homo ludens

in the corner, there was a chess table (at which they would sometimes eat). she, five or six, took the bag with checkers and began to spread them. first randomly (she called her mom to show). then red lines apart from black lines (she called her mom). then diagonals (she called). then two pieces on each square, one on top of. I had two thoughts growing inside my brain, like two feelers in different directions. far apart in time: 1. the image of me playing checkers, trying to play chess. how we forget the learning of it. how a game becomes a game, once learned. and then 2. here in the states, the first insane weeks, when I had this stupid refrain: if it’s a toy world, one’s supposed to play with it. and she was perfect. she sometimes breathed awkwardly through her stuffy nose. and I was sitting there watching, feeling like a very grumpy, hardened being, something like an ancient snail trying to stretch towards her: but did you know there was a game?  

a FLARF poem -

two automatic doors, synchronized

                       
                                            

I want simple Open Dialog

I feel like I was hurting your leather gloves

defibrillator shall be used

low noise

poor robot Should have a job

make a Self in most desirable shape


it is going to show us

two zones

Eastern Door

North/South quirk

Teleologic Doors

doors with two synchronized wings

leaves fully synchronized

Automatic doors opening for each other

something like this

moving system of left/right doors on loop

perfect wiring

synchronization was incomplete

No Temple Door Open
ajar and forced

door claims obstacle

door goes unpunished

when a door is not synchronized fawns choke

chickens may be to blame, but I don't know

just make sure to fly

beige plurality of wings

try using sky roundtrip

or a dead bus

start and stop internal clocks

synchronized with the pulse

current time and date must be cut

Remember

as early as the 1930s

 “standing/walking”, “lying” and “eating”

Remember

synchronized skating teams
style of the first game

and much more

visits at a crime scene

We investigated the behaviour of

master-slave function

driver and passenger

when networked together

12 people between 4 readers

synchronize your books

stay synchronized

two fully automatic memories

will move throughout arena including meeting rooms

The Do-not-disturb sign will hang on the door

will keep mutual exclusion

 

what to do if the hurricane comes

what to do if the hurricane comes
what to do if sandy
what if hudson comes cause hudson is just around the corner
oh this peaceful river almost a fetish the only arrow to new york on the map
what if it takes our cardboard house
(light as a matchbox)
far away
to another shore perhaps
where there’s no valley covered with yellow
and no one is smoking his hookah every night under the window
what if the door lock gets rusty
what if this other shore is the other side of atlantic
what to do if it all hits us in one wave
a smack out of the blue
a bite of real reality
please tell us would you do this to us sandy?

or should I just not care and open the door and let it in
and perhaps even walk out in my new shoes
two little boats the fate of which is now utter uncertainty
all this to meet sandy

you see the best part is I don’t even know if all the panic isn’t just for fun
just for halloween just for the elections teach me america how serious you are
you’re so big america that maybe a hurricane fits you
it’s just proportional with the skyscrapers and avenues
at home we never have hurricanes and no one calls the rain katrina or sandy
it’s just some formless water falling over some people tired even of their own identities
and we also don’t have the ocean
what we have is the tiny sea but in order to see it
you still have to cross some borders
so even now america I feel I’m on a tiny deserted island
opaque times
east europe
in my own compact waterproof dream
while someone is just screaming in my ear: saaaandy saaaandy  






___________________________

*

overheard: Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note

                                                 
Lately, I've become accustomed to the way
The ground opens up and envelopes me
Each time I go out to walk the dog.
Or the broad edged silly music the wind
Makes when I run for a bus...

Things have come to that.

And now, each night I count the stars.
And each night I get the same number.
And when they will not come to be counted,
I count the holes they leave.

Nobody sings anymore.

And then last night I tiptoed up
To my daughter's room and heard her
Talking to someone, and when I opened
The door, there was no one there...
Only she on her knees, peeking into

Her own clasped hands.


________________________________

* Amiri Baraka (n. 1934)

* overheard -- noua rubrica de poezie... netradusa (din lipsa de timp si incredere)