There are two ways to Life,
the way of Nature
and the way of Grace.

   Place your head in my hands
and I'll see that
we don't have to choose.

We stand united
We stand united
united and un-armed

We stand united
In love
In peace
In war

We need no walls
No swords
No stones

Our words are harmony

Our freedom is yours
Our kingdom remains

A dream

It feels like
the middle of the day and yet
you are
tired
It feels like a river that does not flow

A ghost has touched my fingertips
they ache, they shake with fear

Into my feet it flows
and gets hold of me,
grows

This is no joke, love
we should run
before it is too late or before-

what is that?
you shake your head, you're not afraid?

Then I will run alone,
as I use to;
as it has shown to be
my safeguard system

not for me, my love:
for you.

Easy-
to write like this
to write-
and in a flash of bliss I tell myself
to lay aside
the pen and paper
delay-
until a later point in time

But now-
now-
never disrupt a running flow, they say,
and rightly so.
For now, I leave the words,
I let them go-
'cause what-

                *Ah, give it up, my love!
Or have another go, but bear in mind:
You only find what your eyes see,
and see they do a lot.
All good, I say, now rest a moment;

and look:
what you have done here.

I can't write.
My fingers, thin, hoover above the keybord, a yellow bug irritating me when it collides with the light bulb
and my eyes, irritated as they are, and the tv in the background because it always is because I am not looking -

thus the situation being, and me in the middle of it, and no other noise except tv, bug, typing and - eventually, my own blood rushing-

and nothing comes from nothing, or so they say, and still no great lines on the page.

I will have to revise this and see what can I change, for next time.
The bug is gone.

Charcoal dust
on her cloudy eyes
lashes curled-

surprise in his eyes
as he feels the portrait
of the lady
he - before that - so despised
soft under his fingers.

as the two of them -
in slow, bright motion -
come together,
there is no explosion

but only -
she said later -

weather;
as it had been.

He used to
park his rusty red
mobile
near the riverside where you
tend to walk
chat talk
to the world
He used to serve the most
passionate Latte
One day you recognised
a delicate
bird on the foam
He used to park near the riverside
and still does

Shaking hands
I turn to friends and weep
about the loss that did not even happen
yet

To me the everpresent threat of it
looms over me
and to get rid of it I really would
have to get rid of my own self

In my heart's shelf there stand
a thounsand dusty photographs of loss

Once tossed and smashed
I now feel numb when I remember
How those kids left

Bereft of all that usually helds up
a healthy rationality I stop
and stumble

Maybe -
a tiny flicker burning in between the dust -
maybe this time it could be different

Maybe this time
there will be clarity
and - rusting in the chambers of my heart -
the images will softly leave this rhyme

and drift apart
just like they should.

Just leave my heart.

In the rough wind they were playing,
Always, and swaying like trees,
Knowing the cool breeze
That blew.

One day in September
They forgot to remember
How this breeze sometimes turns
To a storm.

Whirling around
They then saw their own faces
Celebrating the ******
Which embraces
Those who know not what’s real –
And what isn’t.

So what if I don't like a poem
and say so?

So what if I don't like people to rhyme
to bridge two edgy lines?

Why, if this rhymes then it is just
due to my humble arrogance -

my love of irony -

and if you like,
just if you really want,

then be my guest and shake yourself
free from those lines
(from all those lines in fact)

and smile,
and now: forget about the rest.

He is sick of looking at people,
at their heads,
from above.

So he climbs downwards,
unseen,
and dips into the shadow of a palm tree.

There he remains
until a child passes by
and frowns at the sight.

And he,
then,
mirrors the child
and after a while:

becomes the pavement,
becomes the street lights,
becomes the smoke that rises
the dust that swirls
around.

And at this very evening
as the sun sets,
all the smoke rises
and all the dust shoots

upwards again.

Help me she says
in a strong voice
and strong is the choice
she made.

Abandon him, she thinks,
I will,
and the chill
that runs down my spine
will freeze not only
my lonely feelings.

It will ignite the urge
for simple ratio;
a thing which, from the depths of my heart
I - upto now - so
despised.

Everything is connetcted, love,
Don’t be a *****
Don't push yourself back to the start
Of our argument

No,
As the smoke settles
And the ark resides
On this vast island

I feel safe to tell you:
That our start has been
From then on until now
Also the end;

Everything is connected, love.

Release my wrists from your consolent grip
I am grown out of it.

Once in our lives
Have faith in me
Forget that horror Trip
That shook us so.

Combat is over
When all red is gone
Your senses may be loaded;
A harsher wind blows
in this lower heaven -
I read the words encoded:

*Forgive us Father
For we fear not
What you have planed for us.
Maintain your hard will
And ferocious tongue.
But once in
Still,
Cold,
Frosty temper
You'll see where all went wrong; where all begins, and Ends,
And  lives
Not through you
But in us.

No matter how far
you can walk
no matter where you take your turn
nothing will show
upon this land
nothing will grow.

Burn all the waste
dig holes so deep
the ground breaks in upon itself
blow up the soil
so that the seep
comes up.

And in the end
you see-
you walk towards yourself:
a convex mirror hems
your field-
and as you try to flee
and as you try to shield your face-

it closes in upon you.

A little fox,
two mice,
a white cat,
a chick
and a tiny bat

accompany
our way

and even if we stray
again

they'll find us

and- with paws and fur and tiny noses-

redirect

our clumsy
human feet.

this is not a poem
it is a question

what makes you think you're so remarkably
invincible, and chasing rays of light until they die away?

what makes me cling to this
disquieting momentum, this moon-absorbing, hateful creature?

this is not a poem
it is a question

why can i not detect the seconds
of high voltage danger, and why-

why do i pour my heart
out to a stranger?

why

°°°

this used to be a question-

turning to an answer, though, and tapping
at my chamber door, pronouncing

with a clear voice - and with rain-drops bouncing off the window pane -

the word:

because*.

He looked up into the grey sky
and decided: it's not time yet, I got time
and, shakig off the cold, massaging his hands,
he said: it should rhyme.

And thus he began:

To fabricate the best amongst all the poems -
that is what I will do, and forget about the rest
and the empty phrases
that fill no cup and no page.

To make you wonder, and frown
and think: who is this?
This master of words, of letters,
What kind of bliss
is he blessed with?

Then also: to make you remember
my name and my word,
and the fame that so uplifted
my thoughts.

And: to remind you
of my soul and bones
when I shall be gone, and not long after that,
you will build a statue
of stone.

But before all that I will-
I must-
I should-

But where shall I begin?
Where shall I
begin?

And you will put down your paper, your pen,
you will sigh, and know: all this was only a revery.
Then you will stand up, undress, stand naked in front of the mirror-
and dance.

I have tried to be honest -
I cannot

I have tried to strip me off my sins
and this is -

and here is where it all begins, cause look:

born, and raised as one is, I belong
to the race of those kids who define
themselves by their age, by the content of time
that they spent

helplessly rushing from one end
to the other, with father and mother
still in between

with memories in cages and stories
unseen and unnoticed

with silences louder than sirens,
bigger than rocks and finer
than powdery snow on the top

and with eyes:
ah, with eyes wider than ruins
and more fierce than millions
and millions of armys in lands
where no daffodils grow

where no dragons fly and no harpees,
where the masses of sky are empty and vast
as the churches

so those eyes:
yes, wide eyes, and empty,
dreaming of countries that see no dawn
that yawn for experience

the youth has told lies to the world
given rise to a culture that hurls itself back
to the starting point
whenever it touches
the edge

so there now:
the youth in a square box
a cage in its own ship
prepared just to rip off the walls
the silly paper

with blue and white cloud print
only to see then, a little bit later,
that beyond
                there is freedom -

and always had been.

a fish flies
through the night air
hardly remembering
he was not born
a bird

a word swims
through the ocean
almost remembering
its destination

a grim old man
feels his heart turn soft
and decides to go
with it for once

The poet stands, bending over a piece of his writing, next to his wife
musing, not writing any longer.

His wife, in both appearance and mind much stronger than him,
shares his glance and dares
to let her eyes dance right across his naked lines.

He feels her breath next to his shoulder, on his skin,
remembers how, when growing older, you start to be
content with less.

So now, she finally adresses him:
Are you writing about me?

He frowns, something he rarely does, takes a deep breath
and, quietly bereft of his most personal emotion, starts to smile.

You know, he anwers, with a slight shiver in his voice,
I'd rather you asked something else. I'd rather-
but he has no choice, is forced to speak, at last.

His wife, slightly intrigued, demands: elaborate!
Two hands are raised to shape the air, create a space
and place an invisible heart
inside its core.

Look here, he speaks, this is my work,
and indicating this he gestures wildly
while his wife remains disquiet, though now
she sees, thus smiling mildly, what he is getting at.

And in the middle, this is you
as if -
now he does not allow his voice to drift
as if my poetry evolves -
But he stops dead and sees
a clear image inside his spinning head:

He concentrates, takes a step back -
and reaches for his woman's face,
places his palms on her red cheeks, one side each,
and begins to speak anew:

*If I had ever written just a single line about you, dear,
I shall be ******.
I won't let false words touch you!
Let me explain:

It is the other way around!
All pieces and all lines and words have once
belonged to you, and now emerge
from your sweet face!

I am now well prepared just to erase
all of my poetry,
for all of it I will find then again,
anew,
in your kind heart,
in you.

Sound* is what I eat -
Out there they say, get rid of it!
Under their skin I see eyes of greed;
No mercy, their voices sit
Down in the darkened chamber.

Music has scared them so much,
Utmost terror it has brought -
Saving not their minds, but mine,
Inclined to confess – here I’m caught,
Clutching a few notes, my shrine.

Sing no more, so I stand
In their midst;
No hands reach out.
Go away - is all they say.

How the laws of a change of perspective
sound so eloquent and intellectual -

and how their glasses
reflect the sunlight and seem
so ill-positioned here

so out of purpose -
though in line -
and out of use already

Close
your folders
your handbooks of modules and rules
put aside your cups of linguistic wisdom

Release
the trees from your far-reaching longsightedness
pull off the net:

Confess
that you are
as clever as we feel you were from the

beginning.

*And with a feeble smile I turned around
and looked at them
and said:

"If you don't get this now-
                       I rest my case"

A skinny day peeks through
your window asks,
Could I come in,
you have already brewed
a second cup of coffee
your skin warm
and you listen

A million suns burn deep into my skin
the love I feel;

and if this love, then, be a sin
how in the world would I
could I
get rid of it and with a grin
live on?

As long as this world turns
itself around and burns these holes
into my beating heart
there is no need to fear
there is no need to part;

All cheap collections
of even cheaper poetry remain
untouched
for in the face of this new day
all I will ever need
and ever have to say is this:

My face resembles yours so much
your beat and mine so much in tune
that, even if all stars collide
and Milky Way and Mars and Moon explode -

I will still hear the quiet sound that comes
from our souls not split apart
but clinging tightly
to each other

in a forsaken universe.

Have you ever felt
this heavy,
heavy weight of an uncut theory-
a pile of words
with no real core-

                        with no real sense
                                  to keep you


satisfied?

Colours of mountains,
The song of a blackbird,
Painful it was, and a little bit scary.

When my eyes would grow bigger,
Rays of light shaped the edges
Of things and of shadows
Not seen but felt.

Carrying on in a distance,
I learned to distinguish
The sounds from the voices
Of soundless creatures.

'What if he's stuck
and no great help is kicking in
to help him?"

Is this your mind
annoying you again?
Is this your artificial voice
blocking your sight?

I might just get a little furious right now;
I tried and tried so hard to teach you
that-
if there is a truth-
that it will reach you

Your ears be closed
or not.