Zohar Eitan: 9 poems from the book Shu Hai practices javelin
Mixed sections of the following poems appear in the First Movement of “Shu Hai mitamen behatalat kidon”.
SHU HAI PRACTICES JAVELIN
Shu Hai practices javelin
– LONG BREATH PAUSE, HERE AND BETWEEN ALL STANZAS –
Wei-ling’s parents are doctors.
They believe it is good to help one’s neighbor.
They train her to volunteer.
(A thing, warm and smooth, fills a deep bowl.
It takes the entire screen, save only the corners.
Now an old fork approaches. It lifts a smooth,
brown mass while disappearing into the top
right-hand corner.)
Approaching
Viewing is forbidden Mondays through Friday,
and the pupils
(The camera struggles to follow the ball’s
movement among legs. The picture is slightly
tilted)
The girls, who can’t play, cheer on
Approaching, Expanding.
The pupils spend time with their families.
Sunday mornings Shu-Yang
Partaking. Washing away.
The city, where many places of interest are
Partaking. Sweeping away. Straightening up.
(Straighten up. Become a drop of water.)
The city, where many places of interest are
– RECITE VERBS QUICKLY, IN A FORCEFUL MANNER, LOUDLY-
(Approaching a man and a boy who stand
almost touching. Both hold cameras. Behind
them we see: a lawn strip, a wall.)
Wrap yourself.
(laughing. Children laughing.)
Like children all over the world, they
(Now the picture slowly scans a room)
must confront the challenges
– LONG BREATH PAUSE –
which stands
(Now the picture slowly scans an empty
room. In one corner stands a stool. A man is
bent over it.)
Before
(Now the picture slowly scans an empty
room. In one corner stands a stool. A man is
bent over it, talking. There are no subtitles.
– VERY LONG BREATH PAUSE –
Approaching, Expanding. Partaking. Washing
away. Straightening up. (Straighten up.
Reflect. Become a drop of water. Wrap yourself.
Wash away. Be reflected. Straighten up.
Evaporate. Evaporate)
THE BOY
After three days of laying heavy granite bricks
in a row along the field
The boy ran into the woods.
He was found the day after, a safety pin in his
dick, his head off.
A little yellow bird was diligently pecking
a recess in his throat. We almost got her.
She was so into it.
The head hasn’t been found to this day.
A couple gone screwing
Hit upon three teeth, attached to each other,
but that was all, and those too
Were probably a sheep’s.
Soon we forgot him. Three days are not a long
time. Still,
Whoever passed through the woods could
have sensed the smell.
That was strange, we knew a smell wouldn’t
remain for so long, two months have passed,
And besides they have sent someone to clean
it up, some old guy, yet
I could swear the smell was there. A sweet
smell, like syrup made of fruits of another land.
Thinking of it now, that might be the reason I
was rather glad to leave there, though
I could swear it wasn’t me who did it. Anyway,
I am telling the head, as much as one can ever
know such things for sure.
LIED
He stares at the frozen lake.
His love he likens to the lake.
Or, instead: the lake reflects her frozen heart.
Perhaps:
His.
The postal coach approaches, carrying
The moderate accompaniment, still in the
home key, in piano. Does he
See his love’s face reflected in this icy water?
He does
Not see his love’s face reflected in this icy
water, since
His love is not here: his love
Has gone forever.
The postal coach slowly passes by, and the
rider, contemplating whether he should load
any passengers in this god-forsaken town, half-
listens to the piano accompaniment, now grad-
ually aiming toward the lowered submediant:
a typical Romantic outlet.
Now he wonders whether he should await the
thawing: spring,
Indeed, will come back, but
His love will not. His love, as
Aforementioned, has gone. Forever. THE NEXT
PHRASE WILL DISCUSS THE SINGING OF
BIRDS IN
WINTER: birds never sing in winter,
And this too
Reminds us of our lost love, and of something
else perhaps, veiled and
Concealed, rising only when birdsong
Ceases. THE TEMPO IS NOW BECOMING
EXCEEDINGLY SLOW, and the piano
Casts random heavy lumps, lengthy, burdened
silences
Surrounding them. THE CLIMAX, NO DOUBT,
IS UP
AND COMING, where at last the cry of pain
will rise, bridging
Image and reality, turning, perhaps,
Image, hero, love, this entire
Song, this baritone, who
Had known better springs, that CD
Player, the
Disc upon it (AAD, RECORDED LIVE IN A
LIVE RECITAL, DES MOINES, IOWA,
NINETEEN FIFTY
EIGHT), us too, redundant,
Quite redundant.
TALOONS
1.
Why do I read poems?
2.
Now, for instance, I am reading poems since I seek the word “taloons”
3.
Perhaps: “talons.”
4.
On the desk, right in front of me, two piles of poems lie.
5.
In one of them, that I already know, taloons are nowhere to be found.
6.
In the other, though, I do not yet know if taloons, or talons, are ever to be found.
7.
I seek the word “taloon” since I do not yet know
8.
And I should find that out very shortly, quite soon
9.
Whether in her taloons she is carrying him, or perhaps in her talons he is clutched screaming.
This is important. The air around him is fading away. He is afraid.
10.
Down below fields fly, and woods, and beautiful homes, everything that always goes by when the big bird passes above
11.
Carrying in her talons, or taloons, an infant, who is now laughing as he listens to the shrieking air. The screeching sound rises higher as the bird’s wings move faster. She is nearing her home in the white mountains, and the infant clutched in her talons, perhaps taloons, laughs since the vast shrieking air reminds him of his own scream. Down below pass
12.
White mountains, fire, black rock, crosses and cypresses, everything
13.
That always goes by when the big bird comes back home, to her chicks, a new, laughing infant in her
14.
Talons.
Mixed sections of the following texts appear in the second movement of Shu Hai mitamen behatalat kidon and in Shu Hai in an orchestral setting.
“I believe that beyond these bushes I could bathe in warm cisterns” is the text for the song in Six Miniatures and a Simultaneous Song.
1.
Stella arrives at the lonesome ranch in
Arizona.
From afar, she hears a baby cry.
Just now, she broke up with her lover, in a
cold, cutting, bitter phone call.
Something is new in all that, but it is still not
quite –
Not there yet.
The ranch mistress has an affair with one of
the hands.
His name, it seems, is Bob. He is thin, and
has a beard and a bald spot.
Stella inspects, investigates. She is very
pretty. Lots about her
We do not know.
Now, she is walking through the wide open
meadow, caressing
The head of a cow.
A strange light of the desert blows around.
Only real concern motivates her, she says.
Only real concern can make such light blow.
Only real concern.
“I believe that beyond these bushes I could
bathe in warm cisterns”
For three years now he has been sitting in a
chair, the very same chair, sitting
Where one could see a triangle: an
Opening between two branches, facing (here
You may hang a picture: a triangle, a wall) a
wall.
Sometimes a leaf dropped, or an ant came in
(they used to
Disappear when he was asleep), and in winter,
on
Clear days, the triangle’s lower edge was
illuminated: a
Line, slanted a bit, appeared there, and he has
spent many a day
Thinking about it: Did somebody open a
shutter? And why
Always in winter? And, perhaps, he may even be
Looking? And once (this too happened in
winter) a bird also
Came. And this is all he now knows: the wall,
two
Slanting branches, a moving dark spot (an ant,
perhaps), a stripe of
Light, fading away. And
The bird.
*David Perlov, “Insomnia,” from “A Diary,” Pt. II.
_What Does the Serial Killer Want?_
The Serial Killer wants it all to be Love.
Like an egg, he explains.
All Unlove should be taken out, says
The serial killer, pared, like an
Egg. It has no place, he
Says, all that is not
Smooth enough,
Or round, or
White.
Parting
I, says he, will be more famous than Elvis,
And I am not even dead yet,
And he tries hard to make her see how upright
is he, how erect, yet we detect
That quick quiver, like a window pane replying
a distant falling shell, passing through his thigh,
As his little finger knocks its way up the kitchen
table leg: every three seconds,
A single knock.
That plate in her hand she has been soaping for
five minutes now in even, circular motions,
continually, always clockwise,
Her head lolling from side to side like the
severed skull of a mechanical rabbit whose
batteries are dying away.
Her ears, though, are unlike a rabbit’s: they are
short and fair.
The coney, as distinguished from the rabbit,
has short ears. It descends from elephants, and
wells
In the clefts of the rock.
“In the clefts of the rock,” she thinks, “like the
dove.” And then she thinks
Of how she ever got there, to the coney.
“Like a gazelle,” he says. And he closes the
door from the outside, quite softly,
And goes.
I should be plain. Must be. It’s
Desirable. Worthwhile, being
Plain, and I must
Ask: bellyache, is that
Plain? Well, am I
Plain enough while being
A bellyache, or is something
Else needed, like: throwing
Up, pinching rabbits, or
Staring right into the
Sun’s sphere, no blinking please, and
Then, right away, close eyes,
Concentrate please, focus on those
Drifting glowing circles, whose
Rims are blurry, as they fade
Away, striving toward the
Shadow. I MUST, AS AFORESAID, BE
PLAIN. The drifting glowing circles now
Turn into grey quivering gradually darkening
Planes. IS “PLAIN” A
I am very hot now,
And I want DERIVATIVE OF
“PLAINT”? to tear all my
Clothes off. Now, when I am
Closing my eyes, i IS
“PLAIN” plainly see
Black. SOMETHING NEAR
“BLACK”? Should I
Go I SHOULD
GO now? I must
NOW go
Now. Go
BE in
PLAIN peace.
© 1996 Zohar Eitan
Published by Bitan Publishers, Halikon Series,Israel
