To some degree
Sometimes
I want to close my body.
Not forever, just enough,
to hear myself thinking
without the world entering.
I would build the walls from bone,
from every thing I have swallowed,
every wound I have peeled open
just to know that it is mine.
The body fortress.
Come closer.
No,
stay there.
I want you from head to toe.
I do not walk alone.
I do not walk alone.
I do not walk alone.
Repetition makes a spell.
My mouth would become
a locked gate.
Enemies, having feet,
would be kept outside.
Having hands,
could not touch me.
Having eyes,
could not find me.
A bullet, a knife,
a lover, a joke.
I will be clutching to the light.
To read in a time of war,
To read it again,
To think about it,
To read it aloud,
To record it, to try again,
To listen back, to send and unsend,
To draw the outline of your figure in my mind,
To want to lift you,
To enjoy the occasional poison,
To blow out the smoke,
To glance up,
To have a bad view,
and try and show you,
To be told it isn't clear,
To feel like a failure,
to stop trying,
and start again.
This is what the body does.
It fails at being closed.
It grows, hardens, softens,
lets in, and knows better.
That's why it's always opening.
The occasional proof
that something entered me
and I survived it.
I eat my body.
I sleep inside it.
I carry it through the street.
I give it away
in pieces.
And every morning
it returns to me.
Some new friends,
an old question that's been bothering me
Do you believe one can love unconditionally?
To some degree,
Sometimes,
I want to close my body
(But it’s not really up to me)
Inspired by Mattijs van de Port,
Moin & Sophia Al-Maria
Knots and Wholes
Today I tried to
untangle
the threads of my red yearn.
The yearn that pierced through me
all these years.
The yearn that kept me together,
the yearn that put me in geometric alliances,
the yearn that gave me shape,
the yearn that formed into a knot.
It had formed into many ovals.
Once I pulled at one, another opened.
A small one turned into a big one,
and vice versa.
The round ones looked so beautiful.
They were shining.
But some of them were already thinner
than the others.
At one point I traced
the individual threads
of its end.
They had separated.
I tried to force them back together.
They were being difficult,
and I sang
“I’m a believer”.
It’s difficult to see where to go
when all the threads are apart.
Only in dreams,
in beautiful dreams
can I gather my strength.
Suddenly, I found the end !!!!!
It was staring at me
the whole time:
I only had to use my spit.
But still, sticking together
is hard.
It was not just the end that
had separated.
Also some of the ovals
along the way.
Some of them twirl very tightly,
it’s hard to see.
But we have to start at the end
to realise where the loops are,
spit all along the way.
Some knots and holes are okay,
and hair and lint and dust.
The only thing I'll keep
are the letters and the photographs.
Bearing witness
There is a thing passing
in the sky,
some thick clouds surround it.
The uninitiated see nothing.
Everything is out in the open,
only some things are purposefully hidden.
I know
how easily a person becomes
a thing
in another person's looking.
Initiates have their eyes open.
There is a life inside
that exceeds, what can be witnessed.
The parts of you
that do not belong
to history at all.
I used to think the clouds
were hiding something from me.
Now I wonder
if I am the cloud.
Mistaking my sight
for the limits
of what can be seen.
And this is my initiation.
Because I am understanding
how little looking has to do
with seeing.
Because I am understanding
how much seeing has to do
with listening.
And if there is anything
I can carry from here,
let me be water.
Moving forward.
Its refusal to become
only the shape of what touches it.
Because our bodies still
have organs
and I am learning
to bear witness to mine.
Manchmal
schmeckt mein Mund nach Metall.
(Ich kann das Zittern meiner linken Hand
nicht kontrollieren)
Wir werden flüchtig sein.
Nicht, weil wir verschwinden.
Sondern,
weil nichts was uns berührt,
uns unberührt lässt.
Erinnerung ist ein Körper
der sich weigert etwas loszulassen.
Weil der Körper nur langsam weiß
was Vergangenheit ist.
The museum of human suffering
hat keine Öffnungszeiten.
Alles wartet darauf,
noch einmal berührt zu werden.
The limits of my language are the
gatekeepers
of the borders of my world.
And yet, we keep running, pressing
(You and I).
Some days I feel them, and lean in.
Some days the words just pour and bubble out of me like a never ending spring.
Some days I feel them,
and lean against.
Tomorrow
will be one of those days.
How can
How can I
How can I talk about tomorrow
Ich bin die, die mich selbst widerlegt. Ich
bin die, die sich selbst erlegt. Ich
bin meine eigene Verneinung. Weil
jede Wahrheit, die ich ausspreche, eine
andere
am Rand meines Mundes
zurücklässt.
Morgen werde ich mich wieder
in meinem Kopf verirren,
an meiner eigenen Zunge stolpern.
Wieder gegen meine Existenz schreiben, als
ließe sich mit jedem Satz
eine Realität verhindern.
(adaptation of a poem by Senthuran Varatharajah)
Die Antwort auf deinen Hunger, ist Hunger
(The answer to your hunger, is hunger)
Why waste a day explaining.
Better to say,
garden.
Better to say,
moss,
the bed I tend in.
The opening of quiet
happened
in my time.
In my time,
I was a bewildered keeper,
learning
the names of seeds.
I am walking
and watering.
The older me
hidden
like bulbs
through winter.
I keep my hope underground.
These small, green promises,
inside.
Growing is one thing.
Living is the same thing.
I am less a stranger here.
I use the words
garden
and morning
because you can walk among them.
But it's more like
sunlight
moving slowly
across wet earth.
A generous light.
It begins
with tending.
There is a sparrow
outside,
and one within.
There is
a tree branch,
daffodils,
and a bird
that shits on my head.
There is a hill
and a garden,
reaching
toward another.
The paths curve gently.
What wind brings me is enough:
the scent of lavender,
the hush of bees.
Sunday was like this.
An unhurried,
living,
blooming,
morning.
How could I know that you love me,
if your eyes didn't speak?
How could I know that
warmth can travel,
if I had never felt your fingers?
If I didn't hear your heart beating,
could I love you so much?
My whole body like a flame.
Where have the past years gone?
I began to live,
yesterday.
I am only just learning,
who I am.
It's beautiful that
your mouth said my name.
It's beautiful that
your laughter feels like sunlight on my skin,
that the twinkle in your eye
gives me life.
It's beautiful that I met you again
and loved you.
(adaptation of a poem by Semra Ertan)
I am a monster
on an
acid afternoon,
scrouching
in catharsis
along my
riverside meadow.