Reasons

      Because in the distance between
when we die and when we forget about it
is where our happiness is pitted;

      Because in the intensity of the green
I seek respite from your drenched words and
pretend that your life doesn't trudge along elsewhere;

      Because in the middle of the woods you only grunted
when I told you that I love you, and I took that to mean
"Yes, me too, very much," and smiled to myself;

      Because the comfort of thinking that this is all there is
is seeping back in, and that the world begins with
my mud-crusted shoes and ends with the jargon in my head;

      Because the possibilities of all the faces passing me by
passes along with them, and their beaming eyes bore through me
holes as big and blue as the sky, that they don't even look through;

      Because I promised, if given another chance, I would grab on to it
though I don't know what that means; and I made a vow of goodness
to a God I don't believe in--and I wonder if He believes in me.

(Originally posted on July 6th, 2006)

There’s No Forgetting (Sonata)

I have been aching for words to say it; but words are failing me again, and again, and again... And in the end I just return to this haunting poem by Pablo Neruda, perhaps my favorite of his, and on which I based my thesis, "Memory for Forgetfulness”: Registering/Effacing the Memory of the Lebanese War, which has, at once, tragically come back to life and become laughably irrelevant...

Ask me where I have been
and I’ll tell you: “Things keep on happening.”
I must talk of the rubble that darkens the stones;
of the river’s duration, destroying itself;
I know only the things that the birds have abandoned,
or the sea behind me, or my sorrowing sister.
Why the distinctions of place? Why should day
follow day? Why must the blackness
of nighttime collect in our mouths? Why the dead?

If you question me: where have you come from, I must talk
___with things falling away,
artifacts tart to the taste,
great, cankering beasts, as often as not,
and my own inconsolable heart.

Those who cross over with us are no keepsakes,
nor the yellowing pigeon that sleeps in forgetfulness:
only the face with its tears,
the hands at our throats,
whatever the leafage dissevers:
the dark of an obsolete day,
a day that has tasted the grief in our blood.

Here are the violets, swallows—
all the things that delight us, the delicate tallies
that show in the lengthening train
through which pleasure and transience pass.

Here let us halt, in the teeth of a barrier:
useless to gnaw on the husks that the silence assembles.
For I come without answers:
see: the dying are legion,
legion, the breakwaters breached by the red of the sun,
the headpieces knocking the ship’s side,
the hands closing over their kisses,
and legion the things I would give to oblivion.

—Pablo Neruda

© Translation: 1974, Ben Belitt
From: Pablo Neruda, Five Decades: Poems 1925-1970
Publisher: Grove Press, New York, 1974
Hear this recited at Poetry International Festival Rotterdam, 2004 by Krip Yuso.

No Hay Olvido (Sonata)

Si me preguntáis en dónde he estado
debo decir "Sucede".
Debo de hablar del suelo que oscurecen las piedras,
del río que durando se destruye:
no sé sino las cosas que los pájaros pierden,
el mar dejado atrás, o mi hermana llorando.
Por qué tantas regiones, por qué un día
se junta con un día? Por qué una negra noche
se acumula en la boca? Por qué muertos?

Si me preguntáis de dónde vengo, tengo que conversar con
      cosas rotas,
con utensilios demasiado amargos,
con grandes bestias a menudo podridas
y con mi acongojado corazón.

No son recuerdos los que se han cruzado
ni es la paloma amarillenta que duerme en el olvido,
sino caras con lágrimas,
dedos en la garganta,
y lo que se desploma de las hojas:
la oscuridad de un día transcurrido,
de un día alimentado con nuestra triste sangre.

He aquí violetas, golondrinas,
todo cuanto nos gusta y aparece
en las dulces tarjetas de larga cola
por donde se pasean el tiempo y la dulzura.

Pero no penetremos más allá de esos dientes,
no mordamos las cáscaras que el silencio acumula,
porque no sé qué contestar:
hay tantos muertos,
y tantos malecones que el sol rojo partía,
y tantas cabezas que golpean los buques,
y tantas manos que han encerrado besos,
y tantas cosas que quiero olvidar.

—Pablo Neruda

The Worst Is Yet to Come

Shed them one by one
like recent habits,
perhaps, or ancient loves.

Feel the world denting under your knees--
bury your face deeper in the pillow,
and let it out.

Listen to the grinding of Fate's stone
chaffing your thighs,
pencil a smirk across your face
and raise it to the light.

The worst is yet to come.


In lawns that knew nothing
but the breeze dabbling in poetry,
a hammock strung
like angels to the skies;

In dusks wrapped in their own perfection,
and beaches slumbering at the lap of forever;

You sat, eyes wide, words few,
absorbing the sand like it's all that is left,
spitting it out variations on the divine.

The horizon blinked under your gaze,
and repeated itself, fumbling and hurried,
waiting for reassurance
at the corners of your mouth.


Plunge it, once more, into darkness
and burn a sigh.

We make alliances of convenience,
greeting smiles with a stare,
showcasing the cleared lots
like something’s there.

But the words dim, and scramble,
and shift direction on the page.

They know, too, like I do,
like the night falls,
they sing it under their breath:

The worst is yet to come.

(To Katyssima, originally posted on September 12, 2006)

VI. The Sinking River at Stevensport

Closing your eyes, you can see 

What nobody ever saw:  

It is midnight, past midnight,  

The figure just visible  

In the moonless, dew-laden dark 

Where river empties into  

River, and the water makes  

No sound, or a sound like time, 

Which stands still now on the bank. 

He, too, stands still on the bank, 

Late-summer night wind whipping 

The white linen of his coat-  

For, yes, he always did have  

A sense of style in such things.  

Behind him, the white car shines 

Under what starlight there is.  

He stares at what stars there are 

And remembers—or does he?- 

The flowered dress he bought you 

And raised above your waist here 

So you could straddle his lap. 

Does he think of the river  

Lit at Louisville, where some- 

Thing he can hardly admit  

To himself happened?—happened 

To you, though you both agreed 

It was the best thing to do. . . . 

Does he speak aloud now to  

No one? Does he say a name? 

Does he say your name before  

He walks into the river?  

Or does he just walk away?  

You must believe both stories  

Till the world makes up its mind. 

Either way, the white car shines 

As dawn fights the water, and

 -—All this behind your closed eyes—— 

That wide water seems to hold 

The dead in their element.  

- Joe Bolton, from "The Last Nostalgia"