One day, I dreamed that I was a human amalgam from the imagination of a few artists. Marginal beings such as: “Nowhere Man,” “Dreamer...,” “Tommy,” and even Felix’s “Bozo.” Out of that exuberance of imagination, I began writing a long poem dedicated to Marilyn Monroe. In my mind and in my aim, this spirituphile work was meant to end only when my life itself would end. Thus, born a dreamer, at the slightest desire, I once again become king of that castle which is my imagination.
CRYING PROSES
God! God! What are these tears of prose... ...that shine upon my face? My life wedded to the reflections of the moon, to the mystery of love, perhaps? Is it a secret hidden within a message, like light weeping beneath runes? Words from her heart would be my fortune!
Tears of ink that, in turn, water one another, swelling and playing, unblocking my gaps, calling one another, calling each other back. A cry in full pursuit, from shadow into reflection, clothed in the death that frightens me, yet which I dare... yes, dare to love for its omens. But God!..... Is death a forum?
Must I speak to her before I lose myself? Offer myself like an ember to her sweet fantasy? To the False One who sprays his threats during the interview, at his question: “Ashes to ashes, who are you?” I would answer, “An isolated and reclusive prince, moving out of a lost body, persona non grata in his own life, nothing more!”
And beneath his piercing and cowardly gaze, yet deadly... would I add, like a forgotten fable: “Is it age?.... I remember, I was faithful to the queen without a pledge. Yes, I am the prince without the right of the first night, in search of a queen without a king, in this due country, this cruel lowland that is my beaten loneliness. Now dodging, now at last, a less difficult isolation!”
Lifting her cape, like a jealous, wicked angel, she would conclude: “But what are you waiting for?... Go join those ninety-nine other mad men and women! Since there were so many mad souls who loved that corsage, then I shall be the eternal refuge for your tribute! You ninety-nine mad ones, scattered everywhere, you pious dreamers of the woman with ninety-nine faces!”
I would reply: “Before!..... Then!...... Yes, ogress! I was a brave man, inwardly and outwardly. Except where I stood in front of it. I lived alone with what I thought was death! There were ninety-nine of them! We have been a hundred since! A hundred to unite, to join, to be married in the mirage... of an empress offering herself tonight, at random.
The shadow of shadows will fall beneath my tongue, and fall asleep soft, trembling, and sweating! Eyes blinking, half-closed, fixed upon my face, like a smile sweetening her bitter sleep, like a candid and foolish nursery rhyme of wonders, seeing me as the horrible beast hiding his ugliness, will deem her task futile before the incomparable challenge...
THE GOLDEN LETTERS
Great! Great! The star has a gilded name, shining by day in the blue sky, dethroning even the writer’s own.... King Arthur. The moon and its renown light up my long night, more than the magic of art or sport, more than any goddess or hero, even Garbo, Madonna, Lennon, or DiMaggio!
Shame on me! Her name dulls mine. An iron resonance, but a tin-like color. At baptism, it was spat into my hand. Later, I sealed it in my palm by casting a spell upon myself, like almsgiving. Yes! I desecrated the tomb of fate by staining the moonstone with the blood of “Como.”
What are the names of the ninety-nine clever worshippers, flattering the Eldorado that was her body? They too hope for the pleasant balm which, through our purpose, will give us thatch, will gild our name with hers, will glorify our Argonaut end after one final error....!
BIOPSY BLUES
Long ago, the queen flew away, leaving him in the shock of his stillness, hanging gallants and panicked enemies. Each subject, thinking too much of the other, began to distinguish himself through voice, books, roses, and pots, but none confessed envy for her crown.
Thus history selects, over time, prince consorts among her fortunate lovers. And yet it forgets or rejects all omissions, those ninety-nine madmen, and me in my confinement. We who, in love, have attached ourselves to the star. We on every side, who in humble ways.... polish lives and navels... to make them shine.
Shit! Shit! “Fuck and shit!” for the others! In debauchery or innocence, let them wallow! Of the two, I alone take part, in my own field. For in my mission, I am the mad apostle, prophet of my apocalypse and witness to my end. No choice of her love, nor of my wine. For the chalice and the cup are ours!
But how can I ally myself with eternity, fill the void without betraying the infinite? Point by point, through the circle of gods from here!..... I hate their threats, and I doubt their guarantees! A universal melting pot of survival? I do not care! After death, it is democracy! My point of support?..... It is simply her life.
Proof... even my panicked unconscious does not care to be reincarnated. Nor does my unbridled conscience care to see itself praised in resurrection! No choice but to go toward the sacred. No choice, before winged death, but to fight, to face it.
Yes! I confess! I, the bewitched one, believe in this eternal and destined love. Let us laugh and laugh with open throats! Let them think me mad if I say, “Madness reveals my reason.” I shall carry the fight for this lofty dream, even if I must bleed my imagination dry.
I shall summon happiness, by proxy......, thanks to those devices that bind me, that rock me with her life. By exorcising my heart... ....I shall transform illusion, and drink my soul... to the dregs.
CLICHÉ!
Seducing the inadmissible.... Those pictures that offer themselves to the gaze, that make her life seem credible, and make me think of its end, without “Goodbye!” Yes! Risk everything for the impossible. Try everything for a slender hope. Even to love her without ever being able to prove it.
But I am here, in time, travelling there as though in a subway. And on this train of years, I gaze at one of her photographs. I drool and sweat in the movement... ...the lucid gaze of my libido. “Tell me... in time, am I too much?”
When my eyes seem secondary and dance upon the burning paper, death appears to me in evening dress, those touching one another in eternity, that mirror. So I imagine myself, reflecting myself, hiding behind my sand mask and my icy dreams that ramble on.
It is like the old “Chaplins.” When those old films come alive, we do not laugh at the past, with the actor, the clown, the mime... we long to forget life for fun! Throwing themselves like tiny shadows upon the immaculate screen of eternity!
LIFE FLOWING
Aim!.... I remain united with time, this vision. Bull’s-eye! I shall reach infinity! Will we be there together, or wed? Every day, the same desires. I torture myself with the same dreamlike joys. Like water, which attracts and can destroy the warming fire,...! I want her!
Except that here, my pupils already without pleasure are troubled by my hands without warmth. No beauty, no sensuality. No body to place beneath my heart.... No voices, no words; nothing to hear, nothing to say. None of my breaths will mingle with her sighs, not even the breath of my final hour.
I move on without thinking, without thinking that I shall always dream of her, smoothly, without shame, without weakening. This despite that strange guilt of revealing a secret I must betray. Will she forget the mystery that follows? I am sorry! I am sorry! I am not small, I am cheap!
Oh! You, my trapped thoughts! You who seem like thousands of years, you who tremble and flutter in my soul, you who flow like a stream, from your waves I grow excited. OH! Final joys. Farewell! I cast you out, all proud.
Go and daydream! I urge you, bitterly, to leave me gently and without misunderstanding, at the speed of my wish, this breeze. Go away! Go away! Go on from behind, or in clusters, all of you willing. My heart harmonizes you, gilds you with the constancy of what it wagers.
Go out to sea, through hills, valleys, and atmospheres. Like a prayer, soften the orphan. Be like a troubling mantra, a motto, please, touch the one I aim for. The one whom my being imagines with desire. Tell her: “I love you, Marilyn”!
FLIGHT OF REVERIES
At last, you are a beautiful queen! We have been travelling for so long, seeking the zenith beyond the horizons, transparent in soft tones. A fine vibrato making a simple refrain of your soul, a breath without breath, which of our choir leads the amen.
Our goal is to proclaim a prayer, from our dreaming master who longs for healing. We are a futile prayer that brings you here, his last chance, our mission. To rescue him from this torture with which he struggles, all of us, his thoughts, perhaps by duty, and in honor, help him find a way out of his pain.
To reach you, in your harbor, we became drops of rain. Then, mingling with that pure source of life, one morning in Eden, where you drank, we flowed into you and infiltrated. This sweetness, in your soul, never before felt, is the love of a stranger, our friend.
His voice and words, filtered by death, will vibrate in cries and in pleas through liberation in the mystical echo of the afterlife. And never, through time, in this forbidden place, to all that is stone and body, will such a voice have taken hold with such a will to survive.
We greatly doubt that we can convince you to listen to that laughable heart, to weep over his powerful complaints, to drink in his mad and troubled desires, or to enjoy his velvety pleasures. And yet, here is our word, like a bible.... a few words to unveil....
WORDS FROM THE STRANGER
“...In the hope that my words, even translated without reason, disturb and frighten the officials of the spirit. What splendor of God are they? His kindness, or his halo. Whatever the brightness of the devil or the torment of his fire.
Our love, unpredictable passion, will fool them even in their plot. They who, by tacit agreement like spies, shared the same unison. And all this for a commonplace cause of labor? No! For the sharing of this harvest: the indescribable power of emotion.
We shall be like a marriage of galaxies, my strange dreams their fascination, your waves generating laughter and sublimation. From this, at last, they will understand that we are our own messiahs. Because you are my alpha, their paradise. I am our omega, your possession.