Babel: The multilingual, multicultural online journal and community of arts and ideas

by: James Schwartz

To my birthday boy on his twenty eighth

On August thirty first two thousand eight

I present to you my poetic faith

A man of your own ideals: gay or str8.

To my longtime muse I present a toast:

May your year be of wine, roses and song

May your year be another year to boast

Of after hour adventures all day long.

Your future writ in the palm of my hand

Your dreams and mine intertwine in my ink

Your past a confusion I understand

Our reality served with a chilled drink.

Ever in gaiety, Jazz Age rages

Literary love can stun the ages.

by: James Schwartz

Among his most favored night-time toys
Absinthe, liquor and phosphoresce hair frost
Of all my dream lovers and phantom boys
In reality I’m easily lost
Laughing, intoxicated he will baste
Brown bottles of luminous fire-fly
Anointing his head with celestial paste
Of stars liquidated into hair dye
He is always reckless in his passion
Blithely flinging raver clothes on my bed
As if he’s going out of fashion
A passing diversion until he’s dead
Taking, embracing me until we glow
The colorless mornings drift by so slow.

[lang_en]at your back the tall mountain your deep research what is it you want to know by asking evaluate who is asking whom about what and why are you asking the question does the identity of the asker matter a question is a power relationship what are you he asks me he asks and where are you really from block the direct energy flooding into your front door by planting a tree a tree of heaven indigenous to china and spread all over California what island are you from you must be this isn’t a question so much as a declaration by someone else proclaiming knowledge of your identity will a mirror on my forehead deflect it

why
who
what?

[/lang_en]

[lang_en]the word angel could be revised as “a woman with wings.” you seduced me with the intensity of your dream a woman whose wings were broken she needed all of us to lift her body with the breath of our song I took water and pigment applied to paper the woman’s face her eye like a world clouds ocean and the earth beneath you told me people of your country with green eyes are a legacy of French colonialism everyone knows this but no one denies them their authenticity there is a space for them in society like the space between the water of the river and its banks

Bersennbrugge writes of durations the space between the beginning of something and its end is a duration invokes the strength of to endure the hardness of durability but duration is nothing it is no thing just a space between like the sight-lines from one to another who are carefully not looking too closely the mirror they see there the open desire my instructions for the painting were exact the color of blue at the horizon half an hour before sunset there might be a name for this I know it matters to you the exact translation of a word

for me it is color it is light it is reaching into the space and touching the heat around your body inhaling the scent of flowers blooming at night scenting the island I live on it is only at night I wish to inhale deeply carry it with me into the daylight like you that scent is already gone

_______

explanatory note:

I’m writing here in a prose-poem style that encourages a certain sliding between meanings of the words. There are no line breaks. This poem is best read aloud, taking pauses and searching for the proper places to restart. Hesitancy is natural.

“Bersennbrugge” is the mixed race Asian American poet Mei Mei Bersennbrugge, who writes difficult poetry I can’t quite digest but love to read. This poem is written using some of her favorite language (”duration”), but is not imitative of her style, which would be too difficult for me.
~Wei Ming Dariotis[/lang_en]

Hi Folks,

I guess it is time for a little self-introduction. Malcolm Lawrence, Founder/CEO & Editor-In-Chief of towerofbabel.com noticed that I had joined his Tower of Babel group on InterNations.com so he invited me to blog here.

I am very new to blogging–my only experience being a travel blog I’ve been keeping for about 3 weeks on facebook, mostly for my family and friends. However, I write a lot, mostly for public consumption through book chapters and journal articles (in my waking life I am an academic).

My writing often focuses on Asian American literature (the subject of my dissertation), art, culture, and community activism around identity politics. I have a particular fondness for poetry–particularly Asian American poetry–which requires often layers of references. I’ve recently been writing and lecturing a lot about the use of the Native Hawaiian word, “Hapa,” by non-Native Hawaiian Asian Americans. I’m also working on a book about mixed race Asian American artists (think Isamu Noguchi) with Laura Kina, herself a mixed Asian (Okinawan) artist. I also write about science fiction and mixed race (I have a chapter in a book on Star Trek, “The Influence of Star Trek on Television, Film, and Culture,” which is all about Spock as a mixed race character and Seven of Nine as a transracial adoptee). And I love ethnic vampire literature, feminist and racially conscious science-fiction/speculative fiction (this all comes together for me in the poetry of Bryan Thao Worra, a Lao transracial adoptee speculative poet).

Recently, I have co-founded the Critical Mixed Race Studies Association, and I am writing about what critical mixed race studies is about–it is an emerging field within Ethnic Studies.

Personally, I am a mixed Asian American (Chinese, Greek, Swedish, English, Scottish, German, Pennsylvania Dutch), born in Australia, raised in San Francisco (and sent to Japanese Bilingual/Bi-cultural school for a few years), tenured at San Francisco State University in Asian American Studies, and at this very moment taking my first vacation in years and spending 5 weeks living with my best friend at her home in Brussels (after having just gotten tenure and having recently, amicably divorced).

And I just turned 39 on the recent summer solstice.

best,

Wei Ming Dariotis

After going out onto the kitchen deck to view the moon hanging over Lago Trasimeno, with its little star companionably lurking over its shoulder, we were greeted by firelies dancing a mating dance and twinkling at us.

This inspired a desire for star gazing, so we adjourned to the uppermost deck of the house, above the front door. The air was so perfectly perfumed and lovely it made me wonder aloud what it might be like to sleep outside there. My friend, Alvilda, said that as children she and her cousin, Noam (now the mayor of New Rochelle, NY–think “The Dick Van Dyck Show”), used to sleep out on the porch to watch the stars in every stage of the summer night.

Who would not rest peacefully after hearing this?

~Wei Ming Dariotis

The moon tonight, the night of the longest day of the year (June 21st) is the size and color of a ripe apricot. I had resisted, at first, buying the apricots here in Umbria. I had only a memory of California’s apricots that looked ripe but were hard and never ripened, or ripened into a surly pulp without ever tasting satisfyingly apricot-ish.

But I was wrong; the apricots in Umbria are gorgeous. And the moon in Umbria tonight is a heavy, succulent fruit.

One star hangs above the moon’s shoulder, keeping watch as they rise together over a hill on the edge of Lago Trasimeno.

We had apricots for dinner, and the tangy honey of their flesh still lingers on my tongue. The apricots taste like the moon. *

* I must credit my friend Reg with this line.

~Wei Ming Dariotis

Para Rosangela de Fátima

Encontro-me tantas vezes pensando em ti
e visualizo tua perfeita forma de mulher,
o dia a aflorar-te nos lábios de veludo,
a noite a escorrer-te pela seda dos cabelos.
Se estás longe de mim, dia após dia
transformo-te na delícia do fruto que aprecio,
no frescor da água que me sacia a sede
e na substância, enfim, que me permite o amanhã.
Posso te sentir na suave brisa matutina,
nos primeiros raios do sol que me aquecem
e ouso ver-te em cada objeto, em cada rosto,
em cada gota de orvalho da verde grama
e no ruflar das asas das andorinhas…
Sou pequenino ante tua presença
e obscuro ante tua transparência,
mas mantenho os olhos cerrados
enquanto o dia corre,
enquanto a hora vital não chega,
até que te encontro, nascida do nada,
florescida, cristalina ante meus olhos,
e bebo da taça dos teus lábios
e aqueço-me do sol do teu sorriso
e me desfaço em infantil alegria…
E vão-se do meu rosto a sombra e a amargura
e tudo o que me faz sofrer quando não te tenho.
Onda que vem
e que vai
e vem novamente
e torna a partir,
mas que não escoa nunca,
neste oceano de delícias que é o teu corpo,
que banha o meu corpo,
que faz nascente o sol no meu rosto.
És a delícia, a doçura dos meus dias
e a cada hora te espero
para reinares sempre em minha vida.

http://www.apoesia.net/index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=162

Poem talks about the tragedy occurred on Congonhas, SP, and external revolt of the pain and uncertainty about who are real culprits

TAMtos dead …
Who is to blame?
The man-machine?
From the machine-man?
The machine-machine?
Or the whole machinery?
And what the box says,
The box burned,
The box “immune” to the fall,
A black-box black?
Does screams, cryng,
Pain, noise,
Broken phrases,
Words disrupted
Denounce guilty?
Who is to blame?
The rain? From the runway?
The tower?
Who has died?
And the next fault?
Who are to be? …
My? His? …

PRIVATE CELEBRITY

VS.

I DON’T CARE TO TELL THE WORLD

(FOR YOU’RE THE WORLD TO ME)

(DJ RESH VS. JAMES C. RULE REMIX)

Pull up in my ride, vibin’ to Prince Bee.

April Hoskins at my side for all to see.

Around this club we’re V.I.P.

Bloglines made a celebrity out of me.

I don’t care to tell the world,

For you’re the world to me;

When my message reaches you

It has reached it’s destiny;

You’re the only world I know,

That’s why I love to tell it so,

I don’t care to tell the world

For you’re the world to me.

Putting on a show, strutting in the club

A homohop flow, pocket full of paper and a fat dub.

Painted eyes laughing behind designer shades.

Falling in love as the night fades.

I don’t care to tell the world,

For you’re the world to me;

When my message reaches you

It has reached it’s destiny;

You’re the only world I know,

That’s why I love to tell it so,

I don’t care to tell the world

For you’re the world to me.

PARTING SHOTS: A SONNET

Family! Family! Where did Old Order, New Beginnings go wrong?

I address you from the pulpit of my own devising.

Forcing you to dance to the techno song.

Screaming truths you’re busy disguising.

You abandon me, aged 9, beside Mom’s grave.

I had to heal these wounds alone.

Breaking down is never brave.

Over your gossip on the telephone.

Over the electronica on the dancefloor.

I see the poisoned clan you are.

Artfully playing the Christian bore.

Refusing to see the literary star.

Turning away, locking your door.

Devouring my bloglines from the night before.

THE DINING ROOM: A SONNET

Through the winters gray pearl light.

We poets contemplate our fate.

To the inky November night.

And the small portions on our plate.

We commiserate, yet we write.

Dining every night so late.

Chewing over what we bit.

Vomiting up what we hate.

Lyrical word warriors, you must eat.

Carving gems from cold bones.

Muses hold at bay defeat.

Lovers push forth the moans.

To crawl forth from the gloom.

To recite our souls in the dining room.

by: James Schwartz

“Unbutton the Shirt Slowly”

Unbutton the shirt slowly
He might like that
The pants lie forgotten on his floor
I smell of the sea
I smell of showers
I smell of cologne
He might like that
Toothpaste and raspberry cocktails
Mingle in frantic kisses deep
Unbutton the shirt slowly
He likes that
Tonight.

“The Pale City”

From the pale city
Beside the pale sea
I traveled once more home
To the fields in hues of tea
I left behind abandon lovers
They did not see me go
I keep my silence still
I have nothing left to show
No goodbyes were called out
As the pale city fell behind
Only silence reigned
Of the indifferent kind.

by: James Schwartz

JAMES SCHWARTZ is a poet and slam performer striving for the simplicity of Cavafy mixed with modern gay wordplay and elements; Schwartz’s poetry / slam material dialogues of GLBTQ issues and affirmations of gay (night) life and love.

James Schwartz was born 2.19.78 and raised in the Old Order Amish community in SW MI. where he currently resides.
Schwartz is the author of several poetry chapbooks including THE SCARLET BAND AND OTHER POEMS (2005). Schwartz’s poetry was published by POETRY LIFE AND TIMES.COM (March, September 07, April 08 issues), THE RAINBOW GAZZETTE (June, September, December 07, January, March, April 08 issues) and most recently the Australian poetry / art journal OutSide the Lines and The Poets Haven.

____________________________________

Dear JS Readers…

Thanks to Malcolm I will be posting a mix of poetry and writings here at Babel.  Also see http://ajscyberreader.tripod.com and http://jsgossip.blogspot.com