Truth of My Youth

2012-01-08T06:53:00.000-08:00

SAVE IT FOR A SUNNY DAY
I.
These dreams will be my anchor
These dreams wille be my income

Like Dylan said the poet’s in the gutter
and it’s a constant struggle cause most jobs are shit jobs
and cause recklessness is the only thing that leads our lives
and doesnt have any arguments to defend itself.
Humans need freedom
the artist needs time

but has no time to make money
so he slaves part of the day
forgets himself part of the day
but who more than the artist needs his own full self ?
The others lose their souls to a job
and find it back in the alleys of a supermarket
like my uncle who brags about his job in a supermarket
and then i notice a note on the fridge with the name of a shrink.

The artist compromises,
finds time between phone calls, frustrations
and obligations and when he succeeds in finding that time
then only can he hope to give his most precious thing to his art,
_____________________his life.

____only then will he feel the pleasure to feel his hands work for him
feel the angel of the spine climb the stairs of his vertebrae
all the way up to his brains.

II.
Heaven could be a place on earth if animals gave up their suits
and the pursuit of success, their lives when they fit only in a suitcase,
cause Reason turns an animal into a man
but the System turns Man into an animal,
this animal who forgot that the reason behind each day
is feeding the body and the soul,
surrouding oneself with one’s kind
and soothing the sexes that allievate the mind.

photo par ? '09

2012-01-06T07:20:00.000-08:00

HAIKUS AUTOMOBILES

Je descends l’avenue Champollion

Trois flics chargent une vingtaine de fusils à l’arrière d’un camion.

Un homme pose sa baguette de pain sur la banquette arrière.
Avant de refermer la portière
Il la reprend, en arrache un morceau
et le tend à son fils assis devant

et moi je casse les rétros des voitures garées sur la piste cyclable.

2011-12-22T12:27:00.001-08:00

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder cause if there's none he goes crazy.

2011-12-19T16:38:00.000-08:00

?
To look at an icicle versus to smash it
convenience versus adventure
to love one person versus to love a thousand.

?
Regarder un stalactite ou le casser
le confort ou l'aventure
aimer une personne ou en aimer mille.

2011-12-17T12:24:00.000-08:00

Le brouhaha, le brouhaha, le brouhaha
le brouhaha ne s’arrêtera pas
le brouhaha, le brouhaha, le brouhaha
quand moi j’étais en 5^e
les profs en parlait déjà
mes oreilles bourdonnent comme une machine à tatouer
ma gorge est sèche et irritée.
Je m’arrête, je m’assieds
je n’en peux plus, je n’en peux pas
du brouhaha, du brouhaha, du brrrrrouhaha…
Mais au milieu de toute l’agitation
je vois le gosse autiste assis sur sa chaise
la tête penchée sur un compas
et quelques bouts de stylos,
comme s’il était à cent mètres de là.
Je l’observe, il ne me voit pas,
il se parle, se chuchote,
son visage change d’expression aussi
vite que ses petits doigts sales,
tâché d’encres multicolores,
qui fabriquent, qui tricotent.
Au milieu de la foule de la classe,
je m’arrête et je l’observe
pendant que les autres élèves, les NORMAUX
s’agitent, font les fous, foutent la merde.
Je les laisse ruiner mon cours quelques instants de plus
pour regarder cet iceberg de calme non-normatif,
non-diagnostiqué.
Je pense aux enfants, aux désaxés, aux fous
quand ils se heurtent aux tabous.
Je regarde l’horloge et puisque c’est mon devoir,
je le rappelle à l’ordre, lui confisque ses bouts de stylos,
je dissipe sa brume éveillée avant de m’occuper des autres…

Recueil terminé, cherche éditeur

LA FAUTE AUX DINOSAURES

2011-11-02T04:13:00.000-07:00

MISERE HUMAINE

Je me suis arrêté pour regarder les gens faire les poubelles.
La grille du Carrefour City s’est ouverte
et une petite dame s’est engouffrée dès que la grille était à sa hauteur.
C’est elle qui a attiré mon attention au départ
quand elle a immédiatement été repoussée par l’employée en gilet bleu
qui traînait la grande poubelle grise à roulette en grimaçant;
_______________________________repoussée comme une mouche
dans le sens où elle est revenue à l’assaut une fois, puis deux,
devant ses deux fils, jusqu’à ce que la poubelle soit dehors.
Ils portaient un jogging bariolé, le genre qui était populaire
au début des années 90 et qu’on trouve chez Emmaüs pour pas cher,
leur mère portait un gilet en laine et un voile sur les cheveux
qui se prolongeait en robe longue et sale,
l’un des deux m’a regardé avec un léger sourire
Et s’est mis à fouiller...
Une baguette de pain, de la laitue, des cartons avec des œufs écrasés dessus.
Pendant que la poubelle révélait et distribuait ses trésors dans l’agitation
des bras et des mains qui pénétraient les couches successives
et la surface noire des sacs poubelles
moi j’étais sur le trottoir d’en face.
Deux ou trois personnes les ont rejoint, un peu en retard au rendez-vous.
Pas des clochards, pas gens sales, pas des « pauvres » ou des « gitans »,
des gens. Des gens qui avaient dû être à ma place il y a quelques temps.
Au bout d’un moment, ils ont commencé à se partager le contenu de la poubelle
et à travailler en équipe. Ils discutaient, l’un deux a ri.

Cette scène m’a rappelé un autocollant que je voyais souvent
sur les poteaux de mon quartier :
Partageons les richesses, pas la misère.
Eux, ils partageaient la misère
en plein milieu de la place, à côté de la Banque de France
et ils n’avaient pas l’air gêné, mal à l’aise ou triste,
ils étaient juste contents de manger.

2011-07-23T22:59:00.000-07:00

ROSEANA, MERCED, CA

The vitiligo stains on her arms and hands
and the bandages on her legs were like the flowers and the litter
on the bushes along the freeway were she was sparing for change.
She is a mother but i can't remember the name of her son
and she hasn't seen him in 20 years...

Before i asked for her name i wanted to call her Mary
because she had an immaculate blue dress and the red plastic umbrella
between her pale hair and the burning California sun
was shining a red glow on her freckled face,
and after she told me her name was Roseana,
she told me her nickname was Mary.

She has ridden the Greyhound bus to Florida to see her family
and when she got there and no one was there
she had a heart failure.
The ambulance took her to the hospital
but instead of taking care of her
_______broke as she was
they strapped her to a hospital bed
at the UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL OF MIAMI
they tested drugs and products on her legs
the doctors and students around the hospital bed,
she said they had strapped 200 people on the beds
and tested shit on them.
She said she could still hear the screams in the night.
One thing's for sure she could still feel the burns on her very body.

America and the rest of the fucked up human race
has not enough of the monkeys and dogs in the labs

now they're so used to inflicting pain on abused lives
that they take their Lower Class Saints
and hold them in captivity
like the American Nazis at the Hospital in Miami.

I told her to go rest at a YMCA or something
but there is no YMCA in Merced
there is a lotta SUVs and Taco Bells,
Carl's Juniors and Am-Pm gas stations
Mc Donald's and Shell gas stations
but no YMCAs.

I gave her a bottle of water and a green bill
and as i left she told me "God bless you".
Well, maybe he has blessed me
after he has blessed the surgeons,
the medecine students,
the troups and cops,
the white majority at the drive in,
and after that if he has the time
he will bless the people on the street corners and freeway exits
that go to jail for holding a sign
and have to walk all the way back to their corner
like modern days Sisyphuses under the burning sun
like Victor, Roseana's friend;
those who get their tents dismantled by pigs
and their legs bitten by bugs, their necks by spiders.
Maybe at that same moment Obama is at his desk working on the Health Care Reform
but i don't trust Obama
and i don't trust God

i don't trust the silent majority
and the ignorant minorities forever waiting
in their comfortable, quiet American consumerist cocoon
to start a REVOLUTION.

FUCK GOD
FUCK GOVERNMENT
FUCK ANIMAL TESTING
FUCK ANIMAL CONSUMPTION
FUCK CARS AND COPS
FUCK THE AMERICAN SYSTEM
FUCK THE HIGH CLASS
FUCK IGNORANCE.

2011-07-02T06:58:00.000-07:00

un parmi les autres, recueil DIY en construction...
Love always.

WINDOW BANE

Everyday, while writing at my desk
i often look out the window to the parking lot
separating my Welfare building from the middle class houses

and every day at the same exact hour i see a blue car parking
on the white-lined lot opposite my window.
____________Number 807.
The driver exits along the neighbors' bushes, closes the driver's door and,
keys in hands walks around the shabby car with a tiny sun roof whose edges are chipped by the sun.
His black pants and tucked white shirt caress the leaves,
he comes out the front of the car, switching his leather briefcase to his key-holding hand and combs his buzz cut,
his red tie sits impeccably, hiding the buttons of the shirt.

He starts whistling while reaching the back wheel:

the soundtrack to his perfect choreography,
everyday he dances in front of me,
unseen and undisturbed
master of the block's cosmos,
he passes the two trees that sit at the entrance of the parking lot
acclaimed by the birds and the soft summertime sun
and commences his run on the gravel sidewalk.
Pay day or not, rain or sun
always the same fucking run.
Today as he slips from my sight at the corner of the beige building
i wonder.
Tomorrow is Sunday, what the hell is he goin to do with his day?
Will he dance and whistle in the comfort of his appartment?
Will he lay his white collar uniform on the chair or the in the chest-a drawers
knowing it'll be worn again the next morning?
Will he leave the TV on?
Will he realize the sick routine has been paused
and enjoy the day off or linger on the things left undone at the office
while his kid or his wife try to talk to him?
Am i even any better than him?

As my scornful thoughts spin
my eyes catch the glowing blond hair
of a very desirable middle-aged woman
in a red tank top and tight jeans who's just parked her car...
and a second later my neighbor, a cancer survivor
who i haven't seen in a while on her way to the bakery,
then the bus stops and my sister exits with the wind in her hair.

If the world's bound to be wretched by the routine of shabby-car-driving executives at least my neighborhood has its saints.

2011-04-22T02:29:00.000-07:00

L'enregistrement de l'album du projet Spoken Words and Open Chords est terminé, il sera disponible bientôt...

En attendant, une petite vidéo réalisée par Brice Gelot de la venue de Scott Bourne à Dijon dans le cadre des soirées Musique Mythes Murder: [lien]

2011-03-13T15:31:00.000-07:00

SILENCE DOESN'T MEAN A THING II

The Earth has been here for a long time
but under these snowflakes
that froze my mistakes
it feels it could be the end.
Are we so desperately reaching for the end?
Are we so eager to know the end
that we destroy the place that we're given
by solid hands?
That we slay the living creatures
drench them in petroleum
cut them open with a knife and cook them?

Aren't we supposed to be afraid?

Primaveral feelings are at bay
a frozen bay
like the park and the lake.
We haven't seen the sky for five days
instead of it, covering it
a uniform grey mass drifted endlessly
like the released souls of forsaken ghosts
knowing the taste of freedom at last,
these ghosts i soaked like a ghostly sponge
while my lungs absorbed smoke,
lying on the bed and seeing red.

Red
like the sun that finally appears today
that fills the sky with a new tinge and hue
that changes the landscape and my mood,
that hungs hammocks of purple and orange
to the skeletons of the trees that line
the industrial avenue with its fences and trucks.
Red
like the sun i chase while it sets
at the end of another afternoon,
that is leaving way too soon,
like a girl you couldn't get to know
before she had to go back home, north,
It had just appeared
but now must leave for the moon.
So i look down to the wall
that spreads along the industrial avenue,
holes on the wall are like ballroom for birds.

Pigeons are out on the snowless ground
they patiently pace around
fearless of the cars and the sound.

Une interview de Gabriel et moi (Spoken Words and Open Chords)
dans le cadre du festival Humanist Records: [lien] l'Oreille au Poste du 11/3
Merci à Marie et sa collègue @ Radio Campus

"this mess in my head is a mess getting out"

2011-02-24T14:35:00.000-08:00

Je lirais quelques uns de mes textes
le 10 mars à 13h15 à l'Atheneum (université de Dijon)
accompagné de mon cher ami Mr Mojo de Lillo à la guitare et autres instruments
(pause méridienne gratuite et ouverte à tous)
Un avant goût sur myspace

2011-02-03T15:03:00.001-08:00

THE ADULT CRASH

The cop said "Walk when the green light's on
drive on, drive on, drive on!"

"Stand still" said the photographer
the clothes designer said "more fur!"
"it's murder" said the vegan
"just walk" said the pedestrian
the director said "think harder"
"That'll never sell" said the movie producer
the music producer said "change his voice"
"harder, better, faster, stronger"
said the electronic voice.
"Do your homework" said the teacher
"take what we have" said the employment worker
the hipster said "oh my god that's awesome!"
the artist said "it's already been done..."
God said "stop calling me"
Santa Claus: "d'ya have work for me?"
Jesus ordered for twelve
Judas said "you're a dead man..."

The pope said something in latin
the pop star said something about love
and the audience listened.
"I'm an alcoholic" said Steve
and the audience said "Hi Steve"
The freak said "i ain't an animal"
the conformist: "can't you just be normal?"
the housewife said "wipe your feet"
the diabetic: "that's too sweet"
the white collar got a burnout
and the boxer got knocked out.

The communist said "share!"
the nihilist said "dare!"
The ecologist: "look what you've done"
BP said "come on, it's only oil..."
The protest singer: "it ain't right!"
the pop singer: "does that sound right?"
the rich man said "what's the price?"
the poor man said "where's my slice?"
the capitalist said "more profits"
and the worker said "i quit"
the journalist said "bullshit!"
the editor said "write it!"
the writer got writer's block
the pornstar said "suck my cock"
the director: "don't change the lines!"
the poet said "it does not, necessarly, have to rhyme."

The cocaine addict said "more lines"
"walk it" said Johnny Cash
"the light's not green" said the cop
the rebel said, "fuck you, i got nothing to lose!"
the buddhist and the bum asked
___________________"do you?"

Cité du Soleil, janv 2010

2011-01-13T15:48:00.000-08:00

UNTITLED

People were looking at a big bird passing,
______hovering, steady,

In the night, on the carless street
the few people were walking slowly,

The bird was drifting, singing, free.

The streetlamps were reflecting on the wet pavement,
the song and the shadows were absorbed in the cement,

The people were going home,
it was around three,
_____and the bird was me.

----------------

INSOMNIAC HAIKU

Growing hatred for this bed
that doesn't let me sleep.
I glance out the window
in the darkness where i want to slip.

to my very good friend Gabriel

2010-12-22T12:03:00.000-08:00

compact disc available

2010-12-20T12:27:00.000-08:00

SILENCE DOESN'T MEAN A THING

The students' heads were bent down as i paced around,
the sole of my shoes made a noise i like on the linoleum.
As the kids took a test
i took time to look at the sun
setting towards the hill,
beyond the railroads tracks.
The three classes of the afternoon succeeded
while it was slowly setting,
the sky was turning pink, orange and green.
It finally hid behind the hill
givin' it a golden linin'.

I made sure i caught a glimpse of these last inexorable minutes
and i witnessed the moment the world turns into darkness
watching the universe quietly work its perfect geometry
through a clean classroom window with white plastic frames.

I rode home in the navy night
and the snow started to pile up like ash
as if to remind us that one day we'll have to return.
It covered the roads and the sidewalks
of this same route i take every single day
back and forth many times a day
like a circle, a dead-end loop.
The snow glew in the night
and made everything drowsy;
i wanted to stain it with red
and call back the summer sun
like the King Without Distraction
but i kept following where the bike lane was.

My tires burned their black lips on the cold,
I started coming up with words
______not to feel alone:
Tree roots are covered by tar
pretty soon it'll be too late
pretty soon it'll be too far
open skies above us all
open rhymes to save us all
or what's left of our souls.
Hope must be found
like a silver lining on a cloud,
it dies last but slow
unless we're bound
to what they call Heaven or Hell
after the days of old.
If time is like the virgin snow
let's leave footprints before we go.

2010-12-10T18:42:00.000-08:00

THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE BULLSHIT

The priest gets up from his chair
his uniform is well-ironed and impeccably black,
the square under his adam's apple is impeccably white
like his skin and his hands,
the only human flaws that appear
as he stands before the conference massed up in the room.
He says that God speaks through our bodies;
his when he preaches,
ours when we act the way we should.
Me?
Doubt denies me the right to let go
to these thoughts and echoes
from beyond the pale of reason
where their faith roams free and runs
and their hands praise god, not the sun
but the son,
that millenary misunderstanding
from the war of Images to the war of the Roses
mistaking a solar star for a demiurge
a cross for a horseshoe
coins for icons
with godly heads and devil tails
and morals to restrain.

As they all follow and recite
the rosary in my head
is tangled and intertwined.

Behind the priest are stupid posters
_________________and well-labelled shelves.

2010-11-11T15:27:00.000-08:00

ALMAZONE

We have been walking in the rain for quite some time now
but i have decided to go up
the hill to the visit the basilica again and i'll go.

We pass old Lyon and the rivers
and on the bridges i feel like there is water everywhere,
i'm above it and under it, surrounded by it,
and through the noise of the rain i can hear
the stone steps shout and the old walls whisper
climb up and recall the promises of love you made by the river
but they're now forever dissolved in the water and never to be found again.
I remember when i uttered them on a spring afternoon;
the girl's just a memory now, a few stills in my head
since i threw away all the notes and pictures
but i can still feel our arms clutching.
I realize the change of the season on me
as it wets my clothes and soaks my socks
through the holes on the shoes she offered me for my birthday.
It's been raining for the past two days.

We get to the basilica through a bushy and muddy path up the hill,
my friend notes we have no girls with us this time...
we go up the marble steps and push the sacred door
inside, there is a big sacred mess
and the priest speaks into a microphone
to tell the visitors to get out for the mass
as if the place will stop being a stone building to become the house of God.

So we get out through the sides
and walk around all the chapels and dig the statues, the sculptures,
all the old objects, exposed in the exhibit room:
that gold has been glittering since the twelfth century
and that ivory represents the Christ in glory
and some man is fighting a snake or a dragon...
I look at the censers and the portraits of bastard cardinals,
and the representations of dead or dying saints;
I stop for a while to observe the paintings of two sacred hearts
and while a few people pray in the chapel,
I feel my very own.

I lose my friends and go back up to the mass
it's All-Saints day all the benches are full
but a man sees me and makes room, so i decide to sit.
Everybody's listening to the priest's psalms,
with their palms to the sky,
a young woman clasps her hands hard to feel the qualms
of faith
but her phone rings and she reaches in panic in her Longchamp bag
to turn it off.

I want to remind the priest that i was man-made
and that because many people died for it
or painted it
it doesn't make it true to all
but all these people standing up and sitting down at the same time
to the words like a human tide
make it holy.

The truth is covered like the Virgin Mary
and faith, whatever it is, is beautifully
hidden at the bottom of hearts
it's pure like the last pure thoughts in a lustful girl
it's a tiny spark ready to ignite
but it's raining hard outside.

I will stay a little bit more and walk around,
look beauty in the eyes and feed my soul.

2010-10-26T18:59:00.000-07:00

WHEN YOU WALK WITHOUT EASE

At a time when the clouds of fire have been extinguished
and now reflect moonlight in a rare lace of air
I look up as I face a wall
and see a satellite glide
in what's left to see from the inky convex sky
between the concrete corners;
the cosmic device brings a Billy Bragg song to my mind.
Like all the words I read in a day,
like all the shit I hear
the tiny light fades into the universe following its orbit
and leaves only an image on my mind.

That's what I think about as my piss drips along the wall
in a uniform shape, splits into two separate ways
then three and four
and collides with the angle of the ground
to shine, reflected by the lamp posts.

I shook my friend's hand and told him good night
only a moment ago but I already feel alone, in this alley
whose gravel path leads nowhere but to a cul-de-sac.
I remember earlier, among a late night still life on the table,
my friend's beer glass like a clepsydra,
the last drop disappeared and the foam dried
like the one on the sea side
except there was no tide to refill that one,
we were washed out of the appartment
made noise in the kitchen
made noise on the wooden stairs
made noise in the streets
finished conversations and disappeared.

I was going to be stripped down to the sheer energy
that animates my body
the time when my shadow, that tired image of me
moves like a treacherous compass needle and confuses my way.

Lately, I've been feeling like this city's shrinking around me
or like I was in wax museum
or like after the scythe,
still, silent crop haulm;
boring has replaced familiar on the street signs as i name them;
the big streets are too straight
and the wind blows cold in those corridors
the smaller ones not meant for solitary men
and at the end of them, my home, my room to lay my head.

Title inspired from Never had no-one ever by The Smiths
Song reference, Billy Bragg - New England

2010-10-02T05:03:00.000-07:00

THE NINETEENTH HOUR

The privilege of the triangular tops of the roofs
is to glow orange, lit by the late afternoon sun
and peer at the last colorful hours of the day,
above the red tiles, the gray tiles, the yellow tiles
and look at the few cats and birds that do what they must
among antennas and the balls that kids have forever lost.

I look at myself in a narcissist shop window
while the lamp posts
with their cold silhouettes against the purple sky, warm up
and get ready for the night.
Some kids are lined up on a rail like silly birds,
golden clouds are stuck between kerosene lines.

I meet my friends downtown
in front of the townhall building,
stone armors and columns
fasces and frontons
glow with a strange light
A strong kid chases a pigeon
around the square
and the bird keeps escaping him,
Asian tourists take pictures of the fountains and people
like they've done for the past three months
while we were sitting on unconfrotable bistro chairs
sipping and talking for days on end.

It is late in the afternoon and it looks like
the sun is struggling not to tip over the Earth,
but like Sisyphus we feel that immense disappointment
and button up our jackets
as the boulder rolls back into darkness.

Victor has a funny story about a guy who broke his shoulder
Mathieu has a new sweater
I have goosebumps on my arms,
we laugh,
we are cold
but all dressed for summer's funeral.

2010-08-26T22:19:00.000-07:00

BLACK OCEAN

I have come thousands of miles to stand

on the edge of America,

the end of America

where the route 66 silently crumbles into the ocean

where fishermen curse as their lines tangle

a buoy blinks,

on the wooden boards a fish lies dead in a bucket

his eyes like black beads reflect

the lights that try to confront the abyss,

the Santa Monica ferris wheel illuminates the pier

it shines and dazzles with colors,

a giant eye, wide open

that sees only oblivion.

And there are those eyes who praise the sun in the day

and wonder when it'll come back

to stop the ten-hour decay,

they look at the wheel and its solar ways

but know it's only artificial,

a consolation in the night

The black ocean's filled with godlessness,

with the reason we write and read

hate and tattoo our skins

with the realization that life is only business,

the true believer's failed races

he who looks at love like devotees at krishna,

he who waits knowing the only thing that'll come is the end

but still eats the fruits of youth,

he who also ripens in the heat on the passenger's seat

stuck in traffic or on a beach bench, alone,

he who ripens and rots, is planted and born again,

who drinks wine, the blood of grapes, not of Christ

until his teeth are crimson and his smile indelible,

he who runs among derelict lives but contemplates,

he who passes the bums' bodies on the sand

like fossils on the black ocean's floor,

he who has buried Hilton's adorers with their stacks of bills

and tequila shots, cocaine lines and death on the rocks,

he who has heeded the irresistible call of the night

but knows that tomorrow, when the sun'll rise

the high school kids of America

will still fight their reflexions under the pier

throwing their white bodies in the sand, burned by the sun

and adorned by skulls

Malibu girls'll walk the sidewalks like the blond ghosts

of an endless time,

the angel-faced teenagers baptized by the pollution in the Pacific Ocean

where float the stanzas i try to find,

the beat birds, the infinite possibilities of words

__and my depression in the summer doldrums.

2010-08-03T07:55:00.000-07:00

TRAIN OF THOUGHTS

Somewhere south of Paris
a man with a beer belly
waves at the train,
his loose dog skips on the path,
he holds the brown leather leash with his other hand.
The train follows a canal for a little while,
a straight trench, man-dug at eye level
filled with quiet water that looks like jello,
flat and smooth.

Now it's summer
but it probably makes great ice to skate
in the winter,
my father used to tell me about how he played
on the canal close to our place when he was a kid.

I pay attention to the rattle of the train for an instant
as i put down a magazine
_____Tackatack-tacktack-tacktack...
the only music i hear,
the bass line to the music in head,
that and the air conditionning
that i muffled with my sweater.

Golden haystacks in the fields through the left window,
rolls that stick to the hills.
Truck parts in a yard through the right one
and the bare tracks that keep stretching
and sometimes distort in a turn
although firmly bolted to the ground.

The sun gently sets on France's countryside.
This is my soil that i'm gliding through,
but i feel nostalgia for America's water towers
absent from this moving picture,
that's going to reel for one more hour.
The sun has nothing to hit on its course.
I'm killing time with a four-color pen
throwing useless words on a dogeared train ticket.

The sunflowers are lined up like hopeful brothers,
I am alone in an eight seat compartment.

2010-07-20T04:18:00.000-07:00

UNIVERSAL ATAVISM

Our parents' achievements seem like big dots
compared to our lifelines being traced.
The giant Morse code of life
emitting to regions unknown;
the future never shows itself to us.

Our parents, who left colorful gifts
by the christmas tree,
figurines of our heroes
or brand new bicycles,
now hand out consolation prizes wrapped in lies.

I lost all my wisdom teeth to the hand of a doctor.
Only the four ones that hurt are called wise
the rest are to show the whiteness of our smiles
and to voice the sound of anxiety as we grind,

I lost my book of god and took up books of men
the covers and sides were rugged
just like how life should be

and as i read the lines and pages
looking for a better reason everytime
knowing that in the end there's never much time left,
i sometimes feel we are decaying monsters
on our way to a place that has too many names
to be found on a map,
so we listen to the sounds of the machine
looking for our wisdom teeth and a heart.

EPIPHANIES updated

2010-07-05T07:00:00.000-07:00

WORDS

Clouds move in groups
slowly like a fleet to the sound of music from my stereo
I put down my pencil
and choose to dig the moment,
bright weather makes things look nice.

Thoughts float in past and future
the written words sticks and stings.

AT A PARTY, EARLY JULY

The source of torments in the mist of sweat and smoke
the tangle of sonic serpentines only stopped by the stone corners,
the sound of words from the brains and vocal cords
stopped by a shrug and a sigh,
The will wandering inside,
the truth of disappointment,
the sharp veracity of the void.

The need for structure and the breaking of it between the pillars,
the speakers have stopped
the grils'll leave, the men'll fight
billions of barking brats
doubled by the devotion of desire.

The joy of fear,
the call of the abyss for the end of destruction.

A girl sits on the floor
hiding her panties with her skirt
her eyes brightens and she smiles through her tears.

The warmth of her smile,
the sheen of the bathroom tiles between mudstains.
Among the remains
the bodies have fought and fainted,
the claims in vain that repeat and dissolve in the air
while all the guest disperse on the parking lot,
the vanity of the tangible ,
the veracity of the void.

The dried tongue of the poet
outside the pathetic circus of skulls,
The tentacles of the tormentors on the shepherd's staff,
the power of the verb,
the veracity of the void.

PORSCHES AND BIRDS

Cycling on my way to work

Two Porsches glide past me,
one silver, one red

smoothly adhering to the curves of the road,
the front of the machines swallow the asphalt
and see the stripes succeed under.
The golden crest with antlers and a horse
shines in the sun.

There's a dead bird near the curb.
Once borne by its wings from roof to tree
and anywhere it wanted to be,
once looking down at the World
now looks up at the sky
from a broken skull
or maybe down from higher above,
if there's a heaven for birds.

Father, is there a heaven for men?
Is there a heaven for Porsche drivers?

I hear children voices,
they hold their father's hands
on their way back from school,
it's almost five in the afternoon

I'm still riding down the road
but stop at a red light
on a bridge above railroad tracks.

The clouds are all gone
but the sky's still filled with faith.
I think of a girl, what she told me
and what she wrote me in the cover of a book
_____and as the light turns green
i hear ring in these words the true names
of the Savior.

FOURVIERE/BE YOUR OWN GOD

The last time i visited the basilica i told the priest
and a man that Jesus wouldn't have minded me keeping my hat.

This time i was with a gorgeous girl
We walked down the marble steps
leading to the side chapels
and while looking at a kneeling angel i thought:

If god exists he doesn't exist here
among the decoration
the chalk-white statues and stones
the representations of his son,
the stained glass and arches.
She admired the glory of Christ
with the same eyes
that like ikea furniture.

We sat down on the long wooden benches and argued
about her ex.
Yes Father we had sex
and without God's consent,
and everytime i laid in bliss
still annoited by hormones
it's not Him i praised but her white body
glowing to the candle light.

She wouldn't talk to me for a while
her eyes were fixed on an effigy
and mine on a mosaic representing ships.

I got up and to examine it
as the gold on it glittered.
I looked at the rows of oars, the smoke
and noticed the dozens of drowning turks,
arms stretched to the sky
to implore a defeated god.

I looked at the whole thing
saw the details and imagined the work.
They should’ve tried that at catechism
when they tried to make me acknowledge God’s greatness.

I looked down and saw her two eyes aiming at me
like darts at the cork
blue and round
from the rows of benches.

She asked me why some angels
were looking down
and why some looked happier
and she translated some words in latin for me.

She was the most beautiful thing among the sacred mess.

A smiling lady opened the doors telling us to be silent
and we entered the chapel of Mary during the office to see
all the people lined up in silence.
Their voices suddenly raised in unison and died out
as the feeble ones were still whispering
their words of hope and faith.

I was looking at candles in a box

i remembered that prophets and followers are wrong
i looked up and the smile on the lady's lips had not gone away,

I put the candle down in the box
and realized that
like when old people look at vanities
the truth lies on the thin metallic layer
behing the glass of the mirror
and knew that all the while
_____Ariadne's thread was running through us saying:
_____untie me from this post called today.

photo by Korina

2010-05-24T10:15:00.000-07:00

VACATION OF ICARUS

I haven't seen any plane crossing the sky
for a few days, tought i
while having a break in the park

no glistening aircrafts that reverberate sunlight
and smear the sky with kerozen lines,
no diurnal shooting stars
in which you wish you were,
wrapped in free blankets
and going somewhere.

I remembered looking at the planes leaving from LAX
µduring a perfect summer afternoons
in the water, thinking
I need to find a way to stay here
but everyday of that blessed summer
the planes still defied the Pacific Ocean
with their bellies full,
they drew the same angle with the Venice pier.

I haven't seen any plane in the sky
thought i
because icelandic dust is flooding
Europe's skies
a fact that would have saddened Kerouac's own road eyes.
Eyjafjallajokull woke up from an untimely sleep
µto spit ashes not knowing
that since the last time he's been breathing,
Google's Earth had been spinning,

We usually never hear about Iceland
but Eyjafjallajokull's rocky lungs,
older than old,
needed to breathe.
Why he drew a breath on that day of April 2010
nobody knows,
or maybe some scientists and their probes

He shook the schedules
of a French businessman, a Danish mother,
a Spanish sister
and made airport refugees,
they sleep on carpetted floors
with airline company logos
with nobody to sing their story,
only the newsmen who film
forgetting sympathy.

I've been snoozing,
leaning my head against the wall
the dog is playing with that same stick
that it won't fecth
and the Boze is still playing music
on the steps.

I just saw a blinking aeroplane in the night sky
it glides and blends kerosene with ink.
The dogs still chews
and everyone is out to get booze.

2010-03-25T16:32:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK CITY FRAGMENTS

We're on a boat between two states
above the ever-moving sands,
unfathomable.
______We land.

Chapsticks and cheesecakes
hasidic jews and hipsters
black snow and North Face
veterans wearing badges,
quiet faces and fat kids
on the subway train
with slogans like limmericks on the sides,
advertisements and alliterations
to be read by relenting retinas
to the rattle of the train,
and every man's wish on board
safely encapsulated within the compartments
that run through the tunnels
like worms on speed.
They slow down and stop
to the muffled electric voices
of recorded operators
and empty liquid streams of passengers.
Another wave gets in to the sound of
Take Five coming out of a tenor saxophone.

The player's fifteen minutes of glory are cut down to
µnot even one but endlessly renewed.
Somebody drops a coin,
i see a very pretty girl leaning against the wall,
beautiful legs in casual pants
and a beautiful face with nothing to stare at
except the rats on the tracks.

They disperse, she gets in,
i stay here
with an ethereal picture of her chestnut ponytail
and the back of her thin jaw.

My friend consults the map and comes back.
Subways or metro maps are always so clear.
Perfect urban lifelines
dotted with glands, joints and connections
with several hearts beating and pumping blood
through claustrophobic arteries.

Have you ever been paranoid on a subway train?
Staring portraits...all eyes in circles...
asian kid waking up...an old lady...
"does this train?"..."i have no idea i am"...
______The decaf was probably not one.

But then i find myself walking
up to another layer of the city
towards the lights on the setting sun
in the well-separated staircase
with two columns of people,
one keeping to the right to
keep things moving.
On the wall next to the exit
i can read
I NEED TO REMEMBER THIS
I NEED TO REMEMBER THIS
I NEED TO REMEMBER THIS
I NEED TO REMEMBER THIS
next to American Apparel silhouettes and a skull.

I look at colorful dancing consumerist dreams
in a blank instant,
so blank it feels somebody's talking instead of me
as if i was sitting at some guy's chair
with his half-empty beer in front of me
with the foam hanging on the sides
slowly coming down and drying up.

On one of the top layers now
sitting on a crimson couch
i stare at the Empire State Building
through the smoke of an ordinary tea.
What exactly do they do in there?
Behind the metallic structure
is it just an assemblage of cubicles?
Do they look at pictures
of their families on a sunday picnic
taped on the plastic separations?
Do they eat tepid food from carton boxes?
Do they regret they have gotten up?

I don't today
because i got up to see
a forty-year old man with a goatee
who dances to his three chord-songs
and smiles to his own lyrics
about global warming
and nods at the drop of a coin
tossed by my friend on the edge of a plateform
where a guy my age walks drunk
with a Subhumans tshirt and a empty look,
a Joe Strummer painting,
a blond waitress with a black dress,
a tattooed hand coming out of the huddled mass
to hold a post,
the moles and roaches
the rats and birds
the beasts of America,
derelict masts defying buildings,
and the ladders on the brick walls
that seem to lead to layers of the city that nobody
ever attained
or maybe the christians
the hindus, the kids that are rolling
or the hasidic jews...

photo by Léon
Feb 2010

signals (updated)

2010-03-08T07:32:00.000-08:00

SIGNALS

Get lost and be guided

Obscurity wouldn't be that green,
yellow and red without the signs
that read Holiday Inn and McDonald's
and the lamp posts
paving the windy road
to the entrance of the deserted mall.
They make the bricks of the steps look brighter
almost pink.
The green bulbs planted
in the grass make it look greener and phosphorescent.
A tailless cat with no direction trots
and passes them.

They can turn my blood cold
but not this one,
it passes by with its disguting
anatomy and dirty hair,
it mews and disappears
on the parking lot of the hotel.

Silence is not really silent either,
the white speakers above
the sliding doors of the entrance
play elevator music.
Cheap chords and howling saxophones
swell on repetitive choruses.
I remember that i heard
Neil Young played
through those same grids once,
at the time i was working there.
I realize i was tapping my toes
on the rail.

Then,
in a second,
the speakers start blowing a siren.
An instant of silence,
An instant of noise...

After that an announcement
to evacuate the shopping center.
Just a test of the system:
it is late on a sunday night,
everything is closed
and there are no ghosts between these walls.
The music resumes with african bongos.

I sit there,
the security camera is watching me,
a half-globe embedded
in the pearly white of the plastic roof.
I am looking at the city:
a black sea with hundreds of buoyants lights
well-anchored underneath
but pitching in the distance,
shy and undetermined to fight obscurity,
they are parallel sisters to the stars,
the millions of burning icebergs
and silver nebulas,
are separated from them only by some clouds
and the rotundity of the world.

A transparent wrap rolls and
twinkles at the lights,
three quarters of a price tossed on the steps,
it rolls towards the trash can
as if it had a plan,
moved by the breeze,
_____the breath from the giant lungs
_____of the cosmic fish.

Goes out to A.

ICBM

2010-02-26T13:28:00.000-08:00

A few words about my friend Andy's new magazine : International Chatterbox Magazine. An all DIY zine about reflexions, music, poetry, society, politics and reviews with an international perspective, with photos IN COLOR!

DOWNLOAD
ICBM blog

More words from me soon i promise

2010-02-01T14:24:00.000-08:00

BRAUĐ

The plastic tubes of the sign
above the bakery across the street
are arranged so that they read
PAIN.

Pain means bread in French,
from the latin panis
but when it blinks red
through the morning mist,
my eyes, corrupted by English
can't help but seeing the meaning
an anglophone beholder
with english speaking eyes would.

It lightens up around 7:15 every morning
and starts throwing spasms of aching red
that immediately dissolve in the fog
for an instant
until electricity spurts again
through the tubes.

Sometimes i'm still in bed,
when the baker has been up for four hours,
sometimes i'm eating flattened croissants
from a plastic pack from
the grocery store at the mall
and when my tired eye
looks at the clock by the window
it sometimes meets one of the throbs of light,
sometimes i stare at it
and it makes me smile to think
of the kind of shop this sign would
advertise for in an english speaking country.
Another language
Another clerk
behind the old register
without ads for baby-sitters
and people giving away kittens.

I recall standing outside a Walmart
one night in America and saying to Brian:
"Look at all these people, the potential
but why do they want to ruin my world?"
It made him laugh and then as we entered
looking for i-can't-remember-what
i though of a poem that
could have said something like this:

Look at those colorful glucides,
all those poor peasants running for
plastic hot dogs and frozen wings,
drawn by the only light in the night,
they have plastic tubes
inside their bodies and inside their heads
containing copper cables
and messages they radiate
to each other
in a range that can't barely reach
the metallic structure of the roof,
let alone the sky...
across the alleys they push Sisyphean carts
to the clink of cans and the beep of scanners,

While we throw timeless sand
at the eyes of our misery
sitting, silhouetted by the sky
at the top of a dune,
we shoot fake bullets with real guns
and make dry ice bombs,
we dance with knives to a familiar tune,
we blow up fuses on a saturday night,
we laugh at ourselves at the corners of the World;
in the dazzling temple they pray:
Our father,
give us this day our daily pain.

Written for Andy's ezine,
i'll put the address to it here when i have it

DERIVE TETRALOGY

2010-01-24T13:07:00.000-08:00

Dedicated to my friend Brian Harper

DERIVE

I was walking the poorly lit path boarded by trees
that I walk when I’m restless
and I want to escape the loneliness of my room.
It was very late at night.

I had left the blaring signs of shopping centers
and their smell of fried food
and the sight of the golden city lights
on a dark canvas of running blue and green.
The trees congregate along the sidewalk
to form a dark screen
and an abode for animals.
Squirrels and birds,
I suppose, since the branches rustle
when I walk by sometimes
Street lamps are evenly scattered on the side of the sidewalk,
their attempt to light my way is futile
but it's ok since there is nothing to see
on this path.
Joggers sometimes and potential assaulters.

I just wanted to walk off my obsessions
I was not even thinking about
how much longer I was going to walk
but my mind got lost
and suddenly I was walking streets with no name
feeling even further away from home,
feeling the distance of the ocean between this continent
and the one where my home stands,
too far to smell the salty breeze
but at once all I missed came hitting me like wave.

My friends, the way they talk
French food, words that don't make sense here
even when they are disguised in an English costume,
taking walks alone
but in my neighborhood.

This is a token of home, a parody.
And it is not funny.
I was following along the bushy side of the sidewalk
punched with holes of clarity
and staring at it.
It seemes to form a celestial-size screen showing nothing
but the picture of loneliness.

A car drove by, a bubble of light made of steel and glass
and I saw the face of its driver looking at me
emotionless,
i caught a picture of him
with his two hands on the wheel,
was he going home or was he escaping?
It was a sign of hope
like when a UFO marks a crop field
and proves we're not alone in the universe
but then I thought of myself in front of my computer screen
opening empty email inboxes many times a day,
recalling words said by ex-girlfriends,
entire paragraphs which don't make sense.
I looked down
the grey squares of concrete succeeded under my feet
as the Masonite tiles of an hospital ceiling would.
I avoided interstices, as usual.

I tripped on a slanted edge
my eyes focused and I saw a parking officer
walking around his booth,
he readjusted his beige uniform as I approached
and my words broke the silence:
“Good evening”
he stepped ahead and replied
he asked me some questions about myself,
where I came from.
We talked a little more since
at this hour no cars need to park
and when the silence settled
he turned around and left
leaving nothing in front of me
but that picture of loneliness.

DERIVE II

My thoughts became asphalt.

At the end of the line,
the one i drew with my bicycle,
________i found a table.

Under the big yellow M
that shone in the night
to lit only solitude
________i sat there.

Outside, aligned,
the tables were all deserted,
the city too,
below
________between the lamps,
hundreds of shimmering lamps.

I wrote a few lines
under the eyes of the cameras,
that kept watching just in case.
At a Mc Donald's, i wrote
on the cold metal
of the silent mall
________i wrote.

Some tourists were smoking cigarettes
outside the adjacent hotel
danes, czechs, germans, poles?
They threw the red butts on the floor.
One last puff and i was alone
and finally,
________i was home.

DERIVE III

I hung up the phone like i would seal a coffin
and the sun appeared in the corner of the window frame
in a tiny explosion
to hit the corner of my eye.

The faraway globe of fire
was cut in a quarter and projected a rectangle
on the table,
it reminded me of the way
that timeless universal light would reflect on the floor
of the appartment i lived in as a kid,
it would, on rare sunny days,
project a patch on the brown carpeted floor
and i'd lay down and stretch on it
and feel the soft and warmed up
material under me,
it was itchy on the bare parts of my body.
The patch was big enough for only me
and looking up through the window
i would stare at the sky.
A sky that was, and still is, anywhere
in the world.

The buffalos of imaginary cowboy games
would run across the room and off the balcony
to go meet wild things in the sky
and images of plastic dinosaurs and figurines
would sublimate on the blue.
I would get warmer,
still lying like a Gulliver surrounded by milions
of carpet bugs
and the brown patch under me
would feel as soft as a patch of sand
and a sober day-dream of youth
would produce more images in my mind
and make me jump over the buildings
ridiculed in size by the ones of real America
but giant enough in the mind of a provincial French kid.

My virgin mind would dally longer
while my body rested
on a day's brightness
until my mother yelled at me
between two squeaks of the ironing table:
she told me not to lie there.

According to her
there was something degrading about the floor.
C'est sale.
I never understood what.

Now i remember thinking about a girl
and wishing she was next to me,
looking at a portion of sky
but from the bank of a pond
through brown sunglasses and a polluted mind
some fifteen years later this past summer.

That's on that day i realized
looking at the sky, provided you cut out
a small portion with the blade of your iris,
allows you to be anywhere you want,
anywhere in the world
but at some point black angels always come down
and caw to remind you
that you're down here
with the rest of us.

DERIVE IV

I tried to steal a CD
but on the very end of my homerun
the guard looked at me in a way
that made me throw it back in a box
full of books on sale.
I was downtown and aimless
so i thought:
let's go to the mall.

I started to follow the road.
That same road i followed everyday to go to school
when we still lived in our old house.
I went through the same neighborhoods,
the rich and the poor
on a copper-colored bicycle,
i didn't see dead pigeons but a dead owl
brown and yellow
concrete against skull
and a flattened teddy bear
on the long Stalingrad avenue.
Avenue de Stalingrad,
Stalingrad Straße.
I saw a KFC sign too
and when i knew i was going to pass the back
of my old house i looked away,
straight ahead at the wet road
not thinking of anything at all.
I think i shed a tear.

I went up the gravel path and the mall appeared
like white sails on a grey sky
the façade of the Mc Donald's was lit
and surronded by empty balustrades.
The place, my place,
that can be so quiet, was packed.
The glass doors vomitted the crawling
and ever-moving ants of saturday afternoons
on the regular and flat stairs
of crimson concrete.

The rain started to fall on the
human ebb and flow.
I tied my bicycle to a post and went in.

The solitary crowd was dense inside,
they moved on the shiny tiles.
I wanted to cut through like a chainsaw,
instead i patiently went along
humming loud enough
to make heads turn.
I stagnated for a moment on the rolling stairs
...instead of a shell
but before i began
i was bored before i even began...
and entered the grocery store.

I walked in the alleys, looked at the CD shelves,
the clothes, the bakery, the dead meat,
the toys and picked a small bottle of water.
I stagnated again in line for ten good minutes,
i even let a old women cut in front of me
...learn to love me, assemble the ways
now, today, tomorrow and always...
I payed my 21 cents
and left the place for the rain.

...my only weakness tadadada
I opened my bag to put the plastic bottle in
and let a few drops fall
on a brand new CD case.

I. écrit en oct.-nov. 2008 en Caroline du Nord, II. écrit en juin 2009, III. et IV en janvier 2010 à Dijon,

Pour un peu plus de lecture et comprendre le sens non scientifique de "dérive" voici un lien
La théorie de la dérive, Guy Debord, 1956

Kings and queens of promise

2010-01-14T16:44:00.000-08:00

Plus de lecture bientôt, en attendant:

UNTITLED

Bicyle
eat vegeterian
steal
Do it yourself
Think
Love
Act
Promote
Destroy
Rebuild.

BEAT SHIT

2010-01-02T18:33:00.001-08:00

HOPELESS

The streets are made of concrete and tar
and bricks and shit
but what are the streets made for?

They're made to walk,
they're made to run,
ride,
roll,
drive
or just stay a whole night
or maybe a whole life.

To get out of night clubs
to wake up drunk and alone
or go to work in the mist,
at eight in the morning,
alone.
To throw bottles,
to throw punches,
to build Mc Donalds or stores
that sell expensive watches
to spit on a street corner
or to watch the buses.

To drag boots at night,
to drag boots all day
and get back to a warm home at night
or just stay.
Stay there outside,
outside of the walls
or outside or society?
To find beat up bicycles
and bring em home and fix them;
to walk around all afternoon
with your girlfriend and get a coffe
or a coke
and talk, talk, talk.
And realize she's not the one,
ride a bike,
through red lights
get arrested.
Go faster than the police.
Ride on the same road
everyday, in the summer sun,
wear two pair of gloves cause it got colder,
see the same dead pigeon.

Where do the streets lead?
the streets of Dijon, of Venice Beach
of San Francisco, of Winston Salem
of Lyon or San Diego
maybe to cul-de-sacs
maybe all to Rome
maybe to roam.

Commencé à 03h32, fini à 03h54.
burn, burn, burn

2009-12-27T15:43:00.000-08:00

APRICOTS IN THE WINTER

It is past midnight now
and my shudders are still open to the misty night,
a blinking plastic tube
goes off on a balcony in the distance.
Gray is the sky,
gray is my window frame in cold metal,
the skeleton of trees dancing in the wind,
gray the drops of rain pearling down
like the tears that were in my mother's eyes
coming in the way of sight
between what's in and what's out,
out in the fish tank outside.

Earlier,
I walked up the streets that had been barricaded
and were guarded by men in bright yellow vests
who shone in the night like the hundreds of bulbs
that suck up the energy
to spit the light down or blink,
to burn but not like roman candles.
They are embedded in flimsy plastic shapes
of snow flakes, stars
or raindeers.

A child dashed by and hit my leg,
i looked down,
_________somebody screamed, lights flashed,
a group of women, a flock of pigeons.
People were everywhere,
they walked down, i walked up,
some of them the arms full of goods,
kids pointed, adults held them back,
teenagers ran like juggernauts of impatience,
some guy got off his bicycle,
the ball of wool of his snowhat wobbled
as he stepped down
and he politely elbowed his way in,
a tough guy almost hit my shoulder,
i swear i would've hit him hard in the face...

It was 5 pm and the penultimate thursday
of the last month of the last year
of the first decade
of the second millenium
and the nearby church was opening for a ceremony.
I guess Jesus didn't spend his night alone
even if the shops were still full
by the time i left.

Fallen leaves cracked under my feet
like brand new euro bills.
Snow has melted and only left rust on my pedals.
When it subsists in chunks on the sidewalk
it's black with the shit we breathe.

'tis the season's plague when madmen lead the blind
Merry Christmas consumer.

poème de Noël avec quelque jours de retard

late night update

2009-12-18T17:31:00.000-08:00

En train d'écrire un truc mais voici une mise à jour de I'll go with you:
lien I'LL GO WITH YOU upd.

dédicace à Simon

2009-11-30T15:23:00.000-08:00

RAT RACE?

Sometimes i walk the streets and look up
to a window and see someone using a computer.
The screen is always perpendicular to the wall
in the boxes they live in,
personal, private cubicles.

They have blue faces and hunchbacks.

Devolution made them monsters,
monsters that exist only on a web,
a web that doesn't really exist.
Virtual silk
they spin endlessly.

Every morning when i have breakfast
my sister's rabbit gets exited
and chews at the bars of its cage
because i'm the first person
of the always and not forever renewed day it sees.
I told her a hundred times i would set it free
but she says she'd kill me.

These people don't chew at the bars.
I did.

2009-11-16T13:48:00.000-08:00

INSOMNIA CHRONICLES

I.
I pushed the door of the kitchen
at 3 in the morning,
opened the fridge and thought,
America might not be the world
but it's everywhere.

On a yogurt cup,
in my fridge,
in my kitchen in France,
in the shape of Mickey Mouse
spreading his arms wide
over the yogurt cup and grinning.
Spreading his arm wide around the world.
The asshole.

Then i thought
What if Mickey Maus
told them to wear a burqa?

Yes, it's everywhere,
even on my lips
as i whisper words to my hand,
in the ink,
on this page,
under my skin.

II.
My mom cut my hair earlier tonight.
DIY.
They grow out too fast
or maybe it's time that flies too fast
and i don't see it go,
anyways my hair's looking good now.
Like Morrissey's or Toby Morse's.

I look back at the last time
my mom cut my hair,
things have changed a little bit,
they tend to do that,
things.
New tattoos added, no more girlfriend,
other pieces to the puzzle.

This box doesn't say how many pieces
and time doesn't say how many bitches.

It's looking good anyways (my hair)
in the mirror in front of the bed.
I have time to look at it because i can't sleep.
I've opened the shudders to the night,
fallen leaves are looking bright
under the street lamp
and my bike's still there.
That's a good thing.

I already know i'll be tired tomorrow
but gotta back to bed.
Fuck Tuesdays.

Ecrit d'une traite la semaine dernière
Dédicacé à Claire Palmer.

Comment j'ai dit au revoir à mon téléphone portable et la faible valeur sentimentale que je lui associais et lettre ouverte à un yuppie.

2009-10-27T13:03:00.000-07:00

Aujourd'hui le destin
ou les lois de la physique s'appliquant à ma poche arrière de jean
ont pris une décision que j'hésitais, lâche que je suis ("Seigneur prend pitié")
à prendre depuis quelque temps :
me débarrasser de mon portable.
J'ai vécu plus de 2 ans sans portable et la liberté que ça procure,
ne plus ressentir le fameux "quand est-ce qu'elle va répondre?",
donner un rendez-vous sans avoir à le reconfirmer 37 fois avant l'heure,
tout cela me manquait.

Alors que je pédalais, mon portable a donc glissé de ma poche arrière,
je ne l'ai pas senti, c'est en entendant le plastique, matière pitoyable,
se disloquer sur le goudron,
sous les yeux de la Renommée de la place de la République (vous aussi vous croyiez que c'était un ange,) que j'ai tourné la tête.

Le caoutchouc de mon pneu glissant, gracieux, en quart d'arc de cercle sur le goudron, je me suis arrêté
et j'ai regardé les trois morceaux de plastique et de composants électronique se faire rouler dessus par une,
_______________________deux,
_______________________trois,
_______________________quatre voitures,
je sourais,
jusqu'à ce qu'un 4x4, véhicule pitoyable, vienne gâcher mon plaisir.
Son conducteur, stéréotype en chemise rose saumon,
la montre aussi brillante que les gentes, a fait un petit écart afin de rouler pile sur ce qui restait de mon téléphone.

Sur le moment mes sentiments étaient très mitigés,
entre énervement et ce qui restait de mes quelque secondes de joies et d'amusement.

Avec le recul et la possibilité de mettre en mots l'exprimable je me rends compte de ce qui a causé cette confusion.

Cet homme, ce qu'il en restait,
ce qui n'a pas été disloqué par la perversion (le péché dirait certains,)
il ne savait pas que je m'en foutais de ce portable,
cet homme,
ce yuppie de merde il pensait me briser le coeur en brisant mon téléphone.
Si seulement il avait su.

Et si je pouvais lui parler, je lui dirai des mots que je n'ai pas écrit :
You are on this unhappy planet,
a carnivor,
a destructor of it*

*Morrissey - Ouija Board, Ouija Board

Poeme!

2009-09-20T15:14:00.000-07:00

THE POEM YOU GOTTA WRITE

I look up at the sky,
a blue sea within a sea
and see the white belly of a helicopter
that scatters a shoal of birds
and the clouds inside my head,
like a kiss on the cheek.

There is a dead pigeon on the pavement
with crimson brains besides it.
I'm sure the slick red ooze contains images
of concrete and millions of shoes.
Mine is hermetic,
hermetic to shower water
(the boiler works again.)
I realized that when i rode in the truck
with other harvesters glued to the side,
blank staring around,
in a late summer afternoon,
i thought
"There are fields inside their heads,
fields i'll never tread."

I don't really go out on vacation
but i am always on the road,
Sal Paradise in a cage of bone.

I look up at a green light.
Trafic is dense,
_______I zig zag.
Pedestrians and cars are bathed in golden light.
_______Slither and skid.
Concrete gray,
red plastic in a hole and blue,
gold in a globe and heaven hue.

_______Zig zag some more,
see heaven through dirty sunglasses
i'm running the nicest of races
and my heart is the only muscle that isn't sore.

_______Red light.
I remember when we sat in the park before the sun,
it drowned in azure, spit light
and tangled in hair.
Mind spat words.
In front of us a sample of humanity was walking
in the cold.
The blue sky betrayed them
like it betrayed me earlier when it forgot to say
The sun is bright but not warm today.
A sample of childhood ran around the cages
in parentless bliss
throwing stones at animals.
Donkeys like goldfish.

I used to do the same
and on compassion :
God never forgot us,
He was never there.

Un long poème pour me faire pardonner mon oisiveté.
Une chanson qui apparait discrètement au début de ce poème (une merveille soit dit en passant, Léon ne me contredira pas) :
The Horrors - Sea Within a Sea

ex nihilo nihil fit

2009-09-03T17:30:00.000-07:00

(il y avait un poème avant ici mais je l'ai enlevé)

Schweppes, vélo et disque volant

2009-08-26T10:43:00.000-07:00

Je vous promet que j'aimerai écrire plus que des bribes de fin de soirée mais je ne trouve pas le temps, à part en fin de soirée si mais bon.

"Faut respecter toutes les marques"

2009-08-12T03:51:00.000-07:00

Un poème en préparation, bientôt sur cette même page. En fait des fois il y a une phrase que je trouve cool et je me dis que je vais la noter et partir de là, mais cette phrase que je trouvais trop cool, qui m'etais venu lors d'un tour de vélo a la Toison d'Or (comme souvent,) avais disparu dans les tréfonds de mon esprit un peu comme un cosmonaute en détresse dans le noir galactique,

mais en triant mes SMS hier soir (de temps en temps, il faut,) j'ai retrouvé cette phrase, oui je l'avais enregistrée dans un message.
Cette magnifique transition pour attirer votre attention sur le blog de Valérian, le collage au top du top, pas les collages de grains de riz sur rouleaux de pq pour la fête des mères ou autres gommettes, non du grand collage, du collage d'homme, en somme, bref:

Firstmanintospace

Bonne journée, n'oubliez pas de faire du vélo et vive la musique des années 80...et Morsay aussi

poème (updated)

2009-08-02T15:53:00.000-07:00

I'LL GO WITH YOU

One cloud is enough to cover the sun
and in the garden
my cousin swings life away,
as a kid would.

She reminds me of the time when
i swung life away too,
close to the cherry tree and
only bothered by the asparagus plant
that stroke my leg and that i found ugly.
It was forbidden to touch it.
I'm not even sure that plant ever gave asparaguses,
what i'm sure of is that i grew older.

Today, i left the city for the wild country
to find sunflowers all lined up and sad.

The wind makes ripples
in the rye like waves.
I finish a can of tonic
and stare from the plastic chair
reclining back on fragile legs
and sink in an abyss.

When i once left
on a dock called August,
i didn't think twice.
What would i do now?
What should i do now?

Every night i walk the streets
of dogs and newspaper headlines,
of scattered sounds and pouring rain
of pearls and pills
and on a different continent
i see the same faces.

Last night, i was thinking of a big clipper ship
and a beer can showed me one
as it rolled on the sidewalk
from a bum's corner.
AMSTERDAM MAXIMATOR 11.6%
Brewed in the Finest Tradition
SUPER STRONG.

While locking my bike i heard him play
some notes i could not recall immediatly
but that i was sure i knew.
On a not so beat-up guitar
with a sticker i could not figure out,
he played I wish you were here by Pink Floyd
as Gab did,
maybe a little less well.

I wish Gab could have been there to tell him
"you should play it like this,"
but nobody says should to a bum
and nobody says I'll go with you
either.

Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep

2009-07-26T16:09:00.000-07:00

En ces périodes de calme où mon navire est en vitesse de croisière il y a une citation de Adam Sol (tirée de Jeremiah, Ohio) qui m'est revenue l'autre jour et que j'avais envie de vous faire partager,

"We travelers have tattooed hearts into our arms and ankles"

Sous peu un poème qui me donne du fil à retordre depuis un petit moment.

Poème

2009-07-20T14:06:00.000-07:00

HOLIDAY INN

Hold on to the memory it's all you've got.

Things have changed.
In good and in bad,
and i hadn't.
Tears, laughs,
boxes, questions about life,
phone calls and bills,
no impact,
until tonight.

I don't want to know what time it is
or what time it is not.
The streets to the hill
still wind around
in the night and good times go.
One a.m., two or three
it makes no difference to me
because i am where i want to be
by myself,
for tonight no better company.

Tomorrow is a different story.
Yesterday was i know now,
at the time i didn't,
when it spoke no words i could hear
and showed nothing i could see
is that what they call destiny?

A light for the blind
and to yesterday's poison an antidote.

A few words on a note
might not change the world
but it can save a man,
a man who doesn't want to change.

Un lien vers la chanson d'où est tirée la citation au debut du poème:
The Distillers - The Hunger

Thursday morning brings the dawn in

2009-07-16T04:45:00.000-07:00

Je ne suis pas allé au feu d'artifice hier soir.

Deux poèmes presque finis
et une bonne surprise musicale trouvée l'autre soir:
Duane Peters Gunfight

enjoy

Sous les tilleuls

2009-07-11T10:41:00.000-07:00

Fernsehturm
(click for better qual!)

Unter den Linden

Holidays in the sun

2009-07-09T12:29:00.000-07:00

Back from Berlin, loved the place, loved the people, loved the graffiti and the tattoos.

I didn't write a word there but i took cool pics, i'll probably write about it later though.

I just received the Wake Forest University poets Anthology for 2009 and look (click for better quality) :

I'm first! with To have or not to have,
I'll upload some Berlin pics but i'm out for the night!

On the road again

2009-06-29T17:08:00.001-07:00

A litlle one before heading off to Berlin,
i take my notebook with me, see you in a week.

ELYSIA

The road dulls the spirits
slowly
like meat
on a knife.
It takes us far away from frathouses
and decent neighborhoods
on a long strip
boarded by country towns
where people tell me i am blessed
and billboard that say just enough
when clouds are shapeless.

The sun slowly sets
and hits the water tower
pink and orange replace blue,
nothing new.

Welcome to Wallace.

The road is so long it never seems to end
and we open the box of big questions
and change CDs
to the hissing sound of the AC.

Existence.
Relationships
Time and sinking ships
crashing planes,
and dead stars

but God is just a bumper sticker.
A metal fish.
A late night conversation
that divides and irritates,
anecdotes and the truths we put aside.

Taco Bells and gas stations
provide.

I read the signs but don't know the direction
i'm a passenger as always
on the passenger seat.
The road is clean and the sides are lush,
a drive through Elysia while dusk
calmly descends upon us.

Davidson, NC

Long time

2009-06-28T15:46:00.000-07:00

Bonsoir,

So i finally made it home and after a computer fixing and an internet connexion not working for a month TruthOfMyYouth blog will be active again! I don't know how active but it will be,

Here's one:

DERIVE II

My thoughts became asphalt.

At the end of the line,
the one i drew with my bicycle,
________i found a table.

Under the big yellow M
that flared in the night
and lit solitude only
________i sat there.

Outside, aligned,
the tables were all deserted,
the city too,
below
________between the lamps,
hundreds of shimmering lamps.

I wrote a few lines
under the eyes of the cameras,
that kept watching just in case.
At a Mc Donald's, i wrote
on the cold metal
of the silent mall
________i wrote.

Some tourists were smoking cigarettes
outside the adjacent hotel
danes, czechs, germans, poles?
They threw the red butts on the floor.
One last puff and i was alone
and finally,
________i was home.

Coup de coeur muscial: myspace.com/decemberagain (normal)

Snowflakes froze my mistakes
a new season, another chance
to make it up to win the race
cause when i left without a trace
it was because i was afraid
to freeze to death
to kiss your face.

Poeme

2009-05-08T18:07:00.000-07:00

LOBBY

I wait in the lobby,
wishing this girl was coming for me.
The clock struck three thirty,
the car will take me out of the city,
the country's something i rarely see,
cows are quiet, i'm full of animosity.

Somebody said big hearts break easily
i wish you could only
lay your head where mine used to be.

Poeme et anecdote

2009-04-26T22:00:00.000-07:00

Ce poeme a ete ecrit apres que Caroline m'ait appris le mot "prong" traduit par fourchon ou dent (de fourchette,)
D'ailleurs si vous avez des suggestions je serai heureux d'ecrire un poeme sur un theme precis,

PRONGS

I brought back nineteen hours
on the front steps of the house.
I tripped
and the trees, with their prongs to the sky,
were looking down at me

in the breeze of the already aging spring.
Its end will come, with it my birthday.
Twenty three.
I need to find a place
to let this day forget me

Kids are playing on the neighbor's lawn
reminding of the time when,
in my father's words
i was afraid of the ball.
I didn't like the ball.
Like didn't like meat.

The center of a slice soggy with blood,
flooding the white surface of a plate
soaking the stamped flowers in red.
The blood of an animal,
red as a cardinal.

The one in the branches
every morning.
In a few weeks i'll be gone
and he won't have anything to look at
but the dust and the stones
dry as hay
covering the driveway.

Not many hours left to call the night,
five
and i'm still waiting for a good day,
still like the bird-dotted trees
with their prongs in the sky.

Ah oui sinon petite anecdote:
Il y a dix jours, mon colloc Mike a recu des repliques de fusil a pompe et de fusil automatique (aussi appele mitraillette par les moins de 10 ans,) les deux a billes.
Apres avoir peint le bout, qui etait orange, en noir nous avons decide de tirer sur des cannettes, toujours mieux que sur des ecureuils. Me lassant de cette exercice et trop hateux de retourner sur youtube.com, je rejoins dans ma chambre.

Mike, lui, decide de tirer sur des verres dans le jardin de devant depuis la chambre qui donne sur l'entree (jardin adjacent a un chemin qui mene a notre maison, chemin lui borde d'arbres, detail important pour la suite.)
Apres quelques minutes j'entend crier, laissant American Hardcore, the history of american punk 1980-1986 tourner dans ma precipitation je vais voir ce qui se passe.
J'apercoie alors un policier de film, le vrai, avec le badge et le gilet pare balle pointer son arme a feu (ou pistolet) sur Mike par la fenetre entrouverte.
Je retourne dans ma chambre,
les policiers entre dans la maison, puis un dans ma chambre, me pointe l'arme sur le torse et me demande de me lever afin de pouvoir me mettre les menotes, avec un magnifique "Slooooowly" de film que je n'oublierai jamais.
Pendant ce temps Mike et Brian sont dans le salon, Mike a les menotes aussi, Brian qui n'avait pas utilise les fusils et qui etait dans son lit en calecon lors de l'intervention, lui, non et le documentaire parlait du groupe Million of Dead Cops, si elle est pas bien faite la vie...

Apres notre identification, quelques questions et la tension redescendue, les membres des forces de l'ordre americaines se fascine pour l'exactitude des repliques et entame une discussion nous disant que notre ami Mike etait a quelque seconde de se faire abattre si il n'avait pas pose tout de suite le fusil, en effet, ils etaient poste derriere les arbres et le rideau cachait la voiture de police (le vehicule en d'autres termes.)

Les forces de l'ordre nous retirent les menotes, laissant des traces assez "badass" sur nos poignets et quittent la maison, sans oublier de nous dire que le panneau de signalisation offert par un ami lors d'une soiree et tronant dans le salon doit retourner a sa place.

Moralite, un jouet est un jouet quand il a un bout orange et nos voisins sont des gros cons.

Homeward bound (updated)

2009-04-20T20:25:00.000-07:00

Un poeme qui m'a donne du fil a retordre,
J'ai retordu au moins trois bobines, tout a la main...

AN EXPRESSION OF THE FUTILITY OF HOPE

Eating Taco Bell
at the end of my American dream,
last night,
on the small table of the living room the wraps met
the Nintendo controllers of another time.

I tried and tried only to return.

There was silence, yet so much violence,
the hot sauce screamed
"Help! I can't tell where i am,
it's dark and i can hear laughing."
And the clocked marked the hours
like a pair of handcuffs.

On the blue couch,
the refuge for picks and coins
i raised my plastic cup and gave a toast
to the past nine months
wondering
what birthed out of it?
What grew out of it?

Nine months ago on a couch too,
i let the night go by
until the clock struck six am
and i had to take a train
a lazy train
that would sway and rattle like the rain,
While clouds conspired to cover Paris
and my soon to be boarded sleepy plane.

I wished for sun,
there beyond the Atlantic.

Before hope decided to depart
leaving silence only
on its deceitful trail in the night,
it agreed to sing me a song.
Simply called Departure.

It didn't last very long,
It said a ship was ready to go
anytime i would need its keel.
I answered they could leave the bollard roped
it was not yet my time to leave.

Sinon un petit coup de coeur musical: The Courteeners - That Kiss

et si vous etes sage j'ai une anecdote

People try to put us d-d-d-down

2009-04-15T15:53:00.000-07:00

MY GENERATION

Like a little girl's dress
hiding secret cigarette holes
in between the pleats and lace,
this youth
is already used.
Arrogant and scared,
dressing like their parents
and talking like their little brothers,
taking pictures and making art,
going to bed very late at night.

"You'll see how it is,"
We barely had the time.

New responsibilities,
cars, rent, bills,
showing confidence and skills,
or lost on our mother's couch.
Girls grew to an age old enough to see the world
only through ex-tainted glasses.
Guys don't want to commit
and only want to get pussy or drinks.
Some of them are beautiful,
they create and hope
some follow the system and are on dope,

but i have faith.

As for me,
I didn't want to leave Teenage Wasteland.

Cacedédi au EFC Crew.

It's hard to keep the PMA.

Poeme mis a jour

2009-04-06T21:28:00.000-07:00

UN JOUR DANS UNE VIE

Qu'est-ce que je fais ici
au milieu de l'apres-midi
assis dans le salon?
La tele brille sur le mur
et je ne la regarde meme pas,
dans cette maison, qui une fois de plus,
n'est pas la mienne.
Ca serait triste d'etre la a attendre demain.
Se demander si, comme un representant ponctuel, il viendra
sonner a la porte,
pour ramener ce qu'hier avait pris
Ou viendra-t-il faire de la publicite
et des compromis
pour vendre des emotions au rabais
et les forcer dans mon coeur et ma tete,
sans que je puisse refuser?

Un jour ma mere m'as demande si j'etais heureux.
Je lui ai dit
que je ne voulais plus etre heureux ou triste.
Qu'il y avait tellement entre les deux.
Elle m'a repondu que c'etait bien de laisser faire les choses
et faire ce qu'on doit.
Faire ce qu'on doit.

J'ai pris un morceaux de gateau
sur le comptoir, dans la cuisine,
dans la boite avec des taches de gras
et dans la menace constante de la souris.
Je n'arrivais pas a dire si il etait bon ou pas.
L'indecision constante du palais.
La cuisine potentielle d'un Ian Curtis
ou d'une Sylvia Plath,
elle me hante au petit dejeuner
et j'y reste le soir pour le confort
d'un verre.

Je me suis leve trop tot.
J'ai le temps maintenant,
il y a toujours le temps,
le temps de rester sur ce canape,
le temps de trouver une copine,
le temps avant d'aller au boulot,
Le temps que je laisse passer le matin
comme un vol de gerfauts.

Quand ce mercredi s'etait devide comme un dimanche,
j'ai decide d'aller faire un tour de velo.
Les roues tournaient aussi vite que les pensees dans ma tete
et j'ai remarque que les batiments du centre ville
apparaissent depuis la rue si on regarde assez tot.
Ils surgirent comme un phare entoure d'une lumiere d'or
au dessus d'une mer d'obscurite.
J'avais le choix, pourtant il fallait que j'y aille,
malgre l'air gele dans mes bronches.
J'ai denoue le bandana autour de ma gorge
et j'ai descendu la pente.

Il y a de la beaute dans ce monde
et c'est le seul or que je cherche.

Petite traduc pour une publication de Wake Forest, le dernier vers n'a rien a voir en francais mais je ne suis plus fache avec la langue francaise depuis un moment,
Dites moi ce que vous pensez et on pourra lacher des comm avec un verre de pinard et des wayfarers de vue en faisant des blagues de gallerie d'art :)

Straight Edge poem

2009-04-04T17:08:00.000-07:00

POISON

These poisons that grab me by the ankle
like a hand out of its grave,
to hold me under the earth
in the world of the living dead,
i want to get rid of them.

The smoke in my lungs
and the liquor in my veins
no longer calm my nerves or numb my brains.

I have retrieved my heart
from the hands of a girl,
trapped it in my chest again
but it still wants out
and the chains of my ribs
can't suppress its shouts.

The instruments of convenience we created
made us the slaves of impatience
and the useless things we accumulated
don't offer nothing we can keep.

Although i have still not found
what is devouring my mind,
today was spent out of the grave
and the worms can still feast from my skin,
i have more life that i can use.

Desole pour la qualite mediocre du scannage

Baudelaire fun

2009-04-04T16:39:00.000-07:00

A translation of Une Charogne by Charles Baudelaire,

CARRION

Do you remember that thing we saw, my love,
on this sweet summer morning?
On the edge of the path, a nasty carrion,
on a bed of stone was lying.

Legs up like a lustful woman,
burning and sweating its poisons
Casually and cynically had opened
its belly full of exhalations.

The sun, on the decay was casting its rays
as if to cook it nicely,
to give back to Nature by hundreds
what she had put back together formerly

And the sky was looking down on the carcass
that was blooming like a flower.
The smell was so strong that on the grass
you almost fainted, my dear.

The flies were humming on the putrid belly,
out of which came black swarms of worms
oozing out in a thick liquid
along the living rags.

All of this was going up and down like a wave
or ascending and crackling,
it looked like the corpse, swollen by a breath
was still living and multiplicating.

This world was playing a strange music
like the running water or the wind
or the grain that the winnower tosses
in rhythm, in his sieve.

The shapes were vanishing just like a dream,
a sketch slow to appear
on the forgotten canvas that the artist seems
to finish only in wonder.

Behind the rocks a worried dog
with an angry eye was looking at us
waiting to retrieve from the skeleton
the piece it had let go of.

And yet, you will be similar to this filth,
to this hideous infection,
you the sun of my world, the stars of my eyes,
my angel, my passion!

Yes, you will be such, you the queen of graces,
after the last sacraments
when you will go down under the earth
molding among the remains.

So, my beauty, tell the worms
that will eat you with kisses
that of my decayed love
i kept the shape and essence.

the Messiah hath returned

2009-03-30T23:29:00.000-07:00

and he looks like that:

i have discovered today that i'm not a funny person and actually feel fine about it (no connexion with the image above)

When reality meets fiction

2009-03-26T21:10:00.000-07:00

I have written a poem about a war veteran living in the street who meets a teenage skateboarder one night (i'll upload it later, it's in the collection)
well, during my last trip to the City of Angeles i saw this homeless guy, with a sign saying he was a veteran, he didn't fight in the same war my veteran did (he fought in Vietnam,) but he was on the same street! so i had to take a picture with him and spare a couple bucks...
Andy took the pic, i printed it and scanned it and now it looks like this, i think it looks cool... coz im a hipster, wait...

i'll upload some very recent poems soon,
thats me, nothing for weeks and then an outburst of creativity, but i see a shrink for that and "he told me thats the lack of sex thats bringing me down, "

Poem...

2009-03-25T13:54:00.000-07:00

PARKWAY

The sloping side of the sidewalk is lined
with empty bottles, still wrapped in the brown paper
that does not conceal them,
disposed of in a drunken nihilist toss.
Thousands of nihilist tosses.

A kid is playing on an oil-stained parking lot
where broken glass glitters on the gray concrete,
amongst the crates and car parts.
When he goes home, the burned-heads go out,
they sit there, on the curb,
looking at the parking lot where they used to play.

Brian Harper Strikes Again

2009-03-25T13:43:00.000-07:00

A quote to live by:

"Don't let the light go out or you'll become like one of those crotchety old men who make the rules for everybody else."
-Brian Harper

...

2009-03-21T17:30:00.001-07:00

est-ce que quelqu'un lit encore ce blog?
does anybody still read this blog?

Bonsoir

2009-03-01T23:25:00.000-08:00

Ca fait un petit moment que j'ai pas poste,
J'accumule, je reviendrai avec du nouveau bientot,
en attendant une petite photo d'une lecture de poesie il y a deux semaines./
I am "piling up" i'll be back with new works soon,
a little picture of a poetry reading a couple weeks ago.

Fine Art Gallery, Scales Center

2009-02-12T00:05:00.000-08:00

The book is on display at the Fine Art Gallery in Scales Center at Wake Forest University,
Go have a look and let me hear what you think.

Poeme XV

2009-02-04T21:52:00.000-08:00

TO HAVE OR NOT TO HAVE

Superbowl.
Disneyworld.
Wii.
Sunday worship at 5.
Mac Donald's.
KFC.
Buy
buy
buy.
Batman
on DVD.
Britney's new CD.
Head and Shoulders.
Fortifying.
Hydrating.
Normalizing.
Need.
Daily use.
Target.
Organic.
New season.
New season.
New season.

No reason.

Poeme XIV

2009-02-04T21:48:00.000-08:00

A NORMAL DAY IN THE LIFE

What am i doing in the afternoon,
sitting in the living room,
with the TV strobing on the walls
when everybody is sleeping,
in another house that is not mine?
It would be sad to be just waiting for tomorrow.

"Are you happy?" my mother once asked,
i said i didn't want to be happy or sad.
She said it's good to just let the days go by
and do what should be done.
What should be done.
I took a piece of cake
from the box on the kitchen counter.
I couldn't say if i liked it or not,
most of the time i can't decide.

I woke up way too early.
There is time now,
there's always time,
time to stay on this couch,
time to find a girl,
time before i go to work,
the time that i let go in the morning.

I decided to grab my bicycle.
The wheels were spinning
and i noticed for the first time
that the downtown buildings appear
early if you look up.
They rose like a beacon in golden light
above a sea of dark forest.
I had the choice but I had to go,
despite the cold air filling my lungs.
I untied the bandana around my throat
and went downhill.

There is beauty in this world
and it's the only gold I'm chasing.

Tadaaaaa!

2009-02-02T13:14:00.000-08:00

Le premier poeme de ce recueil a ete ecrit il y a tout juste un an, pendant une journee pluvieuse et solitaire a San Francisco, d'autres voyages, d'autres evenements et de nombreuses revelations plus tard voici Truth Of My Youth. Entierement publie DIY* il contient 30 poemes inspires par le voyage, le reve, le punk rock, la musique en general, mes amis, bref une lutte post-adolescente. 5$ et l'equivalent en euros, je m'occupe de l'envoyer (j'ai pas teste encore...)

The first poem of this collection was written exactly one year ago, during a lonely rainy day in San Francisco, other travels, others events and many realizations later here is Truth Of My Youth. Entirely DIY published it contains 30 poems inspired by travels, dreams, punk rock, music in general, my closest friends, the post-teenage struggle. 5$, I will take care of the shipping.

Stay Gold.

*DIY=do it yourself, fait soi-meme

Poeme XIII

2009-01-29T18:38:00.000-08:00

LAND OF PIRATES I

This feeling hits me once again
and my road eyes wonder where i am.
A hotel room,
the garden of the hotel lit by bug dotted lamps
lighting the well-trimmed grass and the plastic chairs
and my sister tells a story
about a toothless guy
who wanted cigarettes.
Where am i again?
That was a bad nap.

Vacations.
Carribbeans.
I'm hungry.

Later, i am sitting on the same spot in front of the sea
with the only company of the stars and the moon.
The pages of the book have become thicker in my left hand.
I look up to see the horizon.
A cruise boat is gliding far away
in the inky night,
its side glimmering with rows of lights
and two big garlands hanging from the top to the deck.
A party night,
a jazz band playing, probably
and drinks and dresses.
I refuse to look at the stars
although i know they are beautiful.
A storied mind wandering in oblivion.

Where is the girl i love?

Un poeme ecrit en Decembre.

Bonsoir

2009-01-28T21:21:00.000-08:00

Je vous promets que je mets un nouveau poeme demain matin et si vous etes sages une surprise apres...

bis

2009-01-18T21:37:00.000-08:00

Tout ca c'est pour vous les jeunes

Bonsoir

2009-01-17T21:21:00.000-08:00

Aujourd'hui j'ai commence l'impression et la copie du recueil de poesie et surement trouve un moyen de les relier, donc gardez un oeil ouvert pour savoir quand ils sont prets!

Today i started the printing and the copying of the poetry collection book so keep checking back to know when they're ready!

peace
stay gold

Poeme XII

2009-01-11T20:37:00.000-08:00

UNTITLED

The sheets are warm,
the sun, not yet
as it penetrates through
the bare branches.
Birds were up early,
the greenest of all is the ivy.
The benches wait for somebody to come sit
like the rocking chair on the porch,
sorry but not until the spring.

I discover this place every new dawn,
time as stopped, it is the cold season,
the basketball hoop has been broken
long ago, the wind'll make it fall,
the garden shack needs some fixing,
but not until the sunny days.

At the end of the day,
when everything is said and done
the doors closed and the wars ended,
as the moon penetrates
through the bare branches,
i pull up my blanket,
in an empty bed,
enough said.

J'ai pas trouve de titre donc si quelqu'un veut proposer...
I didn't find a title for this one so if anybody has one to offer...

and this one goes out to Andy

Poeme XI

2009-01-05T10:16:00.000-08:00

BELLE EPOQUE

What?
I can't believe you dumped it
It could have been fixed.

Belle Epoque was the name of this bicycle,
a green Dutch bicycle
purchased ten years ago.
At first my mother's then mine,
the reason i didn't need a driving licence.
I went down so many roads,
every morning to school
and every night downtown.
The handle bars too wide to pass the door to the yard,
the used tires,
the rubber handles marked by my fingers
and the rusted chain,
I hope nobody finds them.

Now the end of a Belle Epoque.

Un poeme tres récent, un histoire déchirante...nan sans rire j'adorais ce vélo
Sinon j'ai du effacer trois poemes et j'ai remis a jour le premier

On the Road

2008-12-31T07:26:00.000-08:00

I finished On the Road by Jack Kerouack a few days ago and i regret i haven't read it before.
Exactly all i like.
Those who read it will understand, it might sound cliché but some art productions are just timeless.

Projet?

2008-12-24T18:47:00.000-08:00

Couverture du recueil DIY qui est censé voir le jour sous peu :

Poeme X UPDATED

2008-12-24T18:41:00.000-08:00

AMICITIA

I was riding on this train
lost in thoughts and memories,
lying stretched across two seats
feeling the restless rumble
with pictures of this girl
I'd never hold anymore on my mind
and eating expensive chocolate bars.
I was filling the small metal trashcan
which smells like ashes
with paper wraps.

I looked outside, the sun was about to rise
on the cow sprinkled fields,
ready to unveil the farms, the forests,
the landscapes
you only see through a french train window.
Always the same, as the smell
and the cold metal of the vent marking my elbow.
I could not shake the last image
i caught of my friends waving
leaning against a rail
one of them holding a coffee cup
steaming in the morning cold.

Them who sat with me in this house,
separated from the world,
laughing and singing,
not thinking one of us could be sad
on the phone with his girl
who had stolen all of his life.

The hour would come when our time would be over,
leaving only reminders:
sand in our shoes, music in our heads
from the strings that we strummed
or the song that we sang.
Some had already left.
Even though i was there
meeting their eyes across the room
listening to their words,
my dearest friends,
my mind was already gone
my eyes looking away
as they did on this train.

Drowsy, i felt it
would never stopped.
I imagined the end of the railroad track,
me standing at the edge of the world that i call mine
and a brand new one stretching in front of my eyes.
I was alone
with my twenty two years and a one-way plane ticket.

This one goes out to Kate (even though not about her) for giving all its sense to the Internet.

Poeme VII

2008-12-04T12:33:00.000-08:00

LOTUS

I sneeze and hear the vibrations
in the body of my acoustic guitar
which leans against the corner of the heater
it is not at its place by the window;
i broke a string like this three winters ago.
I put it in another corner of the bedroom.
A white box with no perspective.

They are all parallel,
the pictures pinned on the shelf of the desk,
parallel with themselves, the walls,
the formica frame,
the speakers, books, paper stacks,
the lines of the drawers,
the laptop computer,
the desktop picture of the laptop computer,
CD boxes, little notes and schedule sheet,

The edge of the paper
on which i write lines,
not all straight
going to the basement or the attic
(as my primary school teacher said.)
Stanzas scribbled, crossed out,
sentenced to parole
until there is almost no white left.

A poem will grow out of this mess,
and'll never wither.

Poeme VI UPDATED

2008-12-04T12:19:00.000-08:00

VELVET

I am in a dark room,
on a bed.
Under the covers.
It is not so dark since the light is strong
behind the blinds,
they are like my eyelids, not completely opaque.
I don't really know what time it is,
late in the afternoon probably,
i feel fine.
When my eyes are closed,
i could be anywhere,
this bedroom or another.
When i open my eyes i could see angels
painted on the ceiling
like in this bedroom
where she and i used to lie together.
I wait for the moment
when thoughts turn into dreams.

Now I open my eyes.
I stare at the walls, one by one,
white,
the same posters,
the same pictures,
but i still linger on them,
the variety of thoughts that arise in my mind
makes me leave them on the wall
and keep exploring each corner,
each letter,
each face,
the ceiling has a lot to look at too,
the design of the tiles,
i keep counting.

Music is playing.
Crystal guitar
the voice which sounds like cigarette,
the gentle, steady tambourine.
I'm not tired, i'm just lazy.
I'm a little bit tired
but i love being here,
all day.
"I want to nullify my life,"
i don't really know what that means
but i agree,
it is night in the day
and i nap my life away.

Un poeme que j'ai écrit il y a un petit moment, petit clin d'oeil au Velvet Underground

Bonsoir

2008-12-02T15:03:00.001-08:00

j'avoue ça fait un bail que j'ai pas mis á jour, je reviens de Californie, j'ai quelque poemes presque prets je vais les poster.

peace out
stay gold
jah rastafarai

Poeme V UPDATED

2008-11-09T01:02:00.000-08:00

DERIVE

It was very late at night and
I was walking the poorly lit path bordered by trees
that I walk when I’m restless
and I want to escape the loneliness of my room.

I had left the blaring signs of the shopping centers
and their smell of fried food,
the sight of the golden city lights,
on a dark canvas of running blue and green.
The trees congregated along the sidewalk
to form a dark stripe
and a place for animals.
Squirrels, birds,
the branches were rustling
when I walked by sometimes,
too often to make the noises scary.
Street lamps were evenly scattered

on the side of the road,
their attempt to light my way was futile
but it didn't matter because
there is nothing to see really on this path.
I was not thinking about how much more I was going to walk,
I just wanted to walk off my obsessions
and suddenly I was walking streets with no name
feeling even further away from home,
feeling the distance,

the ocean between this continent
and the one where my home stands,
too far to smell the breeze
but at once all I missed came hitting me like wave.
My friends, the way they talk when they want to be funny
my mother's foodthese words which don't make sense here
even when they are disguised in an English costume,
taking walks alone but in my neighborhood.
This is a token of home, a parody.
And it is not funny.
The bushy side of the sidewalk
punched with holes of clarity reeled by
forming a theater-size screen showing nothing
but the picture of loneliness.

A car roared by,
a bubble of light made of steel and glass
and I saw the face of its driver staring,
emotionless,
a still picture of him
with his two hands on the wheel,
in a transparent frame.
Was he going home or was he escaping it?
It felt like a sign of hope
just like when a UFO lands on a crop field
and proves we're not alone in the universe
but then I thought of myself
in front of my computer screen
opening empty email inboxes many times a day,
recalling words said by ex-girlfriends,
whole paragraphs which don't make sense.
I looked down,
the gray squares of concrete succeeded under my feet
as the Masonite tiles
of an emergency hall would
and the slits became impossible to walk on.

I tripped on a square edge
my eyes focused and I saw a parking officer
walking around his booth,
he readjusted his beige uniform
as I approached and my words broke the silence:
“Good evening,”
he replied and asked me some questions about myself,
where I came from.
We talked a little more since
at this hour no cars need to park
and when the silence settled he turned around.

Anywhere i lay my head

2008-11-09T00:55:00.000-08:00

Je ne sais pas pourquoi j'ai pas posté ca plus tot mais j'ecoute cet album en boucle (serieusement) depuis le mois d'Aout, la musique est enorme, la voix tres agreable et les reprises par rapport a Tom Waits sont tres bien faites, en plus je suis amoureux de Scarlett Johannson d'une maniere obsessive.

Poeme III

2008-10-27T22:07:00.000-07:00

un de mes vieux poemes que j'ai remis á jour:

END OF THE WORLD

I used to be a cashier.
One day,
while the white neon lights of the ceiling
were blinding me and the neverending bipping
was making my head feel like a big melon,
a noise had to be added to the industrial-chicken-coop atmosphere:
a crying five year old,
his mother didn't want to buy the gums at the end of the counter
at first.
She put the gums and the rest of her things on the counter belt and the crying stopped.
The kid started playing with the debit card machine
so she told him the police would put him in jail if he didn't stop.
Then he started asking questions about my expanded lobes and the ink on my arms,
because at this age self consciousness doesn't exist.
I answered him.
His mother asked if i did drugs.
I answered i didn't, which is true.
They left, the legs of the kid no longer dangling from the cart
but kicking and he resumed his crying,
for some reasons.

This happened every day but this time it reminded me that
some parents teach their children fear and intolerance,
that curiosity is repressed by authority
and that i've been shown fear in a handful of dust
that i saw atrocity in normality
that i saw death on TV.
that i've heard ignorance in anchormen's words
that i've learned some people live in a different world
that i've seen people torturing animals
and expecting God's mercy.
that i've seen horror in the mundane
and disruption in stability.
Also i've learned that a remote control and a pair of slippers
are instruments of destruction
and that matrimony is not love but society.

This was my Supermarket in California
and I thought that this world would end as it began
in a big bright explosion of flames
caused by a void:
the one in people's head.

I am truly sorry
but i don't want your TV shows,
your sedatives and alarm clocks
your babies and multiple door locks.
I'm not crazy,
your World is crazy.
Institutionalized.

xanthox

á lire: Supermarket in California, Allen Ginsberg
http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88/supermarket.html
(j'ai écris la majeur partie de ce poeme avant de rajouté la reference...)

á écouter: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXK0Hjfkrgw

Erwin Olaf

2008-10-27T21:53:00.000-07:00

J'avais juste envie de parler de cet artiste Néerlandais dont j'ai vu l'expo l'autre jour:
des photos qui ressemblent á des peintures,
de la beauté pure,
des filles á la Gil Elvgren,
rien á redire...

désolé de ne pas mettre á jour plus souvent, je crains.
Aussi lachez vos comm, t'as vu.

Poeme II

2008-10-19T21:28:00.000-07:00

CASUALTIES

When i wake up, restful in my bed
And it is three in the afternoon,
I know i've been manipulated
By the hands of fate again.
They have dates and facts tattooed on their arms
and LOVE and HATE across their knuckles,
They won't leave me be.
I'm thinking until my brain is full to the brim
With words and old pictures of my dad.
Among all these words some are heftier:
Friendship
and the consciousness to fight the drunk crowd.
I'm here while some practise for a game.

I hear steps which are not my mother's,
I also know it is time to step out in the world
and stay gold.
Although they say all roads lead to Rome
This derelict path is one i roam
Avoiding the cracks on the sidewalk,
And averting the sight of crosses
Which advertise a god i won't trust.
Death from above for the casualties,
Blindfolded
but granted a new life,
not to be enjoyed now.

Tell me where's hope when the neon signs
Are the only things which shine at night :
The new guides to follow through the dark.
The only clarity to possess
To read the Neverending Story.
I wish i could stare into those eyes.
Even if the same moon bathes them,
A thousand miles away they remain.

Shopping windows are full of Sperrys
And dead bodies wearing fancy shirts,
As dead as the fur on the jackets.
When i've chased the light on my way
I can see my house has disappeared,
I will never push its door again
And now that the walls have collapsed
Dystopia spreads in front of my eyes.
I'm not complaining, i'll rub it off.

xanthox

Poeme I UPDATED

2008-10-19T20:38:00.000-07:00

YESTERDAY

In a world made of earth, bricks and thoughts
there is an urge
as communicative as a yawn,
through glass and steel,
from car to car,
form him to her, across the room.
In the dining-room
the group of friends are talking
around the white table
smeared with coffee and beer rings
on it, books and magazines.
In the basement drums are hit.

Open windows vomit sound
and music on the wooden terrace
like meat pouring out of a sausage maker.
Vibrations distort the air
and hearts pump creativity
through my friends' systems.
Their eyes see the sun for a brief moment,
looking up to the windows cutting
the light with three black bars.
The sunlight behind the clouds.

The heavy, foamy clouds,
deformed by the wind like Play dough,
overlapping each other,
float away to let the rays of light explode
as i watch them from the beach
on my big blue screen.

The night will erase all this,
when the alcohol that it brings
will pump into my friends' bodies.
It will numb their fingers
and put stupid smiles on their faces,
it will make their heads spin
like the sprockets of our bicycles
as fast as the records playing music,
and leave more rings on the white table.

voila bast ;)

Le Boulon de l'Amitié 2

2008-10-11T23:57:00.000-07:00

Pond Surfing, Dijon
Printemps/Eté 2008
fuck yeah

Gabi, Quentin, Victor, xAnthox

From Me To You

2008-09-29T01:38:00.000-07:00

Comme chacun le sais je suis en Caroline du Nord, en charge d'un poste d'assistant de Francais, tout cela pour dire que je suis loin de chez moi (represent le 21, Stalingrad ca degrade) et je voulais commencer ce blog par cacedéier le premier article a tout ceux qui pense toujours a moi, qui me passent des coups de fils etc.
Ils se reconnaiteront...

Cette chanson de Over My Dead Body est pour vous les gars :

You're always there to pick me up
when i'm down and out and left without
the strength and the courage to struggle on
you're always there to show me you care
and i'm so grateful, you mean the world to me
you are the definition of Friendship and Unity
because i know this Friendship
will be one that lasts Forever
and you know i will always be there for you
when i saw you, and you told me, i knew you'd always be there!