uncommended forest / Viniani 2004
for the speechless,
on whose lips I hung to see further afar,
there where light and darkness are set free,
and as I stretch out my hand to grab the fire
I clutch burning black ember
and it hurts.
did they leave with the shining countenance of the sad ones
or did it stay put, the hollow sorrow of the desperate ones?
…they stripped him bare, cut off his head, cut his arms from his shoulders and his legs by the knees, the heads were cured with salt and oregano so that they wouldn’t smell and were shown around the villages to the sound of instruments, after which they hung them in the central square, they published a photograph in the newspapers, they had won.
in praise, as it is,
of the defeated.
Black
wearing but his naked skin,
– birds sleep in him,
in the still of the night nightingales sing –
and down on the earth there bloom
nepenthe, the little flowers of the peasants,
always beautiful, whenever in season.
Further down still,
unperturbed, dreamless, they lie asleep.
And if I look for them further up they do not answer.
Day and night, they light up the world with darkness.
Uncommended forest.
