Os Meus Poemas: 29/11/10

29/11/10

só espero que o que te leve
seja o vento
e não a tempestade
que assola o meu coração
que já não sente
a passagem do dia para a noite

já que todos os ruídos se calaram
com a solenidade do momento
e as sobrancelhas se fecharam
à luz que a perspectiva de um novo dia que poderá existir
sintamos então esta mágoa de português
e preparemo-nos para o velório
agora que novamente se torna claro
a inaptidão de quem está de partida

sentir que fazes falta
e ouvir mil explosões no ar
continuadamente
a adoecer

e nada faz o tempo parar
o tiquetaque das pessoas que agora se preparam
para se despedir
e reparam
que de nada vale um sorriso fechado
um abraço sentido
uma palavra ao ouvido

de nada vale querer sentir
o que não pode ser sentido

O meu avô morreu: 29 de Novembro de 2010

RIP

Poem of the day: sorrows

Lucille Clifton

sorrows

who would believe them winged
who would believe they could be

beautiful who would believe
they could fall so in love with mortals

that they would attach themselves
as scars attach and ride the skin

sometimes we hear them in our dreams
rattling their skulls clicking

their bony fingers
they have heard me beseeching

as i whispered into my own
cupped hands enough not me again

but who can distinguish
one human voice

amid such choruses
of desire

Poem of the day: Eternity

William Blake

Eternity

He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy
He who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity's sunrise

Poem of the day: A Note on Absence

Martin Corless-Smith

A Note on Absence

The story over having wished it otherwise

The water surface/friendship

The drunk euphoric

Good Friday music

Not in this lifetime

A fig tree grows

No miserable deed will do

Space and time, dimensions that just bring more of this

For anyone who has a nose

Show gratitude

A king sat in a box

8 p.m. Friday

rain defeating snow

a space too narrow to pass through

Os meus poemas: A passagem de Deus

A passagem de Deus

Um dia vou fazer-me passar por um Deus anónimo
e tocar nas mãos virgens dos dissidentes
e mentir-lhes ao ouvido,
sussurrando imagens de sangue e de anarquia

Nas minhas parcas vestes
enterrarei um punhal de arrependimento
em vez de um mandato de paz
e bastará uma palavra
de incentivo à violência
para que se dê a guerra santa

De pés descalços a arder no fogo da terra
espalharei impunidades e crenças invisíveis
e deixarei que outros ardam na fogueira
tão-somente por suspeição

Não revelarei o meu preconceito de género
nem o meu conceito de igualdade
para não ferir susceptibilidades
mas rezarei por todos como se fossem iguais
sofrerão todos a mesma dor
sonharão todos com o mesmo apocalipse

Darei uma dentada na maçã da vida
e tentarei padecer do mesmo mal que os cristãos
não ordenarei divisões, apenas segregações
comandadas pelo poder

Far-se-á justiça com as próprias mãos
com a minha permissão
e o futuro será risonho
para os pecadores
e severo para os combatentes

Deixo para trás um livro
cheio de palavras verdadeiras
que serão o espelho de uma sociedade
à minha imagem e semelhança

E no final dos tempos
vão todos passar ao largo da minha memória
e tudo isto parecerá
um mero acto de auto-flagelação.

Album of the month: Darkwater - Where Stories End

This is exciting. Darkwater have just released their new album "Where Stories End", three years after they released the epic masterpiece "Calling the Earth to Witness". Many people still don't know and have never heard of this band, but after that first album, shame on you! Being the progeek I am, I had to check it out and I was amazed when I listened to that album. My love for Darkwater has grown since then and I become a serious fan. And now I'm celebrating the release of their new album, from this relatively young band who I'm sure will still grow immensely. I hope this album puts them on the map, at least for a lot more people and gives them a little bit more of visibility in the metal scene, which they deserve, a lot more than the attention some really crappy bands get for reasons that have nothing to do with music. I respect this band very much and I'm just happy they have a new baby. Album of the month to listen to starting now.

Cheers Darkwater, I salute you and your new album and I will be a fan regardless of it's quality (I seriously doubt it'll suck). And I'm spreading the word. Let me just tell you this, three years is a long time, let's make sure the next one will be faster, yes? No pressure, as long as it's good.

Poem of the day: Cézanne

Alfred Kreymborg

Cézanne

Our door was shut to the noon-day heat.
We could not see him.
We might not have heard him either—
Resting, dozing, dreaming pleasantly.
But his step was tremendous—
Are mountains on the march?

He was no man who passed;
But a great faithful horse
Dragging a load
Up the hill.

Poem of the day: from One Time

Christian Wiman

from One Time

2. 2047 Grace Street

But the world is more often refuge
than evidence, comfort and covert
for the flinching will, rather than the sharp
particulate instants through which God's being burns
into ours. I say God and mean more
than the bright abyss that opens in that word.
I say world and mean less
than the abstract oblivion of atoms
out of which every intact thing emerges,
into which every intact thing finally goes.
I do not know how to come closer to God
except by standing where a world is ending
for one man. It is still dark,
and for an hour I have listened
to the breathing of the woman I love beyond
my ability to love. Praise to the pain
scalding us toward each other, the grief
beyond which, please God, she will live
and thrive. And praise to the light that is not
yet, the dawn in which one bird believes,
crying not as if there had been no night
but as if there were no night in which it had not been.

Poem of the Day: Continuities

Walt Whitman

Continuities

(From a talk I had lately with a German spiritualist)

Nothing is ever really lost, or can be lost,
No birth, identity, form—no object of the world.
Nor life, nor force, nor any visible thing;
Appearance must not foil, nor shifted sphere confuse thy brain.
Ample are time and space—ample the fields of Nature.
The body, sluggish, aged, cold—the embers left from earlier fires,
The light in the eye grown dim, shall duly flame again;
The sun now low in the west rises for mornings and for noons continual;
To frozen clods ever the spring's invisible law returns,
With grass and flowers and summer fruits and corn.

R.I.P.

Rest In Peace

Poem of the day: The Emperor

Matthew Rohrer

The Emperor

She sends me a text

she's coming home

the train emerges

from underground


I light the fire under

the pot, I pour her

a glass of wine

I fold a napkin under

a little fork


the wind blows the rain

into the windows

the emperor himself

is not this happy

Poem of the day: Sonogram

Jennifer Chang

Sonogram

Dark matter, are you
sparkless

for lack of knowing
better? The room

you've spun is distant
and indivisible—

a flickering lapsarian,
you satisfy no mute

progress but
collapse, spiral, winded

by unwinding. Dear
enigma kid, dear psychic

soft spot, I write you
from under eight spastic

lights, each falser than stars,
to promise I'll will

the darkness out of you
or I'll will myself

to trying. Twisted
mister, my incipient

sir, you be in charge
of the what-if, I'll master why.

Poem of the day: Lullaby

Jenny Joseph

Lullaby

By Only when we are in each other's arms
Babies or lovers or the very ill
Are we content not to reach over the side;
To lie still.

To stay in the time we've settled in, that we've
scooped
Like a gourd of its meat,
And not, like a sampling fly, as soon as landed
Start to our feet,

Pulling one box on another, Ossa on Pelion;
Getting the moment, only to strain away
And look each day for what each next day brings us:
Yet another day;

Pleased with the infant's health and the strength of
its frame
For the child it will grow to,
The house perfected, ready and swept, for the new
Abode we go to,

The town in order and settled down for the night
The sooner for the next day to be over,
The affair pushed straight away to its limit, to leave
and notch up
Another lover.

Lie still, then, babies or lovers or the frail old who
In dreams we carry
Seeking a place of rest beyond the crowds
That claim and harry.

We are trying to reach that island for the festive
evening
Where our love will stay –
Waylaid, prevented, we wake as that vivid country
Mists into day.

Stay on this side of the hill.
Sleep in my arms a bit longer.
This driving on will take you over the top
Beyond recall the sooner.

Album of the month: Long Distance Calling - Avoid the Light

I usually only discover things after they have already happened. It's just the way it is. And I shouldn't fight it really because there's no point, it will continue happening because I can't keep up with everything all at once. The important thing is that I end up discovering these precious things anyway, sooner or later and here it is again. Thanks to a friend of mine, again, I discovered this new band, they are called Long Distance Calling and possibly very little people know them. Some might have heard of them before, either because Katatonia's own Jonas Renkse lent his voice to one of their songs, or more recently because they were opening for Anathema's European Leg on their new album tour. Unfortunately that didn't happen in Portugal, something that saddens me a lot, but that's life, deal with it. Maybe I will see them eventually, in the future. I reckon opening for Anathema was a big step for them, it certainly opened new roads for them in terms of the diversity of the audience that listens to them.

"Avoid the Light", released in 2009, the album I'm suggesting for this month was my first contact with this band and I must say that the first date went really well :) Seriously, I'm a lover of instrumental albums and bands, I'm sure it has something to do with my musically and the fact that I like to listen to the sounds in detail so that I can later play them on my guitar. But the sound as a whole really interests me as well. So, instrumental bands were always appealing, especially if they were good of course. Here is another instrumental (almost, one of the sounds has vocals in it, Jonas' vocals) - but it's predominantly instrumental of course - album that everyone should listen to. I'm not discriminating, even people who never listened to metal or post-rock can enjoy this one, I'm afraid. I tend to find the heavier parts of the album the best but not because they are heavy but because they are clever and genius in terms of riffs. I value the originality of the riffs bands come up with, but of course originality always depends on the people's background and knowledge of other bands. And there are a lot of instrumental bands, but not all of them are worth my time, I'll assure you. Not that I'm high in my high horse and think that I'm this musical genius, far from the truth, but I think at this point, and after listening to so many albums for so many years, I know what I like and what sounds weak for me. And that's just me, I respect other people's opinions and try my best not to judge, I know my limitations. The bass is very predominant in this release which is also another thing I like to listen to, especially in metal albums. I also like long songs and long pieces of music with clever changes that seem to be fluidly created by the songwriters and a natural fit. We also have that in this album as well as enough variety to keep me interested, I can't speak for anybody else. Apart from all of these qualities already, there's beauty. I often speak about beauty in music and how I like it, so I'm probably gonna repeat myself, but who cares, I think this album provides a lot of beautiful musical moments and that's always a plus. It kinda shows a good taste and a very vivid sensibility to music in general, in my interpretation.

What else can I say? I'm curious about their other work, the earlier work and the new work they will be releasing next year. It's certainly a band to take into account when you are speaking of post-rock/metal and instrumental ability to write good songs. And it's not even a genre I'm an expert at, post-rock/metal or as some people call it "avantgarde". I prefer to call it instrumental because that way I'm not limiting the band's sound as much, it is undeniably instrumental, whatever else it may be, it's up to the listener to decide and conjure up. I just listen to the album and I like it a lot. Highly recommended, really.

Poem of the day: Enough

Jeffrey Harrison

Enough

It's a gift, this cloudless November morning
warm enough for you to walk without a jacket
along your favorite path. The rhythmic shushing
of your feet through fallen leaves should be
enough to quiet the mind, so it surprises you
when you catch yourself telling off your boss
for a decade of accumulated injustices,
all the things you've never said circling inside you.

It's the rising wind that pulls you out of it,
and you look up to see a cloud of leaves
swirling in sunlight, flickering against the blue
and rising above the treetops, as if the whole day
were sighing, Let it go, let it go,
for this moment at least, let it all go.

New poetic discoveries: Laura Cronk

Laura Cronk

Entering

Moonscape of snow at night.
To die, to crash,

could be a crush of snow.
All softness.

I imagine, driving alone,
being enveloped by snow, crashed into, quickly.

The mice must have these visions.
Talking quietly when they can’t sleep

about tunneling in endless grain until, full of it,
completely enveloped by it, peacefully, it takes them.

Poem of the day: Ku(na)hay

Charles Bernstein

Ku(na)hay

Form
Is One
Then Two Three

Content Is Another
Matter Altogether
No?
*
I Go Home
So Tired
Now

Slump
Into My
Slumber Once Again

Wake
To What
I Almost Forgot
*
No One Waits
Time Fails
Again
*
Still
The Quiet
Sucks Me Dry

A
Bone Solitary
Against the Wind
*
Trust No One
Gets You
Nowhere

Poem of the day: The City Limits

A. R. Ammons

The City Limits

When you consider the radiance, that it does not withhold
itself but pours its abundance without selection into every
nook and cranny not overhung or hidden; when you consider

that birds' bones make no awful noise against the light but
lie low in the light as in a high testimony; when you consider
the radiance, that it will look into the guiltiest

swervings of the weaving heart and bear itself upon them,
not flinching into disguise or darkening; when you consider
the abundance of such resource as illuminates the glow-blue

bodies and gold-skeined wings of flies swarming the dumped
guts of a natural slaughter or the coil of shit and in no
way winces from its storms of generosity; when you consider

that air or vacuum, snow or shale, squid or wolf, rose or lichen,
each is accepted into as much light as it will take, then
the heart moves roomier, the man stands and looks about, the

leaf does not increase itself above the grass, and the dark
work of the deepest cells is of a tune with May bushes
and fear lit by the breadth of such calmly turns to praise.

Poem of the day: The Dead

Mina Loy

The Dead

We have flowed out of ourselves
Beginning on the outside
That shrivable skin
Where you leave off

Of infinite elastic
Walking the ceiling
Our eyelashes polish stars

Curled close in the youngest corpuscle
Of a descendant
We spit up our passions in our grand-dams

Fixing the extension of your reactions
Our shadow lengthens
In your fear

You are so old
Born in our immortality
Stuck fast as Life
In one impalpable
Omniprevalent Dimension

We are turned inside out
Your cities lie digesting in our stomachs
Street lights footle in our ocular darkness

Having swallowed your irate hungers
Satisfied before bread-breaking
To your dissolution
We splinter into Wholes
Stirring the remorses of your tomorrow
Among the refuse of your unborn centuries
In our busy ashbins
Stink the melodies
Of your
So easily reducible
Adolescences

Our tissue is of that which escapes you
Birth-Breaths and orgasms
The shattering tremor of the static
The far-shore of an instant
The unsurpassable openness of the circle
Legerdemain of God

Only in the segregated angles of Lunatic Asylums
Do those who have strained to exceeding themselves
Break on our edgeless contours

The mouthed echoes of what
has exuded to our companionship
Is horrible to the ear
Of the half that is left inside them.