a foot under the sea /
the other /
touching the chest of a humn being/

one hand showing  the sky/
the other feeling my belly/

the one eye  glance the grown/
the other eye / looking  inside me/

my body lay down /
lying as dying/  



morning verses  Kea '19 Maria Panoutsou

I’ve got fifteen years tied in knots
of green and brown and I have
decided that it is time for a change
of scenery. So I climb onto the roof
and pretend I am a chimney, spewing
smoke of blue and grey and lung cancer and
voggy Hilo mornings. A helicopter
circles overhead at an altitude of 805 feet, its
searchlight catching the neighborhood
lying spread-eagled on the living room
floor, brutally desecrated and left
bare-bones to die. I am a catalyst,
an instigator, a cynic with a palm tree.
Today I read an atlas and find
naught but “A Hui Hou” scrawled across
the pages in black pen. I burn the
book, the bridge, and the old tires in
the backyard.

On Saturday it rained and the floodwaters
took my bicycle.

Sometimes I sit by the roadside reading
Bukowski with hibiscus in my hair and
Indiana in my eyes. Hunting dogs
clash with rescue dogs at the house
with the stop sign. The moon falls
from the sky and engulfs the mynah
birds and the plague. The floodwaters
recede and leave a jigsaw puzzle
on the slopes of Mauna Kea. “I am not
afraid,” I say, “for I am only gravel.”
I play the eight-bar blues on Fortieth
and sing songs of drugs and missed
connections. I am hit by a truck and
a little gold car, but I proclaim myself
immortal as I am flattened to the pavement.
I am the Ki’i Pohaku beatnik, and
I write of nature and nurture and
the never-ending rain.

Someone has painted my walls blue
and my hands grey. So I pack my suitcase
and run down the highway for
seven thousand miles and all I see
are mistakenly-numbered houses and
blank maps and dead neighbors
from families I used to know.

There are torrents of rain now,
forming puddles in the forest.
I know the reason. It is twelve
in the morning.

The neighborhood grows obscure.
We are demolished.

(HER:)

Waking up with distant eyes
Body numbed in its dreamscape
Still, forced to extract, remember
Unwanted scenes, a mental ****
You can’t deny nor really escape
An incoherent theater plays out
The nighttime chronological film
Your memory drills the decor
Into your emerging, lethargic brain
You strive to piece it together
It makes sense, you want an encore

My web of dreams is wrought with
People in deeply masochistic scenes
Boudoirs and antique settings
I delve in these repeated lunar sins
Inspired by or tormented in a moon fire
Some hazy mornings I remember that my empire
Comes from those profoundly symbolic rooms
Child of the cross, blessed in a white cloth…
Now naked and proud, embedded in… who?
Silky velvet eyes, dark corners and dooms…

Or, like a prophet, dreaming about my family’s priest
Last night a call that hurt so much that was so clear that was
Unreal. A letter of blessings he wrote by hand
Tools on a table, gifted, in the shape of a small casket
In this horror I besought my heart to have erred
A premonition, coming from so vivid a past emotion?
What are your dreams made of?

(HIM:)

Waking up with distant eyes
Body numbed in its dreamscape
Still, forced to extract, remember
An uninvited guest, a dying ember.
Dreams like false memories are hazy
Fading away hastily- vaguely
Still remember a few things namely
A hedgehog hissing and running around
something similar to a floating clover coin
I'm staring at a red colored behemothic door
There's a note scotch taped on that door
It gives me feelings of a signboard.

Blurry visions; I made the decision
to head for it but wait!
The hedgehog is still running around
It looks at me and starts screaming
Strangely the room is teeming
with darkness; Am I dreaming?
I think I am but I'm heaving
Believing whatever I'm seeing
Fleeting valor but I keep reeling
I'm getting closer to The Brobdingnagian
But where's that gnawer? I'm not seeing
him anymore; It was here before

I'm standing in front of the door.
Floor squeaks but I ignore
This blackness is stevedore
Bugbears came back for an encore
Hefty tidal bores inside my heart
Ready to wipe out everything I have
I look around, I see coal-black
No door knobs, no thoughts gob
I'm trapped in this **** room
My head throbs, I'm no Dom Cobb
Need to escape from this maze
I play a bit part in this Big Sleep
I'm not Bogart but a trash heap
Fear streaks, grey doubts peep
I know I'm dreaming but I still keep
seeing what I don't wanna see
I'm more dormant than The Mauna Kea
Trapped in this room like a bumblebee
My mind's worse than a potpourri

I was looking inside for a skeleton key
Then I opened my eyes suddenly
Why is it always like a movie without an apogee?
I looked around to find somebody
And I saw you in the mirror
Staring at me blatantly
So I'm asking you- Hey, tell me!

What are your dreams made of?
Waking up with distant eyes

Body numbed in its dreamscape
Still, forced to extract, I remember
the way she smiled; Once again I saw her
Last time I saw her was on 22nd of December
Now that she came once again
I am not afraid of the hurricane
that hit the coast; I was lost
She found me- Long story cut short.
Storm clouds all over the skies
Thunderstorms loud; Heavy lightning strikes
My life was completely disarrayed
But now she's by my side; I'm not scared
Her beautiful smile- all things it repaired

We were talking, Don't remember what
Like old times, a very long chat
I remember saying yes to a few things she said
She smiled, happiness spread
all over my body, no discomfort I felt
All worries eased, all fears calmed
She helped me like she used to help
I don't want this day to end
Just wanna stay here for the rest of my life
I looked around, I'm somewhere else now
Wow! It's beautiful; I'm looking at a painting now
Where is she? She's not with me
I don't see her anywhere near.
I looked around; This place is overcrowded.
Unknown faces; Sadness shrouded
All the memories we made clouded
my path; I don't see a thing
I always loved her
Then why does she leave me halfway everytime?
No matter how much time I spend dreaming
Happing ending will always be an unfulfilled dream
Of mine; I'm screaming
Then I opened my eyes suddenly
Why is it always like a movie without an apogee?
I looked around to find somebody
And I saw you in the mirror
Staring at me blatantly
So I'm asking you again- Hey, tell me!

What are your dreams made of?



(HER:)

“An apo-gee”
Distance away-from earth
An apogee is a dream
It’s an acme, a ******
We dream of having dreams. We lie awake, we dream
We fall asleep, we dream. We think of dreams, we dream
In this so irregular laden-meaning scene that stream
Is new matter at night. Leading us through the deepest
Crevices. We recall a hazy landscape...

Waking up with distant eyes
Body numbed in its dreamscape
Still, forced to extract, we remember
The nano seconds of our journey
Like photographs trapped in a camera
We lie down in bed, in our camera
Which is, my dear, the latin word for room
We are a canvas, we are the mechanism
Behind the machinery of dreams
Our brain sorts through the day, sending messages
Hermes in a tiny globulous sphere.

But you asked me to describe the machinery of that matter
In my dreams, I am sometimes seer, sometimes victim
Sometimes goddess. Females are seldom present
Men, men, men, it’s a men’s world
They’re not like horses, a mere form of their symbol
They’re made of skin and bones, their voices bewitching
In no fantasy realm. A concrete cell or a palace
A de Sade manor but… then… always in a room
I must be making use of some mise en abyme.

An abyss, an apogee
Away from earth at the
Bottom of the sea

This woman you speak of
She must be ghost yet queen
I have not seen nor heard
The flutter of her dress
Maybe in your carnal caress
She walked away
WIth a demeanor so noble
That left you longing for her kiss
This bliss of love! this… miss
I mean, dismiss.

(HIM:)

And I woke up listening to this
This soul kiss that I too much miss
Is a call to fall up, deep.
Close my eyes; Time to fall asleep
In a slit trench counting sheeps
Keeping up my defense
Against the fin-de-siecle pretence
Because everything in here pretends
to be real when they are really surreal
Some dreams are meant to make us
feel that way
They won't let our problems wake us
So they can take us away
From the Groundhog Day, we live every day

Waking up with distant eyes
Body numbed in its dreamscape
Still, forced to extract, remember
The taste of that hot meal I had
I can trace it back though I go from
one dream to another like a nomad

A world so beautiful yet everything seems offbeat
The places you visit, the people you meet
Things you did when you were in the hot seat
And things you didn't 'cause you got cold feet
Sometimes in bits & parts, you remember
The long run behind the paper chase
Hard to remember, easy to forget
Images in our head sometimes deface
the imagery of this imaginary coquette
Dreams- what role does she play in our life?
Look through the lorgnette you are holding
You'll know she's the one controlling you
When you search for yourself in her world
Always incomplete, leaving an invisible mark
Inside your mind, onerous to find
Makin' you blind during the night
When you open your eyes & try to rewind
That old broken disc inside your mind
Nothing you'll find cause there's nothing inside
‘Cause that dream just died.

Waking up with distant eyes
Body numbed in its dreamscape
Still, forced to extract, remember
I wish I don't remember this nightmare
A nightmare is a night's mare
Don't know whose footprints I'm seeing here
Inside I'm hollow, about to be swallowed
by sorrow as my faith in myself is so low
Not so clear still I gotta follow
the trail all by myself, I'm going solo
In my backpack, I carry blessing from Apollo
Make use of your snowshoes, hare!
Going somewhere but I'm not aware
That I'm in the open air, completely bare
Ears impaired but I hear a fanfare
All I see is darkness when I stare
at the road ahead to find out who's there
The Oracle is somewhere near
Waiting to rescue you from this despair
And make this matrix a magic square
You will hear what you wanna hear
If you keep moving forward, dear!

Untamed wilderness and an open sky
The Mighty Huntress is nearby
The Spirit of the Wolf will never die
Smell of fresh blood, ravens fly
Beautifying the color of the night sky.
Don't know why I was chosen as the prey
I don't know what's in for me
If I keep walking through this way.
Then long streams of illusions
Flew in from all directions
I cannot reverse the flow
It's like those silent rivers
Heading furiously towards the sea
Why do I see things that I see?
Gotta keep moving; Do you understand me?
'Cause time moves fast but very slow here
Sound of clock ticks I don't hear
Home's far away- a million light years
from the earth but still near
Suddenly a black hole appears
In front of me out of nowhere
I'm going down through this abyss
I'm not afraid 'cause I know where
I'm going; The Light is showing
me the bottom of the sea.
Almost there, I can see it clearly
I know this is where I have to be
So I closed my eyes slowly
As I reached The Apogee.
----
December through January 2018

through the cusp of
predawn heavy dark i woke,
one knee too cold to
feel. stars imperfectly ablaze;
radial fractions between
soft fingersplits in overlying canopy.
at ground level, spinning
slowly, i pried a small hole
out of my cocoon of moss. drew
legs to chest. felt clean air wash
up and over me. this is all that
matters. everything. acres alone,
save trapped stoat or the small
hawk in my ribcage. kea call
up at pearl flat; hours later,
i thaw. i rescind no sentiment.
and i dare not take back a
mote of motion. my
hands mend you sweetness on hazy
days the sun careens through
dust and valleys.
                                endless spurs
on all horizons to clamber to
you, or just to find me. endless
convection to spread wing under.
endless permutations of lovers; but,
of course, nobody else
would near suffice.

down a darkened trail, sleep
heavy on shoulders, i waltz with
torch dying in one hand. beating
heart in other. a fine
day crawls up over
peaks; i sigh, smile,
endlessly think
of you.

It all looked clean, crisp, picturesque postcard promise
The river reflecting skyblue shimmers
Mists rising wisps of secrets
Trees and plants glossy, full bellied, nutritious happy
The birds practising new song and twitching wings
of fancy in the bright 440 volt sunshine
Filtering through
the senses to settle softly.

All was really not that clean and crisp.
The photographer could not zoom in
On a dead kea choked on a 1080 trap
Dropping from the sky like a manna treat
Four fish gobbling pellets pulled upstream
Mouth agape as poison shut the fluttering gills
Two other magpies lost their raucous tone
Deprived by early morning bait
Possums slept softly high up in the tress
With last nights buds bursting in their full bellies

The photographer could not see beauty and ugliness
Together.
The lens could not question the crystalline view
The click was not from gun
digital film rolled irrespective
And his dream of a pristine forest
with no pustules told one side of the story.

The other side
Balanced the books
And tore the heart of the very creatures
That spoke beauty with being there.

The picture was captioned;
Clean and Green.
Was it?
A picture speaks a thousand words
Sprinkled with three hundred lies and lives.
Author Notes

This poem accompanied a lush photograph of forest with a little stream flowing through. In the same area where the photograph was taken, helicopters bombed the forest with 1080 poison pellets to knock off the possums which were eating through the fresh shoots and leaves.

The end result was more than the possums going to thy kingdom come.

There are serious environmental undertones in this poem.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid;=11260667
© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved, 18 days ago

kea |ˈkiːə|
noun
a New Zealand mountain
parrot with a long, narrow bill.

IKEA™

Insignificant Kiwi's Earshot Australia.

Μην φωνάζετε
δεν είμαι κουφή
ακούω τα πάντα




Από το εκεί στο εδώ
με μάτια ανοιχτά  και δεν τυφλώθηκα
τρύπωνε το φως πότε - πότε

Κοίταξα  πρώτα τον γιατρό που με κοίταζε
κοίταξα και  την μάνα μου - ακόμη πονούσε
-χαμογελαστή πονούσε-ανοιχτό το σώμα

Μετά  έκλεισα τα μάτια να ξεκουραστώ
το ταξίδι μεγάλο
και οι πόνοι με χίλιους ήλιους σε νέο πλανήτη

Για μένα  το νερό μοναστήρι πρώτο
πιο σημαντικό κι’ απ’ το φως
και ο αέρας ένα  ποτάμι και αυτό


Ήθελα να γεννηθώ  ανάποδα  
αλλά στο τέλος άλλαξα γνώμη
και βγήκα με το κεφάλι ΄
φελούκα στον ουρανό

Μέσα στο σώμα της, σκοτάδι
υγρασία και  ένα κύμα ταλάντευσης
κούνια και ύπνος  βαθύς

Δεν ήθελα να ξεγελαστώ
κάτι μου έλεγε ότι θα  έχανα την επαφή  
μόλις αντίκριζα το φως
από  τί δεν ήξερα -σκεπτόμουν όμως
λαγοκοιμόμουν
αφουγκραζόμουν  

Κράταγα
τα
σχοινιά  
του
καραβιού

Κράτησε πολύ αυτό  το ταξίδι  
αναρριχιόμουν συνεχώς
καθώς γευόμουν  την μυρωδιά της μάνας
αλλά και την φωνή της που με πότιζε  
με ερωτήματα

Όλο αυτό
είχε  
μια  
γλύκα
ενοχλητική  

Το φως αντίκρισα κουρασμένη  
και  φωνή δεν είχα  να κλάψω
όμως  έκλαψα στο τέλος  
για να ησυχάσουν οι άλλοι

Αυτό το χωρίς επιστροφή  
ταξίδι του ερχομού  
που φανερώθηκε
κράτησε χρόνο πολύ

Στις χούφτες μου μηνύματα κρατούσα σφιχτά
δώρα για βασιλείς και αρχόντους
και στις κόρες των ματιών μου
όλη  η  ζωή της ανθρωπότητας

Είμαι αδύναμη και ο ψυχισμός βουβός
τις νύχτες με παρατάει
και τρέχει σε μέρη άγνωστα κι’  αφιλόξενα
γεμίζει τις φλέβες μου με δηλητήριο
το αισθάνομαι καθώς  όλο το σώμα
σαν το υγρό που ξεχειλίζει κάποια στέρνα

Βρίσκομαι ακόμη σ’ εκείνο το ταξίδι
η μήτρα  γεννά και η μήτρα θάνατο σπέρνει
άντε αδέλφια και εσύ θεέ
ανοίχτε τις  θάλασσες  
δεν έχουμε χρόνο πολύ ακόμη



MARIA PANOUTSOU
----KEA 2019

Under the purple tint of sky
Wild Tulip and Cinquefoil sways,
As pleasant breeze moves over petals
Finding it's way through the maze.

The floating clouds are allured
When out of ground comes a seed,
And swarms of flies stops to gaze
Blue jewels festooned on Billygoat ****.

Windswept earth draped in rosy hue
Crimson-red like a bleeding sea,
Tweaked by Kea, fondled by Spiders —
Flowers of mighty Bombax Tree.

The beauty cannot be discerned
Of Buttercups swanking their golden gleam,
When meadows are lit with Yellow Sages
Desirous Crowfoots gape across the rim of stream.

All along the drooped grass
Lies the scented Chamomiles,
Wrapped in silence, in it's dwelling —
Burrowing Owl secretly smiles.

Past the village, up on a hillock
A bed of Musk Roses thrives,
Unfurling the air with it's sweet scent
Forces Bees to come out of their hives.

The most stunning flower in the ranch
Under the sparkling midnight-blue sky,
Dangling in dust — the Orange Cosmos
Beloved of Emperor Dragonfly.