Coming home 


He came home. She said nothing.
But it was obvious something bad happened to him.
He went to bed with his clothes on.
Hid his head under the blankets.
Pulled up his knees.
He is in his forties, but not right now.
He exists, but only in his mothers belly,
many skins away, in a sheltered darkness.
Tomorrow he has to give a lecture about homeostasis
in meta-galactic astronautics.
For now he's cuddled up like a ball, sleeping.

Obstinate

Sleeping I suit myself to the body of my now called lover.
My chin between his shoulder blades

During the day I remain obstinate.
Notch my forehead into a groovy web when he asks me something.
My words rising in the corners of his eye.
I push the evening away like a bad novel.

I divide that what is from the wine and what is from me,
pour gradually less of me into the glass.
Slowly I diminish into a furious stained ring on the tabletop.

Finished

It took a while but many sick
hours later we had a pact

you carried it in hands that 
could finger like no other
you did that exceedingly well

none of that pointless fiddling about
no, in an increasing rhythm
lingering but with surgical precision

you peeled desire from desire
until apparently there was nothing left
to love.

Iron Bite

when I still had a father with a safety net,
me the butterfly that hardly spoke, he helped
me throw up when I was sick
because I couldn't stand throwing up
now it's reversed
my stomach is empty and I taste iron
in my mouth as if my father
has bitten on my tongue
and he's resisting the blood
that I try to force into my wings.

Camille Claudel

homesick for Villeneuve
the birthplace of her dream

when she was digging into
the brown earth with her fingers
molding the red clay
with her small hands

she never forgot anything
how they locked her up
her hands turning into stone

into the image
she would never sculpt 

Dissonances


leave it, love, 
I'm used to it now

to lettuce that is more
sour than I like

my g-string entangled 
with your boxer

spinning in the 
washing machine,

after so many years
when I know forever 
how to iron a shirt

I again find a hair 
from your beard
in my powder-box

endearing
homicidal

and upstairs somebody
is playing the 
nutcracker suite
way out of tune.

Battle lost


then came the goodbyes 
you lay there quietly sleeping
I kissed your marble cheek

your eyes closed
your hair combed all wrong
by a strangers hand

your best suit
your mouth contorted 
from the oxygen hose

and nothing that I could change
your hair, your mouth, your death
eternity so long

Allen Ginsberg in India

After reading that the American Poet Allen Ginsberg, (hidden behind his beard)
went searching for a spark of enlightenment In India 
had given up with the not smoking, no meat, no fish, eggs, onions,
no masturbation
and mumbling 'guru' for a week
(as was advised by a local guru)
I wondered what he had given up first.

'Guru' seems the most likely
replaced by a 'say Peter' resounding in the
muggy space of their sweaty hut, 
addressing his surprised lover.

But then,
was it the eggs for breakfast, 
a juicy steak
or was the hand stronger than the heart?

I think that outside in the slums of Benares
in his white pajamas with his long black hair
with that squinting  look of his
during sunrise
like Marlon Brando
he opened a pack of Phillip Morris
and said, to no one in particular:

'don't follow my path to extinction,
kid.'

Tragedies


I love tragedies
swaying dresses
on empty train platforms
disowned sorrow
fancy men in expensive suits
who don't own anything but their suits
and a last pack of cigarettes,
lonely salesmen like those immortalized by Ginsberg
worn down siting in cafes, bars and diners
living in a burning world;
men who can sell empires with words,
know everybody, bring the unfamiliar close,
but pawned all their suitcases;
who in their hearts find endless empty sorrow
but don't know where It's from,
and who are too scared to ask 
for what they really need 

Lonely (Maybe he reads too much Lorca)

The night doesn't sleep, brutally
it drinks down the fourth hour 

barstools slowly fill up
with broken dreams and unkissed lips

there is only one sentence left
behind my closed lips

a shaky hand extends and
a glass loses from gravity

in the mirror he sees his reflection staring.
He feels himself becoming image and mirror

the clock is silently judging  
all the nothingness in body and mind

his shadow caresses and steals 
another life unsuffered

until a bright light barks the shadow away
to the realm of the frantic 

at the bar of stale days
life is emptier than a glass.

Closer

an evening and half a night
we talk about lust and love,
desire, despair, pain
the bottles are getting empty
we are getting closer
I kiss your balding grey head
give comfort with my body
tears roll from your child like eyes
when I call you my dear boy

If you were here 

If you were here 
I would say:
undress me
take off my jewelry
put it down gently.

To help you
I would lift a foot
hold up an arm;
undress myself slowly,
take off my shadow.

If you were here 
I would be available like that
while my shadow 
hides herself, 
sometimes to the left 
sometimes to the right of me