AN EVENING IN DANTE'S PARLOUR by Klaus J. Gerken (1974) I There are shadows that are like the wind Strong and quiet, gathering strength and power over the oceans of our thoughts We dwell in shadows and we sing to them We are born and die in shadows never seeing the sunlight There are shadows that are weak There are shadows that even speak to us when we listen long enough These shadows that speak are the most powerful of all They substitute themselves in our place and guide the atmosphere around us Like a monk dressed in bright habit In habiting the darkness - shadows are like this music of the spheres. II She is born out of the morass of lava guided by a volcano - she envelopes us like a lava envelopes a town bringing gifts of destruction. She is only hope give of lies - deceiver of the truth she is the friendship turned to hate - love that always comes too late. She returns to us from the sky she is born to and out of everyone we do not know and fear - she is not a mere woman she is god herself. III Virgil showed Dante what constitutes cruelty Dante admired the spheres Virgil admired God for putting him where he was. Is it only God we trust Is it only God who trusts us not? IV "One begets purity through filth" Does this also mean that one begets filth through purity? V Small wonder we ponder what we do not know So little so brittle all we are is what we know... VI She has all the beauty of a hawk and the power too. She makes love like hot lava flowing through the countryside. She wears black silk and with red hair and minxed smile assaults the midnight city with her sex. No one can resist. She is like a siren singing. Every man should be so lucky as Ulysses to escape her wrath. But men give themselves gladly for tongue-taste of her. Hell bent on destruction and there is a gleam in her eye. A tear of loneliness that no one can dispel. She is a huntress - a domestic cat killing for the sheer joy of it and not the hunger. VIII Mystery she is but not so to be lost. she is a Cyprus virgin drawing water from the well - dark eyes reflecting nothing like the black hate through which infinity passes. she could have many lovers but like a phantom she is condemned to be alone wanting. No one knows where she has come from. she does not give away secrets. she gives away nothing not even herself. I would gladly drown in her arms if she would let me. X Lost IX 1. Dark days of winter have begun Dark clouds hide the sun Joy is gone from peoples' faces Nothing, even hope, graces them; and even I and cast despairingly in misery. 2. My lady, she has gone Without her I cannot go on I cannot find her anywhere It's just no good, she is not here I look across the winter wastes and tell a messenger, "Make haste." 3. Take this message any place Where they might have gazed upon her face And tell her if you find he please to ease my mind - She does not need return Jus ask her why she must spurn 4. me so - I sit here night and day I get no sleep but only fight here with myself to pacify my empty soul and rectify the intolerance here in my heart - hard to do, when we're apart. 5. So everything is bound to this that if the woman will resist my begging of her to get me out of this - I do not know what next I'll do - It's hard through indecision to find truth. XII Looking over all the poems came before I find that nothing matters in them anymore - I change, everything changes. The poems are only an attempt at an eternity - we are finite we change - eternity does not. XIII It always comes down to this The woman seated in the corner of a restaurant with another man is always the woman that you want but cannot have. Jealousy is a terrible affliction. A poem may speak of love but jealousy writes it. XIV Lost XV No one comes here the night is quiet as a virgin weeping Snow curls outside and as you fill your glass of blood red wine you spot out of the corner of your eye a speck of light creeping through the window and the clouds It is a powerful star and is brought to you by the infinite arrangement of a universal holocaust. XVI What is this thing called reality? and how does it compare to imagination? we hear a song which makes us feel good and gives us a sense of security and engraves upon our minds a scene which we ourselves would love to be the players of. and yet how can we capture reality so felting, so intangible? "Reality is not captures It captures you." XVII Lost XVIII The mood is broken The songs no longer please The wine is turned to vinegar The darkness only hurts the eyes And the hollow wind plays cruel tricks on you making you believe that, of course, the outside world will in the end turn out to be the victor. It has always been that way Hurled through space we are an island on an island on an island in infinity within the confines of our collective mind. XIX You stand on a desolate beach overlooking the north sea and dreaming of mermaids... Mermaids they tell you do not exist, but you have seen them and know better... They have come to you at night when the sea was still and you waited up for them But that was long ago - You seldom see them now... Disbelief has driven them away. XX Consider this that if the different civilizations had not disagreed so much all the town and cities would have been alike and everyone, everywhere the same. Art itself would never have progressed from one point to another Empires would never have crumbled and rebuilt And there would almost been no need for history. XXI This is our hope, that some day we will see flowers bloom where there are no flowers now and see smiles on the faces of children when they realize that nothing can be settled through fear, destruction, or hate... XXII The window in my room faces east so that the sun only shines into the room early in the morning and even then it is not very bright or warm - To the south there is a wall... I cannot see the sun for the rest of the day - This is to explain the dark moods The empty caverns that I write about. XXIII One of them rises to explain that really things are not the same - that the cycle of events is frustrated and all the paper cups don't hold enough whiskey for a man to get drunk on - Just the same, he says the hypostasis I put forth is not a fantastic one - It is hopeful insomuch as beautiful women sleep with ugly men - and the child is crust between the two... XXIV Aqua sky and green apples on the table late afternoon empty feeling sipping some Napoleon brandy to get warm it's the poems of another age one reads with uncertainty almost hate - It's a lot of things... the sky turn dark as the day wears on the apples are eaten and the table is converted into a desk for writing for the process of an institution unfavorable in the eyes of god -- (A butcher's blade upon the page cutting words with cutting hate...) XXV Returning, moment through moment, to this and then to that. Sun reflects through mirror brightly in one's eyes. One has read a poem one likes and written a better one. That, my friends, is gratification of the senses. XXVI Nearing New Year one looks at the past with a tincture of sadness -- salt of tears, -- thinking, how marvelous it might have been! XXVII There is power in darkness The power of mystery It vibrates in the night like the radium sun does in the day. It shapes the way we sleep love It shapes our thoughts with which we form the basis of our dreams. Our dreams are very important Through them we see what we have been and shall become in another world. A world which is not governed by laws as we might know -- but the laws of possibilities. XXVIII Lost XXIX Every now and then one writes words that do not last; other people take them as the truth. People change you tell them but they do not believe you. Your past will always catch up to you... Your future too. XXX Bitter taste of Spanish wine is like bitter taste of good love - giving yourself up to a woman to mend is the greatest giving - the taking of her ridicule freezes you - violence is only this: that all we are we are nothing once we understand this there is nothing left for us as lovers or as anything. XXXI It is so close to the new year - why do people argue why do people fight? XXXII - XXXIII Lost XXXIV I haven't got a desk lamp I've broken the one I had It's dark at this desk It's hard to see the words I've got some music on the stereo The music overwhelms me I want to get lost in everything It doesn't matter what I want to crawl under the blankets or hide myself in the tree house I never managed to build when I was young o my youth o my youth why and when have I lost you before I ever had a chance to understand you better! XXXV STOIC "I, a slave?" to whom am I a slave? to woman, to god, to the music warms my ugly mood and pacifies me? I've come this far, might as well go farther. I've nothing much to lose. So much depends upon the silence that there's little I should do to disturb it. "I've deprived myself of much." of course, who could live alone and not do that? The books I never read keep me company. And even they have nothing much to say. The empty page keeps me guessing, what shall I write, what shall I do? Shall I strike a blow for freedom? How can I do that when I even have deprived myself of that? These faces I see on the street happy sad or so afraid they just go their way, never caring for the likes of me. I wouldn't want them to. Whatever I confess I would only want to confess to myself. Others would never understand. In this divine accident there is no purpose. I keep thinking that there is; yet no matter how hard I try it's hard to find it. A glass of red wine before me: I know I drink too much; how else do you think I write so much that is of no consequence? I'd hire an editor and tell this editor to publish my tears that never seem to come. If that made any difference. Art is art. . . . Look now, at me, now. Look, a broken man half trying valiantly to smile. Perhaps this languor will erase the last need of friendship, love. I remain as I am. I remain a slave. A slave of no one but myself. Another empty page. XXXVI Tonight my hear is heavy Why do people fight? My heart's sunk deep and empty Everything is nothing, even day is night. I sit here drinking wine Listening to sad music Sometimes I just want to cry Everything is nothing, all this makes me sick. To hell with this Confounded universe All this is amiss Like a curse! And so there's nothing Wanting's all that's left Perhaps dawn's breaking will put right this rift. Dec 1974 Copyright (c) 1974 Klaus J. Gerken Published by Ygdrasil Press