vrijdag 26 december 2014

THAILAND



BANGKOK: R & R

‘Not one sucks the fear out of me’,
still just, no longer legible on the toilet wall.
I see him, back for a while from Nam,
blond, tall and tittering from tattered nerves

in the shadows of The Strip. Neon
slashes longing. Time clots. Searching
for my dark girl from The Hague
you fondle who’ll ride you for a handful of rice.

Are you rotting in a noose or, through of one those
godforsaken places, racing your empty taxi home?
Your last sentence, my first, the same kind:
The hole, always, everywhere that one and only woman.




CHIENG MAI: THE FORTUNE-TELLER

Whoever he may constantly remind me of;
his gaze appears to hold more life than mine.
Although, I read in many languages, our fortune
matches the sum that has been paid.

He counts my numbers next to hers, divides
and then subtracts once more, traces my palm,
links Aries and Goat on their allotted paths.
Compassion's alien to this temple.

His interpreter enquires if I’m a surgeon.
Copper clatters in an ancient wind. I nod.
‘He see. You not good faith. You know.’
I return the smile, give him more of the same.




MAE SAI: THE BORDER

Somewhere between me and the forbidden hills
of Myanmar surges a border of fear and lead.
The woman who you try to be for us steals nearer,
merging almost with who fears me. You feel

me down, stiff lips in the night over my skin.
I feel the hands of the man in you on my belly.
Once a professional soldier, he now looks like a father.
Not mine, not on your life. You feel

me over, family knows distance, love no mercy.
Branches snap, screens flicker. Primeval
land, as close and out of reach as the culprit.
Till guilt discharges us: flies, and scrap.






Publisher: In de Knipscheer, December 2003.
Book: € 15,00, cd (music by Dirk Stromberg): € 18,00. Set book + cd: € 29,50.
Postbox 6107, 2011 HC Haarlem, The Netherlands.


www.alberthagenaars.nl
www.indeknipscheer.nl

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