A thousand strong

I am a thousand men, their cries
I sense with urge and longing;
Before her image, mighty death,
They all prepare to flee, but one
Whose heart keeps them within him

I am a thousand strong, in me
Their weaknesses are mine;
Before her image, mighty death,
They all fall to a giant slumber,
And all their weakness writhes and rots -
There’s one, though, who beholds them all
And to her lullabies believes
A thousand strong be in him

I am a thousand men, the mistress
They all seek is pale and grins;
When they do battle with her scythe
They all do fall – if one remains
To witness her, to scour the hearts
And reach towards her staring guise,
Then all has not been vain

Before the monument of death

The cycles of the lonely sun
Give way to an awaited pause;
Before the monument of death
It too deserves its solitary end
With dread – a burst of the desire to stay,
With struggle – just a faint glimpse to the night,
With pain at heart – the echo of the passing tides -
The end will come, and no-one ever did betray the end
To keeping a companion, or a heart.
Before the monument of death, alone,
All rest awhile and then depart and pass
Like leaves from one small tree, now lost apart,
Without a brother or a parent, or grandson,
Or teacher, or a guide, or sage,
Or any other man or beast to take them by the hand,
Only the boatman, who, for two coins thrown
Will speak no word and take the last, and least
From footsteps nigh, beyond the monument of death,
Alone

Babilon (privind spre Babilon)

Priveam însingurat, din satul gol,
Înspre câmpia pustie și arsă de soare -
Câteva case răsfirate la marginea deșertului de mărăcini
Conduceau călătorul în neștire, în depărtare -
Acolo se vedea, la miezul zilei fix,
Un miraj ce se-ondula,
Al unor ziduri mari de piatră apărând către apus,
Către sfârșitul unei lumi sau două,
Acolo unde cerul se termină, și unde zumzetul muștelor
Anunță intrarea în împărăția lor,
De veghe

Ce știau ei oare, atunci, cei
Ce locuiau în acele palate de piatră
Ce-acum doar în mirajul grădinilor lor se-arată?
Ce vrăji făceau ei, cei
Ce-au clădit ziggurate, ce-au clădit dinți de fier
Unde acum e doar mirajul câmpiilor lor triste,
Pierdute-n deșert

Mă intorc stingher,
Prin câmpii de mărăcini, prin sate aproape complet părăsite,
Pe drumuri cu praf, prin orașe cu porți căzute,
Pe lângă fabrici ce se năruie și se-ascund în pământ,
Pe lângă cafenele goale, ponosite
Pe lângă roiuri de fețe obosite, ce nu mai viețuiesc acolo,
Dintr-un deșert cu povești și miraje, într-altul
(Un Babilon mai mic privind spre umbra unuia mai mare)
Dinspre apus înspre apus,
Sub soarele etern de miazăzi

???

Nu știu sa desenez, dar mă mai apucă. Ignoră textul, era singurul carnețel la îndemână.

Exile #3 (“Imperfect”)

I fell from my imperfect paradise of gold
Another age, another life in time,
Through which, as through old city streets a passer by,
I stood in awe, and deemed it all as mine

I stand before a tragedy of man
With eyes half-closed, and eyebrows clad in frost,
And my escape, it is no longer there, before my eyes
And taking shy steps back, hope not to have it lost;

I used to try to beat from my imperfect wings,
To reach imperfect heights and burn imperfect flames
Now I appear and vanish in the night
And my imperfect home embitters me in shame

My Heaven and my Hell change place at my command,
And greater fires blaze, and die, and never start,
But there, in my imperfect paradise of gold
There’s always an abode for my imperfect heart

Exile #2

I tread the ground of my own skin
With silent steps, one after one
In my own town I move, alas,
On roads of sand and roads undone

My country’s mist, and though I’m home
The exile creeps inside my bones;
The mornings whisper dreams they lack;
The letters that I write come back -
And thoughts do go,
And thoughts do go…

Old faces gone, new faces dream
My distant lands are lost in sight -
I walk with mellow lights as guide
And silent guard against the night

For life to flow,
For life to flow,
To make my exile round, complete
I’ll dream new exiles, and retreat
And be all empty once again, and blind
And drink back memory, and lie

Treading the ground of my own skin
With silent steps, one after one,
Of all the stories in the air
I am an exile, I am none

I’d love to see you die

I’d love to see you die,
So you can bloom,
And rise like Phoenix to the sky,
And so that in your cries I taste our lives,
As they were bred, enchained, deformed,
Yell and revolt against their maker -
So I can taste death from your eyes,
I’d love to see you die

I’d love to see you die,
So I can pass
One step behind the wicked line
That keeps me here, inside my house,
Where living live and dead do die -
To tear this leaden sky, alas,
I’d love to see you die

I’d love to see you die,
So I can step
Beyond what they describe as grandeur of all death -
To see the horrid rest beyond
The silvery sky at dusk -
To catch you in mid-flight, I’d love
To see you pass, from realm to realm
With one wing ruptured from a brutal Earth, and one,
A dying mind, in stark descent.
At border line, where weeping weeps,
Where all that’s been and all that’s left
Is narrowed to a lonesome cry,
Trapped in a sigh, at once, with you,
I’d love to see you die!

Sonnet by the sea

Nobody taught me at first how to live,
So I turned to the sea on one morning
Waves kept on hurling my soul into shape
And I drowned in their passion and longing

Since then I wander around by the shore
And in miles I see no man’s face gleaming
Hours are long and they rush blindly on
And I feel like I’m dead or I’m dreaming

If I don’t find life, before I descend
On the seabed, in roaring and wringing,
All of my songs, sung in all of the tongues
Will be lost with my heartbeat and breathing

Waves will sing “Lo! though was taught by our ways,
Not one day has he walked with the living”

Poem in HEX

45 61 63 68 20 63 6f 64 65 20 69 73 20 62 6c 65 61 6b 0d 0a
41 6e 64 20 74 65 6e 64 73 20 74 6f 20 66 72 65 61 6b 0d 0a
52 65 61 64 65 72 73 20 74 68 61 74 20 63 72 65 61 6b 0d 0a
57 68 65 6e 20 66 65 65 6c 69 6e 67 20 77 65 61 6b 0d 0a
0d 0a
42 75 74 20 65 6d 70 74 79 20 63 6f 64 65 0d 0a
57 6f 75 6c 64 20 6a 75 73 74 20 69 6d 70 6c 6f 64 65 2c 0d 0a
42 65 20 69 74 20 6e 6f 74 20 6d 6f 64 65 0d 0a
54 68 6f 75 67 68 74 73 20 74 6f 20 65 6e 63 6f 64 65 0d 0a
0d 0a
53 6f 20 74 61 6b 65 20 74 68 69 73 20 74 65 78 74 0d 0a
44 65 63 6f 64 65 20 66 72 6f 6d 20 68 65 78 0d 0a
46 6f 72 20 74 68 65 20 63 6f 64 65 27 73 20 6c 65 78 2c 0d 0a
49 73 20 75 6e 63 6f 6d 70 6c 65 78 0d 0a
0d 0a
41 6e 64 20 69 66 20 79 6f 75 20 77 69 6c 6c 0d 0a
54 68 6f 75 67 68 20 69 74 20 73 65 65 6d 73 20 69 6c 6c 0d 0a
41 64 6d 69 74 20 74 68 69 73 20 64 72 69 6c 6c 0d 0a
42 65 20 70 6f 65 6d 2c 20 73 74 69 6c 6c 0d 0a

Câteva menţiuni legate de poezie:

1. Postul a fost “stimulat” de alte 2 posturi, mai precis acesta ,si acesta. Am zis – dacă tot sunt la modă posturile în binar ce-ar fi să scriu şi eu unul. Ei bine,  regula blogului e că trebuie să fie ceva cât de cât literar acolo, şi aş  fi scris o poezie în binar, dar ar fi ieşit a naibii de lungă (codul binar e chiar foarte lung), şi nu s-ar mai fi văzut nici structura poeziei. Hexa e mult mai scurt. A, şi în plus de asta, cine ar mai fi observat rima? Că tot veni vorba…

2. Rima. Şi poeziile în hexazecimal au rimă. Se observă monorima “0d 0a” peste tot. Ok… am trişat, “0d 0a” de fapt înseamnă rând nou (da, ştiu, în hexa trebuie scrise şi începuturile de rând nou – ceea ce înseamnă că absolut orice poezie în hexa rimează ). Dar chiar şi ignorând “0d 0a” de la sfârşitul rândurilor, tot se vede rima, de exemplu e “65 61 6b” în prima strofă, “6f 64 65″ în a doua, etc.

3. Ok, pentru cine e încă mirat, ca idee, poezia e scrisă în cod hexazecimal (16 cifre: 1, 2, …, 8, 9, a, b, c, d ,e ,f) şi fiecare 2 cifre fac un caracter. Şi dacă la final chiaaaar vreţi să o mai şi citiţi, vă recomand site-ul ăsta (doar nu era să dau totul mură-n gură).

Happy HEXing, everyone!

Exile

I went home to the Land of Youth
Where all my dead do dwell
With swollen lips I kissed the spring
Of Heaven and of Hell

An exile am I,
Doomed to roam
In all my days a new land
An ashen hope I carry on,
And when I turn back time to see
My breath returns to where I weep,
To places I nor reap, nor give,
To ages dim and shallow graves

An exile am I, and I crave