Four Poems from "YOU" (1992)

[Zlatko Waterman]

Apart


All of it is gone now
the white floating of your shift
in the dark room
where I have imagined
never witnessed it
but confess now
a grainy, pebbled kiss
dampens the bare boards
the candle falls on
where you tread
where I shall never lie.
It falls into
the dent in your sheets made
with your own palms
where I shall never lie


























Dark Corner




Even now
in the darkest corner
alone with my cup and cat
I think of your mouth
the force with which
you hold me away
with which we clash
hating
that time I followed
at a respectful three paces
that word love on your lips
this bakes the hem
of my dark corner with its sun

























Smoke

in the secret night
alone with your slim cigarette
you have already forgotten me
except for anger
your last elixir
there is no body, only temper
a way of bending the air
like bending the smoke from
your lips, across the room in
a single skein, it loses momentum
as it reaches the book I gave you
you are warm and safe alone
in the dark blankets and I
am stretched out and dreaming of your mouth
but I cannot dream how you are using it























Healed After India

You healed yourself of me
of my outbreak
with uncommon speed
with unseemly technique
you have done it before
on three continents
the serifs of other tongues
flapping around you like a cloak in the wind
the curry, the bright yellow
beaming across the flat,
sky-filled field, the ox bent slow
under the muddy plow.

The holy man blesses your lips, your feet
ankle deep in manure.
You are on the plane an hour later
recovered, kindness intact
gravel is then kindly spun under your tires
against my parking lot tears
soon there is no more pursuit
a happy turning away, god again in your pocket.

[mtmynd]

Nice picks! I like these a lot.

Apart:

the white floating of your shift
in the dark room

I find this to be an interesting image... a comfort in aloneness, if you will.

Dark Corner:

I think of your mouth

those five words sets the stage for me... and you nailed it!

and Smoke -

there is no body, only temper
a way of bending the air

I was taken by those two lines...

and of course Healed after India needs no comment from me, nothing but an "wow" will do...

Thx for sharing these, Zlatko. I enjoyed them.


cecil

[hester_prynne]

of appreciating beauty....
that's what these bring me Zlatko.

Like Cecil says, thank you so much for these.
they are like calm reassuring eyes in my current stormy chaos.......

H

[Glorious Amok]

wow, i love all of these! what movies form, what dances of colours and emotions choreograph themselves for me as i read! what yellows and reds! what sands and jewels are stirred in the winds.

thank you, those are great poems.

[Zlatko Waterman]

My grateful thanks to all the readers who have commented on these poems.

(Glorious Amok: Check my post to you on the "Talk to Me About Music" thread")

Your fellow scribbler,


--Zlatko

[joel]

some things are more than worthy of digging around in the past...and are breath-taking. some things are so simple they're complex--and no matter how much time has passed them, they seem current--and yet their currency begs the questions, where is your you now? yellow and read somewhere in a new india, perhaps?

[Lightning Rod]

these roll off the tongue, Z-ko

thank you for the glimpses

[Perdida]

Wow, all four of these touched me deeply, so many wonderful phrases, so vivid. Loved it!