November
Myth
of unsolved mystery
Color
of smoke and shadow
What
have you done
November
with
October? last September?
Not
even cold December
could
resist your profound shudder—
your
dark obsessions musty scent
distant
rolls of thunder
Silent
film on tiptoe—
Chaplin Bergman
Pasolini—
heavy
trains of thought
limping
through me now
Deep
in my throat’s forest
your
oboe’s haunting timbre--
twisting
tones of burnt sienna
living
embers turned to ash
November
dismembered
hands
pointing to
The
Eleventh Hour
ever
on the edge of slumber
your
days of dead
were
never numbered
When Death Was a Little Boy
he
spilled blood all over the carpet
and no one forgave him except
for God
and all the other Big-Shots
who have hardwood
Jesus placed a rosary of eyes
that never close
around his neck
And in his mouth
the mutilated silence of deaf
sparrows
whose broken wings turn like
blank pages
against the winds of time
Death has plenty of time
He waits patiently among the
bruised lilies
with his long sad shadow
shading his face
and constantly looking over
his shoulder
He never gets any rest
He has heavy bags under his
eyes
which he must drag along on
all those trips
he never takes himself
Sometimes you
can hear him
rattling
around and around
But no one
sees Death coming—
only Life and
God
whose rosaries are
everywhere
Once Death
caught a glimpse
of his own reflection in God’s
eyes
and all his
mirrors shattered.
Then they
folded like cracked ice—
tequila on the rocks!
He’s still picking up where we
left off
Oh Death has
plenty of time
only… he could use a little
rest--
he looks much worse in person!
Here we go dying
all in a row--
one by one
little by little--
minute-hands
on the ticking clock
we take a number
we wait our turn
then wave So long!
to the sleeping world
Everything else
has already retired--
the wilting petals
the tired sheets
the sleeping pills
in their porcelain caskets
The nurses
starched
and ready-to-go
are going going
have already gone
Here we are now
mooning each other
in unmarked gowns
shuffling down corridors
winding up staircases
circling the ceilings
stumbling into
our iron cribs
None of us have faces
only blank pillows
with dimpled expressions—
expiration dates
stamped on our forearms--
humble offerings
in stainless steel bedpans
Here we go flushing
ourselves down toilets
with yesterday's vomit
clutching remotes
as if they had answers
as if they had souls
as if we could shun
the blind plunging needle !
Not here ! Not here !
How it searches in vain !
Somewhere else
someone else
is silently screaming
burning syllables
of wordless prayer
Shorn like a lamb
as smooth as a baby--
my mouth-- an open grave
Only our bodies
know why
we are here
dining on drip and borrowed blood--
sipping comfort
out of canned air
Only my pain
knows where I am
How often
I long
for that other country--
to inhale its garden
unwhispering my name
How suddenly I fade
with the wave of a hand
not knowing when I will return
Here I go ! Here I go !
So long !
Sooooooooo Looooooong !
Behold
behold NOW
my gaping fear
the mummy-in-waiting
in sterile white gauze
Foiled in aluminum
dressed like a turkey
Beware beware
the slick rubber glove !
On the operating table
I floated over myself
like the moon or a balloon
Losing the earth
I lost all time
sensed the All Knowing
(This I know or
do not know
What do I know ?)
Floating here
is no longer permitted
We walk on our knees
We kneel in our wounds
I don't have a face
Please come see me
dragging my life
like my flesh behind me
Visiting hours
are between this
and that
Song of the Dying
Hello darkness my old friend
Sounds of Silence—Simon and Garfunkel
O Dark Sphere–
face revolving with the earth
changing shape and color–
will I never see the whole picture?
I am falling within
the flickering shadows
of my eyes
They are the fields
of childhood
patterned with liquid dream
disappearing into their horizons
I am closing within
the closing eye of the needle
that threads light
through the visible veil
of God’s invisible world
I know all your human songs from memory
The unpopular
the unsung
remain on my lips–-
my mouth opening like a grave
Who with her
long black gloves
holds a hand darker than night
and places it over each living eye
so we cannot look into the Light–
the beautiful Light that remembers?
Tell me Old
Friend
is it your bow
that draws so sweetly
across the universe of my heart–
a
single violin?
November and When Death
Was a Little Boy were published by Danse Macabre online but not
in print a few years back;
The Waiting Room and Song of the Dying are unpublished.
Antonia
Alexandra Klimenko was first introduced on the BBC and to the literary world by the
legendary James Meary Tambimuttu of Poetry London–-publisher of T.S. Eliot,
Dylan Thomas, Henry Miller and Bob Dylan, to name a few. his death, it
was his friend, the late great Kathleen Raine, who took an interest in her
writing and encouraged her to publish. A former San Francisco Poetry Slam Champion, she is widely
published. Her work has appeared in (among others) XXI Century World
Literature (which she represents France) and Maintenant : Journal of
Contemporary Dada Writing and Art archived at the Smithsonian
Institution in Washington, D.C. and New York’s Museum of Modern Art. She is the
recipient of two grants: one from Poets in Need, of which Michael (100
Thousand Poets for Change) Rothenberg is a co-founder; the second—the 2018
Generosity Award bestowed on her by Kathleen Spivack and Joseph Murray for her
outstanding service to international writers through SpokenWord Paris where she
is Writer/ Poet in Residence.
Fabulous poems. Congratulations, Antonia.
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