Alti
jd november, altijd regen,
Alti
jd dit lege hart, altijd.
J.
C. Bloem
It isn’t possible to say an empty heart when
it is raining and it is November. It wasn’t
raining when you warmed your hands
on coffee from just around the corner
under descants of linden, plane leaves
rasping the street, but it was already November
slipping between my fingers. I watched you
walk along the street while I was drinking Tokai
in the corner of the Hungarian restaurant,
sipping its gold as easily as lies like this one
slipping from my fingers because it is raining
and it is November, although each word
is a betrayal stalked by autumn. A man
shovelled leaves into wind. I saw you
walking from the stadium and rhetoric
sang easy in my ears like rain, as if I could
spring an escape from time dragging
afternoon light through the streets.
It was not raining that day although it was
November. I listened to the music and forgot
the war, forgot how cities split and lives double,
memory deaf to gold slipping over fingers,
hearing only the music singing always November,
always rain, always this empty heart, always.
But it was not raining although it was November
and if this sounds like an ending it isn’t mine;
gold glass of the Palast der Republik
rings its own destruction, rings itself empty
of marriages and governments, saying nothing
beyond the sound of lime leaves scattered
in the streets. And although I’m in another country
(where it is raining and it is still November)
collaboration comes too easily; I slip
into your words and they change me
with the empty ring of rain, rain, rain, rain, heart.
