4 Poems Kriegsjahre

ISLANDS

How they seem to you,

Lost in a squall of winds

And rain, the islands,

Seem like lost loves.

They are lonelier

In this weather, alone,

In the gulf of sound

That batters back all

But the sound you made.

The memory of each

Is a little dream

Evading all purpose.

LOUGH

How the amber air

Is foliated with mush

Purple hues or greens

Extravagant sounds.

A cacophony of bills, beaks

Rises in solitude

After the lush air,

Nature is soiled.

Unable to comprehend

Its slightest defect

Into the dying day.

So the lough is blue

Foaming white,

Streaked with neglect,

Beyond mute

Incomprehension.

That decay means change

The greens mutate into

Reds, oranges, ambers

Cast against the wind.

FIELD

Empty, neat bricolage.

The lines of cabbage,

They are a million greens

Flushed also with purple.

The field is bereft

No human eye weeds

The distant horizon

Nor glances up

At encroaching weather.

There are one million paths

Home, those are driven

Into the hillside, into the landscape.

Where no witness thrills to see

The risen sun, the distant lough

Or the rolling emptied rock

Lolling in abeyance.

KRIEGSJAHRE

Meine Errinerung an die anderen:

Erstens, ein Mädchen mit roter Jacke.

Zweitens, das Narrenhaus meiner Oma.

Drittens, dein Freund der Wolf.

Ein schönes Ort.  Ein kleines Dorf.

Und ein großer Wald mit vielen Bäumen.

Tiefer und tiefer wird das Grüne auf dem Hügel.

Tiefer und tiefer das Rote auf der Jacke.

Und jetzt das Rot auf der Jacke

Mit dem Wolf ist manchmal gemischt.

Die weißen Zähne des Wolfs, seine

Schönen Augen sind dunkel Blau.

Und dann ist der Wolf der Wolf

Und alle Farben sind der Wolf

Und das Mädchen ist auch immer der Wolf.

Und der Wolf liegt bei Narrenhaus.

„Meine Oma ist tot und wohnt mit dem Wolf.“

Sagt das Rotkäppchen zu dem Spiegel.

Der Spiegel ist der Wolf und die Farben

Der Spiegel ist rot in der Grünen in dem Blauen.

Somma Vesuviana

The long elongated toe
Of the volcano is piled
On top of a million
Mosaiced pavements where

Bird, fire and stone
Crunch together.
Their shadows pound
The leadened caldera.

Beneath the tiled piety
Byzantine emptiness exudes
A star, a tree, a gorgon's mask
Poking its tongue out Janus-like

At the past and the future.

A PLATE OF CANDIDE

Twelve recipes and twelve cities.
First take on tiramisu gobbled up
The plate had nails protruding
The bill was six hundred euroes

Outside the pavements were bleeding.
Limoncello in abundant Sicilian
Syrup, we fed it to the corpse
Of Aldo Moro, knew no tomorrow.

We reached the Siren Land
Lunched on margherita then played
Upon a delicate Sorrento jug
In our pizzeria below Vesuvio.

A plate of canneloni
A fine, salty minestrone
Reading Petrarch's "Canzoniere"
Dan Brown's "Inferno" wary

Of Neopolitan darkness shrugged
Off by a lame, insolent moon.
The bill again was far larger
Than our party, then we drank

The bitter wines of Lombardy
Lambrusco and sour grappa
Of the Veneto. The sun and the moon
Fought on the Lido, the Rialto

On the Venetian rios we crunched
Munched our way through crab,
Oyster even pizza marinara.
The salt beef of Florence

Complete with Papal nuncio
Sour breath of Michaelangelo
Putrescence of Brunelleschi.
The leaves of spinach wound around

The necks of the culture vultures
In the suburb Tavanuzze.
At work for my sculptor friend
Rat a tat tat como se dice

O God, Dante and Beatrice
Cosimo and Lorenzo Medici.
Clanking heels in the overlook
Before the bridges and the night

The lock and spun from threads you made
The key from fibres that you twisted
Our gilded gondola's now a hearse
Yes things are bad and now much worse.

Italian cuisine has become a curse
Twelve recipes, twelve cities.
Pulse quickened, blood thickened.
Lord Byron's running his horses

In an asylum where orphans died,
Beggars pried and harlots cried.
Does Dan Brown read Petrarch?
Or is it vice versa? On and on

Questions yet and answers not
Much, much else that was misbegot.

Paul Murphy