Category: poetry

some mark the passage of time with birthdays,
others with summer holidays or hogmanays.
for me, every year, such a marker is a letter
mentioning two colours – purple and orange.
the former points to the place where a smiling
technician catches the echoes from my chest.
in the latter, a physician with a sombre face
tries to figure out why i am asymptomatic
despite deteriorating images on his desk.
and it has been going on like that for years.
only now, it might be the last time. my heart
betrayed my poker face.

do you remember that moment you were waiting for,
the one where all that was left was small talk? of course
not. you never expected that it could ever happen to you,
do you? you have always had this certainty that the day
will simply love you back, and now you just have trouble
sleeping. and if you asked for a sceptic, only to tell him
the funny things one says to someone that one loves,
he would pretend for a moment that he does not know
what you mean. then you could walk together through
the night streets of the city, as if all the possibilities
did not miss you that one night.

I came like Water, and like Wind I go.

The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám

appreciation for a bowl of porridge comes with time.
but first, you will learn to cherish all the little stories
of your childhood that your parents unintentionally
embarrassed you in front of every new love of your
unfinished life.

i am nothing but a link
in the reproduction chain,
and still a snob reading elegy
written in a country churchyard,
wondering if that weary reign
is ever going to fade.
and, if we toss ambitions aside,
you dare ask why, there is always
that somewhat awkward silence
engraved in the granite.

i am still the first draft of a person,
not exactly a catch, a puny little
jest rather than a strong punchline.
sadly, my reflection in the mirror
cannot understand this, and it scares
me more and more with the sight
of this greying imitation of dignity.
and i might actually be okay with it,
if it were not for this tiny, insignificant
detail: the poet suddenly wanted to get
rid of me.

the first shadow was cast by the doctor
of the church. then there was a bishop
and two dominicans opposing the sceptical
canon episcopi. but no one was as influential
as the german churchman with his hammer.
except maybe for a certain northern king.
and even now, when i see faces staring at me
from the walls and fences of holy buildings,
i am not sure if they are portraits of saints
or their innocent victims.

there are two corpses resting
on my kitchen window sill.
far apart, the left one belongs
to the housefly, the right one
to the giant house spider.
they have been dead for weeks,
but for some reason, i can not
bring myself to remove them.

to say that it is because they
remind me of the fragility
of life would be the obvious
truism. and it is not the striking
insignificance of their deaths
or all the social metaphors
they could embody. not even
the aesthetics of the symmetry
of their position. it is the sheer
fact that i still do not know
why.

it is not what she says,
it is how she says it.
it is not what he hears,
it is how he listens to it.
and whether their eyes
follow the mirage.

cutting my lips with the sharp edges
of the skin of a piece of honey melon
somehow escapes my attention as,
while staring at cathleen and colleen’s faces,
i wonder if i would rather slightly smile
or slightly frown, or maybe just play
with a hand grenade at the south-east
entrance to central park, in front
of the bronze statue.