Camera Obscura

Camera Obscura

A stairway leading nowhere

people

taking them up and down as if

ignoring this fact

A bed of dark purple tulips creates

a disturbing background for those

descending

At a distance the husky sound of a lighthouse suggests

an ocean

dimmed and covered with fog

Sitting by a rugged dune a shape or maybe two seem to be

facing the sea

Meanwhile, the unpleasant touch of an hand

too close, too intimate

becoming super real – I

close my eyes and the pressure blows

sand onto the image

clouding it - just as the people

consuming their time uselessly, not even

noticing

an astounding tunisian

cat – green eyes, half closed

and sleek fur -

lying at the third step

resonates each and every foot

passing by

his life spanning

the realm of those individuals

whose feet

walk their shadow

I stop breathing

to understand one of the shapes

turning its face to me so I can

see - myself

if I want to - the sea

repeating its dying

as the morning brightness

invades this room

the silky touch of curled silence

brings me back

you – milk, rye, gray hair

loose – now

that worms

crawl underneath

stairways, people

fall, decaying over the dark

purple tulips – stoically still beautiful

and the cat

vanishes somewhere between

those two.

© 2016, José Eduardo Coelho

Juicy Things About Driving and Restaurants

Juicy Things About Driving and Restaurants

delicacy slides down your throat

the moment rice fields prove their existence

- white storks, chimneys, iron bridges growing into the landscape -

the plausible you

stacks tear drops until light vanishes away

behind cork molded hills

and the mind - starlings, ibis, egrets - sets forth into a drive of its own

mysterious ingredients

cut the surface wide open

and juicy things pop up

at mile 196

parked trucks, big fat cars and signs

blinking – stone soup, fish soup, all sort soup -

the sun splashes its mild winter odor

above the remnants of trees

where chickens, ducks, doves

play one of your childhood dearest scenes

in memoriam

and once inside, the waitress, the ribbed vault, columns, hiding hooks

- are you on your own, sir, what will your order be, red, white?

big screens, one on the right, one behind

merged space

and sound – forks, glasses, someone whispering

seductively about fear while you

attempt one smile

each time the waitress passes by

again last days' rain will keep falling

from north to south

but not today, today every square inch of earth

sweats

impudently

as me inside you, migrating terns – dark coffee

blended hair, naked neck and shoulders, the touch of

my forehead in your

occipital bone -

and then you're finished

- are you ready, sir?

deliciously gorged, one is back on the road

with nothing but tastes swirling

all around your tongue

the exquisite feeling of liquor - left you behind

by the table - now it's only me

and a measurable conviction of solitude

ahead

just another

200 miles

© 2016, José Eduardo Coelho

No Man's Room

No Man's Room

Her description beamed into or from

my mind unintentionally as water ripples listening to the wind

night after night the stairways, old and creepy

announcing the steps

walls guiding the sound of human hands

whispering and touching

each others' warps, seldom preempted

with love – her ass

should be held firmly, within his hands, while

his cigarette and his lighter

crossing the street, approaching

the heavy port

and then the long way up - 5^th floor with nothing

but a lighter and a cold bed

waiting

inside just the promise

of another morning rising ahead and

the instinct of

repetition

undoing, doing – her name – back and forth

into and from

his mouth, as a lenitive

her face, erased, as soon as his eyes

close and the idea of failure settles

somewhere, deep

never mind why a man

crosses the narrow street and joins her without a smile

because he didn't - tonight he's alone

no wife, no girlfriend – the key

should be inserted smoothly

and rotated

counterclockwise

© 2016, José Eduardo Coelho

Hungry For Darkness

Your voice -

there was a dissonance

among an affection -

maybe

the dusk falling

from above the mountain

skyline of birds hungry for

darkness

your voice – damn - so sweetly

played within

my private yard

now the surge of metal feathers

scraping

inside still the memory

caressing our landscape

forbidden crevices, ingeniously drawn

as kisses, daily

picked up from your skin's ribs

and melting

form, content, the strange displacement

of the surface in you, in me

and I – hearing your voice -

follow the track left by

my own steps

forgetting the texture of soil and

direction escaping me

as notion

out

there in the wild this valley

is huge

I wish for the night now

that your voice

is ebbing towards the shore

I'll lie quietly

waiting

to catch its warmth

and drown.

© 2016, José Eduardo Coelho

Há Três Minutos

há três minutos

No céu, o manto do esquecimento

a chuva, frágil, dócil, copiando-se

em gotas, gotículas

temporariamente perdidas no êxtase

da queda

copiosa

e a luz, surda

revendo-se no voo baptismal dos pássaros

ausentes

O olhar

demora-se, pensativo

subtrai-se à inexactidão das coisas -

concretamente as coisas mordem-se, sujam-se

dejectam-se, destruindo-se sem

deixar espaço

para mais que outras

coisas -

cresce asas, por sobre o manto

de esquecimento

e flui

Enquanto te distrais

o meu corpo

- um rio, algures -

cresce

e o som resvala na lembrança

que trago -

há três minutos

os pássaros

eram gotas, deslizando na superfície

do olhar -

e o céu abre-se

troando ais

em êxtase

segredo-te a matéria de que a luz

é feita

e das coisas

nem o nome ou a memória

do espaço

© 2015, José Coelho

Única Certeza / Single Certainty

Não há uma única
certeza
capaz
de se moldar à eternidade;
demasiado liso -
o tempo
-----------------------
there is no single
certainty
able
to shape itself to eternity;
too smooth -
time