The realisation that this violent red came up in me, that it had put itself out there, against my peaceful blue

hidden underneath my skin I thought, but once this/the disconnection came up, this unsafety, the red escaped 

and in an instant, alien became less distant, fluid in my daily countenance. How I've always assumed you

were the rock and I the water, how it turned out to be still and all. Me fully capable of standing my stones 

in the fluidity of waves, in this life of ebbs & flows. And even while I peak over the cliff edge, with the wind 

in my face, drawn into depth & distance - I know the cracks of then and the hills of now will become a passage,

a progress through the fragments I breathe, for the joy I feel. You went along to trust my inner world, while

you wouldn't anyway. So I decided to wend my place that provides me to dream up and survive nonetheless. 

Once your heart has jumped out of your body, the rivers & tides will smooth over. Structured daydreaming will bring

out the bright, fresh morning I need to scare off the ghosts of my lost night, a subverted realism to coast through a

clear consciousness over some guilt and uneasy vulnerableness. What's done, is done. True. Imagine that.

I reel off a little revolution...

I reel off a little revolution
I reel off a little pretty revolution
I am no longer of land
I am back to be water
I wear creamy crest on my head
and some shooting shadows in it
On my back a mermaid asleep
and the wind well at rest
The wind and the mermaid sing
of the rustle of the creamy crest
of the falling of shooting shadows

                   So

I reel off a little pretty rustling revolution
and I fall and I whisper and sing

The colours in my house
nowadays 
black towels in the bathroom
while kitchen ones in orange
midnight blue on my toenails
today is the day
for my best green dress while
my argent laptop provides me
with the best tunes of the world
so today it is
dancing on the wooden floor, like 
devils may care, crimson lacquer heels
and why not, no a silver lining setting 
these days

Winter and my love are gone
a blackbird on my roof
her fauces moving, her beak
trembling as whispering to herself.

She listens: from the faraway tree
like a knock of rocks together
a bonfire of longing, so loud
so clear and so very terrifying...
The blackbird with a cry
dives into the spring waves
so full of wildness I can hardly
endure: winter and my love have gone.

M. Vasalis (1909-1998)

March days have returned yet in
a completely different light than
in other years - in former times

now traffic noise has died
while standing on my doorstep
when looking at yellow flowers

new silence
green gardens
blue rooftops

Days are long and friendless and
I really need to dive in deep
to find the memory between all

this concrete, of the ocean
a smell of salt - sounds of
seagull cries. So here I am

in silence
green gardens
near rooftops

Close my eyes on the upper terrace
knowing the buildings and for a day
all has a blue peace while birds sing

full need to leave it all behind
throughout time it'll be clear
when possible turns doable

Some coded emotion of a kind
not seasoned enough to express
if you mean to say no, just say no
just...
Some mid-morning of a kind
not timeless enough to enter
if you want to go, just go
just...
not going anywhere
not writing anything
not worth any lot
Some onlooker of life
just...

She lies in bed
thinks about the
torturous times
- why do sheets
always seem to
coincide with
consider, relive,
thinking too
through?
She is good at
serpentness, her
suitors said she
always seemed to  
be at best when
unkind. It is just
hard to trust one.
It is just safer to
wreck with words,
he cried.

How dark is his inside sometimes
The light is up, a sun over the stream
different smells, good food and he
sits inside - sulks over nothing made

into something
too big too bright

for my body to take in
for my mind to zoom out

He calls me his strange little
girl, makes sense I cannot seem
to learn from our failure to stay
together, hit my head on a tree
yesterday - nothing to write
home about

not something
that big or bright

for my body to take in
for my mind to zoom out

So I hired a kayak and took
the stream by surprise, stroking
it slowly, calmed down as the
riverbank moves over, carrying

me to something
so big, so bright

my body takes in
my mind lest forget

Mustering my army of coats
without knowing why this tower
why nan and uncles were always on
about a proper robe, the sturdy winter
one, a cascading summer one.

One for every fall in order that
when you parade, you still see the
seasons, you feel no shivers.
So we started with costly coats
though I marched for fleas or thrifts

Doing life the other way around
for richer then poor, cast-offs
outside the high street as new life
to your older self - my boundless
battle of beauty and staying warm

They settled his head on two pillows
one extra behind his back, supporting
a weak smile, comforting a strong fear.
Ill follows death; his fall-down, failure
to rise to old heights, unplanned for
such young days.

Sweet and ever considerate on his bed,
as snow in the sun when nurses, smoking
doctors laughed aside. While my alarm
clock tells his time, a heartbreaking bye
to his mum. Two o'clock too early, yet
15:45 just right.

His punctual big heart.
His way to stay in the end.

I hold my breath
(cannot even get to ten)
Glue myself back together
(ten-second untraceable)

Watching music day out

Feeling the words
(ten tabs open @my Apple)
Echoes of encounters
I happen on the train
(the ten fortyfive)

To travel is to come alive

I am not thinking
I am not back home
(ten times no)

And I do know that place,
only once, Puerto Angel,
and every new memory
constructs itself around
that shore, learning to
read the swifwater, to
my waves being safe,
my extant outside time -
timeless quality is what
I always seem to need
and find in this haven.

In the gloomy ink of an autumn afternoon
she carries back, her youth - lately travels
To feel       freedom
                  timelessness
To free from
what she won't want to know
To everlast
where she will want to go
Keep going my love
To wish,        to search
Her wish,     her search
Riven by past
Consumed by curious
Future travels as the
cartography of her new book
the subtle wave of pages
                  or
the subtle wave of weeds
she looks up, discovers the
deep deep blue above
deep darker blue below
Graced by beauty
A vast landscape of coral
without dividing, the same
depth above as beneath
To feel           freedom
                       timelessness
To free buoyancy
what she wants to show
In the shiny part of the summer afternoon
she thinks forward, still young - forever travels

My own little
private hell

In a way it moves me
strangely to be
so insecure so grey
so hollow in a way
black tide's back
fire slowly fades
along all I wrong
my storm my sanity
the art's to abide
and enjoy the ride
to hell and back
and back again
to feel real again

Would you stay and  
sit with me please?

You have to come with me
It really doesn't seem much
indeed, merely concrete
we don't know nice cafes
or satiric entertainment
Yet the waves sound
And the shore looks
different from up there
So they did, and she is true
Why was I not up here
all the weeks I walked
to follow the sand rather
having looks deceive or
focusing on the idea that
all these extra thoughts
I'd thought 'm away - missing
the clouds hang over the hills
hinder sundown in spring -
the birds all out; now, finally,
there I was catching a perfect
eventide, towerend waves
while azul shines through the
boys in line for a perfect surf
No cloud to strike
No thought to mind
No wish to wait for
storm anymore, anywhere
else.

Would you mind at
all that much to live
with me, he asked her
All hope and cool
while walking their
city river running right
on the square where
her father had his shop
First spring light, the sun
tries a green blushing
Could it be that she
completely missaw what
embraced a home?
A silence so sensefully
inclusive, momentously
marked by this choice
so serious and whole hearted
she could not say anything
but yes. Justified her soul
that moment, that square
That made her lose sight
of her father's protection
in view of herself never
capable to choose
boundaries nor homes.

I actually do
like to wipe the
kitchen, eat a whole
load of crackers,
waist a sound
morning on YouTube
and my whole eve on
box sets, dress up in
a satin skirt, wear
my gold, miss the bus
to talk to you.

The only thing I need
to have ... like a routine
is dancing every day
and to love again.

The room is cold 
dirtied by the empty 
cups, full ashtrays, he's
never been tidy but has
just let go today, himself, 
her last morning. He's
trying to find his way
piles of post, books, empty
paper over the table
He's lost his contacts,
his phone silent since
no one cares. She doesn't
so why so angry, hopeless
The thought of doing
anything about anything
just riles him beyond
imagination. 
The memory of being 
happy about happyness 
just stifles him beyond
inspiration. 
He knows it's his fault
too even then
even now no aptitude
to bring his love to her light.

an orange in the morning
yellowy sunlight sets through
the clouds, blueing up the sky
gets the green in another dimension
gets an evening red that glows
up trees in Mondrian's blue and violet.
But the moment I open my eyes I
feel the winter grey I'm not good
at. The desert deserting the ocean.
The gusts and waves through a coat.
So in black I draw the shades
around the heart, heeding for the
white light of Sun and Moon discs
always. The stars out of reach,
one can only see the seven rainbow
colours through the water drops
once a strange new day has begun
once the sand dunes start to move.
I cannot control foreshadows
I cannot measure the shifts of dunes.

To hold on to those answers
that much
might mean
you embrace your differences
too much
in vain?
To hold on to these shoes
so much
might be
you walk your directions
too much
no avail!
To look at yourself
over & over
To listen to yourself
on & on
It became crystalclear
The things I did
not see
not hear             at first
Yet
It becomes unclouded
The things I do
need to
Left with your plain history
Build my cherished future

I just don't understand
the way things go round,
the way I tick, with you
too = as in:
a simple quiet bay
should do the trick to
calm down a bit
then = as in:
the vivid light city
should play the trick to
live up a bit
love up a bit
A wildfire of views
brighten still blur
while, block
the songs in mind
the stormy sea heart
just rolled into it
I am amazing
I am aimless
But never too late
well, grand of me
life = inevitable
never know where
to clock you
===
I need love you
I love need you

Jet lagged until i cannot do
it anymore, the schedule of
getting back on track. Meaning
i'm losing it completely, more
than already used to anyway
my complicated brain. Thought,
dreams, hunger, thirst tumble
over each other. Meaning watching
tv at 2 am, reading 5 tabs at the
same time so willing to buy any
discount ticket to any afternoon
show hoping it'll help me sleep
sleep sleep, please!
Eating a bunch of peppermints
again, not answering any calls or
emails the songs on repeat, more
than already used to anyway
during a day. One book ready
upstairs, the others lying around
on the kitchen counter below,
an ideal place to stretch the legs
and make another
coffee, coffee please.

little flakes of cloudy breaths
from the top all the way down
Winter is beauty and bear
cold pale and pain
grey eating and drinking
So strategically dressed
she sticks to sitting outside
where the patio heater
Cannot read, concentrate
filling days with endless
songs and numberless walks
Feeling cold still no matter
there'll be birdsong without fall
Wrapped up in a thousand shawls
jewelry has different looks
On the back of an envelope
she scrawls her fears for those
bogeymonsters in dreams now
The ginger-haired guy from her
adolescence nightmares is back
Summer makes her someone else
entirely no dark on the doorstep
no bogeyguys on an envelope

No, it's not that far
I just remember how
to turn to long hair
your mini skirt, to
climbing trees
jumping streams
and make it through
Graduating in '75
we would rock 'n' roll
that summer your smile
made the sky spin
hanging around to
eat oranges and trip
the shade of the trees
on our flat stomachs
and your white top
Those days in heaven
we just believed we
had a birth right to
swim in Jason's pool
cruise in my dad's Ford
Born at the right time
Listening to the music
for the rest of my life

Californian dreams
Of butterfly music
She sings in the shower
Of colours in the sky
People living in the sand
A riverride away from 
Angels' tears Yet once
You've dipped your toe 
In the pool you are lost 
Winter waves still sweet
She likes to settle the red
With the pink In the shade
While the elegant fragrance
Through the open windows
The rain check becomes
A sun check with him
The life of her mind
A love in her life

on a Sunday with my dad
to the video store for more
Eastwood and Bronson
as well as a bit of Bond
as every Sunday we are
tomato soup and hot dogs
melted cheese with mayo
on top. Heater high, grey
days gone when with him.
Practically every week the
film boy told us we'd already
seen that one. How we were
convinced that not what'd
spoiled the mood anyway.

in fears and trust, dreams so ''busy being free'' she thought 
she could be, it would be possible with him but in the end he did
not bring her to his senses; in the end it was just not viable as since 
the moment they mounted together when he showed her no more 
than the blue flowers in their city park but the moment (1) she
asked 'm to play her music, he laughed her away or when (2) she
travelled she asked 'm to not keep distance, which is not necessarily
impossible, he refused and let her go because of that, that stubbornly
proudness aspect of his fathers character, her mothers submissiveness, 
to busy believing they'd make it without realising it takes two to travel.

you called me to explain
you weren't sure you
wanted to talk through
still I knew enduringly well
you shouldn't stand a change
not yet, not now, or
just not
without a kiss and a house
without some things worth
remembering together for a longer  
time, for which you drew closer
yet I just relentlessly estranged
away, for which you given't me
that much space as we needed
It is never what you want
so much to dream about,
this
better be devastatingly excellent
yet I knew it was the one about
the man I shouldn't have dreamt 
about the example I set years
before then, so it became indeed
confounding to make this decision
myself, unexpected and curiously
misleading to have taken anything
you love away from you whilst 
being part of your own decision,
for which
I’ll never love you as much as I loved you 
then.

I need you for some love
and at the kitchen table
All love for the world
and unhindered by me
Fish on a Tuesday
my papers all over
Your eyes my dance
with thoughts to feel
My heart your keep
with solutions to view
Head wind is not the
prevailing kind where
fore your mind ought
to be the rock of us when
the days wash away,
over me, bleak rainbow.

[After reading: ''He's all pine and I'm an apple orchard'']

It's NYE and I don't care
where we're going
as long as
I don't need to read
a menu
a sunset
Is what I need
a nother glass verily
a band rocking on
Make me happy
buy me ice cream
we've missed the eve
In the end
the clouds like a blanket
that other look in your eyes 
A new decade coming on.
Year of yes.
Together or no.

Those tough little mind games,
hunny...don't.
Those smooth empty promises,
please...don't.
Those arms around me,
please...do.
And these kisses too.

Nothing else needed.
You're fine as I am.

So, 
he does believe he's 
kinda special for
writing this script
riding his coupe
feeding her enough *****
to last till the new year

Still,
he does misfeel he's 
kinda double for
reviling her moves
ridiculing this nomadness
touching her enough times
to stay till the new year

So,
he read an ego book he's
kinda full of 
put a bottle in the fridge
after his divorce

Yet,
she finds life
less humourful than
the dialogues he's
playing with pretending

less 
rigid
less 
ruleful

What she wants to
learn without being undermined
kiss without being threatened 
laugh without being scripted. 

The new year a haven 
to those
wandering souls.

For 1,75$ a fast line
For 1,25$ lots of stops
so - why not converse.

How come you're so tall?
Why you're on a bus?

He is my friend, you know.

It is a warm day today.
You want a soda?
Or some salami?

I love your coat-your bag-
your smile. I'm from México.

We had free Christmas dinner 
in a church with Golden arches 
coupons as a bonus.

Completely unruly,
high on cake and life is good
this time.

The funny girl of the group is
copying accents as if it were
a performance. 

Full of joy, merry, 
come and listen to her act 
some time.

Never lose your height, you hear.

This state gives you space to think
and opportunities to dream.
This state shows palm trees up the sky
and harvests most golden apples of all.

Yet
some travellers live in a car 
on a fixed salary. 
Yet
some travellers have no sugar 
or fast line fares.

When you're poor,
you start hoarding stuff.

The ocean crashes
The desert colours
The gates are closing

Murals on walls

Kind words can warm 
the winter months
Unspoken rules can stay
unquestioned fragments

In buses a world unfolds
so why not converse.

Shells of desire
Wings of trust
Eyes in wind
Grains of sand
She has no fear
feels the love in 
different layers
He wants fire men to
be able to do their job 
instead of traffic jams
She wants people to
be at the beach without
fear of armed response
He does not want to
sit on his mam's couch 
and work a 9-to-5 feeling
possessed by banks too
anyway.

Translation of ''Voor Ari''
by Jules Deelder
[Rotterdam, 24 Nov. 1944 - 19 Dec. 2019]

Dear Ari
Don't be afraid

The world goes round
and has done since 
for ever

People can be good
People can be bad

Yet they all are on
The same roadway


The longer you live
The shorter it takes

You emerged from the water
and will pass through the blaze

Therefore dear Ari
Don't be afraid

The world turns round
and will do so
forever

She sits on the bench closest
to the sand; able eyes,
smart soul. Meek, careful,
honest maybe. Talking; once
a psychologist,
always.

How do you loose
your wife, your life, I ask.

Irises as blue as her
goodwill dress, arranged
properly over the wooden
boards where legs crossed
elegantly.

Asking
a fellow rifle bird
about the weather.
Supping 
up some whiskey the skater
brings along because of his
birthday and guardians. It is
good to travel, she says. It is
time for beach now
next month an island. 

It doesn't rain as much
anymore.
Lady Di and Mother Theresa
were good women.

I'm not really afraid
of you.

Irises bluer because of her
tears. The moment I let her
go, I retired. She showed me.
My wife, my life.

I saw someone at home
behind those eyes.
I saw someone go.

he wears my favourite blue
and drinks his favourite beer
he is clapping along to that song
as always out of tune --- loud
and laughing because of sunny
as always. for ever. my dad.

I wanted to divulge
start over and say love
and I really could have
yet instead -
my nails poured into the blue
velvet of our dining chairs
my head a cloud, grey, dark,
storms around that shouted
at you and -
I really should have
saved and said
while you -
nothing, looking or
did you try anything
Don't even recall
Only the sinking
my nails in the blue
and you blaming me
not a grownup not responsible
an I-love-you would have
protected
yet instead I held
nothing more at all.

Fifty and
so much
My dad
The Mac
Hyde Park
Oz and Cali
UK and Spain
Upstate downtown
There you go
There you are

a starless night. a darkness dividing us.
the weight of the love coming down
on me thinking just having a drink.
there he, is again, comes by, different
forms and ways. so I got myself
a new tattoo.                 a white one.
one you can hardly see but hear as
it's the soundwave of my song
of all songs. about birds
wind
islands
freedom.                    an endless sea.
not even a consideration
not making it up
I'd love the new and the now
and yet memory never fades,
his power of final presence
my power to loose composure
this fight you think
you won.                 no last words
                                  for me in his final
say.

Still in love with the image
Yet in doubt when the clouds
Come in, move away from me
My sun sparkles blue
The ocean stays dark
A birdsong is white
It's all tattooed on me
On shoulder and back
You wanted me in a line
Without reading between mine

Ice cold rain dripping down
the bathroom floor, the chairs
on the balcony empty and
grey grey clouds over the ocean
impede her going out sides always
November means gray rain
and unrest, a coldness as a
distance from him, them,
the palm trees at least not waving
breaking the sky, into disarray her
thoughts will travel disquietly
unappreciated and loved
in the dark in an empty room
in the light surrounded by
happy goodbyes. Fall.

You and I
need to think
I've been avoiding
The path your shoes made
it all so visible
The bright light of your absence
I tell me it's all so palpable
the crack in your soles
a crack in my heart
the crack in our chain
Fragments of life kept
in a box that I carry next
I'm left with and yet
I step out of the house
and even now we're gone
your footprints lead my war
into a mirror of melancholy
Where I will forever find
your smiling shoes
my smiling band
our smiling eyes
the memory of better days
a memoir of the worst
I won't wear your shoes
I stand for something else
One can only choose one

a schism between the lines
a fire boiling in the powder
she tries to go
along, to devise
what the others do

even when you glide
it is hard to trust the wind
around you, above you


the front door opens
puts the future on hold
she tries to move
a silence between the thoughts
a flame boiling in unsad words

Sometimes a brightness
Towards the sea
When the sand shifts
Towards a pace

It's her there
It's them near
A current inside
Happyless drifts
Reflecting her face
Brushing her colours

Fear alone is a good thing

Every night he
breaks her heart
Every day she
commences
Be in life
Benumbed and receptive

Because

Why be afraid
when there are that
many invitations
She told him
Her favourite music
His place in her world

So

She knows him
She hates him
Seeing the scared part
in herself
Wishing the self-betrayal
in her past

A peace so desirable
A love so inexplicable
A safeness as freedom
A starfull night.

The other day this
friend sent her a picture
again. He calls it his
archive, she her list
of heart skips.
For reasons they're both
aware of. He's in it,
once again. So she started
to make novel lists, of her
addresses, of all states
and concerts attended. Of
all the quotes that sound.
"Meet the modern'' and feel
the sand between her toes
moves well, she might just
stay here.          For a while.
Dust will gather,
another life on standby
in a top drawer.
She kept two keys
her own tip-tongued as
his is swallowed. He'll be
in that house with her,
time again.    
                        Truth said
                        they still call
                        you mine.

No need to look back
when one with the world
but I cannot help
but I do understand
makes sense withal
trapped in my past by
half a moon and you
caught by a song  
and dad in the car
Californian times and cigarettes
happy childhood and lucky men
compare, compare,
consistency of thinkways
my conscience clear
all the same

a grey afternoon and just now
it starts to rain, big drops
in small pools on her terrace
looking outside - another
glass in her hand
the house gets dark
last light through the living
a house already silent
he's gone, big drops
on the roof beating a drum
beating her dead heart
she sits down, suddenly
dead-tired but too afraid to
lie on their bed, big drops
against those windowpanes
a year of loss
has started
a lifetime of love
has ended
a man has cut her landline
and she cannot believe
there will ever be
a rising of another sun
a blowing out the clouds
another good morning beautiful
another - looking outside
all the water in the world will
not free the lights in the lake
this is how she will remember
losing, forever

[Freely translated after ''In de herfst'' - Vasalis]

Hollow, empty of desire
and while the yellowish amber trees,
the green stony trunks...
the light hovers silently over the leaves.

My heart far too open

too oftly captured by this light

floating thinly with the clouds...

and dreaming hurtfully, wretchedly
only 
to get away from me

and while really so despairingly.

the hardest things
I did
was waking up in
the morning
a rained out Saturday
telling you
I cannot do this
anymore
I cannot talk sit watch
be with you
anymore
the next hardest thing
I did
was sleeping in
this big bed
alone
for a first night in a row
of years after all years
with you.

Deadlocked
So, so cold.

My new middle future
has started
in the blue of my night.