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Tag: imagery

A free gym pass (1/2)

Published by Ondrej on November 22, 2021

It’s been many months since
—you could say “an elapsed ellipsis”—
I have felt like this towards
towards a most resplendent lady

And this time—despite having
caught the monarch butterfly migration in my stomach
I don’t feel paralysed
Excited, scared—good scared—maybe
But not petrified, worried or anxious
okay, maybe yes anxious

But she’s beautiful, she’s many things,
she is her—and that’s true beauty.
Check in with me next week. I hope to have an answer.

Worst case, it’s good to keep your heart pace up:
like at the gym but kostnadsfri!

Reflection

Published by Ondrej on October 23, 2021

With the aural experience of eighties synths
And flying through straits not so dire
That men have no emotion, among other myths
For this reflection upon the present quagmire

For a brief interlude this new land, this new home is left behind
My own feelings depart as a surprise
It turns out, this country, my friends, you mind
Are precious to me beyond any prize

A lady, my sister, my home, my work, a Strait away
This lady, a guiding light, a beacon in times sombre
My friend, a best friend, a sister as bright as day
My work—bleak, grey, compared to my friends’ hearts’ joyful colour.

Strange collection of proud blue and yellow,
I adopt progressively it with great content
The mellifluous language sounds so mellow
Before the dialect’s true internal advent

This meandering sequence of rhyme
Does little justice to those dear to me
Or the country whose habits I mime
It’s hard to talk about, to even see
When you hugged each other thrice
And three cinnamon rolls apiece
So I rolled the fateful dice
Until I return from the seas.

Fifty-six

Published by Ondrej on October 16, 2021

At the ripe age of fifty-five
I went to a club for the first time
was this a head-on dive
into the youths’ pantomime?

With glitter everywhere, my twenties just begun
thank God there are other things to do—it wouldn’t be much fun.

The sweaty Swedish schlager songs
made me spill my drink into girls’ hair
what’s the point of apologising for my wrongs
if neither will remember we were there?

So much needless alcohol
or maybe just bad music
might’ve as well slipped on huile de tournesol
I shouldn’t just confuse it

At the aged age of fifty-six
I now conclude the clubbing
along with the chilled drinks
left behind in the drain, pouring.

Evening travels

Published by Ondrej on September 23, 2021

You sit here as the wind groans
listening to grand foreign overtures
you silence the moment the heart moans
for the bottomless taste of foreign statures.

Always imagining where else you could be
as the windowpanes creak aloud
seeing, feeling the rush of the mountain, the flow of the sea,
your thoughts pile on the redundant historic mound.

Here you are, having invested in irregular attire
A shame the peak of it all’s a vest
with your vested interests minding a quagmire
and your mind’s vestibule aflow with alpine zest.

Your thoughts are the only geographical constant
as the seas and oceans they fade into the night
as tonight’s ceaseless winds rampant
wishing, being, hoping to wish to be out of sight.

A bus from Malmö

Published by Ondrej on September 6, 2021

I was just reading a paper
about the American labour market
when my dear friend calls about a caper
so he comes home to describe it:

This altercation led to a police call
and everything turned out alright
all it was a verbal brawl
on a bus from Malmö at night.

My dear friend was a bit shaken
beads of sweat were on his head;
the troublemaker was away taken
among the Swedish locals not a word said.

This rowdy man played his music loud
so my friend asked to lower the din
this man was far too drunk, too proud
to even consider this being a sin.

Thankfully push didn’t come to shove
although the police did drag him away
what this situation does prove,
is that it helps to keep loud music at bay
or else the taxpayer must policemen’s salaries pay.

Temporarily found (2/3)

Published by Ondrej on August 22, 2021

For months have I wondered
(the inner world)
looking this way and that,
into every fleeting, passing thing
into brief glances, briefer smiles
looking but not seeing
not feeling, not understanding
just passing.

Worrying about each and every one of those moments
and yet—there was an instant
not a dozen hours prior
in which, for the first time in weeks, even years
the emotions weren’t fleeting
nor were they leaving, nor are they now.

The harmony of all your features
not perfect, but just right
just as they should be—
that’s what made you so special.

For the first time in many a day
hope was kindled where hope was hidden
(not gone, but in hiding)
it came back, first trepidatious, then bounding!
…only to find your departure imminent…

I joked to myself that “I would move Heaven and Earth for her” only happens in poor soppy tragicomedies
For the first time (feels like maybe ever), that sentence, that thought occurred to me.

A fleetingly permanent emotion, perhaps,
true all the same.

A Norwegian Girl (1/3)

Published by Ondrej on August 22, 2021

I long struggled to find words to describe
the sheer bliss of gazing up into her eyes
no colour in the world is so crystal
not even brightly polished amber by the most skilful artisans
a blue so bright, so humble, so piercing
the crisp winter sky pales in comparison
this sky, such a radiant blue on a January day
with her, it is a bleached grey
such was her beauty
such was her poise.

A summer’s dawn

Published by Ondrej on August 10, 2021 
Lying in bed with that mosquito scratch
If summers are anything to go by 
it wouldn't perform a miraculous stretch
on anyone’s mind that she said goodbye

Others’ summers can be filled with intimacy
feeling one another’s humid, stale breath
my ones, hah, are filled with plenty of numeracy
and a typical lover’s shibboleth

The bite on my foot still itches wildly,
and that’s summer I suppose
to put my feelings on paper, mildly, 
there’s a solution my soul will endlessly propose

And that ticked-off list, that key
is something repulsively elusive
That key I’ve failed to look for and to see
Like the idea of you, terribly seductive.

I suppose the endless global ailment
Will cease at some point
So I can seek what my dreams meant
and look for her, my heart’s anoint

Till then, it’s more accounting for numbers
And looking for where they’ve gone
and striving for restful slumbers
this summer’s dawn.

Beside the sea

Published by Ondrej on August 3, 2021

I’m sitting here beside the sea
along the sea
with the sea
by the sea

The sea and its endless flatness stretches out before me
as far as the eye can see
and I wonder how beautiful our planet can be
sitting here beside the sea.

It looks like the seagulls see it too
flying in rows of two by two
as they craw, shriek and coo
soaring above the endless view

I wonder, if only they knew
that it goes on for many kilometres too
an endless earthly rue
this sea, this ocean blue

Bruxelles 2

Published by Ondrej on June 25, 2021

Striding, bounding past June’s leafy trees,
bouncing up the gravel path
the weather with me agrees:
a fitting semester’s aftermath.

But it’s not me bounding nor bouncing up the road
it’s my heart that does
this, the first day does bode
well for the rest of my voyage—fills me with a buzz!

Such euphoria I’ve alas almost forgotten
but coming back brings it back.
Like the softness of tumble-dried cotton
this trip’s soundtrack.