Voyage sous un soleil d'août

Lumière d'août brûlante comme une ampoule, blanche sur la poussière de ta peau - 

Lumière d'août je suis restée sans comprendre, le trou noir d'une cigarette sur le papier.

Pays inconnu et moite aux rues étincellantes, bouffée de chaud

En sortant des magasins trop climatisés.

Lumière d'août, renaissance, sortir du ventre noir de la ville pour trouver le soleil.

Dans un cri de douleur devenir aveugle dans les premiers instants,

Et puis les paupières qui clignent et laissent filtrer les rayons insistants - 

Oublier tout d'hier, ennui ombrageux de la veille

Et somnolents dans le décalage d'une terre qui tourne trop vite

Nous marchons dans ces rues d'août, pavés de lumière

Tu fumes sans rien voir, la tête en l'air.

La main en casquette tu évites

Le torrent de passants, je m'agrippe à ta paume humide

Et je suis ta silhouette noire si petite, mon guide,

En cherchant l'ombre des palmiers qui jaillissent vers le ciel trop haut

Lumière que je ne vois plus à travers les feuillages qui te découpe en morceaux.

Un bourdonnement d’insectes brûlants, les couleurs chatoyantes des saris

Voix éclatantes, meuglements, bruits de moteur dans les ruelles encombrées,

Et moi grain de sable je cherche tes yeux invisibles dans le ciel ébloui

Drunk song to Juliana

Tonight I'm getting drunk Juliana and I don't really know why -

But I want to write – sometimes writing comes like that,

Without really knowing why

Juliana one day we'll be far from here,

In another country, another career -

Anywhere you want.

Here I'll write, you drink some more

Where do you want to be?

I guess let's go first to Germany...

And let's have a drink with your family

And I'll write for them too – write a poem

Without knowing why.

But do we know why we do anything?

Why are we here right now or in Germany

Let's get the sausage and the gingerbread -

Hey oh! the door opens, someone pokes his head

Hey, come and join us whoever you are,

Take a chair and sit down.

Whoever told you you couldn't drink? Here drown

Some of that misery – we need some of this in our stomachs.

Without it, no idea what I'd write.

So let's drink Juliana, who cares why he's here

And who is he – is he a neighbour?

Oh he's gone, not keen, not a drinker

Not a writer either, oh well no one's perfect

One more glass not much more!

Otherwise can't go home you know...

Yeah Juliana you too, here – and then let's write.

I want to write about music but I'm much too drunk...

Come on, Juliana help me out and play some of that violin,

Play, play that violin Juliana...

Eyes are closing on the writing, on the music...

How to write in drinking, last drop to lick -

You have another bottle? Chin is dropping on my hand,

I'd go and get it if I could still stand

No regrets right Juliana? This is the life we wanted,

Where we want to be, getting drunk and writing...

And we'll pull through, of course you can!

I'll write and get drunk and you'll play violin.

You want me to sing? No, you sing.

I'll just continue writing - sing some of that opera...

What's left, is that gin? Get rid of that vodka,

Nothing left to mix it with and who in the world

Drinks this stuff pure? Let's write, write but can't...

Sickness and no cure, come, come let's drink into the darkness

Drink and forget it, what rhymes again – lit, tit, kit, shit?

No dick doesn't rhyme, why would you want dick?

More of that please, let's not talk about it.

Walk on and leave them behind.

The terrible blindness of time

Which sweeps everything away.

Why wallow in the low, let's will ourselves to smile!

Smile and the world smiles back at you...

Let's leave the drink for a while, sober up,

Drink some water and write something new -

I feel we're repeating ourselves, please another cup.

Come on Juliana let's try to focus!

But ah beautiful violin, beautiful drink, beautiful cold weather,

Yes too much, the drink has lost us...

Where were we again?

Let's not talk about men, no Juliana not about that

But we can write about love perhaps or – is it just wind

No, not love, that noise in the background -

Like a train rushing in the underground, like a rushing

In my ears or is it in my mind, can you hear the train

Can you hear that wind Juliana? Or am I going insane?

I stand still in your container suddenly in fear -

Writing cannot save me if death is this near!

No, no, why stop drinking? Quick, give me your glass,

It will drown the beating of our hearts,

The blood going around an around, wearing us down,

Time is drowning in the bottle, sinking suns, glowing darts

In the sky, let's shine bright in this dark town

As bright as this lamp right here – let's drink to our future Juliana!

Our marvelous and necessarily bright future,

Bright as money, as a hollow precious stone -

When we'll be rich and great and even more alone

Yes Juliana we'll dominate the world!

Why talk dark and moody?

We still have whisky and pen and paper,

Let's write and write and get much drunker

And play that violin -

The pen is slipping from my hand...

And my head is heavy, heavy you know?

Like a grapefruit about to fall.

No let's not talk about men, never talk about them

No I'm not sad, we're not sad at all

Come on let's drink, drink while we still can

Tomorrow has time to come, already

Already time can't wait

Promise me my friend

That tomorrow we'll drink

And drink and drink and write again.

Care-less but careful(l)

Yes I admit I was careless

Seeking your hand in the darkness

And always wanting more

Too much loneliness to share

« Care - less » as in having no one to care for.

Did you understand how care-less?

Only despair in every caress

Hoping for the stranger to be the one to care

And only in the morning understanding

That it was only a nightly dare

A careless moment fling.

I was careless wasn't I?

Colliding into a glass wall of things unsaid

That I couldn't understand, my head

Unable to reason and my eye

Unable to see, although in the dark

Who needs a light?

Careless, I thought it would be all right

And just went in

Trusting myself to swim

Care-less because no one to care for,

Careless because always wanting more,

You were the one I'd chosen that night

And now I suddenly understand

How dangerous it is to seek a hand...

And now you are neither a stranger

Nor a close friend

But a presence for whom I hunger,

With you I can never be too careful(l).

Careful(l) as in full of care,

I am lucky to have people caring

And everyday a whirlwind of laughter.

Friends, I can never get to thanking

You enough for always being there,

To pick me up from the floor

And open any closed door

And embrace me when I'm feeling care-less

When I'm unhappy

Friends I go from care-less to careful(l) so easily

From less to full, from full to empty,

I apologize for being such a roller coaster

And bursting from tears into laughter,

But I prize you as the most beloved treasures,

You that I'd choose among all others

Only careful(l) can I avoid being too blue

There are things that I can never show

From careless you have entered my careful(l)

A friend like any other for which I'm thankful

But if you ever want my heart you should know

That it continues to beat only for you.  

The sparrow I didn't follow

Rest your frantically beating heart

Against mine you restless sparrow

The eagle threatened to tear you apart -

Endlessly targeted by the crow,

You fled without pausing to rest

You fled again without a quest

Or goal, nothing but fleeing

Through lands and countries

Without ever stopping.

Calm your fluttering wings little bird

You are safe, snuggly in my arms,

Far from roofs covered in turd,

Protected from all harms -

I'm sure you want to be safe and happy

Little sparrow won't you stay with me

Rather than straining against strong

Storms and unrelentless winds...

Don't you long

For a home to stay?

Nay, said the small sparrow

Although you are so kind - 

Peace will bring me only sorrow,

I need the winds to whip my mind

And danger to feel alive

Without the eagle and the crow,

Why would I plunge and dive

In and out of the sky, show

To all that there is hope

In a world of danger

That the smallest one can cope

And even get to love the anger

Of the helpless eagle and the crow!

Oh to see them rage

As their claws miss me by inches!

Your arms are a comfortable cage

Compared with the freedom of escape

As I shoot back into the sky...

You look doubtful but I never lie,

Trust me I would like to stay

To light up joy inside your eye!

Danger brought me to you,

Out of the winds that stray,

You made me a bed out of your shoe

And until nightmares went away

Stroked my beady head.

But trust me, staying I would only die.

Already I hear the call of the sky

I was born to be what I should be

And doing what I should do – that is to fly

And show everybody

How risk is living

And living is what I hold dear

Mocking the crow and the eagle

Not being warm and comfortable down here.

I heard his words, his tiny stern voice,

His desire for foreign lands

And reluctantly approved his choice,

Slowly opened my closed hands -

He flew out with ease

And left me sighing

Sometimes through the trees

I can still hear his singing

And rejoice that he still alive

And flying free.

Playing around (a night in the snow)

Guzzle the snow until it ices you all over

Drink it like your favorite drug

And lose your very shadow in the whiteness

Rising up against the sky

There’s a hole in the night where I threw a snowball

I climbed up the hill, panting,

As you slid down the opposite way and we crossed, briefly brushed wings then went our own ways

I got at the top with a stich at my side

and stopped

and looked out

An armour of silence, a thick coat of answers, the unquestioned – just there

Snow up to my knees, up to my chest and in my mouth

Bury me in the snow strangers

Let me swallow it until it ices me all over

Let it cuddle me to the ground in its cruel softness

We scrape the trees free of their white skin and shoot shreds of it at one another

The sky has let all its planets scatter into white dust.

In our raw hands scraps of stars.

And we laugh until we burst open, stiches in every part of our body

No coat of frost can silence our panting breaths as we chase invisible shadows and lie down on the crinkly stomach of the earth and swing our arms, spread them as wings and hope to become snow angels.

Shivering

Is this night or day?

The winter bites pieces out of me

The wind has blown my mind away

And slapped my cheeks red hot and icy.

Hands full of frozen nails

Grab me with a hundred fingers

And with numbing sighs it wails

Tragic tales of past winters.

Stumbling down that windy street

I yearn for something warm and steady,

Not that ever changing howl and sleet

Blowing the flesh off my body,

But something to cling onto like a hand

Made of skin and bone,

Pulsing blood to heat me up

And hold me fast when I'm alone

I wouldn't mind the wind so much

If I had a hand to go to

The cold and winter have been such

That I've caught myself thinking of you,

And shaking in the wind like in a fever

That wind which claims me his alone

I yearn for a hand of skin and bone

I wish, oh how I wish for summer

To my friends

I built myself like building blocks

A strong base where I can stand,

A Pandora's box that's under lock

I hold tightly in my hand.

Sometimes I glance inside

But sometimes can't find the key,

There are dreams in there to hide,

Dreams reveal too much of me

I built myself like building blocks

A safe fortress around a shed.

I tried to build to prevent shocks

And stacked up walls inside my head.

A mere drink or shake

Can send them crashing down -

A word of you is like an earthquake

Destroying my whole town.

I built myself like building blocks

And masked every opening,

But friendships are at the docks

And leave as soon as you start smiling -

Other architects have helped me

In building blocks to fortify

My sand castle against the sea...

They ciment the bricks and make sure

That I don't make the same mistake

Of falling for another earthquake

And hope that I don't break

Into a thousand puzzle pieces. 

Shame

My scarf is full of smoke and hazy dreams

My head is full of previous nights and horny schemes

I nod when talked to but eyes are vague

All your smiles twirl and fade

In the darkness I strive to forget

I've given up fighting against the smell of vice

Every week I throw a new dice

My high heels follow you clicking in the street

The suffocating stain of pleasure on the sheet

The darkness I strive to forget

The hair painting the pillow's not mine

Again and again I've drawn a line

I didn't cross it but pushed it farther

Trying to excuse my constant surrender

To the darkness I strive to forget

My skin smells like someone's after shave

Shower, scrub away the crave

The silly mess of the night before

The whispers in the night, the groans for more

In the darkness I strive to forget

I scrub until I bleed but it won't disappear

That suggary gel smell, the salty taste so queer

I try to vomit but it's there to stay

The mirror makes me cringe in the light of day

The darkness I strive to forget

Come back and tell me this is right

Throw the booze away and force me to fight

Make me whole and new again, if only

There was more to it than just your body

In the darkness I strive to forget

I put a lid on it all and walked out the door

I'm not a slut, I'm not a whore

Or anything you said in your sleep

Cutting open wounds, scars so deep

That darkness seeped into them

And turned them to regret

There is no night I remember

And no darkness I manage to forget

Moments of loneliness

There are moments where loneliness takes everything

And leaves you naked in the darkness.

There are moments where crouched on a tiled floor

You wonder who you’ve become

And who you’ve lost, running in these foreign lands,

Looking for her

You tried to walk on water

And to multiply the bread

Only to drown with a crust in your mouth.

You’ve hung onto every root, clung to every branch

Only to sink back into a requiem for the dead

There are moments were loneliness blankets everything and fills the gaps like snow.

In moments of darkness, voices come from afar distorted like an echo.

Sitting at the end of your tunnel of thoughts you let yourself slowly freeze.

Like the vine without its tree trunk you have grown distorted

And your thin limbs twist around nothingness, desperately groping for the sky -

There are moments were loneliness blankets everything and fills the gaps like snow.

Drenched in loneliness your mind is crumbling apart, rotten at the core, splitting like an overripe fruit

Soaked in it you walk the world and your reality is no longer what others see

– loneliness is best in the dark when it has taken everything

Loneliness is better never seen, a hand behind a curtain,

A skeleton in the closet, a few dismal words of poetry.

Moments of loneliness around the clock,

In the ticking of the wrist, the automaton of the heart

You’ve been wound up to smile and talk, yet you place your hand inside the whirring chest and feel the emptiness of the mechanic

She turned you on briefly then left you there, static

A toy on the edge of the shelf, a drop off a cliff,

A drop to loneliness

Facing only yourself

A tear fell into the vase and it overflowed

Carried by the wave you spin –

The night seems blacker after fireworks – you thought you lived then died again, rotten wood, an empty seashell abandoned on the beach.

You lived liked the shooting star that falls then disappears, didn’t even get that one wish - you yearn for the arid desert to cool your lust.

On the icy ridges of loneliness, you knew better than her what she was pretending to be

But loneliness is better never seen

She couldn’t get to the glass tower so she destroyed the city

Couldn't get all so wanted none

All the buildings are ruins now and if there is no one,

make love to the ash, to the sand until it clings to you and becomes a second skin

Let it all be a dream, let it all be a dream

Drenched in loneliness your mind is crumbling apart, rotten at the core, splitting like an overripe fruit

From a crack in the flesh I rise like smoke and you, ghostly apparition from the past

You shrink back into dissolving loneliness, slipping into time and becoming nothing

 I stay on the shore and call out that I’m sorry

– loneliness is best in the dark, when it has taken everything

The hand behind the curtain, and for only company

 The skeleton in that closet -

A few dismal words of poetry.

Home is my own heart for always

Always travelling and changing town

From train to train without ever settling

From bluish skies to murky brown

Different faces, people and settings

Multiple homes in smiles an frown

Home is my own heart for always

Every morning a new road under the sun

I miss only the people I leave behind

And always go forward, forever on the run

Nerver forget what was soft, what was kind

And never regret what was forgotten

Home is my own heart for always

When in the dark I can't seem to see

Home is nowhere but in the mirror

In those eyes looking back at me

Me and myself, my only shelter

Although so many houses, a different family

Home is my own heart for always

Although the background is changing

I stay, alone in those mirror frames

Steady in the whirlwind blowing

As all changes, places and names

Dissolving, surfacing, melting

Like colours in the rain

Home is my own heart for always