To Be An Ethnic Minority

When you speak about your past
they say you only speak
about the past

when you speak about other things
they don’t listen

when you shout
they say you are a screamer

if you speak politely
they are impressed

if you cry
they say you are a weeper

if you object
they say you are a liar

if you laugh
they say you are a clown

If you criticize out
of concern for the future
they demand you mind your own business

whatever you do
you both come out
bald.
and you balder.

good being alone

It’s so good being alone
I write you poems
I sing the trees
it’s so good being alone
on my way to London
on my way to Paris
on my way to you
I sing the trees
the snow and the wind
I sing Europe
I sing you a love song

It’s so good being alone
such a wonderful
loneliness
of coming back to you.

Can a Poem Help?

You buy clothes
and I buy records
you cough
and I have hemorrhoids

When discussions go well into the night
and the feeling is that only the wall understands
that all paths lead to a dead end road
that everything is gray and gray and gray
and nothing is white or black

You wear yellow clothes
and I go to Fendelkraiss
looking for a way to fly abroad for a month
or trying by all means to avoid you

How can a poem help...

Suddenly she was more beautiful...

Suddenly she was more beautiful than ever
her face shone and rejoiced
but
I didn’t love her anymore
her beauty was strange to me
her smile didn’t make me laugh
I couldn’t listen to what she was saying
her doubts didn’t interest me
suddenly
the woman most close to me
was the strangest of all
I felt closer to any woman in the street
her beauty didn’t touch me
I could almost ask
excuse me, do I know you?
Your face is familiar to me
I really can’t remember
I can’t remember I see you
everyday.

antipoetry

Like Nicanor Parra I write antipoetry
antipoems for antipeople in antibooks
antipoems for anticritics for antireaders
antipoetry for antiassholes in the antimatter
antielectrons in the antiatoms for antideaf
in my antiadaptation to the literary world
in the antigroup of the antiliterature
antipoetry for antieditors for antiprizes
for antilectors for anticorrectors for antipublishers
and it is not because I don’t like poetry or
because I don’t like critics, it is because,
like any other antipoet I only know
how to write
antipoetry.

[click to view introduction]