Your future lovers and children,— To feel your body heavy, your breast round, Your eyes weary, your step slow, And later on – to face with modesty, The bitter servitude of the golden years.
Sometimes you would like to stop time in its tracks;
Wishing to be sixteen forever And have no future.
Beyond
Beyond these walls there is the sea; Beyond these chairs, Left empty in dreams, Beyond the houses burnt and collapsed, Beyond dark curtains, helplessly flapping Over empty window sockets, Lies the color blue, A steely blue, A piercing, stony blueThe Sun’s bride, Now tear-stained, then exceedingly beautiful, The eternal sea, a foamy answer To the dreams of the night And to the infinite longing.
The Other Window
Now it’s the time to thank The fairies, the princes and the dogs; They urged me to open the second window. Large birds wander through my thoughts And silky fish And sleepy foxes. My blood throbs with a soft rhythm Like water under bridges, equal waves, One denuded, indifferent, The other, struck by the heart’s sorrows, unlocking the second window.
In this fashion I become bird, tailed fish, Red flower; I am able to sleep, to discard the armor, And nudge love with a butterfly’s wing.
On your smile I glide back, To the essence of my womanly body, Vapor bursting into multitude of rays, Like a suspended blast, Like a sigh.
I close my eyes,
I close the book, I close the circle.
The hand quietly dances Over foreheads, over frights.
Passing Through Fire
The child was laid low in the hospital; He passed through fire and no one Could take the fire away From his shoulders.
The child died in the hospital. The sun trickled Drop by drop into the sea.
In the end – When all of these went down – I saw the child on the other side. He wasn’t a child any more, But wasn’t himself either: It was somebody who had passed through fire And he was alone.
The Last of Leaves
The last leaves from the grape vine, Fell noiselessly early this morning. On the universal scale nothing has changed, Just one question or two was added To autumn’s turmoil.
We walk amid piles of rusty leaves, Stenciled in black, as if being counted; The golden hair of the old poplar, Its mane, which the wind once jokingly mussed, Now lies cut down to the ground. Stately maple trees, sob yellowed, Ill with consumption, And it rains.
We lie in wait anxiously for winter, And winter spies on us at every corner, too, Its purse full of diseases and sins, Like a wicked Santa Claus Coming down earlier From his book.
The First Day of the Year
The first day of the year was Wrapped up in peace, Endless peace, flowing from the sky.
We paused on the road To look at our footprints Abandoned on the soft blanket, And to reflect upon our passage on earth, While slowly Our traces disappeared Under white, innocent snow.
The Moon’s Body
Sweet air drifted over the deep river— A fragrance that grew wild and dark. It flowed forth from the breast of the moon Bowing over us, From time to time lighting up The river’s bare belly, And, as gone from the living, Your face.
The Bronze of Statues
Kissed on the lips, the bronze of statues Changes into gold; The inert matter opens wide its eyes, The soul breathes noisily, A smoky trap, sweet breeze, The air seizes us lustfully.
Caressed on its bosom, the bronze of statues Changes into water, Green water, blissful, Covering the alabaster hands of the beloved, Flooding his boundless heart That beats and beats, Stirring up oceans, Running with the clouds, Drawing near.
RODICA DRAGHINCESCU
BORN IN 1962, RODICA Draghincescu is one of the most spectacular figures in the new Romanian literature of the 1990s. She made her debut in 1993 with the verse collection "Nearly Warm." She is the recipient of numerous prestigious national literary prizes and awards, and the literary press has labeled her both the Romanian Nathalie Sarraute and the postmodern Simone de Beauvoir. Very well received by critics and represented in all the most important anthologies of Romanian poetry and literary encyclopedias, her poems, essays, and translations have been published in France, England, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland. She is a correspondent for Phreatique, the journal of the Polypoeti research center in Paris, the Belgian Plume Libre, and the Italian Goccia di Luna. She has published two novels: "The Distance Between a Dressed Man and a Woman the Way She Is" (1996), which received the Romanian Writers Union Award; and Craun (2000). She is also editor of the excellent journal LEVURE LITTERAIRE (available online)
White Wheat (artofnothing)
I see nothing when I see nothing I see nothing the nothing I see when I see nothing I see how the nothing sees me I am 'no thing' since my absence I absent myself I am feeling nothing I am more than non-existence I obey the white, cold nothing I am a nothing of snow I snow little nothings from memory on big nothings of forgetting I am learning the forgetting of the where of the where is he? of the where is she? I do not forget where I snow or where I am the white wheat of gazing in which there is something there where there is nothing everything follows me everywhere we follow one another we are two-gender nothings: M and F (I snow in the F direction and he in the M direction) we snow on each other we snow together around the snowing nothing I have nothing to declare no body no blood no name I name myself without calling myself I am called 'no thing' or 'nothing-nothing' otherwise no name, no not, no no I don't come I don't return I do nothing I made worthless nothings I have not name nor faces for names no face to name face nothing to declare except my absent face (in my absent face there is snow or white wheat and in the snow of snowed words aged with everything they cannot do but brave enough to say nothing and proud of their white wheat)
finally nothing nothing to declare sorry Translated from the French by Howard Scott
Fuse (proseintopoem)
I bury my head in writing, I blow my head up, I go the speed of words. I bury my head in writing, I blow my head up, I go the speed of write. I write the wee red worms that perch on wee read words wide as a writer's loom among the wee red worms. I am the worm in my woman's head. I am the worm in man's writing. I am the wormword or woman-man. I have the way with words of the bisexual worm. I put feelings in my head. I pull feelings from my head. A worm doesn't have feelings, a word needs itself and its fresh food. I write like fresh food, I write in my full frosty body, I need me, I write like "needing me". Fill myself, swell myself, crush myself, till there's no more of me.
And there is nothing more. No shading because of what I could be. Nothing but my name looking like a word that tickles and chews everything it loves that I love like worms. So it writes what I write against all possible writing. WHAT AM I? WHO AM I? A name at the speed of words, a writing in flesh for the little city earth worms under rain and under the feet of people happy or sad. WHO AM I? WHAT AM I? My head floats above me and I can't find myself. My head needs all my flesh. 38.5°C. 38.6°C. 38.7°C. 38.8°C. 38.9°C. 39°C. Fever. Late fall, winter cold, fog, mud, gray dogs, panhandlers, homosexual kids, junkies, -7°C. In a photo you can live or exist even if you're not... alive. I grew up that way (4 seasons, very hot, very cold, everything that is the not, especially not [...], I have known people, fish, animals, birds, plants, stones, waters, earths, the air and fire of photos. I made love with the first photo, love with the second photo, love with the next ones, love with the
camera), love with black glass eye, love with sharp objects, love with warm lines and circles, love with [...] etc, etc, so that now, I don't know any more if my parents are not in some way the grown-up expression of my age at its different ages, taken in photos or left in the margins or beyond the (...) Or me in love position with my life. No, I wasn't crazy, I'm not crazy, I'm too good, too sad, too well-behaved, too beautiful, too nasty, too ugly, too chic, too docile, I am too, I am another thing, another EYE. 39.1°C. I can light up at any moment, the lack of action, the absence, the waiting, its tests too simple, too slow. The inside and the outside of a photograph are inseparable. In every life, any life, there are areas and movements that are explainable, areas and movements that are inexplicable. Dark, light, shadow, limpid void and touched void. I am naked, unplaited, wet, elastic, curly. "The beautiful red worm" with little dancer's breasts. In a photo. 1.67 m. I live. I am. Empty and emptied. I strike with my head the crust of heaven, I give feet to the crust of the earth. If I hold out my hands, horizontally, I perforate the boundary with the world. There remain accidents, mellow wounds, through which I receive letters from the outside, sound letters. Ding - dong, ding – dong, ding – dong... Like church bells. The big bells ring. Ding – dong, ding – dong, ding – dong (...) In my head, the bees are made of little wax bells. My head and the honey of the little bells float over me, wearied by my loss.
I cry out and honey runs out between my teeth. I am a woman with the combed bells of a hive on my head. I am a very good woman, a honey worm, a word in honey, a writing worm with the honey on a woman, a word writing in depth and in length, between and among, neither, neither, why and where in accordance with, with the precision of bisexual writing, to the orgasm of the metaphor of being alone and alone, alone as long as necessary. My love, isn't it not (...)? Don't you love me madly, dammit, I don't, my love! A worm needs no feelings, it makes holes, places for the combs in a hive, places for bells and flights of bees. I am a wormword in time, a wormword – while – in time – words – of – feelings. I am Eye. And I float. I float. I float. I float. I float. I float. My head turned towards what I no longer have. I float towards the other side. And the other side floats too. In the wild green shape of a green water lens. Lens – heads. Green heads. Little aquatic photos. My memory is more and more silly, more and more flower. I write small. And I eat everything that is beautiful. I write in me, to open out the bee hole, the honey hole, the hole in which my head and my body float in
the same direction, a kind of bog flowing on the edge of my memory. I write nastily and you don't like my writing. But verse is like that. It doesn't cuss. It writes in the wound, as if the pain wrote to it on pains, heavy pains, stirring up cuss words. That can understand the words of a worm, of a worm that takes itself for a woman, and especially of a woman who takes herself for a wormword?! Only severely "damned" poets! I am your damned poet, pardon, your worm–poet, your favorite. I am the one who writes cuss words of love on your neck. Pardon. A worm speaks so well, but once in its life. I hope you never hear it. My love, I love you and I don't love you. Here, in Vaihingen, on December 14, 2002, I would have liked that. I run from one end to another. toddling. tittering. I turn in the photo, like the key in the lock.
I open myself. I feel nothing. I open myself by writing. It is likely I write what I tell sitting in this nest of flesh that moves to its own music, but that is not capable of feelings. I see my hands bigger and bigger. My hands like Jack's beanstalks, grow and grow towards heaven. I put my fingers in my mouth and I write in my mouth, I climb on my saliva, I go into the writing: up, down, and so forth, then further and nearer. I put my head into writing. I lift my head from the writing. I go the speed of love at first sight. I write till there is nothing. And it is so beautiful and clear nothing! I can speak freely. And I can speak so well,
I can speak freely, I ca n spe ak free ly! Above houses there are crows. Above crows, a red sky. If I wasn't writing, I would say "black and white sunset." And the belfry of the church of good cheer. And the light fine rain, frozen in the shape of needles. And the fir tree in the window. And the pine cones and my photos in pieces, hanging from the fir branches. And, especially, the crows that fly squabbling, talons dug into each other, like pieces of a puzzle. And the little red worm non-existent, non-existent, non-existent, little non-existent, red non-existent, Word – Worming – the Way to non-existent. 39.1°C. 39.2°C.
I haven't forgotten you. I haven't forgotten you. You told me many times: "You can't have a good relationship with that worm, with that word thing!" And you turn your back on me. "I'm afraid, afraid of listening to you!" - under your breath, before going to sleep. And you will never know anything about the wee red worm. Goodnight or good day during your night! I think I have 39.9째C. Cabbala plot? No, as a poet, lucky numbers: 39, the number of my father's house, 9, in school, my favorite mark, I think that, I no longer climb further higher I write in time, I write like a drill in the navel of heaven. There are no steps, nor stops my writing is not inclined. It's okay! I am the wee red worm, the guinea pig of my writing, I am the
little red letter that gnaws on steps: I come, I return, I implant shrill letters in the stalks of my body, I climb down, here I am I put my head in my head, I put my body in my body, my head in my body my body in my head, here I am. Translated from French by Howard Scott
To Myself At birth I appeared Already oppressed in an air cage. How amazing, what riot of colours A stupefied godmother! Compassion drowned in tears She had an indelible pen And on her lips offered on credit Hung a suspended smile She gratified me with a scribbled digit Which she marked, consoledly, on my back: Girl, two kilos, odd number: thirtynine Strangled by the ombilical chord Survival chance 26%, epidermal eruption Talking to herself. Translated from the French by Constantin ROMAN, London 2003
Although I Sweeten Myself with Sugar My hands filled with sugar (a new being? lucky?) I met him along the railroad tracks watching over his ruddy goats HOW DO YOU DO? DID YOU SLEEP WELL? good morning I MEAN CAN’T YOU SEE IT’S STILL NIGHT the DAYS have turned to grass and GRASS isn’t good for these animals any longer I’ve brought you sugar the goats bleat whenever they feel like it their bleating has stopped – in goat language this is called FREEDOM – I’m about to experience the sensation that I’ve DISCOVERED DOCILE SOUNDS IN MY LARYNX that won’t cause me trouble BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH Dear mr. goatherd I’ve brought you sugar I reach out my hand – I don’t know why it’s said THIS WAY when in FACT the movement is made with the root fastened between shoulder blade and breast WHICH breast is BIGGER: it’s learned to sing and TO TALK: NURSING this other condition scares it depresses it leads it to droop it wishes IT HAD eyes to scope out temptations UNDERNEATH clothes although I sweeten myself with sugar I’M ONE OF THOSE WHO DON’T DO a lot of good for the REPRESENTATIVE ORGANS now for INSTANCE grass grown on THIGHS is poisonous to goats THAT’S WHY I reach out my hand filled with sugar DEAR MR. goatherd TASTE it for YOURSELF (meanwhile) the indifferent or CAPABLE goats have stopped the freight train at the railroad museum where the railroad clerk SAILING-SHIP was celebrating his WEDDING they were sitting DUMBFOUNDED wearing IN PERPETUITY kaleidoscopic CARDBOARD flowers attached with SAFETY PINS to THE CIRCUMFERENCE OF THEIR HEARTS WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE WHEE
WHEE HEY HEY WHEE COME ON HEYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY (a SOLDIER escaped from his UNIT was trying to ameliorate the error) LET’S GET A MOVE ON/farther ahead it’s tHERE/ the wedding OF dead goats the MAN makes dynamite FOOD DEAR MR. GOATHERD the museum’s freight train is like a kind of LOVE you’ve given up waiting for (having a TOTALLY different OBJECTIVE THAN killing goats) (the goats were too greedy) BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH (AFTER ALL THEY can live without being GOATS) NO ONE will hold their FREEDOM up to ridicule good morning mr. goatherd CAN’T you (EVEN) see IT’S MORNING I’ll take pains to believe that the NOISES AND THE BLOOD enveloping us will give FREE REIN to a new relation between you and me (my hands filled with sugar I’ll never be HUNGRY or THIRSTY) Good morning mr. goatherd the kid hawking the morning papers has spread the news everywhere in town ALREADY WE’RE STARS Translated from the Romanian by Adam J. Sorkin and Antuza Genescu
Lullaby for Castaways
way out on the water the way on the water so far away way up there the aurora or the horror of the water in the water way in the water more water the wind in the water swish in the water wish in the water (out of danger and the logic of water) wawa water water the water away in the water wade in the water the poem of the water big water – bang water water wheel big water – bang water waa waa in the wawa water wade in the water away in the water water in water water in waters over the water water water water stream of water dream of water steaming water go beddy-bye (out of danger and the logic of water) from water to water the waves of the castaways wawa water water the water away in the water wade in the water
of the waters waaa the waters of waaa away from the water the water water the wawa waters waters waters waiter's waters wait in the water Translated from French by Howard Scott
THESE ARE ME AND I’VE BECOME MY OWN FRIEND
Should I do introductions? this is the railroad these the arms these the legs this is the see-through dress excited to make its getaway from the body ALSO I HAD a newly furnished head I set it ASIDE to bring it to its senses I turned it over to see its GREEN pinky-pink buttocks also I had a bouquet of fine features two PER MUSCLE in the style of the woman who sells absorbent cotton and tampons maybe I also should have something clear favorite conclusive (like a shoulder with a grain de beauté that immediately could realize if it were lied to about spring’s arrival wafting Parisian perfumes) these are FINGERS
(which my mother always counted until I began to tell her MAMA THERE ARE 10 OF THEM AND THEY STILL OBEY ME now they glissando because they’ve grown up and need to move mysteriously otherwise going to other fingers’ parties seems pointless) THIS IS SHAME a silken arithmetic so young it doesn’t really get it I let it play upon my body and it pushed in close happy and not really used to such sophisticated names WHO asked it WHY this is the train a sort OF drawer where I keep all manner of bodies to put it bluntly these are me and I’ve become my own friend
CAMELIA ELIAS
IN A NUTSHELL: I'm a professor of American Studies at Roskilde U. ~~~ I WRITE academic stuff with a poetic touch - Logic will get you from A to B; imagination will take you everywhere, said Einstein. ~~~ I READ math books, and pretend to understand. ~~~ I DREAM of early retirement on top of a mountain in Norway. ~~~ I BLOG to understand culture. I write prose poetry and fragments to understand other things. ~~~ I APPRECIATE visual art and music. I paint, I sing early music (medieval, and early renaissance) and I play the drums (frame and bodhrรกn). ~~~ THE GEEKY PART: all my drums are custom hand made by Norbert Eckermann, and I bang on them like there's no tomorrow. See her blogs The Atlantic Community - FRAG/MENTS
I’m reading Rachel Pollack’s novel Temporary Agency and while listening to the sublime Nima ben David’s playing on one of my favorite instruments, the bass viola da gamba, I stop at Rachel’s epigraph for Part Two from Euripides: “I pray that love may never come to me with murderous intent, in rhythms measureless and wild.” Nima stretches her fingers on the neck of the instrument in an impossible way, weaving her touch with the vibrations from her bowing in such a way that I feel penetrated in both my vision and my gut. This instantly reminds me of Rachel’s other book: The Body of the Goddess in which she uses this epigraph from Judith Guest’s Miss Manners for one of her chapters: “Ways of doing things may be new, things to be done are generally not.” The bass goes very low on four strings at this point and I hide quickly in Euripides’s prayer. I search for the word of my passion. In Euripides’s time, the Greeks never wrote obituaries. They posed only one question: did the dead have a passion? The text escapes through the soundscape, and a gate opens.
RESURRECTION What people do behind our backs can be quite astonishing. But lucky for us if we like surprises – or signs. Signs are everywhere all the time – as some good masters have pointed out – and if we bother to think about ‘what it might all mean,’ we may be able to construe some narratives that are anything but boring. The veracity of these narratives is not the most interesting – sometimes knowing what we know is already more than enough, and if we should need proof, all we need to do is wait a little. Proof of the known unknown usually has a way of coming to us all by itself. Now, Derrida’s ghost is over me – blessed be his specter. It’s only been a few days ago that I was talking about him in a public forum, and yet now it looks like he wants to be even more forcefully resurrected. But, as befitting a grand master, he does it meta-style, circular-style, and roundabout-style, by imploding himself, as it were, in another text about me, so to speak. Which is to say that he has just managed to haunt the writer Gordon Lish, who once wrote about one ”Gordon Lish” and the death of his wife in his book Epigraph – on which I wrote myself in an old article, and in which I called on Derrida. Now, Lish, being haunted because Derrida calls back on me, has dug up this article of mine and re-published it himself HERE, thus fully resurrecting it along with pics which he stole from my website. Great move. And great pics. The whole affair reminded me of this great line of Jacques’: “When I have nothing to do in a public place, I photograph myself and with few exceptions burn myself” (Postcard, 37). Now I wonder how this applies to virtual public places. I go ask the cards. My old article compels me to do so, as it’s all about divination and hermetic traditions – though not so overtly stated. I was more cautious in those days. – I’m sure I’ll get an honest and straight answer – I always do. If not on what Derrida wants from me, then surely on how to own up to my own ghost.
BIBLIOKLEPTIC Time again to disclose what writing lights our fire - and these days, other people's fires. I've been asked to answer questions about EyeCorner Press by the editor of Biblioklept, and here is what came out of it. Fun, fun, fun, swear words and improper words in between, but all veeeery commonsensical.
For all those interested in the state of the general heart-break over what's going on in the academia these days, the interview might strike a sympathizing chord: you're not alone. And yet, here, if we appeal to any community, then it's the loving kind. Aaaabsolutely.
ZOHARIC BEAM I've always been against the idea that life is something that one seizes, one grabs, and one adds to the list of things and achievements that one wishes to take into one's grave. Let's face it, life is something we experience, perhaps the way one experiences light, and it has nothing to do with what we make of it. This latter idea, of making something of life, is mainly an idiotic Western thought developed to counter both the fear of death and the feeling of guilt for not investing enough time and energy into thinking about what life really means. This month I was fortunate enough to spend time among people who, for the most part, are trying to understand what life is on its own terms. When asked they all said: “everything is connected, so why bother with petty things and cultural constraints?” Most of these people don't have families, they don't do the right thing in terms of getting a solid and stolid job, and they don't give a shit about moral principles based on lots of hypocrisy, lying, and regular dishonesty. And they don't compromise either: if they can't get the stallion, they don't settle for the mule. They are all drummers attending a drumming workshop with the best master, the Lord of the Frame Drums himself, Zohar Fresco – also the Lord of Light, if you ask me, blessed be his name. He keeps it simple too: “remember that you're here to serve, and to read souls.” Zohar Fresco is not only a man who can bang on the drum in the most sublime way imaginable, but he is also one who has mastered the art of simplicity, elegance, and correspondence. He communicates through dynamic soundscapes made up of equal measures between four elements: the pulse, color, energy, and spirit. “The drum is only a tool, tav in Hebrew, and has embedded in its name both the idea of oneness and life. Then there is also the idea of connection – the Hebrew letter vav is the sound of being joined, one and another, AND.” I let myself be pulled into the kabbalistic philosophy of Zohar's drumming, and think about how amazing the idea of joining is, yet joining not horizontally, as one may think is logical, but vertically. Of course, the one and the other cannot and should not be dissolved into one another. They must remain independent. “Before a child is born,” Zohar tells us, “the first thing that he hears is his mother's pulse and her voice.” “Remember,” he then says by turning to the majority of men in the room, “what we all want is this, to hear the woman's voice and her pulse. The woman always wins, remember that.” Something in Zohar's voice leaves no room for disagreeing. He speaks softly, and his words fly as do his fingers on the drum. I insist on touching his hands for the whole time I'm present. And he lets me. And we both feel the power of the shekkinah. He knows why I'm there. I'm not there to imitate his inimitable style, nor am I there to learn how to drum. I'm there for the light, the formless form, which yet in his hands exudes the rigor of discipline. Zohar masters to perfection not only what can be turned into articulate and clear sound, but also the voiceless, what he calls the ghost notes. I like these notes the best. They allow me to follow the movement of his hand into 'almost' sound. The sound of the silent O. “I'm zero,” Zohar says, "I start from
zero on this round thing which is the drum, a zero itself, and I give nothing. But I want this nothing to move people.” His playing moves me. I cry. And then I cry some more as I realize that he plays for me, just for me. Zohar wrote a piece called Echad, One, and I understand what he means by pulsating at unison with another's heart: D-, -T, --, T-. So we also drum for each other. Each in our own way. And the collective beat of 22 joins in. Zohar's gaze following our fingers reminds us to remember the connection: as above, so below. And yet, while his drum electrifies vertically, his gaze establishes a horizontal line as well. We're all under him, but only because he insists on no hierarchy. “I'm here to serve” is his mantra, and one hears it as the doum on the drum, the very vehicle which creates dynamics. Zohar leaves us all flat on our bellies, supplicating, or flat on our backs, ecstatically contemplating the stars. People ask me whether I drum for shamanic purposes. While I reply in the negative, I tell them about various archaic techniques of trance-inducing rituals. By drumming, most shamans of the world believe that they can fly to the Cosmic Tree. The skin of the drum is revived through a pulsing touch and voice. The sounds taken together recall various spirits. As such, the drum is used as a means for ascension. The shaman is a medium who creates a correspondence between theriomorphic ancestors, the mythical subterranean beings nurturing the roots of the tree, and the cosmic branches holding the dead souls. The way Zohar slides his finger on the drum, pressing on it as if to demonstrate my point, creates a swishing sound that always makes me bite my lips. His moist hand tapping gently on the dead skin reanimates some other worlds which I'm trying to mix in with my own. “So, you are an alchemist,” a biochemist interested in drumming asked over dinner. “I don't know about me,” I said, “but I know that Zohar is one. He has the right ingredients, and he knows how to mix them. He puts into his playing neither too much, nor too little, but exactly as much as it's necessary. He takes balance and control to sublime levels. The level where we can all hope.” A few German percussionists insist that I'm a kräuterhexe, a healing herbalist witch with a penchant for synthesizing philosophies and religions. “Drumming is a form of divination,” I say. The drummer summons the sun and the moon, the underworld, the Lord of the Dead, AND... the Echad.” “You will hear spoken in symbols, what you already know,” I tell another, who calls me a healing Tarotist. “The shamans of the tundra Yurak call their drum a singing bow,” I further say, and they offer horse-meat to the master of the drum. What can we offer Zohar? Perhaps an acknowledgment of what we are, including the ghost notes. “I'm all these things because of the magic of noise and the magic of music. We're all summoned by light.” “You have to pull the light to yourself,” another Kabbalist drummer says, and concludes that I'm a “funny woman.” At the end of the day, I don't know about the funny part, but fun I had. In Zohar's company, one always thinks of him as a pulsating light. Splendor is embedded in his hame. If Zohar is a zoharic pulse, then
drumming must return to him. Let us then intone with the shaman, the alchemist, the kr채uterhexe, the Tarotist, and the ghost note: Zohar Fresco, we bow to you in refraction. Let there be fragments of light.
HUMP Playing music with my family and friends last night, I was thinking about how to prepare for my crossing a desert next week. As I'll make a stop in the middle of an oasis, I was thinking of camels and high priestesses. In esoteric traditions the high priestess is considered as the link between the archetypal and the formative, the one who represents “the journey homeward or the return to oneself” (Angeles Arrien). Rachel Pollack makes a beautiful point in her book, The Forest of Souls, about the connection between intuitively sensing the splendor of things that exceeds our grasping and our need for a conscious processing of 'divine' information. Referring to both, the sephiroth – (and the longest journey by camel riding between the two unconscious points, keter (the visible crown) and daat (the invisible knowledge of infinite sharing) and the beauty of tiferet (the heart) – and quantum physics (we hop from one change to another), she talks about our need to make ourselves sacred, not only through magic, but through gimalut chasidim, through riding the camel of loving-kindness. What saves us from drowning in the sand (where we often intentionally stick our heads into when we don't want to hear the truth) is tapping into the secret knowledge of the mistress of waters, waters of which she gives off freely thus drawing spirit into the physical world. The alchemical marriage between Rebecca and Isaac was consolidated by her falling off the camel's back when she got a glimpse of his splendor before she entered his world. He took her into his mother's tent, and they both understood something. The 11th sephiroth is not invisible for nothing. It teaches us to play with the veil of homecoming.
ZORN'S LEMMA When the mathematicians hit you, be ready. It may not be only numbers that they have in store for you. Here I was, thinking of the growing intensity in the pingponging that I play with my genius friend, and laughing at the idea that the more I think that I can handle the biggest infinity around, imagining also that I sit on the edge of the universe where there's a lot of space between the galaxies – that's it, no more clutter, just as I like it up there – not even dust – so, yes, thinking at the edge of the universe of how beautiful it is to add one more zero to the one, and thus get further and further away from screwed up perspectives and verbal animations, I think, yes, with the biggest infinity around, the only ordinary thing that will happen is seeing the emergence of patterns that replace the world of words with images and symbols, and yes, the obvious itself will also occur like magic, and the obvious is that soon I'll change my profession, and so will he, the genius, that is, I mean, here at the edge of the universe, with space in between the ordinary occurrence of the obvious, yes, what will happen is that I'll take up his job at Aalborg University, a mighty universe indeed, and he will take up mine, an even bigger universe, as I'm always into bigger things than anyone else, and we'll improve the world from within, we'll go from the 10 raised at the power of minus 16 to some other 10 raised at some very nice infinity, to destroy numbers, crush them, to make some light, so ok, we'll need some help, I think Caravaggio is a good bet, and so is Zorn's 11th axiom of set theory, yes, we need to fix first some existences, even Gertrude Stein was into redemptive acts, so why not us, get past the obvious but not losing it out of sight, and also past the Bible, but not losing it out of sight either, and then we'll pause 5 minutes into the film that H, the genius, has been circulating around for our instruction into Zorn's lemma, which says that, well, Zorn says a lot of things, that there must be a yes somewhere in it, there's for instance a very nice yes in the very fifth minute, after the alphabet and the creation, and after the facts: "In Adam's fall we sinned all"; "Thy life to mend, God's Book attend"; "The Cat doth play, and after slay", when the camera takes a break from all that infinite obviousness of ordinary things, and when it pauses on the yes, lo and behold, not on anything else, in fact it does so quite stubbornly, pause, that is, or hesitate, to be more precise, and yes, of course, before you know it, H and I will have a lot of fans, we do already, and they will all shout, oy, or perhaps, oh my, how clever of you two, by Jove, but then by then Jove will be out of sight, I mean, with all this infinity in the provisional, who's to say what we'll get out of changing professions, but then again, at the edge of the universe, whether H will be a mediocre poet, and I a lousy mathematician, the question is, will it make any difference, no difference at all, we'll be so spaced out, and totally Muybridgian, beyond analogies, beyond the laws of attraction, beyond the laws of correspondences, beyond the laws of causality, beyond the laws of end results, and, I'm sure that I'm missing some laws right now, I'm sure of it, but, in any event, and even beyond 'whatever', there is light, there's lots of light even there where there's lots of space between the lightning stars, and yes, even though I hate
it, I think that I'll pick up the phone and ask the genius what the hell he's thinking about, although between the two of us, I know it already, so perhaps to the fans then, yes, we promise, we'll do it, we'll hit this one. Let there be 11 of them.
SUPERNOVA My energy is on the rise. The countdown has started to when I'll hit the most holy of the holiest: Norway. First, a week in Oslo in May, and then a month in the mountains in July and August. The place is booked. Hallelujah. While I feel indestructibly powerful, the feeling of freedom that Norway gives me reminds me as well of the fact that I'm also free to feel humble. Such joy, to be on top of the mountains of abstraction. And such warmth, to know that the vistas from there are not conflicting. Mentally I'm already in the new cabin looking outside the window and thinking: here I'm most logical and also most esoteric. And it's fine. It's not even uncommon. While I'm typing this right now, being physically in my own living room, I'm facing equally grand vistas: the shelf of books containing esoteric wisdom. My eyes glance sideways along the spine of Michael Dummett's book: The ViscontiSforza Tarot Cards. Hmm. Of course, I say to myself, and why not? If it didn't bother Michael Dummett to be a Professor of Logic at Oxford and to write books about tarot, why should it bother me? Mother was another example of combining cutting sharpness with acknowledging that repudiating what we don't know that we do know is a bad idea. If it hadn't been too impractical to become a philosopher in Romania in the 80s, she would have liked me to become a logician... and more. All the same. Alexander Neckam, or Albricus, was also a professor at Oxford around 1186 and taught The Song of Songs and other images to all who had a mature mind and sublime intelligence ["maturi pectoris & sublimis intelligentie"]. His teachings reflected his experiences with the Sardae Sagae, the wise women of Sardinia, who, immediately after the explosion of the supernova of 1181, took him to their subterranean temple Ta Rat' and initiated him into the fuller meaning of the Imagines Arcanae [Secret Images]. I said previously in another fragment that Norway is my lucky star. A fragment of my own supernova. Blessings unto it.
MORNING IN THE FOUNTAIN Some days are definitely better than others. Absolutely. It's been a while now since my friend, the genius mathematician who doesn't want to be called a genius – but he can't dictate around here – has been bugging me to write an article together. But today we both decided that that won't do. It's not good enough. I mean, why an article when we can do a whole book? As we have exchanged ideas on the first chapter “The Uncountability of Nothingness” of now well under its way book: Morning in the Fountain: Infinity in the Provisional, we got energized by the idea that it would be interesting to apply the Banach-Tarski theorem to the isometrical transformation of one nothingness into two identical nothingnesses. And why not? We are after all disciples of Cantor's cult of infinity, so I'm sure that we'll hack it in no time whatsoever. Indeed, there are enough wonderful things around that will keep us mentally tall, in a heightened state of excitement... and formless. As Cioran put it: “Infinity leads to nothing for it is totally provisional. ‘Everything’ is too little when compared to infinity [...] The penchant for form comes from love of finitude, the seduction of boundaries which will never engender metaphysical revelations [...] Let us live in the ecstasy of infinity, let us love that which is boundless, let us destroy forms and institute the only cult without forms: the cult of infinity.” (On the Hights of Despair, 99-100)
JENNY JOHNSON
I first began writing poems at the age of 5, so I am told. This continued throughout my childhood but it wasn’t until I was 30 that I began to write seriously. The sequence of 52 poems, A Year of Dreams, was completed in 1979 and is influenced by both the rhythm of Hebridean lyrics and the poetry of Ted Hughes. Perhaps it was not surprising, therefore, when Hughes awarded me a 1st Prize for this sequence in a competition run by what was then South West Arts. My second sequence, Becoming, was written during 1980 – each of the 26 pieces springs out of a meditation on the poem written the week before. However, the progression is not a linear one – rather, a series of journeys to and from the centre and the perimeter of the psyche. Many of the poems that followed Becoming touch on childhood experiences, the difficult relationship with my son and the resurgence of my spiritual awareness. Salzburg University published my collection The Wisdom Tree in 1993 – this represents the best of my poetry between the mid-1970s and the early 1990s. In Neptune’s Daughters, published in 1999 by Expansions Unlimited, Nottingham, almost all the poems from the first section come directly from dreams, and therefore use Jungian or Gestalt symbolism: for 10 years during the 1990s and around the Millennium, I studied dreams in depth. Surrealistic imagery has always fascinated me, in the visual arts as well as in literature. After a severe depressive illness in 1994-5, I developed an aversion to poetry of all types for some years, and wrote very little throughout the next decade. Artistic outlets were eventually found in circle dance choreography and the occasional illustration of my poems for the eco-journal GreenSpirit. I am still very much involved in these creative activities. The final 5, uncollected poems here are my most recent and are more honed than many of the ones before them: some of my earlier work I now find cluttered and stilted! I am grateful to Fred Beake for his consistent championing of my poetry. I acknowledge, also, the influence of the poets Emily Dickinson and Sylvia Plath in particular. Throughout my life, it is the music of a poem that matters most – so everything I write is for reading aloud.
WIND VERSUS SUN from A Year of Dreams
The hand on the field is a shiver of sunlight: the brittle-backed land is a spectre of life.
Closed in a nightshell, it hears the long fingersteps whisper of whiteness, feels the bunched palms on its eyelids of grass.
Wind is a whiplash, astringent with power – a crab-apple fear in a frostbitten bone. Sun protests steadily, wrests from the wizened field seedlings of gold.
TENSIONS from Becoming
Love stands before me – both known, and unknown: having dream-vision, I find in him both clarity, and opacity.
He covers himself in half-rumours – which I touch tenderly with the tips and lips of things.
His name, like a soft gift, is flown down to the hungry valleys, only to be part of an insubstantial diet – of gossip-juice.
Without a murmur, I release the rest of him, and am immediately surrounded by unbearably bare beauty: he has created a perfect, spherical hole within me.
Yet when martyrdom would lodge there, he begins, begins to return – to teach me how to learn, and lose … and learn, and lose again…. How much simpler indefinite absence would be!
To become, I constantly loosen, and tighten … loosen, and tighten.
PASTORALE from Becoming
An oboe is heard first – crisp as an apple. Then a flute – emollient-cold. Like milk. Then a clarinet – warm and mysterious as black currant wine.
On slopes where restorative air continuously sharpens, the appeal of the oboe penetrates into the very core – the refined sorrow unnoticed, except by the keen.
Near the estuary, the resolute flute doctors the febrile summer, doctors the pasture-under-the-shimmer, doctors the last life there – the distanced, the softly coughing.
On the edge of the dry gorge, the clarinet calls: ”Follow me!”
What I seek is a perfect trio: what I find are three fragments – the ascetic sweets of air; the determined unsteadiness of water; the secretive possessiveness of earth.
LOW TIDE
It was the mist we noticed first – Gothic on the cliffs.
Later, when we promenaded, everything seemed to be slipping away: the autumn tide had receded, had left a faded sand to expose ungarmented last hopes; the afternoon town was a husk, half filled – with enervated sun, with diminished wind; and even when the unwinding-within-walking was over – even then, we found our surroundings disturbingly unchallenging.
We remembered an intense artist who had lived here once – remembered aloud: we imagined that by doing this, we could add a little substance to the place.
LOOKING IN
The box comes alive: her favourites are the pink and mauve cardigan-buttons – the diamond ones, with lily of the valley in their crevices. She collects light in these.
Till something inside her protests, jealous; jounces up and down, up and down: till the taste on her palate is of staleness – like that of toy metal.
So after her lukewarm milk – and her biscuit, peppered with holes like a colander’s – she is glad of a blanket and cottons to darken the evening…. Once underneath them, she imagines saffron stars, expanding and contracting; then a doorway on a
mountain. Then continually, feeling even higher than the pine – she listens to an atmosphere rehearsing its aria; finds countless variations on her friends and acquaintances, pulling uphill to accompany her….
However – she cannot, cannot enter it fully, this dream; she can only look in: her foetal position is laughed at. Very soon, she encounters a blinder, kinder sleep….
Early in the morning, she is glancing at those buttons again;
collecting a perfume of lights: dancing the pinks and mauves; greens and saffrons.
MOTHER, DAUGHTER
Tuesday the seventh of August: in the dampened grounds of the cathedral I have kept my appointment and found my Jewish mother; and my youngest aunt; and their violet-eyed companion.
It is thirty-eight years since we parted – Sylvia and I; yet now I feel no sudden gift, no withdrawal of energy: the first conversations are strangely easy.
The three of them, all in their sixties, look quickly for a darkened inn where they can smoke. They talk safely for a while – about furniture, jewellery.
But once in the pub, Sylvia, with curious intensity, begins to compare jaw-lines; and hands; and feet: afternoon novelty alone cannot satisfy, she learns.
I, who have seemed to be mostly air and water, become partially earthed – and less mysterious: I try to remember the names of my ancestors –
Abraham, Reuben, Harry, Frances; the geographical details – Minsk, Russia. And I think of my Jewish father – our hazel eyes.
Before Sylvia leaves for Illinois, I shall give her my poems: in exchange, she will offer her choicest American perfumes‌. Caring, wary, she must prepare herself for more than one journey.
TUESDAY THE COAT HANGER
Fever now distorts … now straightens … makes me a child. … Unable to digest the October air, unable to accept your unnurtured house, your departure, I stare at my church of a wardrobe – at its brazen rail.
Seven coat hangers face me: days of the week, the blue one being Tuesday. And although the colour anaesthetises, I continue to stare – breathing much faster than before: this Tuesday is acquiring a pair of shoulders,
a gold head; is a prince clothed in a cerulean cloak with a silk maroon lining. And his words are like blades – compelling me to rise, to go to your garden.
For your home has reopened! You appear beneath the apple trees moving through the healing grass, your arms full of fruit. Tuesday softens. We wander in this clove-scented heaven for hours. Till dusk turns monitor.
Not wanting to see you absorbed by the dark, I lie on the ground and coax myself to sleep. … In the morning you are nowhere … everywhere. Tuesday remains dustily in the wardrobe, behind cool doors.
SEPTUAGESIMA
Two years and three weeks before her seventieth birthday, my womb, not my mind, registers her death: it accelerates my carmine – till her cancer is totally drowned; benign.
It is three o’clock. Devon. I sense, with half-bewilderment, how my four walls mourn in their sea-blue paper and saintly paint; in their green and lilac trimmings.
I sense it – till a scrutinising full moon clears the sky; choosing for a mask the curtain with a perished lining…. Sylvia, my mother has pointedly returned to her birthplace in Hampshire. The sun – her sun – comes yawning through Aquarius.
THE VICAR’S CLOSE, WELLS
Between cathedral and choir school, an archway stands – entrance to a rectangle of stone: stone dwellings with long, decorative chimneys; a road of flagstones, school uniform gray.
Late medieval, it still suggests regions beyond time; beyond form: suggests the precinct within the void.
I feel compelled to walk its entire length with even steps: I am moved by the rightness of the symmetry.
The energy of stone is different from that of greenwood, or ocean: here, I am neither aflame, nor in dreams: I give and receive evenly.
How different from the clasping and losing experience in towns too clock-tied! How different from the ecstasy and terror of the wilderness!
In the city outside, sleeping water encircles the palace: quickened, it wakens the stone of the streets.
CRESCENT
In her recurring dreams under the newest moon, she is borne by the lagoon’s breath towards fan tracery on stalwart walls.
Home, as always, is semi-unknown. She is journeying again through rounded archways; and again, through a brown and cream labyrinth –
a labyrinth which is expanding according to her needs; which never confuses: infinite freedom, infinite protection, is here.
Coming to a room with a curvaceous dining-table, she rediscovers her cradle of a basket; and her scallops; and her segments of mandarin, and cantaloupe.
Watching over her, are impressions of mature man, mature woman – each with prominent eyebrows…. With their permission, she is waiting for the dawn, the downpour; the resolving, gouache rainbow.
EAST
Early in February, the wind comes straight from Siberia – bearing on its giant spine a fine snow.
Easterly is broader than northerly: it may clasp you to death. Easterly is a bear: northerly is known for its lupine tooth.
In Latvia and Lithuania, the people rise up with the wind: thirty degrees of frost do not deter them. Outer cold and inner heat meet within the pains of a slow burning; an uncertain birth.
In the Middle East: war. On English television, speculation camouflages every insecurity.
The sun, the moon, take turns in a vaporous rising. Snow and frost remain, wintering the earth.
TOWARDS DAWN
Towards dawn, the queen can be seen with her daughters – walking between the deciduous trees from palace to river. She has chosen the very whitest of her robes – one that is clasped with mother-of-pearl. The daughters inherit this need for brightness – their butter-rich crowns upon darkening heads. They are accompanied by the peacock – one that is watchful, not vain.
Each right hand carries a lighted candle: there are candles in the porches of houses they pass. Here, they can glimpse the morning star, the crescent moon. And as crisp as this moon, are the callings of a silver bell with a gold clapper.
The king remains a lunar shell: remains in the barque which will bear him downstream to his burial-home. His widow, his children, pause on the bank; they wait for sun to manifest above the hills: when it dies, they blow out their candles. A flame plays on their faces, in the form of compassion, constancy. It is even within the expression of the peacock.
As the gold climbs further and further to marry the silver – the spirit of the king, poised over the bone,
becomes light enough to depart‌. The barque is unfastened.
LIFE REVIEW
A mother attempts to videophone her son: because of one half-broken button, nothing is to be seen. However – fancying she hears the whispering of companions – she tries again.
All of a sudden – visions begin: in the first – the schoolboy of nine crouches in front of a stage hearth: others in the class, it seems, are chosen for drama-without-scars. Mother, like son, is the unobserved observer.
In her vision of the six-year-old boy by the sea – toying with a watch that she has given him – she catches herself stealing it back; and passing it on…. Recalling that north-east wind at the end of August, she learns about his sense of unreality.
In a third vision – he turns into the baby in the grass: becomes the imago; the six-pointed star…. When he jumps his wordless patterns into unlimited air, she feels how he concentrates the wisdom here and there; here and there.
At last, the videophone reveals him fully nineteen – rejection pressed into withdrawn pupils: beyond them – are signs of a dying star…. Finding its pulse – the mother begins to listen: to respond in time.
PERDITA
Although I have entered the ancient heart of a wood – and have circled it for hours – I cannot find a source for this crying of a baby: this crying without crescendo; without rest.
Suddenly, a lake’s broad face peeps through the firs; and a white swan floats towards me, looking me in the eye: she climbs on to the bank as if to make for the lakeside well. Thirstily, I follow.
Willing the water to rub from awareness my nightmare of tears, I find myself staring through refectory windows: staring past meals at the hearth; right into the far, far corner – into the howls of an old baby.
Instantly, as I become her, I am sucked into the loud light, the pattern of pain without centre…. Then, half separate, I stand at the refectory door – and walk towards her; and take her to the
cradle of myself: to the room’s hearth: the cauldron, the ladle.
BORDERLAND
Ascending towards midsummer, with evening clouds over the river Otter – over the curve of incoming tides – I am drawn to the border of newborn consciousness.
These wildfowl are stilled: they are held within reflections of taming sunlight. High on my right, a helix of larksong begins…. Whichever way I turn, there are mellowing headlands.
In Sidmouth, I am nourished by straight rain; by the cerise-browns of Devon sandstone. Challenged further west, I run along the damp shore in luminous boots.
The estuary beach feels abandoned except for the gull and the shell – and a current of expectancy out there … in here.
But now, where do I go? … The essence of the place calls out: “Today, you have sampled: tomorrow, you travel inland: here, on the very edge, you may play … play.”
Suddenly, a child leaps high by the fringes of the water. I dance alongside: I become White Wave‌. Always, we are close to an unseen guardian, she and I: in the sorrow-joy; the sea-sky.
IDYLLWILD, CALIFORNIA
In the moment between dreaming and waking, the sky needs to be hidden, the unbidden words furled: in Idyllwild, a time long after the dream is the time to begin.
Blue jay, robin and woodpecker witness the dawn – at one with the butterscotch tang of the pine-bark, the chocolate bark of the manzanita.
By forest boulders on Mount San Jacinto, raccoons, lizards, are keenly aware of wolf, coyote, mountain lion, black bear.
Now, words fly wild as disturbed feathers; then swoop like an eagle thru pure, bare sky.
ALLOWING IT TO LOOSEN
Not consciously, quickly releasing the hurt of it, but allowing it times for loosening in secret‌. That is the key.
For seventeen years, my namesake was a close friend. In the end, when she sliced me from her prime, I became too ungrounded for grief.
Now, as my strength rises, I strive less. Recurring dreams of the namesake remind me to wait, wait for my heart to unbind its hurt.
AFTER THE TERIYAKI
After the teriyaki – the trampoline. Eleven is lean; ravenous. In the in-between time before sunset, before the onset of puberty, he becomes the ManBoy; the defender of his Mother – Mother who is creative with her courage.
His father is irregularly absent.
The cat, Sky, curls its blackness into his heart. Nana is witness to it – to his suppleness with words, to his innocence tinged with dark. She is fearful of asymmetry.
Eleven is lean; ravenous: Fifteen has a talent for design. As an only sister, she becomes the storm’s eye: his balance: his compass.
PLAYING WITH AIR
As parasitic stems embroider the oak – a paraglider pilot begins his attachment.
As a gate brays open – he manoeuvres the risers, is a puppeteer with his marionette; an Aeolian harpist.
Now that he is the bold one, his canopy cowers and billows in fits and starts.
Harnessed ad helmeted – so tiny, so new against Cretaceous rock! – he runs, at last, towards the vagaries of chalk’s precipice:
sprung like a child….
In this moment, he is one with a hiss of distance between sky and sea – like a soaring pterodactyl, like a gravitating angel.
But he finds himself caught between the currents of abandon and control.
WESTER ROSS
Wherever I go, I sense mountains: pyramids and paps of sandstone, limestone and gneiss replenish the psyche. To watch is to touch.
Lochs live peacefully among them, purple and turquoise: at Gairloch, a great skua soars over the boat; I see a cormorant, a harbour of porpoises; a gray seal, almost asleep, her head above the water.
On the horizon, Skye, Harris, brighten and fade in a thin mist. In Plockton, the lowest of rainbows grazes Loch Carron; the sun turns theatrical, illuminating a tiny island.
Near the Pass of the Cattle, Highland cows and Jacob ewes are unfazed by the passing car – or by any invader, past or present.
GLORIA MINDOCK
is the author of La Porţile Raiului (Ars Longa Press, 2010, Romania) translated into the Romanian by Flavia Cosma, Nothing Divine Here (U Soku Stampa, 2010, Montenegro), and Blood Soaked Dresses (Ibbetson Street Press, 2007). She is editor of Červená Barva Press, Istanbul Literary Review, and co-editor of X-Peri. She has had numerous publications including Poet Lore, River Styx, Phoebe, Blackbox, Poesia, Bogg, Ibbetson, WHLR, UNU: Revista de Cultura, Citadela, Aurora, Arabesques, Levure Litteraire, and two chapbooks, Doppelganger (S. Press) and Oh Angel (U Šoku Štampa). From 1984-1994, Gloria was editor of the Boston Literary Review/BLuR. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, St. Botolph Award, and was awarded a fellowship from the Massachusetts Cultural Council distributed by the Somerville Arts Council. Gloria’s poetry has been translated into Romanian, Serbian, Spanish, and French. Gloria currently works as a Social Worker and freelances teaching poetry workshops and editing manuscripts.
LIGHTNESS I am terrified of the night, darkness, blackness, lit up only by the moon, the stars. Round dots, a graveyard owned by the angels. It is no accident that I look up and see them. If I could, I would fly up among them. Touch each star, connecting them to each other. A brightness would happen like no other, no dead on earth rotting, disintegrating or being eaten by bugs. A lightness, letting all souls pass a barrier kissing the universe hello.
MISSING The villagers died with grace. Bravely. Those who survived told about the dying. Screaming was their preparation. Some colorful houses are still standing. When looking at them, you can imagine their life in horror. Maybe, I really see them— ghosts, filmed for my eyes. My sympathy is in waves. They can hear me speak. Their hearts beat faster and they understand. They feel my breath— This is not un-human. Overhead birds sing about what they saw. It is not joyful chirping. This evening, there is a big light shinning from the countryside. It is my fault, I lit a match so the world could see, remember. The military killed them. Why isn’t the world sorrowful? The missing are missing.
Dante I’m related to Dante. When I mention this, the response is, “that is why you are like you are and write about death.” I take this as a compliment and laugh. Yes, this is why. Words floating in space immortal— floating into the brains of the public. Dante, Hell is here and the people are killing each other with their guns, machetes, and by other means. Each annihilation, a final death in this horrible world. Living is not what I expected it to be. Nothing but struggle, then death. Time moves, collecting death for its museums— graveyards of souls. It was an interesting life, catastrophe after catastrophe. When I reached to grab on, there was nothing to grab onto, no assistance from anything. I saw them all die so I turned out the light in my house as the ashes blew overhead out of respect. Hell is a silhouette Dante— waiting to strike with long fingers and huge fingernails. Killing, leaving blood stains which disappear leaving us all in exile from earth.
CONFETTI The confetti falls like stars, hitting you on the head with consistency. Then, it attaches to your arms, making a blanket for your bones. Such warmth surrounds your soul making you immobile. Standing there, you taste the moon as breath encircles, like outer space engulfs the planets. You are now spinning into exile. With outstretched arms, the confetti leaves you bare as you shake it off— walking on with no remainder. Vanquished, like your ego. Confetti, lying there on the floor in different colors, alone, swept up by a broom for another universe, a morgue for your voice.
Karachi, Pakistan 3 children, all under 5 sit on a hospital bed, covered in blood. A bomb exploded in Karachi and these children, survived. From this photo, in the New York Times, I could see fear in their eyes. The middle child, had the most blood covering his body. I wonder, what was he thinking? There is no end to the blood flow and there never will be. Bombs will continue and bodies will pile up. Many, won’t know what hit them, but these children will never be the same. These children, won’t dream because they won’t sleep. Forever, in their eyes will be the site of the dying, the smoke, the building shattering around them and as the mess is cleaned up and no evidence remains, who will clean the children, blood forever exposed on them. I wonder, what are they thinking?
THE GUARDIANS The mountain sea, the sky meet with only a few cloud wisps intermediating this event, my guardian angels. Whatever direction I take in my life, they watch me. I watch them. Looking to them for approval, my path is planned. Tonight, I will feel lonely with the stars‌ Taking one in my hand, I will show it daylight and what it has missed from my perspective. On the Almalfi Coast, on top of the world, little village after little village, good wine, winding roads, help me forget the world’s pains. I let the star fall out of my hand. Let someone else wish on it. Angels, follow me. Knock me out with your secrets.
IN CAMBODIA The bodies wrapped in woven mattes are lined up in the corridor of the hospital. Bodies of the young, old‌ Panic crushed the people into broken bones, hearts, skulls underfoot thinking it would make a beautiful picture in the New York Times. Little did they know that they would die today. Would they have dressed differently if they knew? This didn’t turn out to be 15 minutes of fame but faces in a photo captured for eternity. One little boy watched the bridge fall from a distance seeing his parent plunge to their drowning. People were screaming and Panic laughed. With the suspension bridge gone, water suffocated their lungs. Their families wept and the world watched in black and white ink
Word If there was a word to describe war, what would it be? Bullet, machine gun, knife, machete, bomb… These things kill. Bite into your flesh, caressing you into an image captured by a camera. Forever, a photo looked at, you look so innocent, brave, mounted for history so no one forgets…but they do. When you died, what were your last thoughts? Home, family, wife, children, life, panic, good-bye… As your bleed into the soil, it changes, you change. Your death seems too long, too unfair. Soon, they’ll remove you from this war torn place into a new place. A place where the nightmare ends and the future is over.
DEFENSELESS I am defenseless… pounding my feet on a flat surface and if it isn’t flat, it will be. I am defenseless, smoking cigarettes… one after another. My breath struggles… How do I inhale and whisper at the same time? I am defenseless against El Salvador… with hate and love, turning away from my country…where is my forgiveness? How can one forget a former life? I am defenseless against the wooden floor I walk on …sliding across the floor, fast— forgetting where my country is. I am defenseless over thoughts, taking them into my mouth hoping my equilibrium will balance my voice. I am defenseless against inertia… My eyes gaze with such complexity that aspirin is needed. I am defenseless when speaking… Words lash into the air for a home to cling to… but the ground is full of dead bodies. I am defenseless when I smile… mouth awakened by a machete… My skin is only nicked… I am defenseless and can’t stop being
with my El Salvadorans… Our silence like the waves crash into the earth and bounce back into our ears I am defenseless… a gift of surrender sleeps as the grave nears, the stones we want are unmarked— blank but infinite I am defenseless in comfort… The precipice closes in as we touch the hands of angels.
WAR GAMES From a young age, boys play soldiers. Little army plastic figures, fight one another as the boys make sound effects. Boom, Boom, Boom, Got Ya, You’re Dead, Pow! The war takes to the backyard and the boys pretend to fight with each other, rolling in the grass, playing dead. Little did they know, a few years later, this would be a reality. The noises they pretended to make, would be more terrifying, and watching buddies die, would change their lives forever. The boys wear a real uniform and a hat that goes with it or a helmet. The color blends in with the earth. Camouflaging their hearts. One must protect that. They are guarded, ready to shoot for what they believe in or not. Fighting for a freedom, they never had. They could have died, if caught playing soldiers. At 13 years old, taught to shoot and kill, childhood gone, no tears to cry, alone, their soul screams, “I am sorry.”
The Green Door is an international arts magazine which apart from producing regular numbers also devotes special issues to specific themes or single author collections. Submissions can be made to editorsgreendoor@gmail.com for inclusion in the magazine or for consideration as a single number. The editors may also solicit, from time to time, work for artists who they wish to highlight. All artists here represented can be contacted via the editors at the above email address