Rather the circumstances were different – smoke obscures the poster hanging on the brick wall. Bold letters droop heavily from the worn canvas. At the right-hand corner, just where the wall slips out from underneath the banner, waits a little space. Waits on the soft graze of nearly folded wings. A brief chirp addresses no one in particular. Maybe the return home hastily announced. The swift breeze skips along the block as if to hide and remain unknown. A hurried peek-a-boo extended breath across the suspended drape lifts it by the hem , permeates a single moment with whirl and swoosh and uncoordinated flutter – hides bird and voice and wing, spells freedom in all caps. Something resonates within.
Alle Beiträge von Nick
The other side
The miracle sea only I can see, like this. The obverse of my daily dose of thoughts on display as my heart glides just slightly above the skin of the impermanent sea, so as not to touch or disturb. Plainly a game of silent approximation, both never seemed more alike. The throbbing skin, the four chambers softly breathing hello, the aorta pulsing life in the depths beyond sight – the heart of the sea. I marvel at its membrane, stretching far. As it imitates my inner drum, I too cross the void in sudden compulsion to belong. Every encounter leaves an imprint on the organism. Game shifts to dance
, an orchestrated, spontaneous and unmet, forceful advance in space, time and form.
Instantaneously I arrive at the other side. Light across the sea. The not-knowing, but trusting, the hazy outline is forever enough. I find complacency in the wisdom of my heart as it too is swept across the shore, here and there in perfect synchrony.
Window visitor
The window ajar, I am visited by the wind. It takes courage to cross the threshold into my dark room. I am sat right there, right where it enters, where it picks at my bare chest like a hummingbird wrestling the air to steady itself and dive its narrow bill into the nectar , forceful, decisive, yet gentle.
It trespasses not. I welcome each cooling brush, each purposeful touch possessing me. There it is that “me”. As I hold it up to the light to distill more understanding, the wind sweeps it of my hand. Once fist, a tight clutch, a wistful holding on, now that – a palm simmering underneath a light, letting go. Whom to trust more than the descending wind, to break and swallow this manifestation of “me”? And thus , to gesture my self-portrait to follow , to cross over from the membrane that infused it with so many labels into a novel experience.
I hesitate to call the wind by name, to sprinkle it with animate human properties, to say I hear a murmur. Just then the same hummingbird picks out my thoughts, one by one, a quick spasm, one more line of thought struggles against, attempts to connect and disappears. The last rebellion of „me“.
Out, out, wind hollers – perhaps. Farewell room and window, cone of light resting on palm, once taut, now soothed and calm, farewell hummingbird, your wingful tatter , unwavering too. Each stroke of wing – surely there is an in-between, if we look so very close. Universal traveler, wind, in might and meagre – farewell „me“. Free thyself. Ride wind, ride.
(purring heart over calm sea)
A cream top, Massachusets on my mind, a door ajar, lost thoughts curled up in dormant dreams, floating towards the heavens. And still I stand. And gaze. And drop – drop in and out of whispers probing my heart in heated passion for the untold, the limitless
, the beyond.
I want nothing more but to stand and behold – to be stood on and beheld by shape and sound and texture as I peel into this existence extending me tenfold. I shudder from the inside out – crippled, churning mind – as the eternal enters me, expands me.
To be continued. (maybe)
Uman
Mortal – stretcher at the ready. I will carry you across the oceans, sit with you. The cap of my toe peeking out from underneath the sand. I love you sweet uman. The grains I fold too , fold them into the depths of my heart. Little globes, worlds in their own right. You – other – niched in a sweet spot , I am your back, spine and muscle. Ambition hails my hushed attempt at kissing away your scarlet blush. I dissolve , then bow, then bow, and dissolve, with me the morsels of earth , fragments of uman, dazzle, dazzle a pink, lush tone on your placid skin, echoing life, thundering through me, occupying me. I want nothing more than to be free.
Cherry tree
I am madly in love with the cherry tree. The last leaf on the stalk, the pit in the sink, underneath its flesh, unwrapped and exposed. I am madly in love with the cherry tree. And I sing of the petals like a peddler strutting through the village gates, of one up high on a lonesome hill, standing in the midday sun. The crown a shrivel and a scribble on a sketch book left behind, out of pages old stories in rhythmic verse retold:
Ol‘ cherry tree, born and raised of long
A somber tale your bless’ed child
Say wind and storm, and sun and rain
My heart, your steady thump, go onFresh now the seasons strive
Pungent air of dauntless growth
Cross branches soon in outward reach
Buds and blossoms eager thriveAwe for freedom, ease and pain,
Out by stigma, style and stem,
There a flower, notch and pen
Draw and capture, wondrous lust
Dipped in ink and sealed complete
In loves fit wool and mane.
My book
My inner may well resemble a sinkhole. A cavern of dust, putrid soil, how can something grow in this emptiness? The book remains. On my lap, J.D. Salinger’s „The Catcher in the Rye“. My little title of freedom when there is nothing but rain covering my plot. New York, I yearn to be swallowed by your streets. So far, the big apple, I can tell you that. But I would rather sing of these very pages, mechanically stuck between two covers, title and all, print and story. Phonies.
I was referring to the song of a specific fragrance held in these pages as I inhale deeply a formula of time. Reading with my eyes closed turning into a habit for my nostrils. Oh , what wealth in this heated humdrum. The nectar honey is; worn wood dipped into the golden mass by a goddess, resting her head upon her hand, entangled in vines, lapping at her existence. Then set out to dry in the warming rays of the sun , twisting themselves into the fibrous tissue in dire need to unfold the deep , comforting brush of texture I call home.
All of me sinks, absorbs, melts, yes, melts and dissolves. I want to say fades, fades into an untold fairy tale of pages and their lasting fragrance, where really, I discover now, the action is not mine. The inaction essentially unlocks the magic. I am the vessel, on the receiving end of bliss. I will say this: eternity hides in the crease of two pages. Just close your eyes and breath.
I’m wearing a hat
…and it reminds me of something long past. Still
, it provides a sort of shelter, a cocoon, in which I taste the lingering ember of affection and attachment. Someone. So foreign now – the word, not the feeling. Really, it isn’t my hat I’m wearing.
I am dressed in memories, seeping into my heart, letting it swell, ambushing me as I consider. Conceiving a thought, I refuse this birth. The true jubilation is closer to the heart than the mind. I have wrestled with reason too much
, too long, to no avail. The crown of my head serves well to shoulder this hat, that will suffice. A beret.
A scent woven into its fabric; I recognize immediately. One encounter, brief beyond time, has me standing on a bench, overlooking the village roofs. Chimney tops and the passing smoke, faint in its rising, swept away by wind. No, this scent does not dwindle into the night. It is you I bear in the depths of my heart.
So I breath. And I want to say I smile. My parted lips are a release, soon chimney too, a nimble liberation as no part of me needs act
, just a vehicle for breath, soft and free. There now, cocoon and scent, my universe in a waltz through time, no hands whizzing round minute and hour. All I am, is wearing a hat – your hat – and I like it.
Over
Blank. First thing that comes to mind – blank. I am drawing a blank. A hasty outline, which I then gently fill, one stroke at a time. I missed myself swirling across the hidden chambers of such a profound blank. The brush of life uplifting the canvas. Each advance of the hand revealing the obscure in colorful whims. The trace they leave dampens the mind and stills the heart. A merciful beckoning for a worn man and woman.
The pallet of paint will not dry. I feel the texture of the whirling colors with my eyes. One moment I caress my longing to keep them open , then silently prod myself to turn away. Now the outline dances as the delicate borders lose their fringes, deliberately seeking liberation from their confines. Oh what wonder in the rapt furor of colors spreading out boundlessly. I savor the mighty disturbance, breaking down limits we ourselves installed under the pretence of keeping safe.
I glide on the tightrope fearlessly. I shed myself of the restraints that were meant to safeguard me. I face helplessness as I balance myself on the tips of my toes. I shuffle forward on an imaginary line , golden in hue , bright yellow, a frail zigzag fading in the distance. The underbelly of swirls and ropes and brushstrokes, a quiet abyss. If I fall now, I am enmeshed in colorful ribbons, transcending this human experience into far more, far more. It matters little. I flail and flutter some, then leap and turn, spin my core inside out, am dancer, am color and tightrope and abyss. Glad to be a passerby in this timely adventure.
Ein
Behutsam zieht ihr eure Runde – sie gleicht einer Ehrenrunde – die letzte in dieser sichtbaren Welt. An jeder Stelle
, der Bedeutung anhaftet, macht ihr Halt. Wie aus einer Hand hebt ihr den kleinen, blauen Stein mit den feinen, weissdurchzogenen Schleiern hervor, und lässt ihn sich jeden Moment verinnerlichen. Die Frage nach einer weltfremden Magie ist hinfällig, zu sehr ebbt hier Leben in aller Kraft auf als, dass ein Zweifel Nahrung finden würde. Was sorgsam anmutet, ist das Bewusstsein über das Leben, wie jede bedeutungsvolle Regung der Muskeln in der vorgehaltenen Hand verrät. Stein, wie bist du sichtbar! Ein Glühen entspringt dir, fesselt sanft das Herz, wie die Hingabe dein Wesen erobert.
Es liegt die Kraft in euer Beiden erscheinen. Eine stille Feier des Lebens, die eurer Anwesenheit bedarf. Mutter und Tochter. Erst Zuschauer
, dann Akteure im brodelnden Muster der Zeit – heut ein Streicher in andere Gefilde, indes die Unendlichkeit sich euch öffnet. In jener Öffnung hat dich seit Anbeginn die Lebensblüte umgarnt, dich mit dem Menschsein verwoben, dir Atem geschenkt, dich in diesen süssen Nektar geweiht, von dessen Ursprung du dich immer erfrischest; durch alle Gezeiten: Kindheit, Jugend, Alter. Ein weicher Kuss verweilt über deinen Geschichten. Erinnerungen. Wenn Steine lächeln und Winde tanzen, das Blau seinen Schimmer säht, seid ihr innig verbunden.
Steinträger, nun selbst ergeben, einmal noch Besucher, das Wesentliche im Herzen. Es ist die Begegnung mit der Schöpfung. Im Inneren ein leises Pochen, wie ihr die Funken deiner Jahre aufblitzen lässt. Hier hast du gelacht, deiner Mutter gedacht, in dir dein Kind getragen, etwas hinter dir gelassen, und dort der Musik gelauscht, seine Hände betrachtet, Melodien, die in Tulpen münden, ach die Farben, die dir Tränen entlocken, immer noch das Blau. Eine zarte Welt von Furchen umschlossen, in diesem getragenen Gewand deiner Gestalt, ein wissendes Nicken in Richtung des Horizonts. Stein und Liebe vereint. Niemand nimmt nichts. Zeit lauert
, blickt beinahe zärtlich über die Schulter der Veränderung, auch sie hält inne, nur zwei – ihr zwei; eins.