Open Me

You open me –

Like the unfolding petals

of a Georgia O’Keeffe flower

at the New York Met.

You open me –

like a lace curtain

untied

in a Bruges home.

You open me –

like an origami butterfly

taking flight

in Narita.

You open me –

like the No. 12 tram

snaking through

The curves of a Lisbon street.

 24^th February 2011

Who is that man?

Who is that man?

Sitting in Alfama Square

pen and paper in hand.

The flowing hair of Jesus,

the charisma of Che Guarvra.

Is he a liberator,

liberating us with a word?

 26^th February 2011

Only the Poets

Lisbon is littered with livraria.

Through an alley

under an arch

over cobblestones

I find a Portuguese bookshop.

I ask the nice young man,

“Do you have Portuguese authors in English?”

He answers,

“No authors, only the Poets”.

25^th February 2011

Portuguese Wine

Does life feel any better?

Sitting in a Juliet Balcony

in Alfama at midday.

Bare shoulders and bare feet.

Gentle February sun

with a kissing midday breeze.

Getting drunk on Portuguese wine,

Portasda Herdade Vinho.

Getting drunk on joy.

 24^th February 2011

Lisbon’s medieval post modernism

A blood perfect warm sun 

and smooth caressing breeze

rustle the leaves

of the olive and cumquat trees in white cylindrical pots.

The Black sofas under the Lisbon sun

are body warm.

White tables and chairs,

white rectangular tin side tables

and a double shot expresso.

Portuguese ambient pop wafts out through

this outdoor cafe on the expansive flat concrete.

Looking out from this high vantage

to iridescent sparkling waters

and jagged, jumbled dwellings

which are impossibly perched and sandwiched in the hilly terrain

painted greens and clashing but surprisingly pleasing with

the pinks, mustards, siennas and terracottas.

The seabirds are calling to the sound of

the No. 12 tram rattling up and down the alleys of Lisbon,

and to the sounds of kind construction noises

making music with teenagers on excursion laughing.

Modernist and Post-modernist sounds

contrast with medieval bells,

as the Bell tolls 11.

 25^th February 2011

In the Medina

Your smile

is dazzling white.

Your touch

is tender and light.

Your embrace

is embued with radiating warmth.

Your kiss

is sweetly scented with mint.

You are an Arab man

Greeting your male friend

In the Medina.

  3^rd May 2011

Mama?

Three times today in Fez, Morroco

she heard a child

call the searching question,

“Mama?”

At the Hamam

in the steamy warm communal bathing rooms,

small girls

teenage girls

nursing mothers

grandmothers

are naked and bathing

enjoying intimacy and friendship.

A small girl calls out “Mama?”

Through the small square window of the riad,

she heard a young boy calling out

 down the hallway of the neighbouring ancient stone riad,

“Mama?”

And now, sitting on the roof terrace of the riad,

as the call to prayer rises up echoing across the Medina,

a beautiful Fez girl on the crest of womanhood

calls down from the neighbouring roof terrace,

“Mama?”

Mama, you are eternally and deeply needed.

From our beginning to our ending, we need you.

“Where are you Mama?”

  27^th April 2011

If you want Henna?

‘If you want Henna?’

The signs read in the Fes Medina.

Is it a statement, or is it a question?

It is such an unreconciled sentence.

Unsatisfying

as the pale orange scribble I am left with on my hand.

 3rd May 2011