The news, every day:

fires are burning in the streets --


right out of the hearts.

The night is over,

I still dance in the café --


on the shards of glass.

Just in time, the order has been restored
but it has cost me a lot of soldiers
What a night, the men are exhausted
they hope and wish that it is over
but the day is coming, now

the execution, the exhibition
of the king and his commanders –
what a sight he is
in his expensive clothes
with a diagonal bandage

as a royal crown around his head
stumbling through the narrow streets
Today the cheers are mine, with the wailing
of women and the elderly
the horror on everyone's face:

What have they done? Is it really him?

The nights are silent,

the ferries out of service --


everyone in bed.

The night sky is full

of thunder-strokes and lightning --


from my intentions.

Then I heard the sound

of only one clapping hand –


and my cheek turned red.

Then it is autumn,

wind, wet twilight hours, the shops --


illuminated.

Notre-Dame, she is quite old: although she may
bury Paris, which has witnessed her birth, one day
But in thousand years or more, Time will make recoil
her heavy body, like a wolf does with a bull
and twist each iron axon, each of her neurones
to gnaw alas, with its blunt tooth, her bones of stones!

Many men will overflow the island in the Seine
to contemplate the barren ruin, the last remains
dreamers, re-reading what Victor Hugo has seen ahead:
- Then they'll think they see the old basilica
as it was, mighty and magnificent, a Gloria
rising up before them like the shadow of a dead!

The ocean rustles

endlessly far around me --


here, in the brooklet.

The officials in

their official light blue shirts --


around little chest.

The old actor has

been playing all grandfathers --


for twenty-five years.

The old central square:

above the demonstrators


roofs full of pigeons.

The older I get,

the more beautiful is life –


in the younger years.

The old goat just stares

at me, I realise this --


is what is farewell.

The old man watches

the bathing girl in the lake --


and the sun goes down.

The old poplar trees

don't hear the song of the rain –


they just wave branches.

In the garden, people pick
plums and pears, they bake pies
from the bitter apples, they play lute and flute
in the old, old rose garden

On the stone, the light burns
the belly of the lamp, chock-full
of oil, is rubbed, I rake the paths
up to the jetties in the old, old star sea

A hedgehog rummages, centuries pass
children on the bench dangle their legs
and I rake the paths, the birds sing
the song of the beginning, the old, old song

The old storehouses

swing towards my paddle stroke:


I'm cruising through time.

The old threshold is

not worn out, my visitors --


step right over it.

The Oracle knows

what I want, that's what she gives --


me as her advice.

The ordinary

is in slow motion simply --


nothing but beauty.

What year are we living in?
Is that song banned?
Shunned? Forgotten?
Is it that time yet?

Do men have better judgement?
Are they less fickle?
So women won't have to
be any more?

Don't they play
king and duke
like boys anymore?
Don't they brag

about conquests anymore
laughing at the jester
who says it's not funny?
La donna è mobile?

The oxen: marching,

heavily armoured they are --


stomping on like knights.

The pain, the pleasure,

the ****** of giving birth:


fertility queen.

The painting shows the

nation that is not yet there --


It's a creation.

The palace houses

parties, madness, betrayal --


Still it does remain.

I work in the white palace
Input, output, no ripple
in my body, my mind
remains calm, whatever I do

In between I experience the silence
in the red palace rooms
that I can always enter
wherever I am

There I open my skull
into a cup and I experience
myself, let love flow
to what occupies me

There I also look at the lives
of my loved ones, of strangers
and of the people I meet
I embrace them with many arms

of tenderness

The pamphlets are blank,

that is their message, surely --


it's commonly known.

The parents try to

imitate their child: its hopes --


and its energy.

The party goes on

above me, I'm having fun --


with Nino, the cat.

Bruises on my hips
from a growth spurt, long days
of practising my brains
and always cycling against the wind
in the winter over polder ice

A doctor's prescription
with jealous eyes of my sisters
who also want to eat sweet
cream every day, but then
they'd have to grow faster

make long days of practising their brains
and always cycle against the wind
in the winter over polder ice
(for their future, for themselves –
..the party will be later)

The captain will have been informed
because he says nothing about the situation
and that can mean anything

There are reports of peace
and cleared blockades
I must make choices

while I have a good life here
with my family that arose by itself
in the house that was assigned to me

So I just go to bed now
and before I sleep I travel
beyond the known

Left alone, I move on
...accompanied by echoes of familiar laughing voices
...that conceal the truth from me

...the voice of the guide who prefers to stay at home
...of the soldier in his worn-out uniform
...one of the three of the garrison

...who could be on duty
...who fills the cups and drinks on me
...on the health of all people

...around the tower of Belém and everyone
...at the long table with the empty seats
...from the time they were here with many

Along on foot, over a mountain
path, through a dense forest
I'm running out of food

The past constantly

pops up everywhere, haunting --


around within us.

The past heroes rest

in the dilapidated --


inn that the world is.

The past is a rope,

a tangled ball of knots, play --


with it, like a cat.

I have a store full
of old things, it is difficult
to ensure

that they are not sold
to snobs with no idea
of their real value

without the slightest idea
that it cannot be expressed
in their money

only in tax money, annually
to be collected for maintenance
and everything that comes with it

to have the works viewed
by those who are interested
and that can be anyone

which is hard to accept
for barbarians who get rich
from constant replacement

It is dark
a wall at the left side
the ditch at the right
and far away
I hear mopeds looming up
at the end of the path
catching me
in their light
the sound becomes loud

my pounding heart presses itself
close against the wall
a minute and it will be over

They stop

The peaceful air is

banged black and blue by the storm –


out of the country.

The pebble: I shrank,

it grew into a mountain --


with me on top now!

The peonies have

been stolen from the garden --


It's an empty day.

Daydreaming in the tower
of concrete, manning
the office, that's not too bad
on a sunny day

I just have to point
my nose out, count
the chimneys, and I don't
have to pay attention to clouds

Nobody comes
only me, in the morning
with a packed lunch
and a clean mind

for new ideas
about the people in the houses
below me, I know a few
who show themselves sometimes

The percussionists

are counting, they are alert --


to the right moment.

The perfect woman

is from marble, and barefoot –


she stays where she is.

The piano, skew

on the beach, slowly subsides --


in the rising tide.

With wide arms I listen
With hands full of green ears
Polyphonic whispers of fluff
Fine traces of sound
on the bench

A woman and her daughter
look around, the girl stares
and says with wobbling legs

I'll be a mum just like you
with a daddy and a child
who thinks this is the most beautiful place
of all, the whole world, the universe

*

The girl plays with a ball
pulls a flake of my bark
asks: is your name scratched in it?
What is he old, isn't he, triple thick I think
and those lumps, would he be sick?

Her mother laughs and takes the picture
she wished to have had of herself:
the girl, and I incognito

not as wise, not as full
high and wide
of past as I am now
and smaller than what I know

of all the people
who caressed me
of all the wishes
they shared with me

With a bowed head, Pilar is toiling
through the sand, she's been playing
along the edge, where the water is white
from foam, coming and flowing back
much further than she can see

Mama knows right away
Pilar, where are your shoes?
Tell me, where did you put them?
Here Señora, look, I got them

You know, I have a girl like her
but she is ill, she has a fever
and cold feet, we don't have money
to buy shoes, and all of a sudden
she was wearing these pink shoes!

Three women listen in
they flap out their handkerchief
when Pilar gives her hoop
her bucket with the shovel

and a kiss as a goodbye
to the sick girl
who will grow up and
will keep the pink shoes
in a glass jar

The plains are covered

with dental floss to be plucked –


with heavy tweezers.

The plants will show you

where it is passable here:


the Questioning Bog.

Tonight we solemnly celebrate
The Beginning, the screaming

afterlife of the day, the mysterious
play of being desired
as for the first time

be seen
in new shoes, laugh with new eyes

at decency and the people
who tell what to fear and how
love should be

the gentle hand
that moulds my body, the swift one

that completes it in heaven, and the
mighty one that sows the earth in me
and always

be important
to you, holding your beauty

in my caressing hands
in nights from which I wake up in amazement
pregnant of happiness

the magic of attention
that coddles me and makes me laugh

as long as we live in the same world
and then lie silently together because
it cannot be explained

Cleanliness and routine
a blessing of calm

giving me energy
and making me jump
"in spin, the loop is in
out spout, the loop is out"

I'm going wild in the garden
party of earthly delights
I jump to the fruit, ripe and green
every day again, it has no end

as long as it lasts -
until I write smaller and smaller
circles around my centre
under the caprices

A blessing of calm
cleanliness and routine