"lucerne" poems
{ impasse }
Non action –again
Under a dim sun
I read the world
and miss the encounter
Di nuovo inazione
Al sole fioco di lucerne
leggo il mondo
–e non t'incontro
Aug 15, 2016
Aug 15, 2016 at 4:37 AM UTC
Sometimes a fatted pig will wander off from the pen and find his way to the pond on the edge of the property. If it’s dark or foggy, he may fall in and sink to the bottom. Only later when his carcass has filled with methane and mucous will he float to the surface. You’ll know he’s been in the water for a while when you see the bloat, the blisters oozing, and the skin sloughing off in large sheets. Don’t go there. It might reflect poorly on you.
Ok. So you didn’t listen. You went ahead and fetched a stick and poked. And you were taken aback by just how easily it slid through his tissues, like the time when that pigeon alighted on your hand, and you were startled by how it weighed almost nothing at all. So to see what might come of it, you wiggled the stick, and suddenly what was left of the liver and kidneys popped up onto the surface and spit a stream of water into your mouth. They drifted towards you and away again, like your lost toy sailboat, the one that got off the string and floated down the rapids in Lucerne. Over the falls it went, under the covered bridge, and that was the end.
Of course you still eat blood sausage. Why wouldn't you? The texture is rubbery but the taste is well ….. like blood....so metallic on your tongue. But this blood will not wash away your sins. It’s more like Pepsi Cola, or maybe Mountain Dew.
Sep 18, 2016
Sep 18, 2016 at 10:00 PM UTC
Udii tra il sonno le ciaramelle,
** udito un suono di ninne nanne.
Ci sono in cielo tutte le stelle,
ci sono i lumi nelle capanne.
Sono venute dai monti oscuri
le ciaramelle senza dir niente;
hanno destata nè suoi tuguri
tutta la buona povera gente.
Ognuno è sorto dal suo giaciglio;
accende il lume sotto la trave;
sanno quei lumi d'ombra e sbadiglio,
di cauti passi, di voce grave.
Le pie lucerne brillano intorno,
là nella casa, qua su la siepe:
sembra la terra, prima di giorno,
un piccoletto grande presepe.
Nel cielo azzurro tutte le stelle
paion restare come in attesa;
ed ecco alzare le ciaramelle
il loro dolce suono di chiesa;
suono di chiesa, suono di chiostro,
suono di casa, suono di culla,
suono di mamma, suono del nostro
dolce e passato pianger di nulla.
O ciaramelle degli anni primi,
d'avanti il giorno, d'avanti il vero,
or che le stelle son là sublimi,
conscie del nostro breve mistero;
che non ancora si pensa al pane,
che non ancora s'accende il fuoco;
prima del grido delle campane
fateci dunque piangere un poco.
Non più di nulla, sì di qualcosa,
di tante cose! Ma il cuor lo vuole,
quel pianto grande che poi riposa,
quel gran dolore che poi non duole;
sopra le nuove pene sue vere
vuol quei singulti senza ragione:
sul suo martòro, sul suo piacere,
vuol quelle antiche lagrime buone!
751
Neil young speaks over the radio,
helpless, helpless, helpless.
something in me is ignoring the intoxication,
and rejecting relief from an untamed mind.
but the floor looks like a ceiling in here,
so i know theres enough danger
in my blood to flood the red sea.
all these many deceptions
just running gleefully through my veins.
and i am
finally back
in Lucerne.
The early morning gray that hovers
over the ambient light
settles in my stomach,
with all of the other toxins,
but that light--
that light is not strong enough to travel
the static air above the clouds where
Pilatus sits, littered with broken windmills
and snow caps in july
its peaks white with my tomorrow.
there is nothing like this wind
that will soon blow me away soon,
into a new love.
To a city that enjoys my drunken presence less,
where i might get the urge to run again,
but inevitably disappear into a collective disaster,
and into men who have fewer things to love with their eyes.
all these symphonic shifts in my pulse
as the universe chuckles
at my attempt
to be a part
of
anything
at
all.
lucerne, your hot smoke hues will
soon be missed once again
as my blood spikes with every word.
Dec 3, 2014
Dec 3, 2014 at 4:04 AM UTC
In my family, a convent in Lucerne, Switzerland loomed legend large.
Its name is “La Madone Noire” (the Black Madonna) and according to my mom, it is a “finishing school” where captious girls, who lied or who wouldn’t behave, were sent to live with and be schooled by nuns.
It was, from all reports, a terrible and stern place where there was never any ice cream or bedtime stories and the toys, when there were any, were made of straw.
Most of the time it was my older sister Annick getting the dark Poe-like lectures, but I was there, in my high chair, listening wide-eyed. The very idea that Annick could be snatched up, for some infraction, and sent off to the nuns horrified me to the point that my heartbeat seemed to come through my whole body.
Eventually, as we grew, “Lucerne” became a shorthand for “shape up or else,” and oddly, it never lost its potency. Hmm, you know, come to think of it - there was no equivalent monastery for my brother.
Jan 2, 2022
Jan 2, 2022 at 9:10 AM UTC
I think it may be jealousy, but this fog that has sprouted from the inside, my inside, lingers without promise or reward. Looking through the pictures I see it. I see him, I see him absorbing you, absorbing you into the depths of love, of love intoxicating, bright, and day-drunk - like we were when we walked the concrete.
The toast with slices of avocado and a cup of coffee, the dinners, the poetry. The things you want, and the things you deserve become mere reflections in your mirror and you smile a smile that is you best, and you become the best you can, and you grow - you grow just as much and even more than myself or the self that dreamed of Lucerne and Everything Bagels. The self that walked the beach at daybreak, the self that slept soundly through the night.
It was in the backseat of a car that was going North, and in that car I erased your happiness because of my loneliness, because of my existence. I can't go back, and I can't hope to recall your smile and the light that shone through your eyes and through the highline that day.
I think I've rediscovered fear and loathing, and you have continued to rise - to rise and to love. And love was your favorite sport, and it is your favorite religion, even with espresso stains on your teeth and sunburn on your cheeks. You love the air as much as you love him - and your sister, and your brothers, and your mother, and your father, and maybe a little of your love that's left for me. But I was too busy staring at the rooftops and the crying children being scolded by their mothers.
I thought I lost myself when I lost you, but now I think there is no future to begin with; just brighter lights and your laughter sometimes resonating from the low hum of the traffic and the bottoms of empty glasses hitting the bar.
Sep 28, 2015
Sep 28, 2015 at 3:58 PM UTC