The person living behind sliding glass doors

There is a place, sometimes, where there is a person whose sole interaction can be with the white long-off silences that surround him behind the sliding doors- doors that always slide from left to right. Only he can see the glass slab sliding inexorably towards its sound-stilling full stop, that it happens too frequently in this period of time, four sliding doors of glass shutting him off from that which he may not see of himself.

Only visually, sounds remain a muted whispering of browning leaves and expectant trees, a musical prison, a happy place?

2 September 2011

Of illnesses and mental health

1 September 2011

In 2010 I paralleled the British Queen in suffering an annus horribilis of the Belgian variety. Whereas this year I have been a pillar of physical health last year saw me suffering from pneumonia, but this led to clogged-up pipes. Sofie then solved that by giving me some mysterious muti, which in turn led to problems with you-know-where. That became so bad that I ended up in hospital!

Without trying to sound too much like an old man, I also developed an eye problem with visits to the eye surgeon (the problem is that my tear ducts become infected). Luckily this time medication and creams solved the problem, but a year or so before , when I had the same difficulty I made the mistake (it was the day before Xmas) of seeing a retired eye doctor and he said it was a simple exercise to “clean out” (I'll never forget those words!) my infected and blocked tear ducts: without any anaesthetic or so he calmly produced a syringe and plunged it down into my eye, the last thing I saw was his shaking hand. Whew, it was as frightening as the day the elephant chased me at Mana Pools in Zimbabwe! Luckily this year my tear ducts have been working over-time so little fear of any blockages.

And just to round the year off nicely I was stricken with shingles, a nice reminder of my student days when under exam stress I also had shingles.

So far this year has been good, physically, emotionally, well let's see next year.

Groete aan Mannetjies Roux- 'n herbesoek

Het vandag, per toeval eintlik, weer geluister na Lauirka Rauch se “Mannetjies Roux”, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoJfwf0xdNg en die kommentare gelees. Ek was tog verbaas om te sien dat my kommentaar van meer dan 'n jaar gelede die meeste ondersteuning gekry het- en ek was bly om te sien dat dit nie net my gevoelens was oor Afrikanerwees, wat in die lied so treffend saamgevat is nie, maar dat my skamele woordjies ook dié was van ander mense.

Ek wil een van die klaarblyklik jongere mense tog net een ding vertel: die droogte, die ou kloppende diesel, die verlange na reën, die plaasarmoede, is nie net verskynsels van 30 jaar gelede nie, nee, eerstens speel dieselfde feitelike taferele vandag nog steeds af in ons land, in die Karoo, Wes-Transvaal of die Vrystaat, en tweedens moet die lied waarskynlik breër gesien word, metafories, dit verwys eerder na nie-tasbare probleme op die plase van ons land dan na egte droogtes.

En in die lied het ek weer seker die mees tipiese Afrikaanse woord gehoor: “ja-nee”! Was daar ooit 'n woord wat die siel van die Afrikaner mooier kon saamvat- 'n soort van instemming met wat jy teenoor hom gesê het, maar dan tog met die beleefde terughoudenheid dat hy tog maar uiteiendelik sy eie mening het oor die onderwerp waaroor julle gesels het.

“Eens het ons 'n land gehad in Afrika, met 'n kloppende hart, eens het die riviere in ons gevloei en was die bosveldse sonsondergange mooi in ons oë te sien. Nou sit ons in koue, verre plekke, met alleen die wind as ons maat en verre blikke wat probeer om tot daar, daar ver, tot in ons jeug terug te kyk.Maar ek weet dat my verlanges my tog darem 'n bietjie warm sal hou.

Was daar ooit 'n meer tiperende Afrikaanse lied gewees dan hierdie een?

kochvlierzele 1 year ago 20 “

22 September 2011

A Word

A Word is not just a word, not nearly, not ever.

Words are messengers, barefoot natives running along our dusty savannah roads and pathways, carrying scrawled letters and images in cleft sticks, slaloming between fallen mahoganies and elephant grass plantations.

No, a word is a living link between our many-hued, even rainbowy, brains and the object of our attention. Our words are formed in colours, smells and feelings, in our cerebral moon landscapes, they can come tumbling from a waterfall of memories or emotional landscapes - and they link us, and the object of our attention, with the bejewelled memories and emotions of our living days.

Words do smell, they move and enliven, they can tear, I've seen them slash a face, stem a tear. They mean everything, they are our true messengers.

We use words to be. We are our words and, as the expressions goes: they are us, so never again call a word just a word in my presence.

14 sep 2011

Tour de France: helde bestaan nog

(utreksel uit brief aan 'n vriend)

“....Gelukkig het ek iets hier in Vlaanderen ontdek wat my in Julie altyd boei, en aflei, nl de Toer! Hier in Vlaanderen praat niemand van die Tour de France nie, net “de Toer”, en iedereen weet sommer! Ek dink dit is omdat 2 aspekte oor sport my altyd geboei het nl. die stryd om bo jouself uit te styg en die soms-nobilitiet wat dit kan meebring. Tov die eerste punt kan ek jou soveel verhale vertel van die 'afzien', (suffering) wat fietsers (of wat is die juiste Afrikaanse woord vir 'n racing cyclist?) hulleself laat ondergaan (ja, en ten spyte van al die vroeere doping) net om deel te kan neem, en miskien verder te bou, aan die mite van die Toer.

En hulle deursettingsvermoe, wow, ek dink aan Johnny Hoogerland , 'n Nederelandse fietser, en 'n Spaanse ryer, Fletcha, wat 'n paar dae gelede deur een van die tv- autos van hulle fietse tydens die 9de etappe (ronde) van Issoire na Saint-Flour gewoon van hulle fietse gestamp is! Sien bv die fotos wat die pyn en opoffering toon in hierdie jaar se Toer: Daar is ook orals video clips van die ongeluk waaarin Johnny en http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/cycling/picturegalleries/8629864/Tour-de-France-2011-crashes-and-smashes-in-pictures.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/cycling/tour-de-france/8629791/Tour-de-France-2011-Johnny-Hoogerland-hits-barbed-wire-fence-in-crash.

Jy sou dink dat hy na 33 steken in sy liggaam sou stop, niks van, hy het gister net weer verder gegaan omdat hy die 'bolletjestrui' (die trui vir die voorloper van die bergklassement- daar is die geel trui vir die algemene klassement, wat Armstrong 7 keer gewen het, dan die groen trui vir die meeste punte, en dan die bolletjestrui -dis 'n wit trui met rooi balletjies op) wat hy daardie dag gewen het, nie wou verloor nie, wel wetend dat agv sy beseringe hy absoluut geen kans sou hê om die gesogte bolletjestrui verder te behou nie.

Dit is wat ek kan waardeer in die manne, die eenvoudige nobiliteit-(ek weet, daar is natuurlik die kwessie van verdowingsmiddels en doping, maar nogtans).Iets wat ons nog so vaagweg kan herken in die oerwoud van self-serving, oppervlakkige, die me-me-me-me-generation, die stomme idiote wat hulle 15 min se glorie absoluut wil verleng tot 1 uur, om tog maar op Piers Morgan Tonight, of een van die ander talk shows te verskyn, wat dan nog hopelik sal lei tot nog 'n ghost-written 'book', en so kan ek aangaan en aangaan.

So, vandaar my liefde vir al die domme fietsers wat hulleself so pynig, en so uitstyg en verhef tot iets wat hulleself nie eers kan identifiseer nie.

Verjaarsdag van my vader

'n Somerse wyn-en-braaidag in Vlaandere

(of hoe ’n Afrikaner geleer het dat daar meer in ’n braai kan sit dan pap en wors!)

Soms laat die slegte weer ons tog toe om hier in Vlaandere, (meer spesifiek in Herdersem, op Domein De Kluizen, die wynbedryf van my goeie vriend Herman Troch) om op ’n somersdag, wyn te proe. En dan nog, wyn uit Vlaandere self (julle sal merk dat ek meesal praat van Vlaandere, en nie van België nie, daar is geen politieke motivering daarvoor nie, nee, dit is alleen omdat ek op my ‘klavier’, die ding met al die letters ens, waarmee ek my dingetjies uittik, die ‘keyboard’ op syn Engels dan!-twee tikbewegings moet uitvoer om die umlaut te kry  op die woord ‘België’ (sien daar is dit alweer, Alt 137, wat ek moet tik om die umlaut te kry!) en daar is geen umlaut in Vlaandere nie sien).

In elk geval, Herman het ons uitgenooi om sy nuutste wyne te proe, selfs ’n vonkelwyn, met die onwaarskynlike naam van ‘Zjul’ - wat ons onvermydelik lei na die internasionale bekende Aalsterse Karnaval (as werelderfgoed erken deur UNESCO in 2010, no less!) om die ietwat vreemde naam te verduidelik. Herman was vroeër ’n baie bedrywige lid gewees van een van die karnavalsgroepe van die Aalsterse karnaval- ek het ’n skakel hieronde geplaas na ’n lys van die groepe met sulke fantastiese name as:

Allei-Joep  De Droeve Apostelen  De Loizemaanen  De Popollekes  De Sjattrellen  De Steijnzoel’n  De Toerenbiejoekes  De Zwiejtollekes  Krejeis  Lossendeirdeveirdeirdeir  Minder es mier/Gestoikt  't Es Om Zjiep De Salongcarnavalisten  De Snotneizen  De Tettemoesjen  Drasj  Eirg  Lotjonslos  Pertotal  Possensje  Schiefregt'oever

(http://www.aalst.be/default.asp?siteid=2&rubriekid=1047&url=%2Fcarnaval%2Fgroepen%2Fdefault%2Easp )

Wat jy dadelik opmerk uit die name vertel ook die verhaal agter die Karanaval: daar word veral gespot met politiek, met alle gesagsdraers, en mense met ‘n ‘dikke nek’, dws mense met ’n te hoë dunk van hulleself! En dan word daar ook baie (selfs heel veel) bier weggekap tydens die 3 daagse karnaval. Maar, om terug te keer tot ons vonkelwyn ‘Zjul’, dit is Herman se karnavalsnaam. En dit word op so ’n rare manier gespel omdat dit in Aalsters is, die dialek-taal van Aalst. Ter inligting, een van die mooiste kultuur-eienskappe van Vlaandere is juis dat alle dorpe hulle eie, apart-herkenbare, dialek gebruik. Dit is so dat mens van een dorp maar 10 km moet ry om ’n nuwe dialek te hoor, fantasties! En wat nog mooier is, hulle praat graag hulle eie dialek, en is trots daarop. Natuurlik gebruik hulle AN (algemene Nederlands) op skool en as lingua franca- dit is miskien ’n bindende faktor, maar dit is die dialekte wat hulle so parogiaal hou en spesiaals maak.

Elke jaar hou Herman ’n bbq (hulle wil maar nie die beter woord: ‘braai’ hier gebruik nie, hulle verkies die Engelse woord, maar nou ja, dis ook weer ’n ander verhaal, ’n ander stryd wat ek hier tevergeefs veg, nl om die Vlaminge te kry om nie sommer voor die voet Engelse woorde in te voer in hulle taal nie. Ek het minder probleme dat hulle bv ‘computer’ gebruik, maar is dit werklik nodig om ‘kids’ ipv kinderen te gebruik, of soos ek gister gehoor het die plaaslike Minister van Buitelandse Sake, wat op die radio verklaar dat België sal ‘insisteer’ dat Libië al sy verdragte sal nakom. Vieslik!) om mense wat hom elke jaar help met die oes te bedank vir hulle hulp. En dit is wat ons laas Sondag gedoen het by Herman. En ek, ek staan daar rustig langs Sofie, ’n glas Kerner te proe en ek dink by myself, lekker asiditeit, mooi balans, en ek bekyk al die vriende daar, almal onbekend vir Sofie en ek, maar dis ’n vriendelike lot dié, ’n hele tapesserie van dialekte (meesal Aalsters natuurlik want Herdershem is ’n deel van Aalst) en beroepe, maar almal ‘Herman helpers’. En toe val my oog op die man wat besig is met ’n groot braai-toestel, so ’n Weber-ding. En natuurlik wil ek gaan kyk en dan veral my ‘superieure’ (so dag ek in elk geval toe!) Suid-Afrikaanse braai-kennis aan hom gaan opdring, hom ’n keer goed gaan vertel hoe dit alles moet gebeur en gedoen word. Gelukkig vir my het ek eers alles goed bekyk en stil gebly anders het ek my naam, soos my oom Sammie sou sê, mooi gat gemaak, want die man het baie meer expertise van braai gehad dan ek ooit sou kon droom (mens onderskat die Vlaminge maklik want hulle is so beskeie en nooit windgat oor hulle prestasies nie). Ek sal nie eers uitwei oor hoe goed sy braaitegnieke was nie, maar wil wel vertel wat hulle ons aangebied het: eers het ons begin met Franse foie gras op toast, dan was daar behalwe allerhande soorte souse en slaaie en dinge, as voorgereg, lekker hoenderboutjies, gebraaide salm uit Noorweë, gevolg deur ‘spare ribs’ wat gemarineer was in wyn, en dan eendebors! Het nie gedink mens kan eendebors op ’n braai doe nie, but we live and learn seker hê.

Ek sal in elk geval in die toekoms nooit weer ’n woord sê oor braai, of selfs bbq, teenoor ’n Vlaming nie!

The ending of blasé innocence, at Pukkelpop, Belgium

We, the ones (with me in the forefront!) who never stop complaining about how today's youth are so shallow, have no appreciation of real life, live too easily, and simply have no issues in life. The same youth whose main interests in life revolve around computer games, Lady Gaga, Justin Bieber, their hair-do, mobile phones and the state of their tans?

Well, today and last night, their cool, almost arrogant belief that they are untouchable, that they will live forever, was blasted away in a 10 minute fury of  hurricane winds and rain, when trees were snapped like tooth picks and dropped onto food stands, gigantic TV screens came crashing down onto the unsuspecting, and dancing teenage masses as they listened to the singer of Skunk Anansie trying her professional best to be overheard over the howling storm, until she too was almost blown off the stage! In video clips these kids recorded themselves as the sky fell all around them, we hear their shocked screams, the unbelief clear that anything like this could be happening to them, but above all I will never ever forget the agony and pain of one of the teenage girls as she is pinned down by a huge tree, her skull in a vise grip under this tree, cuddling her in its own death throes.

And all we can do, because we remain helpless to change any part of this tragedy, is to weep for the loss of their innocence, even if it was childishly blasé, even if it was arrogant in its naïveté.
http://www.standaard.be/artikel/detail.aspx?artikelid=DMF20110819_037

A summer's day in August 2011.

A day of summer, a sunny day, in Belgium, is not to be ignored.  It is an almost unique occasion, certainly in our summer of 2011.  There have been few summer days this year, apparently less than 20 and, considering that we had such a fabulous early spring I can only conclude that this year's summer has not yet happened, nor is it likely to. 

But yesterday, 15^th August, we did have a summer's day, and we went to celebrate that, plus our public holiday, by having lunch in a not so typical seafood restaurant in Blankenberge. What I forgot to mention though are the incredible traffic jams and a slow-moving line of vehicles crawling to the coast.  The Belgian coast is only about 40 km long and its serves not only the whole Belgian population, but also parts of France, the Netherlands and even a bunch of German day-trippers that regularly stream to the Belgian coast.  Many Belgians also have apartments or houses at the coast and the result of this all is that during holidays and weekends almost every Belgian heads to the coast.  They don't go there, obviously, to swim, no instead they go to ‘flaneer’, a colourful term which is used to describe the promenading, along the promenade obviously, stopping every now and then for an ice cream, a cup of coffee or, more usually, a solid pint of one of Belgian's finest beers (at last count there was close to 600 beers brewed in Belgium!).  Then they slowly proceed again, hand-in-hand, further along the promenade, watching the people on the beach, avoiding seagulls attacking their ice creams, their children, darting in and out on rented karts or bicycles in the masses, pulsating on the promenades.  Interspersed, you always find a number of skateboarders and of course, boys and men flying their kites. 

This reminds me that this past weekend France experienced a record of 793 km of traffic jams and stalled vehicles on its highways, as it was what is called a 'black' weekend, that is, a day or a weekend when one group of people who were on vacation, say, the Dutch, return home and on the same day, another group, for instance, the French, leave for their holidays, resulting in the most frustrating hours on highways, and on small roads, because everyone uses GPS to try and use the back roads and shortcuts.  This misery is repeated on a few occasions during the summer holidays.

Anyway to return to our outing to Blankenberge of yesterday: this restaurant, called 'de Oesterput' (literally, a well of oysters) is in fact, more typical of a South African or Australian large seafood eatery with tables, both inside and outside, and with the emphasis rather on the freshness of the seafood and fish than on the silver cutlery. As you can see in the picture they have a few large "swimming pools" in which the lobsters are kept- and if you select one they will wade in with a net to catch that particular one for you. I selected a chilled Austrian Gruner Veltliner wine, and with that ordered a seafood platter, which consisted partly of lobster, crab, large prawns, cockles and whelks, some whitebait, and one of the local specialities: those tiny grey shrimps that one sees the old-time fishermen net early in the mornings at Ostend Beach- I remember seeing them on their huge work horse, those with the huge hoofs and a large patient hanging head, plodding into the waves, two large hand-woven baskets hanging either side of the horse, the spray of the waves mingling with the early morning mist. 

After lunch we went for a walk along the jetty, in glorious sunshine, and watched various yachts, and men and girls in boats doing their boating things.  I took this picture of a restaurant, which is located right near the jetty, which has handily made use of one the old German bunkers of the Second World War.  These concrete structures are found all over Belgium, and because they are virtually indestructible have been left behind, silent reminders of the terrors that our parents and grandparents had to go through.  This particular bunker formed part of the "Atlantic Wall", fortifications which the Germans set up, and this restaurant cleverly linked itself into the bunker with a new walkway, and I understand that they use the bunker as a perfect climate-controlled wine cellar!  What a wonderful comment on World War II! 
And what a wonderful summer's day, at last - a day to not forget.

Theme from 'A Summer Place'

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRu4aLAG2AI&feature=related

Our summer- our youth, when and how did it become a wintry, bedraggled and dying vine, clinging in solitude on the edge of grey forests? Where are the Monroes, the Cary Grants, the Hepburns, the tomorrows? All gone, all gone to that deeply-remembered bone-palace in the open sky.
(25/7/2011)

Music links: Flemish tristesse

 ‘En God heeft zich ontpopt tot een groot schrijver zonder plot"

Oortref dan maar op ’n blou Maandag hierdie woorde!

Of: ‘Loesje leeft in tederlicht ze haalt haar schouders op’.

Ek hou so daarvan om onbekende sangers te ‘ontdek’, hier is ’n Vlaming waarvan ek besonder hou (ek het voorheen vertel hoe alle musiek wat in die mineur sleutel geskryf is my tref, en ook dat Vlamingen ’n besondere krag is in hierdie tipe trieste liedere): Tom Pintens:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1bFmn5Ny5k&feature=related

en dan sy:

‘In Charleroi’

-dit beskryf die moelike tye wat voormalige ‘smoke stack’ stede ondervind, (a la Springsteen en Billy Joel) want Chareloroi is ook swaar getref daardeur, maar hierdie lied het iets hoopvols in hom:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjaKlX3fCeQ

The Bony King of Nowhere is a Belgian artist with, in my humble opinion, a tremendous future- listen to his ‘Eleonore’:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxw0KVk1HwQ&feature=related

’n Ander local (wat in Engels sing) wat dieselfde tipe musiek maak:

Anton Walgrave se ‘Lost Soul’- (dit affekteer my soveel weer, so met die herbeluister, dat ek daarvan beangstigend stil word!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yq0RZyIyUaI

en:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_dKx9QY2NA&feature=BFa&list=AV4oVf-d_DwKAsr5nNyYYqJJM8p1VFaX5v&index=2

and an achingly pure cover of Springsteen’s ‘If I should fall behind’:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxw0KVk1HwQ&feature=related

Miskien het ek al Raymond van het Groenwoud al genoem in hierdie genre, maar hierdie lied van hom: ‘Twee Meisjes op het Strand’ het my vir die eerste keer wakker gemaak dat die best Vlaamse liederen altyd ’n ‘sad tinge’ het- hy kan nie sing nie, het nie meteens pop star looks nie, maar…  :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxw0KVk1HwQ&feature=related

Its always so simple, isnt it, this really good stuff: no gimmicks, just an honest voice, a piano and a guitar.

Lesley, son of May

He is two months old,
the soft side of death
from his echoing eyes
two shy ice-cream scoops,
caves in which his thumbs sleep
forming the cross-bar of an almost-cross,
he knew he saw
his mother
sucking his numb cheeks
teaching him to swallow
with little-bird sounds

Twenty years for him to:
eat
walk
sleep
(inconclusively)
no purrs, croaks, squaks, words or shrieks
floated through his tactile lips,
her faith a stupid cross,
a frightening lizard she carried
in her mouth,
slipping away at night
it’s tail a forked tongue

Until,
in the light of that night
when he was almost upright,
factory-reject gone platinum
that idiot savant, the Unnamed,
sanctified her
and, care of N.B.C., me,
with two grotesque gifts:
he cried once
fleshy, fatty tears blurping
down in xeroxed precision,
black-red ones
until the pool shimmering
under his piano seemed to run backwards,
into his sockets
two vermillion snakes slithering
over his pyjamas and chins
and then, on some insula of his tangled mind
he met Saint-Saëns and
stroked and ululated
the gnarled Würlitzer into sonnets
of cadenzas and fugues and,
and whilst crying , he sang,
and redeemed me.

1986(?)

(One of the most famous of all ABC Afterschool Specials, ‘The Woman Who Willed a Miracle’ is the true story of two remarkable people: a middle-aged Wisconsin nurse May Lemke, who adopts a six-month-old boy named Leslie and brings him into her family. Abandoned as an infant, Leslie is blind, severely retarded, and suffers from cerebral palsy. Against all odds, May raises Leslie in as "normal" a manner as possible, teaching him to dress and feed himself. Unfortunately, she is unable to get him to speak or respond to intellectual stimuli -- until, at age 16, Leslie listens to a televised classical-music concert, sits down at the family piano, and replays the entire concert from memory, every note to perfection! Remaining sightless, mentally challenged, and essentially nonverbal, Leslie gains worldwide fame as the quintessential "savant," flawlessly playing complicated piano compositions and singing along as he goes...with the recorded works of his musical idol Liberace as his primary inspiration.) 

Of New Knowledge and Dead Blossoms.

It is not true.  It just is not.  Thinking that you know them. 

You grow up in a family, a society, a world, you see films and magazine articles, all confirming that this is a universal, not just a local, but a universal truth!  And being a son of your times, a junkie of the feelgood Bambi culture, which too was brought up on similar myths and night tales, you sometimes wonder if that rosy pathway we're supposed to follow is true, but because of our innocent age - we continue to trust the director, believe in the script, we stay on page: a script that assures us that all will come well in the end.  But it is just not true, still not.

You see them, during all of their young lives, from wobbly first steps to the firm tread they use when boarding that aeroplane whisking them away from you for an eternity, and you know, (you so know it you need to vomit from the knowingness of it) you just never really knew them, not really.

And the wonder sets in your jelly brain, that all this time that you had delusoinally known them, had them figured out so well, (because of your so-called life experience, you the great expert on mankind, especially the younger version, the one really, really close to you) and yet, all that expertise turns out to be worth less than seaweed or the white petals, browning and dead on the lawn.  Maybe less, at least seaweed still send out aromas of the Atlantic, and the dead petals died, giving birth to a red cherry.

Still not.

17 June 2011

Grief- in two languages

Verdriet

verdriet is,

ja,

soos ‘n eensame dood

in ’n ravyn,

maar iets erger,

dit duur langer,

en is minder vrolik.

20 junie 2011

Grief

grief is a little pig-tailed thing,

skipping and hopping,
but creeping up behind you,
smiling at your white throat,
your pulsing blood
already a halo
above its pug-nosed
head.




20 June 2011

SUNDAY FLIGHT FROM BRUSSELS

 

You have flown

like all small birds do,

away today,

and I am here

still,

gasping at your smiles & songs,

helplessly trying to

stuff them into my

echoing heart.

for Alexandra & Daniel
25.7.99

Seventeen

as you, today, flow into the sands,

the skies and the rippling seas of life,

all will pause, and lift their faces and hands

to wonder if porous joy or fleeting strife

will shape the rainbow bands

that will today encircle,

yet set you free.

For my daughter- 29 July 2008

More Poems from the 70's and 80's

SOWETO FUNERAL:(A COMPARISON)

with wise and expectantly sad

smiles

they huddled together, four-deep,

a black sausage

bundled and corralled

into one cattle-proof

open Bedford;

some clutching

black hymn books

others flashing free

Japanese wreaths,

made in Hong Kong

a procession of one Bedford

its mourners singing

raw and soft

following one black hearse

coffin gleaming dully

and its lights

bright and white-

death is no equalizer.

SISTER SMILE

were your intestines pulsating

rhythmically (revolting thick sausage)

to the barbiturate strains of death

when they found you

abandoned (sigh, relief)

your habit, a dull grey as well,

discarded ?

did you not smell his danger at recording sessions, feel his promises echo around your ribcage, tingle
your oh sweet jesus nipples ?

could Antonio, son of merchant Salieri,

not convince you,

with his rather slashed throat

that Senore,

would directly bestow

upon you his Music

and then, languidly,

with a  l imp  wrist

proclaim you

il Compione of mediety ?

News Report 1985-04-02
The Belgian so-called Singing Nun who achieved fame in 1964 with her monster hit "DOMINIQUE" committed suicide today by an over dose of barbiturates. She was  expelled from her order following a dispute with the Mother Superior, who today was not prepared to comment. The Singing Nun who died penniless, apparently had such a sweet disposition that she was often referred to as 'Sister Smile'.

Portrait of the the young Woman as an Artist

accursed;
uncured (a pale pale ) canvas:
serenely gavotting, yet
collapsing spatially,
pirouetting a fine net
across the void
created by a series of lines
hacked into her eyes;
ner consciousness a subdued halo,
a furtive halo flitting
christ-knows, unseen into
the virginity of the canvas,
a glissando of iced passion
splitting her deeply

chorus:

see her sway before the
two-legged easel,
her altar spattered with ink
and the soggy remains of her anima,
see the silenced voice
of her unconscious
drip from a gilt frame

see her now
on the floor, dissolve like hot paté,
a wraithed amoeba retrogressing,
going home
her now-infant face a botticelli oil
(Black Black Black)
red, amadeus-red caressing
her fragmenting lips,
white and prussian-blue
streaks on her forehead.

see her shivering back
into the womb, drippingthe red stuff,
red covering her 2 kg frame,
red running, blackening other colours,
staining the floor,
sucked up into the easel legs,
then into the frame,
spreading gloriously onto
the pale, pale canvas.

Palm (wristless) above owlish waters

When the mist Rolls away
from the Owl-infested waters,
when the hoots (profound) resound,
rebound
across the hurt-hurt-lovely seven silver
lakes;
when the Palm, a Stop-palm, wristless,
floats above
the opacity of the seven;
oh, how I long for
a stray assassin’s bullet.

ONE DAY:THE DAY

the question of when,
not the quantum of,
the End

has stirred me numbly and pre-natally.

It came,

not with Dresden saturations,

Bavarian holiday camps or the express-delivered package floating free from the 'Enola Gay'.

Every xmas shattered by claymores

peace pipes convulsing into R.P,D's

each mozartian jewel crushed

under a jack-boot,

made me wince, ponder, wince, angry, wise

until I had covered myself

with a camouflaged slime

of reason and statistics.

Thus, with some relief

I eventually saw the Marauder

stand in his wellingtons midst

a thousand cornered dolphins, and,

with flaps of their tails,

their every scream of fear faithfully

recorded by high-tech Akai's,

yes, with each wet-slapping thud of

a japanese lance into their bottle-noses

I knew

our time had come,

to pass.

(Written after viewing the annual dolphin slaughter in Japan)

ODE TO A GREEN-AND-BLUE-STONE PAINTING

with the crackling dawn's birth,
her golden Son's smile

touching, fleetingly, the velvet-wetness
of sacrificial stones,
we see (to find to touch)
our re-born child 
of fair face and magical smile;
of arctic-turned-to-Blood
Blood, awesome, beautiful life-force;

Then I drink again from
your scented mouth
your honeyed strokes splashing
bold colours across
my barren canvas.

NIGHT TRIPS

when:

air bursts curdle her

milky blood into a riot,

she dissolves into the long nights,

a milky way in her hair,

passion a smile on her fingers

darting stukas seeking-and-destroying,

she glides down playgirl galleries
heading, inevitably, for the Void;

only to return to him for redemption,

                     sanctification .

Kalk Bay 20 April 1985

NIGHT CLUB

A rum-and-coco-cola room:

doubling up, at times,

as a uterine choc-cock treat,
slip-sliding fat bottles lolling, rolling

across savaged panelyte surfaces,

flat, brusque-forgiving surfaces

flip-flopping between their legs

their stove-piped, berkshired legs,

legs lap-lapping, lick-licking

the mu-mu-music

mmmusic of mime

Glenn Miller and Elvis jump-a-jumping

from Elk echo chambers

pointed shoes and pointless medulla obligatae

all that distinguishes the men

from cheerful rubber plants and

'Mary, I love you sure.  Cheng.  '-walls.

the little languid ladies:

loosely-painted lips licking

at their sagging entrails

(slapped together by stomach muscles

sobbing in foetal abandon)

parted and breathless hips

grinding shallow graves into the wall-wall

the dauphinesses of trashy Alley.

And then Mr. Goddo, the smell

stravinsky-doubled gloom

smothered under dollops of

licorice-1ayered loneliness.

‘n Ander(ste) gedig vir Dinsdagaande

Die A-B bepaalde, beperkende tydshokkie
tussen die
rollende lirieke van vandag
se vandagheid
bevat,
kaalgat, en in ‘n kaalvuis
‘n naguil se wrangwysheid
en dan: emmersvol
vuil,vuil verdriet.

Life (as is)

As the interminable stream
flings and crushes
the marathon smoothness
of my roll,
and rips the outer platinum,
there sits:
treed,
dried,
stained
alive
a bushbuck man,
with mirrored eyes
that scythe
the others free.

LESLEY,SON OF MAY

He is two months old,

the soft side of death

from his echoing eyes

two shy ice-cream scoops,

caves in which his thumbs sleep

forming the cross-bar of an almost-cross,

he knew he saw

his mother

sucking his numb cheeks

teaching him to swallow

with little-bird sounds

Twenty years for him to:

eat

walk

sleep

(inconclusively)

no purrs, croaks, squawks, words, shrieks

floated through his tactile lips,

her faith a stupid cross,

a frightening lizard she carried

in her mouth,

slipping away at night

it's tail a forked tongue

until,

in the light of that night

when he was almost upright,

a factory-reject gone platinum,

that idiot savant, the Unnamed,

sanctified her

and, care of N.B.C., me

with two grotesque gifts :

he cried once

fleshly, fatty tears blurping

down in xeroxed precision,

black-red ones

until the pool shimmering

under his piano seemed to run

backwards, into his sockets

two vermillion snakes slithering

over his pyjamas and chins

and then on some insula of his tangled mind

he met Saint-Saëns and

stroked and ululated

the gnarled Wurlitzer into sonnets

of cadenzas and fugues and,

whilst crying, he sang,

and redeemed me.

A CROSS AND CHAIN

now that tomorrow

has screwed itself into

a nervous little knot

twitching like jellied lava,

since destiny re-routed itself

to this side of yesterday

your cross and chain
has garotted me.