Alan Klaum

The Eternal Truths

 

 

Good ? Bad ? Bad . Good .

Eternal truths caught in a changing world changing .

Stuck like food to the bottom of a greaseless frying pan

And the backs of changing seasons , shadings prophets , critics changing .

Changing

with the oscillations of flower border in a public garden

wrapped around the world going blind with nausea

euphoria

nausea

Bad ? Good ? Good . Bad .

Eternal truths in a changing world

Eternally changing .

 

The Illusion

 

 

The bitch goddess Love :

Buddhist illussion.

A man's creation to still his loneliness with you

Like rain on the desert sands -

Ephemeral , gone , never really touched or felt -

A strange hunger gnawing

Unnourished need .

Bruised by the touch of kindness

The suffering of tolerance

And the silent deafening incommunication .

Around him an invisible prison built while rationality looked the other way .

 

The first seeds of the man's erosion were planted

Like brain-washing :

Undetected , then too late to stop .

The emotion complete , suffused

Then abruptly strangled by the reality of unloving .

Buddhist illusion .

 

 

 

 

Desert Wind

 

 

Smell of a sleepless night

Salty heat

Strangling darkness and the beast's breath .

The desert khamseen

Of tortured spirits

(Fifty cursed nights of the Pharoahs)

Exploding in white sperm

On the city's wilted sheets .

Short-lived marauder

Blowing on Phoenician shores .

 

 

 

 

Beirut Evening

 

 

 

The faint halo of the moon

Hugs it's silver crescent

Over the sea's dark bed

Where the sun slumbers

Under apricot sheets

Exhausted by her lover's play .

The city's pastel sculptures

Hide away , embarrassed

Into silent , muted toys

To listen to the games of children

And a muezzin's voice

Ending the orgy of the day .

 

 

 

 

The Thief

 

 

The splendor of the moon i stole

To use another day .

It hung too long unnoticed

Above the shallows of the bay .

 

I took it through the city .

I heard her sleeping breath .

Darkened peace . Oblivious .

Disinterestedness .

 

Perhaps when dreams rise higher

Someday , but only then ,

I will clinb up through the city

And put it back again .

 

 

 

 

Onomatopeia , USA

 

 

I got in bed with a Negro

hoping to find Baldwin

before my jewishness

Americanized me with circumcision .

 

I coudn't understand why God

gave semetic noses to Indians

they kept on reservations

and not to Anglo-Saxons

 

Living in urban ghettos .

"Why pick on me ?" I bellowed

To God who died searching

for his long lost son , Jesus Christ .

 

"Let's have a little racial stimulatiom

to get some olive skins

into the brine , "he thundered back

watching the Black Muslims

 

Counting noses and circumcized  you-know-whats .

"Maybe we can flost a bond issue in the Arab world

for Black Power . They'd never know

it isn't a utility company,"

 

I ventured meekly , "Along with increased exports !"

God screamed ecstatically . Why we'd stem

the tourist flood from those flooded deltas

on which they pray !

 

What a dandy idea , "he chuckled in reflection .

"Wake me up when it's over . "He strummed

his semetic nose at me , turned over

and fell asleep .