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Saturday, July 21st, 2012
por J Osner
(las que lea con disculpas a Roberto Bolaño: directed freewrite based on some references to rain in La universidad desconocida)
Mientras llueve sobre la extraña carretera
En donde te encuentras
Estoy
Créeme que estoy
En el centro de mi habitación esperando
Que llueva. Está lloviendo:
Corriendo las aguas sobre
Los huecos vitreos, ventanas
Deslizandose
Mis mejillas abajo
Y otras partes
Menos delicadas.
Creo
Creo
Tengo miedo
Créeme que tus huellas tan mojadas
Salpicando
Pulsan inquietante
(And fade.)
posted evening of July 21st, 2012: 1 response
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Sunday, July 22nd, 2012
(written to a prompt from La universidad desconocida)
Entre estos árboles que he inventado
y que no son árboles
estoy yo.
If all the ink were wine and all the paper host
communion of the literate commences
when the printing presses close.
Beneath the trees that are not trees you sleep
and dream of average Joes and trains that are not trains
inhuman people, playing god, write out their epitaphs and fortunes:
your pen like silly putty printing mirrored verses
mocking poets' codes of conduct, bylaws
written waist-high on the wall.
The transubstantiation catches you off-guard,
you dip your pen once more to find
Our Savior's life-blood dripping from the
letters of your scrawl;
and senselessness transmutes your text
to whitespace, letters crawl away
like ants, it's time, don't miss your chance --
the Walrus beckons you behind his hanky.
Come and take a walk, we'll have a pleasant chat,
we'll have some oysters.
Carpenter, who's running late, will meet us at the dance.
posted evening of July 22nd, 2012: Respond
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Saturday, July 28th, 2012
So let's say you're standing now standing stock still on the front stoop
in Saugerties digging the ambient sounds of nighttime
quiet rainstorm whirring thousandfold cicada and
let's say your skin looks yellow in the mottled light
and sight and sight is in itself
diffuse too diffuse
and your line of visionary darkness
and difficult
You're staring at the house across the street the stream of lovely golden monsters
 passing
and the yellow light and patchy shadow mute them
mute them dancing
and dancing
and suddenly, you're dancing
 let's say you're standing like that stock still outside now
your eyes are closed now feel the length
the indentations and extension of your spine expanding
stretching backwards
filling what was void above you
and your hands,
and from your hands expanding
canvas dream hands hanging nervous
limp down by your side you feel
the energy that's pouring out
that's pouring groundward
grounded
posted evening of July 28th, 2012: 1 response
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Friday, August 10th, 2012
Cómo pensar en idioma extranjera, cómo
tomar revelación en los pensamientos
y pasajes, palabras de luz
y de apologia cómo imaginarte que la tierra,
la desierte debajo de tus pies
sea planeta ajeno: que la estrella
la que deseas
a tà te sea patria
a donde nunca mas te volvieras
 (see you soon -- bloggy hiatus to ensue)
↻...done
posted evening of August 10th, 2012: 1 response
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Tuesday, August 28th, 2012
Escucha; oye. Mira. Ve.
¿Qué oyes, pues, amigo? ¿Me oyes
gritar en mi espanto hondo?
Tu mirada me recuerda algunas cosas olvidadas;
dime cosa divertida, hecho falso, algo que
yo pueda olvidar en su lugar.
Oh confuso, casi ciego, busca
simpatÃa o rechazo
—tratamiento por curarte—
escucha; oye. Mira. Ve.
posted evening of August 28th, 2012: 4 responses
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Monday, September third, 2012
Hm... merging a couple of the themes I've been writing about here lately. Writing/revising poetry, writing and thinking in a language not my own, the different voices of the writing process and translation process.... This is a poem I started working on in Oaxaca keying off the rhythm of the first line. (+first line should serve as a clue that I spent a lot of time in class working on imperative and subjunctive voices.) Mil gracias a Paty de ICO para sus direcciones y sugerencias. I added two more stanzas and reworked the first a bit in the past week or so, and turned it into what I think is a coherent poem, a pleasant read.
Escucha; oye. Mira. Ve.
Instrucciones (por The Modesto Kid)
Escucha; oye. Mira. Ve.
¿Qué oyes, pues, amigo? ¿Me oyes
gritar en mi espanto hondo?
Tu mirada me recuerda algunas cosas olvidadas;
dime cosa divertida, hecho falso, algo que
yo pueda olvidar en su lugar.
Oh confuso, casi ciego, busca
simpatÃa o rechazo
—tratamiento por curarte—
y escucha; oye. Mira. Ve.
Primitivo -- sofisticado
¡canta!
que tu graznido
atraviese
vacilente
el micrófono, y los amplificadores
y las lágrimas
Me toca me bendice padre
no bendÃgasme, mi padre
aunque he pecado
Directions
(by The Modesto Kid/tr. Peter Conlay)
Listen; hear. Look: see:
What are you hearing, my friend? Hear me
screaming in my pit of terror?
Your face brings it all back, things I had forgotten:
tell me something, make me laugh, some lie
for me to remember instead of all that.
Confused man, almost blind, go look
for friendship or rejection
—seek some treatment—
Listen; hear. Look. See.
Caveman — sophisticate —
sing!
slowly your cawing
will seep
across
the mics, and the PA
and the tears
Touch me bless me o my father
Don't bless me father
Even though I've sinned
I uploaded a reading of the Spanish text to SoundCloud. That is a not-quite-final revision, I think the rhythm and clarity of it are really improved by the addition of "Oh" at the beginning of the seventh line. (If memory serves, this is an example of an edit to the original text prompted during the process of translation.)
posted morning of September third, 2012: Respond
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Thursday, September 6th, 2012
(another poem written to a prompt from La universidad desconocida...)
PoesÃa que tal vez abogue
por mi sombra
en dÃas venideros
cuando yo sólo sea un nombre
y no el hombre
que con los bolsillas vacillos vagabundeó
y trabajó
en los mataderos del viejo y
del nuevo continente
Mis sueños no tan fáciles
que tengan como antecedente
alguna trauma desconocida
alguna pesadilla anterior
los dejo y caen
no soportados de ninguna
referencia exterior, no enlentecidos
abajo de mi paracaidas, y
¿a dónde? y ¿cuándo
pararán, cuándo van a poder
descansar?
Caen sueños del viejo
y del nuevo continente,
sin término caen;
sueños de amistad
masculino: rough homoerotic self-
sufficiency, soledad publicada. Que en los
mataderos norteamericanos
no trabajen sueños
sino sombras
posted evening of September 6th, 2012: 1 response
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Friday, September 7th, 2012
paralizada
sus movimientos lentos
crecen como las nubes
que crezca hipnotica, paralizada
que sea la totalidad
que sea la madre de la noche
lejano la miro
le sonrío
a ella
paralizado
posted evening of September 7th, 2012: Respond
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Sunday, September 9th, 2012
the automatic CAUTION door swings open and my heart beats faster panicked panting racing down the corridor I know not where  (click through for the dulcet tones of Dolph Chaney)
the automatic PANIC switch engages and I'm climbing up the walls I'm falling paralyzed and endless should have seen that coming no way back tonight my friend the waterfalls of history are soaking me I'm sweating broken searching for the path to bring me home
the automatic wicked bolt of FEAR slides home and punctures my resolve I'm quaking trembling feverish looking in the mirror what I see is sending waves of manic pity through me tell me truly help me I can't find a hand to hold a charge of hope and love and weary resignation say you'll keep me in my pit of fear and solitude and quavering frustration help me turn toward these scaly walls and understand my history my saving grace my destiny my almost unrequited FEAR
posted morning of September 9th, 2012: 1 response
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Sunday, September 16th, 2012
 |  | | 2005 | 2012 |
Out in the back yard
Playhouse lies in pieces and the bolts that once connected them
the once (and future?) construct
scattered sunlight on the lawn
scattered sunlit lifeless hollowed out
the paint like skin that's covered over
veins of douglas fir and cedar
veins of age-old wood and creeping
vitiating rot
Drill battery is charging and I look out my back window
at the stillness of the breezes blowing
pushing round the trees
pushing blowing round the green enclosure
manifold imposing over
arching, dark reality
the creeping, pungent real story
never write it down, I'll never
write it down because it's hidden
hidden dark unnameable
illicit hanging conversation
twittering between cicadas
translate text of endless grayed-out
sussurating stop.
Finished two old projects yesterday -- The playhouse I built for Sylvia in 2005 and which Bill helped me pull down a few weeks ago is now completely disassembled (and Scott has indicated he'd be interested in using the wood to build something for Sasha and Maya); and the Windsor chair I built on my 2002 trip to The Windsor Institute is finally painted, a handsome shade of green. Lee Valley milk paint is the best.
posted morning of September 16th, 2012: Respond
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