Continuum
Unclasped, it falls buzzing
like a wasp in a clean jar
unclasped from the underbelly
of the airplane
The bomb falls
wirelessly sending a message
to a computer that switches
into replacement mode
factory on alert for a spent bomb
button pushed, memory
card awakes
to build the replacement
absurd absence of sanity
Writer’s Night
What is a writers‘ night like?
Where does the bus leave from
which takes us on the road?
And when we get to one of them,
will he let us in or not when we ring the bell?
Should we bring wine or is the writer not allowed to drink,
should we bring music, cigarettes, anything,
can we take a picture of him with the smoke billowing in his place,
as he paces up and down like a caged lion?
Should we bring a book for him to sign,
should we bring our own, signed for him
or would that be a provocation?
Where is the bus leaving from?
Perhaps an omnibus, the wrong chariot?
Where are the writers, and
where is the night that leads us to them?
V
We didn’t know them
deep inside it was hope that said
we had met them in early childhood.
Perhaps we had seen them twice and then they went to the ships
cargoes of coal, cargoes of crops and our friends
vanished beyond the ocean forever.
Daybreak finds us beside the tired lamp
drawing on paper, awkwardly, painfully
ships, mermaids or conches;
at dusk we go down the river
because it shows us the way to the sea
and we spend our nights in cellars smelling of tar.
Our friends have left us
perhaps we never saw them, perhaps
we encountered them when sleep
still brought us very close to the breathing wave
perhaps we search for them because we search for the other life,
beyond the statues.
The Commission
For years he counts infinitesimal
differences that always leave room
for his profit, slight gains perhaps
incalculable for most people though
very important to the money changer,
way of life for the expelled from the
Temple in the ancient days which he
recalls as re-counts and estimates his
gain, old Benjamin, sitting on his
stool with a bowl full of gold and
silver coins from various countries,
he calculates his potential profit and
contemplates the time when he’d go
along with his loot which perhaps
might buy him a better spot
in Paradise. Old Benjamin had also
missed the point of why he lived
his life to just do as expected
as he was taught by his wise teachers
and you said,
he too got caught in the trap of money
he too remained an insignificant
peon among the innumerable others.
As a child, I first met you on an uphill Phanari
side street.
A hanging lamp in the Byzantine Temple lit
your kind face.
Were you, I wonder, one of the myriad faces
that Constantine Palaiologos assumed and left
behind?
Boyaca, Ayacucho, bright and eternal concepts.
I was there.
We had passed through there to the old borders.
Far behind, they had started the fires in Leskovik.
During the night, the army climbed up toward
the battle
from where familiar sounds were heard. Next to
it, going down, endless busses carried
the wounded.
Don’t let anyone get disturbed. Down there is
the lake.
They’ll pass through here, behind the cane fields.
The roads were compromised: work and glory to
Hormovitis, who is famous for such things.
The whistle is heard. To your positions, march!
Come, dismount the horses. Put the cannons
in their positions, get a towel, clean the bores,
light fuses, hold them tight.
The cannon balls are to the right. Vras!
Vras, fire, in Albanian: Bolivar!
Excerpt
was down to his last seventy-five dollars. And if they were going to
be able to buy gas to get back home, he had to be very careful with
the little bit of cash that he did have.
Joel and Tanya had just finished tidying up their supplies
adjacent to the stalls and were giving the horses one last look
when an attractive, middle-aged woman dressed in fancy western
wear approached them. From her looks, Joel guessed that
she had never cleaned a stall in her life. He only wished that he
could say the same for himself—in the last few months he had
done enough stall cleaning to last a lifetime. Helping Harry
change the bedding in the stalls was more of a workout than
what city people would get at high-priced health clubs. “That’s
it,” Joel thought. With a chuckle he told himself that if the
horse business didn’t work out he could always convert the
Circle H into a health and fitness center. One thing was certain,
Joel was in the best physical condition that he had been in
for years.
“You the owner?” the lady asked.
“I am,” Joel replied.
“Mary Lou Schwartz. Is the palomino for sale?”
Joel looked at Tanya and, as he saw the word “No” forming on
her lips, stepped up and replied, “Well now, I guess everything is
really for sale at the right price isn’t it?”
The shock showed on Tanya’s face. As she started to protest,
Joel continued, “What did you have in mind?”
“I was looking for a young reining horse that could eventually
join our broodmare band. This little girl might fit the bill. She’s
nicely put together and seems real sweet and gentle. How does
5,000 dollars sound?”
“Too low” is what Joel thought, but he bit his tongue, knowing
that the offer was just a starting point. He asked, “Would you like
to see her papers?”
“Sure. You are probably going to tell me that she is some kind
of a great-great granddaughter of a Doc Bar or something like
that, aren’t you?”
Secret
The great happiness
we wish to find
in the mysticism
of the olive grove,
in the moist autumnal fragrance
canticle of sounds flowing into
ears unaccustomed to beauty
there, in the light breeze
where the meaning of duty
was freely served,
in the mind’s serenity
we had for years longed although
unconcerned we wasted
in the wrong throw of the dice,
there was our hidden happiness
as we couldn’t understand
it was we who buried it deep
in the rekindled loss of memory
while our symbols became
daggers for the other man.
When you smiled I’d forget of the leaking roof tiles
I’d forget of the holes in the floor
I’d also say, here, big red roses will bloom
through these holes.
Everything was possible in the world, my love
back then when you smiled at me.
Remember that night when we gazed the sky for hours
I felt you trembling in my arms.
“My stars, I said, my good stars make our love so ever bright
make my beloved so ever joyous.
My stars, my good stars, make sure she and I die together.”
Thus, that night
we got married among the stars and forever.
Ah, I’d like to kiss the hands of your father; the knees
of your mother who gave birth to you for me;
I’d like to kiss all the chairs you touched with your dress
as you walked by
to hide in my heart, like a charm, a piece of the bed-sheet
you slept in.
I could even smile
to the man who saw you naked before me
to even smile at him, who was graced with such
happiness.
Because I, my beloved, I owe you something more
than love
I owe you the song and the hope, the tears
and again hope.
In the tiniest moment with you I lived all my life.
You knew how to give yourself, my love.
Monotony
One monotonous day is followed by
another identical monotonous day.
The same things will happen, they
will happen again—
the same moments will find us and leave us.
A month goes by and brings another month.
It’s easy to see what’s coming next;
those boring things from the day before.
Till tomorrow doesn’t feel like tomorrow at all.
Sixth Canto
The promontory under my feet shudders
as my brush hits a reverberating stroke
on my diaphanous canvas of fate while
the golden steel controls all past
and future height and depth
of tender life and its
hardest rigidity as the bottom line
rises to a penultimate
element of importance nothing
stands in front of it no one will
stem its future flow nothing
will ever stand as an impediment
to dark eyes and their thoughts
inventing as if gifted from heaven the
first ever organized corporation under
patronage of the teenage church
devising means and plans for
conquering the cosmos through
sharpness of the double ax or
sword or sulfur
of the bomb conventional or atomic
phosphoring fear
schemes world-over
like a bread slice buttered by
movement of the knife in
gluttony’s tenacious hand
covering inside and out of
power lust appetite
for pleasure through darkness
tingling pockets of masters grasping
for purer rarer more as wheat fields
ask the finest question when the cicadas
and I answer from the olive grove:
we can do better
Manolis Aligizakis 