POETRY FOUNDATION

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/

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“Spring” by Denis Johnson

 

by now even the ground

deep under the ground has dried.

the grass becoming green

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does not quite remember the last year,

or the year before, or the centuries

that kept passing over. all of these blades thought

that america’s grief over the ruptured

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flesh of its leaders

was another wind going into the sky.

a rabbit stiffens

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with hard sorrow up from the grass

and runs. well,

it is another spring and in the clouds

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it is the ranging spectacle of a crowd

of congressmen accusing one another, each

moving in his own shadow against the next.

:::

Antony and the Johnsons–Hope there’s someone

Raymond Federman, candidato póstumo al Nobel de Literatura 2010.

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(Greene County, Georgia, circa 1936.  Ruined house, Penfield vicinity.)

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Raymond Federman:

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In The Place Of Ashes

(for George Chambers)

 

Someday I’ll go
to the place of ashes
and sit beside the ashes
of my mother and father
I’ll sit in the dark
and watch the glow
of the coal fire
through the tiny
mica windows
of the salamander-stove
then holding my breath
I’ll carry the chamber pot
downstairs to empty it
in the courtyard

and again I’ll sit
beside the ashes
and try to scoop them
in the palm of my hand
so they can speak to me
and tell me what happened

 

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El lugar de las cenizas

(para George Chambers)

 

Algún día iré
al lugar de las cenizas
y me sentaré al lado de las cenizas
de mi madre y de mi padre
Voy a sentarme en la oscuridad
para ver el resplandor
del fuego de carbón
a través de la pequeñas
ventanas de mica
de la salamandra del fogón
a continuación, conteniendo la respiración
llevaré abajo la bacinilla
para vaciarla
en el patio
y otra vez me sentaré
junto a las cenizas
y trataré de esparcirlas
en la palma de mi mano
para que puedan hablar conmigo
y contarme lo que pasó.

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Raymond Federman, candidato póstumo al Nobel de Literatura 2010.

http://www.federman.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Federman

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A Ho-Hum Occurrence

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I turned sixty on Sunday

It’s a round figure, or should I say rotund.

as solid as a rock.

In reality I feel like I’ve come to a new dwelling place,

where even that true romanticism of the fifties

gets diluted with something so well-aimed, so right on target,

to be like a stone headed straight to the head.

I ignore why,

but this morning I awoke a bit sad,

and it has nothing to do with asking myself if my life has been good or bad,

nor if I ended up a failure or a loser (the two things are by no means the same)

or if I’ve lost or gained anything with the time:

these are trifles

even more ho-hum than the occurrence of the birthday, itself.

Several significant lovers thought about me

and I received congratulations from a scant few friends,

who range from extremely laudable to quite in dubious character

depending on which shelf that day’s librarian has relegated them.

My few living relatives have grown, frankly, quite tedious,

but I know some of them will have thought of me

because they belong to those generations that still keep track

of birthdays and anniversaries of tragic events, without the aid

of some sort of modern appointment book.

In the end, they do much more than I.

I’ve thought a lot about my mother; the number of years would have surprised her,

Probably being an inconceivable dream to her.

Other souls have come by as well, just as if showing up at a party

and receiving the enthusiastic greeting reserved for a kindred spirit.

They take me to a far-away steakhouse, to dine on meat and passionfruit drink,

and heart of fowl which I dared not taste because hearts

bring out either pity or disgust in me.

But it’s all right, Ma: I’m not even bleeding.

I arrive just in time for the inauguration of a new kind of social service

that grants a special rate of merely one euro

to go to the movies one day a week.

What more can I ask for? Now I’ll immerse myself once more

in the aromas of the movie theater, in those red, cushioned seats,

with my bag of pop corn and a cold Coke,

like those times when I was as tall as Peter Pan, flying next to him

across the starry sky of Varadero, from Kawama to Oasis,

and then from Oasis to Kawama, back and forth continually,

until I turned sixty.

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© 2010 David Lago-Gonzalez

© Kurt Findensein, translation

unknown - imperfect minimalism

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Like a bird on the wire,
like a drunk in a midnight choir
I have tried in my way to be free.
Like a worm on a hook,
like a knight from some old fashioned book
I have saved all my ribbons for thee.
If I, if I have been unkind,
I hope that you can just let it go by.
If I, if I have been untrue
I hope you know it was never to you.

TENNESSEE WILLIAMS - Life Story

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Life Story

by Tennessee Williams

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After you've been to bed together for the first time,
without the advantage or disadvantage of any prior acquaintance,
the other party very often says to you,
Tell me about yourself, I want to know all about you,
what's your story? And you think maybe they really and truly do
.
sincerely want to know your life story, and so you light up
a cigarette and begin to tell it to them, the two of you
lying together in completely relaxed positions
like a pair of rag dolls a bored child dropped on a bed.
.
You tell them your story, or as much of your story
as time or a fair degree of prudence allows, and they say,
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
each time a little more faintly, until the oh
is just an audible breath, and then of course
.
there's some interruption. Slow room service comes up
with a bowl of melting ice cubes, or one of you rises to pee
and gaze at himself with the mild astonishment in the bathroom mirror.
And then, the first thing you know, before you've had time
to pick up where you left off with your enthralling life story,
they're telling you their life story, exactly as they'd intended to all along,
.
and you're saying, Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
each time a little more faintly, the vowel at last becoming
no more than an audible sigh,
as the elevator, halfway down the corridor and a turn to the left,
draws one last, long, deep breath of exhaustion
and stops breathing forever. Then?
.
Well, one of you falls asleep
and the other one does likewise with a lighted cigarette in his mouth,
and that's how people burn to death in hotel rooms.

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Hermoso poema de Tennessee Williams, uno de los escritores a los que siempre regreso. Hermoso, real, duro, sarcástico, insospechable e insospechado. Me encanta que se ría de mí. Al fin y al cabo, eso es también la vida. ¿O no?

106 - Shakespeare

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(via balcon6)

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To me, fair friend, you never can be old,
For as you were when first your eye I ey'd,
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold,
Have from the forests shook three summers' pride,
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turn'd,
In process of the seasons have I seen,
Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burn'd,
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green.
Ah! yet doth beauty like a dial-hand,
Steal from his figure, and no pace perceiv'd;
So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand,
Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceiv'd:
For fear of which, hear this thou age unbred:
Ere you were born was beauty's summer dead.