Poems of Jan
Oskar Hansen, PT in the May / June 2010 Sketchbook
Free Verse
Moribund
Panorama
...a short
poem about a Sunday
This landscape I
walk in was once tilled by people, who, tired of poverty and endless struggle,
left, to find work in towns. Trees and bushes have found their own grotesque form, shown as a freak show in a madhouse, Boughs stretched heavenward as asking god to release them; dimly I hear the hum of universal despair.
Lifeless sky, only the gentle breeze makes rusty leaves peel in the stillness of the moribund.
Senryu
Bowed forest
Bent by the northwesterly
Boars thrive here
Summer woods
Swimming elks in a tarn
Seem philosophical
The forest’s
bear
The honey pot found
The rabbits smiled
Dawn’s
forest
Deadly chilled serpent
Dazzled by the sun
The sun amid
trees
Tried to set a stage of love
The breeze blew pollen
The
Keeper of the Peace
Behind high
walls cypresses’ stand dignified and tall,
the iron-gate leading, into a silent Paradise, is open
white marble and names in golden letters.
In here traffic noise dies down, a perfect spring day
comes to an end. I feel at ease here, have no regrets,
this place will one day be my home.
The gardener smokes a cigarette, fine Turkish blend,
tickles my nose, wish I could smoke too. With a big
key he locks up and wishes me safe journey.
Twenty
years in Algarve
(Biographical)
I have lived in the upper
Algarve for twenty years. I have been hiding away from life all those years, I know every bush, tree, every
bend in the road, seen, seasons come and go, trapped in my own alcoholic mind,
unable to be free from this slavery that only makes me feel
at ease when the bottles have been emptied and sleep brings in a new
day. Then working through the day, never taking the time to
befriend anyone, relax; for my quest is the night when I can open a bottle of wine
and dream the loser’s reverie and see myself if I could be free of the
past’s ghosts. My childhood is my nightmare, only wine can still my fears;
those disgusting people who abused a child. Shall I ever be able to break the chain of fear, feel equal
to fellow man? Alcoholism is a burden, a struggle I’m losing
as I sink into old age misery.
A Moment to
Remember
This night is
too beautiful to behold, moon and silence. My heart aches.
Know I will wake up at dawn and regret that I can’t take it
with me.
It will all be erased one day and I shall not know that I
ever lived.
I have nothing, cannot own anything but my own ageing body,
all I can do is to enjoy the rare moments of fulfillments.
I hear a plane high up...see its light, full of passengers
going home and back to work. Why would anyone want to leave
this place?
Across the road, in a darkened house, a man lies dying
racked by pain...hecan’t even shave himself. He sees not the
full moon.
My life consists of moments, not like takes at a film studio
that can be done
over and over again till it’s right. Some moments are too
sad to behold.
Do not think of this now, I will drink another cold beer,
smoke a cigarette,
look at the stars and dream.
APoem
from the Seas
I once saw, where
the horizon ends, a ship plough the sky.
White tears on pale blue, and I saw the waiting darkness;
I knew, before any others, it would be a starlit night.
Look, I said, but it was too late, the ship had cast anchor
behind a cloud loading mist for Dogger Banks, and took
onboard discarded dreams to plug the dikes of Amsterdam.
Sunflowers on mythical sea and red flying fish, my ship is
bound for the Saragossa Sea with a hold full of old sailors,
it’s here they come to stalk in the fog of the forgotten.
Moon Light
Senryu
No moon is
peace
Half moon is, partial promise
Full moon is heartache
Full moon is romance
Half moon is waning love
No moon is emptiness
Anemic moon
On afternoon’s azure sky
Is pale as demise
Bird
Migration Senryu
I see no
birds today
Need them for my loneliness
Wonder why they flew?
The birds which left
Built me a nest of feathers
A bed of eiderdown.
Birds are transient
Open the door of any cage
See them fly as dreams.
Nagasaki
Mon Amour
A Reading
There are moments when things
become clear, I sat on deck, a night when the Pacific Ocean was, as its
name, calm; listened to the heartbeat of the ship, which seemed to beat
faster when one of the engineers opened the door and came out on
deck. I heard laughter from the mess-room, they were playing cards
but I knew I would never be one of them, I had tried, the swagger and the misogyny,
living in
a world where women were either whores or mothers. The ship was bound for Nagasaki, which for the young crew
meant little, but I had been here before and visited a graveyard
where
Portuguese sailors
had died long time ago when Japan was an unknown land.
At fifty I was a relic and accepted that.
Walking down the gangway, I didn’t bother to look back,
didn’t shake anyone’s hand— it was dinner time anyway.
Before flying back to Europe I tried to find the Portuguese
cemetery, it wasn’t there anymore; another relic gone.
