Amichai : My People Are Alive

by Felipe Alvarez de Toledo

When we were young, cicadas buzzing in a nearby tree,
We'd go out to play at early dawn, just you and me,
Frolic between blades of grass, swaying, greys and silvery hues,
Until the sun rose, turning the world into orange-red glass,
And the stars set softly into the earth behind us, blue.

At dusk one night, they took you away. Who would I have, to play in the fields?
Years later, under the sweltering sun, (Zzzzz -- piercing my eardrums)
They found you, among others, in an earthy pit. Brought you home in a car,
And I watched you return to the soil (Still, there you are).

I remember the long-ago fun, when I was a child;
But who'd want to play in the fields, knowing the secrets of the ground?
I once loved my old thoughts in this vast landscape,
But cicadas beat my feelings into a haze;
Corpses line our memories, pillaged and raped.

New haircut picture for tomorrow.

Note: He's in a coffin.

Don't Die on Me, Little Raccoon

Funeral Blues

W.H. Auden (1907-1973)

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone.

Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,

Silence the pianos and with muffled drum

Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead

Scribbling in the sky the message He is Dead,

Put crêpe bows round the white necks of the public doves,

Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,

My working week and my Sunday rest

My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;

I thought that love would last forever, I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,

Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun.

Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;

For nothing now can ever come to any good.