Monday, December 27, 2010

Metal Guru

Karol Bak

A diesel engine throbs in the blackness of morning silence
Fumes hit the buttons that transport you through time
To another morning in another life on the other side of the world

Polarised filings of past endeavour viewed through the prism of age
Filigree flavours remembered on perfumed timelines
Lubricate the cusp of the wave called now

The cold bites your mind through the soles of your boots
The morning is a sacrificial anode for your future self
A fact that cannot ally your shivering nor still your racing heart

Polaroid snapshots viewed through panes of obscured glass
These fragile anchors hold you fast against the maelstrom
The present keeps moving intangible mercurial metallic

Voices chant in the blackness of morning solitude
Mist hangs low in the field below the high school
Everything tastes of yesterday

6 comments:

Yodood said...

As in every attempt to define with our dualistic language, now cannot be described without terms of what it is not — keeping us from being fully here. Although the past and future plans make us who we are at any instant, they keep us from observing the present for what it is anyway.

Garth said...

Yodood: the virus we call language cannot contain concepts that reach beyond it, true, but in general language is only used lazily (cliches and aphorisms) - despite all these shortcomings I will continue to attempt to convey those concepts with the only tool at my disposal: language. ;)

Yodood said...

Although our use of language is anything but lazy it reaches only those of like sensitivities for the effort, leaving made up minds unaware. If writing is not to introduce new perceptions as possibilities lazy certainty results.

And here we are, wiggling in tautological quicksand…waving to others similarly stuck.

Garth said...

Yodood: Yes, the irony for us atheists (or non-theists) is that we end up preaching to the choir.

Harlequin said...

i like how you've used your gift of language ( and your marvelous and courageous relationship with it) to work with time and being here in this nifty piece; you have managed to use so many great words that suggest edges, limits, non-limits, horizons, not to mention all the portals you have provided.
quite a crafty thing, here.
thanks!

Garth said...

Harlequin: well spotted the portals :) I never cease to be fascinated by what can be dredged from the memory by the occurance of a smell/ a perfume - in this case the smell of deisel fumes in the cold air.

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