Saturday, November 15, 2008
in-between silence(s)
" is it right, my love, is it right?
are you happy inside your eyes?
can't you see your lover
fall apart in her silk threads?
in time the hunter will find
the trail of blood
i see you alone tonight
when will you tear down?
love will save you
try not to starve yourself of love
- feed your hunger
is it right, my love, is it right?
it's a question with no reply
i am sure of longing to be on the open sea
to feel the comfort of the mist
upon my cheek
no, i'm not crying
lose me in your memory
turn your head
let me become a part of it
let me become a part of it
(...) "
it didn't start that way...
it never does.
a more tender
more thoughtful
more heartfelt gesture gets my attention,
draws me in,
makes me feel special,
loved,
wanted...
and the game begins.
suddenly i am touched by rules i was not explained,
that i do not understand,
yet somehow invade my whole life and its surroundings.
and i can no longer smile what i feel,
i cannot hug too tight,
i cannot look deep into their eyes.
the next square to land on is unknown.
i place myself on it with all the care and honesty i can,
all the fear i hide,
all the love i do not know
- my hands clenched behind my back..
yet i always seem to mislead myself.
..
i'm in every place
all over the place(s)
in what i feel.
and i don't know
i won't find out
what flows around.
where it starts.
where it ends.
if.
what.
when.
and it will always be
a hand held
(too far)
away.
(first image: noose, by cynthia zordich
last image: (c) ana nicolau)
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
"phoenix"
my body took my soul for a drive.
the sun was beginning to set
and somewhere across the world someone's wish for a new day,
a new chance,
a new start,
was finally coming true.
a flock of birds flew past as i turned down the road that would lead me to my next moment of now.
another bird passed by
right in front of my eyes,
filling me with his own essence
and the amazing wonder of all.
the unborn poppies
smiled
as i rolled down the window
to let in that field of coloured sea.
...
my body took my soul for a drive.
together,
they rescued me.
Saturday, October 4, 2008
refugee
the world is immense
and i have no home.
suddenly it hits me,
the unbearable reality,
when all i touch turns to gold
and all i love is out of touch
and i'm forever lost
in this labyrinth i created
for my own daring.
i don't like it
this way.
i don't like it
when i see myself
from the distance
and it feels
dark
and haunted.
..
nothing but shadows
beyond the deafening silence.
nothing
but timeless
ghosts.
.
" every night my dream’s the same.
same old city with a different name.
men are coming to take me away.
i don’t know why but i know i can’t stay.
there’s a weight that’s pressing down.
late at night you can hear the sound.
even the noise you make when you sleep.
can’t swim across a river so deep.
they know my name 'cause i told it to them,
but they don’t know where and they don’t know when
it’s coming,
when
it’s coming.
there’s this fear i keep so deep,
knew its name since before i could speak:
aaaah aaaaaah aaaaah aaaaaah
they know my name 'cause i told it to them,
but they don’t know where and they don’t know when
it’s coming,
when
when it’s coming
keep the car running
if some night i don’t come home,
please don’t think i’ve left you alone.
the same place animals go when they die,
you can’t climb across a mountain so high.
the same city where i go when i sleep,
you can’t swim across a river so deep.
they know my name 'cause i told it to them,
but they don’t know where
and they don’t know when
it’s coming,
when is it coming?
keep the car running
keep the car running
keep the car running "
(image: desiree dolron, xteriors ix)
Friday, September 19, 2008
" pai "
"i miss you
i guess that i should"
(counting crows, raining in baltimore)
..
morning becomes dark and empty as i wake up to the day
to find the scratched hands and words
that have lost you along the way
would you have stayed if i'd dreamt harder?
could you have had another try?
in dreams reality is kind
and pain no more than a sigh
..
today only i will be a child,
with no possible time lapse
no shame or masked fears
- i miss you always beyond this silence
this trail of memories
this blood of tears
...
("day comes up sicker than a cat
something's wrong that is that
mr. somewhere missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
a boat from the river takes you out
'cross the other side of town, to get out, to get out
you take the tide, any tide, any tide
like there isn't gonna be any tide
mr. somewhere missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
a world like tomorrow wears things out
it's hard enough to get what's yours for now
and the hardest words are spoken softly
softly look, no hands upon
nr. somewhere missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
now the milkman beats you to the door
that was once a home, home no more
mr. somewhere, missing somewhere
couldn't get the calendar to stop
missing somewhere,
never did figure just how much
missing somewhere,
never will admit just how much ")
something's wrong that is that
mr. somewhere missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
a boat from the river takes you out
'cross the other side of town, to get out, to get out
you take the tide, any tide, any tide
like there isn't gonna be any tide
mr. somewhere missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
a world like tomorrow wears things out
it's hard enough to get what's yours for now
and the hardest words are spoken softly
softly look, no hands upon
nr. somewhere missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
missing somewhere
never did figure just how much
now the milkman beats you to the door
that was once a home, home no more
mr. somewhere, missing somewhere
couldn't get the calendar to stop
missing somewhere,
never did figure just how much
missing somewhere,
never will admit just how much ")
..
(image by unknown author, sadly.)
Sunday, September 14, 2008
(in) alice's pain
.
suicide watch is an intensive monitoring process used to ensure that an individual does not commit suicide.
.
..
i was sitting close to her, a seat between us, my hand reaching past it, over her shoulder, cuddling her till where my fingers could reach, wanting almost to go through her skin and reach inside, deep where the voices i could not hear shouted at her, voices no one could imagine, voices that would deafen her speech and mute her hearing;
and so the touch, the attempt of the touch, the touch desperate to reach inside, inside until my hands covered the mouth of those unfair and lying voices that pushed that firey-alice into the deepest hole in her,
away from everything,
from everyone,
away from everything that is
life
in life.
" you see..
i wasn't supposed to be alive by friday......"
she said it in a whisper,
knowing what is certain,
with no path to return.
and i had vertigo of her planned death.
...
she spoke through the crying that torn her breathing apart,
as if nothing left inside but the black of all her immense colours, that darkness of sharpened knives and swallowed pills
that lingered across years of injustice, hidden love, discouragement.
and i thought
i thought
that it isn't fair.
the scales becoming more and more uneven
everyday
without us knowing,
without us knowing the weight of every hour.
the weight of not recognizing oneself.
of losing
everything
one is.
so tempting, just letting go.....
before my eyes she fell, and i knew she fell with her eyes closed, clenched as fists, and thus let herself go, not speaking to anyone, not even looking at us anymore, nothing of her but that little girl's body abandoned by herself and that quiet, chocking, painful cry,
that contaminated my blood with sadness and anger.
unthinkable not to hold the hands of one who carries in them their own present and raise them until they see, know, feel everything that is, can be, always, everyday, every minute, still, always, life.
i wanted to shake her and say stop, stop the voices, stop everything that's tormenting you, dive out of yourself if you need to because we'll catch you,
we will catch you,
just don't go.
not like this.
not before so much of you.
but she was just a little girl, curled up in herself,
tiny tiny,
tiny with fear and so grown up with pain...
scared to break her, almost...
as if a bird with broken wings.
with nowhere to fly to.
but,
still,
each moment...
the healing.
every
single
little
moment...
now.
in the quietness of the night, she slept as one who surrenders to the rest of the arms of a home, a friend, a shelter.
in the tender light of day she held my hand and took me through her labyrinth of trees, all tangled in rusty knots of dark memories and flowers left to die by their own negligence,
and through the mist of fear i could see she looked this way.
at us.
inside.
from the distance.
she looked.
and we had to make her see.
so we told her of the lights that brighten the day,
the candles that go out so that it can come,
the night that rests, tranquilizes, pacifies...
let it come, peaceful.
and may the day be gentle on you..
everyday.
..
let it.
what we think is only that,
a thought we allow to be.
life at its full is a sunset
a hand held in the dark
the sea.
..
(image by john tenniel)
Friday, August 15, 2008
(my) country of people and sea
" Everything chains me to the land I gave myself in:
the suddenly teenager river,
the light tripping on the corners,
the sands where I impatiently burnt.
Everything chains me with the same sad love
that is knowing life doesn't last long,
and in it I put hope and the warmth
of some fingers with remains of tenderness.
They say there are other skies and other moons
and other eyes deep with joy,
but I belong to these houses, these streets,
this love dripping melancholy. "
(eugénio de andrade, canção breve)
...
i see the way.
i know it complete, and i know where it leads.
to which sea of land and people of my own.
fear of shame?
shame of fear?
the same cold shiver going into the sea
- my whole life in suspended desire
for the awaited time of this dive of me.
more than queens and princes
i bring in my suitcase the fairies that know my wings
in certainty, dignity of just being.
i am all those i buried,
all those that were born inside
- tattooed seeds of constant change of tide.
.
i hear (myself) in the wind.
as if mine the name that someone.
as if calling dream to a life
that no one else
no one else
has.
...
right now,
faraway and close,
i try humbleness:
i live.
.
(first picture: ana nicolau, selfportrait2007
second picture: eduardo gageiro
third picture: haleh bryan, dani-blue)
Friday, August 1, 2008
" through the looking-glass "
" i know who i was when i got up this morning,
but i think i must have been changed several times since then. "
(lewis carroll, alice's adventures in wonderland)
...
" The child closes her eyes on the wall
She counts the time her friends take
To transform
She closes her eyes inside the numbers
Looks inside and around and finds
Herself
The child asks whether to meet herself
She wants to find her friends, she wants
To be answered. She calculates the loud voice
The height of the wall, the progression of silence. "
(daniel faria)
..
ruela, "inaseashell"
(...)
if you knew that love can break your heart
when you're down so low you cannot fall
would you change?
would you change?
how bad, how good does it need to get?
how many losses? how much regret?
what chain reaction would cause an effect?
[that] makes you turn around,
[that] makes you try to explain,
[that] makes you forgive and forget,
[that] makes you change?
makes you change
if you knew that you would be alone,
knowing right, being wrong,
would you change?
would you change?
if you knew that you would find a truth
that brings up pain that can't be soothed,
would you change?
would you change?
how bad, how good does it need to get?
how many losses? how much regret?
what chain reaction would cause an effect?
[that] makes you turn around,
[that] makes you try to explain,
[that] makes you forgive and forget,
[that] makes you change?
makes you change
are you so upright you can't be bent
if it comes to blows?
are you so sure you won't be crawling?
if not for the good, why risk falling?
why risk falling?
if everything you think you know
makes your life unbearable,
would you change?
would you change?
if you'd broken every rule and vow,
and hard times come to bring you down,
would you change?
would you change?
(...)
the end is not near, haleh bryan
(first image: sue blackwell, alice through the looking glass
fifth image: thespeak, thinking
ninth image: lachlan humphreys, change
all other images: haleh bryan
song&lyrics: tracy chapman, change)
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
self-reminder (in advance)
" paston common, 5.maio.08 - "free balance"
i brought myself here.
it's seven, almost seven years already, of emotions that confuse, comfort, feel safe, confuse, take forward, carry, frighten, feel safe, confuse, feel safe, confuse.
that have brought me here, in me. as the will for more.
.
it's stunning, this life i now live.
of believing, knowing, all that. that i am happy. i am (already) happy. for so much and more. for all that is in me.
(it's beautiful here, this moment in time.
as i close my eyes, the birds lull me to the truth in me:
i am part of nature.
i am the birds.
i am the trees.
i am the sea.)
i live the life that i know.
the one i brought myself.
i open my eyes, conquer and receive in me
all that, through my will, is mine to be. "
..
(first image:do you believe it in your head, by michael vesen
second image: integration of the soul.
by an unknown artist, sadly...)
Sunday, May 11, 2008
(in (between) life and dreams)
" so runs my dream, but what am i?
an infant crying in the night
an infant crying for the light
and with no language but a cry. "
(from the poem "in memoriam a.h.h.", by alfred lord tennyson)
...
i keep imprisoned
chocked with the memories' mourning
the franked weight of a sick life
- all that unreality
of your final moments
...
i miss you.
i am chocked
with never more.
(first image: youth mourning, george clausen
second image:death in the the sickroom, edvard munch)
Sunday, April 6, 2008
(in) discovery
" i wonder if i've been changed in the night?
let me think. was i the same when i got up this morning?
i almost think i can remember feeling a little different.
but if i'm not the same, the next question is
'who in the world am i?'
ah, that's the great puzzle! "
(lewis carroll, alice's adventures in wonderland)
..
i slow down the time.
my body forces me to look at my soul.
i look at what i am
with open eyes.
i won't spend
lose
(any)more
time
forgetting,
when forgetting
will bring me nothing.
despite the pain of going
without leaving a box,
some water,
a glass globe.
i smile at life.
to all that, in it,
is truth
and justice.
i remember what i want.
what i love.
and i move on.
never_the_less.
slowly.
without running.
without running anymore.
without running
unless i want to feel on my body
the wind that brings me life
and soul
and sea.
knowing,
alone
and deep down,
that when i fly
there is so much,
so much lulling me...
...
" 'everything's got a moral, if only you can find it'.
and she squeezed herself up closer to alice's side as she spoke. "
(lewis carroll, alice's adventures in wonderland)
and she squeezed herself up closer to alice's side as she spoke. "
(lewis carroll, alice's adventures in wonderland)
(first image: day will come, by haleh bryan
last image by gundega dege)
Sunday, March 2, 2008
break(ing)
i delayed him in our hug, back then.
there were numerous days of distance between us, lives we lived apart, all the things we didn't share, the pains, the walls, the joys, the victories, missing what we once were, the pride-sometimes-shame of what we became, what we are in this present of one more day.
the one today.
where i shape my departure from you.
(when dream is gone, haleh bryan)
it ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe
if you don't know by now
an' it ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe
it'll never do somehow
when your rooster crows at the break of dawn
look out your window and i'll be gone
you're the reason i'm trav'lin' on
...
don't think twice, it's all right
it ain't no use in turnin' on your light, babe
that light i never knowed
an' it ain't no use in turnin' on your light, babe
i'm on the dark side of the road
i wish there was somethin' you would do or say
to try and make me change my mind and stay
we never did too much talkin' anyway
...
so don't think twice, it's all right
i pack the life i was here to open it somewhere else, in another space, my own, where i'll live with open doors, letting in the air and the others, the music that reaches the silence within, that makes it sing, gently wakes me up, sets me free, slowly returns me to the feeling inside.
...
on that other part of me, i still hold on to what i don't have or know.
and i don't
ever
let you die in my dreams.
..
you only die in this everything
this life
this being
of every instant.
you die in me
only
everyday.
...
it ain't no use in callin' out my name, boy
like you never done before
it ain't no use in callin' out my name, boy
i can't hear you any more
i'm a-thinkin' and a-wond'rin' walkin' down the road
i once loved a man, a child i'm told
i gave him my heart but he wanted my soul
...
don't think twice, it's all right
so long,
honey babe
where i'm bound, i can't tell
goodbye's too good a word, babe
so i'll just say fare thee well
i ain't sayin' you treated me unkind
you could have done better but i don't mind
you just kinda wasted my precious time
...
but don't think twice, it's all right
.
(aditional images by cig harvey, katia chausheva and noronha da costa
poem: adaptation of don't think twice, it's all right, by bob dylan)
Friday, February 22, 2008
they talk of cuba...
and i think of reynaldo*:
"why is it that we, the great majority of the people, and even the intellectuals, did not realize that this was the beginning of a new dictatorship, even bloodier that the previous one? perhaps we did realize it, but the enthusiasm of knowing that now one was part of a revolution, that a dictatorship has been overthrown and the time had come for vengeance, outweighed the injustices and the crimes that were being committed.
not only were injustices being inflicted; the executions were being conducted in the name of justice and freedom, and above all, in the name of the people.."
(*reynaldo arenas, before night falls)
(the scream, edvard munch)
.....
you cannot shake hands
with a clenched fist.
(indira gandhi)
.
Monday, February 18, 2008
touched
.
adj.
emotionally affected; moved.
.
"what sort of diary should i like mine to be?...
something loose knit and yet not slovenly, so elastic that it will embrace any thing, solemn, slight or beautiful that comes into my mind.
i should like it to resemble some deep old desk, or capacious hold-all, in which one flings a mass of odds and ends without looking them through.
i should like to come back, after a year or two, and find that the collection had sorted itself and refined itself and coalessed - as such deposits so misteriously do - into a mould, transparent enough to reflect the light of our life."
...
"this diary is my kief, hashish and opium pipe.
this is my drug and my vice."
...
thank you to those who
generously
share it with me.
for the kindness,
the presence,
the giving.
(sky and water, m. c. escher)
...
adj.
emotionally affected; moved.
.
"what sort of diary should i like mine to be?...
something loose knit and yet not slovenly, so elastic that it will embrace any thing, solemn, slight or beautiful that comes into my mind.
i should like it to resemble some deep old desk, or capacious hold-all, in which one flings a mass of odds and ends without looking them through.
i should like to come back, after a year or two, and find that the collection had sorted itself and refined itself and coalessed - as such deposits so misteriously do - into a mould, transparent enough to reflect the light of our life."
(virginia woolf, a writer's diary)
...
"this diary is my kief, hashish and opium pipe.
this is my drug and my vice."
(anaïs nin)
...
thank you to those who
generously
share it with me.
for the kindness,
the presence,
the giving.
(sky and water, m. c. escher)
...
Friday, February 15, 2008
"afin de ne pas vous blesser"
it's like falling knowing there's nothing below...
i look down (again) and see the crude darkness of the certainty of nothing at all,
a dazzled rock that now fears the sea...
yet nevertheless:
hand in hand, i go.
i fall as if flying, deepened with balance and happiness, as my body stops being my own or ours: we leave that weight behind and love as if resting from life, sometimes from ourselves,
we tattoo our hands with sand in nights full of moon and giving
- the blood pulsing,
the water being born.
we love with the fury of fear,
the unfair certainty of love,
so much less than life...
and we love in flight.
we love in vain.
for no safe refuge for this flight.
and all is dreams, after all.
open wings,
body,
fall(ing).
without knowing.
feeling
the acute
silence
of falling
alone.
.
(silence, bogdan zwir)
- my castrated wing...
when did you choose, in land,
to be water, flipper and sea?
(reunited with her thoughts, haleh bryan)
...
(imagem primeira, portrait, de haleh bryan)
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