Tag: collaborative writing

50

  By

NO VULL ESCRIURE’T

 

Escriure’t poemes a tu és com morir-me

perquè no puc escriure’t sense trobar-te a faltar;

escriure’t lletroles a tu és consumir-me,

quina poca gana de poder-te rimar!

Escriure’t amb veu petita i lletra amarga

-d’eixa tan barata que te solc fer-

no pretén dir que puga ser més llarga

la cremor que em fa no poder-te voler.

Si cap la mort sencera en quatre versos,

un serà eixa boca que no te puc besar;

un altre, els meus dits com deu cucs encesos

que et vetllen de gana de mossegar.

Si cap la vida impresa en un glop d’aire,

vull, vida meua, que em digues que sí:

al teu si és nat el colombaire

que ha de dur les cartes del meu destí.

49

  By

NETEJA

A la merda tots aquells lúbrics

apèndix d’homes anònims

perduts en laberíntics índex

d’existències sense importància

anotats a l’agenda fins que

un dia s’esborren de sobte

i ja no tornes a ser l’àpex

de vida penjant dels seus muscles

carregats de fem i silenci

i profilàctics de marca blanca

sota tauletes de nit llogades

-tres euros cinquanta la capsa-.

 

A la merda tots aquells íntims

girons d’ànima rància

podrint-se per les escletxes

des que un dia la venguérem

i entregàrem a les deesses

de l’inhumanisme indòmit

i el capitalisme salvatge i pútrid

i les calces negres del pràimarc

i eixes manilles incòmodes

a les mans d’aquells xics estúpids

que mai van saber satisfer-me

perquè cap d’ells va aprendre

a lletrejar el meu nom propi

i simplement em deien ‘nena’

-cap d’ells va mostrar ser hàbil

tampoc insuflant alenada-.

 

A la merda, com deia, els fútils

fal·lus ridículs i asèptics

que un dia m’ompliren, tan mísers,

no l’úter sinó la bilis

bombejant-me, pou, amb pobra

vàlvula extractora d’orgasmes,

de llàgrimes, de ràbia amarga

i em deixaren feta un silenci

fins que arribares, llum, per ser Home

i em brollares el somriure

i em poblares l’esperança.

48

  By ,

DAWN WITH CLYMENE

amanecer con climene

I can see the nymph from here in all her glory. Her skin, her clear body, the dawn reflected in her neck. The eternal line of her back, the dimples on her buttocks. The hair loose, flooding the pillow. She, carefree from me and everyone, plays to seem inert in the calm of her rest. She plays to sleep without letting me enter in his dream.

The nymph always turns her back on me. Now, when I try to make love to her; and also when she shows hermetic and unsympathetic to my attempts to drink her lips, or give my eyes to her. She has too many suitors; however, little or much, she ignores them all.

The nymph dawdles on the white canvas of her blankets, draws hills and mountains on the bed and on her body. I look at the bruises on her side. Damn nymph, why don’t you let me love you, why I do not cease to love you, why don’t you keep far of your hips all of those that hurt you, taking your back – your everlasting back now I kiss – and mark on them their gross men fingers, their unconscious kicks. No, nymph, not; can’t you see that they are wearing you out?

In the morning light, the nymph looks incredibly beautiful, mysterious, like a river to plough through or a bunch of stars. Her skin smells like cinnamon and sandalwood; and beyond, like musk and fruit. Like church incense her breasts, which I guess when I crown the top of her neck. And her belly, which smells like bread, as it smells good women bellies.

Perhaps I love the nymph. Only perhaps. Desire is confused with the hatred in such an easy way… How to love her imperturbable back, her unwavering stubbornness, her mysterious coquette woman’s face. How not to love every one of those rays of sun, in order to settle on her skin and penetrate her with sweetness, and warm her heart. How not putting my heart and soul in the attempt to see her smile, determined, in my arms, away from the bruises of all those that should never, never have touched her.

46

  By

Mother

“Víctor.”

“Yes?” he answered mechanically as he tensed; delicate topics could only grow in crescendo.

“If you ever have babies, and one of them is a boy, would you name it Blue?”

“Blue?”

“As a name.”

“But Blue is not a name for a person,” he repeated, feeling himself at the beginning of the conversation again.

“But I like it,” she argued, tenacious, like every time she made a decision she was fully convinced of.

“You like very weird things.”

“Ana is weird and you like her.”

“Ana is weird?” Víctor was surprised, he did not thought his girlfriend had any particular weirdness at all; the fact was that he actually considered her to be excessively ordinary.

“Yes.”

“Wow…” he did not want to ask the nature of such an assertion.

“So, are you going to name your baby Blue?”

“I’ll have to ask Ana.”

“Why?” the girl’s utter surprise tone pleased Víctor.

“The baby’s mother should have an opinion, shouldn’t she?”

“But I don’t want you to have babies with Ana,” Cristina was horrified, she did not know his brother’s girlfriend but she was sure she would not like her, she was not appropriate for him, her brother, her constant and pillar, who deserved more, so much more, someone unique, exceptional, like him; someone absolute.

“Why?”

“I don’t like Ana.”

“You don’t know her. Also, I’m the one who has to like her.”

“Do you love her?”

“I don’t know,” that he had asked himself more than once, but he also did not sense from her any specially stirring behaviour.

“But she’s your girlfriend.”

“Yeah. But that comes with time. Would your rather she wasn’t?”

“Yes. I want you to have a boyfriend named Blue.”

“Well, that’s not going to happen,” he repeated once more.

“Because you like girls.”

“Yes…”

“You’re weird too,” sentenced the girl with a firmer tone than him.

“Well, thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” she articulated while smiling with her mouth full of bread and cheese, not even waiting for the last chunks Víctor had just removed from the fire to cool down.

45

  By

LA MORT QUOTIDIANA

Ha trencat hui l’albada

la mort d’una terra inerta

i la nina desgrana el seu fil:

no ho faces, nina, desperta!

Ja comença a obrir el sol

el caliu de les papallones

i nina abandona el bressol

deixant-hi mortetes rodones.

Nina oblida el que sap

i, conforme obre les parpelles,

el món li arrenca del cap

el que il·luminava amb elles.

Com màgia, així, la convenç

de que ja no paga la pena:

Nina, no veus que eixe llenç

de mort s’ha tornat condemna?

Que li han furtat la paraula,

que li han tancat la boca

i han entrat estranys a casa

a endur-se el que no els pertoca.

I nina, que ho accepta i calla,

no veu que la mort és propera:

El que hui et furten, rialla,

no vindrà amb la primavera.

39

  By

Ever wonder if it’s forever, the moment passes,
but I feel you now, all the way down…

Biffy Clyro “All the Way Down”

We seemed to always be the first ones to rescue each album from the stores. And I say rescue, because none of the shop assistants working at those record stores, no matter how much they loved music, could ever get to treat those little square boxes with the same special care we did.
In fact, we were probably never the first ones. The kind of album that we were looking for, from American or English indie bands, did only reach the shopping center of our village  weeks after its original publication abroad.

It was then that the Barcelona of the late nineties became our little paradise on earth, a paradise with its epicenter in Carrer Tallers, the endless source of the one and only thing that mattered to us in life: music. Stores like Revolver, Discos Castellò or Arise, kept those little gems that we wanted so badly.

The ritual after the release of an album was always the same, but each of the instances became a unique moment, almost as unique as each album. I remember the excitement around the opening of the plastic wrap, inhaling the smell of the paper booklet for the first time, reading the poetry in the lyrics without having heard a song yet. But the real magical moment came with the first listening of the albums opening theme.

“It’s My Job to Keep Punk Rock Elite” of ‘So Long and Thanks for All the Shoes’ by NOFX, “Feticeira” from White Pony Deftones, “Panic”, the ‘Launched’ Beatsteaks, “Glitter and trauma “, from Biffy Clyro’s  album of the same name… the list is endless.

We had a different way of understanding music. We stared at each other without saying a thing – but telling each other everything – while the first notes came out of the huge black speakers in those years. We felt superior to the rest of the world for finding concealed nuances in each song, unveiling clever hidden tricks in the magic of each rhythm, in the mastery of every unexpected change in the tone, in those choruses full of poetry that made our souls explode.

Perhaps someday the time will come when we will realise that we were never that special, that despite what we had always thought, we were no more than simple organisms that are deconstructed with the proper arrangement of notes…

So fragile …

Our soul boiling with every chord, our mind in full swing while deciphering the impossible lyrics of every song.

Those long afternoons lying in bed, the music pounding our eardrums at an insane volume.

And our eyes, lost in a kind of unbelievable trance. Those contained screams camouflaged behind each instrument.

The black rubber flooring of the stage, the yellow light in the tubes. Feeling that the chill that once ran through your skin is still there, endless.

Perhaps someday the time will come when we will realise that we were never that special…

Perhaps…

39

  By

Ever wonder if it’s forever, the moment passes,
but I feel you now, all the way down…

Biffy Clyro “All the Way Down”

Parecíamos ser siempre los primeros en rescatar cada disco de las tiendas. Y digo rescatar, porque ninguno de los dependientes de las tiendas de discos que frecuentábamos, por muy amante de la música que fuera, podía nunca llegar a tratar aquellas pequeñas cajas cuadradas con el mismo cariño que nosotros.

A decir verdad, probablemente nunca fuimos los primeros. El tipo de álbum que perseguíamos, de bandas independientes norteamericanas o inglesas, no llegaba al centro comercial del pueblo hasta semanas después de publicarse en su país de origen.

Era entonces cuando la Barcelona de finales de los noventa se convertía en nuestro pequeño paraíso en la tierra, un paraíso con epicentro en la calle Tallers, la fuente inagotable de lo único que nos importaba en la vida: la música. Tiendas como Revólver, discos Castellò, o Arise, guardaban esas pequeñas joyas que tanto deseábamos conseguir.

El ritual del estreno de un disco era siempre el mismo, pero cada una de las repeticiones se convertía en un momento único, casi tan único como cada disco. Recuerdo los nervios al abrir el envoltorio de plástico, al oler el papel del libreto por primera vez, al leer la poesía en sus letras sin haber escuchado aún las canciones. Pero el verdadero momento mágico llegaba con la primera escucha del tema que abría cada álbum.

“It’s My Job to Keep Punk Rock Elite” del ‘So Long and Thanks for All the Shoes’ de NOFX,  “Feticeira”, del ‘White Pony‘ de Deftones, “Panic”, del ‘Launched‘ de Beatsteaks, “Glitter and Trauma”, del disco bajo el mismo nombre de Biffy Clyro… La lista es infinita.

Teníamos una manera diferente de entender la música. Nos mirábamos sin decirnos nada – diciéndolo todo al mismo tiempo – mientras las primeras notas salían de los enormes altavoces negros de aquellos años. Nos sentíamos superiores al resto del mundo por encontrar matices escondidos en cada tema, astutas triquiñuelas ocultas en la magia de cada ritmo, en la maestría de un inesperado cambio de tono, en aquellos estribillos llenos de poesía que le reventaban a uno el alma.

Quizá llegue el día en el que el tiempo nos demuestre que nunca fuimos tan especiales, que al contrario de lo que siempre habíamos pensado, no éramos más que simples organismos que se desmontan con la configuración de notas adecuada…

Tan frágiles…

El alma hirviendo con cada acorde, la mente en plena efervescencia descifrando letras de canciones imposibles.

Aquellas tardes tumbado en la cama, con la música golpeando nuestros tímpanos, sonando a un volumen demencial.

Y nuestros ojos en blanco, sumidos en una especie de trance inexplicable. Esas ganas de gritar contenidas camufladas tras cada instrumento.

La tarima de goma negra del escenario, la luz amarillenta de las válvulas. Sentir que el escalofrío que una vez recorrió tu piel aún sigue ahí, interminable.

Quizá llegue el día en el que el tiempo nos demuestre que nunca fuimos tan especiales…

Quizá…