Some fragments
I felt like writing. And was thinking about how to translate Sapphic stanzas into something that could work with English. (Read: I am not good enough to deal with real metre.) I don't pretend that these are good, but they're maybe a start to something.
Opet Festival, 2006 AD
Empty scraping sounds
the boat dragging through the sand
sweat on shoulders glistens in the sun
chanting women and beating drums
the grunt of the men working, working
in the hot desert sun, the water sparkles
as the men bear their god
slowly
into the temple
- and all this reduced to empty words
a white classroom
Broken thoughts and fractured images:
your two-dimensional immortality
Lived out on screen
Drawn in line
Shifter
Every time I see you I am shocked at the unfamiliarity of your face and feel as if I am encountering you for the first time because I don’t
Remember you. I don’t.
Even lying here I forget your face the moment it passes from my sight and you are no longer anything but a series of sensations and -
I can’t recall your name
When I see you again it will be a painful re-acquaintance, played out in silence. I tell myself that if I strike hard enough I might yet chisel your face into my mind,
Into my heart. I might.
They are not as autobiographical as some might be tempted to make them.
Opet Festival, 2006 AD
Empty scraping sounds
the boat dragging through the sand
sweat on shoulders glistens in the sun
chanting women and beating drums
the grunt of the men working, working
in the hot desert sun, the water sparkles
as the men bear their god
slowly
into the temple
- and all this reduced to empty words
a white classroom
Broken thoughts and fractured images:
your two-dimensional immortality
Lived out on screen
Drawn in line
Shifter
Every time I see you I am shocked at the unfamiliarity of your face and feel as if I am encountering you for the first time because I don’t
Remember you. I don’t.
Even lying here I forget your face the moment it passes from my sight and you are no longer anything but a series of sensations and -
I can’t recall your name
When I see you again it will be a painful re-acquaintance, played out in silence. I tell myself that if I strike hard enough I might yet chisel your face into my mind,
Into my heart. I might.
They are not as autobiographical as some might be tempted to make them.