Ernst Stadler, Martin Piekar, Gunter Haug, Richard Preston, Dolce far niente

Dolce far niente

 

De oogst door Vincent van Gogh, 1888

 

Mein Herz steht bis zum Hals im gelben Erntelicht

Mein Herz steht bis zum Hals in gelbem Erntelicht wie
unter Sommerhimmeln schnittbereites Land.
Bald läutet durch die Ebenen Sichelsang: mein Blut
lauscht tief mit Glück gesättigt in den Mittagsbrand.
Kornkammern meines Lebens, lang verödet, alle eure
Tore sollen nun wie Schleusenflügel offen stehn,
Über euern Grund wird wie Meer die goldne Flut der
Garben gehn.

 

Ernst Stadler (11 augustus 1883 – 30 oktober 1914)
Colmar, de geboorteplaats van Ernst Stadler

 

De Duits-Poolse dichter Martin Piekar werd geboren op 5 augustus 1990 in Bad Soden am Taunus. Zie ook alle tags voor Martin Piekar op dit blog.

 

Ich bin kein ElitePartner

Ich bin kein ElitePartner, wusstest du,
Dass Ameisen Mikrowellenstrahlung sehen
Und überleben. Wenn ich dich
Zerstückelte und in die Mikrowelle steckte
Würdest du es nicht ausnutzen
Mir an die Wäsche zu gehen? Ich bin
Derart prätentiös unelitär, dass ich gerne
Saufe und Freunden dann sage, wie sehr
Ich sie liebe. Ich streite gern, auch nüchtern.
Ich will am Valentinstag zurückgelassen
Dieses Gedicht schreiben und mich
Ungeliebt fühlen. Ich baue nämlich nicht
Auf die Zukunft. Ich trage schwarz und nur.
Ich trage es ästhetisch und nur. Am besten
Trägst du es auch und nur, weil es dir gefällt.
Du sollst mir nicht gefallen, gefalle mir.
Wenn du einen Mann vergewaltigtst, dann
Ausdrücklich und lang, er könnte ein
Potential Rapist sein. Besser ist es.
Denn wenn wir Hobbys tauschen, hast du
Mir am besten eins verschwiegen, behalts
Für dich. Beziehungsstatus sollst du nicht
Teilen, du sollst ihn leiden. Leide mit mir
Einen. Verkupplung ist nur die Ausrede,
Wenn man nicht mehr voneinander loskommt.
Für Trotzficken hab ich keine Zeit übrig.
Wer will schon Krötenlecken statt
Der Partnerin. Und im Horoskop finde ich nur
Weitere Gründe gegen Online-Dating.
Wenn ich meine Ängste teile, möchte ich
Das du dich mit mir fürchtest.
Autophobie: die Angst alleine
Auf sich selbst gestellt zu sein. Liebe ist eine.
Die Wahrheit ist immer eine andere.
  

Martin Piekar (Bad Soden am Taunus, 5 augustus 1990)

 

De Duitse schrijver Gunter Haug werd geboren op 5 augustus 1955 in Stuttgart. Zie ook alle tags voor Gunter Hauch op dit blog.

Uit: Niemands Mutter

„Kam es von der Anstrengung, weil sie die steilen Stufen so rasch hinauf gehastet war oder war es auf diese unheilvolle Vorahnung zurückzuführen, die sich mit Eiseskälte in ihrem Gehirn immer weiter ausbreitete? Das Geräusch von Annas Schritten, die ihr gefolgt nur, schreckte sie aus den düsteren Gedankengängen. Luise hob ihre rechte Hand und klopfte mit dem Zeigefinger zaghaft an die nur angelehnte Tür, die sich dadurch einen Spalt weit öffnete. „Hallo Barbara, darf ich reinkommen?” Vorsichtig spähte sie in die Kammer hinein, nachdem von Barbara noch immer nichts zu hören war. Totenstille herrschte in dem engen Raum. Totenstille? Sie spürte, wie ihr eine Gänsehaut über den Rücken lief. Totenstille! Umso mehr zuckte die Wirtin Sekundenbruchteile später erschrocken zusammen, als urplötzlich eine Stimme hinter der Tür ertönte. „Du Mama! Die Tante spricht heute überhaupt nicht mit mir!” Es war die Stimme von Johann, ihrem sechsjährigen Sohn, der mit ausgestrecktem Arm auf das größere der beiden Betten deutete, die die enge Kammer nahezu vollständig ausfüllten. Barbara! Es schien ihr, als sei der Boden unter ihren Füßen ins Wanken geraten. Genau dasselbe Gefühl wie damals, an jenem unseligen Tag, an dem sie ihre Schwiegermutter Margareta Klee, die sie so sehr ins Herz geschlossen hatte, leblos zurück zum „Goldenen Adler” gebracht hatten. Tod! Entsetzt schlug sie bei dem Anblick die Hände vor den Mund. Aschfahl und regungslos lag Barbara in ihrem Bett. Kein Atemzug drang aus ihrer Kehle, die weit aufgerissenen Augen starrten blicklos zur Decke. Barbara Reinguber war tot — irgendwann in der vergangenen Nacht war sie gestorben, ohne dass dies jemand bemerkt hatte! Wie es immer schon ihre Art war. Dieser bittere Gedanke schoss Luise durch den Kopf, während dicke Tränen über ihre Wangen rollten. Lautlos, unauffällig, gerade so, als sei sie praktisch gar nicht vorhanden. So hatten es eigentlich alle während der vergangenen drei Jahrzehnte empfunden, in denen die Barbara als Dienstmagd im „Goldenen Adler” tätig gewesen war. Und genauso war sie nun auch gegangen! „Was ist denn jetzt mit der Tante?”, meldete sich die ungeduldige Kinderstimme von Johann lautstark zu Wort und riss Luise abrupt aus ihrer Trauer. „Und wieso starrt sie denn die ganze Zeit an die Decke, ohne etwas zu sagen? Weißt du denn, was das für ein Spiel ist, Anna?” Die Erwähnung von Annas Namen löste die Erstarrung bei der Gastwirtin. Das Kind! Was sollte sie dem Mädchen jetzt nur sagen? Der Vater verschwunden, die Mutter gestorben! Also war Anna sozusagen Vollwaise — und das im Alter von sieben Jahren! Aber sie musste etwas sagen! Irgendetwas! Luise biss sich auf die Lippen, während sie fieberhaft nach den richtigen Worten suchte. Dann wandte sie sich langsam um und suchte den Blick ihrer Nichte, die neugierig hinter ihr an der Türe stand und genauso wie Johann auf eine Antwort wartete.“

Gunter Haug (Stuttgart, 5 augustus 1955)


De Amerikaanse schrijver Richard Preston werd geboren op 5 augustus 1954 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Zie ook alle tags voor Richard Preston op dit blog.

Uit: The Hot Zone

“The blood comes from both nostrils, a shining, cloudless, arterial liquid that drips over his teeth and chin. This blood keeps running, because the clotting factors have been used up. A flight attendant gives him some paper towels, which he uses to stop up his nose, but the blood still won’t coagulate, and the towels soak through.
When a man is ill in an airline seat next to you, you may not want to embarrass him by calling attention to the problem. You say to yourself that this man will be all right. Maybe he doesn’t travel well in airplanes. He is airsick, the poor man, and people do get nosebleeds in airplanes, the air is so dry and thin … and you ask him, weakly, if there is anything you can do to help. He does not answer, or he mumbles words you can’t understand, so you try to ignore it, but the flight seems to go on forever. Perhaps the flight attendants offer to help him. But victims of this type of hot virus have changes in behavior that can render them incapable of responding to an offer of help. They become hostile, and don’t want to be touched. They don’t want to speak. They answer questions with grunts ormonosyllables. They can’t seem to find words.
They can tell you their name, but they can’t tell you the day of the week or explain what has happened to them.
The Friendship drones through the clouds, following the length of the Rift Valley, and Monet slumps back in the seat, and now he seems to be dozing.
… Perhaps some of the passengers wonder if he is dead. No, no, he is not dead. He is moving. His red eyes are open and moving around a little bit.
It is late afternoon, and the sun is falling down into the hills to the west of the Rift Valley, throwing blades of light in all directions, as if the sun is cracking up on the equator. The Friendship makes a gentle turn and crosses the eastern scarp of the Rift.”

Richard Preston (Cambridge, 5 augustus 1954)

 

Zie voor de schrijvers van de 5e augustus ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2016 deel 1 en deel 2.

Dolce far niente, Joost Baars, Martin Piekar, Gunter Haug, Richard Preston

Dolce far niente

 

Flevopolder: Exposure door Antony Gormley, 2010

 

Ach, ganzen van de flevopolder

ach, ganzen van de flevopolder,
wat maakt het jullie uit,

dat onderscheid tussen natuur en cultuur?
jullie strijken neer waar water en ruimte is,

wanen je in het gakken onbespied door hen
die in metalen lichamen over de dijk voorbijrazen

(wat is in ganzenoren dat razen trouwens anders
dan ook een soort van gakken?)

jullie vliegen op ten zuiden van europa
waar menselijker wezens dat verboden is

en steken door de lucht het water over
waarin veel van hen ten onder gaan

jullie bereiken niet een land, maar land,
belanden niet maar landen,

jullie onbeperkte welkom komt van de aarde
en gaat ons niet aan,

wij die niet van de aarde zijn
en daarom de aarde willen bezitten.

ik ben op weg om mijn geleende metalen lichaam
aan zijn bezitter terug te geven,

met een gevulde tank
en met een lege portemonnee,

maar wat kan jullie dat schelen,
jullie economieloze wezens

met jullie grenzeloze gaan?

 

Joost Baars (Leidschendam, 2 oktober 1975)
Leidschendam, de geboorteplaats van Joost Baars

 

De Duits-Poolse dichter Martin Piekar werd geboren op 5 augustus 1990 in Bad Soden am Taunus. Zie ook alle tags voor Martin Piekar op dit blog.

CyberschlafStörung

Lass den Ghost in der Shell
Er muss brüten
Vom Mond im Jupiter im Livestream
Eines Nichtschlafs,
Denn
mich flieht der Schlaf
Durch die Nacht
Chat ich mich
Wenn du eine Revolution willst
Bestell sie über Amazon Prime
Gesicherter Versandt verringert Risiken
In gestörter Einsamkeit
Zieh ich meinen besten Schlafanzug an
Dustern gezwungen zu wachen
Ich halte Dunkel nicht träumend aus
Share me, share me, share me with you applephone
Und lass uns Doppelgänger tauschen
Per Zufall sind wie Foetalisten
Und hüpfen von USB
Zu USB-Port zu wälzen hilft
Nicht einer Ruhe beizuwohnen
Ich habe den Anschluss an Schlaf verloren
Und Versuche durch alte Tags
Wer die Langeweile sucht
Bleibt ungefunden
Du kannst nicht einfach
Deinen Beziehungsstatus ändern ohne
Dich zu ändern
Ich hab ne Buchempfehlung für dich
Schreib eins
Trommle ein paar Server ab und
Finde mein Leiden immer wieder
Scheißreziprozität des Netzes
Ich brauche einen Kollaps
Ich ghoste keinen SleepStream
Ich puste die WifiVerbindung aus
Und wünsch mir was

Martin Piekar (Bad Soden am Taunus, 5 augustus 1990)


De Duitse schrijver Gunter Haug werd geboren op 5 augustus 1955 in Stuttgart. Zie ook alle tags voor Gunter Hauch op dit blog.

Uit:Margrets Schwester

„Johanna Magdalena Friedrich ist am 3. August 1829 in Treschklingen bei Rappenau auf die Welt gekommen. Im Dorf kannte man die Kleine als ein fröhliches Mädchen. Denn obwohl sie in recht ärm­liche Verhältnisse hineingeboren worden war, fühlte sich Johanna auf eine unbestimmte Art und Weise unbeschwert, geborgen und zufrieden. So ein Kind spürt die Armut ja meistens nicht, vor allem dann nicht, wenn es bei den anderen Familien im Dorf genauso kärglich und bescheiden zugeht, wie zuhause. Und genau so war es in Treschklingen. Bei allen: bei den Tagelöhnern, den Kleinbauern, den herrschaftlichen Angestellten auf dem Gutshof, den Arbeitern und den Straßenwarten – sogar bei den Handwerkern. Die einzige Ausnahme bildeten die beiden Gastwirte und natürlich der Rittergutsbesitzer. Sie seien arme, aber glückliche Leute gewesen – so würde Johanna später einmal über ihre frühe Kindheit erzählen. Und dass sie der ganze Stolz ihrer Mutter gewesen sei, mit ihren dunklen, fast schwarzen, glänzenden Haaren und ihrer dunklen Hautfarbe, die in einem scharfen Kontrast zu Johannas wasserblauen Augen stand. »Die hast du von deinem Vater geerbt«, murmelte die Mutter manchmal lächelnd, wenn sie ihrer Tochter die Haare wieder zu zwei großen Zöpfen flocht, die dem Mädchen bis zu den Schultern herunter reichten. Auf ihre anschließende Frage, wer denn eigentlich ihr Vater sei, erhielt sie freilich niemals eine Antwort. Die Mutter pflegte darauf grundsätzlich nur leicht den Kopf zu schütteln, während sie den Zeigefinger der rechten Hand behutsam vor ihre geschlossenen Lippen führte.
Natürlich konnte Johanna im Vorübergehen ab und an aufschnappen, wie sich manche hinter vorgehaltener Hand spöttische Bemerkungen über »die Zustände« im Haus des Kleinbauern Christoph Friedrich ins Ohr tuschelten, aber das brauchte sie nicht weiter zu bekümmern – schließlich gab es ohnehin kaum eine Familie, die von der üblichen Tratscherei der dorfbekannten Lästermäuler verschont geblieben wäre.
Dennoch war ihr bald klar geworden, worauf die Schwätzer abzielten: auf diese ihrer Meinung nach seltsamen, wenn nicht sogar unziemlichen Familienverhältnisse im Haushalt der Friedrichs. Na und? Sollten sie sich ruhig weiter das Maul darüber zerreißen, dass Johannas Mutter auch nach der Geburt ihrer beiden unehelichen Kinder noch zusammen mit ihren drei jüngsten Geschwistern Maria, Georg und Elisabeth unter dem Dach des Vaters lebte.“

Gunter Haug (Stuttgart, 5 augustus 1955)


De Amerikaanse schrijver Richard Preston werd geboren op 5 augustus 1954 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Zie ook alle tags voor Richard Preston op dit blog.

Uit:The Hot Zone

« When a hot virus multiplies in a host, it can saturate the body with virus particles, from the brain to the skin. The military experts then say that the virus has undergone “extreme amplification.” This is not something like the common cold. By the time an extreme amplification peaks out, an eyedropper of the victim’s blood may contain a hundred million particles. In other words, the host is possessed by a life form that is attempting to convert the host into itself. The transformation is not entirely successful, however, and the end result is a great deal of liquefying flesh mixed with virus, a kind of biological accident. Extreme amplification has occurred in Monet, and the sign of it is the black vomit.
He appears to be holding himself rigid, as if any movement would rupture something inside him. His blood is clotting up and his bloodstream is throwing clots, and the clots are lodging everywhere. His liver, kidneys, lungs, hands, feet, and head are becoming jammed with blood clots. In effect, he is having a stroke through the whole body. Clots are accumulating in his intestinal muscles, cutting off the blood supply to his intestines. The intestinal muscles are beginning to die, and the intestines are starting to go slack. He doesn’t seem to be fully aware of pain any longer because the blood clots lodged in his brain are cutting off blood flow. His personality is being wiped away by brain damage. This is called depersonalization, in which the liveliness and details of character seem to vanish. He is becoming an automaton. Tiny spots in his brain are liquefying. The higher functions of consciousness are winking out first, leaving the deeper parts of the brain stem (the primitive rat brain, the lizard brain) still alive and functioning. It could be said that the who of Charles Monet has already died while the what of Charles Monet continues to live.
The vomiting attack appears to have broken some blood vessels in his nose and he gets a nosebleed.”

Richard Preston (Cambridge, 5 augustus 1954)


Zie voor de schrijvers van de 5e augustus ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2016 deel 1 en deel 2.

Richard Preston, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, Sergio Ramírez

De Amerikaanse schrijver Richard Preston werd geboren op 5 augustus 1954 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2010 en eveneens alle tags voor Richard Preston op dit blog.

Uit: First Light

“There was a lull while the astronomers stared at the screen in silence. Juan Carrasco pulled one of several notebooks from his box of marinated jalapenos and made some notes in it. He felt that the only way to begin to guess what was going on inside the Big Eye was to keep track of its vital signs. He felt that the big Eye had its good nights and its bad nights. On the first day that he had reported to work on Palomar Mountain, he had written on the cover of an empty green notebook: “Love and Ambition are the wings to success. 1969.”
He had been afraid that he would fail—that he would crash the telescope. His old fear still touched him once in a while. He tried not to think too hard about the glass giant, moving out there in the darkness. The green notebook showed signs of much use. He had had to repair it with packing tape, Palomar glue.
Other notebooks had followed the green notebook. While at first he had stuck to critical information (“astronomers’ favorite radio station: KFAC 92.3 on the dial”), he had also wondered: “What happened at the moment of creation? How did the stars and galaxies come into being? How will the universe end?”—jotting questions for Jim Gunn, hoping that Gunn could answer them. Gunn, however, had been working fiendishly for most of his life to answer these very same questions, without ever attaining satisfactory answers, because (Juan noted) “What we have here is a fundamental problem.”
On a shelf within easy reach, Juan placed a tattered dictionary, and when he heard a savory word, he looked it up to get the nuances. Some of the astronomers seemed to forget that the night assistant was taking notes. When they spoke of their fellow astronomers, he recorded what he had heard:
Goon—a man hired to terrorize or intimidate opponents
Yokel—a rude, naïve, or gullible inhabitant of a rural area or small town
Jargon—unintelligible language or words
Grandiose Conclusion
When the astronomers saw something spectacular on the video screens, he made a note of it for posterity: “Supernova!!!”

 
Richard Preston (Cambridge, 5 augustus 1954)

Lees verder “Richard Preston, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, Sergio Ramírez”

Dolce far niente, Frouke Arns, Richard Preston, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, René Puthaar

Dolce far niente

 

 
Gezicht op Nijmegen vanaf Lent door Eugène Lücker, 1933

 

Liefdesliedje voor Nimma

Wij waren het eindpunt genaderd, maar hadden het niet gemerkt
jouw lichaam was tegen mij aan in slaap gevallen
en ik weet nog dat ik aan Doornroosje dacht
vlak voordat ook ik vertrok.

Op de spoorbrug schrik ik wakker. Geratel en een stem.
Ik versta bestemming en of we niets vergeten willen.
De Waal buigt zich als een aanzoek langs de kade,
en de stad houdt het antwoord voor zichzelf.

Iemand vouwt zijn krant tot hoed tot boot tot vogel
en vliegt op. Wij stappen uit. Slaapdronken nog
gapen we de maan in onze mond. Een late man
speelt piano op het perron. Weer thuis,

weer terug. Hoe waar dat ik je zo vaak verliet,
maar je nooit verlaten kon. Het geeft niet
dat ik een van velen ben. Het is genoeg
je kalme hart te voelen kloppen aan mijn rug.

 
Frouke Arns (Handorf, 1964)
Frouke Arns is momenteel stadsdichter van Nijmegen

Lees verder “Dolce far niente, Frouke Arns, Richard Preston, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, René Puthaar”

Dolce far niente, Marijke Hanegraaf, Richard Preston, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, René Puthaar

Dolce far niente

 

 
De Oversteek, Nijmegen

 

Oversteken

Opnieuw heerste in de uiterwaard het rusteloze
van stervelingen

maar ze droegen andere helmen, blauwe en gele
hoog op het hoofd als uitgelaten petten.

We trachtten de verre bewegingen te doorgronden
verzochten de rivier dringend zich te gedragen en
keer op keer dachten we terug aan de geniesoldaat

hoe hij een canvas boot over het blote water joeg
die woensdag om vijftien uur in ’44.

Achteraf kunnen we hem en zijn kameraden
minuten stilte geven, maar nooit meer
de beloofde nacht, het tamelijk veilig duister.

De boog is gehesen, de koelte van beton bewaakt.
We zagen ginds het roerloze van pijlers groeien

beschouwden lang genoeg de overkant als overkant.
Er ligt een brug die het voorbijgaan draagt.

 


Marijke Hanegraaf (Tilburg, 6 maart 1946)

Lees verder “Dolce far niente, Marijke Hanegraaf, Richard Preston, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, René Puthaar”

Richard Preston, Sergio Ramírez, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, Guy de Maupassant

De Amerikaanse schrijver Richard Preston werd geboren op 5 augustus 1954 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2010 en eveneens alle tags voor Richard Preston op dit blog.

Uit: The Hot Zone

„The doctors thought he should go to Nairobi Hospital, which is the best private hospital in East Africa. The telephone system hardly worked, and it did not seem worth the effort to call any doctors to tell them that he was coming. He could still walk, and he seemed able to travel by himself. He had money; he understood he had to get to Nairobi. They put him in a taxi to the airport, and he boarded a Kenya Airways flight.

A hot virus from the rain forest lives within a twenty-four hour plane flight from every city on earth. All of the earth’s cities are connected by a web of airline routes. The web is a network. Once a virus hits the net, it can shoot anywhere in a day æParis, Tokyo, New York, Los Angeles, wherever planes fly. Charles Monet and the life form inside him had entered the net.

The plane was a Fokker Friendship with propellers, a commuter aircraft that seats thirty-five people. It started its engines and took off over Lake Victoria, blue and sparkling, dotted with the dugout canoes of fishermen. The Friendship turned and banked eastward, climbing over green hills quilted with tea plantations and small farms. The commuter flights that drone across Africa are often jammed with people, and this flight was probably full. The plane climbed over belts of forest and clusters of round huts and villages with tin roofs. The land suddenly dropped away, going down in shelves and ravines, and changed in color from green to brown. The plane was crossing the Eastern rift valley. The passengers looked out the windows at the place where the human species was born. They say specks of huts clustered inside circles of thornbush, with cattle trails radiating from the huts. The propellers moaned, and the friendship passed through cloud streets, lines of puffy rift clouds, and began to bounce and sway. Monet became airsick.“

 

Richard Preston (Cambridge, 5 augustus 1954)

Lees verder “Richard Preston, Sergio Ramírez, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, Guy de Maupassant”

Richard Preston, Sergio Ramírez, Conrad Aiken, Gunter Haug

De Amerikaanse schrijver Richard Preston werd geboren op 5 augustus 1954 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007 en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2008 en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2009 en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2010.

 

Uit: The Wild Trees

 

“Steve Sillett had feathery light-brown hair, which hung out from under a sky-blue bandanna that he wore tied around his head like a cap. He had flaring shoulders, and his eyes were dark brown and watchful, and were set deep in a square face. The Sillett brothers stood shoulder to shoulder, looking at the birds. Their bodies were outlined against decks of autumn rollers coming in, giving off a continual roar. Scott handed the binoculars to his younger brother, and their hands touched for an instant. The Sillett brothers’ hands had the same appearance-fine and sensitive-looking, with deft movements.

Scott turned to Marwood: “Marty, I think your car should be called the Blue Vinyl Crypt. That’s what it will turn into if we fall off a cliff or get swiped by a logging truck.”

“Dude, you’re going to get us into a crash that will be biblical in its horror,” Steve said to Marwood. “You need to let Scott drive.” (Steve didn’t know how to drive a car.)

Marwood didn’t want Scott’s help with the driving. “It’s a very idiosyncratic car,” he explained to the Sillett brothers. In theory, he fixed his car himself. In practice, he worried about it. Lately he had noticed that the engine had begun to give off a clattering sound, like a sewing machine. He had also become aware of an ominous smell coming from under the hood, something that resembled the smell of an empty iron skillet left forgotten on a hot stove. As Marwood contemplated these phenomena and pondered their significance, he wondered if his car needed an oil change. He was pretty sure that the oil had been changed about two years ago, in Alaska, around the time the license plates had expired. The car had been driven twenty thousand miles since then, unregistered, uninsured, and unmaintained, strictly off the legal and mechanical grids. “I’m worried you’ll screw it up,” he said to Scott.

Steve handed the binoculars to his brother and climbed into the back of the Blue Vinyl Crypt. “Dudes, let’s go,” he said. “We need to see some tall redwoods.”

 

 

 

Richard Preston (Cambridge, 5 augustus 1954)

Bewaren

Lees verder “Richard Preston, Sergio Ramírez, Conrad Aiken, Gunter Haug”

Richard Preston, Sergio Ramírez, Conrad Aiken, Gunter Haug, Wendell Berry, Guy de Maupassant, Ron Silliman, Christian Wagner

Zie voor de volgende schrijvers van de 5e augustus mijn blog bij seniorennet.be

  

Richard Preston, Sergio Ramírez, Conrad Aiken, Gunter Haug

 

 

Zie voor de volgende schrijvers van de 5e augustus ook bij seniorennet.be ook mijn vorige blog van vandaag. 

 

 Wendell Berry, Guy de Maupassant, Ron Silliman, Christian Wagner

Richard Preston, Sergio Ramírez, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, Guy de Maupassant, Ron Silliman, Christian Wagner

De Amerikaanse schrijver Richard Preston werd geboren op 5 augustus 1954 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007 en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2008.

Uit: The Demon In The Freezer

 

In the early nineteen seventies, a British photo retoucher named Robert Stevens arrived in south Florida to take a job at the National Enquirer, which is published in Palm Beach County. At the time, photo retouchers for supermarket tabloids used an airbrush (nowadays they use computers) to clarify news photographs of world leaders shaking hands with aliens or to give more punch to pictures of six-month-old babies who weigh three hundred pounds. Stevens was reputed to be one of the best photo retouchers in the business. The Enquirer was moving away from stories like “I Ate My Mother-in-Law’s Head,” and the editors recruited him to bring some class to the paper. They offered him much more than he made working for tabloids in Britain.
Stevens was in his early thirties when he moved to Florida. He bought a red Chevy pickup truck, and he put a CB radio in it and pasted an American-flag decal in the back window and installed a gun rack next to the flag. He didn’t own a gun: the gun rack was for his fishing rods. Stevens spent a lot of time at lakes and canals around south Florida, where he would spin-cast for bass and panfish. He often stopped to drop a line in the water on his way to and from work. He became an American citizen. He would drink a Guinness or two in bars with his friends and explain the Constitution to them. “Bobby was the only English redneck I ever knew,” Tom Wilbur, one of his best friends, said to me.
Stevens’s best work tended to get the Enquirer sued. When the TV star Freddie Prinze shot himself to death, Stevens joined two photographs into a seamless image of Prinze and Raquel Welch at a party together. The implication was that they had been lovers, and this sparked a lawsuit. He enhanced a photograph of a woman with a long neck: “Giraffe Woman.” Giraffe Woman sued.”

 

Preston

Richard Preston (Cambridge, 5 augustus 1954)

 

De Nicaraguaanse schrijver en politicus.Sergio Ramírez Mercado werd geboren in Masatepe op 5 augustus 1942. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007 en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2008.

 

Uit: A Thousand Deaths Plus One (Vertaald door Leland H. Chambers)

 

“Darkness had now fallen and I was obliged to move closer to the fluorescent tube installed under the bookstall’s eaves, when I discovered a snapshot of a nude which was not feminine in the least, and which was the Before to the Afterward of the cover photograph that showed Turgenev’s body on his bed at Les Frênes. One explained the other, and their relevance was mutual. At the foot of this other one was this description: The Russian writer Ivan Turgenev after being embalmed (flexible negative treated with gelatin).

The body rests on what looks like a joiner’s work bench, enveloped in a troubled light that comes from a clerestory window above. This doesn’t look like the dissection room of a hospital but rather one of the shed-like service buildings at Les Frênes, a stable perhaps, or an equipment room, with stucco walls blackened by candle smoke. There is a pail at the foot of the bench that might be used for milking, or might be there to receive the viscera from the cadaver. But that isn’t all. At one side, barely offering her profile to the camera, Pauline García-Viardot is staring at the body with religious fervor, her shoulders thrown forward—don’t forget that Ernesta Grisi found consolation in calling her “the hunchback”—and dressed severely in mourning, with a veil thrown over her face.

This is a furtive visit by Pauline to that shed after the embalmer has finished his work, as furtive as the presence of the photographer, who took the snapshot from outside, through the window. He would have been carrying his brass suitcases full of equipment along the path among the ash trees and had sat down on one of them to rest near the shed when his attention was caught by the banging of the shutters loose in the wind, and he looked in. There was Turgenev, naked on the workbench, and Pauline in her pose of motionless contemplation. He hastened to get his portable camera out of its bag, took the picture while scarcely poking his head in, and disappeared immediately from the window frame, fearful of having been betrayed by the sound of the camera’s shutter. Then he went on his way carrying his equipment cases toward the dacha to wait there for the body, now dressed, to be moved to the bed, and to go ahead with fulfilling the assignment from the Revue des Deux Mondes that had brought him to Les Frênes.”

 

sergio-ramirez

Sergio Ramírez (Masatepe, 5 augustus 1942)

 

De Amerikaanse schrijver en dichter Conrad Potter Aiken werd geboren in Savannah, Georgia op 5 augustus 1889. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007 en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2008.

 

Red is the color of blood

 

Red is the color of blood, and I will seek it:

I have sought it in the grass.

It is the color of steep sun seen through eyelids.

 

It is hidden under the suave flesh of women–

Flows there, quietly flows.

It mounts from the heart to the temples, the singing mouth–

As cold sap climbs to the rose.

I am confused in webs and knots of scarlet

Spun from the darkness;

Or shuttled from the mouths of thirsty spiders.

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Madness for red! I devour the leaves of autumn.

I tire of the green of the world.

I am myself a mouth for blood …

 

Here, in the golden haze of the late slant sun,

Let us walk, with the light in our eyes,

To a single bench from the outset predetermined.

Look: there are seagulls in these city skies,

Kindled against the blue.

But I do not think of the seagulls, I think of you.

 

Your eyes, with the late sun in them,

Are like blue pools dazzled with yellow petals.

This pale green suits them well.

 

Here is your finger, with an emerald on it:

The one I gave you. I say these things politely–

But what I think beneath them, who can tell?

 

For I think of you, crumpled against a whiteness;

Flayed and torn, with a dulled face.

I think of you, writing, a thing of scarlet,

And myself, rising red from that embrace.

 

November sun is sunlight poured through honey:

Old things, in such a light, grow subtle and fine.

Bare oaks are like still fire.

Talk to me: now we drink the evening’s wine.

Look, how our shadows creep along the grave!–

And this way, how the gravel begins to shine!

 

This is the time of day for recollections,

For sentimental regrets, oblique allusions,

Rose-leaves, shrivelled in a musty jar.

Scatter them to the wind! There are tempests coming.

It is dark, with a windy star.

 

If human mouths were really roses, my dear,–

(Why must we link things so?–)

I would tear yours petal by petal with slow murder.

I would pluck the stamens, the pistils,

The gold and the green,–

Spreading the subtle sweetness that was your breath

On a cold wave of death….

 

Now let us walk back, slowly, as we came.

We will light the room with candles; they may shine

Like rows of yellow eyes.

Your hair is like spun fire, by candle-flame.

You smile at me–say nothing. You are wise.

 

For I think of you, flung down brutal darkness;

Crushed and red, with pale face.

I think of you, with your hair disordered and dripping.

And myself, rising red from that embrace.

 

 

Aiken

Conrad Aiken (5 augustus 1889 – 17 augustus 1973)

 

 De Amerikaanse dichter, schrijver, essayist en criticus Wendell Berry werd geboren op 5 augustus 1934 in Henry County, Kentucky. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007  en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2008.

 

 

The peace of wild things

 When despair grows in me
and I wake in the middle of
the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

 

 

A Meeting

 

In a dream I meet

my dead friend. He has,

I know, gone long and far,

and yet he is the same

for the dead are changeless.

They grow no older.

It is I who have changed,

grown strange to what I was.

Yet I, the changed one,

ask: “How you been?”

He grins and looks at me.

“I been eating peaches

off some mighty fine trees.”

 

berry

Wendell Berry (Henry County, 5 augustus 1934)

 

De Franse schrijver Guy de Maupassant is geboren op 5 augustus 1850 in kasteel Miromesnil bij Dieppe. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2006 en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007  en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2008.

 

Uit: Le Horla

 

“12 mai. – J’ai un peu de fièvre depuis quelques jours ; je me sens souffrant, ou plutôt je me sens triste.
D’où viennent ces influences mystérieuses qui changent en découragement notre bonheur et notre confiance en détresse ? On dirait que l’air, l’air invisible est plein d’inconnaissables Puissances, dont nous subissons les voisinages mystérieux. Je m’éveille plein de gaieté, avec des envies de chanter dans la gorge. – Pourquoi ? – Je descends le long de l’eau ; et soudain, après une courte promenade, je rentre désolé, comme si quelque malheur m’attendait chez moi. – Pourquoi ? – Est-ce un frisson de froid qui, frôlant ma peau, a ébranlé mes nerfs et assombri mon âme ? Est-ce la forme des nuages, ou la couleur du jour, la couleur des choses, si variable, qui, passant par mes yeux, a troublé ma pensée ? Sait-on ? Tout ce qui nous entoure, tout ce que nous voyons sans le regarder, tout ce que nous frôlons sans le connaître, tout ce que nous touchons sans le palper, tout ce que nous rencontrons sans le distinguer, a sur nous, sur nos organes et, par eux, sur nos idées, sur notre cœur lui-même, des effets rapides, surprenants et inexplicables.
Comme il est profond, ce mystère de l’Invisible ! Nous ne le pouvons sonder avec nos sens misérables, avec nos yeux qui ne savent apercevoir ni le trop petit, ni le trop grand, ni le trop près, ni le trop loin, ni les habitants d’une étoile, ni les habitants d’une goutte d’eau… avec nos oreilles qui nous trompent, car elles nous transmettent les vibrations de l’air en notes sonores. Elles sont des fées qui font ce miracle de changer en bruit ce mouvement et par cette métamorphose donnent naissance à la musique, qui rend chantante l’agitation muette de la nature… avec notre odorat, plus faible que celui du chien… avec notre goût, qui peut à peine discerner l’âge d’un vin ! »

 

Guy-De-Maupassant-1850

Guy de Maupassant (5 augustus 1850 – 6 juli 1893)
Portret door François Nicolas Augustin

 

De Amerikaanse dichter Ron Silliman werd geboren op 5 augustus 1946 in Pasco, Washington. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007 en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2008.

 

 

the nose of kim darby’s double (Fragment)

 

Canyons, paths
dug thru the snow
Tunnels
the walls as high as
shoulders
The weight of it
heavier
when it begins to melt
& then, at sunset
still midafternoon
the temperature drops
wind over the ridge
so that by dawn
each surface
hardens into ice

Dams clog the drains
to turn the window
facing north
into a waterfall . . .

Driving north
past the mall turn, King
of Prussia, past Bridgeport
and the narrow brick streets of Norr’stown
the road eases up, what
was once country
into a more purely rural
suburbiana (golf course
blanketed in white

A gas station that has not yet
turned into a minmart

Swath cut
by the powerlines
right thru the old quarry, the pit
filled with water
is called a lake, each
new townhouse with its private dock
tho if you look upstairs
you will discover the doors to the closets
all made of vinyl

Someone in another room is singing the alphabet

Barely visible in the high slush
fog mixed with rain
a woman waits for her bus

 

Silliman

Ron Silliman (Pasco, 5 augustus 1946)

 

Zie voor onderstaande schrijver ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007.

De Duitse dichter en schrijver Christian Wagner werd geboren op 5 augustus 1835 in Warmbronn.

Richard Preston, Sergio Ramírez, Conrad Aiken, Wendell Berry, Guy de Maupassant, Ron Silliman, Christian Wagner

De Amerikaanse schrijver Richard Preston werd geboren op 5 augustus 1954 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007.

Uit: The Hot Zone

„The headache begins, typically, on the seventh day after exposure to the agent. On the seventh day after his New Year’s visit to Kitum cave-January 8, 1980-Monet felt a throbbing pain behind his eyeballs. He decided to stay home from work and went to bed in his bungalow. The headache grew worse. His eyeballs ached, and then his temples began to ache, the pain seeming to circle around inside his head. It would not go away with aspirin, and then he got a severe backache. His housekeeper, Johnnie, was still on her Christmas vacation, and he had recently hired a temporary housekeeper. She tried to take care of him, but she really didn’t know what to do. Then, on the third day after his headache started, he became nauseated, spiked a fever, and began to vomit. His vomiting grew intense and turned into dry heaves. At the same time, he became strangely passive. His face lost all appearance of life and set itself into an expressionless mask, with the eyeballs fixed, paralytic, and staring. The eyelids were slightly droopy, which gave him a peculiar appearance, as if his eyes were popping out of his head and half closed at the same time. The eyeballs themselves seemed almost frozen in their sockets, and they turned bright red. The skin of his face turned yellowish, with a brilliant starlike red speckles. He began to look like a zombie. His appearance frightened the temporary housekeeper. She didn’t understand the transformation in this man. His personality changed. He became sullen, resentful, angry, and his memory seemed to be blown away. He was not delirious. He could answer questions, although he didn’t seem to know exactly where he was.

When Monet failed to show up for work, his colleagues began to wonder about him, and eventually they went to his bungalow to see if he was all right. The black-and-white crow sat on the roof and watched them as they went inside. They looked at Monet and decided that he needed to get to a hospital. Since he was very unwell and no longer able to drive a car, one of his co-workers drove him to a private hospital in the city of Kisumu, on the shore of Lake Victoria. The doctors at the hospital examined Monet, and could not come up with any explanation for what had happened to his eyes or his face or his mind. Thinking that he might have some kind of bacterial infection, they gave him injections of antibiotics, but the antibiotics had no effect on his illness..”

 

preston

Richard Preston (Cambridge, 5 augustus 1954)

 

 

De Nicaraguaanse schrijver en politicus.Sergio Ramírez Mercado werd geboren in Masatepe op 5 augustus 1942. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007.

 

Uit: Adios Muchachos (Vertaald door Mark Falcoff)

 

“Doctor Emilio Alvarez Montalván, Nicaragua’s most respected conservative ideologue, once said—when we had already been defeated in the 1990 elections—that Sandinismo had brought to Nicaraguan political culture for the very first time a sense of responsibility towards the poor.

This is, in truth, one of the irreversible legacies of the Revolution, beyond the ideological illusions that confused us at the time, beyond, too, of the bureaucratic excesses and deficiencies of Marxism in practice, beyond the inexperience and the improvisations, the poses, the cheap imitations, the rhetoric. The poor continued to be the humanist frame of references of the project that came apart, piece by piece, on the road—from the catacombs and proscription to the loss of power and an ethical catastrophe, a subterranean impulse, or one perpetually postponed, but never fully extinguished.

In identifying itself with the poor, the Revolution was radical in the purest sense of the term, and under the rubric of a search for justice, capable of being repeatedly naïve or arbitrary, many times losing a proper perspective of what was possible, or even what was just and desirable. What is just and desirable should, in fact, confront reality, and in that very sphere of reality we find economics. Nicaragua’s economic system suffered from obsolescence, and required changes. But it also represented the texture of social relations built up over centuries of tradition. It was precisely there, in fact, where we faced our greatest resistance to needed change—a resistance that we did not take seriously as we should because we believed that merely by ending poverty all Nicaragua’s traditional beliefs would disappear.

The image that dominated our imaginations was that of people with nothing to lose, the wretched of the earth represented by Leonel Rugama in his poems. The miners of Siuna terminally afflicted with silicosis; the peasants in the valleys of the Jinotega mountains, who did not have salt; or in the lost canyons of Matagalpa where vitamin deficiencies produced night blindness; the day-workers on the banana plantations in Chinandega that slept in kennel-like boxes; or the legions of ragpickers in the dumps of Acahualinca along the sewage canals of Lake Managua—mothers with their children, grandfathers and grandfathers, fighting the buzzards and other scavengers of prey for something to eat.”

 

sergioramirez22[1]

Sergio Ramírez (Masatepe, 5 augustus 1942)

 

 

De Amerikaanse schrijver en dichter Conrad Potter Aiken werd geboren in Savannah, Georgia op 5 augustus 1889. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007.

 

 

EVENSONG

 

I

IN the pale mauve twilight, streaked with orange,

Exquisitely sweet,–

She leaned upon her balcony and looked across the street;

And across the huddled roofs of the misty city,

Across the hills of tenements, so gray,

She looked into the west with a young and infinite pity,

With a young and wistful pity, as if to say

The dark was coming, and irresistible night,

Which man would attempt to meet

With here and there a little flickering light. . . .

The orange faded, the housetops all were black,

And a strange and beautiful quiet

Came unexpected, came exquisitely sweet,

On market-place and street;

And where were lately crowds and sounds and riot

Was a gentle blowing of wind, a murmur of leaves,

A single step, or voice, and under the eaves

The scrambling of sparrows; and then the hush swept back.

 

II

 

She leaned upon her balcony, in the darkness,

Folding her hands beneath her chin;

And watched the lamps begin

Here and there to pierce like eyes the darkness,–

From windows, luminous rooms,

And from the damp dark street

Between the moving branches, and the leaves with rain still sweet.

It was strange: the leaves thus seen,

With the lamplight’s cold bright glare thrown up among them,–

The restless maple leaves,

Twinkling their myriad shadows beneath the eaves,–

Were lovelier, almost, than with sunlight on them,

So bright they were with young translucent green;

Were lovelier, almost, than with moonlight on them. . . .

And looking so wistfully across the city,

With such a young, and wise, and infinite pity

For the girl who had no lover

To walk with her along a street like this,

With slow steps in the rain, both aching for a kiss,–

It seemed as if all evenings were the same,

As if all evenings came

With just such tragic peacefulness as this;

With just such hint of loneliness or pain,

The quiet after rain.

 

III

 

Would her lover, then, grow old sooner than she,

And find a night like this too damp to walk?

Would he prefer to stay indoors and talk,

Or read the evening paper, while she sewed, or darned a sock,

And listened to the ticking of the clock:

Would he prefer it to lamplight on a tree?

Would he be old and tired,

And, having all the comforts he desired,

Take no interest in the twilight coming down

So beautifully and quietly on the town?

Would her lover, then, grow old sooner than she?

 

Aiken

Conrad Aiken (5 augustus 1889 – 17 augustus 1973)

 

 

De Amerikaanse dichter, schrijver, essayist en criticus Wendell Berry werd geboren op 5 augustus 1934 in Henry County, Kentucky. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007.

 

 

The Man Born to Farming

 

The Grower of Trees, the gardener, the man born to farming,
whose hands reach into the ground and sprout
to him the soil is a divine drug. He enters into death
yearly, and comes back rejoicing. He has seen the light lie down
in the dung heap, and rise again in the corn.
His thought passes along the row ends like a mole.
What miraculous seed has he swallowed
That the unending sentence of his love flows out of his mouth
Like a vine clinging in the sunlight, and like water
Descending in the dark?

 

 

Like The Water

 

Like the water
of a deep stream,
love is always too much.
We did not make it.
Though we drink till we burst,
we cannot have it all,
or want it all.
In its abundance
it survives our thirst.

In the evening we come down to the shore
to drink our fill,
and sleep,
while it flows
through the regions of the dark.
It does not hold us,
except we keep returning to its rich waters
thirsty.

We enter,
willing to die,
into the commonwealth of its joy.

 

 

In this World

 

The hill pasture, an open place among the trees,
tilts into the valley. The clovers and tall grasses
are in bloom. Along the foot of the hill
dark floodwater moves down the river.
The sun sets. Ahead of nightfall the birds sing.
I have climbed up to water the horses
and now sit and rest, high on the hillside,
letting the day gather and pass. Below me
cattle graze out across the wide fields of the bottomlands,
slow and preoccupied as stars. In this world
men are making plans, wearing themselves out,
spending their lives, in order to kill each other.

 

Wendell_Berry

Wendell Berry (Henry County, 5 augustus 1934)

 

De Franse schrijver Guy de Maupassant is geboren op 5 augustus 1850 in kasteel Miromesnil bij Dieppe. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2006 en ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007. 

Uit: L’auberge

 

Puis, dès qu’il sommeillait, vaincu par la fatigue, il entendait la voix qui le faisait bondir sur ses pieds.
Une nuit enfin, pareil aux lâches poussés à bout, il se précipita sur la porte et l’ouvrit pour voir celui qui l’appelait et pour le forcer à se taire.
Il reçut en plein visage un souffle d’air froid qui le glaça jusqu’aux os et il referma le battant et poussa les verrous, sans remarquer que Sam s’était élancé dehors. Puis, frémissant, il jeta du bois au feu, et s’assit devant pour se chauffer; mais soudain il tressaillit, quelqu’un grattait le mur en pleurant.
Il cria éperdu: “Va-t’en.” Une plainte lui répondit, longue et douloureuse.
Alors tout ce qui lui restait de raison fut emporté par la terreur. Il répétait: “Va-t’en” en tournant sur lui-même pour trouver un coin où se cacher. L’autre, pleurant toujours, passait le long de la maison en se frottant contre le mur. Ulrich s’élança vers le buffet de chêne plein de vaisselle et de provisions, et, le soulevant avec une force surhumaine, il le traîna jusqu’à la porte, pour s’appuyer d’une barricade. Puis, entassant les uns sur les autres tout ce qui restait de meubles, les matelas, les paillasses, les chaises, il boucha la fenêtre comme on fait lorsqu’un ennemi vous assiège.
Mais celui du dehors poussait maintenant de grands gémissements lugubres auxquels le jeune homme se mit à répondre par des gémissements pareils.
Et des jours et des nuits se passèrent sans qu’ils cessassent de hurler l’un et l’autre. L’un tournait sans cesse autour de la maison et fouillait la muraille de ses ongles avec tant de force qu’il semblait vouloir la démolir; l’autre, au-dedans, suivait tous ses mouvements, courbé, l’oreille collée contre la pierre, et il répondait à tous ses appels par d’épouvantables cris.
Un soir, Ulrich n’entendit plus rien, et il s’assit, tellement brisé de fatigue qu’il s’endormit aussitôt.
Il se réveilla sans un souvenir, sans une pensée, comme si toute sa tête se fût vidée pendant ce sommeil accablé. Il avait faim, il mangea. »

 

maupassant

Guy de Maupassant (5 augustus 1850 – 6 juli 1893)

 

 

De Amerikaanse dichter Ron Silliman werd geboren op 5 augustus 1946 in Pasco, Washington. Zie ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007.

 

Uit: You

 

XXII

Small boy in a seaman’s cap reminds me suddenly of my own such
hat at that age, cap my father left behind. A light fog promises to
burn off. A week between homes.

Voices, verbs, verses (word, bird, third – absurd). Boy’s shout
from the street stories below brings me out of my sleep instantly
until I determine that all my children are here inside asleep. The
absolute second you have the first opportunity in over a week to
relax, to take a deep breath, give a sigh, you realize from its
shallow painful wheeze that you’ve had bronchitis for days. Pesto
potato pizza.

Seek out the path of most resistance.

A splinter I thought would work itself out has instead infected the
whole finger. Dream in which, although I haven’t seen you in ages
and we were never more than cordial in a professional context, I
wake to discover you next to me in bed naked – the actual body is
always such a surprise – leaning toward me for a long, slow,
deliberate kiss, guiding my hand gradually from you small almost
conical breast south until I enter, first the front, then behind, and
you twist, groaning, a broad grin across your face. Day that never
happens.

Day that I discover total allergy to this powder detergent, big
welt-like rashes everywhere from my neck to the soles of my feet.
Cardinal in the yard smaller than I expecte
d. You live on the east
coast now.

When, on the car radio, they hit the baby-in-the-microwave story,
I hit the button. Among the morning’s rich cacophony of birdsong,
pick out first one, then another, that sound completely unfamiliar,
using each in turn as the foreground through which to hear the
whole (nearby crow entirely out of scale). Upstairs, footsteps pace
back and forth, for which I construct my own imaginary narrative:
a young girl, a Latina whose parents, themselves the children of
farm laborers, are schoolteachers, goes on scholarship to an
excellent school, then rises quickly to corporate middle
management, one day to discover her own desire for one of her
employees, an older married man entirely inappropriate for her
future – what should she do? Velcro sandals.

The sky grows lighter before it starts to rain. I stand in an empty
attic studio, wondering where to put the desk. Young poodle
lopes up to the wire fence. Fan rotates slowly over the vacant
kitchen. 

 

Silliman-Ron

Ron Silliman (Pasco, 5 augustus 1946)

 

Zie voor onderstaande schrijver ook mijn blog van 5 augustus 2007.

 

De Duitse dichter en schrijver Christian Wagner werd geboren op 5 augustus 1835 in Warmbronn.