Saturday 21 October 2017

A poem by Elly de Waard

https://meandermagazine.net/wp/2017/10/gedichten-400/


THE TWO SCALE PANS

I once heard a wise man
remark (it was
the poet Leo Vroman)
it makes no sense to
spend time bemoaning your fate
since nature knows nothing
of justice whatsoever.

I’d like to put
this more concisely. To
begin with he is quite right.
Although it might well be that
nature knows what is just
in the sense that she strives
for balance. The scales
of Lady Justitia

have for her no
moral values, but rather
the gravity
of the earth and the utter
velocity of light.
She is the weighing process
as it were: she sets aright
but she holds her tongue.

Thursday 19 October 2017

Monday 16 October 2017

Wednesday 11 October 2017

Klaus Høeck's contribution to chess literature - now in English!




       i open with the
king’s pawn (aggressive) and walk
       into the dark and

       the somewhat doubtful
aljechin defence (more
       beautiful than lu

       pins) that is to say
black knight to f6 and my
       serbian oppo

       nent also has at
tack in his thoughts i begin
       my counter-attack


       we follow the main
variant to black knight d
       7 (bent larsen’s

       move against mikhail
tal as dangerous as wild
       roses) it is here

       that the white knight is
to be sacrificed which i
       do as the theory

       advises (but in
correctly then calls the po
       sition unresolved)


       the game now contin
ues with the necessary
       forced moves (into the

       wilderness) to the
decisive fourteenth move that
       is to say the black

       queen from d8 is
moved to a5 (origin
       ally discovered

       by a swede but most
ly accredited to the
       russian bagirov


       after a quiet in
termediate move (deep in
       to the shadows) the

       sword’s blow then falls that
move which i have patiently
       been waiting to car

       ry out in real
ity after lengthy a
       nalyses done at

       home – i now move the
white pawn forward two squares from
       a2 to a4


       two exclamation
marks – for even though the move
       doesn’t look like much

       it gives a win in
all the variants (as is
       often the case) see

       the position in
the appendix and try for
       yourself to find the

       decisive move that
leads to the win before read
       ing the solution


       i have chosen to
incorporate this game in
       the collection here

       because it makes up
my humble contribution
       to chess theory

       and i hope that pre
cisely as a poem it
       will survive in the

       rose-garden of mem
ory a bit longer than
       it otherwise would

Wednesday 4 October 2017