Ruben Nilson: 'Fimpen och Tändstickan' in English

'In this town' - poem from 'The Refrain of Other People's Lives' by Arnold Jansen op de Haar

in this town

my books have

remained in exile

a cardboard sarcophagus of data

signed on the inside cover

full of smoke and in storage

the colours faded as those of

badly clad fellow countrymen overseas

like pastry from the right shops

like sunday lunch mother wine

like meeting her in

the middle of town

in unexpected places

like a homeless person who waits for her

on sundays after church

like the mist above the river

or fireworks   clouds

yes evening light

like phoning that you’re safely home

the silence of the city at night

like guts gurgling with bacillophobia

after visits to restaurants

like an aunt laden

with cheap jewellery

put her on four wheels

and simply drive off

like wild leftish nieces

turned bourgeois

who you were secretly in love with

and their absconded husbands

like talking about who

were there before you

like the visiting of the dead

on the anniversaries of their death and

at easter yellow ribbons

on their graves

like the first meeting

with the blond and grey lady

like the searching for a

dog gone astray

like smoking together

in the water meadows

or drawing animals on a

bare back with your salty fingers

or still knowing everything

about all the photos

and continuing to pass it on

to yourself

till you’re just the only one

till someone opens the boxes

Key poem in Frostenson's latest collection

The word’s formulae

I collect rows, I collect sticks, I collect leaves and words

I separate chaff, and sow

In the word language are lag and lug

This is cognisable. E n c o u n t e r  would be the word

Somewhat monotonous and contrary

To derive

etymology is no philosophy, but diverts, diversifies – is amusing

The paths of ants resemble the urge

To write is not to play but pretty close, a playful thought –

writing. Ergo

dance.

To turn on the spot, to swing around, stand on one’s head

one’s forehead earthwards

Stand in the word-lair. Teem on the earth

Root and sniff among words

Drive game out into the light!

Pull up and suckle the consonant root

Poem, as if the word is wrenched half-way. Broken mid-line

That’s not how it should sound. Take forward and

Take to you

Line, the longing to run alongside. Just be carried along

Resistance likewise. Articulate, unruly language

Latin –

Oh how I wish I knew Latin. The most physical of languages

The most tangible. Rods, bars, workings. A box of

tools

Teach me to employ fewer words. Teach me to use the plough

teach me to deploy

the harrow I speak about

– It is a spike harrow, to be precise.

– Fine, we like to be precise. (words from an unknown film)

Frostenson cites Gullberg

Voice grass

Voice grass

The night-given voice

raised you from your bed

the memory maybe of a Gullberg line

for feet astray the grass is singing

a host out there, the weave of dead ones’ voices

as soundless as the growth of grass

I’ll carpet you where’er you go

zkv44

För vilsna fötter sjunger gräset - poem by Hjalmar Gullberg

För vilsna fötter sjunger gräset

För vilsna fötter sjunger gräset

Jag är din matta var du går

Räds ej att natten förestår!

För vilsna fötter sjunger gräset

Under mitt täcke sänks din bår

Räds ej att natten förestår!

För vilsna fötter sjunger gräset

Du går mot hemmet var du går.

For feet astray the grass is singing

For feet astray the grass is singing

I’ll carpet you where’er you go

Fear not the night as if your foe!

For feet astray the grass is singing

Your lowered bier shall rest below.

Fear not the night as if your foe!

For feet astray the grass is singing

You’re homeward bound where’er you go.

Another Frostenson poem: 'Mani / Linjer'

Mania/Lines

Line, the word exerts a pull

the thought of being drawn out to an end

the string wants to be tautened

nerves must be strung, they seek their ache

                                           whirring is the nerves’ song

we are on our way to ending, but – towards

the red strokes of the nerve atlas are so beautiful

many miles of you are within me

if you are unravelled

                                           become a bird formation

we want to burn up in air

we want to be lines

our urge is to be  c o n s u m e d

                                           symmetry would have soul’s breath

                                           symmetry will be my death

Despairing anguish, here you do not belong

in the long

                      grey, languishing thread

how does all become constraint

this mournful control I

have begun to exercise over my being

must be exorcised at all cost

be forced off the stage

                                           disappear

is a gain, to be wholly unequalled

think in slightly holier and happier terms

instead

to go to the utmost is a wonderful duty

to be delighted purely and simply by light

a rare commodity

                                           no the opposite

What is it that sounds of fingers

performing Bach

an infinity

so does it sound, and therefore so harrowing how it just ends

fades away

freezes in the line of Contrapunctus 14

                                                that’s how it was, everything stopped

in mid-breath   grasp the bed-frame

the room’s turned upside-down

                                           in the seconds when you

died

with my hands I grasp an arm

my tears flow and take grief with you

hear that which continues sound

within the body beyond all speech

                                                notes are the bones that sing