Bootstrap Framework 3.3.6

[Orlando the Lady]

ih, pa zasluzila sam ja i samar

[Torry]

^za mene nisi:cvece:

[Hys.]

The Secretary Chant

My hips are a desk,
From my ears hang
chains of paper clips.
Rubber bands form my hair.
My breasts are quills of
mimeograph ink.
My feet bear casters,
Buzz. Click.
My head is a badly organized file.
My head is a switchboard
where crossed lines crackle.
Press my fingers
and in my eyes appear
credit and debit.
Zing. Tinkle.
My navel is a reject button.
From my mouth issue canceled reams.
Swollen, heavy, rectangular
I am about to be delivered
of a baby
Xerox machine.
File me under W
because I once
was
a woman.

M.P.

[Orlando the Lady]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRH_Vy-L6uA


Stojte, galije carske! Sputajte krme
moćne!
Gazite tihim hodom!
Opelo gordo držim u doba jeze
noćne
Nad ovom svetom vodom.

Tu na dnu, gde školjke san umoran
hvata
I na mrtve alge tresetnica pada,
Leži groblje hrabrih, leži brat do
brata,
Prometeji nade, apostoli jada.

Zar ne osećate kako more mili,
Da ne ruži večni pokoj palih četa?
Iz dubokog jaza mirni dremež čili,
A umornim letom zrak meseca šeta.

To je hram tajanstva i grobnica tužna
Za ogromnog mrca, k'o naš um beskrajna.
Tiha kao ponoć vrh ostrvlja južna,
Mračna kao savest, hladna i očajna.

Zar ne osećate iz modrih dubina
Da pobožnost raste vrh voda prosuta
I vazduhom igra čudna pitomina?
To velika duša pokojnika luta

Stojte, galije carske! Na grobu braće
moje
Zavite crnim trube.
Stražari u svečanom opelo nek otpoje
Tu, gde se vali ljube!

Jer proći će mnoga stoleća, k'o pena
što prolazi morem i umre bez znaka,
I doći ce nova i velika smena,
Da dom sjaja stvara na gomili raka.

Ali ovo groblje, gde je pogrebena
ogromna i strašna tajna epopeje,
Kolevka će biti bajke za vremena,
Gde će duh da traži svoje korifeje.

Sahranjeni tu su nekadašnji venci
I prolazna radost celog jednog roda,
Zato grob taj leži u talasa senci
Izmedj' nedra zemlje i nebesnog svoda.

Stojte, galije carske! Buktinje nek
utrnu,
Veslanje umre hujno,
A kad opelo svršim, klizite u noć
crnu
pobožno i nečujno.

Jer hoću da vlada beskrajna tišina
I da mrtvi čuju huk borbene lave,
Kako vrućim ključem krv penuša njina
U deci što klikću pod okriljem slave.

Jer, tamo daleko, poprište se žari
Ovom istom krvlju što ovde počiva:
Ovde iznad oca pokoj gospodari,
Tamo iznad sina povesnica biva.

Zato hoću mira, da opelo služim
bez reči, bez suza i uzdaha mekih,
Da miris tamjana i dah praha združim
Uz tutnjavu muklu doboša dalekih.

Stojte, galije carske! U ime svesne
pošte
Klizite tihim hodom.
Opelo držim, kakvo ne vide nebo jošte
Nad ovom svetom vodom!

[LeDeNa_]

Pitam se, vere mi, šta smo ti i ja
Činili dok smo se voleli?
besmo li dotad od sise odbijeni?
Ili sisasmo seoska zadovoljstva, kao deca?
Ili hrkasmo u jazbini Sedmorice spavača?
Tako je bilo; osim ovog, sva zadovoljstva su lâže:
Ako ikad kakvu lepotu videh,
Koju poželeh, i dobih, bio je to tek san o tebi.

Sad dobro jutro našim budnim dušama,
Koje iz straha jedna drugu posmatraju,
Jer ljubav svu ljubav za druge prizore ograničava,
I jednu malu odaju čini jednim svugde.
Nek pomorski otkrivači u nove svetove idu,
Nek mape, svetove na svetovima, drugima pokazuju,
Mi jedan svet posedujemo,
svako po jedan ima, i jedan jeste.

Moje lice u tvom oku, tvoje u mom se javlja
I verna prosta srca na licima počivaju;
Gde naći možemo dve bolje hemisfere,
Bez oštrog Severa, bez zalaznog Zapada?
Što god umire, podjednako pomešano nije bilo;
Ako su naše dve ljubavi jedno, ili ako
Volimo isto u svemu,
nijedna ta ljubav ne može umreti.

Džon Don

[LeDeNa_]

Sada, kada ništa na svijetu ne može vratiti dane prohujalog ljeta
naš sjaj u travi i blještavost svijeta, ne treba tugovati,
već tražiti snage u onom što je ostalo i s tim živjeti.

zaboravimo, ne radi nas, ne radi zaborava
zaboravimo da smo se voljeli, da smo se svadali i
da smo bili krivi.

požurimo, s danima i danima sto će doći
požurimo sa shvatanjima, sa svim što me odvaja od tebe.

jednom, ćeš se vratiti i ubrati cvjetove
koje smo zajedno mirisali, gazili
ali, tvoje ruke bit će prekratke, a noge premorene da se vratiš...bit će kasno.

možda ćemo se naći jedanput na malom vrhu života i neizrečene tajne
htjeti jedno drugome da kažemo, al' proći ćemo jedno kraj drugog kao stranci
jedan skrenuti pogled bit će sve što ćemo jedno drugome moći dati.

zaboravit ću oči
i neću promatrati zvijezde koje me na tebe neobično podsjećaju.

ne boj se, jednom ćes se zaljubiti
al' ljubit ćes zato što će te nešto na toj ženi podsjećati na mene.

ne otkrivaj svoje srce ljudima jer u njima vlada kob i egoizam
život je borba - nastoj pobijediti
ali ako izgubiš-ne smiješ tugovati
cilj života je ljubav-a ona traži žrtve.

bio si moje veliko proljeće
uspomena koja će dugo živjeti u budućnosti
koje ću se sjećati.

osjećat ću tugu jer sam tebe voljela
bit će to ironija tuge.

nestat će sjaja u travi
nestat će veličanstvenosti svijeta
ostat će samo blijeda slika onoga što je prošlo.


William Wordsworth

[Speculum Columbae]

Ausi conme unicorne sui
Qui s'esbahit en regardant
Quant la pucele va mirant.
Tant est liee de son ennui,
Pasmee chiet en son giron;
Lors l'ocit on en traïson.
Et moi ont mort d'autel semblant
Amors et ma dame, por voir,
Mon cuer ont, n'en puis point ravoir.

Dame, quant je devant vos fui
Et je vos vi premierement,
Mes cuers aloit si tresaillant
Qu'il vos remest quant je m'en mui.
Lors fu menés sanz raençon
En la douce chartre en prison,
Dont li piler sont de talent
Et li huis sont de biais veoir
Et li anel de bon espoir.

De la chartre a la clef Amors,
Et si i a mis trois portiers:
Biau Semblant a non li premiers,
Et Biautez cens en fait seignors,
Dangier a mis a l'uis devant,
Un ort felon, vilain puant,
Qui mult est maus et pautoniers.
Cist troi sont et viste et hardi;
Mult ont tost un home saisi.

Qui porroit souffrir la tristors
Et les assaus de ces huissiers?
Onques Rollans ne Oliviers
Ne vainquirent si fors estocs;
Il vainquirent en conbatant,
Mais ceus vaint on humiliant.
Soufrirs en est gonfanoniers;
En cent estor dont je vos di,
N'a nul secors que de merci.

Dame, je ne dout mes riens plus
Fors tant que faille a vos amer.
Tant ai apris a endurer
Que je sui vostres tout par us;
Et se il vos en pesoit bien,
Ne m'en puis je partir por rien
Que je n'aie le remenbrer
Et que mes cuers ne soit adés
En la prison et de moi pres.

Dame, quant je ne sai guiler,
Merciz seroit de saison mes
De soustenir si grevain fes.

Thibaut de Champagne, trouvere (XIII c)





A solis ortu usque ad occidua
littora maris planctus pulsat pectora.
Heu mihi misero!

Ultra marina agmina tristitia
tetigit ingens cum merore nimio.
Heu mihi misero!

[...]

Planctus de obitu Karoli, nepoznati franacki monah IX vek

[bas bleu]

dover beach

the sea is calm to-night.
the tide is full, the moon lies fair
upon the straits; on the french coast the light
gleams and is gone; the cliffs of england stand;
glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
only, from the long line of spray
where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
listen! you hear the grating roar
of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
at their return, up the high strand,
begin, and cease, and then again begin,
with tremulous cadence slow, and bring
the eternal note of sadness in.

sophocles long ago
heard it on the aegaean, and it brought
into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
of human misery; we
find also in the sound a thought,
hearing it by this distant northern sea.

the sea of faith
was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
but now i only hear
its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
retreating, to the breath
of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
and naked shingles of the world.

ah, love, let us be true
to one another! for the world, which seems
to lie before us like a land of dreams,
so various, so beautiful, so new,
hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
and we are here as on a darkling plain
swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
where ignorant armies clash by night.

matthew arnold

[Orlando the Lady]

Kavafi:


ITHACA [1910, 1911]

As you set out for Ithaca
hope that your journey is a long one,
full of adventure, full of discovery.
Laistrygonians and Cyclops,
angry Poseidon-don't be afraid of them:
you'll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare sensasion
touches your spirit and your body.
Laistrygonians and Cyclops,
wild Poseidon-you won't encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.

Hope that your journey is a long one.
May there be many summer mornings when,
with what pleasure, what joy,
you come into harbors you're seeing for the first time;
may you stop at Phoenician trading stations
to buy fine things,
mother of pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
sensual perfume of every kind-
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
and may you visit many Egyptian cities
to learn and learn again from those who know.

Keep Ithaka always in your mind.
Arriving there is what you're destined for.
But don't hurry the journey at all.
Better if it lasts for years,
so that you're old by the time you reach the island,
wealthy with all you've gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaca to make you rich.
Ithaca gave you the marvelous journey.
Without her you would have not set out.
She has nothing left to give you now.

And if you find her poor, Ithaca won't have fooled you.
Wise as you will have become, so full of experience,
you'll have understood by then what these Ithacas mean.

[alexandermagic]

Originally posted by bas bleu

dover beach

the sea is calm to-night.
the tide is full, the moon lies fair
upon the straits; on the french coast the light
gleams and is gone; the cliffs of england stand;
glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
come to the window, sweet is the night-air!
only, from the long line of spray
where the sea meets the moon-blanched land,
listen! you hear the grating roar
of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,
at their return, up the high strand,
begin, and cease, and then again begin,
with tremulous cadence slow, and bring
the eternal note of sadness in.

sophocles long ago
heard it on the aegaean, and it brought
into his mind the turbid ebb and flow
of human misery; we
find also in the sound a thought,
hearing it by this distant northern sea.

the sea of faith
was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
but now i only hear
its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
retreating, to the breath
of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
and naked shingles of the world.

ah, love, let us be true
to one another! for the world, which seems
to lie before us like a land of dreams,
so various, so beautiful, so new,
hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
and we are here as on a darkling plain
swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
where ignorant armies clash by night.

matthew arnold

[walt333]

XVIII

Ljubi me, ljubi ponovo, na dar
najzaljubljeniji mi pruži jedan
poljubac, onaj najviše medan:
Vratiću četir, vrelija no žar.

Vaj, zar se opet žališ? Da taj jad
ublažim, deset daću ti još vrućih.
Poljupce tako srećno preplićući
jedo u drugom uživajmo sad.

dvostruki život vodićemo tako:
u sebi i u dragom biću svako.
Da mislim ludo, ljubavi, dozvoli:

Povučeno da živim, to me boli,
pa mi je uvek, da se smirim, stalo
da izvan sebe izronim bar malo.

Lujza Labe iliti la Belle Cordière (Lepa Užarka)

[d_kiš]

DESTROYING BEAUTY

a rose
red sunlight;
I take it apart
in the garage
like a puzzle:
the petals are as greasy
as old bacon
and fall
like the maidens of the world
backs to the floor
and I look up
at the old calendar
hung from a nail
and touch
my wrinkled face
and smile
because
the secret
is beyond me.

C. Bukowski

[Orlando the Lady]

Originally posted by walt333


Lujza Labe

[d_kiš]

BENEATH MY HANDS

Beneath my hands
your small breasts
are the upturned bellies
of breathing fallen sparrows.

Wherever you move
I hear the sounds of closing wings
of falling wings.

I am speechless
because you have fallen beside me
because your eyelashes
are the spines of tiny fragile animals.

I dread the time
when your mouth
begins to call me hunter.

When you call me close
to tell me
your body is not beautiful
I want to summon
the eyes and hidden mouths
of stone and light and water
to testify against you.

I want them
to surrender before you
the trembling rhyme of your face
from their deep caskets.

When you call me close
to tell me
your body is not beautiful
I want my body and my hands
to be pools
for your looking and laughing.

L.Cohen

[smaug]

d_kiš pise na engleskom, pod pseudonimom...

[bas bleu]

whenever that happened

hell is the familiar all stripped of wonder.
was there a moment
when wonder at the world died in my eyes?
had i friend i could recognise?
when did i take friendship for granted?
when did i get used to the thought of murder?
when did my flesh cease to astonish me?
when did my mind become grey-familiar?
whenever that happened is when i knew
i could do anything.
when wonder died in me power was born.
i can change the world because i no longer dream of blue,
i can betray a god because i never heard a girl sing
of steps in the street or sunlight blessing a field of corn.

brendan kennelly

[IMPACT]

[bas bleu]

i remember, i remember

coming up england by a different line
for once, early in the cold new year,
we stopped, and, watching men with number plates
sprint down the platform to familiar gates,
'why, coventry!' i exclaimed. "i was born here.'

i leant far out, and squinnied for a sign
that this was still the town that had been 'mine'
so long, but found i wasn't even clear
which side was which. from where those cycle-crates
were standing, had we annually departed

for all those family hols? . . . a whistle went:
things moved. i sat back, staring at my boots.
'was that,' my friend smiled, 'where you "have your roots"?'
no, only where my childhood was unspent,
i wanted to retort, just where i started:

by now i've got the whole place clearly charted.
our garden, first: where i did not invent
blinding theologies of flowers and fruits,
and wasn't spoken to by an old hat.
and here we have that splendid family

i never ran to when i got depressed,
the boys all biceps and the girls all chest,
their comic ford, their farm where i could be
'really myself'. i'll show you, come to that,
the bracken where i never trembling sat,

determined to go through with it; where she
lay back, and 'all became a burning mist'.
and, in those offices, my doggerel
was not set up in blunt ten-point, nor read
by a distinguished cousin of the mayor,

who didn't call and tell my father there
before us, had we the gift to see ahead -
'you look as though you wished the place in hell,'
my friend said, 'judging from your face.' 'oh well,
i suppose it's not the place's fault,' i said.

'nothing, like something, happens anywhere.'

philip larkin

[smaug]

Lesbia hath a beaming eye, But no one knows for whom it beameth,
Right and left arrows fly, But what they aim at no one dreameth
[...]

Lesbia hath a wit refined, But when its points are gleaming round us,
Who can tell if htey're designed. To dazzle merely or to wound us [...]

[d_kiš]

GOVORILA SI O SNIJEGU

Govorila si o snijegu koji je zavejao ulice.
Govorila si o snijegu koji je zavejao naše zagrljene stope.
A ja sam znao jedno:
da te moram zadržati,
barem dok tuguju drvoredi.

Ida
voli me.

Topli kao Golfska struja
znam
oplovićemo sva mora nježnosti
i bićemo jednom samo uspomene.
Ali to je kraj balade a mi smo tek u sredini.
Ida
voli me.

Voli me
Ida
barem dok plaču drvoredi.
Voli me
Ida
barem dok psalmuju vjetrovi.
A poslije,
voli me barem do moje smrti.
Poslije,
kad umru vjetrovi.

Voli me
Ida
kao da nikad nećeš otići.

Kao da ćeš otići sutra.

I. Sarajlić


WANTING TO DIE

Since you ask, most days I cannot remember.
I walk in my clothing, unmarked by that voyage.
Then the almost unnameable lust returns.

Even then I have nothing against life.
I know well the grass blades you mention,
the furniture you have placed under the sun.

But suicides have a special language.
Like carpenters they want to know which tools.
They never ask why build.

Twice I have so simply declared myself,
have possessed the enemy, eaten the enemy,
have taken on his craft, his magic.

In this way, heavy and thoughtful,
warmer than oil or water,
I have rested, drooling at the mouth-hole.

I did not think of my body at needle point.
Even the cornea and the leftover urine were gone.
Suicides have already betrayed the body.

Still-born, they don’t always die,
but dazzled, they can’t forget a drug so sweet
that even children would look on and smile.

To thrust all that life under your tongue!—
that, all by itself, becomes a passion.
Death’s a sad bone; bruised, you’d say,

and yet she waits for me, year after year,
to so delicately undo an old wound,
to empty my breath from its bad prison.

Balanced there, suicides sometimes meet,
raging at the fruit a pumped-up moon,
leaving the bread they mistook for a kiss,

leaving the page of the book carelessly open,
something unsaid, the phone off the hook
and the love whatever it was, an infection

A.Sexton

[Ulix]

San Martino del Carso
(Giuseppe Ungaretti)

Di queste case
Non è rimasto
Che qualche
Brandello di muro
Di tanti
Che mi corrispondevano
Non è rimasto
Neppure tanto
Ma nel cuore
Nessuna croce manca
E’ il mio cuore
Il paese più straziato

[Ulix]

Nemogući snovi
(Reinaldo Arenas)

Sanjao sam da živim u ogromnom zamku s čitavom svojom porodicom, i da se u svakoj od soba moji najmiliji zanimaju svakodnevnim malenkostima.
Sanjao sam par udobnih cipela.
Sanjao sam potop.
Sanjao sam velikog i nežnog, muževnog crnca, baš za mene.
Sanjao sam polje gardenija.
Sanjao sam klupu pokraj mora do koje bih odlazio uveče, samo da sedim.
Sanjao sam da moj autobus uvek vozi na vreme.
Sanjao sam da sam učiteljica.
Sanjao sam da imam izvajano (ili bar prihvatljivo) telo, ne ove mlohave sise.
Sanjao sam ogroman balon koji za sobom vuku svi gačci iz Lenjinovog parka, i sebe kako u tom balonu putujem daleko, daleko, veoma daleko...
Sanjao sam da imam istog muža duže vreme.
Sanjao sam da imam sina koji nije peder nego snažni stolar ili zidar.
Sanjao sam pisaću mašinu sa slovom Ñ.
Sanjao sam da nisam ćelav.
Sanjao sam da sanjam košmar – živeo sam u ćumezu hotela Monserat i budno motrio na sve one koji su motrili na mene. Kada sam se probudio, shvatio sam da je košmar stvarnost, pa poželeh da sanjam da sam sanjao košmar.
Sanjao sam risove i risove belog papira dovoljne da napišem roman.
Sanjao sam da mi ispred kuće raste drvo badema.
Sanjao sam da me je oteo goli anđeo.
Sanjao sam da možeš da kupiš so bez sledovanja.
Sanjao sam da sam mlad i zdrav i da je preko puta moje kuće zarasli plac, gde napaljeni vojnici gluvare i čekaju na mene.
Sanjao sam da sam odvrnuo slavinu i da je bilo vode.
Sanjao sam grad poput onog koji sam izgubio, ali slobodan.
Sanjao sam avenije i široka šetališta pod senama drveća.
Sanjao sam veliku okruglu kolibu pokrivenu palminim lišćem, s nadstrešnicom od cinkanog lima po kojoj dobuje kiša.
Sanjao sam kineski ventilator.
Sanjao sam da su Lesama i Marija Luisa u velikoj sobi, da me zovu, i kada dođem do njih, Lesama kaže Mariji Luisi: Vidi, kako dobro izgleda.
Sanjao sam socijalne zube koji ne žuljaju.
Sanjao sam da neko kuca na vrata, otvaram – nasmešenom mladom čoveku, sav je uspaljen i voljan.
Sanjao sam ekspres lonac.
Sanjao sam zelenu reku koja mi govori: hodi, hodi, ovde je ishodište tvojih žudnji.
Sanjao sam da odlazim daleko, veoma daleko, ali koliko god daleko, veoma daleko stigao, uvek sam mogao da idem još dalje i sve dalje...
Sanjao sam da ne može postojati toliko užasna boleština kao što je sida i da uživanje nije kažnjivo.
Sanjao sam miris mora.
Sanjao sam da je sav užas ovog sveta samo san.

[Laerem]

Randall Jarrell - A Conversation With The Devil

Indulgent, or candid, or uncommon reader
- I've some: a wife, a nun, a ghost or two-
If I write for anyone, I wrote for you;
So whisper when I die, We was too few;
Write over me (if you can write; I hardly knew)
That I - that I - but anything will do,
I'm satisfied... And yet
- and yet, you were too few:
Should I perhaps have written for your brothers,
Those artful, common, unindulgent others?

[LeDeNa_]

"Šara", Oktavio Paz


Jednim komadom ugljena

Mojom krnjom kredom i crvenom olovkom

Nacrtati tvoje ime

Ime tvojih usta

Znak tvojih nogu

Na ničijem zidu

Na zabranjenim vratima

Urezati ime tvoga tela

Dok sečivo moje britve

Ne prokrvari

I kamen ne zavapi

I zid ne uzdahne kao grudi.

[LeDeNa_]

Zelja po sebi jeste kretanje
Ne samo po sebi pozeljno;
Ljubav po sebi ne pokrece,
Samo je uzrok i cilj kretanja,
Bezvremena i bez zelje
...Osim sa gledista vremena
Uhvacena u oblik što ogranicava
Izmedju nebica i bica.

T.S. Eliot

[LeDeNa_]

Sada, kada ništa na svijetu ne može vratiti dane prohujalog ljeta
naš sjaj u travi i blještavost svijeta, ne treba tugovati,
već tražiti snage u onom što je ostalo i s tim živjeti.

zaboravimo, ne radi nas, ne radi zaborava
zaboravimo da smo se voljeli, da smo se svadali i
da smo bili krivi.

požurimo, s danima i danima sto će doći
požurimo sa shvatanjima, sa svim što me odvaja od tebe.

jednom, ćeš se vratiti i ubrati cvjetove
koje smo zajedno mirisali, gazili
ali, tvoje ruke bit će prekratke, a noge premorene da se vratiš...bit će kasno.

možda ćemo se naći jedanput na malom vrhu života i neizrečene tajne
htjeti jedno drugome da kažemo, al' proći ćemo jedno kraj drugog kao stranci
jedan skrenuti pogled bit će sve što ćemo jedno drugome moći dati.

zaboravit ću oči
i neću promatrati zvijezde koje me na tebe neobično podsjećaju.

ne boj se, jednom ćes se zaljubiti
al' ljubit ćes zato što će te nešto na toj ženi podsjećati na mene.

ne otkrivaj svoje srce ljudima jer u njima vlada kob i egoizam
život je borba - nastoj pobijediti
ali ako izgubiš-ne smiješ tugovati
cilj života je ljubav-a ona traži žrtve.

bio si moje veliko proljeće
uspomena koja će dugo živjeti u budućnosti
koje ću se sjećati.

osjećat ću tugu jer sam tebe voljela
bit će to ironija tuge.

nestat će sjaja u travi
nestat će veličanstvenosti svijeta
ostat će samo blijeda slika onoga što je prošlo.


William Wordsworth

[bas bleu]

to his lost lover

now they are no longer
any trouble to each other

he can turn things over, get down to that list
of things that never happened, all of the lost

unfinishable business.
for instance… for instance,

how he never clipped and kept her hair, or drew a hairbrush
through that style of hers, and never knew how not to blush

at the fall of her name in close company.
how they never slept like buried cutlery –

two spoons or forks cupped perfectly together,
or made the most of some heavy weather –

walked out into hard rain under sheet lightning,
or did the gears while the other was driving.

how he never raised his fingertips
to stop the segments of her lips

from breaking the news,
or tasted the fruit

or picked for himself the pear of her heart,
or lifted her hand to where his own heart

was a small, dark, terrified bird
in her grip. where it hurt.

or said the right thing,
or put it in writing.

and never fled the black mile back to his house
before midnight, or coaxed another button of her blouse,

then another,
or knew her

favourite colour,
her taste, her flavour,

and never ran a bath or held a towel for her,
or soft-soaped her, or whipped her hair

into an ice-cream cornet or a beehive
of lather, or acted out of turn, or misbehaved

when he might have, or worked a comb
where no comb had been, or walked back home

through a black mile hugging a punctured heart,
where it hurt, where it hurt, or helped her hand

to his butterfly heart
in its two blue halves.

and never almost cried,
and never once described

an attack of the heart,
or under a silk shirt

nursed in his hand her breast,
her left, like a tear of flesh

wept by the heart,
where it hurts,

or brushed with his thumb the nut of her nipple,
or drank intoxicating liquors from her navel.

or christened the pole star in her name,
or shielded the mask of her face like a flame,

a pilot light,
or stayed the night,

or steered her back to that house of his,
or said “don’t ask me how it is

i like you.
i just might do.”

how he never figured out a fireproof plan,
or unravelled her hand, as if her hand

were a solid ball
of silver foil

and discovered a lifeline hiding inside it,
and measured the trace of his own alongside it.

but said some things and never meant them –
sweet nothings anybody could have mentioned.

and left unsaid some things he should have spoken,
about the heart, where it hurt exactly, and how often.

s.a.

[LeDeNa_]

- A kad zaboraviš čistu posteljinu srijedom i subotom,
A naročito kad zaboraviš nedjelju
Kad zaboraviš naše nedjeljne trenutke u krevetu,
Ili mene kako sjedim na radijatoru u tromo popodne,
I gledam niz dugu ulicu koja nikamo ne vodi;
Zagrljenu priprostim starim kućnim ogrtačem nenadanja;
I ništa ne moram da radim, i sretna sam, ne znam zasto...
I da ponedjeljak nikada ne dođe!
Kad to zaboraviš, kažem,
I kako si psovao ako bi netko zvonio na vratima,
I kako bi meni zastalo srce kad bi zvonio telefon,
I kako smo napokon krenuli na nedjeljni ručak;
To jest, kroz dnevnu sobu do stola zamrljanog tintom
Na nedjeljni ručak.
A to je uvijek bilo pile s tjesteninom, ili pile s rižom,
I salata, raženi kruh i čaj, i kolačići s čokoladom.
Kažem, kad to zaboraviš
Kad zaboraviš moj tihi predosjećaj
Da će rat završiti prije nego dođe red na tebe;
I kako smo se konačno svlačili,
Gasili svjetlo, uranjali u krevet,
Ležali načas opušteni u nedjeljnoj svježoj posteljini,
I nježno se savili jedno u drugo...
Kada, kažem, zaboraviš sve to,
Tada možeš reći, tada ću možda povjerovati
Da si me posve zaboravio.

G. Brooks

[bas bleu]

success

i think if you had loved me when i wanted;
if i'd looked up one day, and seen your eyes,
and found my wild sick blasphemous prayer granted,
and your brown face, that's full of pity and wise,
flushed suddenly; the white godhead in new fear
intolerably so struggling, and so shamed;
most holy and far, if you'd come all too near,
if earth had seen earth's lordliest wild limbs tamed,
shaken, and trapped, and shivering, for my touch --
myself should i have slain? or that foul you?
but this the strange gods, who had given so much,
to have seen and known you, this they might not do.
one last shame's spared me, one black word's unspoken;
and i'm alone; and you have not awoken.

rupert brooke

[bas bleu]

a dream of jealousy

walking with you and another lady
in wooded parkland, the whispering grass
ran its fingers through our guessing silence
and the trees opened into a shady
unexpected clearing where we sat down.
i think the candour of the light dismayed us.
we talked about desire and being jealous,
our conversation a loose single gown
or a white picnic tablecloth spread out
like a book or manners in the wilderness.
"show me", i said to our companion, "what
i have much coveted, your breast's mauve star."
and she consented. o neither these verses
nor my prudence, love, can heal your wounded stare.

seamus heaney