A poem from 'Rib Cities' by the Swedish poet Eva Ström

The loving couple

The loving couple

thin with age, golden-wedding tinged

with brains worn into holes

have become disobedient children

that hide the security alarm

and live clocklessly outside the schedule

among left-overs and dizziness squalor

still in love, elated

in dried-out deposits of memory

disclaim the connection

with the ticking of the metronome

An age has forced its way out

is planning a weak-sighted wedding

rummaging among underclothes

for a down-soft memory

something infantile lingers

at the temple, sweeps past

the dry tears of the ear-conch,

shreds the account

into illegible chips

stretches the features

to thin grimaces

outside the limiting tracks

of the nervous system.

This time the ode is my own

ode to ma

woke up with outstretched

forearms hands pointing away

thumbs tucked along fore

fingers muscles taut

the word ‘skein’ in my head though

it should have been ‘hank’

but ‘skein’ is what ma

asked me to hold while she wound

garn into a ball

dip left wrist and up

dip right wrist and up while ma

winds the empty wool

A poem by the young Dutch writer Anne Broeksma

It’s important to live in insipid surroundings

I am an inedible moth

differ from the edible specimens

by behaving like a moron at the right moment

it’s important to live in insipid surroundings

and I’m a great believer in the idea of only being a small example

there are people running around with right to return written behind their eyes

and who at the same time plant a flag on every square centimetre of growth

it’s a question of not wanting to fly towards the light

of not becoming the umpteenth twit that disappears into the sun

WYRIWYG - a Høeck poetic

ode on listening to music

what appeals to me

so much about haydn’s mus

ic is you get what

you hear – man bekommt

was man hört – the same applies

to poetry i

sincerely hope – you

get what you read for if the

words meant something else

than precisely what

is there on the page why not

write that something else?

And a Whitsun poem from Klaus Høeck

       wind

       yeeah – let’s go out to

the vollsmose part of town

       together and see

       what’s cooking let’s go

out to the table of ba

       bel in the midst of

       diversity right

now at whitsun come on come

       with me in the po

       em and the spirit –

come don’t be afraid outland

       ish says the soundtrack

       come on then – it does

n’t cost anything (as it

       does at the zoo

       logical gardens

opposite) you’ll get a free

       peek in behind the

       headscarves the wind is

greener than the saudi-a

       rabian flag and

       the election post

ers are just the same as they

       are everywhere else

        what did i tell you –

there is nobody who’s throw

       ing stones at you no

       body slitting your

tyres nobody scratching the

       paintwork nobody

       insulting you or

your wife no cursing of the

       holy spirit there

       are not even a

ny graffiti whatsoev

       er on your poem

Just the poem for today! Klaus Høeck in the last section of 'Palimpsest'

ode to peace of mind

i can’t remember

what i am to remember

and i’ve forgotten

what i am to for

get i can’t remember what

i am to forget

and i’ve forgotten

what i am to remember

for just a brief mo

ment i find myself

in a state of utter now

ness and peace of mind

A translation of 'The Carillon' by the Dutch poet Ida Gerhardt

The carillon

The people in the streets looked stricken,

their ashen faces drawn and tight, –

then something made their features quicken

and, listening, they seemed brushed with light.

For in the clock-tower when, resounding,

the bronze-chimed hour had died away,

the carilloneur began his pounding

and everywhere was heard to play.

Valerius: – a solemn singing

with bass bell’s tolling undertone

and flickerings of lighter ringing:

‘We raise our eyes to Thy high throne.’

As one of all those nameless people

who by the house fronts came to stand,

I listened to the pealing steeple

that sang of my afflicted land.

This speechless gathering, beyond us

the city with Dutch light above –

I’ve never for what’s stolen from us

felt such a bitter, bitter love.

War year 1941

A favourite poem by Erik Menkveld

THE NEW FISH

Already when the specimen was being served

adjoining tables stop the digging

of further trenches in the chestnut purée,

the spading of curled-up lettuce leaves

stagnates, wines linger in lifted glasses:

this fish is not the usual feast

of the deep. A revelation,

hauled it would seem from primordial

waters. Though head and tail-fin gone,

seasoned fishermen blinked back their tears

at the sight of breasts, the rudiments

of limbs. How many species had had to

perish for this peerless creature? Or

in it had their origin? But the time

has come for consumption. Uncertain moment:

the chef was faced with a culinary enigma.

How to prepare what’s never been prepared

and in itself is seemingly complete?

Poach, braise or marinate? Superfluous,

an insult. And what then? Do you keep things

simple with seaweed and slivers on toast

or does this call for a complex brandade

for the more demanding stomach? Raw, unsliced

it became, with ostrich egg and shoveller roulade.

Even the sploshing ice-cube water

halts at the point of pouring.

Then the first elected eater places

the first forkful in his mouth. He chews

in silence and unparalleled abandonment. Then

starts to utter ghastly screams. Revulsion,

ecstasy perhaps? He dances round for minutes,

subsiding into baffled staring. Even

after the babas he can’t speak about it.