I WAS ALMOST THERE
As I drove
She came
Into my mind
And I knew
I had to
Write it down
But I was
Almost there
And I didn’t
Want to make
A note while
Behind the wheel
In a matter of minutes
I said to myself
I will embrace her
With pen & paper
She was fresh
And pretty
Waiting for me
To make of her
Lines of reality
And when I
Parked the car
And sat at
My desk
I could only see
Bourgeoisie strangers
Hypnotized by
Video games
She was gone
Forever.
MY INTERNET WIRELESS ANTENNA
Hello everybody!
I am sad to report that my connection has been down for some time now. The Baja Wireless folks (our internet provider) said we should have full connectivity by next Tuesday. In the meantime, I will write the good old fashion way. Pen and paper.
Take care,
Juan.
DRIVER WITH CAR WANTED
I need someone with a car to drive me from Rosarito Beach, Playas de Tijuana, or San Diego California, to Arizona Western College in Yuma, so I can attend a writer’s convention where I have been invited to read my poetry.
We would depart on the evening of the 19th of April and we would head back the afternoon of the 23rd
The driver must not be afraid of crossing the border, since part of the event will take place in San Luis Río Colorado.
I must be allowed to smoke in the car and we might need to stop for a drink or two on our way there and on our way back.
As payment I can share with the driver the secret of the healing properties of poetry.
And some gas money too.
Please send all replies to skypilgrim@msn.com
Poetically yours,
Juan.
Poets are mostly voters and tax payers, but the alienation of the poet is a common theme. Among poets there are also probably higher than average rates of clutch burnout, job turnover, rooting about, sleep apnea, noncompliance, nervous leg syndrome, depression, litigation, black clothing, and so forth, but this is where we live, or as Leonard Cohen put it, poetry is the opiate of the poets.
—C.D Wright
My friend, Coptic poet Mathew Shenoda, has answered a question I asked him more than a year ago. The question has to do with the role of poetry in today’s world. His response is the following:
“The mission of poetry in the world today is first to express the truth, to soothsay and second to take the knowledge of that truth and create a visionary space wherein another world is possible. Poetry is counter-madness”
Mathew has a new book out:
Somewhere Else
Poems by Matthew Shenoda
Introduction by Sonia Sanchez
Rooted in the traditions of the Coptic community, this compelling debut collection widens the political conversation surrounding ethnicity, pan-Africanism, and pan-Arabism.“These papyrus-dipped poems launch the Eastern desert into the ‘Forever-West’ where we all dwell. Listen to Shenoda’s ‘giraffe tongue’ unwind—incantations reclaiming the Coptic earth and its peoples, stories and sufferings, a grandmother and grandfather’s lessons of war, death, rebirth, love and peace. This book holds the keys to our present global predicament—each word is a star in our night.”—Juan Felipe Herrera
“While reading Matthew Shenoda’s Somewhere Else, I become acutely aware of history insisting on the verity of knowledge. History is more than memory. It is hope and experience. And it is the passion of life. And for Shenoda, it is the connection to the Nile of story, song, music, dance, and the power of language between Egypt and America. Great poetry you can dance to!”—Simon Ortiz
“The history of Eg ypt and the Nile River Valley are strikingly evoked in these tightly crafted, most times short, terse poems, with lines full of surprises, as in: ‘I am somewhere/between home & home,’ or ‘in our bodies a rooted history.’ These are strongly political, beautiful and peaceful poems and they constantly remind us: ‘Holy things/Do not die.’ Somewhere Else is a wise, eloquent book.”—Quincy Troupe
Paperback Original
ISBN: 1 -56689 -173 –6
Coffee House Press
List Price $14.00
I can’t wait to get my copy.
15
The bedroom
Had 2 beds in it
I took the one
On the right
I felt someone
Looking at me
Through the window
I closed the blinds
Then I closed my eyes
And went to sleep
I had a dream
In it I saw
A wonderworker
Smiling at me
His smile was like the sun
And we were
On a beautiful countryside
I was overcome with ecstasy
And could not speak much
I just asked a few questions
And he would just smiled
He answered with
A radiant light
Of silence
And I knew I was
Being healed of things
I did not know
I was pleased to see him
Because he had left
The monastery
One day earlier
And I know he likes
To visit his guests
In dreams
Then I awoke
The sounds of knocking
At my door
Accompanied by
Short foreign words
It was still dark
I knew I had to get up
And go to
One of their temples
14
The monk said:
Now we’ll go to
The men’s guesthouse
And started walking
Once again I followed him
It was late at night
And I was getting tired
I wanted to sleep
It was hard to keep up
With the agile monk
He walked fast
And I did the best I could
Another 2 storey building
And he said:
This is the guest house
He opened the door
And invited me enter
Inside the ambiance
Was pleasant
Almost like a resort
There was a living space
With comfortable sofas
Next to it there was a kitchen
And sign that said
Restaurant food
Is not allowed
You were encouraged
To cook your own
We have three rooms available
The monk said
As he looked at a notebook
I asked which one I could take
He told me to choose one
I asked which one he recommended
He said the one I select
Would be a good choice
Three rooms next to each other
I entered the one
In the middle
And said good night
May you rest
Said the monk
LUNCH TIME
I drink my coffee
Inside my beat up truck
I poured it out
Of my beat up thermos
A man
Driving a Jaguar
Stops and looks at me
The coffee
Tastes so good
It is so hot
And it’s even better
With the cigarette
I wouldn’t trade
This moment
For his Jaguar.
LIKE A PLANE
As Lukas drives shotgun
For the first time
He looks at the dashboard
And says
It’s like a plane
It’s night time
And he tries not
To fall asleep
And I remember
My father
And his mysterious friends
One of them
Had a private jet
And we flew
From California
To Arizona
They let me sit
In the cockpit
Next to the pilot
And I tried
Not to fall asleep
But I did
Just like Lukas.
MY DEAR GRANDFATHER
As Diego
Chews the strawberries
I remember my grandfather
How he used to
Pick us up at
Kindergarden
And we would walk
To the market
And he would
Buy us fruit
We walked home
Eating mangos
And when a
Car did not stopped
As we crossed the street
He yelled at the driver
With his beautiful
Tequila voice
“Chinga tu madre”
He chanted
His words traveled
Like a flock of birds
Reaching the inside
Of the Volkswagen
My brother and I giggled
Like small children do
He laughed too
It was my first encounter
With poetry
13
I said to the doorman:
A couple of months ago I spoke
To a monk named Akasios
I made reservations with him
And he answered:
No one said anything to me
My wife looked at me
I looked at my wife
He carried on:
But we can see if there are
Rooms available
Did you bring luggage?
I answered I would get it later
He asked us to follow him
We entered the monastery
Walked through its corridors
Very soon I realized I was lost
And would be hard to get out
If I had to do it by myself
We stopped outside a 2 story building
And the monk said:
This is where female guests stay
I said good bye to my wife.
A veces los poetas también son profetas. Me tomé la libertad de traducir un fragmento de Ron Silliman.
"Pienso que los poetas jóvenes —los que hoy tienen diez años de edad y aún no saben que se convertirán en poetas —no serán tan pasivos con su destino. Alguien —y muy pronto— tendrá que clavar una estaca en el suelo con un tremendo efecto polarizador. Cambiará el entendimiento de lo que están haciendo y de cómo el trabajo de una persona concierne con el de otra, y cómo ambos poetas se relacionan con su propio material, etc. No tengo idea de cómo se pueda manifestar dicho evento polarizador, ni de de dónde pueda venir, sin embargo ciertamente no vendrá de ninguno de la generación de los mil novecientos cuarentas a la cual pertenezco. ¿Será un nuevo lirismo? ¿Será un nuevo anti—lirismo? No tengo la menor idea"
Ron Silliman.
Agradezco la colaboración de Éktor en la traducción de mi poesía “Gridlock” A continuación el poema:
PLETÓRICA
La ambición es una
Congestión pletórica
Raudales de almas sórdidas
Como los suburbios
Un experimento refractario
De hombres banales
Ultrajadores de la humanidad
Su veneno
Nutre a la clase media
Incita en ellos
El amor
De Abel y Caín
"En poesía, como sucede con el milagro, lo que importa es la intensidad. Nadie sino el Ser Único más allá de nosotros, a quien no conocemos, podría sostener en el aire, por pocos segundos, el perfume de una violeta. El poeta puede —a semejanza suya— sostener por un instante mínimo el milagro de la poesía. Entre todos los hombres, él es uno de los pocos elegidos a quien se puede llamar con justicia un hombre de Dios."
José Gorostiza
11
When I was
About to make a U turn
We saw sign that read
St Anthony’s
Greek Orthodox
Monastery
12
The entrance was a Mediterranean arch
I stopped the automobile near it
At the entrance there was
A tall and thin man
Wearing a black cassock that reached
All the way down to his ankles
He was so still and quiet looking at us
My wife and I looked at each other
Not knowing what to do next
I told my wife to wait in the car
And I got out and walked towards the monk
Gravel crunching under my feet
I stopped next to him
The monk looked at me and I looked at him
Peaceful stare in the night
The entrance light was above us
This monk had very fair skin
With red hair and a red beard
And serene blue eyes
When it was obvious he was not going to speak
I introduced myself
My name is Juan
I extended my hand towards him
He shook my hand and told me his name
A Hellenic name I can’t pronounce nor remember.
I would like to thank writer Luis H. Crosthwaite for being kind enough to allow me to use his pc to post my poems.
Currently, at my homestead, we are trying to get wireless internet, but this endeavor has been more difficult than previously thought. We are still on the hunt for an antenna that will get the signal from the nearest tower.
God bless you all.
Juan.
THAT PLACE
I remember
When Chula Vista
Was a ghetto town
I used to drive by an
Abandon supermarket
A spooky building
And I fled California
Escaping from
Diseases of the soul
And I found sanctuary
In the evergreens
Millions of steps
Up in the northwest
And now
I earn
My living
In that same
Frightful building
Nowadays it has
A new paint job
And it’s decorated
With charming
Marketing tricks
I am there
Almost every morning
Selling to dying people
Who buy things
Dying people buy
Watching rich
And unfulfilled
Housewife’s
The prosperous
And the poor
The sick
And the young
All of them
Beautiful sad spirits
Heavily carrying
Their abandoned lives.
DISCONNECTED
I have been
Trying to connect
Into the sky
And I am not able
To fly with signals
To touch unknown faces
I am limited
To kiss estrangers lips
To be a kind
And invisible person
I can’t do it
Because of the weather
And because of illness
And tsunamis
Death just before
The New Year
And prayer is
The most important
Commodity I posses
I have been trying
To connect with you.
