Lament by Remco Campert

Lament

Here now along the long deep water

that I thought that I thought that you would always

that you would always

here now along the long deep water

where behind reed beds behind reed beds the sun

that I thought that you always would always

that always your eyes your eyes and the air

always your eyes and the air

always rippling in the water rippling

that always in living silence

that I always should live in living silence

that you would always that waving reed always

along the long deep water that always your skin

that always at midday your skin

always in summer at midday your skin

that always your eyes would break

that always from joy your eyes would break

always in the calm midday

along the long deep water that I thought

that I thought that you would always

that I thought that joy would always

that always the light still at midday

that always the midday light your olive-skinned shoulder

your olive-skinned shoulder always in the midday light

that always your cry hanging

always your bird cry hanging

at midday in the summer in the air

that always the living air that always

always the rippling water at midday your skin

I thought that everything would always I thought that never

here now along the long deep water that never

I thought that always that never that you never

that frost never that no ice ever the water

here now along the long deep water I thought never

that snow ever the cypress I thought never

that snow never the cypress that you never more

Original title: Lamento From the collection: Dichter - Uitgeverij De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam - 1995

Dublin by Frank van Dijl

Dublin  Frank van Dijl [1951] photo Internet I. Everyone in Dublin has the same popish puppy-face that you still see in remote  parishes in the south of the Low Countries, which have only just been connected to  the telegraph and telephone net. The Irish: palefaces with water-colour freckles  and lifeless eyes that at any moment can drown in tears. Indeed, drowning sorrow in drink is what they do best: when you give them a pint they will wag  their tails and growl in gratitude.  Sometimes, it is said, they lick your hand. After closing time, far too early of course, they piss, one paw up, against the pub. II. In almost everything they imitate the English, but after all, how long haven't these been their  bosses? So it's bacon and eggs in the morning, tea with milk, sandwiches for lunch, tea with milk, a bit later afternoon tea, with milk, and in the evening steak and kidney pie with far too big, far too green peas. Just like the English they drive on the left, although it makes  no difference on their narrow roads where you drive. And they speak English: the bilingual street signs are only there for show, just like The Irish Times has a little corner left for an article in Gaelic. A stray dog is dead happy with the smallest bone. III. It is a long way to Tipperary: the dog, dead tired, drags his paw. Oh, sure, Ireland is stunning, with mountains and valleys, and the Irish whiskey is good to drink: I know all about it. But James Joyce wrote his best books somewhere else, though of course, in the museum dedicated to him  in Dublin, they don't tell you that, and Kennedy became America's president. Ireland is not a country, it is an island, and it isn't even that. No one feels called to greatness,  meekly they walk the streets, thanking God  that at least there are potatoes again. Then what the hell was I doing in Dublin? Epilogue I, who went swinging in London, Paris or  Berlin, entered – madness -  the kite of Aer Lingus and read sweating  how I should act in case of emergency. I sought oblivion in alcohol. The drink  against fear of death, which I didn't seek here,  consoled my body, and my limbs acted  as if it was normal to be Icarus. No city beneath me, Dublin is a hole  between mountains of cardboard, a decor for  cheap tragedies without a heldentenor. I, Icarus, fell. It didn't help to call out. Who would save me: I fell with them. But just as the sea is good enough for the sailor, I was content. Original title: Dublin From: De Tweede Ronde, tijdschrift voor literatuur, herfst 1981 - Uitgeverij Bert Bakker, Amsterdam

ars poetica by C. Buddingh'

ars poetica

C. Buddingh' [1918-1985]

I remember as if it were only yesterday

(I was maybe 22): I sat

brooding over a poem, and near the window

my mother was peeling the potatoes

the verse was not working: my back was

dripping with sweat and I thought with annoyance:

how in the name of god can one

write poetry in the same room

someone is peeling potatoes ?

That evening, when everyone was sleeping, I finished

the verse: it was an exceptionally bad verse

and I understood only very much later: the best

poetry is written while peeling potatoes

Original title: 'ars poetica' -from the collection 'Is dit genoeg: een stuk of wat gedichten -  honderd jaar Noord- en Zuidnederlandse poëzie (1880-1980) in dertig thema's - dl.II - samengesteld door C. Buddingh' en Eddy van Vliet - 1982 - Uitgeverij Elsevier Manteau, Amsterdam/Antwerpen

Something about music in March by Jaap Harten

Something about music in March

Jaap Harten
[1930-2017]

From my window

I see tomcat Ape sneaking over

the gutter of the neighbour's shed.

Grey skin against grey

roof tiles, a drizzly sky

above it and in the background

the RC graveyard with a lilac

prelate. Today an important person will be

committed to the earth there.

Starchy or dejected (who can say?)

the bereaved trudge, friends,

housekeepers, etc. behind the coffin.

It is 12th March, cutting bleakly in shrubs

and wreath ribbons: tears might also

be brought about by the lashing wind.

Always looking at tombstones

leads to too much organ music at home.

Why not play a LP with the

sonatina of Ravel for once?

Consolation is not for sale. Years

pass by and I'm off now to buy

luncheon meat; life goes on

they say. Even so, while shopping, I worry

about the right music at my cremation:

Satie too modish, Bach too outmoded.

I'd choose Greta Keller with Dis-mois je t'aime

a scratchy little record from the meagre

thirties, but the favourite

song of Dior. It would match my

French ties, boots and glasses.

I never really felt I belonged in

Holland, rather to German drag

or Indonesian boy. Honestly, I

am at an utter loss in this country.


Original title: 'Iets over muziek in maart' -from the collection 'Poëzie is en daad van bevestiging' - Noord- en Zuidnederlandse poëzie van 1945 tot heden - gebundeld en ingeleid door C. Buddingh' en Eddy van Vliet - 1984 - Uitgeverij Manteau Amsterdam

Heavenly Peace by Ira Bart

Heavenly Peace

                            

                                        for Duo Duo

Ira Bart (Ria Baart)
[1947-1996]

You were on the Tiananmen Square

when a new wind was starting to blow there

full of spring air and cherry blossom, the future

crushed under the wheels of tanks

                       - colics, hard corses of a lava flow -

did you run, no, but did I run

over my screen.

I recognised you later in my country

by a photo in the newspaper.

Driven by hate and homesickness you watched

in my house pictures of the whitewashed square where

what had happened was no longer shown.

               People who haves eyes are often sad, you said,

swimming in the sea, where your head

became a smaller and smaller dot

until I could only somehow

                                          vaguely

                                                        surmise it.

Men in a boat showed you the way

back. Why, you asked, denying the supremacy

of the sees, surely rinsing off something

               must be done with a great deal of water?

Original title: Hemelse Vrede - From the collection: Verwaaide liefdes, tere vleugels - 1997 - Uitgeverij Tortuca, Rotterdam

The thrush again by Hans Andreus

Hans Andreus
[1926-1977]

The thrush again. There wasn't an evening that he lost his way: his soundtrack between the houses moved unfailingly synchronized with in this reality the in- escapable effect of clouds, sky and setting sun and while I lay still as if I were dead, sang he. He sang.

Original title: 'De lijster weer' - from: Om de mond van het licht. Een kleine case history - Uitgeversmaatschappij Holland BV - Haarlem - 1973

Two poems by Bert Schierbeek

Bert Schierbeek
[1918-1996]

LOOK it's much worse than you think if you think it's even worse

I THINK when it rains let her not get wet and if it storms won't she get a cold and I also think that that thinking doesn't help because you'll never get wet again nor get a cold because it rains nor is windy ever more for you

Original titles: 'Kijk' and 'Ik denk' - from the collection 'De Deur', Uitgeverij De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam - 1972

Landscape by H. Marsman

Landscape

H. Marsman [1899-1940]

In the pastures grase
the peaceable creatures;
the herons glide
over shiny lakes,
the bitterns stand
by a dark pond;
and in the washland
the horses gallop
with waving tails
through rolling grass.

(Original title: 'Landschap' - from: 'Verzameld Werk', 1938 - Uitgeverij Querido, Amsterdam)

Terror by Lucebert

Lucebert [1924-1994]

Terror

finally the empty road

the endless empty road

the empty stones the thousand and one

white steps the split stones

the very long white road

the extremely stony road the extremely

split stones the endless

jog the glass the stones the white

recently dug legs of passers-by

right behind the brushwood

nothing conspicuous behind the hills

deserters are plugged

a general breaks wind

over the road moves a stinking cloud

the corpses find themselves between the white stones

remarkably well hidden

artistically inlayed between the split stones

every split is a surprised eye

and the hundreds the endless empty eyes

are from nobody from nobody are

also the storms of violence

at times they are disguised as closed cars

slowly over the empty white road

but then it is also certain that they will vanish
suddenly in the clear bloodstain right on the horizon

Three poems by Eddy van Vliet

La gare forestière (Paul Delvaux) The wood smells pause. Between the leaves darkness keeps asleep. The sky fills with light yellow defence. On the rural platform the waiting has started. The destinations do not run out for the girls who made up all the arrivals. The rails are carrying like parallel running servants their ponderous masters. For everybody waiting they bring an absentee.

Eddy van Vliet [1942-2002]

For Gert B. It is Easter Monday. The magnolia flowers. The garden wall seems to glow gently. Just for a moment I sense the winter when I take the garden chairs out of the cellar. What is in the bud, wants to open before nightfall. As in a race green holds the first place. Nothing is hesitating. The exception is my hand that touches the tree-bark. The branch that it breaks, contains no sap. It is clear: the pear tree is dead and from what I have heard this morning, so are you.

The synagogue on the Koornmarkt I have come to Delft, not for its blue or its tower. Because only what was lost, has the right of existence. Ornament that lives in a pencil sketch. Light spots on the eastern wall. Tolerance made evident from a speech Much was devoted to what had disappeared. A collection. The words of a poet from The Hague. Lotteries and the whole life of an unmarried engineer. The specification provided room for eighty Jews. In fear they threw themselves down. The occupiers registered a hundred and thirty eight. Twelve returned. Oh Eternal one, I love the throne of Your house that turned into a storage place for rusting barrels.

Original titles: La gare forestière, Voor Gerd B. and De synagoge aan de Koornmarkt  - From: De tweede ronde, Tijdschrift voor literatuur, Herfst 1989 - Vlaams nummer - Uitgeverij Bert Bakker BV, Amsterdam.

Departure by Hans van den Bos

Departure                       29th July, 2002 Along artificial landscapes made for unwitting creatures, the road leaves, in a tropical  heat, a long past behind.  In the mirror the skyline  of the city, proudly rebuild  after brutal assault from the east,  fades like a mirage. Endless lowlands rush past – an accelerated poem, until smoking and flaming pillars of capitalism become manifest in the low sun. Far beyond the last city, the last link to the coast, a sultry south-west wind, that often  fling waves against dunes and dykes, brings now the salty smell of the sea. A ship on which many forever left before, slips slowly between the jetties, away from the coast. A final look over the yellow dunes, then only sky and water remain.

Original Title: Vertrek

Mangan’s Bay Revisited by Hans van den Bos

Mangan’s Bay Revisited In the hidden white cottage monotone ticking of the meter. On the table before the window, with a view to the green lawn, pen and paper, surrounded by books, are waiting for words. The autumn wind whistles around the cottage; clouds skim along the sky. Two black dogs horse about on the grass, swept interchangeably by rain and sunlight. On the deserted beach the breakers rattle over coloured pebbles and bring in loads of kelp harvested, in bygone days, by farmers to fertilize their fields. Sea and clouds touch each other. An unexpected sharp cry of a great black-backed gull stiffens a lonely grey heron who then rises gracefully and disappears over the blanketed water. In the cottage in front of the fire the two black dogs are asleep and the pen fills the white paper.

Original Title: Terug naar Mangan's Bay

Bride by Ton van Reen

BRIDE A woman rests on the beach sitting on a bundle of brushwood cold jellyfish of blue-tinted glass spread around her like jewels Her hands lie on her lap playing with a brittle shell the pink mouth opened to the wind a shout in which the sea races around Motionless she looks out over the water her headscarf is blowing like a blue windvane towards the sea a silent greeting to the fisherman in his boat, small off the coast The tide rolls towards her a white fan of wet lace is spreading out over her foot With arms full of spume the sea dresses her as a bride

Ton van Reen (1941) [photo Internet]

Original Title: Bruid

Catherine Deneuve by Manuel Kneepkens

Catherine Deneuve

Catherine Deneuve
[photo Internet]

#Metoo is called in France #Balancetonporc

(blow the gaff on your pig!)

100 pretty French women are protesting

Catherine Deneuve belongs to them

'This is La Douce France, Nom de Dieu!

Gallantry we hold dear!'

A man's hand on a woman's thigh

is not Les liasons dangereuses!

A man's hand on a woman's bottom

is not L’Histoire d’ O!

Oh, good old Catherine Deneuve

once Buñuel's Belle de Jour

all Bad Men are grateful to you

Me too!

In the name of Marquis de Sade

I put you naked across my knee