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Belim Tower Road
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The document, when printed, contains 107 A4 pages and the material in it is copyrighted in Argo Spier’s name.

©Argo Spier.
ISDN - 2003-09-06 and upon request.
All rights are reserved. This publication may not be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

[Samson 's soaring drive to the South]

Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays at the dam

Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays at the dam
Oh, illicit son
Oh, cool Messias Vinho Verde
Shipped all the way from Belem Tower
Lisbon main street

Dedication

'I dedicate this to the only person who did anything worthwhile with poetry … the honourable Mister Bartholomias Dias, fine man, analyst, priest, dreamer, roadrunner and discoverer of vast open countries. The one and only Master of Belém!'

Introduction to Belim Tower Road
[Samson 's soaring drive to the South]

In Belim Tower Road, Argo Spier creates a world of many levels. On the first level there is a world in which the character Samson relives his past while driving south along the highway towards an ever evasive Belim. He never reaches Belim. In this imaginative world he enters the vast desolate hinterland of literature with all its accumulated debris of words and sediment of sentences. He does this in a strangely unscrupulous way, not respecting any of the acknowledged genres of litera-ture, mixing philosophical utterances with poetry, poetry with story telling and dramatic dialogue with ordinary expression. Belim Tower Road is an encyclopaedia of sound and pictures and there is a somewhat dark undertone to the whole of the anthology. The plot of the story is set in the first poem with the verses ...

I dimmed the light I closed the
door
I walked off

the patio the day was done the
office
was dead

the court has spoken
also it was autumn
the train ...

Dramatic and clever punchlines and carefully placed hints push the story along as it slowly reveals its true driving force : the creation of poetry with recombined words and an endless generation of words, images, themes and stories. Words are taken from everyday sentences and existing literature and novel pieces of poems and poems are compiled.

The farmers are picking up
their furniture

all along the Gourits River
all their cattle are washed away

Habakkuk 3 verses 16-19

On one level the author is telling an ordinary story, the story of Samson's life, but on other levels he is dabbling in the sub-conscious mind and the hidden secrets of poetry. He tries to cover his tracks with many false trails and sometimes plain deception. He leads the reader on but not in a shameless way, it is more his way of courting the reader that is so charming. His poetry is colourful, picturesque and the many minor themes linking into one another make it a pleasant drive for the reader down the highway to Belim together with the main character, Samson.

On the way to Belim there is statement and understate-ment, irony and hilarity, expectation and tears, contradiction and compli-ment. There is the relationship with Liza and the young Lynx fillies in the vault, the Jehovah's Whiteness, who could be Samson and Liza's illicit son, the diary with notes for poems in Samson's keeping, the devil's anatomical parts, the admin-istrative per-sonnel with names like Matty, Marc, Doc Luc, Jo, Paul and Pete, all names of writers in the New Testament, and there are the Barbarian files, Barbara being the author's first love. All this is cloaked in a cloth of Buck-ovskian story telling.

On yet another level, the author ex-periments with some mordac-ity and daring in a cult-like manner with the recombination technique, creating what he calls his proof of dark matter in language or Necro Poetica. Necro Poetica, the horrific act of a poet's meddling with existing literature and trying to resurrect words, words old and cold, used and spoken, abused. Using contradicting semantic values and many categories and experiment-ing with new syntax, the author seeks new fragments of meaning within existing literature. He rearranges often vulgar utterances and ordinary and commonly-used words to tell altogether different stories with the same words and recombined sentences. His structure is the archaïc but potent one of a road journey, in this case to the mysterious Belim Tower. The following poem is an example of the fullness, thrust and inventiveness Argo Spier displays in Belim Tower Road.

talk of Fire talk of Hearts the Hearts of Poems
Summer Poems full blossomed Poems Poems
with Fire on their Edges

Women in their Souls

they burn
they smoulder

they're as ripe as an Orchard on the Slopes
of the Lusiadi of Camoes

talk of that Fire ...

talk till the Cows come Home
and eat up all the Hay

and the Maid say
Frenchmen are Frog-faced men

the Sky is up there where it's supposed to be
the Lilies 're in the Field the Water's where the Trees are

it looks like a previous Day
it smells like agricultural Atmospheres

are Frenchmen Frog-faced soldiers?

talk of Fiery Hearts of Poems and Men sic talk
of the Ceremony of Consummation of blood

or if you don't want to talk
don't or talk

about the Guys who went with Dias

On yet another level the anthology contains two kinds of poems, the first of which one might call the flat ones and the second the resurrected ones. There is an ambiguity in the understanding of which is which. In the first half of the compilation Samson is telling his story, starting where he left the Clerk of Court's office to first take the train and then, the next day, to buy a car. The rest of this half is filled up with the story describing the work he had done in the Administrative Office where new laws were made. The author uses flashbacks and reflexion to give the story its actuality.

Another story is simultaneously unfolding. The author himself is driving south in his mind while typing on his 486 Mhz 66 clone computer.

In the second part of the anthology, the section with the 50 Barbarian Files, again something new happens. Totally new and different poems surface. These are the resurrected ones. There are 18 of them and as the author mentioned in a poem preceding the 50 files they are pieces of pure Necro Poetica. The numbers, the so called File numbers at the top of the poems, refer to the page num-bers of Lawrence Krauss' book, The Fifth Essence - The Search for Dark Matter in the Universe, Vintage Press, 1990. In these poems a new context is given to words and sentences that were once trapped in a dis-cussion of the strange contradic-tory things that hap-pen in the Quantum world of Particle Physics. And as Krauss claimed to have sufficient mathe-matical proof for the existence of Dark Matter, Argo Spier claims that he has found Dark Matter in poetry. The author emerges like a butterfly out of a cocoon, as a master of recombination, a sorcerer and deliv-erer, a saviour of castrated words.

The 18 poems could also be viewed as 18 god-desses (the satanic number 9, times two, convert-ing it to a holy number) that eva-nesce from the dead and by doing so, unveil their new virginity. A ceremony of consumma-tion is taking place, a final climax which the author has been preparing from the beginning of the compilation. The 18 resurrected poems are perfect examples of the suggestive power and dark side of Necro Poetica. File no.: 227/In the early pri-mordial poetry is beautiful without having to have meaning other than its own existence.

a seemingly innocu-ous difference
presented itself
as in a basin
and began to grow
first
remaining largely unaltered
simulating itself towards expectancy

Poetry has never seemed so easy. Take the chains of the past away from words and they show innocent new faces. The main character, Samson, knows what imprisonment means. He is caught up in a fast changing pre-Mandela South-African world, but also in a mediocre world in which poetry is a dubious subversive thing. He can't live in such a world and escapes into his diary, he gets into the train, leaving everything behind and goes to Belim. His laconic acceptance of the course his life is taking and his joy when driving and doing poetry, as well as his persisting in going to Belim reminds one of characters such as the Chinaskian character in Buckowski's poetry or, even more, the Oom Schalk Lourens character in Herman Charles Bosman's Mafeking Road. The following poem reflects some of these character traits, but is chosen here because it also shows the author's inventiveness in creating atmosphere and suspens.

I need some more References with
Portuguese Phrases

the Barbarian Files are coming up

no one is going to take me seriously
I have to get the Atmosphere right
keep the Illusion about Belim
running there must be more

References quick

Santa Joao di Vila do Condo
that's nice
Viseu
Ildefonse
Douro
Ribatejo

and

Toureiro I am a Toureiro
I have a Car

every Priest down from here to Belim
knows that by now ... Farpas

I go my own way Corrida's but that's Spanish
try Manuelino and Azulejos Everybody

knows Azulejos as well don't they?

The anthology is dedicated to the honourable Mister Bartholomias Dias, Dreamer and Roadrunner - Discoverer of vast open Countries and the Master of the Belim Tower, and together with the many references to Portuguese phrases throughout the anthology, one is led to assume that it's the Belém Tower on the Taag in Lissabon that's being referred to. 7 times, the number of the creation, the following verses recur in the anthology

Oh lonely Bar-b-Que's on Sundays at the Dam
oh Illicit son

oh cool Messias Vinho Verde
shipped

all the way from the Belim Tower
Lisbon Main Street ...

Nothing is less true. That is a deception. Belim not Belém. The Clerk of Court structure and Samson's driving on the highway south is but an archaic peg on which to hang the author's real intentions and, anyway, Belém is north of South Africa. The Road to Belim is poetry. It is the Road to the altar called Belim, the altar on which the ceremony of resur-rection of the 18 god-desses is to take place.

Throughout the anthology prepara-tions are made for this ceremony and the ritual of consummation or resurrection. Careful hints and references are placed on the way to this section of the anthology. The ar-chaism of travelling is only the author's vehicle towards the deliver-ance awaiting the 18 Vestal virgins, their rebirth, in the 50 Barbarian files. Probably the deepest level is to be found in this strange allusion and in the various con-nections be-tween words like Be-lim and biblical words such as Samson and Mirjam Siffra, who became Liza when she started work at the law-enforcement office. Mirjam Siffra means Mary the Im-maculate and Samson is a Naz-arite chosen for life to fight idolised images. Samson is on his way to Belim to view Africa, an image, a mirage, an idolised continent?. The word Belim in itself sounds biblical and prophetic. Is it a reference to the Bel legend which also has something to do with idolised images? The 18 files are true naked poetry. They consist of words saved from the grave into which they were put in 1990 by Krauss. The author has recombined them and seems to be saying, look, this is their proper place. Look, these are the true symbols. Look, the Road to Belim is the true art of Ne-cro Poetica. Only on the altar of Belim does true poetry exist. Only there is true po-etry resur-rected. Argo Spier is the chosen Naz-arite battling his way through deca-dence and the misuse of language ... through illusions.

Belim Tower Road is a well-struc-tured anthology and offers an easy read and much on which to reflect. It contains some of the most delicate poems the author has written. A last one should be mentioned. It is found in the anthology among poems dealing with the death of a father of a 12-year-old girl named Marianne.

Oh cold cold tear
cold tear hot

on my cheek why?

hey ... tear ... why
are you

dripping

down

from my eye?

The term Necro Poetica was developed in the Workshop MBM Word in 1993/1994, during the author's chairmanship of the work group.
LWCFSD Poetic Society.

The road towards Belim
- The Story of Samson and his souring Drive to the South

1. can I help you sir

I dimmed the lights
Closed the door
And walked off into the street

The day was done
The office dead
The court had spoken
And it was autumn
There was a train at the station

I was tired

At the Portuguese Café
On the corner across from the chemist
And the Pet Shop and Burley’s Take Away
I bought a packet of cigarettes
Two and a half cent's worth of peanuts
An apple
A carton of milk
And I donned my coat

Down the road
49 years of age
And on the spur of the moment
I went to the station
And bought a ticket
Long distance
2nd class
With no bedding

And in the train
The waiter asked
Can I bring you something from the bar

It was a long day!

Vinho verde and some nuts please
I answered him

Going far he wanted to know
Yes, south … towards Belim
I told him
A destiny fixed
And a poet running
Leaving home

Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays at the dam
Oh, illicit son
Oh, cool Messias Vinho Verde
Shipped all the way from Belem Tower
Lisbon main street

2. highway running

A year without summer
Seven doors on foot
A cuckold's babe
Belief
Snow-white
Men's business
Malina

All in this order!

A miracle how this
Is a poem

One could say The thirteenth word
From the top
+ paper's the reason

You could say
Yes it is a shame
Or yes its black letter
Words

Or yes
Its a cow dung's shame
Black letter words messed
Up on 'ice 'ice 'owwhite
Paper
Taking the virginity
Out of calls like rogues
Like shameless rogues
Full of cow dung

'I eh … but its
A poem still isn't it?'

3. floods are coming

On my way to the Burley’s Take Away
A Jehova's Witness stopped me

'The world is falling apart, see?
Armaggedon's coming
Buy this Watch Tower from me
Oh there's going to be wars
Aljubarotta and floods
Red River Taag

Oh the country is going down
The drain
It will be washed write down
To the sea

Oh the farmers
Will have to pick up their furniture
All along the Gourits River
All along the riverbeds'

'Oh my, look at the time
I have to go a go go … go'

4. the train whistles

Shall we go ho somewhere my love?
Shall we take the road oad love
And go ho ho ho?'

''Ear 'ear the echo echo?'

Telephone rings
Doorbells ring
Cowbells clang ang ang
The train whistles
The cars are snorting

'The cows are getting prettier 'eaf, ain't they?'

'O 'ou 'ear ee?
'Ear what … eh 'em 'em?
Oo let's go o o o my love ve f'

5. long distance call

I talked to her on 'e 'hone
She called me
'e 'e Marianne Anne
Ann I … I … called ed ed it 'r 'r

'Uph 'Uph

'Allo o o … ck' 'lear con-on-ection-tion?
'Ow are 'ou'

'Ine 'ine 'ice…'

'Ou 'ere 'il 'il
… 'Es 'ice 'ear 'o 'ou…'

'Aaim's up ph ph
… 'Aai 'iss 'iss 'ove ov 'ou'

'Eeeeep eeeep … eeeep'

6. a small very small piece of paper

I stopped on the highway
The other day to ask for a piece
Of paper at the double
I had needed it fast to notch down
A poem ready and ripe for the writ

Oh, big commotion!

'…'E wants paper
Bloody paper for a poem
Get-out-of-the-way
Getoutoftheway!'

A straightforward matter

A file was dumped on my desk
‘Whites Only’ it says

'Why is this file so thick?’

7. you don't fool me

The poet who made the commotion
About the paper on the highway … the other day
The other poem … I met him
Yesterday
My car had broken down
On that very same spot

'I know about your thing!' he said to me
'You don't fool me!
Yes, no I know
You use silly
Out-of-this-world incidents
To create something o write
About and you think you are a poet
But you are not'

And after a while he continued
'…And what's more, you use official time
to write your poetry'

I thought about it but already
By then
I was head-on away fast
Concocting this one you are reading now

'You call it a poem?'

'Yes, and you?'

8. a trolley of files

Highway Writing and trollies
Loaded with files … oh, I am working on
The third floor of the Law Enforcement's Office
And travelling, that I do in my diary
An old one
And I do everyday
That’s my work
Poetry
But nobody knows this
I am a file filing poet writer
I fill paper

'… La la la I
Oh, that is my way'

9. in the middle of centre lane

In my dairy … was this a good sign?
In the road ahead of me
I saw it clear
Come, step it up step on the gas
Go go a go go
Faster and faster
And write quicker

And when then out of the blue
A big balloon burning
Burning higher hanging over you
And its burning stops

Oh!

It comes down
Write in the middle of center lane
Boy you got to watch your go a go
When the going looks good

10. coffee breaks

Coffee breaks are long
Starting on time every time
There's a turn for everyone
To go for the Take Away at Burley’s

Liza and me we are the ones
Who go Thursdays and Fridays
And Matty and Joe when they don’t
Work on their texts in the Witness' Tower
They go

And every day on the corner
Of the Chemist opposite
The Pet Shop and Burley’s Take Away
There's a new sale of the Apocalyps

And lately Luc and Mark
Too abating with pleasure
Over the T-girl's and the Witness’
Tower Game
Name

And there are the stories
That fill everyone's heart
Write down to Paul's and Pete's
We all love Burley’s quick and fast food
When its wrapped in paper
With pics of fashionable Vauxhalls' Vivas

The greatest topic however
Of 'em all is ritual dissatisfaction
With the mixing of the ordered food
But its nice to hear everybody
Playfully naging and naging
And see how coffees and teas
Get cold

'Hey this Take Away’s got no Mayonnaise
On it’s burger!'

'Hey this Beetroot Chicken Double Salad's not mine!'

'Hey who ordered Frankfurters with Onion Bulbs?
'Whose German in here?’

But Liza and me we never join
Its always Liza and me who’s cool
In the lovely diary of mine

'Say why's this poem so shitty singy?'

'I wrote it as a link 7 years
After the original … 2003 edition
And I am liking it now with its 2007 edit'

11. and Sundays at the dam

‘Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays
At the dam
Oh illicit son
Oh cool Messias Vinho Verde
Shipped all the way from Belém Tower
Lisbon main street'

12. the Tower of Samsara

Liza was there with me … once
Many years ago when she had bought a bottle
of Samsara perfume to tease me
On the double
Before her bus left too early
And I had to take a flight back home

'Was it then that she changed her name?'

'No … she changed it in the vault
That day with the lynxes
And commotion on the second floor'

13. when I sleep

Writing poetry when lying down
Resting my head on a cussion
In a Vauxhall Viva … that's the way to do it
Write
You don't need pens papers
Or anything else

And writing comes naturally
Oh, I could do it for hours … driving
In my dreams
Going south
Flying fast towards Belim

And sleeping while driving
Oeee, that's dicey bussiness
However
My god you can't see a thing
Where you go
This is the kind of poetry … yes

'No, yes, you don't say!'

'Yes, but ok, not really
No
Or can one?’

Anyway progress is made
Fast on easy street
And by lunchtime, wow
A whole new sequence is completed
With or with out a theme that’s worth it

14. sleeping poems are worrisome

The dark matter beginnings
Of poetry as it rushes through
Your brain … I like it
Oh, it’s the deep mystification
And coolness of it that counts

Felicitas Julia!

The red river Taag is red
Its the time of the month
But this time …

'Why are we all
Sleeping behind our wheels?'

'Oh actually because
We don’t know a thing
About our ability for poetry
But sure, yes, poety's a worrisome game’

15. wallpaper scrolls

Driving fast
The the poems are fast
And speedy things
And the other things
That are also fast

Too fast
And you just can't see
What's passing you

When you write
In your sleep
You don't even know
Which way the road
Will scroll
At the turn of next

But its ahead of you
Its a goooooeeeeey
A go and a paper and a roll
And from the walls
It rolls off so fast
That it doesn’t leave a mark
And viola, you are back at tabula rasa
From the walls

It rolls
It scrolls
Quick
And when you really start
With it
There's no finger in the pie

'Look how quick this one rolls'

Here it starts

(and) here it stops!

'You haven't even seen it
So fast it went down the paper road!’

16. it makes me believe

Next day Spring
Look I am onto Summer
Its May the 10th in my diary
Its a fine day
And even the date
It shows an even number

Oh makey-believy smile its Friday
Although its really Monday of course
This is how it works when you work
In a diary and you work fast
No time for days
But oh, I live in my own time
Anyway
All the time
And in the past tenses
I too was there
And also me

I like it
The way I am
And the way it goes
But in my diary you will see
Nothing really has happened
To me
All of the past days
And months
And years

That's so nice and that's
What intricates me
I am me every day
And I am me
After all these years
And that's what I like
And yes
I can still make it
In the Big Time

Oh I like that much
The beating of the days
And the seasons
And the years
And everyday is a fine day
I like fine days and play
And the poet called Ray Pearce

But let’s check again
It is October now
When I want it to be October
On page 84
There’s a fine day too
And on all the pages
I have writen whatever I had wanted
Take 1991 column
March

'Wait, I'll get that page for you
Here!'

Its 4 years ago now
There I wrote in the past
And when you read this
For all you really know
I could been dead
That sort of thing

‘You know what I mean?’

Etc.

‘But of course I am not dead
I would know it if I were to be
Dead, wouldn't I?‘

Oh I just got power over time
That's all
Poets have great power

Over time

17. fooling around with poems

I had the kitchen clock moved
Into the study
I am going to time myself … a poem
How quick?

'Ok? Start!'

'40 Seconds

'…4 Minutes'

'…8'

'Uuuuuh 10'

'20'

'40'

'…1 hour no go'

I'm taking the clock back to kitchen
Kitchen clocks disturb serious work
It was a fool's idea anyway
Clockwork Orange
Oh how stupid of me!
Poems don't work this way
Oh, I am so sorry … botching up
Your time like this

And mine

18. another file dumped

A fly on my desk
Its in the ointment
All Blacks against all the whites
Will play with a ball
Rugby

Amabokka Amabokka

'Oh, go to Toulouse
Buy two tickets two for too!'
And running around my desk
I thought about
The colours people can have

Compare Malays
With Indians
Bushmen
Xhosas
Zulu warriors
Dutchmen rock spiders
Portuguese small ones
Milkmen
Peanut-sellers
Mafeking Road citizens
Bosman's people
Clerks of the Court
Tzwana people
Etc.
For instance
And all the other people

'Whoooat was that?'

A poem
What you've seen of it
Is what you've seen of it
Oh this one has slipped by you
Too
So fast too man
As fast as farties fly

19. medicine man

More files came in … delicate
Matters arrived
And urgent stuff

This one
Look at this one urgent
Group Areas Section 5
Department of Agriculture
It was first misfiled
At the Head Office Admin
And Law Department's
Office
Now they’ve send back

'Oh its certainly
Not an urgent case
Send it back again'

20. holiday season

'Portuguese women and … Liza?'
I once met a girl from Oporto
In Luanda
She was nice and small
Her bossom was wavy
And her cousin was from Brazil
But come to think of it
When does the holiday season
For the farmers start?

Oh Oporto … Douro Valley
Of the Beaux
Grab that Witness' Tower
And throw it out into the open
It's not for Liza and me

She's half Portugese
She says
And semi Jewish
Or this is what she tells everyone

21. to the chemist

When more files came
There was a provincial problem

'This problem's not mine'

Not mine and I filed it
On Matty's stack
Then I went to the chemist
Opposite the Pet Shop and Burley’s
Wistling while I go

'Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays
At the dam
Oh illicit son
Oh cool Messias Vinho Verde
Shipped all the way from Belem Tower
Lisbon main street'

22. come out to scare

When the words come
Let them run
Let them run into
Which ever combination
They click into
Into whatever spots
They move into
Let them hide
Let them wait there
Wait there to come out
Later
And scare you

Oh, they do make sense
They make me and you
Happy when they come
For the scare

Oh, when they come
For you and me
Let them come
In any whatever way
In any what-so-ever-any-old-way
They do make what-so-ever-any-old-sense

'Welcome free souls
Hey, come run spun do done
But do stay

With me!'

23. driving issues

Now that I have the time … I worry
Oh, I worry myself down to the ground
I worry about this and about that
And that too
And a lot of other things

I worry about poems
And about the road ahead
The road to Belim Tower

And other things
Driving issues
Fast driving
And the filing
Of files
Oh, the devil's tail
The Jehova Witness' verses
Illicit children
Liza
Her name
Her eyes
Mine

She's a woman
And that works on me

24. into the ground

Into the ground I worry
I worry about all the Vauxhall Vivas
Owned by Administration personnel
I worry about all their files
Too
And the Urgent Notes attached
To the files
And the Law Enforcement's 3rd floor
Social Community Developement
Scheme
And about everybody's worries
And more about the files everybody
Is taking home in their Vauxhall Vivas
And how these files never come back
I can't tell you how much I worry

I worry myself to the ground
That's how much I worry

25. the thing gets you

May 20th cold … still Spring

'Why is it so cold?'
Do I see leaves fall off the trees?'

'No, its files falling from heaven'

'How can I write poetry
And process files at the same time?
And how can I lead a double life?
And be ok?'

26. the deeper you get into this thing

And the deeper you get into this thing
Of what poetry is and the scrolling of it
Down the sides of windows
Facing trees

And into storytelling … the tighter
This thing grabs into you

'Did you know that poems
Are fragile pieces of snot?'

'Yes!'

Anyway nobody can work overtime
And still tell a good story
Nobody can drive 50 homemade files
Home from his desk
Or shoot loose in the air
And still consentrate
On poetry

'And the inches of time…'

Pete Liza Joe Matt Luc
Mark Paul and the Jehova's Witness
Oh, they agree with this

'This is no life!'

'Sure…' they’ll agree
'But poems are still fragile pieces
of snot'

27. a skew turn

All write is all ways write
Take a skew turn with a poem
And its all screwed up
For good

'…Office work or not!'

28. lane to Lane

Driving through tunnels of dark
I am flying turning
Switching from lane to lane
Dodging cars skipping ropes
Sliding writing poetry … while
All the while
I am turning the pages and pages
Of 50 pages thick governmental files

I am working as quick
As the winds blows
I am writing

'What about the reference numbers?'

'Oh lord, I have forgotten those…!'

29. not a single lane

Dreaming poems flat into the night
No headlights on
No sharp vision
Not a single lane
No fast lane
No slow line
No center lane too
That's night driving for you
That’s a way to go
That's a sad way to go
All by yourself
And alone in the dark
Its sad sad sad sad

And when you wake up
The next morning
You always have to think
About that
When you write about that

30. four mountains

Liza was furious

'All bloody files come to me
They crawl onto my desk like hillsides
Growing in the wind’'

And my god, yes
When you look up at the nature
Of it
There were really 4 mountains
Growing on her desk

'Hey look how fragile
And small Liza looks
Behind that heavy load
Of her mountains'

'Say Liza
Why don't you change
Your name to Abcent?

'Hey that's not a nice remark
Cut it out!'

31. grab a mountain

I stood up
Went to her desk
Grab a mountain
Took it to Luc's desk
Went back
Took another to Matt's desk
A third I took to mine
The fouth … my god
When I looked up
She's was taking it
To the trash cutter!

'Oh Liza I didn't mean that!'

But her zeal wasn't done yet
She did an even more stranger thing
She went to the trolley
With the incoming files
Took off the biggest mountain on it
Before it could even shift to her desk
And she did the same it
Trash it in the trash cutter

And then she went to file rack
In the corner where 2 more mountains
Were growing in secret
And she did the same with them
Trash cutter too!

And then she went into the hallway
And on two of the trollies with mour mountains
She alter their route logs:
Urgent Query For Room 92 Fifth Floor
NOT Third floor … us!

'Oh mi god!'

The owl has swallowed the mouse
And now she looked like a 40 year old
Woman
Who had a lover till the early mornings
Of every day
When she was 20
Oh she was satisfied to the core
And she took out her knitting
Saying
'Now I finish the Jehova Witness' jersey'

'Oh migod…!'

I was sick sick sick at heart

'Jezus … 250 files in 20 minutes!
Gone and done!'

And when the file boy Mark came
I just couldn't explain it to him why
Queries for room 92 Fifth floor
Pass Laws Section didn't passed through
3rd floor Pass Advice Section
And never will arrive
at any other section of the Law Infocement’s
Head Office

'Never heard of 'em'

'Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays
At the dam
Oh illicit son
Oh cool Messias Vinho Verde
Shipped all the way from Belem Tower
Lisbon main street'

32. getting winter fast

Wednesday and a lot of geese
On the highway
All moving together
All heading the same way
Migrating south or just away
From here

Must be getting Winter
Or such fast season
Or maybe there's something elsy
Going on
Another kind of migration
Of files maybe

'Literazry revolution perhaps
Wallpaper…'

33. even when it rains

Thursday everybody took to the tarmac
too

'Look at Africa!' Liza smiled at me!
'You can see Africa from Belem
The day is clear
Even the misty morning
Has cleared up its act'

'And what when its going to rain?'

I blew her a kiss
From across 6 mountains on my desk

And she smiled
And blew it back
And kept on knitting
Smiling like a pelican

34. when left alone

Poems die alone
When left alone
They die like flies
When left alone

35. everybody will say

Poems are small pieces of snot
Dried up on Snow White’s blouse
They will say this after reading
What I have writ

36. remake all the laws

5 more trolleys with more mountains
Arrived
Urgent files on each and every
One of them

'Hey, this isn't the third floor
Its second floor … Out with it!'

'Hey, get that trolly out of here
We are not going to rewrite
The whole bloody Constitution
Before Friday!'

And then it all changed

37. world of poetry

There is this world you know
This world of poetry
It's a dying cave full of old people
Full of old verses
Full of leprous people
And blind people
Possessed people
Deaf people
Mute people
MS people
Cancer people
Aids
A woman with flowing blood
And tired folk
10 of them
All hiding in the deep

Of a place called
Santa Maria Di Alcobac

38. up the daring steps

I passed a town South-east
Of here
In its center
There was a Grotto-man-made-Jeronimos-hill
And up the daring steps
Crawling on her hands and knees
A woman

'Good grief!
It's Liza!
How did she get here?'

'I Paego Madonnina Aiuta La Nostra
Mamma A Guarire Ti Vogliamo Bene Grazie'

She was praying
Trying to speak Portuguese
But she had got it wrong … it was Italian
She spoke

39. on her way to the top

She got it wrong
On her way to the top
She crawled on hands and knees
To the altar
And she had it wrong
All wrong
Wrong
Her words were wrong

'Oh and that scared me!'

40. a 1000 pieces

I stopped at a traffic light
The headlights of my Viva Choenk
Fell from their sockets
They smashed onto the road
And broke in say a 1000 pieces

'What have I done wrong?
How can my lights drop off like that?
How can I now drive writing in the dark?'

41. not seeing a thing

Marianne was 12 years old
When her Daddy fetched
Her from school
Felicitas Julia
Drove her home
Made food for her
Sat down with her
Had a stroke
Gropped for air
Didn't get it
Fell down
And died

He too broke say in a 1000 pieces

'What have I done wrong?
How can my daddy fall down like that?
How can I drive now not seeing my Daddy?'

'Its dark so dark … look how dark it is…'

42. fast driving

Fast driving's a thing
That counts wears you down
And after some distance you
Are pooped and need something
Else

'A nice stopover maybe'

Maybe you can eat something
While working at high speed
Writing poetry
Oh man it bucks you

'Say are you hungry?'

Why not eat this poem?
Start at the bottom
Soon only the top will be left
That'll freak you out

'Long poem now short poem'
A long half eaten short
One'

Some excitement … eh?
That will put the drive right back
In it … but you'll have to rewrite it
And it will still be my poem
Oh you will have to hurry
To get it written back again
Cause I'll be long gone by then
Into another poem

'…Like that!'

Sure fast driving's a thing
That counts wears you down
Some distance etc.

43. be friendly

I don't follow people going all
In the same direction
Not on the highway
No I don't

Driving into the same direction
Oh, it matters
Same direction poets always
Pretend
They're write but they aren't
They also write the same stuff
As everyone else

'D'on't drive with them!'

'...Cause if you be friendly
With them they…
Oh, you just get their V-sign
Write up your nose
And if you step on the gas
They step on the gas
And everybody stands still
Rather be clever and do the ½
Smile bit and when neighbour's
Not watching … shoot out
Write from under his arse'

44. from a baby locust to another baby state

The writer's cloak brings you friends
Many friends different friends
All friends' friends those friends
Whose hammocks you may use
Those in whose capsules
You may germinate
In whose skin you are allowed
To grow in
And from where you can
Transcend from baby state to locust
Or to whatever other baby state
You need to be in

Friends whose honour you may
Substitute for your own
Friends you can move
To whenever you'd like to move 'em
Friends you can travel away from
Friends you can split up with
And taste on the pallet
Of your tongue

'Cut your shut Callaert
Let's go!'

Friends that taste like honey tastes
Friends you can call
Wake up
Resurrect without expectation
Or reproach

Janus double faced friends
With similar cloaks

45. mediterranean countries

Friends all friends
On the phone 're nice
Friends on the phone
Talk and chat
And that's nice

They want to know
About Belim
About the Tower
They talk and chat

'Say you're writing a book aren't you?'

'Say how is it coming on?
Poems is it?'

'Did you get your other books sold?
Loose droppings on the road?
Bogy Road?
D'Aro?'

'Now it's Portugal … eh?
You'll sell in Portugal
They'll just love that Tower of yours
Over there AND you can see Africa
From there isn't it?’

‘Ahhh you take up all the mediterranean
Countries nowadays aren’t you?
Good idea
Wish WE had come up with it'

'Oh … a lot of books say
All laying out there
Baking in the sun … ay?'

Oh, friends on the phone 're nice

Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays
At the dam
Oh, illicit son
Oh, cool Messias Vinho Verde
Shipped all the way from Belem
Tower Lisbon main street

I like it when they call and talk
And chat and ask me about my work

'It's so nice!'

45. short and dark

And the Maderalian girls came
Over and dance
On the beach of Capo Sao Vincente
Down
The Algarvarian way

They're short and dark
And have beautiful feet
And they're such nice lynxes
But how to get them off the bonnet
Of my Viva... By J'ove
I just don't know

46 I just don't know

Buy a truck someone said
You can stuff a lot of stuff
In the back of it
And trucks drive fast too

He didn't get it
He thinks the whole driving
Thing
Is a utility thing

And I just don't know how
To explain it to him

47. slow car

Big truck this side
Slow car that
Side
My car
Caught in the middle

'Who wins?'

Yàààààààààh … I

And looking back
Feeling good
Once again

Yàààààààààh!'

But then

Out of thin blue air
A fast bike…
Left side…

Yàà…

'Cut! Cut!
This is a sick poem'

48. scathing souls

There are things that burn holes
Flaming holes into the souls
Of paper
Those things are words
Hot flaming words
That burn

They burn black dot holes
Into the scathing souls
Of paper

'But I've said that
Haven't I?'

'What paper?'

'The burning
Flaming paper in your hand
Of course
The small piece of Rank Xerox
Paper you have write now in your hand
The one I landed you
On the highway'

49. white lace

Go on go upstairs Love
Go put on white lace
And panty-hose black
Come down Love
Carry something in your hand
Anything
Make it an open hand thing
A sure poem thing
A midnight swell thing
Not a spider but a promise

Also bring the ornament I bought
For you at Sintra … do you remember it?
Oh I was stuck there in that tower
Remember and Alfonsus
And Dionysus waiting at the lake
Of Obidos
And the Tabula smaragdina
At the corner of Rua Direita
And us in the back of the bus

'Oh nobody have noticed us!'

(And then I noticed the blush
On Liza's cheek)

50. although

Even this is a poem
But at first sight
You would not say so

'Would you?'

Still it is … it is my poem!
I wrote it!

Pointe is you'll remember it
And that makes it a good poem

51. don't have a phone

Good sign ahead the road's clear
All I have to do now
Is stepping it up
Doing the fast thing
Fast
Faster and
Faster

But then … when telephone
Rings

'How can one not fall
To the ground
Again?
Plus you don't have a phone
In your car…!'

52. vermillion

The man behind me
Behind the Viva
Infront of him ... he was
Making signs
Trying to attract attention

'Out of the way!
Out of the way!'

I dropped the pen in my hand
Turned vermillion and when I look
At the speedo, man, I was doing 40
On the 120 shove

53. oh don’t worry

Step on the gas fly right on
Right out
From under the nose
Of the guy behind you

He doesn't like that
He likes it less than
Then guy behind him

Oh don't worry
It doesn't matter
Driving's all about that

And it is a mincey business
Too
But the important thing is... it has
Nothing to do
With what somebody
In the hind thinks … I think

54. carnaval

When I look in the mirror
To fortune tell the rear
I see Carnaval
On the highway

That's a good indicator
Of how I go the go
How far I am … how far
In the front
With my poetry

'That is to say …
etc.'

'And how far are you?'

‘Far, man, oh Felitias Joy … far’.

‘Mm, I see…’

55. Snow White’s blouse 1

To flash out poems that's for beginners
That's too tiresome and doesn't work
It doesn't work … not for me
It doesn't work
Not for you too
And you
And you
And you too
You all are too old
For it to work … say 42
And ubove
And your faces glow too much

'Are you daft?'

‘Yes’

56. Snow White’s blouse 2

To flash out poems that's for beginners
That's too tiresome and doesn't work
It doesn't work … not for me
It doesn't work

Snow White's Blouse is white
It's soft, see?

Oh no, I am not a beginner
I got the paper and
the diary's mine

57. lemmings

Oh no Lemmings
A cracked version … oops!

'Who hacked it?'

57. a farmers hog

More and more of the same
Is always nice they say
But I say nay more and more
Of the same is as nice as hay
Any day when you're a farmers
Hog looking for hay in May

May
I say more?

More and more's too much
Of the same
Too much of the more
Too much like drought
Too much like dry earth
Barren devil's right toe's earth

Too much like pumpkins
Too much like willows without tears
Too much like shouts without sound
Too much like verses without my help

Too much like tomatoes
Too much like mealies
And other vegetables

Too much growing … talking
Seedy things like thiongs

More and more and your soul
Will catch fire and the thieves will come
More and more and you will
Have to leave town without an excuse
More and more and you will have to move
For good without being able to explain why

58. complaining

Matt Mark Luc Joe Pete Paul and Liza
Listened to me
As I read from my Bible of Poetry
My diary
Dissatisfied they all are

‘Sam’ they say, shortening my name
From Samson
‘You should spend your time
Not so much on such … but you
Should tell the SA
That Liza's mountains of files
Had eroded into thin air … it was the floods
Who took them
The Witness' floods
They were all washed to the sea
An so on
And this talk of trashing file … you
Invented it’

They all had soft core's…!
And they say this just
Because there's this query coming up
From the Educational Departement
etc.

And besides, Agriculture files
Mealies are other Farmer files
Mixed with Law files
… that's a cock up
Bussiness
Now isn't it?'

'Hey Sammy, what happened
To Liza's files?
You should know ... shouldn't you?
You are the writer here'

‘Aaah man, shut-up!’

59. light up your light

And again they come and tear
Down at my door

'Hey Danny Boy Sammy, tell the SA
You're ready for ripping out pillars
From underneath in the vault
And ... if he doesn't believe Liza's
Story
About her name
That it was Mirjam Siffra
Tell him when he was born
And where

And

'Hey Samson and Delilah Man
The SA
Will listen to you … tell him its you
Who trashed the files
In ordinary day time time
Sessions'

And

'Hey Lonny man Sam, Armaggedon’s
Days
Are coming up
Ask the Jehova Witness for help!'

‘Aaah man, shut-up!
I am working
Writing’
‘

60. on the slopes of the Lusiadi of Camoes

Talk of fire
Talk of hearts
The hearts of poems
Summer poems
Full blossomed poems
Poems with fire on their edges
Women in their souls

They burn
They smoulder
They're as ripe as an orchard
On the slopes
Of the Lusiadi of Camoes

Talk of that fire
Talk till the cows come home
And eat up all the hay
And the maid say
Frenchmen are frog-faced
Men

And
The sky is up there
Where it's supposed to be
The lilies're in the field
The water's where the trees are
It looks like a previous day
It smells like agricultural atmospheres

'Are frenchmen frog-faced soldiers?'

Talk of fiery hearts of poems
And men
Sic of the ceremony
Of the consummation of blood
Or if you don't want to talk
Don't

Or talk about the guys
Who went with Dias
In Belim Tower Road

61. write decently

I am writing this on the highway
I fly as time flies
It saves time
It's nice whow!
There's no time for more
Time
Or to either look where you are going
Or to write decently

But that's ok by me
I like the duality
And the speed

And the taking

62. real hard

Marianne's Daddy was a fool
boozing away time as if he owes it
all - all the time in the world

'Why is my Daddy drinking
so much? What did I do?
Why is everybody drinking
where my eyes can see them?'

I thought about her questions
I thought about them real hard and all
I could come up with was
the only answer worth giving
to this sort of interogation

'Hey, don’t ask so many questions'

She didn’t like it

'You drink too' she said 'And
you think you can do
whatever you want - write
whatever you want - write this
and stuff'

'... and so on'

'Aaaaaggh what are we talking about?'
I thought and end the poem

63. in Batalha

About this Belim thing
One day there was a Prince
He lived in the Abbe of Santa Maria De Victoria
In Batalha
The Priests there liked him
Much
He had a car a Vauxhall Viva
With spoilers on the top

One day
He said to some of the priests
Let's go see if Somerset Maugham
Is right
Let's go on a crucifixion trip to Tomar
Let's go watch the window
With the Dias boats
The ropes the anchors and the flying sails

No some of the priests said
You can't use those things
And also who now goes
By car that far?
It's a waste of time … why
Do you write about these things?

The Prince thought to himself
Oh-ho I must watch out
That was a stupid idea of mine
They're turning against me
Maybe soon
I won’t be a prince anymore

And he changed the subject

That night he sneaked off
Took his car and drove to Belim
All by himself

64. sticky thorny words

So nice to sleep in any bed
Other than this one
In this one there's sticky thorny words
This one's gluey with rhyme non rhyme rhyme
This lattice wasn't designed
For sleeping

65. sleep is like water

Sleep is like water
And it flows into wet pools
And water is kabbalic for death
That is what Joe told Matt while Luc
Was listening with care
And when he had learned
That it was Mark
Who had got it from the Jehova Witness
On the corner at the Chemist
Opposite the Pet Shop
He said

'Oh'

Pete and Paul … they weren't there
But were busy
Transporting mountains of files
Sneaking 'em home
In their Vauxhall Vivas

The Court of Law has said
There is an emergency.

‘Really?’

67. writing a poem

And then I thought of a poem
And while writing it … I was still
Being busy with the first one
But the is a current thing with me
Writing another poem
All the time
See?

Writing it
While writing a poem
That sort of thing
A lot of poets
Are the same
They just work

On Poetry
And go for it

68. a picnic spot

'How many poems
Do you need before you reach Belim?'

'Why do you ask?'

'Oh, nothing...'

69. and at that

That
Steep!

70. into my neck

At last it was Tea Time again
(And she brought in coffee)

Barbara was a librarian
By profession
She had told all the staff
That

But she said she couldn't get
Another job
Or an ordinary library job
Or something
Somewhere
Where they file books
Onto shelves

'So …'

She said
She applied
For the Tea job 'cause
They got files
And files are like books
You got to file them onto shelves
Too

‘And at the Law Enforcement's Office
On the 3rd floor
These days and with the changing
Of the times
There are a lot of files
To be moved and archived’

'That's close enough to books
Ain't it?'

'Yes that's very true…'

Barbara had a weird way of saying ‘no’
When pouring tea … ‘yes?’
Too weird for the liking
Of Liza
It seemed

Is it because she needs me
My body?
My mind?
And soul?
I secretly thought
Up as a reason for tension

'Liza, Barbara and me
A trio?’

71. insects and maggots

Move the words you want to move quick
Move them very quick and remember
Where you move them to
It is you who are to decide where
They go to
It is you who choose their places
Any places

A church a town
A hall
Any hall
For that matter
Even into a City Hall

Take Oporto for instance
There's a lot of insects and maggots there
And the pain at night
Is spotty
All over your body
And all over your sleep

Oh, there are many places
That need moving into
And filling up
And the words do their tricks
Even at your home there's
Probably a place or two
too

You can shuff
A word or two into

'Do you have a place at your home?
Or are you like me?'

72. take time off

Take time off white time
In areas with black and white
Seggregation
There's the light from the day
And the night
And what's poetry all about
Anyway?

‘And how the it works
in it! Unbelievable!’

‘And poetry is a very natural thing
Come to think about it
Its a giving thing not a taking thing
It takes your soul and always when
You think it give you a soul
You are wrong … in this sense
It is a giving thing
Beacause its taking you

At last

73. deep cherry red

'Wwwwho oked this file?
Wwwwho used my stamp on the oked?
Damn the devil … I didn't'

'Sir to be honest it was
An urgent file … and…'

He spat on his desk and called
Murder
Then he took the file
And ripped out the advice
Of my veto to it

Then he tore it up in say
A 1000 pieces and he took
The pieces
And trinitied them all across the floor
Some pieces dwindled into the hallway
Float down the stairs…
And with the gravest voice ever heard
From a Senior Assistant in the Head Office
Law Enforcement Departement Third floor
He said

'Never ever use my stamp again!
Mister Poet!
Never ever write PS'es to the Minister
Ever again!
On files of grave importance.
In any file
For that matter
Ever again!
Now getttttttt out
Of my sight!'

Liza stood up
Made her face into a moon

'He didn't do it sir, it was I'

'Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays
At the dam
Oh, illicit son
Oh, cool Messias Vinho Verde shipped all the way
from Belem Tower Lisbon
Main street'

'Getttttttt out too!
Youuuuuu!'

74. at 120

Driving fast like a truck
At 120 when you're at 80
This one too rushes past you
Without you even having had
The time to grasp its size

'…What the hell, devil's claw,
Is the meaning of it?'

Whoosh again…
Another one

'Nice road poem eh?
Nice and fast!'

Luc Matt Joe Mark and Pete
And Paul agreed

'Oh, it was a fast one
Allright!'

Even Liza whispered in my ear
How nice it was
The poems I produce
And indeed
The poems I produce
While covering files
Are very nice

It was Wednesday
When it happened

‘I remember it well
It was me and Liza’s turn fot the Burley
Take Away
Opposite the chemest
On the corner’

75. off sick

Barbara took off sick
For two weeks and for two weeks
Now there will be no tea
Or coffee
The S.A announced
But he said we can still have the break
As shedeuled

'…Just poetry'
I thought … lovely!'

76. the highway trying

A hub-cap came off
Flew past
Like it was an UFO
Nobody believes you
But sure as speed … you
Got to know your duck
When you duck doing
The highway trying
To write
About a flying hubcap
Flying past

Things happen so fast
There on the highway
F-uck, you just won't believe it
How fast
My poetry is!
All you can do is
With it
When the hub comes off
Is get out of the fast lane
As fast as you can
And move over to slow
Oh yes, when you see something
Like a hub-cap coming at you

‘Move!’

77. she doesn't need a poem

She's a boy with not many words
She does not speak very much
She doesn't need a poem
She said
She knows them all

Ok

I won’t write her a poem
I won't even mention it

Ok Alice Lalice
Liza

‘Ok, Sammy?’

78. a spoon for Liza

Barbara was back from sick leave
And tea time flourished with flavour
Again

Liza was also back
Into sulking
At the first Tea Time rounds
There was 3 spoons
For Liza and me
And one for someone else
And there was poetry
And intrigue of love
In the air
Barbara gave a spoon to Liza
And tea
Liza let it stand there
Till its cold
The spoon she fed into the trash cutter

It was Thursday
And another day was done for
It

79. cold tea

Barbara asked me
Whether I like my tea sweet or black
And Liza again left hers standing there
Till it was cold

'This tea is cold
I don't drink cold tea
Who serves tea bloody cold?
What class of person … that is'

80. the Devils's Íost left toe

Don't get white boy
Don't get black either
If you want to copy styles
They will notice it
Don't copy mine

If you want to copy a style
For somebody else
However … that is nice
And Ok by me

Like this for instance
Literally … but then it's faking
I didn't write it

'Get that into your ears'

But if you fake it
Literally … its a half done tone
I wrote it
The devils's lost left toe
And people will notice it'

They will read it
People always read the same
Old stuff over and over again!
They always read my poetry

'But that's another drift
Isn't it?'

81. something other than driving

Someone asked
Why … say wouldn't you like
To do your own thing
For a change?
Something other than driving
To the south?
Something other than writing
Belim Tower Road?

‘Sure you say … all the time'

'Why not do it then?'

'Man,' you say 'you know
How it goes
One is always too busy
With something else
Isn't one?'

82. more references

I need more references with Portuguese phrases
The Barbarian Files are coming up

'Is Liza really a Portugese Jew?
Is she really who she said she was
Her real name … Myram Siffra?'

Oh I must deliver … keep it up
In Belim Tower Road

'….More references
Quick!'

Such as
Santa Joao Di Vila Do Condo

'Oeee that's a nice one
What about'

Viseu, Ildefonse, Douro, Ribatejo
And Toureiro?'

'I am a Toureiro I have a car!'
Every priest from here down
To the bottom of Belim Tower Road
Knows that … you not?'

Farpas I go my own way
Corrida's

'But that's Spanish
Try Manuelino
Azulejos
Everybody knows Azulejos'

'Do they?'

83. a 1000 Files

About these 1000 lost cases … files
That is disparado whooshy

'Sir… eh'

'Ggggget outttt!'

84. overtime

Everybody is working
Overtime

January
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December

The Minister still is not satisfied
The Jehova's Witness was write
There's going to be a flood!
And bigggggggg trouble

85. more Laws

We need more laws he wrote
On the slip of the inside
Of a big file … a lot more
laws

Things are slipping
And now is the time to act
... If we don't act
Now

… etc.

86. I get bored

I get so bored
Oh lord I get bored
All the time

I get bored
When I read a poem
I get bored
When I write a poem
I get bored
When I do not read
Or write a poem

I get bored
With this poem
I get so bored
With this poem
I think I will just stop
It right now … right

At the end of this verse

87. add up the years

Winter bores me
Summer bores me
Autumn and Spring
Bores me

The weekdays bore me
The Months are the slow
Moving shakers
Who add up the years
That bore me

I can't tell you
How bored I am
I am bored down
To the ground

That's how bored I am

88. something good to write

I turn the pages of the very nice magazines
Looking looking for something
Something good to read
About
Something good to write about
Something very good
Something like my poems

'…You know?'
They're good
They're very good
To write about…'

'Nothing!'

Nothing in all the books
Nothing in all the magazines

'Nothing!'

Nothing like my poems!
It seems poems
Like my poems
Are nowhere to be found
Poems like my poems
Seem only to be written
About

And then only by me…'

89. newspapers aren't any good

Somebody read a newspaper today
While forwarding fast on the highway
In his Vauxhall Viva

How can he do such a risky thing?
Newspapers aren't any good
They run on words already cold
And the truth is this one day
And that the next

'Poor man!
He has lost the track of it all'

90. behind the steer

When I go up the stairs to the height of a verse
I think oh boy I should have stayed down there
Below … right there
In front of my 486DX 66Mhz
Right there behind the steer
Of my Vauhall Viva
From there the road
Is always clear

When I stay down here
However I think oh girl I wish you were in here

It's very confusing the way this is
You never know whether the devil's lips
You want to stay or go

91. rain and so on

I want to stop now for now
I am getting tired
It's late
Winter's coming up
Rain and so on

I want to get out now
I want to do something
Else … other than filling
Filing poems all day

Its late
Its dark
It's not nice
I want to go away … where?

Ok but what will this poem say?

'Silly silly poem'

Its got it's own way
Of taking the road
Side road or small path

'… Poor fool
Doesn't it know
The longer it drags itself out
In my hands the bigger the chance
Of it to suffocate itself

Apparently not … I am
Still writing it

'Please let me go now
poem!'

92. a

A
seemingly
innocuous
difference
presented
itself
like
a
basin
and
begins
to
grow
first
remaining
largely
unaltered
stimulating
itself
towards
expectancy'

'Wait! This is Belim Barbarian
Stuff
They're not ready yet!'

93. cold cold tear

Oh, cold cold tear
Hot on my cheek
Why?

Hey tear why
Are you dripping
Down
From my eye?

Oh little Marianne
Your Daddy is dead'

94. under my shirt

A new law is passed and the SA wanted
To see me … Press Section he said
That'll do for you till
The big clean-up is completed

And when Liza turned her back
On me
To watch the Tea Girl Barbara filling
Of the Tea and coffee pots
I slipped my poetry agenda
(My diary)
Very precariously
Underneath the skin of my shirt
And sneaked out
Of the door like a runner
Leaving base
Up and away
I was on my way
To the Press Section 5th floor

'...On the road again
Oh my career was flying'

95. anyway oh boy

What's with this
What's with that?
And what
With Belim Tower Road?

The poets and priests
They go for the sacraments
Wallpaper and Necro Poetica
What do you go for?

'Do you know
What Necro Poetica is all about?
And Wallpaper?'

96. the next day 1

I looked at the date
Devil's tooth how time flies

97. the next day 2

Today for instance it is the 1st of April
Fools day of the year XX in my diary
But of course its much later
In the month
(My diary is an old used one
I bought in the sale)

In reality its Carnival
But there is no problem
With that
I don't live in my diary
I only write in it!

'I'm not a fool you know!
So I am not affected by time'

'Nice to know…eh?'

98. the next day 3

Anyway oh boy again how time flies
I go through the days
The months
The years
Like the devil in hell himself
I drive in my Vauxhall Viva
And I file my poems

Whenever I have the time
I'm a highway man as well
All write

'Oh I like my own feeling'

99. your own you share

'Check this
Rewrite this'

New regime
More files

100. don't tell me

Within yes the yes
Limits yes of the yes
Articles 314 yes bis
Yes d yes and yes n
Within yes the reference
To yes article 05 c yes

And within yes
The yes limits yes are
Of eyes yes Articleyes
314 yes bis yes d yes
And yes with yes that

'Reference to yes?'

'No'

'Yes'

'Oh'

'Yes this is poetry
See …no?
Wallpaper Sec
From zeee Vintage Year
Cuck koo et al such
And so on'

'Yes'

101. the stars from M47

My chin rested in the palm of my hand
My hand was attached to my forearm
My forearm ended in my elbow
My elbow rested on my knee

My elbow slipped from my knee

Wham!

My head came down on my desk
Oh all the stars from M47
Shattered in like … say in a
1000 pieces

'Falling angel Lucifer
The SA hasn't even notice it!'

'Plus oh migod
The Press Secttion is soooo boring...'

102. recapitulation

On page 196 of my diary the word
Recapitulation marks the beginning
Of the secret Barbarian files
This word is pre-printed in my diary
And I can do nothing about it

On the opposite page
Of the Recapitulation page
There is white blanca's tabula rasa

'Recapitulation?
What's there to recapitulate?'

It's July already and I've done
Something
Like say six months' poetry in these
Past four weeks
I don't need to recapitulate a thing
I drive too fast

I drive a book a month
At this speed
And by October
I will have finished 50 more
50-page Mountains of poems
Removed from Liza 's desk
I think

'Recapitulate the road to the south?'

The days?
The months?
The years?
Belim Tower Road … in general?

But Belim doesn't exist
Its just a dream I am writing
… But it is in sight
Of course

And the Babarian files
Ooeee that's going to be a bugger
I fear
I got to resurrection 'em…
All
Get this New Poetry
Into real scary shape

101. resurrection

Take up the pieces of words spoken
And crucified
Words that were dead
And said and cold
And … and in this poem
Resurrect them

'Do it!
Do it now!
I wait for you!'

102. even more than that

In the Press Section 5th floor
There's access cards to the Vault
In the Basement
And this is a secret
Only Old Hands After 14 days in the Section share

In the vault there are thousands
And thousands … if not millions
Of files
On alluvium rows and rows
Of strong wooden racks

And there are corners
And more rows from A to Z
And at these corners young filly lynxes
Live … oh stories stories stories

'And really ... you wouldn't believe it'

103. the devil's hair is on fire

July the 4th
True as the devil's hair is on fire
It's the 4th of July today!
I'm on

In my diary
Its the 1st which was about the 3rd
Four seconds ago
I've covered three days of poetry
And 50 50-page files in one day

'Cool!'

Yes I am flying with the times
And the days
Let's have a party
Or a joke … the going is that good

In 1442 Columbus sailed the ocean
Blue … no it was in 1443
He sailed in fourteen forty three
The deep blue sea
Dias sailed the green
Sea! Blue!

'Get it?
Its a good job
Poetry is!'

1442 = ocean blue
And 1443 = deep blue sea

'But what when blue rhyms with 42?
And what when sea rhyme withe 43?'

What's it going to be?
Blue or blue?
No problem … 's America's problem

'And that was so many years ago…'

But let's have a longer party
We're close to the it of it
Very close

Brut Canals & Nubiola
Sant Sadurni D'Anoia Éspanâ!

'But don't drink too much … you
Could become hooked
On booze too'

'Its like it is with poetry'

104. it's a black one

I have discovered the one
And only poem
Thééééééééééé one

And only

It leaves all other poems
Miles and miles
Behind

It's a black one
A darkey

'…Only thing is I can't recall it
What so ever now…'

105. question

Why
Why
Did you
Call
Me?

106. even more laws

And more new releases
Fast
Times they are a changing
They say noooooooooo
You cannot wait
Any lonnnnnnnngerrrrr!

107. a hidden corner

The 50 page file landed
In my lap with a big thud

'Where is Matt Luc Joe … Pete
Paul liza Barbara and Mark
All of a sudden?
Why me?'

They didn't see it!

'How barbaric!'

'Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays
At the dam
Oh, illicit son
Oh, cool Messias Vinho Verde
Shipped all the way from Belem Tower
Lisbon main street'

108. a new filly in the vault

She had a minted voice and a small smile
And her big bossom was fresh too
The white of a whale was in her bra
And on her line she knew what was
Forbidden on white and black tarmacs
But her odour … god
Samsara

It crept behind her whenever she passes
It oozed like smog

'Boy … she was a sweet sweet
beautiful lynx…!'

109. then she squinted

She squinted with her marrow eye
And stuck out her slitty tongue
Write into my face

I was a button

'Click'

I was on

It was then that I moved
Into my diary for good

For a long time…

110. lipstick

'It took you a while checking
Those few file numbers?'

'Don't tell me'

'But say … is that blood on your collar?
It couldn't be lipstick … could it?'

'No … no its not lipstick
Its blood … I cut myself shaving
This morning'

111. sneaking off

Barbara sneaked in
Through the Fire Escape
As Liza stepped out of it

'Wow almost
A meeting'

112. washes me with 50

'Hush … take this and wash me
Barbara said and gave me
50 poems neatly wrapped
In a clean tea cloth
Conspiracy and tone
And I liked it

And in it
Hush … the air of Samsara
Again

'As raw-bone as raw bone'

113. her feet were tender

Her feet were two tender tiny rabbits
Running up and down the Fire Espace
Playing softly away from the altar
And me
Coquetting with love

'Resurrect this'
She ordered like a Muse

[The 50 Barbarian files]

114. File no: 234/should these minor irregularities force us

to re-evaluate success
of t h e s e cold
old feelings
one
has to
neglect
the effects of it

(it may be
important to alleviate
at least
some
of
them)
the motivations for
performing
such
might explain
unknown dynamics
that create satisfaction

but
should minor
irregularities force us to ?

File no: 115/the halo of our own

halos diffuse
indefinitely
apparently

on the basis
of observation

t h a t is
whatever our own
indication

and line of sight
of t h i s effect
of t h i s

promise
to understand
and

for
probing for

115. File no: 232/different and independent analyses

analytical
or
numerical parameters
reveal
detail and

the agreement
lies
in sliced densities

and
it is clear

looks
can be deceptive

however

and
as good-looking
as

t h i s

116. File no: 232/other independent analyses

analytical as
well as numerical parameters
reveal
both detail and

different densities

in the final
stages
of observation
the
abundance is
small

in the
system and

looks can
be

deceptive

however and
as good-looking
as t h i s

117. File no: 234/looks can be deceptive however and as good-looking

numerical simulation
displays
the success
of
a model

even h e r e

the qualitative agreement
alone
proves an aforementioned
parameter
and

opens a universe
with

the expansion rate
at it's maximum
allowed
value

as usual is

in matters such
as t h e s e

118. File no: 231/for if our miracle

as our intuition
suggests

in the absence of structure
the

initial condition
looks good

towards when
universes are dominated
by simulations
of reality
and fast

resolutions
by

sensitive descicions
for

if our miracle looks
good

it is an opening

119. File no: 234/any specific quantitative problem

essentially

equivalent measures
as among the various problems
are made
to fit

manmade guesses
one can calculate
the probability
of finding

one can even
say

the incapacity to be sensitive
to remnant fluctuations
is pitiful

but
t h e s e are
the manmade t h i n g s

and
they are h e r e

120. File no: 232/in the present similar slices

a better approximation
as if we see
better

as if we raise the hope
of explaining

as if
constant reproduction
of detail

and
the amount
of adjusted observation
split in two
halves

of what
we shall see
when
the numerical simulation
is cold

cold as burning
frozen liquid

121. File no: 28/filling the void

the idea that a uniform
tenet
pervades
as largely as
serendipitous observation
is filling the void
introspection is discovery
and was then
as unexpected
as non directional
as h e r e
we just travel
freely
as if
we understand
the context
it happens h e r e
as if we can
allow
an equal number
to be
equal

122. File no: 228/the distinction is not sterile

every blank space
containing the indistinguishable
any configuration
anything
can undergo interchange
individually
while
equally probably
fundamental tenets
dilute behavior
normally though
t h i s serves
t h i s
and t h i s
is a basis to know
distinction

113. File no: 227/in the early primordial

a seemingly innocuous difference
presented itself
like in a basin
and begins to grow
first
a remaining largely
unaltered
mimmicking itself
growing towards expectancy
t h i s idea
was
floating
like water washed
forever over
and over
again
and
reconciliation and
involvement
made
the difference

114. File no: 112/3/the pair is in fact due to a single
deduction of the expected
differentiates
the unexpected
accurately
a constant relation
allows us
the measurement
of
it all

File no: 121/equation to

consideration overcomes the
determination
to escape
the remaining boundaries
the need
to be sent upwards
lessens
as we
approach
closer
if we were to lose

115. File no: 156/combined observations of a certain
are more
abundant enough
are more
to make up
some form
are surprises more
convincing
than ten times
less
or are
illogical alternatives more

116. File no: 331/if the halo were

if it were
less
stringent but not so
effectively removed
then
the upper limit could
govern
a motion
with
a predicted
flux
hope
is
the distinction
the spill
the compatible force
(it is not easily
said
get lost)

This
is obviously based
and not produced as distinctive signatures
This
is not produced by any other!

116. File no: 329/when we come close how close do we come?

the profound significance
of T h i s
remains
the obstacle
the search for
abundance
carries the distinct
signature of T h i s
T h i s isheavy
like a Dark Flower
T h i s we know

117. File no: 325/326/the brain is like a cryogenic detector

by
any any
any standards
T h i s is Dark
Dark as super cold
Dark glass
to detect T h i sand everything else
takes
some faith
burning constrained
else
and
even at early times
it was
automatically
revealing remaining
constant long
even
when it was Dark
even T h i s occurs

118. File no: 323/it is T h i s notion that makes the search

feeble
happily feeble
disturbed but
not so as to be detected
in h e r e merrily
or
not without resorting
to
or not without
unimpeded penetration
or gay proceedings
just enticingly
enough
just
very small
and
silly
hark the dark

Then it went wrong
Completely wrong

119. Liza dissappeard
*[This is a PS to the file]

The Barbarian file took longer
To process than what I had tought
It would
And I didn't finish it completely
The pool was too deep
And the night too long
Resurrecting old words said and cold
Oh that's risky
And it eats into you
The horrific act of writing
And doing the seance of Necro Poetica

And in the process I forgot
To spend time on the further
Developement of Liza's
Character … she just disappeared
From my mind

She wasn't even mentioned
In the Barbarian file at all
So weren't Matt Mark Luc Joe
Pete and Paul

Nor was the Law Enforcement Office
3rd mentioned
And the Press Section 5th floors

It was almost as if the file
Had consumed everybody
In its sacristi of poetry

'Consubstantiation or transubtiation?'

And also I seemed to have
Forgotten about the Jehova Witness
On the corner of the chemist
Opposite the Pet Shop

But there were reasons for
My behaviour … I suppose
I was so pretty close to the fire
And wasn't to be distracted
And also
There were the lynxes
And all the reference numbers
Wallpaper storytelling
And the road
And Belim
And everthing had to be checked

'And row M was a bugger'

120. but then one day

But now Liza was standing
In front of me again
In Row M
She was white with fright
And anger
And her glasses
Were forgotten at her desk
Her pupils were wide
As if she had taken hash
And as she looked past me
At the button-eyed lynx
Behind me
Dispersing her Samsara fog
Into the muffy vault air
And she saw the lipstick blood
On my collar

Oh she became madder
Than mad

And like a fierce animal
She goes for the lynx
And with one swift tear at her hair
She had a floss of the lynx's hair
In her hand
The lynx started to scream
Hysterically

From all over the vault
Out of many shelves
More lynx's jumped out
And dashed
For the Fire Escape

Liza let out a shriek
That cut through bone
And as if she had lost her mind
She reached for moutains of 50
Files the most important ones
Non-accessable law departement
Ones
Archived solid ones
And she started to throw them
At the fleeing lynxes
The files burst open
And the contents fluttered
All across the lynxes' trails
(1000 pages fluttered)

And paper flies all over
The floor and the reading tables
The whole constitution
Of the country was at stake

'How did she knew
Where they were hidden?'

And then she ran
Chasing after the lynxes
Into the direction of Fire Escape
I was speachless
I didn't find a single word
That could be used
To fully dramatise
The extend of the damage
She had done
From row A write down
To row M where Barbara
Was hiding behind 50
Holy files

And then she discovered
Barbara
She hissed then spats
Like a basalisk
And her sickening screams
Hurt the ears
That were eavesdropping
On the first floor

(They had heard her screams
As she called out 'Samson'
And 'Your bastard'
As far as in the Press Section
On the 5th floor
The Jehova Witness told me later)

'Oh migod!'

121. she walked like a queen

Then she stopped
When the vault was empty
And only she and I were left
In the darkish underworld
Of the vault

And then she shifted her bum
With a 'hup'
And walked away from me
Like the queen I knew she was
A Portugese Jewish queen
A Cleopatra from Africa
Whom had a name change

She was as composed
As a mannequin
And I noticed her very very nice
Behind
Ever so real
As she passes rows X
W and Z
And passing it
She stuck out her hand
And without even looking
At the files
She ripped out the bottom panels
Of all the racks
Another 1000 tumbled down

The files tumble to the floor
Spreading their interiors
Across it like dead things
Carcasses

And I thought
'Oh migod nobody will now
Ever be able to reconstruct
The county's Constitution
... Ever again'

122. two holes

I was now a mutilated Law Enforcement
Office Clarck with an unrepairable lazered
History behind me

'…Won't do my career any good!'

There was a hole now in my soul
Which you could see through
And inside it was Robby Williams' face

(I got this last verse idea
From a Robby Williams song
… Hank William's brother
See my The Story of Caroline
Which I wrote many years after this)

123. sobbing on a shoulder

Nothing was the same after that
Even today while I am copy reading
This I realize it

'What a tradegy poetry is!'

And down there in the vault
It was now a morgue
All Samsara ooze was gone
I was utterly alone
A priest way out of my time

Then and now
I didn't and don't
Feel
Like checking another
Single reference number
Of any what-so-ever file
Ever again

I remember how that day
I just went backwards up the stairs
Tripping over my tail as I go
I left the mess of the country's
Constitution just where it laid

It laid there on the cold
Dark cement floor
And at lunch time
I took the fire escape out

'No Tower for me … no thanks'
I told the Jehova Witness
On the corner of the chemist
Opposite the Pet Shop

124. oh lonely Bar-B-Que's

'Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays
At the dam
Oh, illicit son
Oh, cool Messias Vinho Verde
Shipped all the way from Belem Tower
Lisbon main street'

125. lovers quarrel scenario

Is this a white park or is it a black one? A green Peroxide one? Come tell me! Worse, tell me … the lynx with the button eyesIs she mine or yours?

Opening:
'She left me in here … locked in
With all these files
On my lap'

Melancholy:
'It's unfair it's unfair it's wrong
You do this to me only because
I love my work so hard
Weep … weep'

Intermezzo:
'You don't understand
You don't understand what I
really do!
These words … oh
These words they…
Its as if they possess me!
I have …'

Twitch:
'I am an Officer of the Law
The Office of the Enforcement
Of Literary Rules
I am straight with you
Not with the words'

Naughty thought:
'That's what I have thought
… up to now
Ha-ha hat!'

Reconciliation:
'I am sorry!
Oh I am so sorry!
Please let me out of here
Please … help me
Get out of here
Help me … cut it!'

126. win time

The days after that day
I too vanished out of my life
I was done for … almost
Belim Tower Road
Was reaching its end

I thought
I was spend

'What had become of my work?'

My diary stayed shut
For a long time in those days
And in the months after that
Only time seemed to win
Paces of its own

127. out of gear

And it got much worse!
Via via I learned that Paul had bought
A new Vauxhall Viva
Everybody on 3rd floor
Now had a Viva
A Station Wagon

'Its for the files … in the back
You can stuff in a lot'

Vauxhall Viva Station Wagon
Model EP 3 Deluxe
With spoilers on top

But what was more
Mark said Paul had used up
All of his advanced pension fund
To pay for the car

'If he goes on pension now
He will be too old
For it'

Both Matt and Joe
Was very upset with that too
And Pete had said that now
Certainly the country
Will go down the drain
With everybody driving Vivas

'It the colour … why did he
Have to buy a grey one too?'

Pete shouldn't have bought
A grey one that's for sure
It was a bad sign

Luc too was of that opinion
But it was an un-be-lievable safe deal
Everybody agreed
In the end

'Just watch out when
You stop at the traffic lights
Headlights might come off
Like Argo Spier's'

And there was the SA too
He had a problem too
He had to verify things
Explain the vault
To higher authorities
Etc.

And apart from that
The story just dragged on
And on and on and on
Belim was gone from my sight
Oh and it hurt
Wallpaper can stretch man
Out as long boy … there's no stopping
To it

Whoosh it runs from the wall
Out of the door
And of course … when you
Reach Belim

'Ooeee watch for the turn off'

Also Barbara had left the job
No more tea and cookies for her
She had said
And rumour is
She also had changed her name

She was now Bess
A new librarian
It was also the Witness who
Had filled me in on this

She also had found a better poet
One without holes in his soul
He had told me

'Well let him do the re-erecting
Of poems from now on'

Sic ok I still have the copies
Of the poems she gave me
But you know...

'Check page 82'

And there was the reorganization
Of the Vault Personnel
All the lynxes had got fired
Now its only gay personel
Who runs the show below
The belt of the safty
Of Floor 1

'And oh the other gossip was...'

And there were other stories too
Via via the grapevine they originated
The Witness knew a lot
About Apocalypses

And it seemed
Dumping files had become
A comon practice in the Law
Enforcement Office
It even had spreaded to
The Press Section

Everyday…

128. quiz

'What mistake did I make?
Did you find it?'

129. answer

'Fill in: ………'

130. wallpaper poems

Wallpaper poetry is made up
Of stuff like this
Mmmmm the art of writing tout court
it is

And if you're in it
You'll know you are in it

Man plain raw barbarian
Dark fluff stuff
That's Wallpaper!

'Belim … oh my Tower!'

131. very hot poems

'A quick last fast one!'

Saw a man heading backwards
Wrong Direction
Funny determined look
On his face

His hands were clutching
The steering wheel
He was making noises
He was making speed
He was going a hard go
The way we all go

He was a poet
He was working
Hard
On some very hot poetry
Ignoring traffic like that
Riding backwards

Into the stream

132. wrong orders

The country really
Was going down the drain
The Jehova's Witness
Proved write in every
Aspect

'It's Paul's Viva…'
He told everybody

'Aauuw non!

'Si Monsigneur
But how can one rewrite
40 year's law in a couple of days?
Get the vault up and running
And still work on poetry?'

Fundamental complaints everyday
And lieing crept in in a big way
The old hands started telling
Everybody that they eat at home
They lied because none of them
Had got homes

And those who swear they have
Even bragged that they have
They're the same ones telling
Everybody that I also have switched
To Chicken Nuggets from Kentucky's

'Nobody can afford
Chicken Nuggets from Kentucky's
Not on a weekly basis
And keep on affording a Viva
To take files home in!'

133. the timing of the change

Nobody can keep up with the timing
Of change
Nobody can change
The changing of the times
… this quick

134. the police were there

In the end the Pet Shop owner
The Take Away and the chemist joined
The unrest
The Take Away shut down
Because of wrong orders

And Customars dropped
Off the owner said
The Chicken Nugget rumours
Didn't do bussiness any good
People just bought less

And the chemist also fell short
On a weekly basis
And the Pet Shop owner
Well there's the story
That he went mad
The week after I had written
This

The police were rushed to his shop
And caught the Jehova Witness
While he was opening up
All the cages
Just like that

Havoc
Cats
Dogs
Parrots
Mice
Monkeys
All in the same room

'My god no order!'

The police took them both away

135. blood on judgement day

'Paul shouldn't have bought the Viva!'
'Yes the Apocalypse!'

'And the chaos that's coming
Fast
More blood
The Gamka river will be washed
With blood right down
And into the sea'

'Mmmm mosquitoes and maggots
In Oporto …
And the river Taag
That runs high crossing its borders too'

'Oh and all that furniture…'

'Oh and
Lonely Bar-B-Que's on Sundays
At the dam
Oh, illicit son
Oh, cool Messias Vinho Verde shipped
All the way from the Belém Tower
Lisbon main street'

And when I drove home that particular
Night I saw something even more
Disturbing

On the back of a truck
On the highway
A yesterday slogan poem

It said
You're slower 'n me, screw you!

'Oh really?'

'Really and that finished me off
Things like this happen
And when they happen
People who are poets
Get so pissed off
You wouldn't believe it!'

136. still covering tarmac

What has happened?
Here I am
Oh I am still driving hard
All write
But I am still only sitting behind
My 486 DX2 66Mhz Viva
And the evening is coming
On strong

The same as every night
I am still working
A hard go
Still covering tarmac
Still doing Wallpaper Belim
Still fast as miles can slip by

And yet … am I getting there?

137. everything is returning to its grave

Oh, Liza oh girls from Algarve
Beautiful Maderialan Lynxes
From Funchal
Oh Barbara
Oh you

'Where are you?'

Oh Matty
Mark Luc
And Joe
And oh you Jehova Witness
Why is everything slowly
Returning back to the grave?

'Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays
At the dam
Oh, illicit son
Oh, cool Messias Vinho Verde
Shipped all the way from Belem Tower
Lisbon main street'

138. when you go deep into it

Oh that's what you get
When you go deep into it
And fast!

Wallpaper

When you look up
Viva Alvaro Pais
You notice devil's dick
You've missed it

139. epilogue + closing time

'…Oh don’t let all further poems evolve like roads …
highway roads to Belim'

Oh Jehova's Witness!
I thought
Why were you so write
You with your eyes as blue as mine
As blue as Liza's … the same colour of eyes
What really is the truth?'
You, she and me
And you ... who are you?

'Oh you got your jersey!
She finished it for you?'

And…

140. I got off the train

I got off the train and looked for a garage
Bought a brand new Vauxhall Viva
A grey toned one Model EP 3 Deluxe
Station Wagon with spoilers on top
I paid for it using the advanced pension
Fund scam just like Paul did

And I took the road South
The Road to Belim
But before I left the town
I stopped
At a Portugese café and bought
Some apples and peanuts
And a carton of milk

'Oh …
Lonely Bar-B-Que's Sundays
At the dam
Oh, illicit son
Oh, cool Messias Vinho Verde shipped
All the way from Belem Tower
Lisbon main street'

'So nice …!
That's how many years ago now?'

Other storytelling poetic sequences by Argo Spier

Bogy Road - A multi-levelled search into the essence of Wallpaper poetry and glimpses of the power and darker sub-conscious side of Necro poetica.
Sampel Four -Wallpaper poetry and Necro poetic seances, moving into the absurd with the printing out of wini.ini files as poetry.
Mucus Gravel - A compilation of sea and farmer poems, hilarious Wallpaper poetry and beautiful songs.
Raam - The only work in his mother tongue, the Afrikaans language; a Kubrickian space narration with translations of poems into various languages.
Municipal Paint Opera Lodge Café - Containing The Blackwater Stories, Wallpaper poetry and dreams.
Santa Christiana D'Aro - Wallpaper poetry and a brilliant and homely story.
Belim Tower Road - Wallpaper poetry, containing perfect illustrations of Necro Poetica, the resurrection of words already said and cold and the creation of fragile Vestalian sound poetry.
On the beach of Ville St. Gillis Croix de Vie - Miscellaneous and uncompleted.
Mister Page on Page International Airport - Miscellaneous.
A Lover's Sundae Sarum - Anniversary love poems.
Douche and Addition - Poetry and columns.
Zinzli come home Albi - Summer Poems from Chur.
Seasons of Sarum - Storytelling poetic sequences and a deep drive into Sarum.
Green Muse Trying - Columns and Storytelling Wallpaper poetry.


Blurbs on some of Argo Spier’s publications

Green Water Pain -
[When Night grew with the Dew]

'… with fingers that pat into the core of feeling'

'Green Water Pain contains the right mix of art-historical issues, love verses, vague sadness and frivolous ditty-like rhyme. It is a sensitive journey and to the pointe poetry. The intermingled references throughout the story to the poetry Paul Celan gives it its eary palpate'.

Was it Mucha's?
No it wasn't Mucha's, it
was Jan Zrzavy's Cleopatra 1 and the Still-Life-
with-Lillies-of-the-Valley, it
wasn't Mucha's, it was
Frantisek Bilek's How-Time-Models-Its-Poet, it
wasn't Mucha's, it was Maximilian Pirer's
Medusa washing her wriggling hair
no it wasn't Mucha's, it

From Medusa's wait
Nights grow with the dew and slowly
night after night they swell like love puffed virgins
hungry women
night after night at night they wink their eyes
and wriggle their snakes
oh you vile guilty ones laughing sweet
when spawning your basilisk egg
screaming loud when breeding your feral foul
when hauling your little snakiest babes
from Medusa's wait

Mr. Changs! from Ching-Ching
[Summer Love from Chur]

'... hilarious, sad and yet lovely. Soft tender insider poetry'

'The story of Mister-Chang!s-Lue-from-Ching-Ching refreshes and will bring a tear to the eye ... but it is also a story of a very compassionate and understanding smile!'

'In the morning, in front of the Mirror on the Day of the Story of One Day in the Life of Mr. Chang!s Lue from Ching-Ching, Mister Chang!s Lue from Ching-Ching saw the impartiality of his Teeth. He saw how Independent they were. Each Tooth went its own Way and refused to conciliate with any other Individual Tooth. They all travelled away from each other with ever increasing inflated Speed, and those that had left first faded into the distance like Fleeting Days in the Lives of Poets. Mr. Chang!s Lue from Ching-Ching looked at his own Eyes watching him from the Mirror. To his surprise he saw that his Eyes were also showing a similar Pattern of Behaviour. They were fading. Travelling towards unknown Destinies'.

Castle and Flower
[Winter love story in verse and exercises in the Art of Imitation of Haiku]

I dedicate this short draft and exercise in the art of imitating Haiku, to the three “Witches of Eve”, Maya Nuda, Maya Vestita and there bigger sister, known since the beginning of time as the cruellest and most incisive, Nancy Muse, who, in the slow months of the year of 1997, castigated my cringing soul and making me run, beg crawl and return to the feeding dens of their love for me.

All of what is written down here on paper happened in actual life. It happened with me in the same year. The Year I refused to be what I am not: a Poet!

A Winter Love Story in Verse and Exercises in the Art of Imitation of Haiku - When leaning she laughs - When shines a Moon - Humanoid your Face.

THE MOVING MYRIAD

A WILGCOFFEE STAND-ALONE PUBLICATION
Laggard winds and clarion breezes … colour, laïs and a circle.

The Moving Myriad was written in the weeks before the author was to appear in court on a charge of refusal of payment for a misprint of one his mayor publication, Green Muse Trying. The Moving Myriad gives a good insight into how the author's mind functions in catastrophic events and how he battles to come to terms with his persecution by the KOLV VZW printing house. The association he makes with the prosecuted medieval chanson composer and poet JEHANNOT DE LESCUREL who was hung in 1304 for promiscuity and immoral love is transparent. DE LESCURAL was author and composer of one of the first three-voiced laïs in the history of polyphonic mediaeval music. His song and composition, Gracieusette Gillette, of which the original text is given in the footnotes along side the English translation of it, is theme grande in The Story of a Myriad and its recurring echo's throughout the book tells the story of a tender and indestructible love.

… thought provoking and tender with the delicate honesty of a fearful heart… Just a lovely sequence and completely worthwhile to read.
LWCFSD Poetic Society.

Recognition Song for Madam Gillette

A WILGCOFFEE STAND-ALONE PUBLICATION
clarion breezes and the colour of life

Recognition Song for Madam Gillette and its recurring echo's of the licentiousness of carnal love tell a fragile story of a tender and indestructible love, the love of words.
The author uses the sad history of the prosecuted medieval chanson composer and poet JEHANNOT DE LESCUREL who was hung in 1304 for promiscuity and inmoral love. DE LESCURAL was author and composer of one of the first three-voiced laïs in the history of polyphonic mediaeval music, Gracieusette Gillette. At the time writing the author too was prosecuted and fined, but not for immoral love, but for the refusal to pay for a misprint by the Kolv Vzw publishing house in Ghent, Belgium of his book called Green Muse Trying.

Thought provoking and well structured. A story of the delicate honesty of a fearful heart but a lovely sequence and serious alchemy. … The poet is a charm and his seduction power is great.
LWCFSD POETIC SOCIETY.

Sym-
metry breaks. Russet sound
and brass replaces guise; pewter and alloy, tin.
And into the foreground a dark myriad slowly
motions. It breaks from the clinging archetype;
while in the widening space of the rearing
no man's land, the ABEL man runs.

And there is a call. It calls as if calling
from a hinterland. It calls you.

Legally a Muse

Aspirations and motivations, the theme of love-and-war and small worlds are the ingredients that make Legally a Muse a story of light complexity and lovely predictable suspense. Its about the forbidden zone of makeshift communication and the overkill of innocence in the face of instinctive rivalry.

'We were in a movie. And she couldn't help it. But she took her script serious and did at that moment something that she had never done before. She bent over and kissed me full on the lips. The teeny-whiny little margin of what had become of the write and the wrong disappeared. And she kissed me again. And this time she ventured deeper into the forbidden zone of makeshift communication. Plain adulatory. Her heart pounded fresh and I was a writer. Some flesh. She stuck the tip of her tongue into the small slit between my lips. I felt lithe and ordered another round coffee'.

Oliver and the Art of Sharing

Boundless self-centricity verses its counterpart, the perilous desire to share inner feelings, and the challenge between these two rivals as well as the deadly pursuit of cause-and-effect throughout 'Oliver', mould the story as it slips from happiness to a quest for happiness into an unpretentiousness and very recognisable readable piece of writing.

'An unbounded compassion washed over me. From then on every single motion I made in the Old City became a journey of joy into Wonderland. The Wheel of my karma had started to turn and I was caught in its positive tolling. My soul and I were reincarnated in the body that was with us and we both were excited like children going on an errant with their mother'.

Machines of Art
[From the Argo Spier Prague Interview]
'The material used in the Praha Interview, originated on a walk in Prague…'

'The Praha Interview, originated on a walk in the mountains surrounding the little town of Tsciertschen in the Swiss Canton of Graubunden. Argo Spier, a pupil of the South African poet, N.P. van Wyk-Louw claims to be the Master-of-the-art-of-recombination of words. The interview collects and recombines parole, creating a meta language and poetry ... the scrolling kind. As are his poems, it is picturesque and interlinked. It is a story, Argo Spier is a storyteller ... and his stories are his work, Wallpaper poetry and Necro Poetica, the ghastly rituals of writing poetry, his kind'.

'Poetry! You want to know what poetry is! You want to know what makes a poem a poem! A poet does not know answers to fit questions like these and the last person to ask what the essence of poetry is, is a poet! I have not discovered this so called essence yet and probably never will! I am still searching for the it of it like every other natural born writer under the sun. I just don’t know the answer to it and I am not the write person to be interviewed about it!'

BOGY ROAD
[POEMS OF INNOCENCE AND JOY]

A Wilgcoffee stand-alone publication
'... utterances and everyday dialogue shaped into shocking rhyme'

'... working with flat characters and a simple plot, SMUTTY creates a racy story with a constant night marsh and chilly touch as it reaches its tentacles into the subconscious. Bogy Road has a newness and a fresh vagrancy. It contains séance-like poetry which excites'.
LWCFSD Poetic Society

Then she opened her mouth and showed me her tongue. JUVANTE JEZU,
it was split! It was split like DI THE LEVIATHAN'S. She spoke with a voice.
'I am not dead. I am alive and I am a woman not a feman!
Honestly I can also be a man!
I am the poem you are writing!' she said and then she opened her mouth again and hissed into my face.
I saw her skin color.
It changed from amethyst turf to moist mud.
I smelled the vagrancy of revitalized life seeping through the air like a cool drug, breezing, promising, inviting, sweetening, growing, ripening and segmenting.

Blue Sweet -
[Mr. Page on Page International Airport]

'... desolate spaces of feeling, accumulated debris of used words.'

'Blue Sweet is a neat but strange step in the spoor of Wallpaper poetry storytelling. It contains sediment of gall, its unscrupulously honest and there is a typical touch of classy hilarity. The right mix of ordinary utterances, irrelevant dialogue, stark expression and the inevitable dramatic drive, makes it the perfect setting for a true Sduttian story of a Mr. Page

on a Page International Airport.

And you’re lonely.
And you. Don’t know which. Way.
And your words. Are juxtaposed with images.
Of long Bien Temps. Ago.

Blue Space. Up the slopes. The Hex.

And you’re lonely.
And you. Don’t know which. Way.
And your words. Are juxtaposed with images.
Of long Bien Temps. Ago.
And you are.

… daring wallpaper poetic storytelling and a sweet suck on…

With minimal strokes and well selected words the author works his way through the vast amount of accumulated encyclopaedic debris left behind on the road of literature and reshapes waste to beauty. With its 6 separate stories Blue Sweet, carries the reader over the threshold of hesitation into the surreal world of the process of creative writing. Vast spaces containing human feeling emerge as the pace is set and kept throughout the book … a decorous contribution to the debate re the essence of creative literature.

The master poet is here, once again, at his best and he uses his seduction power with great ease, skill and unscrupulous honesty. Blue Sweet with its irony, pathetic mien and off-beat bravura … a daring statement, lovely and an experience in depth to read.
LWCFSD POETIC SOCIETY
Cocked Poise
[When I castled your Eye in my Loess]
' ... bracing and garrulous ... yet a gentle read and a tender story'

'… intricate and to the bone, a referral to Seasons of Sarum. Cocked Poise has several deconstructive doors offering contemporary art-historical rumpus. It has fingers touching in deep water, the ritual of writing tout court'.

'No musician', I said, 'there’s no musician
on the beach, other than me! There’s nobody
other than me, to stain your sky. There’s no mountain,
no valley so high,
no sea so high,
as the day, the almighty day, I castled
your eye in my loess.'

A WILGCOFFEE STAND-ALONE PUBLICATION
... refreshing and loquacious...

Taken up in this publication are the sequences Zinsli came home Albi, which contains the so-called Chur poems and originated in Switzerland, A lover's sundae sarum, love poetry written in Austria, a third sequence written on the beach of Ville St. Gillis Croix de Vie, France and the in 1997 well received Canterbury Carillon which was written in England as a contribution to the defamed child abduction and murders in Belgian in 1995-1996 and presented in schools across Europe

'… intricate … core material from the author's Seasons of Sarum. The sequence has its fingers touching into the sub planes of the great poetic undercurrent unconsciousness. The ritual of writing tout court'.
LWCFSD Poetic Society

[THE POET IS A NOMAD]

The diurnal alternation of light,
and poacher night, its weight,
and the weight of day,
and earth in its dreary sleep,
and sea, and earth, in the wake
and depth of douse,
and the stabbing stone, its height,
and the moon,
the immortal moon,
its silver dish, and your sun,
its flame,
and the flare of shining flaxen
gold.
- Your re-enactment of IT, of the Primal Scene,
that is what makes the poet a Nomad. -

The naked star, its meandered scatter
outside of the ring of the sky,
the rambled maze
in which the poet's frail reward

is solitude and sand,
and in which, wolf and coyote,
jackal and fox,
and howl, carouse,
celebrating death, resur-
rection,
and birth and birth,
and stirring dying days,
and surviving twilight.
- The dawning of your re-enactment of IT,
of the Primal Scene, that is what makes the poet

Sample Four
[The Masked Man of Sainte Margarita]

' ... the endless generation of words, images, themes and stories'

'Sample Four employs Wallpaper poetry (the endless generation of words, images, themes and stories) and results in Necro Poetica (the ritual of writing). It is a Sduttian and Argo Spier pushes his own genre to the limit by incorporating a transcript of a TV Soap Opera and the so-called Computer poems, the latter which are print-outs of the wini.ini file of his own computer. The dark and cult-like undertone throughout the book hint towards what edge Argo Spier wants to drive language and poetic storytelling. Sample Four is also an encyclopaedia of sound, pictures and non-sensible sense and an intriguing story of four poets in a bar in the middle of the Karoian desert discussing meta aspects of writing tout court'.

next day ... static life
they gathered on the beach of Miramar
(they knew about the nightly raid)
Phaedo Phaerus Timaeus
and
the Masked Knight of Sainte Marguerite
sat on a rock feet in the water
don't be metaphysically naïve
the soul belongs to the world of fluid forms
that's why it rains so much it's easier to fight
that way when all is wet
the earth dogged
're you sure?
absolutely poems are written

MUNICIPAL PAINT OPERA LODGE CAFÉ
A WILGCOFFEE STAND-ALONE PUBLICATION

The Story of Helena and the Secret Pleasures in the Palace of Joy.

The master poet is here, once again, lover and at most, in control. His seduction power is great and he is just the Master Lover. The speed, versatility in matter choice, use of words and themes and skill makes it the most beautiful and boldest story written at the change of millennium. Municipal Paint Opera Lodge Café with its irony, pathetic mien and on-beat bravura is a most pleasant experience to encounter. The reader will just love it. It is wallpaper poetic storytelling sec.
LWCFSD POETIC SOCIETY

somewhere
backstage Vienna another life VALENTINE
winter spring summer autumn
rain
subversive thoughts authentic Passions JOYCE
JAMES sure waiting behind the doors shoes
dreams writing poems landslides roofs
shoes numbers room numbers upstairs
sky
don't read what you don't write
slippery mud slices slippery slices
slipping under feet Macintoshes more
rain more steep rain poems
my many poems
wait! wait! wait! open the door
who's behind that door door door
do you hear hear hear the echo echo?
people notice poems everyday when
I write
poems everyday deconstructing poems
writing
people write about poems filamentary writings
signs of the Zodiac SAGITTARIUS VIRGO
WASSERMANN fire earth water breath and men
people many people Northerners
Southerners United East Indian
Companies
they write about poems my many
poems
they read about poems my many
poems
they read naughty things in poems very naughty
things in my poems naughty things with married
women children Muses of Dark Pools death
poisonous life lies lies lies lies lies

Santa Christiana D'Aro

WALLPAPER POETRY SEC THAT FAST SCROLLS THE PERILOUS 'HOLIDAY' ADVENTURES AT SANTA CHRISTIANA D'ARO.

Look ... you put flowers on the table you make it nice they knock it over when reaching for the milk and butter there is water in your plate water on your bread water all over you you don't like that you don't want to make it nice anymore you knock the bread on the floor it mushed up the floor you get up you slip on the smooch you hurt your back you don't like that you think why you had put flowers on the table why you had made it nice why look at you you are like an old idiot you don't like that nobody likes that nobody likes an old man they ask you hey why you walk like that like an old man all crooked and bent askew you put flowers on the table or something someone knocked it over when reaching for milk and butter or what all that water in your plate water on your bread water all over you you didn't like that you didn't want to make it nice anymore you knocked the bread on the floor it mashed up the floor you got up you slipped on the smooch you hurt your back you didn't like that you thought why you had put flowers on the table why you had made it nice why look at you you are like an old man you don't like that nobody likes that nobody likes an old man everybody's gone ask you hey ...
Municipal Paint Opera Lodge Café

…. seduction power, exuberance in cadence, speed, complaisance in matter-, word- and theme choice, appropriateness of thrust and the brilliancy of hidden rhyme make of 'Lodge' a push of one in a million. And with its irony, pathetic mien and on-beat bravura it is an experience to apperceive. The rendezvous of the poet and his beloved on the steps of the Opera lodge Café at Backwater Bridge is just too beautiful an experience … too beautiful to describe in words other than his own.

somewhere
backstage Vienna another life VALENTINE
winter spring summer autumn
rain
subversive thoughts authentic Passions JOYCE
JAMES sure waiting behind the doors shoes
dreams writing poems landslides roofs
shoes numbers room numbers upstairs
sky
don't read what you don't write
slippery mud slices slippery slices
slipping under feet Macintoshes more
rain more steep rain poems
my many poems
wait! wait! wait! open the door
who's behind that door door door
do you hear hear hear the echo echo?
people notice poems everyday when
I write
poems everyday deconstructing poems
writing
people write about poems filamentary writings

The Story of Caroline

A Wilgcoffee stand-alone publication
A quest for the sanity of love and a drive into the unconscious … stark and a never ending story…

The story of CAROLINE and her double diagnosed male persona with overt personality traits, T'ALBERT, EUGENE is one large encyclopedic peeping box in which emotion intermingles with about everything to tell the story of the creation of the story of CAROLINE.

… well structured and the multitude of theme lines are running a steady course throughout the book only to intertwined in the end into a tight knot.
… hilarious at times, chilly at others, with poetry and prose interlinked. There's the 'reality-at-home' and the 'reality-abroad' and there's the merge of these two with very recognizable patterns... An exciting story of a writer's love for the love of words. - LWCFSD Poetic Society

Then, and honestly, I couldn't helped it, I devilishly thought why not drop a pebble in as well? Just for the tease.
'If you think I am so kind, why don't you tell your wife that?', I said and added, 'Or do you have a husband?' and burst out in laughter. Victory! However it was short lived. She stung me immediately where it smites. Chapeau!
'I already have!', she touché-ed.
I repressed a frown. The tight elastic band around this cheap unbounded novelette was squeegee-ing tighter.
'Yes...? Everything...? Oh dumbfounded love!'
'Of course not! But if he is to ask me ... sure I will tell her!', she replied.

Raam in 5 talen: Afrikaans, Nederlands, Frans, Duits, Engels

A WILGCOFFEE STAND-ALONE PUBLICATION
'Een Kubrickiaanse reis doorheen de grenzen van taal'.

RAAM, een Kubrickiaans ruimte epos, beschrijft niet alleen een reis in de ruimte, maar is zelf een reis , een reis doorheen de ruimte van taal. De lezer wordt meegenomen doorheen een veelvoud van goed gestructureerde taallagen, lagen die in elkaar verstrengeld zijn en die in elkaar overvloeien, afzonderlijk en toch onafscheidelijk van elkaar. Met een bijzondere en suggestieve stijl en een zekere geladenheid, creëert de schrijver in dit prachtige en compacte werk de illusie van een geboorteproces van taal en van een taal die zich ontwikkelt vanaf het vroege archaïsche begin van klank, menselijke klank, tot volwassen geworden zingevende expressie. Naast de originele versie in Afro-Afrikaans van de dichtbundel RAAM, bevat deze publicatie ook Nederlandse, Franse, Duitse en Engelse vertalingen ervan en een inleidende artikel over RAAM.

[AFRIKAANS]

De tijd wordt zwaarder
in de verte verschijnt een speer
een vernauwende buis
vuur

een schijnende monoiliet

vreesaanjagend in de schaduwkring
die wachtende wildehond
canus lupus : roofdier of wolfshond

en het sterrebeeld het getal 58

[Français]

Le temps est saturé
dans le lointain un point est apparu
le tuyau se rétrécissant
ou le feu

le monolithe luisant

terrifiant
dans le cercle d'ombre
le loup qui attend
canus lupus : fauve ou chienet la constellation
avec le chiffre 58

[Deutsch]

Die Zeit wurde bleiern
In der Ferne tauchte ein Punkt auf

eine sich verengende Röhre
oder eine Flamme
ein gleißender Monolith
Kälte verströmend

Im Kreis der Schatten
wartete der wilde Hund
Canus Lupus:
Urhund oder Wolfshund
und die Sternenkonstellation Nummer 58

[English]

The time grew heavy
in the distance the point
the narrowing tube
or the flame

a shining monolith chilling

in the shadow-circle
the wild dog

awaiting
canus lupus: vulture or wolf dog
and the star constellation
with the number 58

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