Friday, October 30, 2009
थे गुअर्दियन ऑफ़ क्लास
Odd thing with waiters they can see your suit
is rack bought, not tailor made, wordlessly look
further down the menu recommend something
you might be able to afford. Wine list, forget it,
they have house wine served in a jug.
Regal when serving, doing you a favour letting
you mingle with, what they consider the upper
crust. Then they will go home to a flat they share
with ten other people and sleep on a sweat
stained mattress on a dirty floor.
थे ब्रोव्निंग
Hard times, awoke in a bed with a woman I hadn’t
seen before, she snored. Running down to the docks,
gone the ship, my home. The scorn in dockers faces,
it is a great shame for a sailor to be left behind.
In my pockets coins for a beer to steady my nerves
and remember I had fifty dollar in the watch pocket,
A motor boat idling gave its driver the money, down
the river we caught up with my ship, the captain took
take me onboard with a scowling face.
Hard times, had me working nights, but wanted a full
breakfast in the morning. 14 hours a day, the crew liked
my cooking, it didn’t help what the crew thought.
In Hull a new cook came one, as the captain said, that was
reliable, the crew said:”we are sorry to see you go”, but not
one of them spoke out for me. So the lesson is, forget
the crew, be a friend of the boss and he will understand
your flaws smile and say:” don’t do it again. He will like
you because he think he has got the power over you
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
the termination
In Pakistan bombs fall, explode and artillery
shells whizz through the air, burning building
and dead children, all this happen when I sit
listening to a program about abortion.
It strikes me that those who are anti-abortion,
often are for capital penalty and do not dither
to drop rockets on villages in the mountains of
Pakistan or Afghanistan.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Sunday, October 25, 2009
sex and the medical profession
I’m sitting in my car waiting for my wife who is at mass
I find it impossible to believe in any religion, but I say
nothing it is important for my wife to believe in a merciful
god. Paris, and agony, my wife prayed but did call
an ambulance. Battling doctors, how young they are, I felt
like a low paid, reluctant actor in a hospital drama, one
who has to play the nurse when he really wanted to be
the famous heart transplant surgeon.
The doc asked if I smoked. No! She looked sullen since
I didn’t, it is so easy to blame the fag. I said I had smoked
15 years ago, she looked relieved and told me to keep up
the good, work: she removed the catheter a lovely pee
Is better than sex, if temporarily, now I feel like making
love, my wife tells I’m deluded, I say nothing but bid my
time, keep a blanket in my car in case I should meet
someone who is equally barmy.
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
a poem
Mighty Amazon flood
Flows strongly towards the sea
Pauses by the delta
But now it is all too late
Reduced to melancholy
Sweet water blending with sea
And history is forgotten
Monday, October 19, 2009
unheaard music
The fingers on my left hand move all by themselves
like they are playing piano that produces music
I cannot hear. I watch my fingers play but it makes no
sense so I try to stop by holding them still with my
right hand’s fingers. So I sit like a vicar contemplating
the Sunday sermon, a mild one who hasn’t an arsenal
of fire and brimstone speeches, but would rather talk
about the coming spring. My wife brings me a glass of
water and a pill, fingers rest, but I would liked to have
heard the music they played, for all I know it could
have been music brought to me in a dream by Mozart
who died so young that he can’t believe it yet, and
tries trough, me to play his latest masterpiece.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
tanka...amazon
Poem
Mighty Amazon flood
Flows strongly towards the sea
Pauses by the delta
But now it is all too late
Reduced to melancholy
Sweet water blending with sea
And history is forgotten
a housewife in alexandria
The woman in Alexandria Egypt in her black chador
which mercifully hides a thin, body, lines up outside
a bakery she has walked six miles to buy bread for
the day. Her body could have fitted a Dior’s creation
snugly but as it is she has to haste home and feed
her children. She has been to the fruit market too
where rib cage showing mules with open sores wait,
their starvation have lasted so long that they are no
longer hungry but eat when fed. A rich woman, who
has never starved wanders about, tells mule drivers
off for not taking care of their beasts and dispenses
salve on animals’ sores. The woman, with a model’s
body, is poor and blind to this, empathy with animals
are for the wealthy, those with time to care.
Friday, October 16, 2009
Partnership (the payoff)
Partnership (the payoff)
It is our job to control this stony, dusty landscape you
claim as yours (my god you’re welcome to it), we’ll
drive 20 miles along a rough lane with our armoured
cars. We don’t want any trouble, but we are members
of NATO doing a job. Behind the ten mile-stone you
will find cigarettes and money in a plastic bag. We can
live in peace, we like to come home in one piece, receive
medals and be admired by the girls. Three months hence
we will go home, someone else will take over they may
be more serious than us and actually take their job
sober; think they are winning a war that was lost years
ago when NATO (US’s foreign legion) declared war on
the wrong enemy.
losing ones mates
I used to have many friends, but I was busy and time passed;
got a new phone number neglected to tell them, when I, one
day, rang few of them, they had moved on too and one had
died; now that I’m suddenly old I think of them all, we used
to have much fun and deep talks. I’ve met a few of them lately
but distance has made us passing ships in the night, blinking
lights and have a good voyage. A man who neglect his friends
will always lose, there will be no one to tell him when he errs
and make gentle fun of him when he gets a little pompous.
At an art exhibition I met on such friend he criticised my latest
collection of poetry, I answered by saying his work was too
commercial and made to fit a hotel foyer. Years ago we would
have had a shouting match, got drunk and made up, now we
parted in silence; my phone doesn’t ring, we are now passing
ships on a vast ocean of the friendless.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
late night poems
Autumnal Aura
The fall month of October, in upper Algarve,
is still warm but with cooling evenings and
sunlight begins to fade earlier every day.
The sky is still blue, if paler than yesterday’s
and has white strands of clouds near its
horizon. Windless is this day but birds on
the roof, have left their nests flown south,
Africa I think, for a few month. They will be
back in March have their chicks and make
a lot of noise. The man from the forest has
delivered winter wood, wrote him a check,
gave him a whisky; so I’m ready for winter
but secretly wish these peaceful days will
stretch well into November.
,,,,,,,,,,,,,
Unheard Music (Mozart)
The fingers on my left hand move all by themselves
like they are playing piano that produces music
I cannot hear. I watch my fingers play but it makes no
sense so I try to stop by holding them still with my
right hand’s fingers. So I sit like a vicar contemplating
the Sunday sermon, a mild one who hasn’t an arsenal
of fire and brimstone speeches, but would rather talk
about the coming spring. My wife brings me a glass of
water and a pill, fingers rest, but I would liked to have
heard the music they played, for all I know it could
have been music brought to me in a dream by Mozart
who died so young that he can’t believe it yet, and tries
trough me to play his latest masterpiece.
..............
Nightly Thoughts
I wonder why a quiet evening isn’t enough, the thinking
will not stop slow down and make sense; calming effect
the wine has but it’s always too much; ideas drown,
must catch them while they make sense, the night is
deep and silent while I wait for something to articulate.
Art speaks, but I have to nail down the words, they are
always inadequate and paler than those in my mind,
I have giving birth to ugly ducklings once again, but they
are mine, I will not send them into abyss’s of delete hell
just yet, but wait to see if they can learn to walk alone.
Emancipation
French women are free well-educated and elegant,
yet spend too much times striving to attract men and
open their legs for anyone. Later they call it freedom
of choice while frantically trying to get money out of
the man who knocked them up and left them hanging
there twisting in their own distressing liberation.
They will intellectualize their misery, see themselves
as a Sagan melancholic, yet yearning to be middle
class housewives worrying about the prices of onions.
Yes, they will be married, to the very best address, and
meet other wives and talk endlessly about equality.
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
French emancipation
French Emancipation?
French women are free well-educated and elegant,
yet spend too much times striving to attract men and
open their legs for anyone. Later they call it freedom
of choice while frantically trying to get money out of
the man who knocked them up and left them hanging
there twisting in their own distressing liberation.
They will intellectualize their misery, see themselves
as a Sagan melancholic, yet yearning to be middle
class housewives worrying about the prices of onions.
Yes, they will be married, to the very best address, and
meet other wives and talk endlessly about equality.
A Day in the News (nepotism)
I was painting the hall but didn’t have enough
brown paint, mixed some yellow into it and it looked
like the walls of a French bakery. The young son of
the Gallic president has landed a top job, this is type
of nepotism that can only happen in France where people
still have fear of those in power, it takes a long time
before they dare protest and when they do, they tend
overreact. France reminds me of African nations,
they have not truly grasped the idea of democracy,
a leader tends to dispends favours to family and friends.
What about Norway? Several parties, yet the same
political families rule generation after generations.
Lazy electors, only vote for names they know, surely
Norway could not be like France or Gabon?
French emancipation
French Emancipation?
French women are free well-educated and elegant,
yet spend too much times striving to attract men and
open their legs for anyone. Later they call it freedom
of choice while frantically trying to get money out of
the man who knocked them up and left them hanging
there twisting in their own distressing liberation.
They will intellectualize their misery, see themselves
as a Sagan melancholic, yet yearning to be middle
class housewives worrying about the prices of onions.
Yes, they will be married, to the very best address, and
meet other wives and talk endlessly about equality.
A DAY IN THE NEWS
A Day in the News (nepotism)
I was painting the hall but didn’t have enough
brown paint, mixed some yellow into it and it looked
like the walls of a French bakery. The young son of
the Gallic president has landed a top job, this is type
of nepotism that can only happen in France where people
still have fear of those in power, it takes a long time
before they dare protest and when they do, they tend
overreact. France reminds me of African nations,
they have not truly grasped the idea of democracy,
a leader tends to dispends favours to family and friends.
What about Norway? Several parties, yet the same
political families rule generation after generations.
Lazy electors, only vote for names they know, surely
Norway could not be like France or Gabon?
France is more than Paris
This dark, unfriendly French provincial town, only,
a pizza parlour open run by a gloomy, unshaven
person who looked like a reluctant refugee from
Kosovo I wouldn’t like to stay down-wind from.
Everything made of plastic tables, chairs that once
had been white, under the counter rested pieces
of pizzas that was going cold, I had two pieces one
with salami, the other with tuna, washed down with
soft drinks. Finished the meal, the man looked at me
as saying:” What are you still doing here? I left.
Turned, looked into dirty windows, and thought” If this
is hell I better start saying my prayer now.
more than paris
This dark, unfriendly French provincial town, only,
a pizza parlour open run by a gloomy, unshaven
person who looked like a reluctant refugee from
Kosovo I wouldn’t like to stay down-wind from.
Everything made of plastic tables, chairs that once
had been white, under the counter rested pieces
of pizzas that was going cold, I had two pieces one
with salami, the other with tuna, washed down with
soft drinks. Finished the meal, the man looked at me
as saying:” What are you still doing here? I left.
Turned, looked into dirty windows, and thought” If this
is hell I better start saying my prayer now.
evolution
Some people have problems understanding
their ancestors were apes. They feel somehow
belittled not being unique, not created and
evolved like any other life-form.
Orang-utan is my favourite great, great, great
something ancestor, it slowly swing from tree
to tree, mind its own business, looks cute and
doesn’t dream of conquering the world.
Jesus, I’m sure, is the result of a long evolution,
up from the sea, shimming up a tree for safety,
down again walking about with two strong legs:
and I ask; is God a dignified orang-utan?
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Monday, October 12, 2009
the resettlers
Black is white yellow is green, war is peace and
everything is truth even if it is a lie when spoken
from an auto cue by a man who should receive
an Oscar for expression of horror about Afghan carnage,
a war he expanded and will keep on fighting till
he lose and declares victory. A lake of blood, will
the west ever be forgiven for trespassing into
the business of the Middle East. And in the end,
even though they don’t know it, yet Israel will pay
the heaviest price for being a Western transplant
that did not take root in Arabic soil.
oskar.hansen@sapo.pt
tanka
For those who are dead
The planet doesn’t exist
And it never did
Must we for that reason think
Life is a lone planet’s dream?
Tanka
Writers and poets
Think they can be immortal
By ink a pen
But everything ever written
Will rot as autumn leaves do.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
Saturday, October 10, 2009
second reading of the "homecoming "
this is a second reading of "the Homecoming"
published by www.cyberwit.net
where the boook can be purchased
the collection is a part of a triptych
the price of the collecttion of 140 pages
is 15 euros and there is a limited issue
Friday, October 9, 2009
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Cracks in the mirror
readings from one of my books "cracks in the mirror"
the book is published by cybewit and can be bought through
amazon bookshop
the collection has been reviewed by "The journal a respected
poetry magazine in England it's editro is the fabled Sam Smith