Berichten van 18 juli 2018 tot 19 juli 2018

 

Dolce far niente

 

 
Zomermorgen door Sergey Lutsenko, 2016

 

 

Summer Morning

How beautiful the morning,
When summer days are long;
O, we will rise betimes and hear
The wild-bird's happy song--
For when the sun pours down his ray
The bird will cease to sing;
She'll seek the cool and silent shade,
And sit with folded wing.

Up in the morning early--
'Tis Nature's gayest hour!
There's pearls of dew upon the grass
And fragrance on the flower.
Up in the morning early,
And we will bound abroad,
And fill our hearts with melody,
And raise our songs to God.

 

 
Sarah Josepha Hale (24 oktober 1788 – 30 april 1879)
Newport, New Hampshire, de geboorteplaats van Sarah Josepha Hale

 

 

De Nederlandse dichteres en schrijfster Anna Enquist werd geboren op 19 juli 1945 in Amsterdam als Christa Boer. Zie ook alle tags voor Anna Enquist op dit blog.

 

Mijn zoon

Mijn zoon stormt door het huis,
een roffel op de trap. Hij is
zichzelf een motor. Het lied
dat in hem leeft ontsnapt hem
soms. Ik hoor hem zingen
op de gang en zwijg.

's Nachts is hij bang, hij twijfelt
aan zichzelf, aan ons, de wereld.
Ik neem hem in mijn arm
en zonder spreken vaag ik
de oorlog weg en kinderkanker,
mijn eigen dood, het monster van de tijd.

Ik lieg hem voor en red hem
tot wij beiden slapen in gestolen veiligheid.

 

 

Winterwerk

De sarabande spelen op de vrieskoude
deel. De uilen hebben het klavier onder-
gescheten. Stom staan de dingen
van de zomer om je heen, strohoed,
trompet. Omhoog die bovenstem, waar
vogels schuilen op de balk, en dan omlaag.

Vertraag het lied, houd in totdat bloed
stolt en adem stokt. Kan zij nu gaan?
Doorspelen. In de bas orgelt een toon
die alle tegenstemmen op zal zuigen.
Hollen of stilstaan - maakt niet uit,
je hamert hoorbaar op het einde aan.

Niet meer dan vilt op staal, lucht
die uittrilt tot stilte. Slechts een dag
in de gestage rij van dagen.

 

 

Conversatie met de kinderen

Aan tafel gaat het over
wreed. Dat je een lied zingt
waar de ander van moet huilen,
en dat je dat wéét, zeggen zij
zwaaiend met hun lepels. Zeker.

Of met een licht de trage
zwarte kreeften lokt. Jij
in de boot. De dieren spoeden
zich, kunnen niet anders doen
dan ijlen naar wat trillend
fonkelt achter raster dood.

Het ergste is de dolkstoot,
vinden zij. Dat iets geheels en
gaafs zo onverhoeds wordt aangetast
en voortaan niet meer zelf is
maar in binding met het wapen
dat zich toegang eist, en breekt, en krast.

Ontroerd, geobsedeerd, verwond
hoor ik hoe zij het wapentuig
van liefde argeloos als wreed
benoemen. Zonder aarzeling.
Boven de soep houd ik mijn mond.

(Schumann, Kinderszenen, opus 15)

 

 
Anna Enquist (Amsterdam, 19 juli 1945)

 

 

De Franse schrijver Laurent Binet werd geboren in Parijs op 19 juli 1972. Zie ook alle tags voor Laurent Binet op dit blog.

Uit:La septième fonction du langage

“Au Flore, à côté d’une petite bonne femme blonde, ils aperçoivent un homme qui louche derrière de grosses lunettes, il a l’air souffreteux et sa tête de grenouille dit vaguement quelque chose à Bayard, mais ce n’est pas pour lui qu’ils sont là. Bayard repère les hommes de moins de trente ans et va les aborder. La plupart sont des gigolos qui draguent dans le secteur. Est-ce qu’ils connaissaient Barthes ? Tous. Bayard les interroge un par un tandis que Simon Herzog surveille Sartre du coin de l’œil : il n’a pas l’air en forme du tout, il n’arrête pas de tousser en tirant sur sa cigarette. Françoise Sagan lui tapote le dos avec sollicitude. Le dernier à avoir vu Barthes est un jeune Marocain : le grand critique était en pourparler avec un nouveau, il ne connaît pas son nom, ils sont partis ensemble l’autre jour, il ne sait pas ce qu’ils ont fait ni où ils sont allés ni où il habite mais il sait où on peut le trouver, ce soir : aux Bains Diderot, c’est un sauna, à Gare de Lyon. « Un sauna ? » s’étonne Simon Herzog, quand surgit un énergumène en écharpe qui lance à la cantonade : « Regardez-moi ces gueules ! Elles n’en ont plus pour longtemps ! En vérité, je vous le dis : un bourgeois doit régner ou mourir ! Buvez ! Buvez votre Fernet à la santé de votre société ! Profitez, profitez ! Chassez ! Périclitez ! Vive Bokassa ! » Quelques conversations s’interrompent, les habitués observent le nouveau venu d’un œil morne, les touristes essaient de profiter de l’attraction sans bien comprendre de quoi il s’agit, mais les serveurs continuent à servir comme si de rien n’était. Son bras balaie la salle d’un geste théâtral outré et, s’adressant à un interlocuteur imaginaire, le prophète à écharpe s’exclame sur un ton victorieux : « Pas la peine de courir, camarade, le vieux monde est devant toi !
(…)

Quand Jacques Bayard arrive devant la chambre, il découvre une queue de plusieurs mètres dans le couloir. Tous attendent pour rendre visite à l’accidenté. Il y a des vieux bien habillés, des jeunes mal habillés, des vieux mal habillés, des jeunes bien habillés, des styles très variés, des cheveux longs et des cheveux courts, des individus de type maghrébin, plus d’hommes que de femmes. En attendant leur tour, ils discutent entre eux, parlent fort, s’engueulent ou lisent un livre, fument une cigarette. Bayard, qui n’a pas encore bien pris la mesure de la célébrité de Barthes, doit vraisemblablement se demander ce que c’est que ce bordel. Usant de ses prérogatives, il passe devant la queue, dit « Police » et entre dans la chambre."

 

 
Laurent Binet (Parijs, 19 juli 1972)

 

 

De Zweeds – Palestijnse dichter, toneelschrijver, journalist en literair criticus Ghayath Almadhoun werd geboren op 19 juli 1979 in Damascus. Zie ook alle tags voor Ghayath Almadhoun op dit blog.

 

For Damascus

This summer seeping through the fractures
of Damascus is killing me. I creep like rust
on the doors of this prison, now turned
into a museum. I sit in a cafe
frightened and shrinking on days
when money is scarce, and laughing loudly
on days when my shifty pockets are full.
Damascus is my cracked home, and
Kasyon is what I grieve. I sprawl
in the evening like horns of cars
and carts of broad beans. Strangers and
tourists take to me. I am fenceless, any
joy that betrays me, returns
in sorrow to my laughing face. I
am a weird blend; my face mirrors
the wretched and the shopfront displays.
My body is fields of burning
wheat and my tongue scolds like a shoe.
The policeman, the teacher and
the mysterious man stare at me, so I sadly
laugh, and they joyfully cry. Damascus
is mine, and I will not share my bed with
anyone other than the wicked and
the whores. I am the descending ladder
to high pits and the footsteps of thieves
on the sand. My body is a departure
motel and my words are tiny gospels that
the prophets had lost, so the prodigal sons
embraced them. Therefore, I will toss the crumbs
to birds on barbed wire, and I will castrate
glory on asphalt. This is what they taught us
in public schools, before they let us off
like rabbits to chew the grass
of submission. I said to you that I will not
allow anyone to sneak in and peek at Damascus
as she bathes alone, her small
breasts timidly uncovered, I will not
let you
in.

 

Vertaald door Zeina Issa

 

 
Ghayath Almadhoun (Damascus, 19 juli 1979)

 

 

De Franse schrijver en filosoof Jean-Pierre Faye werd geboren in Parijs op 19 juli 1925. Zie ook alle tags voor Jean-Pierre Faye op dit blog.

 

Le visage qui va

Le visage qui va
voir, est aussi regardé
juste avant qu’il ne lève
les yeux au-devant, et ne soit traversé
- maintenant il est juste
moulé dans la lumière, modelé
du dehors, caressé
le long du cou, de la hanche
et des reins, jusqu’à la confluence
des jambes et du ventre
et jusqu’où il est ventre et corps
mais lève les yeux, ouvre
ce trou dans la distance, le long
des murs chauds ici, rouges
délabrés, marqués de joints écaillés
et jusqu’au fond et aux arbres
au chemin de son, passé et crissé
à peine prenable, ici
elle, confondue
peu à peu avec les murs
assise, fondue dans le ciment
et les grandes écailles tracées et détachées
écoutant longtemps et voyant
appuyée au revers de main, et
ne cessant pas de rester et d’être
durable et dessinée

 

 
Jean-Pierre Faye (Parijs, 19 July 1925)

 

 

De Zuidafrikaanse dichter Lucas Cornelis Malan werd geboren in Nylstroom op 19 juli 1946. Zie ook alle tags voor Lucas Malan op dit blog.

 

In Camera 1

Ensconced in Duchess Court she managed to retain
some antique furniture and a precarious dignity:
and after fifty years as midwife also the knack
of charming people. Here she preserves photographs,
old journals and her pain in specific detail.
The Royal Albert tea service (picked out
at Anstey’s as a bride) she uses only
for teas such as this – and all the snacks I made myself.
Now, this is the lounge where we will have our tea.

But let me show you something at the back
– please excuse the mess round here, I am
a dressmaker too, you know – designer stuff –
the place gets terribly untidy; and then, of course
Lindy’s always underfoot. Sit down! Now sit!
She gets so worked up, you see. And this gate
I had installed for my security. But just take a look
out there: You can almost see eternity. Now,
have you ever seen a view like that?

This gown I made for Marguerite. She came
round here this morning – Miss South Africa of ’68.
Never married, do you know? And still
as beautiful, although she’s put on weight.
Poor girl. I wonder, though . . . Oh, never mind,
that’s, after all, the way things go. Now come,
let’s have some tea. Do you know this? Earl Grey,
which Gavin brings from London, always fresh.
He’s with SAA, a gentleman and very kind –

The sun is shifting, she makes more tea. We speak
of this and that: My husband died in ’83, how sad
for me who had no kith or kin. But then, you see,
the Lord provides: my tiny Lindy here
is like a child and always such a joy. But what
is to become of her if I – She speaks, and all the while
the light around us fades. It’s getting late,
she notes, but don’t go yet! You have to see
the view at night. I go along with her to look:

Like a sea the city lies, incandescently inflamed
in outgrowths round the core, the outskirts –
like a nocuous yellow flicker along the seam
dividing elite and deprived neighbourhoods:
a Milky Way torn off by gravity. This is a place
of people, of passion and loneliness. She looks:
You know what this reminds me of? I listen
and then leave. But embedded in that metaphor
(a cemetery alight) I see an old placenta
splayed out – black and terminal with blight.

 

Vertaald door Charl J.F. Cilliers en Lucas Malan

 

 
Lucas Malan (19 juli 1946 – 15 april 2010)
De NH kerk in Nylstroom

 

 

De Indiase dichter en schrijver Dominic Francis Moraes werd geboren op 19 juli 1938 in Bandra. Zie ook alle tags voor Dom Moreas op dit blog.

 

KANHERI CAVES

Over these blunted, these tormented hills,
Hawks hail and wheel, toboggan down the sky.
It seems this green ambiguous landscape tilts
And teeters the perspective of the eye.
Only two centuries after Christ, this cliff
Was colonised by a mild antique race
Who left us, like a faded photograph,
Their memories that dry up in this place.

They left no ghosts. The rock alone endures.
The drains and cisterns work, but wrecked the stairs;
Blocks are fallen: sunlight cracks those floors,
And fidgets in a courtyard where a pair
Of giant Buddhas smile and wait their crash.
Then temples, audience-halls, a lonely tomb.
I touch its side. The stone's worn smooth as flesh.
A stranger dangles peaceful in that womb.

Worm he will be, if born: blink in the sun.
I'll crawl into his dark; perhaps he'll climb
Beyond the trippers to the final stone
Flat of the hillock, there to grow in Time.
Dry pubic ferns prickle the bitter sand.
Hawks in a hot concentric ecstasy
Of flight and shriek will wake his vision.
And When the clouds lift, he'll glimpse the miles-off sea

 

 
Dom Moraes (19 juli 1938 – 2 juni 2004)

 

 

De Griekse dichter Miltos Sachtouris of Miltos Sahtouris werd geboren in Athene op 19 juli 1919. Zie ook alle tags voor Miltos Sachtouris op dit blog.

 

The Poet's Head

I cut off my head
I put it on a plate
and took it to my doctor

— There's nothing wrong, he said,
it's just overheated
throw it in the river and we'll see

I threw it in the river with the frogs
and it raised a dreadful racket
it started shrieking and howling
all kinds of strange songs

I picked it up and put it back on my neck

and roamed the streets in a rage

with a poet's green hexagonometric head

 

For Spring

The sun is green
the trees are burning
awaiting the swallows
our iron swallows' nests
no longer fool us with their flowers
they cost us our arms and legs
now our arms and legs are hanging
from the trees

 

Vertaald door Karen Emmerich

 

 
Miltos Sachtouris (19 juli 1919 – 29 maart 2005)
Athene

 

 

Zie voor nog meer schrijvers van de 19^e juli ook mijn blog van 19 juli 2017 en ook mijn blog van 19 juli 2015 deel 1 en eveneens deel 2.

 

Dolce far niente

 

 
Bryant Park Reading Room door Peter Salwen, 2014

 

 

In The Park

Sitting on the grass
in the park—thinking about
what's going by, about
the pinks and plenary reds

of today's sunset.
Insects rampant as ions
off charged wires nipping,
tingling my legs.

Those buildings are like
bottles of scent fragile
in their lemon spray
mist and cologne light.

The harbour's becoming
dark against the chromocosm
of the moon adrift
under the stars.

A gull squeaks—it's
the sound of a pin
piercing polystyrene—it
carries out to the yachtmasts

moving mechanically
as wiper-bars, out to
the Opera House a duster
of starched serviettes.

Now, out to the suburbs,
those racks and racks
of tinted light
rising behind the trees.

 

 
Judith Beveridge (Londen, 1956)
Hydepark in een zomers Londen

 

 

De Nederlandse dichter en schrijver Simon Vinkenoog werd op 18 juli 1928 in Amsterdam geboren. Zie ook alle tags voor Simon Vinkenoog op dit blog.

 

Robert

dit kan mijn geboorte nog niet zijn
dit is het leven van een ander -
het slaan van mijn hart is geen bewijs
en mijn mond is nog gesloten

dit is het bloeden van een rose keel
het woord dat de eerste daad verlamt
de hand die op mijn mond gelegd
aarzelend de gedichten zegt
waarin mijn vloeken
huizen naar beneden halen

dan sloop ik deze negenmaandse muur
waarop mijn vingers langzaam
het mene mene tekel schrijven

 

 

Groet

In de pijnkamer van onthechting
overgave deint en dreint

alles weten om niets te weten
lessen vergeten alles opnieuw
van te voren

kleine roofridder
hard als staal

adieu

 

 

Thelonious Monk

dit is een straat van parijs
met een arabier in de zon
die langzaam slenterend werkloos
loopt te zijn een 1951-noordafrikaan
ting ting ting in de bleke zon
zonder geluid

dit onder water uitgesproken
vonnis ting ting ting
ternauwernood de oppervlakte rakend
en met een strofe in de franse taal:
je donnerais ma vie
toute entière
pour un petit rire confus et obscène
herinnert aan de dierentuinapen
met mondbekken harige benen
en ronde gladde achterhanden
die gretig alle kleuren willen grijpen wit en zwart
ting ting ting

 

 
Simon Vinkenoog (18 juli 1928 – 12 juli 2009)

 

 

De Amerikaanse schrijver en journalist Hunter Stockton Thompson werd geboren in Louisville (Kentucky). op 18 juli 1937. Zie ook alle tags voor Hunter S. Thompson op dit blog.

Uit: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

“The only thing that really worried me was the ether. There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge. And I knew we’d get into that rotten stuff pretty soon. Probably at the next gas station. We had sampled almost everything else, and now – yes, it was time for a long snort of ether. And then do the next 100 miles in a horrible, slobbering sort of spastic stupor. The only way to keep alert on ether is to do up a lot of amyls – not all at once, but steadily, just enough to maintain the focus at 90 miles an hour through Barstow.
“Man, this is the way to travel,” said my attorney. He leaned over to turn the volume up on the radio, humming along with the rhythm section and kind of moaning the words: “One toke over the line … Sweet Jesus … One toke over the line …”
One toke? You poor fool! Wait till you see those goddamn bats. I could barely hear the radio … slumped over on the far side of the seat, grappling with a tape recorder turned all the way up on “Sympathy for the Devil.” That was the only tape we had, so we played it constantly, over and over, as a kind of demented counterpoint to the radio. And also to maintain our rhythm on the road. A constant speed is good for gas mileage – and for some reason that seemed important at the time. Indeed. On a trip like this one must be careful about gas consumption. Avoid those quick bursts of acceleration that drag blood to the back of the brain.
My attorney saw the hitchhiker long before I did. “Let’s give this boy a lift,” he said, and before I could mount any argument he was stopped and this poor Okie kid was running up to the car with a big grin on his face, saying, “Hot damn! I never rode in a convertible before!”
“Is that right?” I said. “Well, I guess you’re about ready, eh?”
The kid nodded eagerly as we roared off.
“We’re your friends,” said my attorney. “We’re not like the others.”
O Christ, I thought, he’s gone around the bend. “No more of that talk,” I said sharply. “Or I’ll put the leeches on you.” He grinned, seeming to understand. Luckily, the noise in the car was so awful – between the wind and the radio and the tape machine – that the kid in the back seat couldn’t hear a word we were saying. Or could he?”

 
Hunter S. Thompson (18 juli 1937 – 20 februari 2005)

 

 

De Duitse dichter en schrijver Steffen Popp werd geboren op 18 juli 1978 in Greifswald. Zie ook alle tags voor Steffen Popp op dit blog.

 

Dickicht mit Reden und Augen

Möglichkeit und Methode überschneiden sich
ein kühner Satz bricht sich im Wald, fortan er hinkt

kein Sprung ins Dickicht dringt, kein Huf hinaus
kein ausrangiertes Fahrrad betet hier um Ruh
kein altes Lama spuckt, kein junges auch

sie hängen in den Tag, in Baumschaukeln
kein Baum, genau besehen, keine Schaukel, nicht mal
ein sie, nur hängen, Tag

Reden, durch nichts gedeckt, doch lebhaft
Lebewesen fast in einem Dickicht
hängend, hinkend eine, darum nicht weniger wahr
nicht wahr, nicht weniger, nicht – ungerührt

schaukeln oder grasen zur Pflege der Landschaft
oder stehen nur in ihr, schauen herüber mit Augen.

 

 

Betonstufen, die Meere

Bewegung (Luft), Meerfarbe (grün), ein Igel (die Technik eines Coyoten
ihn auf den Rücken zu drehen) – dein Herz, der nahe Hafen
dehnt sich an seinen Schlafkanten. Futter in Säcken, Munitionskisten
der gespaltene Huf eines Esels im Brackwasser –

das Meer zeigt dir Ufer (die Grenzen), du schläfst in deinen Staaten
es gibt Geheimzeichen, Türme (auf See blickend), Flugabwehr
Ingenieure mit Fliegerkappen – du zählst sie an Stränden, es sind Gelenke
und sie verbinden dich (wie eine Schrift) mit allen Dingen.

 

 
Steffen Popp (Greifswald, 18 juli 1978)
In 2013 

 

 

De Noorse schrijver Per Petterson werd geboren in Oslo op 18 juli 1952. Zie ook alle tags voor Per Petterson op dit blog.

Uit: Out Stealing Horses (Vertaald door Anne Born Picador)

„Early November. It’s nine o’clock. The titmice are banging against the window. Sometimes they fly dizzily off after the impact, other times they fall and lie struggling in the new snow until they can take off again. I don’t know what they want that I have. I look out the window at the forest. There is a reddish light over the trees by the lake. It is starting to blow. I can see the shape of the wind on the water.
I live here now, in a small house in the far east of Norway. A river flows into the lake. It is not much of a river, and it gets shallow in the summer, but in the spring and autumn it runs briskly, and there are trout in it. I have caught some myself. The mouth of the river is only a hundred metres from here. I can just see it from my kitchen window once the birch leaves have fallen. As now in November. There is a cottage down by the river that I can see when its lights are on if I go out onto my doorstep.  A man lives there. He is older than I am, I think. Or he seems to be. But perhaps that’s because I do not realise what I look like myself, or life has been tougher for him than it has been for me. I cannot rule that out. He has a dog, a border collie.
I have a bird table on a pole a little way out in my yard. When it is getting light in the morning I sit at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee and watch them come fluttering in. I have seen eight different species so far, which is more than anywhere else I have lived, but only the titmice fly into the window. I have lived in many places. Now I am here. When the light comes I have been awake for several hours. Stoked the fire. Walked around, read yesterday’s paper, washed yesterday’s dishes, there were not many. Listened to the B.B.C. I keep the radio on most of the day. I listen to the news, cannot break that habit, but I do not know what to make of it any more. They say sixty-seven is no age, not nowadays, and it does not feel it either, I feel pretty spry. But when I listen to the news it no longer has the same place in my life. It does not affect my view of the world as once it did. Maybe there is something wrong with the news, the way it is reported, maybe there’s too much of it. The good thing about the B.B.C.’s World Service, which is broadcast early in the morning, is that everything sounds foreign, that nothing is said about Norway, and that I can get updated on the position of countries like Jamaica, Pakistan, India and Sri Lanka in a sport such as cricket; a game I have never seen played and never will see, if I have a say in the matter. But what I have noticed is that ‘The Motherland’, England, is constantly being beaten. That’s always something.”

 

 
Per Petterson (Oslo, 18 juli 1952)

 

 

De Amerikaanse schrijfster en essayiste Elizabeth M. Gilbert werd geboren op 18 juli 1969 in Waterbury, Connecticut. Zie ook alle tags voor Elizabeth Gilbert op dit blog.

Uit: Big Magic

“When I talk about ‘creative living’ here, please understand that I am not necessarily talking about pursuing a life that is professionally or exclusively devoted to the arts. I’m not saying that you must become a poet who lives on a mountaintop in Greece, or that you must perform at Carnegie Hall, or that you must win the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival. (Though if you want to attempt any of these feats, by all means, have at it. I love watching people swing for the Bleachers.) No, when I refer to ‘creative living’ I am speaking more broadly. I’m talking about living a life that is driven more strongly by curiosity than by fear.
One of the coolest examples of creative living that I’ve seen in recent years, for instance, came from my friend Susan, who took up figure skating when she was forty years old. To be more precise, she actually already knew how to skate. She had competed in figure skating as a child and had always loved it, but she’d quit the sport during adolescence when it became clear she didn’t have quite enough talent to be a champion. (Ah, lovely adolescence when the ‘talented’ are officially shunted off from the herd, thus putting the total burden of society’s creative dreams on the thin shoulders of a few select souls, while condemning everyone else to live a more commonplace, inspiration-free existence! What a system...)
For the next quarter of a century, my friend Susan did not skate. Why bother, if you can’t be the best? Then she turned forty. She was listless. She was restless. She felt drab and heavy. She did a little soul-searching, the way one does on the big birthdays. She asked herself when was the last time she’d felt truly light, joyous, and – yes – creative in her own skin. To her shock, she realised that it had been decades since she’d felt that way. In fact, the last time she’d experienced such feelings had been as a teenager, back when she was still figure skating. She was appalled to discover that she had denied herself this life-affirming pursuit for so long, and she was curious to see if she still loved it.“

 

 
Elizabeth Gilbert (Waterbury, 18 juli 1969)

 

 

De Argentijnse schrijfster en vertaalster Alicia Steimberg werd geboren op 18 juli 1933 in Buenos Aires. Zie ook alle tags voor Alicia Steinberg op dit blog.

Uit: Call Me Magdalena

"They were helping themselves from all the dishes and trays, and they left everything a mess. They were playing with a little rubber ball, and suddenly one of them missed the mark and the ball fell into Enrique's cup, and to top it all off he was dressed in a white shirt and blue tie at the time?' "My God" "But nothing bothered us after the first bite of that crisp toast with butter and homemade duke de leche. And right after that a good cup of excellent coffee" "With milk?" "Yes, it was already mixed with the milk, in an enormous coffee pot?' "Just like in those old-fashioned hotels" "Everything was old-fashioned in that house. Even the kitchen helper, who was white and chubby, with a blue dress and apron and white slippers, with freckles on her arms and chest. She was the one who knew how to make a cocktail with port and a beaten egg" "What's it like?" "You have to go get the eggs from the henhouse and use them while they're still warm. You separate the whites from the yolks. You can reserve the whites to make meringue. You beat the yolks with sugar until they take on a whitish color, and you add the port drop by drop, beating all the while. That woman beats egg yolks with sugar and port all day long?'
"Now let's have breakfast in Mar del Plata, as you suggested?' "This isn't the same place where we always go?' "But Hike it, dear. It's sheltered from the wind and you can see the ocean. How many croissants do you want?" "How many do you think? Three, of course. Don't they always bring three croissants with the café au lait?" "No, dear, that was before. Now you have to ask for the number of croissants you're going to eat" "Why did they change it, dear?"
"Because diets have become so popular: croissants are very fattening. By the way, shouldn't you be on a diet?" ‘
"Im not planning to diet in Mar del Plata, dear?'
"But you weigh 125."
"And YOU weigh 150. Let's go to the casino?"
"Later. I think I'm just going to order cafe au lait and nothing else. No croissants."
"I'll do the same, dear. Coffee with skim milk and artificial sweetener?'
"Now you're talking?"
"May I ask your name? We've called each other 'dear' so much I've forgotten your name?'
"My name is Ignacio Ibargiiengoitia."
"Basque?"'
"Strange that you should ask after forty years of marriage. My grandparents were Basque, all four of them."

 

 
Alicia Steimberg (18 juli 1933 – 16 juni 2012)
Affiche

 

 

De Nederlandse schrijver, criticus en politicus Aad Nuis werd geboren op 18 juli 1933 in Sliedrecht. Zie ook alle tags voor Aad Nuis op dit blog.

 

Gezichten

Een gezicht nooit meer zien.

Een gezicht zien dat niet bestaat.
Langzaam duidelijker, totdat
ook de kleinste rimpels, putjes in de huid
een oogwenk helder zichtbaar zijn.

Maar het is geen gezicht.
Het was misschien een man die
honderd jaar dood is, en gestorven
zonder ooit te zijn afgebeeld.

Er zijn er zoveel.

 

 

Voor B.

Gedachteloze woorden raken dieper dan doordachte,
weloverwogene, ze snijden door het zachte
web dat onzichtbaar de vertrouwde dingen bindt.
Vastknopen kan dan niet. Geen goed woord dat ik vind.
Ik voel me dwaas - en even dwaas is alles weer terecht
als je gedachteloos 'dag liefje' zegt.

 

 
Aad Nuis (18 juli 1933 – 8 november 2007)

 

 

Zie voor nog meer schrijvers van de 18^e juli ook mijn blog van 18 juli 2015 deel 2.

 

Onafhankelijk van geboortedata

De Australische dichteres en schrijfster Judith Beveridge werd geboren in 1956 in Londen, Engeland, en emigreerde in 1960 met haar familie naar Australië. Ze groeide op en ging naar school in de westelijke buitenwijken van Sydney. Later studeerde zij aan de University of Technology in Sydney. Ze besloot toen ze van school ging om zich te wijden aan het schrijven van poëzie en nam parttime banen in kantoren en bibliotheken aan om voor zichzelf tijd over te houden om te schrijven. Haar eerste boek “The Domesticity of Giraffes” (1987) was een enorm succes. Ze won de Dame Mary Gilmore Award, de New South Wales Premier's Award en de Victoriaanse Premier's Award in 1988. Voor haar vierde boek “Wolf Notes” (2004) ontving zij de Victorian Premier's Award en de Age Book of the Year Award voor poëzie. Beveridge heeft creatief schrijven gedoceerd aan de University of Technology, Sydney, de University of Newcastle en de University of Sydney, evenals aan hogescholen. Ze co-redigeerde de poëzie bloemlezing “A Parachute of Blue” (1995) en heeft ook meegewerkt aan de poëzietijdschriften Hobo en Kalimat. Ze was lid van de Literatuurraad van de Australische Raad en werd in 2005 poëzie-editor van het literaire tijdschrift Meanjin.

 

The Kite

Today I watched a boy fly his kite.
It didn’t crackle in the wind – but
gave out a barely perceptible hum.

At a certain height, I’d swear I heard
it sing. He could make it climb in
any wind; could crank those angles up,

make it veer with the precision of
an insect targeting a sting; then he’d
let it roil in rapturous finesse, a tiny

bird in mid-air courtship. When
lightning cracked across the cliff –
(like quick pale flicks of yak-hair

fly-whisks) – he stayed steady. For
so long he kept his arms up, as if
he knew he’d hoist that kite enough.

I asked if it was made of special silk,
if he used some particular string –
and what he’d heard while holding it.

He looked at me from a distance,
then asked about my alms bowl,
my robes, and about that for which

a monk lives. It was then I saw
I could tell him nothing in the cohort
wind, that didn’t sound illusory.

 

 

For Rilke

You can cup your ear in your hand
and hear your voice turn all light and clear
in its depths —
but we hear nothing, just the noisy world.

And the world loves to be noisy.
It loves to make a clatter,
to play itself with our tongues
its diamond styluses
loudly
and for long periods.

But you are your own quiet singing.
The world sets speakers above our heads
(even when we sleep)
blaring at tremendous decibels —
and we can't hold out against it,
in the morning
the words of its song
pummel our lips awake.

Our hearts—they're like utensils
taken from their original uses
and put into the world's jug-band.
Listen to us: we are like bottles
filled to different levels and then struck
for our various resonances:

not like you, poet —
your voice pure as a tuning fork
independent
of what it's struck off; the gentle
absolute humming of steel
against which we are, to ourselves
severe grating, unbearable
dissonance.

 

 
Judith Beveridge (Londen, 1956)
Hydepark in een zomers Londen