Kiki Dimoula Poems

My small child

got into mischief once again

climbing the ledge of the universe

his hand jostling the red

plate hanging on the skywall spilling

all the light down on himself



God startled

to see the sun

dressed in child clothes

scrambling back down the ladder

of my mind



And now I sit

and sternly scold my child

as secretly I steal his poured-on

light.
...

Below, the sea waits always

for a wrinkling wind.

Athos Dimoulas

"Supreme Generality"



Some wide-flung windows

hoist Summer up by insect derrick.



I count: a couple of letters

are missing. The bottom rocker of the s

is gone. It had been loose last year.



Now where will all this dimininution sit

with its host of eunuchs?



Still, the diminishing is firm —

it withstands tons of pain. Sit freely.



I think I'll add a recliner to the list

to replace the broken s.



I also need

a small transistor radio

glued to the ears of the waves

tuned to the pirate stations of the sands.

An easily sensitized song reels in

characters that almost match the ones

summer is missing and then some. In case

you remember others. You'll have

plenty of seats.



Filtering glasses too, lest I remember more,

though now and then I do wear smoky contacts.



A hat for the sun

although it blazes less than when

night and day you'd invent it.

I'll try on an old sunburn

curious whether my back's

old crazy passion for it peeled.



New swimsuit — my decline has gained

a lot of weight. In fact, I'd relish

a new body — to sit along its miles and stroke

the airy wrinkles of the sea.

But logic will finally prevail:

the logic of this body at my disposal.



All the sea's Ss one by one

are carefully hoisted bubble-wrapped

in blue transparent water

by seagull derrick.



What sea? Mere

illusionist pirate water —

a distant cosmogony's refugee.

Corruptingly immense

because of the precipitous

and schistic initial temper of the cosmos.

Harlot escape's optical pimp.



What sea?

Time for the logic of the body

at your disposal to prevail.



Get dressed and swim.



(Tear-Dumping Strictly Prohibited.

Maturity already is
rabidly salty on its own.)
...

What are you doing here

a straight working road like you

on an idle bench?



Well, I'm psychoanalyzing free of charge

this painter from a foreign dark-skinned land,

how calmly and skillfully he paints

the day out-of-work.



I midwife reliability and honor.

He plants the brush in one hand

and in the other's microwaves

he heats a breadstick dried by hours

upon the sun's proclaiming tongue.



I'm analyzing the inventive stalling

of his hunger. He eats a sesame

apart from each small bite

extending its face value.



The light annoys me. Difficult customer.

He doesn't like the paint job

keeps changing it by stirring in

every new passing hour.



I'm furious at obedient expatriation.

With every passing hour

it paints the unemployed day.



Finish already.

Soon the difficult customer

will set.
...

[Matthew, 73]

Because you keep

suspect company

especially that of the soul

you will be called someday to Prosecution

for interrogation and identification.



Be cautious

confess laconically.



They will lead you in darkness

to a sealed informants' hall.

You will sit

at a fist-beaten table

before a fat dossier

of suspects' pictures.



They'll leaf through it one by one,

you will not speak, they will go on.

As soon as you see a finger press

insistent as a gun barrel

against a suspect's temple



be ready you will say



I do not know the man



(thrice)



the barrel will move slowly, it will land

on time's temple, keep

steady insistent



I do not know the man



(thrice)



equally strong if terrified

your answer in front of death's

photograph must stand



I do not know the man



(thrice)



and when the Prosecutors finally

irritated and with savage

punches smash your face

upon a faint exquisite sketch

in dreaming's charcoal



I never saw it again



once



you will say.
...

Lie down. On something hard.

At first comforts' vertebrae might hurt

but gradually and painlessly the spine

of immobility lengthens like a cypress.



Now contract your bad habits

in a rigid line.

Bring your hands loosely to your chest

like makeshift wings of temporary angels.

Don't shift position.

Deftly the supine rows.



Don't be scared. Fear is fattening,

it contains hunger.

Don't snack on sensations. Too many calories.

They're responsible for deprivation bulge.



Eyes closed at all times please.

No misconstruable peeking,

no lollipops of light.

They radiate ultraviolet nostalgia.



Exhale forcefully, lie still,

don't breathe, don't breathe —

you risk imprinting only half

the oarsman on the x-ray.



Surrender now to the slide of sleep.



I'll put on a tape, relax, your mama's

lullaby, sleep my sweet

baby, willing or not.



Weigh yourselves. No moving —

your body has an integrated scale.
...

I read a most interesting

scientific finding



that we humans are

the only creatures on the earth

who weep.



And I felt pride that just our own

introversion affords us such

expressive philanthropic glands.



Let's say — as a hypothesis —

I was a little lemon tree in bloom

and my bud hardened to a lemon

and a fiery wind

thirsty for something juicy

twisted the branch's throat

and stole the lemon

cut it in half

with the innocent pocketknife

of a child's small theft

squeezing it hard

to drip the juice

in the roasting mouth

of its gaping breath

and by mistake in squeezing

a tart torch of its drop was flung

into your distant eye



— a wish can fly

as far as you desire —



perhaps — just a hypothesis —

it would be heard

in your tear-ducts' court.
...

You'll perceive nothing

you'll just read in the morning

some coded lips scrawled

on your bedside glass

with all-night water.



I'm thinking of sending my melancholy

to sleep with you tonight

so I can be alone a little.



In her bag

under her evening meds I'll pack

as if by accident one of her childhood photos

in case you sing her a lullaby

and under the lullaby I'll hide

a second set of clothes

in case things change and you

keep her tomorrow also.



Of course, how do you love by night

another without asking? Listen:

eros was an imperative

before it was entreaty.



Besides, you'll feel nothing.

She'll not lie beside you exactly

the exact is inhospitable.



In an ample adjacent willingness she'll sleep

glued leaning sideways to

the imperceptible — sublime creation:



Love me you tell it and it loves.
...

A pleasant surprise.

Today at 6:30 AM

— instead of 7 yesterday —

the public streetlights dimmed.

Some small birds tripped a bit

over their hazy twitter

but right away one constantly

strengthening hand of light

lofted them on high.



So now day's grown.

By half and hour you will say.

Is that so small?

Just remember the chronovores —

finally 2 minutes were enough

not even.



Then all the rest of the limitless

remaining storm was yours.
...

Despite its polite temperature

the night

hustled October to its finish.



Others too sat outside timid

each one's fear

won't easily forgo

that tepid prequel of the wintry

and so I too detoured

your Nordic climate

with an almost summery attitude.



Are you cold? No

we were discussing heatedly

how very black the absent stars

painted the sea



your orange juice sat far

from my coffee

and totally out of context

you whispered love

dies before it gets to age



I barely heard

you pulled your chair

so violently close its iron leg

jammed into my leg's thought



and up flared a suspect otherworldly

fragrantly vacant pain



plainly you

God from your secret and forbidden

heights had squeezed

derision in my cup.
...

c. Crickets Without Night





Night

I heard the crickets and the stars

praising with incense

you who gives them meaning —

if you don't come they neither sing nor shine



I heard the invisibles

whisper gratitude

for the absolute silence you spread

allowing their resonance to clamber

safely up awe's giant trunk.



I also heard a few cowards

badmouthing you for obscuring us

how can they see to love us

without light.



What off-the-wall argument, as if

stars and crickets without night



love has ever clearly seen.

Only by her genetically weak spark

the wind-whipped light enlarged.
...