B.Z. Niditch, 9 january 2015
(for Tadeusz Konwicki
22 June 1926 – 7 January 2015)
Perhaps watching
the Konwicki film
"Salto"
with Zbigniew Cybulski,
the Polish James Dean,
last night,
brought back
the times
after lectures
when we would sneak
into art theaters
for two foreign films;
then afterwards
how we would lay
on warm blankets
intertwined with
the grass
by the Charles River.
Scott Mitchell, 7 january 2015
Sonatas, be surely defined
when closed lush lips, to his soul
whisper the sweetest wine
Horizons, be known to endure
in low light when the moon ignites
as he consumes what once was yours
Stars, grasped as a tigers mane
stilettos point to the sky
in sharp reciting of his name
~
Scott Mitchell
2015
Ankit Damani, 7 january 2015
I once had a birthmark on my left shoulder.
A baby screaming in agony bore this mark,
the result of an injection
which was meant to protect
my helpless body from infection.
From danger.
A neat little sliver of protrusion
surrounded by a crater,
the moat to my microcastle.
It once proudly stood alone,
a landmark against impurity.
My forefinger would sometimes
drift off towards it and circle cautiously,
perhaps its feeble attempt at time travel,
taking me to my days of perfection,
of honeydew and home movies.
I would once again feel familiar fingers
that ran over the lonely guardian,
as they washed my flawless skin,
fingers kneading all along
those puny yellow-brown arms.
I may still have the mark today, but I can't be sure.
My forefinger doesn’t drift anymore.
It wouldn’t dare to navigate around the
swarm of pustules, boils, cysts
that now stand tall, surrounding the terrified knoll.
The moat rendered hopeless.
Furious volcanoes, land mines
so eager to burst forth from
this toxic, etherized land,
pulsating like a horde of smartphones
buzzing in sync to form an earthquake.
Nothing could stop them but goddamn,
do they infuriate the perfect child in my dreams
who glares at me scornfully, every night.
My eyes cannot meet his.
Michel Galiana, 7 january 2015
1. - As I did rove Quelvénic Grove
My toil was well rewarded:
I saw a doe wearing a blue
Cover that two stags guarded.
Both of them clerks, I dare remark.
Get up, Lord, you must withstand!
Hunt them at least, none of these beasts
Should desecrate your woodland! -
2. The three poor beasts, as noise increased
Fled the grove early that day,
Took up abode near the highroad,
Till a baker came that way.
- Give us some bread. It will be paid.
For this young girl is hungry.
She followed us. 'Twas perilous
To leave her room, most surely.
3. No one allows that she follows
Her own heart. She escaped.
Her kith and kin will call it sin
That her own life she shaped.
And, the poor thing, she may now sing,
Tonight she will cry sadly;
When tears are shed and all is said,
She'll die tomorrow, early. -
Translated from the Breton
B.Z. Niditch, 7 january 2015
Only if you had been
an adolescent Marxist
in a post revolutionary era
or a later day Christian
after a religious age
has passed you by
at a May Day march of time,
when only children
inspire your absence
from the lost crowd
by the river's edge
alone with your notebook
holding onto a birch branch
with your carved initials
waiting for your lover
or in the silence of a monastery
from a retreat by iron doors
could you expect "Ida"
to surprise you.
B.Z. Niditch, 7 january 2015
Despairing of fathomless cold
birds wait on the fountain
for rain water over stones
by the war memorial,
two friends from the country
wrapped in leather jackets
sleep in turn after celebrations
of the new year's century's peace
one wakes with a poem
the other turns his back
and finds his lost motorcycle
by a church's stained window.
B.Z. Niditch, 7 january 2015
(in memory Stanislaw Baraczak
died December 27, 2014)
Old walls of Warsaw
joined in your silence
shadows disappear
over voiceless hours
in the blood of snows
writing a diary
to friends back home
staring from fallen words
of ink from my desk
at my proof-read letter
wanting to be dispersed
from our own reflections
of my film and poetry
twentieth century reviews
now translated.
Renato N. Mascardo, 6 january 2015
gone by in time
like a thieving nutmeg that spoils and spreads
the eldering crawls unentreatably in spurts
the buon fresco of the past up in the ceiling of my mind
its plaster having brittled and flaked
has let loose the painted fractals of what i was
down a swart and endless void
the tense pluriperfect no longer holds for me
even the simple past begins to go
i hear the soundless brittle brattle of fragments of what had been
falling slowly and fast away
leaving the remnant of my self
alone in the stark wilderness of my mind//
renato
friday 02 january 2015
Satish Verma, 5 january 2015
You put up a price on all
the gifted items.
I was not ready to pay back in dreams.
Wanted to tell you
without telling.
Lips to lips we talk of a stillborn
space which does not crack.
Betraying the anger, words feel sick.
I was trying to decipher the moist
corners of eyes.
I will wait till sunset, when
I will call for the night and take off
my shadows and dropp petals
one by one and come out
in hot sun to receive the
burns of hatred.
It was not easy. Tulips were in full bloom
and my tracks were warm.
There were false shades
all around the garden.
Gert Strydom, 4 january 2015
I tower almost to the clouds
on the lookout to see you,
to be aware of your arrival
and at night I hang out bright lanterns
while I scout into the distance
are looking if I can see your star jumping
or somewhere can find a sign of your arrival
over the plains that lay far into the distance
and when you are far off at the horizon
then my heart is already flowering,
then great joy is present in the cathedral
of my eyes,
then the hall of welcome
is prepared for the banquet of our love
and as if I have consumed
too many bottles of champagne
you are already foaming in my veins
long before you are with me.
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