Six years ago
the woman who would be the love of my life
didn't even know me

Five years ago
this random guy moved from one city
to another

Four years ago
we said we would meet
any day now

Three years ago
she moved from one city
to another

Two years ago
the time was almost
right

One year ago
this random guy went to the park
and so did she

Today
we wonder
what if

Zoals elke dichter zou ik
één woord willen schrijven
waarvan iedereen zegt
dàt bedoel ik
en dan kijkt naar z'n lief
en zegt zo ben jij

Maar al wat ik zeg
er was ergens wel
iemand die het eerder
of zachter
of prachtiger zei

please, poets,
shut your charred mouths for once
your honey and bile drenched pens
your eager wringing hands
your sweet evil grimaces
your skyward eyes
"come, poor creature, let us
moan and smile and weep together"
no - just no
SHUT THE **** UP
and let this love
be real

I want to hold you
during each of my little deaths

I want you to hold me
when it's time for my big one.

since I met you
noone compares
you least of all.

"They won't know when to stop," I say.
"So don't pour in too much.  
They will eat so much they'll explode."

Very poetic.

We sit and watch them swim -
Their bowl on the dresser
a grotesque mirrored cosmos
reflecting ours in which limitless love is poured

and in which we feast
and feast
and feast.

"Till death do us part"
in other words
"Better dead than happy"

I stroke the armrest as if it were a cat
interesting - fingertips velvet lines palm erase repeat
I look up
then squint and my lips kiss a thought
and when I am done squinting
I breathe in as if to (but I don't) speak
slow nod
clock tick
interesting - lace curtain breeze sun spots carpet
your eyebrows so high
so low
slow shake
mouth open
interesting - mind focus emptiness abundance distance
then all of a sudden
get up brisk step door slam *******
yeah
interesting

former happiness
left to dry in scorching heat
condensed and you are
bleeding tar, you are
crying ink
obsidian drops shatter into words
that bite the paper like acid
your charred words of powerless poetry
my cloak of calculated indifference

Door het uit te spreken
wordt het misschien weer wáár

Ik moet het ook zeggen
dat is de stille afspraak

zwijgen
is nog erger

achter in je ogen flakkert wanhoop
die je zelf nog niet waarneemt

net op tijd

"ik ook van jou."

The summer evening is heavy in my face
but the breeze blows things off my shoulder
I didn't even know were there
Behind the door I just closed for good
they stare at the multi-colored flickering
There is more world in front of me
Shall I walk all the way to you?
How many days per one thousand miles?
Pondering and walking determinedly
Nobody has a clue what am I smiling about
Maybe I seem mysterious
Wait will they miss me?
When will they even notice?

I'm back at the door again
I'm a good boy
I don't smoke

Night, street, streetlight, store
Pointless glow in misty cloud
Live a quarter century more
Nothing changes.  No way out.

You'll die - you start all over twice
And all repeats unmodified:
The night, canals with rippled ice,
The store, the street, the light.

Она видит фотографию березы
на стене гостиничного номера
«Это русские деревья»

Она заставляет меня читать Блок ей
лежа на животе с ногами поднятыми вверх
она улыбается мне
но она не смеется над моим русским

Хочет, чтобы я настаивал
только сказать «нет» снова
но она позволяет мне любить ее

Она одна вещь
я люблю не понимать

Мне нужно выучить тысячу слов
прежде чем я могу тебе сказать
что ты имеешь в виду для меня
но в первую тройку я уже знаю:
я люблю тебя, я люблю тебя, я люблю тебя.
Мое сердце замирает,
мой язык спотыкается
я должен просто заткнуться
и я учусь читать
в твоих глазах стихотворение пишется
твоя улыбка рифмуется с моим счастьем.

Poets and writers have it easy.

Where painters and sculptors
must hone their skills for a lifetime
to approach beauty in their work

writhe in frustration
when the marble won't assume the right form

watching paint dry
wrongly

I can just write
"she was beautiful"
and everyone
recognizes you

There is this interesting phenomenon in music perception that when the natural overtones of a certain tone are all present, the human auditory system hears that certain tone even when it is not actually there

Which is how the talented electronics nerds in industrial design manage to extract booming bass from tiny earphones - it is not actually there, it is all between your ears

Is that what poets do?  Strike an idea and carefully note down its overtones which happen to be representable in words? So that when we are lucky, the reader can reconstruct that which the tiny piece of writing can't possibly contain?

Is a poem anything but
awkwardly juxtaposed words
in a grotesque attempt
to paint meaning

The building blocks of thought
so delightfully inadequate
grinning from the page -
We can't help it either

We belong in your mouth,
not on paper

My dear
what are you doing?

If I were young and romantic
I would stay,
wondering what changed
and searching my soul for my errors

and you would write poems
about how we "grew apart"
and about how I never "got" you

But I am not young
and probably not romantic

So instead you will write poems
about how unfair it was for me to leave
and about how I was the only one who ever "got" you

You leave me no other choice
because in your mind
"we" have already become a memory

And reality could never compete.

I never quite noticed
there are
so many people
who aren't you

We promise
we will take a daily dose of each other

We promise
we won't notice how we become a habit

We promise
we will recognize so much of us in cheezy love songs and poetry

We promise
we won't notice how poetry turns to prose
how prose turns to factual reports
about how our days were

notice how what was that thing only we had going
becomes an item on a silent list
between the brushing of teeth and the getting up for work

how a fingertip brushing our grey callous skins
draws retreat and silent apologies where it once drew goosebumps

how our lips black from unspoken misunderstandings
yearn for way back when

Maybe we should have overdosed when we still could
We would have died in bliss
we heard the uncle cynic's snicker
stain the "till death do us part" with truth

It's not so much his ignorance
of your existence
you should fear

When he really wants
to ******* over
he'll hit you twice.

The shattering made everyone stop
talking and look around at
what was happening and I
just stood there with what's
called a sheepish grin kind of
embarrassed at my misfortune

and people rolled their eyes and
picked up their lives and whispered
to each other that it was only
a matter of time seeing as I was
holding onto it so clumsily

But actually it was you who
with the sweetest of smiles and
the most sympathetic of nods
took it from my trembling hands
and let it tumble down.

No polite
conversation please

I have not had any
awesome adventures
or deep insights
since we last spoke

OK?

feel free to just
watch me
watch you

stare

until it gets

comfortable

Eleven digits
but not the green button
You are probably
But if I don't
I'll just
Come on
Triple check
You actually
So I'm, um, in the area
You will?

You were 36 hours of amazing.

I was Vincent.  Victor.
Or something.

The old king sighs.

His people hold their breaths
His armies are ready to fight
His generals look at each other

His queen remembers the passion
His people remember the days of splendour
His generals remember his ardour

The old king looks up at the clouds
then bows his head again
"Maybe it won't rain tomorrow."

Nobody moves.

The mind is very reliable.
It will merge faces from vague acquaintances from distant pasts
It will connect the dots
It will pay no attention to the man in the gorilla suit
It will disregard the distance between us
It will sharpen your pixels
It will release delightful chemicals
for itself to enjoy

I love drawing goosebumps on your skin
with my fingertips

It heals wounds
sure

It also makes paths disappear under overgrowth
lichens on stones first
moss
ferns
thistles and poison ivy

You can still see where you once walked freely
but you have to tread carefully now

And after a while
even though your heart still jumps when you see her
you don't remember how to get to hers

That first leaf to turn gold
That first breeze to be strong enough to take it down
That first crocus
That first grey hair you notice on your father
ha ha ha how time

That first morning you wake up next to her
realizing that yesterday
was the first day you did not tell her you loved her
you'll tell her many times today
just in case
ha ha
ha

you look out the car window
feet on the dashboard
sunset
silence
we are
just
driving

Do we realize
when memories are made?

afterwards
you look up from your knees
with defying gratitude