Budapest
1994 –1995
The city is founded on a passionate unreason.
D. H. Lawrence
Your eyes have steeped in mine and now we look alike.
I’m waiting for the moment of your recognition, for your
silence to arrive at my soul. The marching pianos never stop
playing, whiskey’s dripping on the floor in your house.
Some men stared at you last night, and I was looking for
your hand to touch me. I dreamed of you with my eyes open.
Morning came and messages from far, very far away.
The harbinger was shouting your name, it fell out of
his mouth and tumbled down the street to my door.
How you got in I don’t know, but you’re always with me.
1994. 08.02. Tel Aviv
for Paul Klee
A crystal tree in a garden without fence,
a face emerging from pink, a toothless smile.
Clowns gathering on the grass by the open window.
Books on the desk, Japanese flowers and
bottles of ink, a quill. And sunlight.
My home is open, scholars, my room is bright.
My bed smells of sweat from last night’s sex.
And the bird-man flying, his mask is off.
Feathers among sunflowers bending to the East.
Apocrypha and 2000 years. I’m growing.
Let us in while the door’s open, let us see!
The dream of touch we are, let us touch!
Little girl playing with the Sun, the ball
rolling and rolling to the woman of Egypt.
Death will come in fire, walk right through it!
to see through the window brings
an unbearable closeness of people
dressing cooking talking and
hanging clothes all at once
cars passing on moonlit streets
families walking on the promenade
the TV’s on in every apartment
this is our third world poverty hope
and a strange feeling in the stomach
telling us to get out of here well yes
fought the summer in one long battle
and I won. Decay touches the streets, cold
wind sweeps through the streets. We’re shining
in the gold temple, smiling in your house.
This place we will never leave. The scent
of my mother lingers in the vestibule, she’s
ever present here, healed, whole. She’s
nineteen again, dating my father.
How nice! Pure joy it is to see them together.
And soon I will be born (after my brother),
out of love and unity, mutual redemption,
to grow up to be thirty, just like this year.
Love’s way is hard. The risk, the
fear for the other in those moments
of turning away face and heart:
souls tied together and bodies
held apart , without a word said.
One is breaking through the wall of
distance, the other standing confused,
wanting to move between two liberations
to be free somehow, but cannot break out.
We are words too, our souls mingle
with them, by them. Pure words like
fresh water run through mountains,
fields and cities; they cleanse us,
they hold and release simultaneously.
for Debie
you’re the land sweating,
gasping for air your breasts
throbbing in excitement, your rear
shaking to the rhythm the cry
for Chile was loud we didn’t hear
the silence afterwards nor the
music on butterfly wings they flew
and landed on a flower right here
Nocturnal passages through the unity
of light. You and I are one outside
the schizophrenic city. Just lay around
and do nothing for a day, youl’ll see.
Here I am, dwelling in the smile of
all others. I’m urging you to do the same,
before it’s too late to push to the safe side.
Are you curious? That would be my death.
Where is your existence if not inside?
Remember my name, now you’ll have to
call me, I’ve arrived in another silence.
2 September 1994.
Sinai, Egypt
How to put back together what has been
broken for ages? Should I resurrect old
friendships nobody remembers, or should
I let their shadows glide along the streets
like ghosts in an emptied mass grave?
Your body, where’s your flesh and blood,
and mine? Where have we disappeared?
Where are the years? And love, Zsuzsa,
Gábor, Laci, where is our love today?
13 September 1994.
searching for continuation
before the fear and after
FACE spilling
the blood
of sacrificial animals
seed and soul
FAITH seed and soul
repeat
so we break in or break out (they’re
the same) BLUES
eyes and hair
the banjo
friends enclosed in
grey rain
send the clouds away
i’m not here i’m here
“please talk to me”
who’s dancing?
streets and snow
we return daily to the bright tree
outside
WANT
TO
WALK
and come back
So who are you? Some others I know already,
they keep phoning me on Thursday evenings to say
hello or good night. They won’t come to me,
won’t call me unprepaired, won’t look at me.
Your hair’s full of memories of kisses long gone.
Your laughter’s a doorbell ringing. Who’s
standing out there? I’m locked up in sunshine.
Beware of secrets, they could destroy you.
Only the Unicorn is immortal, and flowers grow
among ruins. We don’t need houses and roads,
let’s forget the people of this planet for a day.
You’re the dawn, only you don’t know about it.
Or you do, but you don’t want to tell me, or I’m
asking too early and too much. So I’m losing you
without having ever held you in my arms.
But I just met you yesterday for the first time!
memory (a ghost)
letters
sounds
names
( )
friends
melting pot
p
l
a
n
e
t
= song of freedom
for Marlon Brando
angry
impatient
disillusioned
fed up
exhausted
overwhelmed
imprisoned
stripped
ripped
whipped
giving
openhearted
angry
impatient
That passage back is blocked,
that silence there is sold
to the devil. I’m too old
for staying here, but forced.
By dint of love I paint
the surface blue, and taint
the ocean white with faint
starlight for those who failed.
Border crossings of
no movement
on an empty train.
Actually I’m flying
backwards unstoppable,
right to your heart.
Raindrops break the
silence at the station.
The platform takes off.
Budapest is a place where you don’t get
revelations easily. You have to wait and
get depressed to the bone, then get drunk
or preferably stoned, to be able to see.
Everything will come in a dream, and you
won’t even have time to pack your bags.
Needn’t try otherwise. This is the only way.
I could use you. Cover my pain with
pubic hair, let me in the cave to find visions
of mystics, to get away from time grinding
my bones. Will I love you? I can’t tell or
promise a thing, the rhythm of my thoughts
gives the beat to this march to oblivion’s shore.
What strange country this is, where no asylum,
no safe haven can be taken when you’re alone.
I loved you once, but I can’t recall the taste of
joy of space, only the narrow path of rebirth,
the wet walls, as I’m going inside the tube to
be sqeezed out at the break of day again.
o madness
without
you i’m going
mad
images
of disaster
rushing
in my head of blue skies
o
red red red red
o
i want you
i want you i-you
girlboy
in a pool of
red
for Kurt Cobain
throw it off
reject the song
the dance
call up a friend
and speak
nonsense
it’s a shock
that you don’t
hear me
throw it off
the wrong the
harm
won’t you ever listen?
the baby’s crying
put a bullet through
the head for
love of
love
for Leonard Cohen
Each year it’s the same at Christmas,
people start throwing shit at each other,
dogshit, horseshit and of course, bullshit.
It begins days before the final show,
it’s done on the streets, then at home.
“I want this!”, “I want that!”, “Love me
the way I tell you!”. And so on.
When the disapproval of others takes over,
people start spitting on foreigners or on
certain antisocial elements and the homeless.
To be with one’s family might be the worst,
the most difficult to avoid or escape.
We hurt each other, why pretend OK?
O give me a word of love for Christmas, I’m
starving for real talk, for real affection,
you can save your gifts for your enemies.
Man of vacuum, why were you born?
I can hear people praying to you,
singing loud in a dry well of history.
They’re calling out the names of Judea,
Samaria, Betlehem, and create black
holes in the universe, holes of guilt.
We don’t need your fears old man, the
years you lived exceed eternity through
the pain inflicted on twenty centuries.
2000 years crying out, “Will you
never leave us? Will you never jump
headlong into your darkest fears?”
We won’t wait long for your decision.
Want Want Want
a mistake
They told me.
Making me angry,
pissing me off.
What did they want?
Go Go Go
The wrong way
To turn back.
They told me
a thing.
Let me see, scoundrels,
who you are!
Smash Smash Smash
your faces
of
Reason.
Smoke, smoke,
rise from the ash,
rise like visions
from the mind.
Be my guide,
be my door,
I’m wearing
colors,
like a peacock
of grace
I’m wearing
feathers, like
a bird flying
home.
Home, I invoke
your name,
and cancel all
other magic.
Reveal yourself
to me.
26 December 1994.
awaiting the spirit to come back
awaiting the vision’s continuation
awaiting the green pasture’s return
awaiting your mind to enlighten
sitting at the station I am
sitting in the armchair I am
sitting on hope’s patio I am
sitting on the floor I am
empty glasses and cups
empty hearts and heads
empty homes and beds
empty plates I remember
smiling in deep blue water
smiling in mountains’ mist
smiling in your smoky room
smiling in your arms I’ll be
5 January 1995.
still sleeping still
crying
there she is
here we are
and
sniffing dogs and
hungry midwives
wink
wink she says
ginger ale saliva
canada dry
so am i
amoeba
free at last
hovering in the hollow
yet free
won’t look back
but goes
out into it
the new the
fresh
they cry
come back guys
we need
you
we need you
you
come back or we die
so many times we forget
to love
for Cat Stevens
I saw it in a dream last night, it was there,
a small thing, grey, I don’t know why, to me
it’s gold somehow, even now that morning
has broken and I’m back to Earth in a crack.
Wide open is the day and my eyes too, ‘cause
I don’t know how I got here, where familiar
faces turn to stone and split under the hammer-
blow of language that is itself completely broken.
Where’s the living stream? I must find it or
I’ll drown in dirty waters of self-consciousness,
which would be unfair, since I’ve been trying
to live clean and free with all my strength.
Is that not enough? Oh Mercy! I give up.
There’s no solution for the problem of
relationships.
The best thing to do is to
hang on to each moment as if
it was eternal,
and to do the same every day,
and save
spiritual property
from the fire.
Then
get on board again and sail out to the
unknown
for whale fishing
with
bare hands.
two directions
sides
street abyss
sky
a a a
friend lover
assimilated crowd shhh
wowowowoodoo
look
black division lines
pro
tect
another sea
descend
or
drop
oooh
faceless years
rushing off
cold cold Sunday
loveless women
money never
enough
“give me give me a cunt
hairy blond”
heartless men talking
Italian
“tall tall slim”
kids not yet
in full
ripeness
slow death
metal headache
devil-smart
angels
I don’t remember
if there has ever been
a home
away from strange
noises
of murder
in the urban
pipe system.
I fail in love.
I am afraid.
But when you let me in
the universe
calms down
and the dark waves
withdraw
to let the light through
to reach
my heart
and tame the
powers.
And my grand-aunts Lili and Gizi?
I remember their spirits greeting me on the stairs of
the Yad Vashem. I guess they moved there after losing
children and family in the war.
It happened much later that I went back in time
to ask of the future. I became a slave to a city, like
those in Egypt who built the pyramids, and
all I can say is I’ve been there.
When my Mom visited me in Tel Aviv she said
that I should write a book about my family.
I’ve been thinking of this ever since, but right now
I can’t write more than this.
bones bones
want my flesh
nipple eyes
suck-me-in lips
and tongue
lick my dick
desert heart
velvet skin
of
aborted children
belly dance
or striptease
will make him
want
me (she says)
I say
NO
Never alone, never together,
never lost, never found,
but looked upon as...
as who?
Never remembered,
never forgotten.
Yes, I’m in love,
and never say never, but...
Anyhow, maybe tonight,
perhaps next year.
Don’t look back! Growing
impatient with you. Come on,
don’t run away,
I’m full of hope and
expectations.
WHY NOT??!!
So I’m going back home to the passion,
the madness, to that something impossible,
to behold, my country, land, or whatever
people may call a betraying woman.
Love is the old craze nowadays, but I find
nothing in my lovers’ eyes, because it’s
a demon that tells them to love,
they lie even to themselves, to me.
How can I have something that is not?
Let’s float on the river instead, become
a boat never touching shore, it’s better,
’cause it’s true, it’s what we are.
And now’s the time to move on, to burn
the manuscripts and publish the fire.
Towards the center we fly for
great emanations of renewal, for
the white flame inside the Sun.
Matter catches on fire and gives
heat for life. The source is vision,
the center of death and oblivion.
Towards this we fly. But I need to
feel your hand in mine as we’re
advancing, else I start spinning.
I’m not a focal point, nor a blaze,
I’m a reflection in a mirror, your
mind. Two hands, one heart we are.
And the third eye awakening.
Most of them are turning their faces
to the Moon to become her, but
your profile tells me who you are
and who that other you is. Somebody
gazing. Now he’s looking in my eyes,
a child, a jester facing me, a smile.
And my dream last night! I went to
Eilat, to the place of this city 4000
years ago, to the green and yellow
of Canaan, to the trees of the law.
So I collect grapes of vision.
And here’s the moment, welcome!
My greatest revolution, unconqurable,
single army, chosen, delighted in.
No uprising of the future interests me,
no imagined pain of the past torments me.
Here I am in the kitchen, making plans
for the afternoon, for the evening, and
for a good sleep tonight.
Budapest, 24 February 1995.