OBLIVION TO SORROWS

Is the second or the third pot

of coffee this night? I don't

recall, it matters not, what

matters is coffee black as

the now dark summer night

running hot down my throat,

blissful forgetfulness.

31.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH AND NINTH DAY OF THE YEAR

Midnight, and finishing a fourth translation
this night, I get a modicum of peace and calm
from the sorrows, regrets and desires that have
raged through my mind across the hours
of the late evening. I have taken the words
of the dead and with them quenched that
tempest which, for darkling time, was me,

now brimming with borrowed peace.

31.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

LET YOUR SORROWS GO

In the vast bosom of the night

dig the grave of all your sorrows;

it has space enough, let them rest,

away from the hours of the light.

30.07.2023

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I KNOW THE ANSWER

It's not that one has erred,

but that then doesn't correct,

that dooms - if conscience

still stirs in its cage of bone.

But what worth is a conscience

in a mind that doesn't correct

what it has wrought in errors?

30.07.2023

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FRANKENSTEIN'S MONSTER

The past, my

endless mistakes,

torn across

all my hours,

and I, the lesser

for it, yet

defined by

them, made

by them,

constructed in

the Frankenstein's

laboratory of my

errors, and

now solely

the sum, a living

echo, of those.

30.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

A LESSON WE WILL NEVER LEARN

Longing for the lost,

we fail to see

what is loosening

from our grasp

and will vanish,

never to be found,

while we mourn.

30.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

THE LONG DAWN

Morning in purple and blue,

tree-tops, the fields descending

from the village gilded with

pale golden light, and here,

cool shadows at six o'clock,

lingering touch of the night.

30.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

WESTERN SAHARA AND UKRAINE

Each time you cry "Slava Ukraini!",

European and American politicians,

I think how you sold Western Sahara

for thirty pieces of silver and fertilizer.

Then you took your "European values"

and your "American values" and

strangled them and buried them

in nameless graves, in the desert,

under the buzzing sound of Chinese,

Israeli and Turkish drones with

Moroccan flags on their silver skins.

30.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

DON'T TRUST POETS

Machado praised as a genius and a poet

the unknown who came up with tying

a donkey to a water-wheel, and hid

the world from it through blinders; this

to Machado was divine inspiration -

not the raising of the water, but

the blinders. Tormenting an another

being was to teach oneself, to Antonio.

No wonder he went on to support

Fascists and their war that would

kill a million human beings.

30.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

FOR ALL THOSE PEOPLE WHO CARE ABOUT UKRAINE BUT NOT ABOUT OCCUPIED NATIONS LIKE PALESTINE

One of the nine child victims of the

Shati refugee camp park massacre,

carried out by Israel's occupation

forces in Israeli occupied Palestine's

besieged Gaza Strip on July 28th 2014. 

The head and the face are

intact, a sleeper waiting

the moment to awaken,

but the chest is torn open,

deep red flesh and lungs

and blood, and the 'West'

didn't and doesn't care.

"Israel has a right to

defend itself!

Israel is just

defending itself!",

goes the endless mad

chant around the piles

of corpses of slain

Palestinian children.

30.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH AND EIGHT DAY OF THE YEAR

Your breast cupped in my hand,

my tongue on your nipple,

engraved in my thoughts

on this whispering night

your breast cupped in my hand,

my tongue on your nipple.

30.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTH DAY OF THE YEAR

Rain, a sullen overcast

day, droplets beating

across gloomy hours,

keeping time.

29.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTH DAY OF THE YEAR

Rain hitting the roof,

for who knows how many

hours, I awoke to its

sound, one I have always

loved, a time machine

of the mind to carry

back to years when

listening to its magic

I imagined a future

instead of looking

back to a distant

past I didn't cherish.

28.07.2023

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ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH AND SIXTH DAY OF THE YEAR

Little things, over many years,

to avoid that desert of absence -

being there, once a week,

like we used to be, I think -

nothing more might have

been needed to raise your face

and make you talk more yesterday,

little things, and me unmooring

myself from the weight of

loss, so as not to lose you, J.

27.07.2023

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ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH AND FIFTH DAY OF THE YEAR

And, just like that, you

have to re-encounter the past

and its mistakes you made,

and be casual and smile,

talk and be polite,

so that others might break

out a bit of their long

self-imposed loneliness. 

26.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

SAVE YOURSELVES, FOOLS

The average human being

in the collapsing 'West'

has been let down by schools,

lobotomized by the mass media

and social media, made

harmless for their rulers -

those intoxicated rulers

who are whipping, in ecstasy,

the industrial horses driving

the society's carriage

towards the waiting abyss.

Our leaders can't wait

for us to get there.

25.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

IN THESE DECLINING YEARS

If our past selves

would see us now,

walking towards

them on the same

pavement, they

would at most

have a strange

feeling of unease

that would make

them cross

the road to

get rid of it,

of that shabby

stranger that

reminds them

of the years

to come.

25.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH AND FOURTH DAY OF THE YEAR

A solitary mosquito buzzes

in the dim room as the light

outside the windows wanes;

I sip coffee cautiously

from a deep blue glass

and think of dead poets

and dead dreams and

graves lacking flowers.

25.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH AND THIRD DAY OF THE YEAR

Nights getting darker,

silent as the birds

have had their brief

summer; the warmth

remains in the dim

blue hours, but the

human absences

deep silences

across the flesh

of existence.

24.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

LIKE A SNOWBALL ROLLING DOWN A HILL CREATES AN AVALANCHE

So casually we throw away

lives, ours and others,

in moments we only

recognize when time,

passing, has become

a revelation, and then

we must regret what

we barely remember.

23.07.2023

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ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH AND SECOND DAY OF THE YEAR

Reading Cavafy, as world

sways green outside the

darkened room, a strange

mix of the old joy and

the weight of years, age

a lined of snuffled candles

more understood than

imagined now, and

without the sordid, radiant

memories that sustained

the dirty old poet.

23.07.2023

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ON TWO HUNDREDTH AND FIRST DAY OF THE YEAR II

This day has flowed

away in dream and headache

and toothache and what

not, slipped past

like a bream glimpsed

in the muddy waters

of a lake shore.

22.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON TWO HUNDREDTH AND FIRST DAY OF THE YEAR I

Should find words

to mark this day

with a poem,

and here they

are, as good

as the day is,

words to mark

this day

with a poem.

22.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

WE CAN'T ACCEPT OUR FAULTS IN OTHERS

Bitterness is something

no bitter person ever

accepts in their fellow

human beings, a cardinal

sin, a red flag waved

before their very core,

a crude trampling of

the most hallowed ground

by undeserving feet.

21.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

REGRETS

All thrown away,

these wasted years

and wasted lives

that we so casually,

like flowers, snapped

from their stems

because we could.

21.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE TWO HUNDREDTH DAY OF THE YEAR

The past is not only

lost, but the people

we were, as lost

almost as those

under the headstones,

transformed not

from flesh and thoughts

to bones and ash,

but to different beings,

lesser beasts gazing

in incomprehension

at what they were

without realizing.

21.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

PERHAPS

Perhaps I'll go and take a walk,

with a book ready in hand to keep

as many new thoughts as possible

flowing to hold the mind in check,

if the summer landscape, flickering

in sunlight and cloud shadow, isn't

enough to keep the past at bay.

20.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

BAISAÕ(1675-1763), THE OLD TEA-SELLER

Baisaõ presents himself

as a humble monk gone

wayward and poor, living

on the proceeds of his

tea-selling, yet tells us

how he only sells

the finest brands of tea,

brewing them with

the best possible set,

the one he would destroy

to avoid such fine items

to be despoiled by

unworthy hands.

20.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

"EUROPEAN VALUES"

All of Europe's Values

dead in the hold of a boat

four kilometers down off

Pylos, laying abandoned

on the desert border

of Tunisia and Libya,

hand-cuffed and thrown

into the Aegean, yet still

uttered from the rotting

lips of our ghouls

in their fine suits.

20.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

MY MOTHER'S FLOWER

On these days it's best

to acknowledge the date,

what was and is not, and

then fill your mind with

whatever is at hand,

the world's wars and

its dying multitudes,

the dead words of dead

people, wonders opened

from time or stars,

to forget what should

never be forgotten,

to ease the day that

shouldn't be, for

even the flower left

in your care is dead

for a year and more.

21.06.-20.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ALL OF YOU

To have you

on the grass

naked, so pale

that my hands

need to warm

all that flesh

curving, opening,

waiting, and

where to start

with all the wonders,

when all demands

equal attention,

but from all of you

to have you?

20.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

THE BONES BESIDE CROSSING PATHS

It's not what we do to

our dreams and hopes,

although difficult it

maybe to watch their

withered bones beside

our over-grown path,

it's what we do and

don't to those whose

paths cross ours that

matters; if the bones

beside their paths

are by our hands,

through action or

idleness, then that

is the greater guilt.

For the one hope

we should have

been keeping alive

of ours is this:

That the dreams of

those who we

love should

come true.

20.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND NINETY-NINTH DAY OF THE YEAR

On this mild morning, milky

clouds across the sky, Sun

shining among them, and

the mind drifting across

the landscape, its chains

loosened, I still come

back to memory of you,

the moment giving away

to the lasting, thinking

of your hand resting

so casually on your

naked thigh as we

last spoke. I am

transfixed by that

vision on this mild

morning balanced

between sunlight

and coming rain.

20.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND NINETY-EIGHT DAY OF THE YEAR

Already dark the nights,

the autumn comes fast

and the summer, barely

begun, slips away among

the multiplying stars.

19.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND NINETY-SEVENTH DAY OF THE YEAR

So soon it

will be here -

autumn.

18.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND NINETY-SIXTH DAY OF THE YEAR

Claim that Israel's regime isn't committing

war crimes and human rights violations,

and you are either liar or work very hard

to be ignorant of facts, and perhaps the liar

is the more honest of you two Apartheid lovers.

17.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE ONE HUNDRETH AND NINETY-FIFTH DAY OF THE YEAR

It's 17:10 and

in mid-July it's

basically afternoon.

Just four months

and it will be a bleak

 evening this time.

16.-17.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND NINETY-FOURTH DAY OF THE YEAR

Saving the world,

with one tweet at a time,

but not saving the people,

letting them down,

and what is the world

if not the people?

15.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND NINETY-THIRD DAY OF THE YEAR

To Hasbara trolls on the Turtle Island.

82 years ago someone

like you, hearing about

Germany's occupation forces

rounding up people,

would have been asking:

"What did they do?

The Wehrmacht

doesn't arrest anyone

for no reason."

Reality:

You don't have

to do anything.

Occupation forces

are not police.

They don't

need a cause.

14.-15.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND NINETY-SECOND DAY OF THE YEAR

New coffee as the already

dark July night looms

behind the windows,

a herald of the long

nights of autumn &

winter, towards which

we are falling

across time.

13.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

RUPERT BROOKE(1887-1915) 3

Honestly, I would be a bit ashamed

to have died of a mosquito bite,

when other men were blown to pieces

or drowned alive in mud, or came

to be crushed to pulp under tanks,

or were cut in half by machine

gun rounds. Honestly, I would

be a bit ashamed among the shades

to have died of a mosquito bite.

12.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

HE WAS NOTHING SPECIAL

If Rupert Brooke was 'the handsomest man

in England', I do wonder how ugly the other

poor bastards taken into consideration must have

been - an entire class of well-off Quasimodos

marching through Edwardian summer parties

in Oxbridge? And how bad the eye-sights

of the adoring ladies and gents?

12.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

W. H. AUDEN(1907-1973)

Being a conservative brings

you popular laurels; refusing

to move on, leave a trail

where none existed, this

from the beginning to

the too fertile end

is much applauded.

But that's where it ends;

too often walked paths,

no matter how pure

and strident your steps,

bring no laurels

from Stockholm.

12.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

ON AN ANOTHER DAY

Death is something

that will happen to another

person, on an another day,

when you are a bit older,

and tired, more tired

than even on this day,

this day that sees you

lie down on the grass

and sleep in the cool

shade, while the ground

burns hot where

the gravel touched

your bare feet.

An another person,

almost just like you,

just a bit older,

on an another day.

12.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

OR PERHAPS I WILL LIE DOWN AND SLEEP INSTEAD

I might take a walk,

but probably, it's a hot

day, will just sit

in the shade with

a book and leave

the roads to

other feet.

12.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND NINETY-FIRST DAY OF THE YEAR

Is the world tired of us,

or we of the world?

It's we - the world

never noticed us.

12.07.2023

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ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND NINETIENTH DAY OF YHE YEAR

A day begins, a day

ends, and something

of us is gone, and

in its place, a quick

filling to mend

the hole.

11.-12.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

LIFE COMES TO YOU

Life doesn't come

to you fast, it comes

wobbling, a walking cane

in a quivering hand,

to lay a long withered

flower on your

freshly dug grave.

10.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

EACH TIME I AWAKE FROM DREAMS OF YOU

To PRC

Each time I awake

from dreams of you,

there's a lingering

image imprinted of you

capturing the rising mind

with thoughts of you -

first with burning lust

and then aching loss,

as the mind struggling

from sleep's flow

into reality emerges,

and acknowledges

your absence on 

it's now bitter shore.

10.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

AFTER EMILY DICKINSON

There's

always trouble,

Life's that way,

it takes you where

Trouble lies awaiting,

and as trouble

from their hideout

charges, Life

stands aside,

spreads it arms,

and smiles,

that aide to a bandit,

who travelers

from danger to

peril carries.

10.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND EIGHTY-NINTH DAY OF THE YEAR

A walk in morning

sunshine, yet the dead

in their graves lie

under the weight

of all these years,

as silent as on

any dark and

gloomy dawn.

10.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

NEW COFFEE AT 23:48

A cup of hot, steaming

coffee that almost

burns the lips,

a good way to end

a day that barely was,

like oneself.

09.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

I SHOULD HAVE NEVER TOLD YOU TO COME

To PRC

Thinking of

you,

both how I

should

have left you

be, should

have said

no, and also

how I

still

can't forget

your skin,

how it drew

both a gaze

and a

wandering

hand.

09.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

READING PHILIP WHALEN'S(1923-2002) "SELECTED POEMS"

Was reading

Philip Whalen

yesterday, and

turning the

pages, reading

from the back

towards the

beginning,

poem by

poem,

a revelation

"This guy

makes sense

now."

09.07.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse