Ille St Marie
9 July
Monday, July 14th, 2008
Ille St Marie…
The oldest Catholic church in Madagascar:
The origin of the Malagasy name is obscure. European sailors named the small island ‘St Marie’, when the island became a major hideout for pirates in the Indian Ocean. There is even a “Pirate’s Cemetery” on the island. More than one thousand graves were sadly destroyed by merciless cyclones over the past years and only nineteen remained. One of the gravestones is even engraved with a scull and crossbones.
The island were the pirates appatently lived:
The famous grave with scull and crossbones:
…and this guy was buried upside down…
Although a very beautiful place, modern life on St Marie does not yet exist. Just to find working Internet becomes a nightmare. I believe that I will only be able to post this entry when back in the capital on the main island. I also find Madagascar VERY pricey and food is more expensive even than in NYC! My ‘upper end’ hotel will not receive even two stars in South Africa. My hunger for culture and true contemporary art and intellectual exchange will most probably make this one of my last journeys in Africa. The most disturbing to me is the very visible prostitution everywhere. Much older European men are here in hordes in search of beautiful young Malagasy women. Maybe I am just jaded; it could very well be a search for true love in a very cruel world.
However, I search for beauty and find plenty..
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for you
lovely one
i am forever
waiting
on impatient sidewalks
endless coffees
scribbling
scribbling
scribbling to calm
an unsure heart
is my life so small
once again my universe
is contained in
the ghost of you
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your beautiful freedom imprison me
—————————————–
i cannot contain you
you are free like the rain
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my skin knows yours
two halves of a perfect map
—————————————–
i am nowhere to be found
lost in your hold over me
—————————————–
will these trees bloom again
when you set me free?
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you stole my heart
then lost it in a foreign land
—————————————–
only an unknown tongue can
silence this persistent fear
—————————————–
i am the angry man banished
to this desert land filled with unknown butterflies
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11 July
Monday, July 14th, 2008
(for my friend marco in the big apple)
tonight i roll
turkish tobacco
light it slowly
smoke with you
a perfect sunset
these days i am
often sad
a king in bone dry exile
a scull-faced
stranger
we have walked
this world together
shared ripe colours
danced like lovers
watched my angel
die
alone: loosened
from our gods
yet together yearning
to get home
we cut the world
before us
where the sky
lives in silver ponds
no talk
of childhood
only an indigo wind
whispers
around us
(ille sainte marie, Madagascar, 11 July)
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i am the plagiarist
who will steal from you
shamelessly
i want to devour
your heart
taste your tongue
pickle your testicles
peel your sex
until discovered
stripped bare
locked away
the cinema clown
without his face
——————————————–
we fled
each other
pale without blood
no territory of flight
tongue our ego’s
heart our fright
pray for feathers
grew monstrous erections
to conquer
the darkest nights
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zebu
my heart
strong as an ox
I’ve cut the artery
sacrificed the sacred bull
bled a little
bruised a lot
your blood bribe
ripe promises
already gone
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My “5 star hotel”:
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