Poem - Poem Polishing

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polishing a poem never ends
you read it for the 100th time
and find a height or a hollow, 
or a lump or a rough place
as you run your mind over it.
but worst of all, 
you find a jagged word,
a word that does not belong,
does not fit anymore, did it ever? *
the poem alone can cut, 
bleed, insult, vomit, 
but the word that is jagged
is a living nightmare.
you think of it having your dinner
driving along the road
making love to somebody.
there is no escape,
except to edit.
be thankful… 
not to be published..





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*=
...and so the down into that spiral of how did this word insinuate itself into the poem / or how did I miss it and all the other human frailties that seem to emerge when a mistake creeps up on you and you are there down at the end of an alley with a bad word and nowhere to run.. except to face it - deal with it... this may sound melodramatic and so it is... above all other things a poet's life is melodramatic.. one single little tiny word of a few letters can ruin your weekend...



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At the Bottom of the Night..suicide beckons

Every life lost in the modernisation of China is so sad, so needless, so futile - one such life lost is that of the young poet;-  Xu Lizhi (1990-2014). 

I would like to extend my sincere condolences to his family and friends and also to thank the friends of the Nao project for the translations of poems by Xu Lizhi (许立志)

Here below his death poem together with commentary, background and links to the full article and more of his work.


“On My Deathbed”

I want to take another look at the ocean, 
behold the vastness of tears from half a lifetime
I want to climb another mountain, 
try to call back the soul that I’ve lost
I want to touch the sky, 
feel that blueness so light
But I can’t do any of this, 
so I'm leaving this world
Everyone who’s heard of me
Shouldn't be surprised at my leaving
Even less should you sigh or grieve
I was fine when I came...
and fine when I left.

-- Xu Lizhi, 30 September 2014


我弥留之际

我想再看一眼大海，
目睹我半生的泪水有多汪洋
我想再爬一爬高高的山头，
试着把丢失的灵魂喊回来
我还想摸一摸天空，
碰一碰那抹轻轻的蓝
可是这些我都办不到了，
我就要离开这个世界了
所有听说过我的人们啊
不必为我的离开感到惊讶
更不必叹息，
或者悲伤
我来时很好
去时，也很好

-- Xu Lizhi, 30 September 2014

Commentary 

For those 'employed / indentured slaves', in emerging economies there may seem to be little alternative. Is a return to the poverty / humility / simplicity of a rural backwater so bad?

Tens of thousands of the young in China are sold the illusion of a better future, glamour enhanced by photoshop in magazines, actors in roles all painted up on television and in film... much of it fantasy, lies and illusion.. sleight of mind. 

Aided and abetted by their American counterparts the Chinese company executives consuming all in their path. The wealthy international corporations engaging in abject dishonesty, studiously avoiding the images and news of the deaths of workers - workers who are treated like dogs at the end of an ornate supply chain.

The reality is that the capitalist system is built on dishonesty, greed and ever increasing consumption, for the majority of workers it is impossible to defeat the system;-

• you will be paid a fraction of what is ever fair
• you will work extra hours without pay
• you will be removed / abused if you complain
• increasing taxation will dilute your earnings
• you can easily waste the best years of your life

This is not unique to emerging economies, all over the world people give their lives in an attempt to gain more money to gain more things.. to gain more money to gain more things.

We do not need more consumers consuming and perpetuating the nightmare of immoral rampant consumption; we need more artists and philosophers and writers and poets...  happy to live simply without consumerist trappings. Only then will we get a reset of a system being destroyed by its own greed.

Des Donnelly.. aka Drax

Background

Xu Lizhi (许立志) was a Foxconn worker who committed suicide on 30 September 2014, at the age of 24, in Shenzhen, China. The full article also includes an obituary and explanatory notes.

Please read the full article on Libcom.org entitled ;-

 The poetry and brief life of a Foxconn worker: Xu Lizhi (1990-2014)


Xu's departing poem 
by Li Fei and Zhang Xiaoqi
10 October, 2014

《我弥留之际》
“On My Deathbed”

我想再看一眼大海，目睹我半生的泪水有多汪洋
I want to take another look at the ocean, behold the vastness of tears from half a lifetime
我想再爬一爬高高的山头，试着把丢失的灵魂喊回来
I want to climb another mountain, try to call back the soul that I’ve lost
我还想摸一摸天空，碰一碰那抹轻轻的蓝
I want to touch the sky, feel that blueness so light
可是这些我都办不到了，我就要离开这个世界了
But I can’t do any of this, so I’m leaving this world
所有听说过我的人们啊
Everyone who’s heard of me
不必为我的离开感到惊讶
Shouldn’t be surprised at my leaving
更不必叹息，或者悲伤
Even less should you sigh or grieve
我来时很好，去时，也很好
I was fine when I came, and fine when I left.

-- Xu Lizhi, 30 September 2014

Shy, quiet, introverted, solitary

In 2010, Xu Lizhi went [from his home in rural Jieyang, Guangdong] to work at [a] Foxconn [electronics factory in Shenzhen], beginning life on the assembly line. From 2012 until February of this year [2014], over 30 of his writings were published in Foxconn’s internal newspaper Foxconn People (富士康人), including poems, essays, film reviews, and news commentaries {…} Xu posted the titles of these writings on his blog in a post called “The Maturation Given to Me by a Newspaper,” indicating his gratitude for this platform for his literary aspirations. The first time his friend Zheng (pseudonym) read Xu’s poetry, he was astonished to discover that this young man could be so talented. Henceforth, Zheng always looked for Xu’s writings in the newspaper.
Zheng’s impression was that Xu was a shy boy, “of few words, but not silent.” “Xu asserted his convictions, but he seemed quite solitary – very much the air of a poet.” When Zheng heard of Xu’s suicide, his entire [week-long] break for [China’s] National Day was shrouded in grief. He could not go outside for days.

Turning feelings into poems; fearing they'd be read by family

Most of Xu’s early poems were descriptions of life on the assembly line. In “Workshop, My Youth Was Stranded Here,” he described his conditions at the time: “Beside the assembly line, tens of thousands of workers [dagongzhe]1 line up like words on a page/ 'Faster, hurry up!'/ Standing among them, I hear the supervisor bark.” He felt that “Once you’ve entered the workshop/ The only choice is submission,” and that his youth was coldly slipping away, so he could only “Watch it being ground away day and night/ Pressed, polished, molded/ Into a few measly bills, so-called wages.”

At first Xu Lizhi found it difficult to adapt to the constant switching between dayshifts and nightshifts. In another poem, he described himself by the assembly line “standing straight like iron, hands like flight,” “How many days, how many nights/ Did I – just like that – standing, fall asleep?” He described his working life as exhausting, “Flowing through my veins, finally reaching the tip of my pen/ Taking root in the paper/ These words can be read only by the hearts of migrant workers."

Xu once said that he never showed his poetry to his parents or other relatives, "because it's something painful; I don't want them to see that."


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Poem - the electrocuted sheep

the electrocuted sheep a by-product of an iterative process,

itself leading to a successful dream.

The stereotypical android not really concerned with public opinion

and most admirably - not pretending,

unlike many of the political 'dead'.

The universal term zombie having to be withdrawn,

due to an ideological complaint, from the zombie union.

This did not come as a surprise,

voting turnout correlation analysis in the Freestate

consigning the political party zombies to the over qualified scrapheap.

The union involvement only at the 3rd floor of their long fall,

i.e. on the way down, for the optimists or slow learners.

Since we have covered dead politicians, zombies, optimists and slow learners,

there's no one left, except the clergy or those with varying levels of religious stupidity.

As we approach our own migration to silicon, in the near term,

any discourse on an imaginary god  and/or  her groupies is time wasted.

..after Philip K. Dick . Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

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Salute to Che Guevara

Che Guevara

Once again... October 9 2014 marks 47 years since the fall in combat of Ernesto Che Guevara, freedom fighter and legendary guerilla born: June 14, 1928, Rosario, Argentina.

His father Ernest Guevara Lynch said "The first thing to note is that in my son's veins flowed the blood of the Irish rebels", he said in a 1969 interview. He went on: "Che inherited some of the features of our restless ancestors. There was something in his nature which drew him to distant wandering, dangerous adventures and new ideas".



As an Irishman I must again reiterate my immense pride in the fact that Che Guevara has family connections with Ireland.

a toast to Che... y hasta siempre

Poem - Decanter Fish

I was sitting having a small glass of wine
when I saw a fish 
swimming in the fairy liquid decanter
I thought this was bizarre
even by my standards
I jumped up
and ran out to the scullery
for the fishing rod...
I thought to cover the decanter
give the fish a sporting chance
this time I opted for a worm
since fly fishing in the house can be very disruptive

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by Des Donnelly   ..written 23.Apr.2014
a few readers have asked me to publish something / anything not politics.. :-)  so this is like an interlude...

Poem - The Language of Profanity

the language of profanity, down at the pub

this tends to be more Irish, depending on your perspective

taking English and bending it around concepts

or the other way around depending on the humour

life punctuated with expletives

but there’s a breed of hoity toity fuckers

that turn their noses up at everything

sitting in their comfortable Dublin whatever?

never coming any further north than Balbriggan

and even then only for funerals and weddings

profanity something they read about in rude plays or novels

literature that was often banned

when the PP’s had the upper hand

they’d be cosy with those tramps

even though their day is done

their brand of fascist conservatism remains..

in denial

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by Des Donnelly   ..written 13.Sept.2014

William Wall Essay - Riding Against The Lizard – On The Need For Anger Now

An Essay By William Wall

  (© William Wall 2009)

  

“Anger is the political sentiment par excellence. It brings out the qualities of the inadmissible, the intolerable. It is a refusal and a resistance that with one step goes beyond all that can be accomplished reasonably in order to open possible paths for a new negotiation of the reasonable but also paths of an uncompromising vigilance.

Poems - Big Yellow Statue

whatever amount of Irish

is in Obama

it’s not enough

he’s a gutless coward

afraid to fight for anything

not even his own promises

but he’s brave enough to be slabbering

about Ireland and taxation

yet essentially silent and complicit

on the murdering of children in Gaza and Palestine

don’t even start on Guantánamo’s broken pledges

the disappointing Obama

led about by the nose of war

out robbing the world of life

all that’s missing the ring

I can see a big yellow statue to him

somewhere in Ireland
in a few years time

we’ll probably put a ring in his nose

just for clarity..

in posterity

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by Des Donnelly  ..written 11.Sept.2014

Poem - The Tibetan Republican Army

I’m a great fan of the Dali Lama
but he’s probably not a Tibetan Rá man himself
happy reading   Matthieu Ricard’s   happy book
it’s hard for Irish to embrace Buddhism
how the hell would we get any progress
if we don't fight for it.. 
this might not be great for our karma
but sure we'll straighten it up at the next reincarnation 

be lovely to do it the other way

but go out and look for the Tibetan Republican Army
there’s no word of them
not that that got us anywhere, the last time..
but perhaps in a perverse way it did
it turned the most of a country from violence
to sitting down to talk
for half a generation
to trying to sort it out
at least for a generation or so
people doing it for themselves
activism and realism in action
the independents capturing votes
getting rid of the old rhetoric
no tolerance for demagogues anymore
or the blind leading the visionary 
the antique parties tired and old
their day has come.. 
and gone



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by Des Donnelly  ..written 5.Sept.2014

Poem - Not Kosher

extremist, terrorist,
interesting words
for an interesting phenomenon
the old freedom fighter and guerrilla gone
ISIS a creation of some sort by somebody
the truth of anything becoming more elusive
but definitely a smell to ISIS
paradoxically the whole thing is not kosher




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by Des Donnelly   ..written 2.Sept.2014