"The Lair" (New Poems by D. L. Siluk)

In Another Time (Donkeylalnd, 1986)

2009-02-27T13:17:00.001-08:00

It wasn’t any serious conversation they were having, nothing much at all, mostly about not seeing each other after a long time; she invited him to sit down by her in the Monetary Bar, off the corners of Sycamore Street and Acker, by the Jackson Street Bridge, the railroad underneath it, he sat on a stool, hadn’t seen Jennifer St. Clair, for fifteen-years she being thirty-one years old now, he about thirty-eight. It was a wet spring, and the cool early evening wind came through the barroom doors, it was warm in the bar, sitting down rubbing his hands together, there was kind of a odd feeling inside of him. He looked round noticed they—the old neighborhood gang, the Donkeyland gang as the police called them, were all there, the same ones he left in 1968, when he went to San Francisco, and then onto the Vietnam War, to college, and traveled around the world some, did some writing, and worked as a psychologist for the Federal Government.
They looked different, had different expressions across their faces; older, much older now, old before their time. He felt as if he had entered the gate to the lions den. There were unusual looks from the several old gang members over in the opposite corner, across from him in the bar, trying to figure whom he was he presupposed. Someone leaned over the bar, one of the gang members to see who he was; it was Jennifer’s husband, John,
“Haw Chick, is that you?” He said.
“Yes! It’s me…! ” Said Chick.
“Good,” he said. “Come on over here with us guys have a drink!”

There were others Chick Evens knew around the bar, but they were too drunk to notice him. Someone was hammering on the bar for another drink, an old friend he noticed; then he noticed another old friend, who hadn’t noticed him yet, was bragging how he was a Black Belt in karate, standing up leaning against the wall, talking looking over at Chick, and then at John who was a few feet from him, he waved at Chick, with a smug countenance. Then Chick Evens ordered a coke.
“You’re fortunate Chick, to have gotten out of this drunken neighborhood when you did,” said Jennifer, “I heard you quite drinking, I guess seeing is believing, I’m really happy for you.” She then winked at him, adding to her monologue a question, “all right, what’s up, what brought you back to this corner bar?”
“You mean, why I am here if I don’t drink anymore?” said Chick.
“Everyone around here still gets heavy drunk, not going anyplace in particular, except up here to these two corner bars, you’re one of the few who got out, and if you stick around here you’ll be like us again, drunks, busybodies, and gossipers—you know what I mean.”
“Yes, I suppose I do, things haven’t changed much have they?” he said.
“It not very interesting here, not at all interesting,” Jennifer said, waving her hand at her husband.
“They’ll want you to go over there in a few minutes and drink with them, you know how they get,” she said, then hesitated, adding, “please Chick get out of here while you can. People hate those others who used to walk with them, and now have passed them.”
Chick looked over at the guys, he waved at the several, saw they all seemed to have rebuilt faces, old before their time, he knew they all had heard he had traveled some, and so forth, whereas they all had done the same—still the same—their background being here, up at this corner bar, and the one across the street, he had been a reminder I suppose to them, life had been long and pale as it was. Chick still wanted to greet them, but it looked close to what Jennifer had said, ‘…people hate those who pass them…who at one time walked with them,’ so he hesitated to make a move.

He noticed her hands were still slim and brown and lovely, she was of the Chippewa race of Indians, like Johnny her husband.
“I will, I swear I will go after I finish my coke!” said Chick pleasantly.
She glanced at him, and put out her hand, and he held it lightly, then let go quickly (as she picked up her glass of beer and drank it half down),
“I always liked you Chick” she said, adding “you were always different. I’m sorry Chick, but nothing has changed here since you’ve been gone, although it’s nice you haven’t forgotten us.”
“I understand.” He said.
“Yaw, that’s the trouble, you do understand,” she said with a sigh, and finishing off the other part of the glass of beer, then yelled at the barman to bring her another glass of beer.

(It did bring back some old memories to Chick Evens, as he sat there drinking down the last sip of his coke; it was a hell of a thing all right—he told himself, to get drunk daily, chase the women drunk, or half drunk, nightly, then pass out, wake up, feel as if you were hit by a hurricane, and start the cycle all over again, each twenty-four hours.)

They hadn’t said a word for a few minutes now, chick had zoned out of the present, and she noticed that.
Johnny had yelled again for Chick to have a beer with the guys again, and so did Mr. Karate Man, and Big Ace, and a few of the others, of the one time Cayuga Street now past middle age.
Said Jennifer back to them,
“What do you want with him, we’re talking yet?”
“Have him come and have a drink with us,” said a voice from the group.
“No,” she said, “Were talking about old times, I just told you that.”
“All right,” said the unnamed voice.
“You better go now,” said Jennifer.
He looked at her, the shape of her face, there was still youth in her eyes, she had three children now, so she had said, her cheek bones curved outward, in another five years, she’d be unable to find her beauty, he knew that, funny she still had some he thought. She had a thick head of dark hair, and a nice forehead he thought.
“Oh, you’re too sweet,” he said.
“And when you come back, you can tell me of all about the travels you’ve done since then.”
Her voice sounded a little stranger than it had a moment ago, not completely, recognizable, yet settled in the fact it was as it had to be. Maybe as he would have liked it to have been for her.
“Yes,” he said ominously, “if the good Lord’s a-willing.” Adding, “you’re right, I’m a different man, and these are different times I’m even a stranger to myself here.”
He looked at the door, at her, he saw that she was a tinge uncomfortable with him now, the forth glass of beer in front of her, half gone, him, still sober as a sparrow, and he was to her likewise, a different looking man. The group down at the corner of the bar moved a little ways closer to them, as if working their way down to them. Then looking into her beer glass, it was like a mirror, he saw his past it was all quite true, he was out of place here.
Next, he started to leave the bar, she said, as he passed her,
“You look very well—healthily Chick; you must be living a very good life.”
He never looked back, he knew if he had, he’d see the group, and then have to have that drink, and one was never enough, and it just wasn’t worth it.

Written in Lima, Peru 1-2-2009; previous name “Days Without Women” • (ds)

"Here today, gone tomorrow" (Poetic Prose)

2008-08-29T10:04:00.000-07:00

“Here today, gone tomorrow”
(Poetic prose, on real life)

“Here today, gone tomorrow,” my mother used to say, in her simple natural way—and in-between, few of us are remembered. Movie stars, I think they think they’ll be remembered until kingdom comes, like presidents of nations, and generals of armies, so many alike, but they are akin to old books badly written, put on shelves, like old songs, long forgotten, not much else. I think my mother took a pick—between this and that, said “…what do I really want, wish,” and she chose life to live, and simple things, a little money, and her two children, her brother and sisters, and a few friends, and that was it, it was enough; at the end, at eighty-three, she said to me, “I never expected to live this long.”
It was all for Jesus now, she done her best, with what she had, it appeared to me, at the time, He, Jesus gave her a moment to prepare, recall, and then, then she said, “I’m ready,” and she left.
I think earth bored her some, perhaps me and my brother too, we were all caught up with our own lives, adventures, troubles and things to do. And so she left, just like that, as simple as she came, like she meant, and let me paraphrase: here one day, and gone the next—; so simple and fast it all seems now, as if it was planned: I think we’re all just a little less than a vapor fading in the wind: and the best we can say, at the end is: we came, we saw and then left.

#2473 8-29-2008 (on the roof top, in Lima, Peru)

The Sweeper (a poem on war in Somali, with commentary)

2008-08-23T17:01:00.000-07:00

The Sweeper
(A poem, on war in Somali)

I’m Tired of man’s wars
Tired of this world’s Leaders
I stand facing blood crushed limbs
Of those I once knew as friends,
In Somali’s dark city
Where the Butchers Plague
Has come, to stay, and I must die.

Here, I became part of the dead:
I harbor no delusions.

I once listen to the sounds of fish,
Even of jumping frogs, in ponds.
I could fall to sleep at secluded waterfalls
In Venezuela’s, Gran Sabena,
Listen to its shroud’ like veils
Of pouring water…!

It’s what I gave up, sadly gave up,
And weep as I write this poem
Torn from my shell, I am one of those limbs
The sweeper is sweeping up right now,
Off the streets of a Somali port city,
If only I could have,
Seen another autumn also…!

#2472 8-23-2008

Note: There has been a three day battle, or war, part of an ongoing war, a period in Somali, where people have been dying like flies, and it will soon be tucked away, in the writings of time, perhaps brought to surface now and then down the road of life, but for the most part forgotten. Eighty-nine-people died, and over two hundred wounded: mostly civilians, body parts stinking up the city’s streets. When you are in war is one thing, one shoots out of a plane, or from a distance he sends rockets your way, or the armor comes in, and shoots it shells. Lives are taken in the name of war, and progress, and all such silly things. And the insurgents, be it Ethiopian or Islamic, or Somalia’s citizens in its capital, nobody, nowadays, sees the dying much anymore, until they are dead. Facing death, the death you bring on in war, puts the warrior in a deep freeze, you don’t see, hear what you are killing, you just kill the enemy, whomever they are, and for whatever they’ve don. From the looks of things the Somali city Kismayo is an open air, graveyard, where limbs and body parts are likened to an unkempt butcher’s shop, or market place.
I say to myself, and I have been in war, “I don’t want to die in some bloody city, in somebody’s backyard, because someone, somewhere shot a anti-aircraft gun, and shot my legs off, then my arms, and he doesn’t know me, nor I him, and he will sleep well tonight because the shock part of seeing the dead you killed is nullified. Now comes the bullet to my head because someone a mile away decided to press some buttons. Or someone fifty-miles away wants to have a personal, not with the people he will kill in the city, he will simply just kill them for fun, if they get in the war, but war to rule over people who they want to control.”
Control is power, and nowadays, the new philosophy, or so it seems to be, is not so much to be rich, than to be in control of those around you. And should a ruler not be, then he will kill and destroy everything, something the USA does not understand, that being, the rulers of today, do not care if you starve their control, as long as they control, because they will eat anyways, and blame the rest of the word for their countries woes. If they can’t control it, they will destroy it. Again I say, it is a different kind of a bird that rules nowadays, more on the peacock order.

A Simple Man (A Poem(

2007-10-09T09:46:00.001-07:00

A Simple Man

I’m sure I can’t remember where, but some
Where in my simple life I found the key
That unlocked the door of the jungle around me.
Back then, the Lord and I, walked side by side,

Up and down that old path, a dirt alleyway!
I would sing, and hum, in the snow and rain
That circled over my head, on the way to school;
But then He disappear; growing up was done.

I was a simple boy; those walks were all I knew
No dog, no father, just mom, Mike and grandpa;
A hamster that looked at me, a turtle and poems
(I started writing them at twelve-years old).

Today I’m sixty-years old, can’t sleep all that well
Yesterday I tried to talk to the Lord again, just
Like I did way back when; my voice, words
A bit rumbled? But then, I’m now a simple man.

Commentary on the Simple Man: No: 2012, October 7, 2007. I’ve learned in life, God takes the simple things and stupid as they may be at times, and he loves them. He hears them weep as children, and swear as adults, and somewhere in-between, He gives them keys to open certain doors (if they are willing; He even embarrasses the smart and strong and arrogant with the simple), and yes, he keeps coming around, to see if the simple spider stooping has floundered into the empty air, and become a lovely, butterfly. When we are young, simple and innocent, it is different than when we are adults, simple and likened to a dragon. But I’ve learned being simple can be appealing to the Lord, you know he made us as we are. It is best we do not forget who we are, perhaps tuck it away now and then, if it is too much to swallow, but learn to live with it. Some folks laugh the simple-ness of other folks, it is not wise to do so, lest the Lord remind you, who you really are (and bring you back down off your high horse). I have learned if you love God, and trust Him, and the odds are against you, He can even them up, if you take the opportunities He throws your way, and wait, prepare. Once I waited for ten years, but it was worth waiting for, I had to prepare, be available, willing and usable.

Two Poems on Life (By D.L. Siluk)

2007-10-03T15:00:00.001-07:00

Two Poems on Life

Surprised by Morning

There is an unknown dilemma that is by us…;
day has come, and evening has arrived on time.
As for the evening, shades of darkness fell,
so I noticed looking through the glass windows.

I sat quietly back in my white plastic chair
on the Platform, and wrote this poem,
thinking and looking:
“How did it all come about?”
“How will morning be?”

At last I found myself in bed,
the waters of my mind, rose and fell;
then I wakeup, surprised, somewhat,
morning had arrived (it was here).

Note: No: 2008, October 2, 2007, written on the Platform, in Huancayo, Peru, 2.55 PM

“Upon His Death”
(An Elegy, before Death)

Now close his eyes—please, for all his breath has gone.
For, they will not open up here, on Earth again!

For years, life has fed upon his ivory bones
That with his breath gave in (to death) all at once.

Deep inside our minds, we decay, suffer on…!
Until our minds, bodies and souls say: it’s enough.

Now let him be, and his body let us bless
That came to earth, at birth, and goes to heaven to rest.

Short Commentary: Death comes sometimes slowly, or so it seems— (or can be) for us folks watching this happen to our loved ones; perhaps it is harder on us doing the watching, than those doing the dying (?)
We often try to get the last photographs, our facts in order; tell and listen to the last jokes, stories and simple conversations we will forever share, and preserve them deep into our memories. Yes, all these gathered images we truly loved of that individual—and we wait; and until we die like them we simply endure. It’s all called life!... No: 2004 (9-28-2007)

DEATH PASSED ME ONCE (Poetry by dlsiluk)

2007-09-15T11:57:00.000-07:00

Index

New Poems on Death (8-2007)
Death Returns
Death: Roots of the Earth
The Honored Ones
Dialogue with the Devil
Selected for Death
Death Passed Me Once
The Rocks (with notes)

New Poems on Death

Death Returns

Death returns: it found no resting place;
I saw it in flight, last night over the Sierras;
beneath the last sparks of twilight—!
The condor’s wings covered death’s decent;
and glides now through the air in peace!
Yet death’s tail-shadow leaves at dawn, to
return at dusk, blue-bellied full—as
if it has swallowed a whale (once again).
The condor, the condor, likened to a fly in a web
death finds no rest, only new flesh, new flesh!

No: 1949 8-27-2007

Death:
The Roots of the Earth

Death has a way of saying Hello, when it means Goodbye! We human beings on earth’s surface never really disappear—only transform.

From the moment of death the body will change, you can’t
hear it, it simply gets foggy—becoming the roots of the earth.

No: 1950 8-27-2007

The Honored Ones

How mysterious to be born a human being
—and then to die as one!
To be able to wash off those old fleshy garments
of bark and milky-clay…!
We are the honored ones—(you know)
given to a whole world system—:
one hand reaching to heaven the other to hell.
Those who have not been born yet:
man and beast are not so far apart
(and the second, very hard to please).

No: 1951 8-27-2007

Dialogue with the Devil

“I’ll make a pack with you,” said He to me (the Devil),
“I have detested you long enough. I first saw you as
a child—then when you were old enough to make friends
I saw you again…. It was you who worshiped my kinds
of sins—then you broke away, but now is the time to start
carving new adventures. I have left one sap and root for
you—let there be commerce between us?”

I said back to Him, “Dark eyed, ivory scandaled thief, there
is none like thee, among heaven, earth or hell; none with
such swift feet, or tongue—eyes or hears, none like thee,
dark as midnight are your sins, —face of a death’s seabed.”

No: 1954, 8-28-2007

Selected for Death

“No, no! Go from me—!” I left death lately in her sheath
—oh! Dim it was, for she surrounded me.
Thin, are her arms, yet such a grip—they bound me,
immoveable, and left me…cloaked, as in a web,
a cocoon—subtle and swift she was, like magic, in her
binding.
“No, no! I cried, “go from me, I have still your taste—
your scent, your soot, your aye—halt!”
(But she wouldn’t listen.)

No: 1952 8-28-2007

Death Passed Me Once
(1993)

This man knew the secrets of death
(he cast them over my head).
No man could know such things, unless
he was part of it.
And now he’s gone, he up and left—
(just like that…).
I called out: “Are you near?” and he did
not answer back.
Then at the end of my bed I saw—why!
There stood in my hospital room, the
eyes and shoulders of a great being:
He did not speak, —he simple watched
over me.

No: 1953 8-28-2007

The Rocks
(Rapturous poetry)

Friend, please tell me what is wrong with me?
Or is it perhaps the world?
For I told myself, it could be either way!

I gave up drinking, smoking and gambling,
and I never swore, but then I started to.

So I prayed on that, and went after women
instead, and became compulsively attracted.

I went and got married to give up women
and just have one, and I started up swearing again.

I worked hard at trying to figure myself out,
pushing aside pride, greed, lust, envy and gout!

And every time I take my inventory, I find one
more issue, that had been hidden under a rock!

“Listen up Friend, there’s only been one
who has ever been able to kick over those rocks
and find nothing of value to talk about…!”

No: 1955 8-29-2007 In this poem I try to put what I call eccentric energy into its rebellious branches; a tinge of spirituality; the ego and the body play a role here, and how a man may try to prepare himself for death, trying to subdue his impulsive nature, be it sexual, or excessive energy in other so called, taboo areas: acted out and un-acted out desires. The rocks, or rock, are ones invitation to look under it, for there is where you will find your problem, the situation is always on top, and thus the problem has to be under the rock. This is an old Hindu style form of poetry.

The Hour of Death (Commentary; in English and Spanish) & Poems on Death

2007-08-31T11:47:00.000-07:00

The Hour of Death
(Poems and Commentaries on Death)

By
Dennis L. Siluk, Dr.h.c.

Illustrated by the Author (in English and Spanish)

Awarded the Prize Excellence: The Poet & Writer of 2006 by Corporacion de Prensa Autonoma
(of the Mantaro Valley of Peru)

Awarded the National Prize of Peru, "Antena Regional": The best of 2006 for promoting culture

Poeta Laureado de la Ciudad de San Jerónimo de Tunán, Perú (2005)
(Awarded the (Gold) Grand Cross of the City (2006)

Also awarded a metal of merit, and diploma from the Journalist College of Peru, in August of 2007, for his international attainment

“The Hour of Death”
(Poems on death by: D.L. Siluk)
Copyright ©2008 by Dennis L. Siluk

Then I heard a voice from heaven say,
“Write: Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.”
“Yes…for their deeds will follow them.”

Revelation 14

Dedicated to My Little Wife:
Rosa Siluk

Index

Commentaries One and Two

One
Commentary on Death
((The Hour of Death)(in four parts: written: 8-2007))

Two

Watching Death
About Dying
Death by the Numbers

New Poems (8-2007):

Death Returns
Death: Roots of the Earth
The Mystery of Life
Dialogue with the Devil
Selected for Death
Death Passed Me Once
The Rocks (with notes)
-
Poems written 2003-2007

The First Depth
Satan’s Daises
The Iron Raven
The Marble Tomb
Winter of Death
To Death (with notes)
Old Mrs. Stanly (with notes)
Grandpa’s Cellar Ghosts
White Shadows
(Scented Death: in seven cantos: with notes)
Tanger’s Kasbah ((Casaba)([Black wind))

Poems to My Mother
(Dedicated to Elsie T. Siluk)

One Long Glimpse

Love and Butterflies

An Old Wood Pile
Commentary One of Two

Commentary on Death
(A Four Part Commentary)

Part One
The Hour of Death

Without warning, death comes to thousands of earthlings each day, every second of the day, for a variety of reasons. People die in natural disasters as well as in war, we see this in the media, the newspapers, television, radio, in all forms of reporting, it comes to us daily. Rich and poor alike must face this sooner or later. In the Army I saw people die, and now being older, many of my loved ones are dead, the older I get the more death I witness on the road of life; yes, around me death is cluttering.
I’ve had heart attacks, strokes: and other diseases, illnesses in life, been put on diets, and I am still living, but it is still a matter of time for me, I’ve been fortunate to have been able to reach the age of sixty-years old, and being here, or there, one must know the day and hour is not far off, thus, one must be prepared in advance, to face it, know it is but a few pages off in the book of life.
From the day we are born, we are facing—like it or not—a dying experience, in future time, be it a week, month or century. Some see death as the enemy, a twisted enemy that wants to shatter us like glass if only it could get a hold, a grip on us.
Death has no flashing red lights, no ominous dread—it rides a pale horse often, and has no distinction between pauper and elite. It has a one time experience (usually), where body and limb lay sprawled out someplace— and when found, is put beneath the ground: we often call these tragedies, but it is of course repeated throughout the world, everyday, and is as normal as drinking a glass of water.
Death has its form of grief for the living also, it can be crushing, and can cause dramatic changes in individuals, and families, especially if unprepared, yes indeed, and it can alter future plans. But we have only a few options when death approaches, to face it and deal with it, or pretend it does not exist, and deal with it in the afterworld, if indeed we can. If death suddenly strikes, there are of course no more phone calls to one’s loved ones, no more daily business meetings or crusades, or admiring the beautiful city, or the far off mountains. No more interviews by Time magazine. One will only discover he or she has arrived, seriously arrived, and consequently arrived, at perhaps a distasteful, painful, unpleasant platform. On the other hand, perhaps at heavens door one may arrive, where famine or epidemics are no more, no more fatal elements the world has to offer, no more causalities of war; no matter where we end up, death is permanent, but not lifeless, or so I believe, and in one-way or the other, we will carry on.
Thus, this book is about death, in poetic form, after you read it, you may want to confront it, dodge it, avoid it, or try to reason with death, but what must really be done I believe is, somewhere along the line you have to make friends with it, let go of it, and make peace with those around you and God, with the time you have left. Realistically, you have little choice, your sins will follow you, dwell within you. When you die, you take with you what is inside of you, how else could it be, it is inevitable, for death does not cleanse one from a conspiracy (or scheme to cheat afterwards), now that he or she is silent— and death has struck, you politely can not ignore it, the high command in Heaven and Hell will not allow it. Each one wants you—desperately, the question is: who gets you? The uncertainty is not in dying, that is well known, but rather in what order do you belong to? The battle never stops until after the fact.

Part Two
The Enemy

If truly to one, death is the enemy, death being the silent conspiracy of the pale horsemen, thus, one cannot afford to ignore him. This is your warning my friends, “…your deeds will follow you,” Revelation 14. Break the conspiracy, face it, for death never sleeps, it hides behind the condor’s dark wings, and all of a sudden it is in front of you. It is really an impossible theme to get away from. Did God plan death? “I don’t think so!” that is why we live on afterwards—it was not part of his original plan, it crept in. I am not really telling you anything new, it is not any boiling new news that you will die, but discussing death, or the aspects of dying, facing the facts we must face sooner or later anyhow is prudent, and needed, with or without fear, for it is simply healthy to do so I believe; another point being, it is not a riddle, it is simple: we need to get knowledge of it, like anything else. Call it a phantom, a ghost, that stalks you, whatever you wish, but please try to approach it objectively, and with some compassion, for God has shown you it: Paul in the bible says in so many words: it is ones last enemy; but he never did fear it, nor should we.
Death takes a person, snatches him like a hawk to rodent off the ground and drag him up to its den; yes, it robs one of its potential, or can; a friend of mine at the bank back in 1993, was taken at the age of 37-years old, a stroke in his car driving home from work. A young man in his late thirties recently, died of a disease, his children still in school. A friend, an electrician, was electrocuted a number of years ago working in a steel mill. I can go on and on, all taken from life experiences, but the point being, Death comes not as a stranger, but as a rival to God’s plan. Again I say, for Paul implied, the last enemy is death (1 Corinthians 15.25, 26).
Yes indeed, death can destroy life, it does, has and will, the very opposite of God’s original plan. But why then do we have death? The question can be extended psychologically to: why do people sin that was not part of God’s plan, and what is the penalty? Like Satan, and Adam, and mankind, we have scoffed at God’s warning, and the price for this is death of course. As we see in the bible, it reads, “For the wages of sin is death…” (Romans 6:23). Consequently, death has taken over the world, animals, plants and human beings. But Christ has delivered (saved) us, yet we must die. But if man would not have sinned, or Satan, or Adam and Eve, what then? I think we would have passed ‘go’ (or gone from earth to heaven) without death.

Part Three
Laughing at Death

Let’s not laugh at death, so many people do, for it will catch up with you one way or another. Some folks don’t believe in death, others think it will never come, some even think death is better than life. Some have a fatalistic concept of it, saying, “It’s not a big thing, what’s the problem, once you die, you die, you sleep forever—no more problems!”
So we see people can go from one extreme to another; psychologically paralyzing themselves with the fear of death. This is of course the fate of the person who has no faith. Or someone is trying to buy God’s favor. Fear of death is for the most part, common to man, to Christians as well as non Christians.
Mentally and psychologically, one can face death realistically, and make it a victory, by grabbing on to the love of God, through Christ; we see this in Romans 8.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to die tomorrow, but I would like to know about my forthcoming departure from this earth.
I am not writing this to be morbid, but because it is a subject avoided so often. And perhaps we can find in death some peace, a feat, maybe even a little wit.

Part Four
Recommendations

As a minister, or as a Counselor in psychology, here are my recommendations: if you have accepted your death, or transience (humanity as it is) thus, you should put your affairs in order, make a will, make peace with God, with your children (if possible); try not to make it hardship on the living; do not leave a mess of confusion. Some folks say: hell with it let them take care of it when I’m gone. It is a selfish way of looking at things, anger perhaps for dying. It is one thing to go on to heaven (assuming this is where you are going) and leaving a mess for your loved ones down on earth. Would it not be great to help those who need it still when you are gone, and you know as I do, they will need all they can to carry on: it will indeed mean a lot to them to have things in order. When my mother died, she left her will to be cremated; told me were here insurance papers were, paid the last perineum on them, gave us her account number to her bank, and phone numbers to her pensions. She even paid her last electric bill, and months rent (which she never got to use), so it would not be a hardship on the living. There was no sourness, no greed in her. I hope I can be as polite as she was upon death.
We need to make arrangements, for eventually death will grab us like a viper in the tall grass. Planning and prayer, if need be seek counsel from qualified advisors. My mother’s family fought over my grandfather’s estate, except for my mother who said: let them deal with it, I’ll take whatever. But my grandfather left a mess, and yes, there were hard feelings between the many sisters and brothers up to the day they died. Long before death, this could have been prevented.
Just like your wedding, plan your funeral, if you want a party, so state it, as if it was a birthday party, it is up to you. You will someday, stand before God and give an account.

It has been my privilege to write this commentary for you, for deep down in my heart, I know the reader loves God, otherwise he would not have reached these last words I am now writing. People can be complex, but the true believer knows death longer has a sting; it has been conquered by the resurrection of Jesus Christ: death as I have said previously is revolution to a new beginning.

Spanish Version

Comentario sobre la Muerte
(Un Comentario de Cuatro Partes)

Por Dennis L. Siluk

Parte Uno
La Hora de la Muerte

Sin aviso, la muerte llega a miles de terrícolas cada día, cada segundo del día, por una variedad de razones. La gente muere en desastres naturales, como también en la guerra, lo vemos esto en los medidos de comunicación, en los periódicos, televisión, radio, en todas las formas de reportaje, este viene a nosotros diariamente. Ricos y pobres de la misma forma tienen que enfrentarla tarde o temprano. Cuando estaba en el ejército vi gente morir, y ahora siendo viejo, muchos de mis seres queridos están muertos, cuanto más viejo me vuelvo de más muertes soy testigo en el camino de la vida; si, alrededor de mi la muerte esta abarrotando.
He tenido ataques al corazón, derrames cerebrales y otras enfermedades, enfermedades en la vida, he sido puesto a dieta, y aún estoy viviendo, pero todavía es una cuestión de tiempo en mi, he sido muy afortunado de llegar a la edad de sesenta años, y estar aquí, o allá; uno debe saber que el día y la hora no está muy lejos, así, hay que prepararse anticipadamente, para enfrentar a esta, saber que sólo está a unas páginas de diferencia en el libro de la vida.
Desde el día en que nacemos, nosotros estamos enfrentando—nos guste o no—una experiencia de muerte, en un tiempo futuro, sea esta en una semana, un mes o un siglo. Algunos ven a la muerte como a un enemigo, un enemigo inesperado que quiere hacernos añicos como cristal si sólo esta pudiera cogernos, agarrarnos.
La muerte no tiene luces rojas intermitentes, tampoco un pavor siniestro—esta cabalga un caballo pálido a veces, y no hace distinción entre pobres o privilegiados. Esta tiene una sola experiencia en la vida (normalmente), donde el cuerpo y las extremidades descansan estirados en algún lugar—y cuando es encontrado, es puesto debajo de la tierra: a veces los llamamos tragedias, pero este, por supuesto, es repetido a través del mundo, todos los días, y es tan normal como beber un vaso de agua.
La muerte tiene su forma de aflicción para los vivientes también, esta puede ser aplastante, y puede causar cambios dramáticos en las personas, y familias, especialmente si no están preparadas, si ciertamente, y esta puede alterar planes futuros. Pero nosotros sólo tenemos pocas opciones cuando la muerte se acerca: enfrentarla y hacernos cargo de ella, o pretender que esta no existe, y hacernos cargo de esta en el más allá, si de verdad podemos. Si la muerte sobreviene repentinamente, no habrá por supuesto más llamadas telefónicas al ser querido, no más reuniones de negocio diarias o luchas, y no más admiración de la bonita ciudad, o de las montañas lejanas y no más entrevistas con la revista Time. Uno sólo descubrirá que él o ella ha llegado, llegado seriamente, y consecuentemente llegó, talvez a una plataforma dolorosa y desagradable. Por otro lado, talvez uno llegue a las puertas del cielo, donde no hay más hambrunas ni epidemias, ni más elementos fatales que el mundo tiene para ofrecer, ni más casualidades de guerra; independientemente de dónde terminamos, la muerte es permanente, pero no sin vida, o eso es lo que creo, y de una forma u otra, nosotros seguiremos.
Así, este libro es sobre muerte, en forma poética, después que lo leas, tu talvez quieras enfrentarla, esconderte, o evitarla, o tratar de razonar con la muerte, pero lo que debe de hacerse creo, es de que en algún momento a lo largo de la vida tú tienes que hacerte amigo con ésta, y dejarla, y tener paz con todos alrededor de ti y con Dios, con el resto del tiempo que te queda. De manera realista, tú tienes muy pocas elecciones, tus pecados te seguirán, morarán contigo. Cuando mueres, te llevas contigo lo que tienes dentro, cómo más podría ser, es inevitable, porque la muerte no te va a limpiar para una conspiración (o confabulación para engañar después), ahora que él o ella están silenciosos—y la muerte ha sobrevenido, tú cortésmente no puedes ignorarla, el Comando Alto del Cielo e infierno no lo permitirá. Cada uno te quiere—desesperadamente, la pregunta es: ¿quién te obtendrá? La incertidumbre no está muriendo, esto se sabe bien, pero más bien ¿en qué orden tú perteneces? La batalla nunca se detiene hasta después del hecho.

Parte Dos
El Enemigo

Si es verdadero a uno, la muerte es el enemigo, muerte siendo la conspiración silenciosa del jinete pálido, así, no podemos permitirnos ignorarlo. Esta es tu advertencia mi amigo, “…tus acciones te seguirán”, Revelación Capítulo 14. Rompe la conspiración, enfréntala, porque la muerte nunca duerme, esta se esconde detrás de las alas oscuras del cóndor, y de repente está enfrente de ti. Es realmente un tema imposible de alejarnos. ¿Dios planeó la muerte? “Creo que no” es por eso que vivimos en el más allá—esta no era parte de su plan original, esta se escurrió dentro. Realmente no te estoy diciendo nada nuevo, no es una nueva hirviente noticia que tú vas a morir; en cambio, analizar la muerte, o los aspectos de morir, nos enfrenta a los hechos a los que nosotros tarde o temprano debemos enfrentar, de todas maneras es prudente y necesario, con o sin miedo, porque es simplemente saludable hacerlo, yo creo; otro punto es, de que no es una adivinanza, simplemente es: que necesitamos tener conocimiento de este, como cualquier otra cosa. Llámalo a esto una aparición, un fantasma, que te acecha, lo que desees, pero por favor trata de acercarte a este objetivamente, y con algo de compasión, porque Dios te lo ha mostrado: San Pablo dice en la Biblia con estas palabras: es nuestro último enemigo; pero él nunca lo temió, ni tampoco nosotros debemos.
La muerte se lleva una persona, la arrebata, como el águila lo hace con el roedor de la tierra, y lo arrastra arriba a su escondite; sí, nos roba de su potencial, o puede. Un amigo mío del banco allá en el año 1993, fue llevado a la edad de treinta y siete años, un derrame cerebral mientras el manejaba su carro de regreso a casa. Un hombre joven en sus últimos treintas recientemente murió de una enfermedad, sus hijos todavía en la escuela. Un amigo mío, un electricista, se electrocutó unos años atrás mientras trabajaba en un molino de acero. Puedo continuar y continuar, con casos tomados de las experiencias de la vida, pero el punto es, La Muerte viene no como un extraño, sino como una rival a los planes de Dios. De nuevo, digo, porque San Pablo implicó, el último enemigo es la muerte (1 Corintios 15. 25, 26).
Si, ciertamente, la muerte puede destruir la vida, ésta lo hace, lo ha venido haciendo y lo hará, muy opuesto a los planes originales de Dios. Pero, ¿por qué entonces tenemos a la muerte? La pregunta podría ser extendida psicológicamente a: ¿por qué la gente peca, que no fue parte del plan de Dios, y qué es la sanción? Como Satanás, Adán, y la humanidad, nosotros nos hemos mofado a la advertencia de Dios, y el precio por esto es la muerte por supuesto. Como vemos en la Biblia, esta dice: “porque el pago del pecado es la muerte…” (Romanos 6; 23). Consecuentemente, la muerte se ha apoderado del mundo, animales, plantas y seres humanos. Pero Cristo nos ha salvado de esta, pero todavía tenemos que morir. Pero si el hombre no hubiera pecado, o Satán, o Adán y Eva, ¿qué entonces? Creo que hubiéramos pasado “ido” (de la tierra al cielo sin morir).

Parte Tres
Riéndose de la Muerte

No nos riamos de la muerte, tanta gente lo hace, porque esta te alcanzará de una forma u otra. Algunas personas no creen en la muerte, otros piensan que esta nunca vendrá, algunos incluso piensan que la muerte es mejor que la vida. Algunos tienen un concepto derrotista, diciendo “¡No es una gran cosa, cuál es el problema, una vez que mueres, moriste, dormirás eternamente—no más problemas!”
Vemos que hay personas que pueden ir de un extremo al otro; paralizándose psicológicamente con el temor a la muerte. Esto es por supuesto el destino de la persona que no tiene fe. O de alguien tratando de comprar los favores de Dios. El temor a la muerte es por lo general, común al hombre, para cristianos así como a no Cristianos.
Mental y psicológicamente, podemos enfrentarnos a la muerte de modo realista, y hacer de esta una victoria, aferrándonos en el amor de Dios, a través de Cristo; lo vemos esto en Romanos 8.
No me interpretes mal. No quiero morir mañana, pero me gustaría saber sobre mi próxima partida de esta tierra.
No estoy escribiendo esto para ser morboso, sino porque este es un tema evitado muchas veces. Y talvez podamos encontrar en la muerte alguna paz, una hazaña, talvez incluso un poquito de ingenio.

Parte Cuatro
Recomendaciones

Como ministro, o como un consejero en psicología, aquí están mis recomendaciones: si tú aceptaste tu muerte, o tu humanidad (humanidad tal como es) así tú deberías poner tus cosas en orden, hacer un testamento, tener paz con Dios, con tus hijos (si es posible); trata de no crear una penuria con los vivientes; no dejes un lío de confusión. Alguna gente dice: al diablo con esto, deja que ellos se encarguen de esto cuando ya no esté. Esta es una forma egoísta de ver a las cosas, rabia talvez por morir. Es una cosa ir al cielo (asumiendo que allí es donde estás yendo) y otra cosa es dejar un lío para tus seres queridos en la tierra. No sería fabuloso ayudar a aquellos que necesitan cuando te hayas ido, y tú sabes como yo lo se, ellos necesitarán todo lo que ellos puedan para continuar: esto significará, ciertamente, mucho para ellos para dejar las cosas en orden. Cuando mi madre murió, dejó en su testamento que quería ser cremada; nos dijo dónde estaban los papeles del seguro, ella había pagado hasta la última cuota de éste, nos dio el número de su cuenta bancaria, y los teléfonos de quienes les pagaban su pensión. Incluso ella pagó su último recibo de electricidad, y su alquiler del mes (el que ella nunca lo llegó a usar), para que no sea una penuria para los vivientes. No hubo amargura, ni ambición en ella. Espero que yo sea tan amable como ella lo fue a la hora de su muerte.
Necesitamos hacer planes, porque eventualmente la muerte nos cogerá como a una víbora en la hierba alta. Planes y oraciones, si se necesita busca a un consejero de asesores capacitados. La familia de mi madre peleó sobre los bienes de mi abuelo, excepto mi madre que dijo: déjalos que ellos se encarguen de esto, tomaré lo que sea. Pero mi abuelo dejó un desorden, y sí, hubo resentimientos entre los muchos hermanos y hermanas hasta el día en que ellos murieron. Mucho antes de la muerte, esto pudo haber sido prevenido.
Justo como con tu boda, planea tu funeral, si quieres una fiesta, entonces dilo, como si este fuera una fiesta de cumpleaños, esto depende de ti. Tú algún día, estarás enfrente de Dios y le darás cuenta de tus actos.

Ha sido un privilegio para mi escribir este comentario para ti, porque en la profundidad de mi corazón, yo sé que los lectores aman a Dios, de otra forma él no habría alcanzado estas últimas palabras que ahora estoy escribiendo. La gente puede ser complicada, pero los verdaderos creyentes saben que la muerte ya no nos hace daño, esta ha sido vencida por la resurrección de Jesucristo; la muerte como lo dije anteriormente es una revolución a un nuevo comienzo.

Poems on Death

New Poems

Death Returns

Death returns: it found no resting place;
I saw it in flight, last night over the Sierras;
beneath the last sparks of twilight—!
The condor’s wings covered death’s decent;
and glides now through the air in peace!
Yet death’s tail-shadow leaves at dawn, to
return at dusk, blue-bellied full—as
if it has swallowed a whale (once again).
The condor, the condor, likened to a fly in a web
death finds no rest, only new flesh, new flesh!

No: 1949 8-27-2007

Death:
The Roots of the Earth

Death has a way of saying Hello, when it means Goodbye!
We beings on earth’s surface never really disappear—only
Transform.

From the moment of death the body will change, you can’t
hear it, it simply gets foggy—becoming the roots of the earth.

No: 1950 8-27-2007

The Mystery of Life

How mysteries to be born a human being
—and then to die as one!
To be able to wash off those old fleshy garments
of bark and milky-clay…!
We are the honored ones—(you know)
given to a whole world system—:
one hand reaching to heaven the other to hell;
the truth is, we have two flavors.
Those who have not been born yet:
man and beast are not so far apart
(and very hard to please).

No: 1951 8-27-2007

Dialogue with the Devil

“I’ll make a pack with you,” said He to me (the Devil),
“I have detested you long enough. I first saw you as
a child—then when you were old enough to make friends
I saw you again…. It was you who worshiped my kinds
of sins—then you broke away, but now is the time to start
carving new adventures. I have left one sap and root for
you—let there be commerce between us?”

I said back to Him, “Dark eyed, ivory scandaled, there
is none like thee, among heaven, earth or hell; none with
such swift feet, like your tongue—dark as midnight
are your shoulders—face of a dead seabed.”

No: 1954, 8-28-2007

Selected for Death

“No, no! Go from me—!” I left death lately in her sheath
—oh! Dim it was, for she surrounded me.
Thin, are her arms, yet such a grip—they bound me,
immoveable, and left me…cloaked, as in a web,
a cocoon—subtle and swift she was, like magic, in her
binding.
“No, no! I cried, “go from me, I have still your taste—
your scent, your soot, your aye—halt!”
(But she wouldn’t listen.)

No: 1952 8-28-2007

Death Passed Me Once
(1993)

This man knew the secrets of death
(he cast them over my head).
No man could know such things, unless
he was part of it.
And now he’s gone, he up and left—
(just like that…).
I called, “Are you near?” and he did
not answer me back.
Then at the end of my bed, I saw—why!
There stood in my hospital room, the
eyes and shoulders of a great being:
He did not speak, —he simple watched
over me.

No: 1953 8-28-2007

The Rocks
(Rapturous poetry)

Friend, please tell me what is wrong with me?
Or is it perhaps the world?
For I told myself, it could be either way!

I gave up drinking, smoking and gambling,
and I never swore, but then I started to.

So I prayed on that, and went after women
instead, and became compulsively attracted.

I went and got married to give up women
and just have one, and I started up swearing again.

I worked hard at trying to figure myself out,
pushing aside pride, greed, lust, envy and gout!

And every time I take my inventory, I find one
more issue, that had been hidden under a rock!

“Listen up Friend, there’s only been one
who has ever been able to kick over those rocks
and find nothing of value to talk about…!”

No: 1955 8-29-2007 In this poem I try to put what I call eccentric energy into its rebellious branches; a tinge of spirituality; the ego and the body play a role here, and how a man may try to prepare himself for death, trying to subdue his impulsive nature, be it sexual, or excessive energy in other so called, taboo areas: acted out and un-acted out desires. The rocks, or rock, are ones invitation to look under it, for there is where you will find your problem, the situation is always on top, and thus the problem has to be under the rock. This is an old Hindu style form of poetry.

Commentaries Two of Two

Watching Death

Like it or not, we think in line with our customs and traditions often times, right down to the point of how we imagine, or what we believe in about death. Death being a normal and natural thing, we mimic our parents and our TV heroes, and how they portray death; perhaps that is why there is so much gloom out there on death. The Maya, Inca and Aztecs took dying as a preparation period, along with rituals to be put into place; when they knew it was near.
On another point, People fear to talk about death, as if it was a storm out of control, brewing just for them. Death is seldom viewed by children in America, as if it was a private affair. I seen my mother in the hospital 26-times in 23-days, when she was dying; and she was laughing and joking in her death bed. I am grateful for that time. It is a choice I feel, and I’m glad I had the deciding vote. I believe children should be allowed to visit and see their grandparents on their dying beds, should they so wish to, and even push them a bit to do so. My son’s daughter saw her grandmother while she was dying in the hospital, and started crying, she was but a child. But what I feel she will remember is not her crying, but her great-grandmother’s smiling, for that was the last picture she saw of her.
Perhaps death is too much like hell for Americans, because most people I talk to think everyone is going to heaven, and thus, hell no longer exists. Be that as it may, what a cheap escape from the arms of hell; as my mother used to say, “Dennis, why does everyone think they’re going to heaven.” I couldn’t answer that, but now I can, hell is too close to death, and death is their nemeses. Written 7-15-2005 (seen internationally on the internet by 25-sites, and thousands of readers)

About Dying

Has the thought of dying ever occurred to you? Is there emotional pain with this issue? That being: are we looking at the end of the road? When we roll over and get out of bed, most of us will see things as normal, ordinary, unrelated to death: you most likely will not say: “Is this my last day on earth?”
Every two seconds someone dies someplace on earth. To a city the size of Lima, Peru, perhaps it is as high as 80 to 100-deaths a day; or to a smaller size city like St. Paul, 10 or 20. In my twenty-years of counseling, I’ve seen many folks suffering a loss in the form of a death of a loved one: thus, the grief comes next; it is perhaps why I got out of the business, enough is enough.
Many folks go to drinking, into depression, or into other stages of emotional illnesses: all this to deal with death, to find comfort. We even seek out psychologists and the clergy out.
What is true to the body, should it not be true to the mind (?) If we can reason it, it most likely is. Death can be no less than becoming part of a completion of a part of something. If one is to become more complete, on his deathbed, gender is put aside, and just completeness remains in the processing stage.
What wise words can a person say to another while dying? I thought about that when my mother was dying, and I had no wise words, but she did. She said: “I’m fine with it… I’m ready… I don’t want to live like this…. I’m ok with it,” and she enjoyed the guests and folks stopping by to greet her in the hospital.
—But what really was she saying, or how do I interpret her words for me? just this: ‘…the here and right now matters, this moment is real, and this is where it all is at, where it will take place, the present holds the proof, transformation is about to take position.’
She was not worried about bills, dinner, and so forth and so on: she was involved with the transformation process. That I believe is what she was telling me. (Written: 12-7-2005)

(Additional note: perhaps on another point, she was trying to show me how to die, for there comes a time when it is the only thing left to do (some of us need to be taught).

Death by the Numbers
(A short Commentary)

Death comes and goes as quick as the shifting of gears in a car for this world’s population (s). If one makes it to 60-years old, it has been said, he or she is lucky. Not because of health reasons per se, but because we live in a dangerous world, for the most part. One can die a thousand ways, just leaving the house for eight hours. Compile that to 60-years x 365-days, equals: 21,900 days to have been killed in, and thus, that same number, is how many times you have avoided death. The odds are not in ones favor; if one believes 1000-times a day he could have been killed (by transportation accidents, killers, tripping and falling, getting cancer, a chicken bone, etc), this equals: let’s add three more zeros to that, and it comes out to be: 21,900,000 chances to have been killed in the past sixty-years. Most people never do seem to catch sight of this. We become too carefree. But death is not no scarecrow, it lingers all about, like white on rice. Perhaps we have a guardian angel, it sure would seem so in my way of thinking.

Poems written between:
2003-2007

The First Depth

Struggling against ungraceful skiesthe warlords of eternal darkness—unseen to life’s obvious eyes—ebb and seek the prize, dominion!
‘The First depth,’ the silence of the deepeternal legions with ungraceful eyesthe Abysses storm, uncircumcisedthe colossal ramparts now untied
‘The First Depth,’ with rival skieshere, gathers demonic and divinenow with storms, once hidden beyondarmies of defense, build their saga
and I saw dreadful swords like sunsthunder and lightening by Orionthis was the tidings of cosmic doomif only man could have seen the gloom.
And the echoes I heard from the starsunnamed, immortal flames cast downgathered on earth for the final countdownArmageddon’s titanic onset!...

#610 [4/2/04]

Satan’s Daisies

Walk slowly, he is nearabove the clouds; talk softly, he can hearour venom mouths!

With his dark charcoal hornsand plotted lustHe that was once fairis after us!

#612 [4/3/05]

The Iron Raven

“You cannot escape, debased death (says the axiomatic, Iron Raven,who delivers the dead)—.My imperishable Icons…!Die, you shall, exhumed someday—!”Fame is no exception—to the Ravenhe seals fate, in ignoble ways!

#611 [4/3/05]

The Marble Tomb

‘Twill be the same, the same (I told him, when he was living), A wood or marble tomb—in a hundred years, let’s sayor a hundred so called dayswhat matters to he,(for he will be dead)—?a pompous monumentwill be of no use—yet he built it out of marble (nonetheless), not wood!
Your name will be forgottenamongst the rubbish and rootso’er rotting dampness; andwho will clean your tomb?(I asked him all these thingsbefore he died; and he neverdid reply—and built his tombof marble, admiring its size!)
You—in there, in that tomb…!You cannot hear a thing—!!!!!And out here they’re buildingyes…another mausoleum for another rich man…!

#613 [4/3/04]

Winter of Death

In the winter of doubtDeath swims—engulfsLike a hurricane—likeA ship sinking; thus, Pitilessly tons of Crushing sea!

Here I stand on the lofty Poop, above the angryWaves—, as it waits For Me!...

#943 [12/7/05]

To Death (a Poem)

There are 72-deaths, and God said, “Pick one,” and so he did, “To Death,” was its name: its eyes were sleepy, droopy. He then wondered what the other 71-deaths were like.

Many of the deaths were among the dark hills, stone-forests below…! Waters that were full of flames, undrinkable!

Stagnant, he slowly glided down its gap, to its warm end, from its glaciers of cold sweat, from flesh, and found death to be his friend (for a while anyways); no dread, just calm, sweet dancing in the dark—here all the longing desires became beautifully-mad, with pounding.

As time passed, people trampled the dark path. Then he learned a prayer—one most everyone heard, but only a few said (it echoed throughout the halls and tunnels of death, it sounded something like this:

“Use us again, if only but for an hour…!” (Regretful voices.)

Here in this death, one of 72, he was intact, but death was no longer his friend, he was likened to a pacing panther. Then a voice said: “This is your new existence and the best of the best, of the 72-deaths” (perhaps he should have chosen life).

#1318 4/17/06

Notes: Elements of Poetry: there are many elements in poetry, I’ve written on a few before, I normally do not make it a habit to do so; I’d rather swim in with the piranhas, and let the skeletons do the narrating on what is and is not poetry. But here is how I see a few things, take it with a altering view please, nothing is written in stone here: Free Verse without fixed meter or rhyme but using formal elements of pattern verse (e.g. assonance, alliteration), it is a popular way to write poetry, everyone who has published contemporary poetry seems to have used it in one way or another. Suspense in poetry can be created by what is called lines enjambed; that is, a clause or sentence can run over into the following line (I have used it many of times). Thus a kind of mystery is forced, or expressed, emphasized: as used here in the first sentence of my poem, “To Death”.

“If Death Had Wings”
(A poem on Death)
If I saw death, and death had wingsI know where I would go—someplace between Heaven and Hell,--in the form of an eternal soul:where peace and hunger was no more—;if only death had wingsthat is where I’d go—!
Yes, yes, if only dearth had wings!Wings, wings, wings—I’d put them on my soul.
Note: No: 1562 12-10-2006

Old Mrs. Stanley

She sits on her porch and knitsbending at the window-sillwith old, old waxed fingerssmiling away her day my old neighbor, Mrs. Stanley.
Now comes forenoon, she stops the knitswitches to another window (still on that little porch though)looking down now, down the street(I’m but fifteen, she doesn’t see me)‘Doesn’t she have anything else to do?’
I say…!Through the drapes I can see her face,
she seems homeless in that big house.

Notes: I remember her husband, he died two years after we moved to Cayuga Street, in 1958; I remember how he loved that Rambler (automobile), he bought it in 1959, and it sat there after he died for ten years in that old warn out garage, until her son took it. In 1968 I’d leave for San Francisco, in-between, I’d travel some, in 1966 and 1967, I traveled to Seattle and Omaha, Nebraska, but in ’68, I’d not really return for 12-years; around the world I’d go, and Mrs. Stanly, she’d be looking out that window, until she died at 93-years old (she died in the 1990s). ((7/1/2003)( 10:55 PM)) #1518

White Shadows
(Scented Death: in seven cantos)

Cantos: 1-7

White Shadows
[Scented Death]

1

Ah, yes, a cantankerous age indeed
is old age: so they say
the golden age. Somewhere along life’s line for me
there came a basis, a set belief: we all have our branch to perch on if we can find the tree.

2

I walk, used to walk the shadowy streets, ‘…now this is your day,’ says my second-self; ‘life has been a blaze.’ It is early March; ‘tis the time, the great day; there is no other like it –never will be. (‘Before I was, I was not, now I am, and
and soon to be again. It all comes out clear at the end.’ So says my second self.)

And it’s hard to leave something old—
things, just things, but nonetheless, hard to leave: anything, it all entails grieving.

3

Home to sweet rest: to waves of laughter; no more storms to clash against. Now sunlight
gleams over the horizon; fire and comets
shooting across the sky…
darting to and fro; so many spirit filled worlds I want to explore,
get to know—to go to.

4

‘It’s your day, your walk, your first step, to
the beyond (so says, my second-self
again!)’ ‘Twas all I ever knew, this world, everything else surreal! I suppose. I can no more say
what shape I’ll be, than when Venice will sink.

5

I have seen many faces in life, had many
breakfast’s: some heavy, some light; watched the soul grow, decay, rise again. All within the next step: which often is, and one never knows—semi-dramatic….
Yes, O yes, we are all part of this marathon,
post –Donate? Who shall inherit my garments—? I don’t
know, nor care; let Faulkner have them.

6

I will not dazzle future ages; no, not like Poe, or
Longfellow. Or shall I do tricks, or
showmanship; take the Nobel Prize and shove it; it only limits the visions of the Poet; confounds his wit, and spit he needs to write with, his: lyrics, stanzas and sonnets.
The pen and the man, not always do they deal with
God’s plan, more poets live in a lie,
a burnished-mirror, creating voices they never hear, covered with clouds and clouds
and white shadows, in the great halls of
humanities waste.

7

Sailing in the way of the wind, like us humans—do,
hence, how shall we (or is it I), die? None of
us want to, until the day it happens, and you got to!...
I lived, dimmed, only by the cascading of time
within me; like a box of scented wood, when the scent left, I was gone, just like the white
shadows above.

Note by the author: we talk about death, because we are born for it. It is natural now, and it is a way of telling how much you liked living, or can be. In this fragmented canto-poem, the journey is just a journey. We must live in preparation for the fullness of tomorrow, the next step, the one beyond. Subjective or objective, it can be depending on how you adjust to the direct treatment of things. Things are to me just things, made to be used, moved, and onward. I am a thing, and I must move onward. And because I can reason an afterlife, so there must be one. The transition is the point of contention for most people not the facts. We as humans compose in a sequence, the outcome, when in reality, the result of life, the gift of life, the sadness to leave it behind, is in fact, the product of somebody whispering into your ears: feel the poetry of death, it’s but a white shadow, like everything, the unknown, yet the premise has been set: as in a poem. I shall be geared up for death when it comes so I can roam the galaxies, it is my next mission. How do I know this: I bet in time, Venice will sink (how do I know that). #1263 Written: 3/6/06.

Grandpa’s Cellar Ghosts

It was the ghosts. He knew them—well,
by now anyway, and with good reason.
My first impulse (when I heard his story)
was to shut it out of my mind: not listen,
but I couldn’t, he needed to talk.

The ghosts halted at the end of the tunnel,
so grandpa said, helplessly—to me…,
it was all in their favor, he put in his mind.
When I had last talked to him, the door to
the cellar was open, it now was shut, he
—standing in the kitchen by me, said:
“I’m waiting for things to happen,”
restlessly waiting he was; funny I thought,
to see him waiting for once
not complaining.

“They’ve dug this tunnel, you see…” he said—
(hesitantly); he stood there a moment longer,
as if in a trance, “in the cellar, they’re coming for me…”
so he did believe (the tunnel had taken six weeks
to dig, he told me).

Now leaning on the old stove in the kitchen,
balancing his physical being with his thinking
(his upper teeth grinding on his lower) whispered,
“Hand me my coffee…” he never said please,
his hands shaking (he had just eaten some
scrambled eggs; I made them). “I could hear
them digging down there, for weeks,” he said
with a—troubled face, “in the cellar….” He added.

The only fault my grandfather had besides being
moody: fault with me that is, I didn’t’ pay him
much attention. Perhaps that day he had forgotten that
fault, as I was questioning where this cold fear of his
was coming from (surely he knew we all had to die
but I was only 26-years old, and death was some-
thing new, even being in war, does not prepare you).
He was 83-years old; perhaps death was the grave,
no such thing as ghosts, but here they were: waiting.

I thought, looking at grandpa, thought (not saying
a word) thought perchance he was wondering if
the ghosts were now going to chase him around the house?

Funny, was all this, so I thought at the time…
not sure why. These ghosts had no reason to chase him
around the Cellar or try to find him in his house. Then I said,
“They’re harmless, grandpa,” as if they were real, I was
talking like him…and he said, “Come into my world,
and you’ll see…!” Of course that was not possible,
so I just leaned my back, against our old stove.

These cellar ghosts I figured, would pass on, fade away,
after a good night’s sleep for him: or two or three;
that would do the trick); but no such thing, that wasn’t it.
I really didn’t know what to believe—like I said before,
I was but twenty-six years old.

Now that I look back, being fifty-eight, things have changed (they always do, don’t they?); those old familiar spirits are more than they seem, now—, more than what they were back then; for there is another world, as real as ours, as perplexed as it may seem, and I suppose they are willing to wait for me; should they find an opening (another world within our world that is).

He died two weeks later—after that last conversation:
back in ’74, a long time ago, of course. He died face down
on his belly, flat on the floor in his house, trying to get from one room to the next, as if someone, or thing was chasing him.

Note: This occurrence took place in our old home, in St. Paul, Minnesota, 186 Cayuga, Street, in 1974, perhaps a few weeks before my grandfather died. The place now is torn down, a park was build along side the property, then a parking area for cars, and I lost track now, who knows what is there now. #1234 Written in Lima, Peru, at my home 3/18/06; modified 3/22/06.

Spanish Version

Los Fantasmas del Sótano del Abuelo

Eran los fantasmas. Él los conocía—bien,
por ahora de todas formas, y con buena razón.
Mi primer impulso (cuando oí su historia)
fue aislarlo de mi mente: no escuchar,
pero no podía, él necesitaba hablar.

Los fantasmas se detuvieron al final del túnel,
eso decía el abuelo, impotentemente—a mí...,
todo estaba en su favor, él puso en su mente.
Cuando hablé últimamente con él, la puerta del
sótano estaba abierta, ahora estaba cerrada, él
—parado en la cocina cerca de mí, dijo:
“Estoy esperando que pasen cosas”,
esperando inquietamente él estaba; gracioso pensé,
verlo a él esperar por una vez
sin quejarse.

“Ellos han cavado este túnel, ves...” él dijo—
(vacilantemente); él estuvo allí un momento más,
como si en trance, “en el sótano, ellos vienen por mí…”
eso él pensaba (había tomado seis semanas
para cavar el túnel, él me dijo).

Ahora apoyándose en la estufa vieja de la cocina,
equilibrando su físico ser con su pensamiento
(su dientes superiores rechinando con sus inferiores) susurró,
“Alcánzame mi café…” él nunca decía por favor,
su manos temblando (él acababa de comer algunos
huevos revueltos; que los hice por él). “Pude oírlos
cavando allí, durante semanas”, dijo él
con una—cara preocupada, “en el sótano...” Él añadió.

El único defecto que mi abuelo tenía además de ser
malhumorado: defecto conmigo es decir, no le presté
mucha atención. Quizás ahora él se haya olvidado de ese
defecto, mientras me preguntaba de dónde este miedo frío
de él venía (seguramente él sabía que todos tenemos que morir
pero yo sólo tenía 26 años, y la muerte era alguna-
cosa nueva, incluso estar en guerra, no te prepara).
Él tenía 83 años; quizás la muerte era lo grave,
no tal cosa como fantasmas, pero aquí estaban ellos: esperando.

Pensé, mirando al abuelo, pensé (no diciendo
una palabra) pensé talvez él estaba pensando si
¿los fantasmas iban ahora a perseguirlo alrededor de la casa?

Gracioso, era todo esto, eso pensé en ese momento…,
no estoy seguro por qué. Estos fantasmas no tenían razón para perseguirlo a él
alrededor del Sótano o tratar de encontrarlo en su casa. Entonces dije,
“Ellos son inofensivos, abuelo”, como si ellos fueran reales, estaba
hablando como él... y él dijo, “Entra en mi mundo,
y tú verás…!” Desde luego eso no era posible,
entonces sólo me recliné en aquella estufa vieja, contra mi espalda.

Estos fantasmas del sótano (pensé, pasarían, se desvanecerían,
después de una buena noche de sueño para él: o dos o tres; esto haría
el truco); pero no tal cosa, esto no era. Yo realmente
no sabía
qué creer—como dije antes, sólo tenía veintiséis años.
Ahora que miro atrás, teniendo cincuenta y ocho años, las cosas han cambiado
(ellos siempre lo hacen ¿no?); esos viejos espíritus familiares son más de
los que parecen, ahora—más de lo que eran en ese entonces; porque hay
otro mundo, tan real como el nuestro, tan perplejo como puede parecer,
y supongo, que ellos están dispuestos a esperar por mi; si ellos encuentran
una apertura (otro mundo dentro de nuestro mundo esto es).

Él murió dos semanas más tarde—después de esa última conversación:
allá en 1974, mucho tiempo atrás, por supuesto. Él murió boca abajo, sobre su vientre, sin vida en el piso de su casa, tratando de ir de un cuarto al siguiente, como si alguien, o algo lo perseguía.

# 1234 18/Marzo/2006; Escrito en Lima, Perú, en mi casa modificado 22/Marzo/2006. Nota: Este acontecimiento ocurrió en nuestra vieja casa en la calle Cayuga 186, en San Pablo, Minnesota, en 1974, quizás unas semanas antes de que mi abuelo muriera. El lugar ahora ha sido derribado, un parque ha sido construido a lo largo de lo que era la propiedad, luego un lugar de estacionamiento, he perdido la cuenta, quién sabe que hay allí ahora.

Tanger’s Kasbah (Casaba)
[Black wind]

I walked among the eager and neglected—; Arabs and queers and Spanish boys; Merchants and foreigners; it was a long odyssey, with a hovering black wind overhead, long and icy finger all over me. Black wind above my head—seeping, seeping everywhere, within, inside the Kasbah: a maze with no end; the spirit of madness contained by—unconscious…addicts everywhere—; a few,…just a few gracious men, laughing here and there…it was a hot unceasing day. I felt at first, akin to a bullfighter; then later on, like the bull; then, at the end of the day, I felt empty like the bullring after the bull has been dragged out and butchered!...but what an escapade!

Note: in l997 the author visited Tanger, Morocco, and got into a bit of a jam; found his way back to Spain safely. [#490 2/19/2005].

The world is a mixed one, and we must all live together, this is why I added this poem to the collection of death poems, so many will die in the black wind of some far off Casaba, and Satan will have his death wish for the lot.

Poems to my Mother

♥

Elsie at 19-years Old

The Long Glimpse

From the arch of the doorway
She’d look my way, into the garage, at me—
as I readied my automobile to go someplace;
She’d be looking-steadfast
I’d open my car door a bit, ask:
“Why you staring? (at me)”
“No reason,” she’d reply, smiling.
Then with a tinge of hesitation
she summon up, and said (at 83):
softly, in an almost whisper “You….”
((as if she had remembered the day I
was born) (almost in a trance.))
And I’d for the life of me—
not know why; I know now though, she was
simply getting a long glimpse before
she died (for she died shortly after).
I guess, she was really saying goodbye,
saying goodbye with a long glimpse
to last between now and then, when we’d
meet again.

No: 1947 8-24-2007
Love and Butterflies
[For Elsie T. Siluk my mother]

She fought a good battle
The last of many—
Until there was nothing left
Where once, there was plenty.

And so, poised and dignified
She said, ‘farewell,’ in her own way
And left behind
A grand old time
Room for another

Love and Butterflies…
That was my mother.

—By Dennis L. Siluk © 7/03

An Old Wood Pile
Dedicated to Elsie T. Siluk

Old skin once held tightagainst her skeleton—rose no more, just drapedloosely over her unpadded fleshun-tightened muscles and tissuelost its courage, no-fortitude—.Gone are the days and yearsthat stood against the indomitable elements; the skeleton, now a landmarkhidden under flesh and blood,guts and mortal fiber.
Backbone, collapsed from drudgery (time, time’s—cascading inside).Bones now leaving impressionsaccepting fatelike tarnished silver!...Her hands look like autumn leavesfallen from old trees. Winter is around the cornerthe door of time is closinglike an old wood pilebeing burnt up—.Hard to open things,hard to do anything.She’s precariously balanced—painfully slow….
She hears my feetcross the room—her palesweet blue eyes, flickerlike butterflies….
Tilting her faceto catch her breathShe says:“Who wants to live like this?”

#793 [8/11/05]

Notes by the author: “I think of myself as an old wood pile you might say, and so I use that analogy here: in my poem “An Old Wood Pile,” not out of disrespect, for I used my mother as an analogy, as well as my grandfather (in a prior poem), and even myself, which I’ve also used on occasions, within this book: “Last Autumn and Winter”. My mother had her mission, I was part of it; she was part of mine. I think I have learned to do one thing, if anything, in life, which is to examine it; otherwise, for me it would not be worth living. For this is where the truth of the matter is. Why do we do what we do [?] My mother said, “Who wants to live like this…?” and I had to make a choice for her, after she made her choice. We live in a world where most people, willing or unwilling live in a pretense. When my mother said what she said, there was no more deception for her, if there ever was any. She wanted to go to the next level, and said goodbye in her own way; as we all will in time.” Originally published in the book, “Last Autumn and Winter.”

Versión en Español

Un Viejo Montón de Leña
Dedicado a Elsie Siluk

La piel vieja que una vez se mantuvo lisa
contra su esqueleto—
no se levantó más, sólo cayó
sueltamente sobre su carne flácida
músculos y tejidos sueltos
perdieron su coraje, ninguna-fortaleza—.
Ido son los días y los años
que estuvieron de pie contra los
elementos indomables;
el esqueleto, ahora una señal
escondida bajo carne y sangre,
tripas y fibra mortal.
Espina dorsal, demolida por servidumbre
(tiempo, tiempos—torrentes de tiempo dentro).
Huesos que dejan ahora impresiones
de aceptar el destino
¡como plata deslustrada!..
Sus manos lucen como hojas de otoño
caídas de viejos árboles.
El invierno está muy cerca,
la puerta de tiempo se está cerrando
como un viejo montón de leña
que está siendo quemada—.
Difícil de abrir las cosas,
difícil de hacer algo.
Ella es efímeramente equilibrada—
terriblemente lenta…
Ella oye mis pasos
cruzar el cuarto—sus pálidos
dulces ojos azules, parpadean
como mariposas….
Inclinando su cara
para coger su aliento
Ella dice:
“¿Quién quiere vivir así?”

# 793 [11/Agosto/05]

Apuntes por el autor: “Pienso en mí como un viejo montón de leña, podrías decir, y por eso uso esta analogía aquí: en mi poema ‘Un Viejo Montón de Leña’, no por falta de respeto, porque use a mi madre como una analogía, asimismo a mi abuelo (anterior a este poema), e incluso a mí mismo, que también lo hice en algunas ocasiones. Mi madre tenía su misión, yo fui parte de ella; ella fue parte de la mía. Pienso que si he aprendido a hacer una cosa en la vida, es examinar ésta; de otra manera, para mí no valdría la pena vivir. Porque aquí es donde está la verdad del asunto. ¿Por qué hacemos lo que hacemos? Mi madre me dijo, “¿Quién quiere vivir así…?” y tuve que tomar una decisión por ella, después de que ella hizo su elección. Vivimos en un mundo donde la mayoría de la gente, dispuesta o indispuesta vive en un pretexto. Cuando mi madre dijo lo que ella dijo, no hubo más engaño para ella, si alguna vez hubo alguno. Ella quiso ir al siguiente nivel, y dijo ¡adiós! en su propio modo; como todos lo haremos en su momento”.

Back of Book
(use picture of me standing by Napoleon’s grave)

In 1993, Mr. Siluk was ordained as a minister, allowed to minister with his psychology and Bible in hand, at the many hospitals and clinics he work at, and was General Manager of Hawthorn Institute, a chemically dependent clinic in Minnesota. In 2007, he was given the title of Dr. h.c. for his impeccable behavior and contributions in the Mantaro Valley of Peru. In 2005, and 2006 he was awarded the title of Poet Laureate, and given the Cross of the City. And between 2004 and 2007, was awarded many accommodations from Universities, and magazines for his commentary and poetic cultural contributions. He was a licensed counselor, in dual disorders, and worked for many clinics and hospitals during the 1990s thru 2001. In the middle to late 1980s, Dennis attended seminary graduate school, for several months studying theology. And for the first time, Mr. Siluk, reaches out to a subject seldom brought to light: death. Not in a morbid way, but in a confrontational way, and in commentary and poetic form.

Thursday Haikus: Lunch at the Cafe

2007-05-10T15:38:00.000-07:00

Thursday Haikus: Lunch at the Café
[At El Parquettos, Miraflores, Lima Perú]

Lima Sun

They say, sun until June
—In Lima, Peru
What if they’re wrong?

#1823 (5-10-2007)) When we count on something or one too much, we normally get disappointed somewhere down the road; expectations unmet I call them, and sorry to say, we become disappointed in others and suffer for that, perhaps we need to look at things and people as less than perfect.))

Lunch at the Café

Worthless! Worthless!
— Spaghetti today
Like a lake full of rain

#1824

Silverware

Silverware clashing!
Behind my back
Like birds out of tune…!

#1825
(at El Parquettos)

Commentary on From: Here we see the use of Haikus as (almost) epigrams, yet within keeping the grace of the haiku, and close to its form (the three lines, syllables are relatively close, if not 17-sylables, but the stress is not in keeping it uniform with the Japanese style Haikus, it is in keeping with the simplicity of the glorious day God has given, just one Thursday in so many.

Time Travel

Well, here I am again,
Its 2:35 PM (at the Café);
What month is it?

#1827

Sleep

One of the greatest gifts
God has given me—!
Is sleep! Beautiful sleep!

#1828

Rotten Poets

The minds of Ginsberg and Burroughs
Was full of nasty thrills
With young boys

#1829

Café Blues

Soupy Skies—
Crossing over the open café
Becoming too pale to write

#1830

Allen Ginsberg spoke of Kerouac as the master of the Haiku, I now care to refute this; first of all Ginsberg was perhaps the worse and most unclassy poet that has ever lived, and Kerouac, although good with spontaneous prose, was far from a master of the Haiku; the best I can say is he was the master of his own style of Haiku, and that alone. If he did anything, he lowered the Haiku to a windmill, where at once it was a skyscraper.

Afternoon Haikus at the Cafe

2007-05-10T11:03:00.000-07:00

Afternoon Haikus at the Cafe
[At El Parquettos, Miraflores, Lima Peru]

Outside the Cafe

The little pigeons
Around the cobblestone
Are looking around!...

#1814 (5-9-2007)

Sarah

The waitress looks
Like pigeon
Picking her ear at heaven

#1815

Minstrels

Men of the band—
What do they think?
I know (money for tips!)

#1816

Afternoon

In the afternoon sun
The people
Walk slowly

(by the café)

#1817

Rosa Reads

Frozen in thought
Forearms on the table
Under a yellow umbrella

#1819

Minstrels #2

Listen to the band play!
All the little brave men
Will all die some day!

#1820

Umbrella

The sun creeps over the umbrella
Separates us—
Like heaven to Hell

#1821

Coffee

Coffee—too strong
To put me to sleep
Too light to drink

#1822

Comments on the Haikus—The Haiku is both singular and plural, but can bring some issues when the‘s’ is employed. Best known for its 17-short line syllables and developed over hundred of years in Japan. Many people have slighted the original style of the Haiku, calling it revolutionary names, unskilled at it likewise, such as those ungrateful from the Beat Generation, who seemed to have won the hearts of many with a single utterance from Zen, on top of their well wishes. Anyhow Ginsberg, Kerouac, Burroughs, and those like them somehow felt like Solomon and King David involved in producing the new Psalms of God, felt like they were doing bestowing upon earth such great wisdom. Not likely of course. Poetry should have no trickery, especially in the short Haikus, since there is no room for them. They need to be free, plane, graceful, simple, and to the point. I’ve written many in the past, and have exterminated with them, like others, careful not to descry the essence of them. We must make sure the course of the poem does not go mountain climbing, in saying that I mean, we must look for a fresh lake water in writing them, the calmness must be in them, for if not how can they grow on the soul. Ezra Pound, a great writer in many forms, studied the Haikus as many of his contemporaries have. And I suppose I have, and those after me will. The best we can do is to produce them with grace, and apologize for our mistakes, and stand tall for our endeavors.

Note: It should be noted, there are different styles of Haikus, Chinese and Italian to mention a few; some with additional lines, and others with additional syllables within the lines, it just happens to be the Japanese is the most popular.

Little Windows

The little silent stone windows
At Cajamarca
Stare in our face!

#1812 (The Little Windows refer to the graveyard, 200 AD, in Cajamarca, Peru, where the pre Inca natives buried their dead in the windows)

The Picture

Keep your eye steady
Lest you lose the whole objective
To paint the whole picture

#1811

The Little Olive Amuc's (The Legendary Little People of the Andes))Peru)

2007-04-18T09:24:00.000-07:00

The Little Olive Amuc’s

Ah, little olive fellows from the Andes
Or some internal caves therein:
From Ticlio, or Bone City (La Oroya),
An underworld civilization!

According to the very best of legends—
From the Wanka to the Inca times—
They live in the crust of the earth
And in the hard cold mineral mines!

They followed the miner’s footsteps
From barbarity nights to dawn
A dwindling civilization
With cities of gold and bronze!

By them are the treasures well-known;
Hidden in underground temples;
From Machu Picchu to the Mantaro Valley
To the Nazca Peruvian Lines!

With all of this ponderous mystery
It’s distressing these earthly Amuc
Reveal little sign of their whereabouts
But provoke our most curious thoughts.

Such mystery with humans and pixie’s,
The problems of peace a pauper,
Relations between goodwill for both,
Or misdeed and rebuke therefore!

So when we look for treasures dim,
And find problems of where and when,
Simple find an Olive Amuc and pray,
He will by your very best Friend!

#1795 4-18-2007

Note: Legend has it these Amuc of the Andes, are perhaps a foot to 18-inches tall; some with blond and other with dark hair. It has been said they have iron wings, and live in the mines of the Peruvian Andes. Many older folks who have been in the mines, worked them, have claim they have seen them; or folks that have known folks that have. Myself, I have never seen them, and I’ve been in the Andes, but I’m looking forward to it. And when I do, I of course will let you know. The Wanka to the Inca times, infer, between AD 700 to 1600 (and from the present times: the time of the Miners).

Train to Munich (Parts one thru three)

2007-04-15T13:41:00.001-07:00

Train to Munich

(October, 1970)

Introductory Chapter: We had met a girl once from Denmark (met her at the October Fest of 1970, in Munich), and he dated her for a while thereafter by going to Denmark to see her—yes, he had gone to Denmark to date her; I remember meeting her, and she was a doll, dark bronze skin, healthy from the breast to her little toes. Like I said, He met her at one of the big fest with me then Ski went to Denmark to be with her during one of his ten-day vacations; only to come back and say she smoked pot, and took some LSD when he was with her, along with some other drugs, and he tried to reform her and she got mad and told him the relationship wouldn’t work, and to be quite frank, Ski hated drugs, and she was lucky to get away from him. I think when I was with him I really didn’t want to meet anyone, kind of claustrophobic of some form of impending disaster to befall me. But the train to Munich was a blast, there again we almost got into a predicament.

Chapter

As we got off the train (Ski and I) we were distinguishable as a sack of brown potatoes, amongst white laundry bags, walking through the train station, out its doors, then outside onto the sidewalk, at 5:00 AM, I witnessed right away young folks walking, waking up, from few hours sleep in the corners of the train station, sacks in their hands, or laying beside them, or laying on them, the renowned October Fest, in Germany was going on, and this was the place to be, or at least the place I wanted to be. No reservations needed, just ones body.

Several young Germans were walking on the opposite side of the sidewalk; several blocks from the train station, where Ski and I crossed over to the other side, “You speak English?” asked Ski, to the group. They looked at us strangely; we simply wanted to find our way to the fairgrounds. Ski was abrupt with his way of producing or trying to produce, dialogue.

“American GI´s” a voice from the group said. Ski lifted his eyebrows, I figured this would be a fight, or it was at least in the makings.

“No, we’re reporters from New York City…”said Ski. Thus, we got a lot more respect instantly. “We’re from a …” (a magazine, can’t remember which one he said, but they were impressed, and so was I that we could get away with such a fib).

I felt something like a volt of electricity in the air, after this mirage was created.

Chapter II

—We then walked about Munich for a number of hours, I saw an old bum laying drunk on the sidewalk, everyone just stepped over him or around him, and I stopped and starred at him. “Come on…!” Said Ski, let’s get on to the fest. And so I did. And then we found a big beer hall, and we couldn’t pass it, or I couldn’t, and we stopped in it and had a few beers. Then we got to the fest, the October Fest, and it was huge, with big beer tents. It was perhaps 11:00 AM. We walked about for a while, I didn’t want to get drunk too quick, so I slowly drank, and found a place to rest under a shade tree, on an embankment, where a lot of hippies were, that evening, Ski and I would return there to rest again, and watch all the hippies sack out for the evening, having their own personal picnics.

Then we went on to the big beer tent. I was getting drunk now, and ended up dancing on the tables with folks I never knew. I was talking to a woman later on at the entrance of a beer tent, I had said a few words in German, and she rattled on for an hour, and she thought I could understand her, but I could only understand ever fifth word or so, which I suppose was good enough. Then Ski came along, said he had met this gal, and he’d introduce her to me shortly, and we both went to the bathroom, and some guy took a picture of us, urinating, and Ski blew up, grabbed his camera and broke it in front of him, and the guy almost cried. “Let’s get out of here,” I told Ski, in case the police took his side. And we left the tent, and then the gal showed up, and he introduced her to me; lovely as could be, bronze and youthful, with a nice shape.

Our ride back to Augsburg, on the train would not be so exciting, we were both tired, and wanted to rest somewhat. Which was good for me because I didn’t want to be confronted by the conductor, and his crowed again like on the way down; We ended up in his cabin, because Ski wanted something, and pushed the porter, and a fight right in his cabin was mounting, and there was three or four of them, and two of us, but I was ready, and Ski was more than ready, but I smoothed it out, at the last second.

The Cliffs to Torre Torre (Huancayo's Envy))Peru))

2007-04-13T15:56:00.001-07:00

The Cliffs to Torre Torre
(Huancayo’s Envy))Peru))

Prehistoric Geological Monument near Huancayo

Tall up by the cliffs, in the township of Huancayo, stands
A cluster of piercing stone like pillars, lightening rods
From the Ancient-gods, with thousands of years being:
weather worn and torn and blistered;
These pillars of stone reach—heavenward.
Around this cluster, an engulfing, natural enclosure
Like an old cemetery guarded with erect towers and tombs;
Brownish rocks, baked by the sun, washed by the rains
from the heavens:
It is called ‘Torre Torre’ and rests below the cliffs of Huancayo,
alone.
It is the envy of the Valley, where both warrior and poet seek.

#1788 4/13/2007

Note: The poem, ‘…Torre Torre’, is not referring to the island called ‘Bora Bora’ in the South Pacific, it is a geological wonder in and around Huancayo, Peru, beyond the Andes, in the Valley of Mantaro. How it got its name, I don’t know, but I’ve been to the site a number of times, and it is always fascinating to see the course the wind, and weather have taken on this geological wonder, how they worked to mold such things as these stone towers; primeval geological erosion. Fascinating I say, for surely they’ve been here longer than the city of Huancayo, habitants by some 325,000-citizens; an old Wanka culture once roamed this area, perhaps dating back to 1000 BC. The stone pillars are more tucked away in what I’d call a gorge. One can go down to see it, and actually walk through it, or one can go onto the cliffs above it, and look down over it, and if more adventurous, climb down into it, or like me, just observe it from a close distance, both ways.

For folks who wish to visit the site: Torre Torre is a geological formation of enormous towers of clayey soil, molded by the winds and rain, located very near to Cerrito de la Libertad.

Tale of a Heart and Soul (a Lyric)

2007-04-08T09:08:00.001-07:00

Tale of a Heart and Soul

This is an odd story (or tale)
to say the least,
where I came upon any angry old man once
in Garmish Germany, back in ‘73—.
We walked together in the surrounding hills
and thus, spotted two young boys—
with silver-white hair, perhaps three or four
years of age, playing with a wolf,
that was peaceful, joyful, quite happy….

“Awe,” said the old man in fright and spite,
Just what do we have here?”
Spooked in admiration he was,
angry for whom, knows what!
He said to me, irritatingly, “If I were that
wolf beast, I’d be wild, free and happy!
I wish, I wish, I wish I could be!”

And I do believe, sometimes when we
wish hard enough, God grants us just
that, what we want, but shouldn’t have…
a lesson perhaps, to be learned,
if not by the ‘wisher’ hopefully by others.

And then, all of a sudden, the old man
was calm, peaceful, joyful, singing a song,
wanting to play with the boys, haply,
as if he really knew them…!
(something was very wrong);
then the angry wolf, attacked him—
not me, perhaps (so I thought at the time)
it was the Old man, inside the wolf’s skin,
and the wolf inside the man,
and the wolf killed him,
and I shot the wolf…!

#1784 4-8-2007 (D) Sometimes things happen for reasons beyond our comprehension, and simply not knowing why, so we guess at its internal structure, its motivation, reasoning, motives for being, happening, when it is the simplest of all to say what you really think and feel, and that is usually right. As in this case, perhaps the man got his wish, and envy got its revenge, one of the deadly seven sins.

The Hanging Gardens at Babylon

2007-04-05T08:55:00.000-07:00

The Hanging Gardens at Babylon
(Its Ecological Miracle)

There they lay, under the sway
Of King Nebuchadnezzar’s
Magnificent city, Kingdom,
In the 6th Century B.C.;
To enchant the world,
And his home sick queen
(Median Princess Amytis)
The city with the legend, of:
The Hanging Gardens at Babylon—:
Primeval City of the world;
Here humanity marveled
At its city gardens, its Water
System—now but a mystery;
Now but a crumbled city
In the desert sun, in Iraq…
But one needs to look deep
Deep down in the callers beneath
The palace (deeper than they have)
There they will find the riddle
Of how and why: three shafts
Sided by side, and a chain-pump
Structure, there resides…
Seven levels high the
Gardens stood (some 365 feet
Above the ground (the days
Of a year)) water pushes water
And magnetic gravity with the
Help of the moon, pulls: up,
Up to its roots, helping
This ecological miracle, and
This magnificent city’s fable?

#1784 (4-5-2007)

A Note: It has puzzled folks for centuries on how the Gardens were watered in Babylon, back in 604- to about 560 B.C., perhaps too much so. And I suppose they need to do more digging to find out exactly the correct method, but it doesn’t seem all that complicated to me. When it was built on levels, 365 feet high with several pumps to help it along, and man power was next to free, and add simple gravity to the picture, and a touch of the pull from the earth’s moon. In the out skirts of Cajamarca, Peru is an aqueduct, called El acueducto de Cumbe Mayo, 3000-years old, water runs up hill (the aqueduct is 9000mts; thus, there is nothing new under the sun.)

Historian Maria Rostworowski and Poet Dennis L. Siluk (In Spanish and English)

2007-04-02T16:49:00.000-07:00

SPANISH VERSION

Diálogo Narrativo y Reunión
de :
La Historiadora María Rostworowski y el Poeta Dennis L. Siluk

Por Dennis L. Siluk
(Traducido por Rosa Peñaloza de Siluk)

Avance: Una reunión histórica, puede ser llamada esta entre la renombrada historiadora, María Rostworowski (de Diez Canseco), de Lima, Perú, y Dennis L. Siluk, poeta y novelista (quien vive parcialmente en Perú, y en su tierra natal Minnesota, EE.UU.); María tiene medio siglo investigando y estudiando el pasado histórico del Perú, y una audiencia mundial con sus incontables libros sobre su cultura, tradiciones, y datos históricos; algunos libros traducidos del español al inglés (por ejemplo, “History of the Inca Realm”).

La madre de María era una dama peruana y su padre era de Polonia, como fue mencionado durante la reunión entre ella y Dennis. María nació en Barranco, Lima, Perú; cuando tenía cinco años ella fue con su familia a Europa—y vivió en Francia, Polonia, Inglaterra y Bélgica, y volvió al Perú cuando tenía 19 años. Similar a la experiencia de Dennis, en la que él se enamoró de Perú (particularmente del Valle del Mantaro, y ahora ha venido a Perú a radicar parcialmente)

Ella se casón con un polaco en Polonia, así como Dennis se casó con un peruana de Huancayo, Perú, aventurándose en Lima, en 1999, cuando ellos se conocieron y se casaron unos meses más tarde, en febrero del 2000.

María se volvió una historiadora autodidacta. Así como María, el entusiasmo que tiene Dennis lo han conducido a explorar Perú y escribir seis libros sobre sus costumbres, tradiciones y cultura, en forma poética, y recibir reconocimientos de la Universidad Peruana Los Andes, en Huancayo, por su contribución cultural; además, le concedieron la Gran Cruz de la Ciudad de San de Jerónimo Tunán y fue nominado Poeta Laureado de la ciudad, y le fue concedido el Premio Nacional de Perú, “Antena Regional”: El Mejor del 2006 por promover la cultura.

María, en Lima se conoció y se casó con don Alejandro Diez Canseco, su verdadero amor y juntos condujeron una vida muy orientada a la cultura, quizás como Dennis y Rosa Peñaloza de Siluk lo han tenido estos años pasados, ya que Rosa ha viajado alrededor del mundo varias veces, y por muchas partes de Perú.
Aunque la mayor parte de las poesías culturales de Dennis es sobre muchos aspectos de Perú, otros son sobre el Guerrero Wanka y la Guerra del Pacífico, Dennis siendo un Veterano de Vietnam decorado de la guerra (1971), y también poesías sobre el Valle del Mantaro; como con María, en mayor grado es sobre el Imperio Incaico.

María, puede quizás ser llamada, o mencionada como la “Josephus” de Perú; mientras Dennis ha sido referido en Perú, como Julio Verne (refiriéndose a todos sus viajes y libros relacionados con viajes, y su estilo cultural de poesía, y sus escrituras), y de vez en cuando, como el Poeta Trotamundos, denominado por los periódicos y revistas en Perú.

Y ahora para la narración y reunión:

El Diálogo Narrativo y Reunión

Nosotros (mi esposa Rosa y yo) llegamos al edificio del Instituto de Estudios Peruanos a las 10:50 de la mañana del día Jueves 22 de Abril del 2007, en Lima, Perú (Jesús María); justo después de acabar de llegar hablamos brevemente con la persona encargada de la seguridad, y nosotros estábamos ya con veinte minutos de retraso para la reunión, debido a que nuestro taxi se malogró en plena carretera (Panamericana) y tuvimos que salir de allí a buscar otro taxi en la calle transversal. Mientras nos apresurábamos a subir las escaleras, llegamos a una pequeña oficina, que el guardia nos había indicado, allí estaba ella sentada detrás de su escritorio, yo la reconocí al instante, había visto una fotografía de ella, ella lucía lo mismo, pensé que era una fotografía de cuando ella era más joven, por eso estuve sorprendido, ella lucía más joven de lo que pensé: ella llevaba una blusa de seda multicolores (negro, rojo y blanco principalmente). Ella tenía 91 años, pero parecía más bien de 67 años, pensé que estaba muy conservada. Ella, María dio la vuelta por su escritorio, saludándome y a mi esposa, mientras nos pedía que nos sentáramos, en aquel momento le di dos de los libros que había escrito sobre Perú, ella leyó los títulos verbalmente, mientras miraba cada uno, los leyó en inglés, “Spell of the Andes”, y “The Magic of the Avelinos”, después ella sonrió (más adelante le diría a una amiga, refiriéndose a los libros “son maravillosos”), podía ver que ella estaba orgullosa de ser peruana, aun cuando yo averiguaría que ella tenía raíces polacas por el lado de su padre, y peruana por el lado de su madre.

Yo sabía que era muy difícil conseguir una cita para hablar con ella, ya que ella había estado enferma una semana antes, y no permitía a muchos visitantes, en primer lugar, lo que fue confirmado por un número de personas antes de mi llegada, e incluso el guardia estuvo sorprendido que ella me permitió visitarla, así que me sentí más que afortunado.

“Siéntese por favor”, ella dijo con su delicada mirada fuerte, pero ojos suaves y severos.
Mientras me sentaba la pedí que firmara uno de sus libros para mí, “Historia del Tahuantinsuyu”, y mientras me puse a firmar mis libros para ella, ella dijo modestamente con un poco de humor, “Intercambiaremos firmas”, y otra vez vino esa sonrisa misteriosa, que era cálida y natural.

(Durante los pocos minutos siguientes me levanté, y mi esposa Rosa, tomó dos fotos de ella y yo, y yo se los mostré en mi cámara digital, y ella me miró un tanto y dijo, “tengo 91 años”: No dije nada, quizás nada que decir, ella lucía 25 años más joven. Ella lucía muy bien para su edad.)

Después vino, conversación suelta sobre la comida de Huancayo, ya que yo había empezado ese tema diciendo que “mi esposa era de allí”. Me gusta “cuy colorado”, le dije, y ella contestó, “¿ha probado cuy chactado?” y contesté, “¡Ah si…la esposa del profesor Pedro de Huancayo lo hizo para mí, estaba muy bien!” Entonces añadí, “me gusta Huancayo pa…pa…” y antes de que yo pudiera terminar la oración, ella me preguntó, “quiere decir, ¿papa a la huancaina?” Sí, reafirmé.

(Pienso que María estaba descubriendo, que amaba a Perú y a sus culturas misteriosas tanto como ella lo hizo, atrás cuando primero descubrió esta tierra antigua.)

“¿Cuál es su origen?” ella me preguntó, sabiendo que yo era de Norteamérica.
“Ruso e irlandés”, le contesté, añadiendo, “y su apellido no es...peruano ¿no?
“Ciertamente no”, dijo ella, “es polaco”. Entonces añadí, “Yo también soy polaco de parte de mi abuela, ruso de parte de mi abuelo, e irlandés de parte de mi padre”. Un tanto repitiéndome yo mismo.

“Es una mezcla” comentó ella. Creo que omití el decir que era polaco debido a eso, demasiado condimento en el pastel. (Y hablamos brevemente sobre esto, cómo la vida en mi clan familiar, sacó el polaco y ruso en el círculo familiar.)

Después, mi esposa y yo la invitamos a tomar desayuno diciendo, “Martina va a ir el miércoles a tomar desayuno (y su amigo)”

“¿Quién es Martina?” dijo ella, con una pizca de ingenio, ella estaba muy dinámica para ser una mujer de 91 años.
Mi esposa le explicó, que ella era del Centro de Antienvejecimiento en Lima, y ella reconoció el nombre enseguida, diciendo, “hay una reunión la próxima semana allí”. (Pensé, qué memoria tan aguda, mejor que la mía)
“Estoy muy vieja para desayunos” dijo ella, “tengo que comer comida especial, pero gracias por la invitación”

Entonces comprendiendo que el tiempo había pasado rápidamente, simplemente dije, en voz baja; “No deberíamos de tomar más de su tiempo, usted ya nos ha dado la mayor parte de este, y estoy seguro que usted tiene muchas cosas que hacer” y entonces nos disculpamos, y ella dijo en seguida, “encantada de conocerlo”, ella estaba de pie, cuando habló, y ahora comenzó a sentarse, mientras nosotros comenzamos a marcharnos.

Esta fue una reunión muy cordial, y una que siento, sacó la predecibilidad de una persona, una que no está encerrada en una caja debido a la profesión de uno. Esto fue bueno pensé: hay una gran humanidad sobre esta renombrada historiadora.

ENGLISH VERSION

The Narrative Dialogue and Meeting of:
Historian Maria Rostworowski and Poet Dennis L. Siluk

By Dennis L. Siluk
(Translated by Rosa Peñaloza de Siluk)

Advance: A historical meeting, it can be called between renowned historian, Maria Rostworowski (de Diez Canseco), of Lima, Peru, and Dennis L. Siluk, Poet and novelist (who lives part time in Peru, and part time in his home state of Minnesota, USA); Maria has a half-century of investigating and studying Peru’s historical past, and a world wide audience with her countless books on its cultures, traditions, and historical data; a few books translated from the Spanish into English (i.e., “History of the Inca Realm”).
Maria's mother was a Peruvian lady and her father was from Poland, as was brought out during the meeting between her and Dennis. Maria was born in Barranco, Lima, Peru; when she was five-years old she went with her family to Europe—and lived in France, Poland, England and Belgium, and returned to Perú when she was nineteen-years old, similar to Dennis’ experience, in that he fell in love with Peru (particularly the Mantaro Valley, and now has come to Peru to retire here part time).
She married a Pole in Poland, as Dennis married a Peruvian from Huancayo, Peru, adventuring in Lima, in 1999, they met, and married a few months later, in February of 2000.
Maria became a self-taught historian. Like Maria, Dennis’ enthusiasm has lead him to explore Peru, and write six books on its customs, traditions, and culture, in poetic form, and receive awards from the Los Andes University, in Huancayo, for his cultural contribution; in addition, he was awarded the Grand Cross of the City of San Jeronimo, and appointed Poeta Laureado of the city, along with Awarded the National Prize of Peru, "Antena Regional": The best of 2006 for promoting culture.
Maria, in Lima she met and married Alejandro Diez Canseco, her true love and together they lead a very culture-oriented life, perhaps like Dennis and Rosa Penaloza de Siluk have these past several years, for Rosa has traveled around the world several times, and throughout Peru.
Although much of Dennis’ cultural poetry is on many aspects of Peru, a great deal is on the Wanka Warrior and Pacific War, Dennis being a decorated Vietnam Veteran, of the war (1971), and the Mantaro Valley, as with Maria, to a great extent is on the Inca Empire.
Maria, She perhaps can be called, or referred to as the Josephus of Peru; as Dennis has been referred to in Peru, as the Jules Verne (referring to all his travels, and books relating to travel, and his cultural style of poetry, and writings), and at times, the Globe-trotter Poet, dubbed by the newspapers, and magazines in Peru. And now for the Narration, and meeting:

The Narrative Dialogue and Meeting

We (my wife, Rosa and I) arrived at the building about 10:50 AM, Thursday, morning, March 22, 2007, in Lima, Peru (Jesus Maria, district) at the cultural center (Peruvian Learning Instituted); right after we arrived we talked briefly with the guard, and we were already twenty-minutes late for the meeting, our cab was stranded on the highway, and we had to jump off it, and catch another on the side road. As we hurried up the stairs, we came to a small office the guard had pointed out to us, there she was sitting behind her desk, I knew her instantly, had seen a picture of her, she looked the same, I thought it was a younger picture at the time, so I was surprised, she looked younger than I thought she was: she wore a silk like multi colored blouse (black, red and white for the most part). She was 91-years old, but looked more like 67, I thought, well kept. She, Maria came around her desk, greeting me and my wife, as she asked us to sit down, at which time, I gave her two of my books I had done on Peru, she read the titles verbally, as she looked at each one, read them in English, “The Spell of the Andes,” and “The Magic of the Avelinos,” then she smiled (later on would say to a friend, “These are marvelous books…”), I could see she was proud to be a Peruvian, even though I would find out, she had Polish roots, from her father’s side, and Peruvian from her mother’s.
I knew it was most difficult to get a visit to see her, she had been sick a week before, and did not allow many visitors, in the first place, thus confirmed by a number of people prior to my arrival, and even the guard was surprised she allowed my visit, I felt more than lucky.

“Sit down please,” she said with her strong looking frailness, soft but stern eyes.
As I sat down I asked her to sign one of her boos for me, ‘Historia Del Tahuantinsuyu” and as I went to sign my books for her, she said, modestly, and with a little humor, “We shall interchange,” and again came that mysterious smile, that was warm and unspoiled.

(During the next few minutes I stood up, and Rosa my wife, took two pictures of her and I, and I showed them to her on my digital camera, and she looked at me somewhat, and said, “I’m 91-years old:” I didn’t say anything, perhaps nothing to say, she looked 25-years younger. She looked good for her age.)

Next came, loose talk about the food from Huancayo, since I had brought up the subject of my wife being from there, “I like Cuy Colorado,” I told her, and she replied, “Have you tried Cuy Chactado?” And I replied, “Oh yes…Professor Pedro’s wife in Huancayo made it for me, it was very good!” Then I added, “I like Huancayo po…ta..” and before I could finish the sentence, she corrected me, “You mean, Papa a la Huancaina?”
“Yes,” I confirmed.

(I think Maria was finding out, I loved Peru and its mysterious cultures as much as she did, back when she first discovered this ancient land.)

“What is your origin?” she asked me, knowing I was from North America.
“Russian and Irish,” I said, adding, “And your name isn’t Peruvian...?”
“Of course not,” she said, “it’s Polish.” Then I added, “I’m Polish also, from my Grandmother’s side, Russian from my Grandfather, and Irish, from my father.” Somewhat repeating myself.
“It’s a mixture,” she commented. I think I left out the Polish because of just that, too many spices in the pie. (And we talked briefly on that, how my extended family life, brought out the Polish and Russian in the family circle.)

Next, my wife and I invited her for breakfast saying, “Martina,” was going to be over Wednesday for breakfast (and her friend).
“Who is Martina?” she said, with a speck of wit, she was quite lively for a 91-years old woman.
My wife explained, she was from the Center of Anti-aging, in Lima, and then, pondering a bit on the name, and center, she recognized the name, saying, “There is a meeting next week there.” (I thought: what a sharp memory, better than mine)
“I’m too old for breakfast” she said, “I have to eat special food, but, thank you both for the invitation”

Then realizing the time had gone by quickly, I merely said, in a low voice; “We shouldn’t take anymore of your time, you’ve already given us much of it, and I’m sure you have things to do,” and so I excused us, and she said promptly, “Nice to meet you,” she was standing, when she talked, and now started to sit down, as we started to leave.
It was a most cordial meeting, and one I feel, brought out the ordinariness of a person, one that is not locked into a box because of ones profession. This was good I thought: there is a great humanness about this renowned historian.

Transformation (An Odd Story of a Spacecraft)

2007-02-20T16:21:00.000-08:00

Transformation

Mick and Me

It was back in 1963, or ’64, when my brother and I were up by Rice School had left his presence for a spell, and went over by the small grocery store, when I returned, my brother was staring, looking up into the sky. He’s about six foot one, I’m about five foot eight inches tall. I was at that time slim and muscular, my brother, somewhat, pleasingly plump. He said, “You know what I saw Lee?” And I said of course, “No, what?”
“You won’t believe me,” Mick commented.
“Try me, “I responded. And here is what he said: “I just saw a round space craft, it was held still in the atmosphere (he is at this time sixteen years old, I am fourteen),” then he sucked in his breath as if to let it all out at once and said, “It lit up, like the moon, light all around it,” and he looked about to see if he could find the craft or perhaps its silhouette, “It was descending, closer me, and then you showed up.”

Back in the ‘60s we young folk were doing many things, but our neighborhood was not into all those drugs, if I recall right, although who knows, but somehow I do feel his story was creditable. Now for another story which somehow I feel links into this one.

Transformation

Sid and Me

I knew the fellow, we went to school together, but he never wanted to go, he just would come and pick me up at the edge of the street that led into the school, and he’d take me off and we’d get drunk, and pick up girls. I was seventeen at the time, and he was nineteen. He always seemed older to me, I mean, as if he had the wisdom or insight, or foresight, whatever you are suppose to have in your later years (perhaps fifties), he had at nineteen years old, no questions asked, he did, simple as that. His first name was Sid, I will not tell you his last name, because he has passed on, some years ago, many years ago, to be truthful.
Here is the story he told me:

“I was walking, just walking, that’s all, and believe it or not, a spacecraft was following me. Yes, I said a spacecraft. Perhaps other folks saw it, or thought they saw it, because it was there, and gone as fast as a clap of an eye. But I saw it. I was…( he hesitates) you won’t believe this, but its true, I was 59-years old at the time this took place, I looked back then, as if I was sixteen or seventeen, yes, I proclaim to be nineteen now, but I’m really much older, if I told you, it would be hard to absorb. Anyhow, I was walking, and I saw this young boy, he was handsome, very good looking, built like you, several years ago, and it stayed in my head, and as the ship followed me, for the few minutes, it seemed to be extracting information from and of my thinking, thinking I say, of and at the moment. Even though I was spellbound of this spacecraft, I was thinking nonetheless, it was perhaps a delusion, illusion, something of that matter. And the boy came back into my mind.
“Well, as I turned the corner to walk a little further, I saw three lovely, shapely girls, in bikinis, lovely as three smooth looking sunflowers, and it was of course summer, and Elvis was of course popular and they were playing one of his records, in the backyard by their pool, resting on towels (this was of course in Minnesota). One of the girls, a blond, with shapely legs, and just the right curves, like a hard pear, she looked at me looking, and smiled, and went back to her friends. A black girl was there, and she turned around, she looked more Spanish Black, than black-black, and she also had a great pear shape as she twisted around to see what the blond was looking at, and there was a third girl, who paid no attention to me at all.
I turned around and walked away, I am old man, or at least getting old you know (so I told myself at that time), I was at that time, and I’m several years older now of course. But what took place in the following hour or so was amazing. I walked over to Como Park, it was but a few blocks away, there the lake was, and so I simply leaned against a tree, again I saw the disc, the sphere, spacecraft, it read my thinking process again. And this time there was some wishful thinking going on in my head. Here is what took place:
‘[the Voice said:] undress, standstill, and we will remold you, it is called a transformation, and you will look similar to that young boy….’ And I did what the voice said, and my body got red hot, something from the ship was hitting me. I couldn’t´ move if I wanted to. Then my skin bubbled, and I heard the voice again say “
‘Close your eyes’ and I did. And my skin got numb, and hot, and needle like pricks went through the skin, and a crust, like a casing came over me, except the inner eye sockets. And then I heard the voice again, “Jump into the water and wash yourself, we shall monitor you, see how you are doing with your new transformation.” The voice was more an echo through a machine it sounded like.
“I did wash myself, and when I came out from the lake, a few folks got mule-eyed at me, and turned their heads. But I put my cloths on quickly, went to the bathroom at the pavilion, by the lake, and to my amazement, I was that boy I saw, almost perfect, so my reflection showed in the mirrors of the bathroom. Then I heard the voice again say, “You will be old inside, but new on the outside.” And as I looked at myself in the mirror a second time, I couldn’t believe my eyes yet. I was that boy.
“I went back to that place where those girls were, and the one blond fancied me, and that was the beginning of different life for me. She was of course, forth some years younger than I, and my voice was deeper than a young chap, but it was never too deep even when I was young.”

This was of course many years ago, perhaps (I was 17 years old in 1964, he was perhaps 65, if indeed he was 59, when he says he met the girls, he died I think in 1976, he would have been somewhere around 76 years old, and his wife, 27 or so, she never knew); he has long since been dead as I’ve mentioned. Folks couldn’t figure it out, especially his wife, whom was 40-years younger than he, and she thinking he was but three or four years her senior. And perhaps this was my first experience with what I call my adventures into the Cadaverous Planets series. Whatever, he enjoyed his marriage, if I recall, and his wife, whom was in the process of divorcing him anyhow, got $5000-dollars from his insurance. So you can’t beat that. True or not true, I will never know for certain, but I kind of miss his ramping about.
Written: 2-19-2007

"Softly Bends the Leaves" (Poetry on Imaging and Imageery)

2007-02-02T16:06:00.000-08:00

Poems with: imaging… and
imagery

Softly Bends the Leaves

Softly bends the long thin—knifelike leaves
Through the curtains and glass
I can see—, Its green…

The Sun reflecting off its seams;
If I move the piano, just a tinge
I’d see the whole thing.

#1659 (2-2-2007)) Lima, Peru

God Told Me

God told me once,
“Dennis, you’re after my heart…”
“Oh!” I said (perhaps playing dumb)
“Is this not true?” He replied.
(I hesitated, not sure why)) Said :))
“Yes, this is true,” (I was no fool).

#1658 2-1-2007

Highways

We build highways where people go
No one seems to get off them
And so, no one really knows….

#1660 2/1-2/2007

Triggers

The Deepest thing in us is Memories,
which can, and will
find their way out, once triggered.

#1661

Rosa’s Newspaper

She turns the pages of the newspaper
Like a slap on a child’s wrist
(so it looks and so it sounds):
Trying to find the crossword puzzle…!

#1662 (Dedicated to my wife, Rosa Peñaloza de Siluk)

Commentary: Poetry’s Function (just a few words): I believe the nature of poetry, its function—for the most part, have attached meanings; in the physical world, it can be confusing, it is in fact about language, as it claims to be. For often it has no voice, theme or even recognizable form. We call this free Verse, which is the dominate form of Postmodernism; prior to this, we had of course, Modernism, where we reexamined what poetry is. The density of language and intensity of imaging… and imagery; put another way, mental images; and: descriptions, metaphors, similes. Language is a two-way street, embraced but unregulated for the most part.

Shapes and Heat in Lima´s Summer

2007-02-02T01:44:00.000-08:00

Shapes and HEAT in Lima’s Summer

I can tell by the morning
After I get up, look out my windows
That heat will come, thus, I can bake
In the outside restaurant, in the afternoon—
Next, I hear the birds in the garden singing
I look at the shapes of them (everything)
In the park, doorways, the street
Like syllables in a poem; shapes, shapes
(I can almost count them))The shapes))
They have faces you know, and
Images, weight, color (dimensions)
Everything, every little thing, has shapes.
I let myself (for a moment) just a moment,
I let the shapes dominate me (by them)
And then, then the heat comes…
Souring is the sun (in Lima’s summer)
Then I rush down to El Parquecitos
A Restaurant in Miraflores…
(by: Taxi, Taxi, Taxi…more shapes)
—talk to:
Carmon, Ela, or Sarah … (usually);
Looking at more shapes: their
Sounds, colors, weights, dimensions.

#1657 2-1-2007

Comments on writing a poem: To write a poem, one must travel, study art, music, movements, the eyes, and body language of the individual, the colors and shapes of the landscape, you must see the fire flicker, hear the sound of it, smell the smoke, feel the heat of the fire, to the flesh (all from memory); thus, now we are ready to write a poem: flesh, fire and flickers, make for a great beginning.

Great Poems

“If you can’t write go to the Zoo,
And look at the panther,” said
The painter to the poet—and
He did just that, and wrote a
Book called: “New Poems,”
In 1908; and matter-of-fact,
History now calls them
“Great Poems” at that.

#1657 2/1-2/2007

In these two poems and comments, Dennis tries to deliver a message I think, he is trying to say: use all you have to put into the poem. If you travel, use it, if you play music, add it...yes, look at what is around you, this is life, write about it. And if you can't find it, to write it, go looking for it. Rosa

Elephants in the Sky [A Story about Timbuktu]

2007-02-02T01:02:00.000-08:00

Elephants in the Sky
[A Story about Timbuktu]

[1980s, Lee Evens in Mali, Timbuktu/Africa]

Advance: Lee was discharged from the Army in 1980, whereupon, he traveled the world, one of those locations was in Mali, by the legendary city of Timbuktu; whereupon he found himself in the middle of a plague, a plague of locust.

[Diary-review]

There were swarms of locust over the top of my car, in front of me, in front of the car—swarms I say swarms: a dark shadow covering the sky, descending, descending onto the road—in front of me, behind me, it was locusts, locusts, locusts—locusts everywhere, everyplace: so thick, thick with layers that made my car slip, slipping and sliding as if on ice. They seemed like they walked, walked, walked among the sky, cluttered together like big oaks; akin to a druid dark sky, coeval with the leering sky. They looked like pools of ghouls embracing, embracing the hooded faded sky that looked like dusk, but weren’t. Good God, good God, good God, I cried!
My radiator was being blocked, plugged by these finger-sized carcasses. I had to pull over to the side of the road. It was but a moment thereafter when I saw some adolescents down the road a bit, not too far, just a little ways, three of them trying to beat them off, beat the locusts with their belts, pants belts. Then one resorted to a stick, a stick I say, would you use a stick? To be honest, I’d run I think, run like hell; anyhow, he took a stick to beating them off, while the other used their hats, hands; they were dropping down like hail onto them from all sides; ragged looking shadows of them, full-fledged shadows, throbbing against their bodies were these locusts: down and sideways: bombarding them like creatures from outer space, like in the bible, where it mentions such things happening back in those far off days, the days Moses: the plagues God bequeath upon the pharaoh.
I think these kids would have loved to have found a window anyplace to climb through, and nail shut about now, as I kept looking out of my car window, and these creatures stained my window dirty with their restless scribbled bodies.
This was bad, very bad; the large insects were in their hair, noses, ears, climbing up their pants legs, flying straight for their mouths. They tried to spit them out, but more would jump from ear to nose to mouth.
The whole area was becoming infested with them [them: being, those locust critters; huge grasshoppers]. They were becoming as thick as the walls of Troy—twenty feet thick. I turned the engine of my rented car off; it spit and sputtered a bit, then came to a dead stop, a burping stop. I could not see the boys anymore, only a cocoon of these creatures several inches thick around them—like mummies; they now rolled about on the ground like dying lions, screaming: it simply shivered me; it was as if hate and love coiled within my stomach.
For a hundred miles around I had heard they were eating up the crops before anyone had time to harvest them; catastrophic damage to all the crops, as the new generation of larvae appeared—thus, widening the dimensions of the one-hundred mile radius to possibly two-hundred miles (sooner than later). But now they were on top of my car: yes, yes, yes, on top of my car; under it, all over it, and in the fields beside me, on the road. I was but twenty-five miles outside of Timbuktu. Ah! What would you do?
As far as I knew, there was no means of spraying available to kill these creepy-crawlers, nor any other treatment, why that occurred to me, is beyond me, I mean who gives a shit, I’m in the middle of it; yes, yes, no equipment as supplies were of a minimum and vehicles were scarce—I was lucky to have secured a deal with this jeep. I was witnessing farmers beating the locust into trenches; what more could they do? Swatting them, whacking them, from all sides, and running: I mean running! Like the boys should have done, didn’t do, but should have done, could not do anymore.
(This was the moment I’d put forward to later, when I telling others they looked like elephants in the sky. But that was to be a little bit in the future yet; now they just kept coming and coming and coming, these locust-insects.)
Now I’m breathing in the hot air in the jeep, it seems to me I’m recycling my own air. In the five-mile area they covered most everything; there were at least, must have been at least, couldn’t be less than 250-million locust I figured (insects); hoppers, yellow winged hoppers—crazy and manic hoppers, as if they were on a sugar high. That would be a weight volume of 5000 elephants dropping from the sky. I had a lot of time to figure that out, for the most part, let’s say hours watching these hoppers fly and jump, and descend, trying to eat my tires—trying to get into the jeep and eat me.
‘Try, try, try,’ I said, ‘…fuck you all I said.’

[Entry] “I was in Timbuktu a few days ago, on my way back to Timbuktu now, I had been in the countryside—where theses critters were breeding, I am not sure where it was in particular, but it was in Mali where they had breed I do believe—first, someplace in Mali. I was doing what I love to do, checking out some old writings that were found in one of the old mud houses in Timbuktu; realizing at one time Timbuktu was a Mecca for learning for the Muslims, or better put, Islamic cultured; on the old Silk Road you could say. I was eager, the phenomenon would move east, away from me, to Sudan or Chad, or all the way to Egypt; move away to anyplace, but out of Mali and for sure, away from Timbuktu in particular. I was surprised there was not a humanitarian crisis alert, or if there was it didn’t look like it where I was; yes, were the United Nation’s vehicles? A good question I figured, and never to be answered.
The trick is to kill them before new generations developed, thus stopping them in their tracks from breaking into other places—countries, and a new cycle starting. The crops I knew would be gone soon in the south and now in this area as well, if they were not yet, and should they go east—well, let them worry about that.”

They leaped like little elephants on the hood now, hood of, of my car; they looked, looked into my windows, deep into my windows, nose against the glass (smutches all over the glass like a disease; voracious little dispositions all over their faces, like fairies stuck together) as if I was eatable, somehow I got the sense (they had the scent, my scent I expect) they knew I was trapped in the car, and I was for sure. But I remember what Solomon told me in Egypt, Cairo a few months back, should something like this occur—so it was somewhat forecasted almost—and it was now developing: anyhow he said,
“(‘…should this occur…’) Try to make it till morning, when everything cools down.”
I figured the wingless ‘hoppers’ the new breed, were developing now in the fields around me as the adult yellow ones could be seen flying about eating, and killed by whomever (the farmers and gosh, that was about it for now).

[The Big Hopper: diary entry] One big hopper gazed through my window, must be the size of a sparrow—(I’m writing this down as he’s looking at me). At its sight I saw its milky eyes, they followed me, then I realized it was somewhat blind, I mean, its eyes gave out a yellowness to it, as if it had cataracts, its lips trembled from old age, it mumbled something, as if talking to itself, then it stood aside to let the younger ones peer in on me.
“Come…súh!” (Note: the author translates for the bug) the big one said (smiling an amiable grin). Thus, with apprehensiveness my eyebrows were quivering with my nervous system was wacky. Panting like a dog, I was. I was so bewildered…! I ended up looking out the window for the longest time…blankly; then turning my head demurely to see if any of those hoppers where in back of me—sneaking up on me; were getting inside the jeep. My eyes could not relax from this insidious invading force, if anything was quite disarming…this was, but then what would you expect, harmony in the middle of an earthquake? What would you expect? I found myself drifting at times, but I knew I couldn’t go to sleep. I mean who could?
There I sat behind the wheel, crouched forward to peer through the blinding storm of locust; these hoppers were like rain sheets hitting the windshield quicker than the wipers could fan it clean. My palm and forehead had a glossy mist to it.

It was now mid-afternoon, and they were hot, it was hot, I was hot, everything, even the car was hot, and thus, morning would be my best time to make my move, when they’d be cooled down, down in the crops around me—quiet. Hence, I had turned my car off and I’d leave my car off, the suspense would come in the morning when I’d have to try and start it again.

—[2:00 AM] I must had fallen to sleep, and an automatic clock in my head woke me up, it was inky dark out there, outside my windows, hence, I started my car up, it choked a bit, but it started, and I noticed my water gage going up, as if a water hose was plugged or ripped. I turned the car off. I didn’t want to make too much noise, just get out of here and get back to Timbuktu: I figured they’d follow the crops, and bypass the city; oh possibly a few million might divert themselves to the city, but that is not bad; I mean, what is a million when you got 249-million more. I knew they were all on the cool ground and in a few hours they’d be in the air again—over me again; and should they decide to stick around I’d die of a heat stroke I figured, sooner than later that is, sooner than they’d get a chance to eat me. I opened my car door slowly, pacifying the moment; shinned a flashlight on the road beside me, there were many about—sleeping, quiet, almost stone-still—could I have hummed them to oblivion, I would have; but I could walk around them for the most part I figured, and I did, did just that, then I opened the hood of the car, slowly, quietly, with more gentleness then I ever knew I had, as if it was a woman, looked at the hose, and several hoppers flew in my face, I had glasses on, they poked at my eyes nonetheless, I said nothing, nothing at all, just swatted them away with the rag I had in my hand—and I didn’t use much force in doing that. One hose had a small crack in it. I knew I’d lose water, all the water I had in the car in about five miles should I not prepare it, with twenty miles left to go should I not fix it—I’d be worse off than now, I’d be stranded right in their pathway. The engine was covered with the winged hoppers, I wanted to say to these hoppers a few gruesome swear words, but I can’t, I’d wake them creatures up surely; I had waked them up—a few of them up already, and they started to fly out and about clearing a passage to my hose.
They were not jumping on me, just a few, trying to crawl up my pants legs—tickling me here and there: still attacking my glasses; I think they liked glass—but just a few attacked me half in a fog out of some instinct and automatic reflex: nothing to get alarmed about I told myself. I tried not to open my mouth, a few seemed to spot it when I took in a deep breathe of air—as if they had radar, consequently, they zoomed right at it, I had to spit them out as when they hit my face their legs seemed to have found their way into the crevice of my mouth. Then I got an idea, I opened my trunk up, took out a five gallon can of gasoline, in this country you always carry extra gas, water and food, always—lest you find yourself in some deserted location, as I have at this very moment; I poured it on the side of the road, up about two-hundred-feet leading into the fields, then on my way back I took my First Aid kit, put the white tape—normally used for bandaging wounds—put it around the hole in the hose (not making a sound), and started my car up, at the same time I lit the gasoline by throwing a match out of the window onto the road, and I hit the accelerator to fifty-miles an hour (it’s as fast as my jeep would go ((it was an old US Army jeep they must had purchased it from some Army surplus garage)) and I watched the road and fields explode with lightening-like fire behind me.
Yes, yes, yes, behind me was a windless fire breeding into the fields, eating hoppers while sleeping, roasted grasshoppers: yes, yes, yes they woke up, this horde of hoppers woke up in a French-fired position I’m sure; to them I expect it was their ‘Pompeii,’ and shall talk about it for a thousand years to come in this region of the world; to me it was salvation; oh yes, it is what legends are made out of in the hopper-world, I’m sure—I got a mouth full of toxic fumes which was the only curse of the predicament for me, and a bonfire galore as I raced to Timbuktu.

When I got to the city, it was locked up tight, everyone afraid to come out of their mud huts. I knew I couldn’t tell them I had lit the fire—for my sake; they’d make me pay for the corps I suppose (after the crisis was over I’m sure; for humanity has a short memory when it comes to thank-you’s and money). But I think they were happy to see it was all over, and a few heard my jeep motor, for slowly one by one, a few came out of their shops until the whole main street was out looking about with their doors open, ready to run back in a moments notice. I had expected them to invade the city somewhat—somewhat expected this to happen, as did the residents, but none did; and they did head east. Hence, had I told them about me lighting the fire, they’d have roasted me in it, so my silence, or intuition was right on.

Written 3/26/2005, while at the BN, Café in Roseville, Minnesota

The Cockroach Haiku’s (or Hokku)

2007-01-30T09:12:00.000-08:00

The Cockroach Haiku’s (or Hokku)

Commentary:

The haiku is a Japanese tercet; its lines consist of 5, 7 and 5 syllables respectively. In my first book of poetry, I did several of them; to be proper, the lines are unrhymed, I say proper in the sense of how the poem was meant to be.

We can add to this hardship, short poem, by adding the name of a longer Haiku, called Tanka. Here we add two additional lines. Thus, making a chain, and now we got five lines; the two extra lines have seven syllables each. I have done these poems in the past (not naming them Tanka, but they were). This part of the poem should revolve smoothly with the above three lines.

There are always exceptions to the policy, is that not true, and in my case, it is good, because I do not like to be locked into form, to where it robs effect, and emotion. Thus, we have the Enclosed Tercet, that allows rhyme (aba)) usually)). Then we have the Sicilian Tercet, this also allows rhyme, iambic pentameter.

We can also go to the Triad, a loose Irish form. I’m part Irish, so this can come in handy. Here we have three tercets, all bearing some relationship to each other, and all consisting to be one poem. Then you see Siluk’s Haiku, and that is another story. We have several linking poems, some with a slight rhyme to it, others not, the lines are 17-syllables, and usually I like them 7, 5, 5 --not always though. (there are other forms of haiku I have not mentioned, Chinese, etc., and I think the main purpose of the haiku, or poem (or any poem for that matter), is to insure it is readable to the reader (if not a specific group in mind, for some poems are so difficult, you need a combination to unlock them). Light it may be, or hard and heavy. Here it is lighthearted, but much truth to it.

The Cockroach Haiku’s
(The poems)

Cockroach I

Now listen, you Cockroaches—
don’t tell the thieves—
where I live!

#1639

Cockroach II

Leaping from my neighbor’s yard
“Excuse me,” he said,
“Where is the damn bread?”

#1640

Cockroach III

The night is so long and hot,
Here the cockroach rests
By my bedroom door!...

#1641

Cockroach IV

Fatty cockroach, please stand still
Dennis is coming
(where are my glasses?)

#1642

Cockroach V

The old fat cockroach, he bends
His fat little knees
Listening for me.

#1643

Cockroach VI

Cockroach, cockroach please beware
I’m stepping down
These hard wooden stairs.

#1644

Cockroach VII

Since it is summer and hot
Can we not, have some—
Cockroach courtesy?

#1644

(1-30-2007))Written in the evening, while in Lima, Peru)) Commentary added 1-31-2007, and poems restructured.

The Old Camera (A Tribute to Mike Rossert)

2007-01-29T18:44:00.000-08:00

The Old Camera
(A tribute to old times)

Sometimes I feel
(looking at that old picture
from that old camera—back in ‘58)
feel I’m still that eleven-year old boy
in Como Park (St. Paul, Minnesota)
standing in the sun
with my pal, Mike Rossert
(like Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer)
smiling—proud as can be
(over nothing)) just life))
arm around his shoulder
(his around mine)) now 59)).
I suppose there wasn’t a care in the world
(just loose time, romping time—).
That old camera (1840s)
caught it all:
life was so simple
it was a ball…!

#1632 1-29-2007

Note: Dedicated to Mike Rossert. Mike and I roamed St. Paul as kids, between 1956, perhaps to 1959; but we remained friends until I was perhaps 15-years old, then we both lost track of each other. He was perhaps my first real friend, I mean, one I spent any quality time with. We’d roam the banks of the Mississippi River, and wake up the bombs in the caves thereabouts. We run and explore the tunnels under the streets of St. Paul, Minnesota, that went from the Capitol to the Historical Society, and to other such places. And to the top of the hill where the museum used to be, and of course out to Como Park; we’d also run in and out of the elevators downtown, like clowns. I think he was more daring than I but it was—nonetheless, unforgettable times, times that are worth looking to back; thus, it is prudent I do believe, to let ones kids explore the wonders of youth, it is only around for a clap of an eye, than lost to oblivion, unless you can capture it, in a poem.

A Reminiscence of Keiko Fujimori [A Limerick]

2007-01-29T17:37:00.000-08:00

A Reminiscence of Keiko Fujimori
[A Limerick]

Keiko Fujimori once said
(in so many words):
Be careful who you select
For your next president (of Peru)
Lest we be stuck—
For five-years, then what…?

#1634 1-29-2007 (Written in Lima, Peru) the Limerick is paraphrased to how I understood, what she meant, from a TV News broadcast in Lima, Peru (during the elections of 2006)

Note: The statement of being careful whom you select for president Keiko Fujimori said (which I remember her saying, watching TV, and was inspired by it; which is of great importance, and very much looked at in the United States) was during the runoffs of the election of 2006, for presidential candidates of Peru; but yet I think the statement is one everyone needs to examine, everywhere and every time they (or: one) go (s) to elect an official. So often, and so quickly one forgets who is paying their wages: Not only in Peru, but all over the world (South America seems to be plagued with it share of official robbers to the point, one wants to become an elected official simply for monetary gain).
Sometimes you get what you ask for only to regret later (and sometimes forget) you asked for it. I agree with Keiko, look at their track record (what have they done to deserve to represent the people)) too often we put into office unqualified people)).
So often we are fooled by their smile, and how they present a lecture. They (politicians) are trained to lecture, how to grab emotion of the soul of a person, how to use certain words to gain influence over a group or crowd. They know who they are talking to, what select group they are addressing. That is why we must elect our officials by thinking, not by our emotions.
I know the verse I wrote for Keiko, is short in words, if not oversimplified, but nothing more really needs to be added.

The Coke Stream: The Mantaro Rio (Peru))In English & Spanish))

2007-01-25T06:26:00.000-08:00

The Mantaro Rio of Peru:
A Coke Stream

When you come to visit the Mantaro Valley, just beyond the huge mountains called the Andes, you will enter a Valley unequaled on earth, and again, I must say, you will be surrounded by the second largest mountains in the world, the Andes, although they are not the huge ones, perhaps only 2000-feet tall, but you are 10,500-feet high already, thus, you are 12000-feet above sea-level. The valley is more beautiful than the Scared Valley I think, and it has the old time touch to it; that is to say it brings you back two-hundred years with its adobe houses, ox and carts, and donkeys, lamas and dogs running up and down the hills, throughout the valley villages. And once in the city of Huancayo (population apex: 325,000), you have all the modern amenities a big city has, so you got a mixture of both, old and new. And the women still dress in their old Wanka garb, with gold and black Wanka hats: a land of intrigue, mystic and romantic Wanka-ism. But there is a sad part to this tale, or story, when you follow the once beautiful river called the Mantaro Rio (and I have been here now four times, and am thinking about living here), you follow a green path, a blue sky, and an infested, contaminated mud stream, sad to say, but a touch of reality: called the Mantaro Rio. It looks more like a coke-a-cola stream than a river that should be blue or green.

Once you gaze upon it, you will not want to swim in it, as the animals do not want to drink from it, both man and beast are wise in this area, for should they, I’m sure they’d not do it twice. Yes, it’s a shame, perhaps those polluting it, should clean it, or drink from it: but that would be murder wouldn’t it, and we are not savages are we not; yet some folks seem to think, otherwise: that being, they have the right, or preference to do as they please with the water of the Mantaro Rio. This was once the problem we had along the Mississippi, where I live (part of the year), in St. Paul, Minnesota, in the United States, until we the people, enforced the government to take action and enforced the folks doing the polluting, to build refineries to clean the water they were infecting. Sounds logical to me.
I’m not sure how hard it is to clean what you dirty, perhaps no harder than cleaning the neighbor’s dirty laundry, you know, the one you dirtied and left for someone else to clean (a lot of us do that don’t we): the Mantaro Rio belongs to the Valley folks, not just those living down by the mines; thus, one may want to call the Core of Engineers in Minnesota, to see how they did it, and perhaps, we can fix what needs fixing.
Now they are even (some Ungodly folks) are sending devilish letters to the Monsignor of Huancayo, saying in so many words: if you don’t shut up, we’ll kill you, or shut you up. Let me simply say this: those saying these things are simply cursing themselves to God, and putting their own, families and lives in danger: with the One they can’t see, but can see them. Why do I say this? I’ve learned in life, what you plant is what you harvest. If it is evil, it will not blossom godly flowers why should it, thus you plant deadly seeds, and you get a deadly harvest, so beware.

Note: written on the way back from Huancayo to Lima, 1/10/2007

By Poet Laureate, of San Jeronimo, Peru Dennis L. Siluk; Awarded the National Prize of Peru, "Antena Regional": The best of 2006 for promoting culture (by: Prens@ndina) and recognized by the Colegio De Periodistas del Peru as: Poeta Laureado Del Valle Del Mantaro, 2007

Spanish Version

Río Mantaro del Perú:

Un Corriente de Coca Cola

Cuando vienes a visitar el Valle del Mantaro, justo más allá de las enormes montañas llamadas Los Andes, entrarás en un Valle sin igual sobre la tierra, y otra vez, debo decir, estarás rodeado por las segundas montañas más grandes en el mundo, Los Andes, aunque estas no sean las enormes, quizás sólo 610 metros de altura, pero tú ya estarías a 3,200 metros sobre el nivel del mar, así, estarías a 3,810 metros sobre el nivel del mar.

El Valle del Mantaro es más hermoso que el Valle Sagrado del Cuzco pienso, y este tiene un toque de los viejos tiempos; es decir este te lleva atrás doscientos años, con sus casas de adobe, bueyes y carros, y asnos, llamas y perros corriendo arriba y abajo de las colinas, en todas partes de los pueblos de valle. Y una vez en la ciudad de Huancayo (población aproximada: 325,000), tendrás todos los servicios modernos que una ciudad grande tiene, así tienes una mezcla de ambos, lo antiguo y lo nuevo. Y las mujeres todavía visten en sus tradicionales trajes Wankas, con sus sombreros Wankas dorados y negros: una tierra de intriga, mística y romántica Huanca-ismo.

Pero hay una parte triste a este cuento, o historia, cuando sigues al que era una vez el hermoso río, llamado Río Mantaro (y he estado aquí ya cuatro veces y pienso vivir aquí), tú sigues un camino verde, un cielo azul, pero una infestada, contaminada corriente de lodo: llamada Río Mantaro; triste es decirlo, pero es un poco de la realidad. Parece más bien una corriente de Coca Cola que un río que debería ser azul o verde.

Una vez que lo veas, no querrás nadar en este, así como los animales no quieren beber de este; tanto el hombre como la bestia son sabios en esta área, porque si lo hacen, estoy seguro que ellos no lo harían dos veces. Sí, esto es una vergüenza, quizás aquellos contaminándolo, deberían limpiarlo, o beber de este: pero esto sería asesinato ¿no?, y no somos salvajes ¿verdad?; aunque alguna gente parece pensar de otra manera: es decir, que ellos tiene el derecho, o la preferencia de hacer lo que a ellos les parezca con el agua del Río Mantaro. Una vez este era un problema, que nosotros tuvimos a lo largo del Río Mississippi, en San Pablo, Minnesota, en los Estados Unidos, donde yo vivo (parte del año), hasta que nosotros la gente, forzamos al gobierno para tomar medidas y obligar a la gente que generaba la contaminación, de construir refinerías para limpiar el agua que ellos infectaban. Me parece lógico a mí.

No estoy seguro cuan difícil es limpiar lo que ensuciaste, quizás no más difícil que limpiar la ropa sucia del vecino, tú sabes, el que ensuciaste y dejaste para que alguien más lo limpiara (muchos de nosotros hace eso, ¿no?): el Río Mantaro pertenece a la gente del Valle, no solamente a aquellos viviendo por las minas; así, uno podría querer llamar el Núcleo de Ingenieros en Minnesota, para ver cómo ellos lo hicieron, y quizás, podamos arreglar lo que necesita ser arreglado.

He oído que ahora ellos (alguna gente Impía) incluso están enviando cartas diabólicas al Monseñor de Huancayo, diciendo explícitamente: si usted no se calla, lo mataremos, o lo haremos callar. Déjame simplemente decir esto: aquellos diciendo estas cosas simplemente están maldiciéndose ellos mismos a Dios, y poniendo sus propias vidas y la de sus familias en peligro: con El que ellos no pueden ver, pero El puede verlos. ¿Por qué digo esto? He aprendido en la vida, que lo que plantas es lo que cosechas. Si es malo, este no producirá flores piadosas, por qué lo haría, así si plantas semillas mortales, y consigues una cosecha mortal, entonces ten cuidado.

Nota: escrito en el camino de regreso de Huancayo a Lima, 10 de Enero del 2007.

Por el Poeta Laureado de San Jerónimo, Perú, Dennis L. Siluk; premiado con el Premio Nacional de Perú, “Antena Regional” como: El mejor del 2006 promoviendo la cultura (por: Prens@ndina).

“The Magic of the Avelinos,” by Poet Laureate Dennis L. Siluk.
A book on the: culture, customs and traditions of the Mantaro Valley of Peru.

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A Brief Overview of the Historical Wanka
(An Introduction)

The Wanka culture is rich in the Mantaro Valley of Peru, and perhaps we could start at any corner in the Valley and present (or come out with) a good history surrounding the Kingdom of the Wanka. So let’s start right from the beginning, 10,000 BC, known as the Litico Period. Here we find Archeological sites called Callavallauri, and here we find nomads and hunters for the most part.
From there we can shift to the Arcaico Period, or 4000 BC. A time when agriculture appeared in the Valley, and throughout; here we can find ruins called Chanchas Puquio (Huancan0.
Now we shift another 2000-years down the timeline, a period of the Ceramic, along with the growing of corn, and an archeological site nearby the Andean city called: Conception (Junin).
Now we take a big leap, to 600-1460 AD, the Medium to Late Horizon periods; this is really the Wanka Period at its brightest. A time for breeding stock, agriculture, more villages, and of course war (the Huari)
The Huari Empire in the Mantaro Valley connected with one another, that is, the valley consolidated for the most part. The Huari disappeared and was replaced with the Wanka Kingdom about 1000 AD, although everything was somewhat really interconnected prior to this.

Now we must go to about 1200 AD, the Wanka development is well on its way, I shall call it its middle glory: here we see Jauja, San Jeronimo, Sicaya, Chorgos Bajo connect with one another.
The Capital of the empire was Tunanmarca and the Huari culture, perhaps between 500-900 AD—was predominated in the area. After their influence disappeared, the Wanka got more independent and adopted what may be considered the God of the Wanka’s. Huallallo Carhu (The Great Wanka Warrior). He was punished by Pariacaca, and made to eat dogs for his last defeat. It has been said; the God of the Wanka’s ate human flesh, which was really not that uncommon back then for that background (environment and/or societal surroundings and way of life); and to repeat myself, He was to eat dogs for penitence.

And so you see, we have looked at the Wanka from a few different historical angles, let alone, a few obscure ones: let me bring you into his home, the places the Wanka, in the later years in the Mantaro Valley called home, that is; for example: Arhuaturo (ruins): Cajas; Wariwilca; Huancayo; Pacara; Sapallanga; Chaclas; San Jeronimo (Unish koto); Quitcas (Ushucoto) and Tambo. All these places I’ve visited. There are of course more places they called home, in the valley, but this will do for this book, perhaps I will discover some more in the near future.

"The Great Wanka Warrior" (An Epic Poem of the 13th Century in English and Spanish)

2007-01-24T18:49:00.000-08:00

—A Poetic Adventure

The Great Wanka Warrior

Ancient Wanka Ceramic

Hawks over the Valley
(An Introduction to the Wanka Warrior)

All men who live by war, present
A kind of hawk-like appearance
(as well as, a steadfast stance).
His, whose body showed strength,
Combined with endurance
Smooth shaven, features being more of
The sun, than of nature—
He was the Wanka Warrior.

His dark eyes were cold,
Under his feet, the land moaned.
He was once told, “In the ranks of the
Wanka Warrior, there is always a place”
(for a Saber-warrior like He). “

“Yes!” the Wanka Warrior exclaim
(with an elastic voice) “...but what do you mean?”
“You cried out in the stress of the fight
(battle)—you smote your enemy,” said
the chieftain, adding, “you’re quick
To anger (there was an instant of
breathless tension).”

“Very well,” said the veteran warrior,
“I seek an enemy!”
“Whom?” inquired the Chieftain?
“The plague of the Valley!”
“You know, this man is a mighty general?”
“It matters as little as if he were a
brickmaker,” held the Wanka Warrior.

(It would be another year before the Wanka Warrior would take the road home from his last great battle, The Road to Unishcoto.))

Unishcoto, a familiar way of spelling the ruins, can and has been spelled in a number of ways, for example: with two words and a “k”: Unish koto, and/or with an “H” Hunishcoto)).

First Faction
[1 thru 4]

The Warrior

1
The Warrior

I was born in the Mantaro Valley
I came from an old Wanka stock—
Race whose characteristics
Were inclined towards violence—war
We battled against one another…!

In the mountain country—I lived
A valley surround it, it is where I spent
My boyhood, a physical contest it was!
Yet all one breathe of life to me…;
A restless life, thus, I became a warrior.

One must understand the risks,
The uncertainties as a warrior;
You must be utterly fearless, wild,
Primitive, and so I became, I was:
All of this, aloof strain, and more!

2
The Blade

As a warrior I could expect nothing,
Only fury from my aching muscles:
Grasp, raw skinned knuckles, aching,
Staring down my victims, doom:
My murderous blade sharp at its point.

I learned death in a thousand forms
And due to this, I was partly dead.
In my life, at this time, I can but reply:
Continual violent action: imposes!...
Oversimplified, and now I die…!

3
Captured

I was captured once and left to die
My wife (but not then)) I shall not name))
Fumbled vainly at my feet: I had been
Physically tortured, she held me upright
She cried, and prayed and cried…!

Worthless, yet she had pity for me
And now she waited vainly, hoping…
Wringing her hands, knowing I was well
No more a shield, thus, I was free to:
Fight again; whoever saw such a woman

You will say perhaps, it is not possible
For a man like me, to fall in love—
She was indeed a blinding flame,
A deafening sound in my chest—
A sound I could never put to rest.

For a long time I was senseless, lifeless,
Longing, but healing in my sleep, to love
Never really expecting to find it, yet:
Once found, she disrupted my life…
Yet, somehow, we became one.

4
The Vanquished

I always thought I’d return to her
My little yellow flower of the mountain
“I shall return,” I decreed…! Freed
But vanquished, bloodstains kill…
They do not play favors for anyone.

In my mind, as I came to her—
I could visualize through my eyes
Her features dazzling, floating;
It is but now a transcendent vision
Yet strangely familiar as I walk…

5—Interlude
Death Shadows

As in any war, he found his minds-eyes upon the dead, his eyes trying to close (from the demised, the dull, the dead that laid now behind him, — leaning on (whatever he could), forward and quietly he advanced: he tried and tried to wipe out their memories, the battle, the blood, the gloom, yet he recalled, remembered all the shapes, shadows and colors of shades of doom…his lot in life)!

Stiffly in their cast mode, bold and cold, immortal faces shrinking: he got away from them… shook his head, kept his eyes straight ahead!

He called it hopeless surrender; he would have to learn how to be un-cold, for the world could not afford a warrior with true affection (sorrowful it would be in battle)) but he was coming home)).

In his journey back, he lost all account of time, dead feet walking, un-hurrying, he clinched his hands, a snarl on his face: one way or another, he was coming home to his wife.

Their features showed—teeth, faces bleached white: incapable of further movement, he made odd sounds (shaking his head up and down)) he was dying)). His breath hissed almost equal to the wind, as he recollected, all the death smells: wordless, he sank inside, to a silence of crudeness, yet he kept walking talking, wailing.

Second Faction
(Parts one thru five)
The Great Wanka Battle

Part One
By the Teeth of the Moon

Four thousand warriors battled this night
Two-thousand Wanka warriors would die
Along the Mantaro Rio, in the Valley
And they had equal weapons and all
And many of the warriors were hidden

On both sides of the Rio were Wankas
The Wankainos and I (the ancient ones)
We, kept up our incessant fires, spirits
But with scant avail, for we all knew
Slowly the enemy, the foe crept closer...

Closer and closer they crept for accuracy
To the edge of the Rio–spying they came
Hid in the ditches along the Rio, and trees
Held their positions, waiting, just waiting:
In short order—, hoping to wipe us out.

Suffering terrible, in the cold winds
It would have been madness to swim
Across the Rio at night, but we did
Suffering terrible from the cold winds
Slowly we crept closer to them…!

Thus, we crossed the Rio at night with
Only the teeth of the moon for light;
Arching down now on the ground
Blue blades by our sides—determined
Bizarre figures—spears at our thighs:

Part Two
Battle along the Rio

Once on land we rushed the camp
In-between fires, dogs and cats…
I heard voices vaguely familiar:
“Then I slashed off heads—they rolled
Grinning down the hill to the mud—”;

Panting, blood stained, fierce faces
Led only, by the teeth of the moon—
Flamed eyes, fumbling in our haste,
“Back!” I heard someone say—
Instantly my ears heard a distant roar!

The shooting of porras snarled by—
Fire arrows singed my hair
I was the last Wanka warrior to die:
In this chaotic war: blindly we fought
Some bodies smoking—burnt crisp…

I saw the remnants of my comrades
There was no escape, none—none at all!
We walked into a devouring path –
I and I alone, escaped to the Rio…
By the teeth, and face of the moon!

I raced through the water’s blackness—
I suspect, I was confused, mumbling:
The erratic moon, bobbing above me
Then I reached my side of the Rio—
There was the spy in the hollow log…!

Part Three
In the Midst of Battle

In the midst of the Wanka battle
Massed thick with Wanka bodies
We were all fighting like demons
The battle was a gasping deadlock
They could not thrust us back…

We slashed, heaped high their bodies
Then when we were exhausted, they
Came in full force—hand to hand
Men stumbling among the dead—
Flesh and blood, and thunderous roars!...

Wanka warriors—we were everyplace
Everyone madden to a frenzy (hidden)
They—our enemy Wanka brothers,
They were hidden high in trees, logs, ditches
Desperate melee, we gave way!..

The battle streamed out, throughout
The camp, and down to the Rio,
Trampling feet, shouts—with blue steel
Hand to hand, came the vengeance:
All foes in the same Valley and Rio...!

Part Four
Death (in the Midst of Agony)

On we died like locust, so thick in battle
So broad we could not spread our arms,
And once tried, our: wide, busted wings
Fought on (with broken arms and knees
We fought on); consequently, being
Repaid—we died in pain, agony.

Red, red blood was the repayment—
I could not pity them, or they us…
The battle sight dazed us all
Some cowering in terror, and me, me—
I was in the painful midst of Agony!...

Hacking and slashing—warriors!
I avoided chance blows—somehow,
I slashed and gashed, a path to the Rio
I swam swiftly through the currents
My bronze limbs against the water-walls;

Now across the Rio, glaring in on me—
I found a path, where the wind blew…
The dome of the moon –shattered
In the semi-darkness: my bronze limbs
Crushed, with pain and now the rain…!

I heard in the distance, Wanka iron lungs,
And pounding feet like triumpht drums—
They said, “We conquered the fools,” yet
They, like us, are from the Valley—too,
And some day they will be conquered also.

Part Five
Stone Walls

Of this past cataclysmic frenzy
That took place a day ago—
The death of howling humans,
Brought me memory crushing walls
A ghastly roaring through it all…!

You think before a battle, and during:
Your body can blast through it all,
How many fell yesterday, I do not know
But I was the only one to escape—
Across the rio, through the river’s flow

What I expected to find or gain in war
Is different than what I found—
Like blind and brainless monsters
We fought—a blinding white flame
Enveloped in a frantic oblivion.

You my say, perhaps it was all in vain,
My only reply is that I was part of it,
Senseless as it is, was, and will be—:
Again, afterwards, one becomes vested
In delirium, paralyzed with it…!

After the Battle
(Parts six and seven)

Interlude
(to: After the Battle)

Ascension

The road (from the Rio) traveled relatively straight to the mountain; the Wanka warrior identified with it, it curved upwards and to the right sharply ascending to the top, part of the way, would be easy—he knew, yet painful, for he had his wounds, as a result, when he climbed it, he zigzaged his way to the top; cupped on top was his ancestors ruins, the old bins for harvest time year around, and beyond that a small stone house, his home.

As he climbed the mountain, some 5000-feet upwards, he thought not of dying or battle (not yet anyways) or the conveyance upward, but of the small stone house, Unishcoto itself, and he did not want to forget it, it was his drive.
He looked up (the countryside behind him now), the top could not be seen, it all looked steep, yet he climbed it a hundred times before, it looked like a waterfall, ready to cascade ontop of him, broken rock and all, like an ocean of earth.
Each breath he took, was like the last bit of breathable oxygen; the night clouds were dreary, moved across the moon like windblown waves, ceremonial looking; they had shapes of stiff looking corpses, with necks twisted about like wooden crews, holding them together. (Death was waiting?)

—Part Six
By Lantern of the Moon

I struggled now up the side of the sierra
The old creek bottom, behind me now
My mind in a scanty obliviousness—
At last I saw, from afar…
A silhouette standing in the darkness…!

As I walked towards my home—,
Thinning tree branches loomed at me
From the dark hushed vague sky—;
A dog started barking ahead:
Guided only by the sky’s lantern…!

I felt a sad, gloomy, and faintly chilled
My wounds—told my body it was dying
Fading among the living sierra trees;
The dog heard me, he barked again,
His shadow trying to listen: ‘Who is it?’

My wife stared off into the darkness—
I saw her, heard her voice ebbing my way
‘Come down this path,’ I wanted to say
But motionless I lay, like a broken branch
Off a living tree, I was but a silent echo.

—Part Seven
I Died

I died, went into a condemned silence
I died, and the silence swiftly rippled
It was neither night, nor day—but still
I wanted to follow the path ahead,
You know the one to my house!

But I was dead—among the living trees
The house seemed to leap before me
(a different dimension perhaps);
Then I found myself beside her—
I whispered her name—stirringly!

Her lips were cold, or were they mine?
She tasted fatality, doom—didn’t know
Her head bowed between her breasts
I was now above her: she was so brave.
(And I died, and she went to bed.)

And I thought then, about the times
She and I, held each other—abreast:
And we would lay in the meadows,
And quietly in the darkness—she’d
Make me warm, and she was soft.

(But this doom, I could not escape.)

Interlude
(Last Kill)) Or Battle of the Jackal))

(Last Thoughts :)

“I remember now—‘Dog’ as we called him,
Stood there in the haze, as I came upon him:
My eyes ablaze with fight, with an old hate:
‘He is all jackal,’ I thought, now in battle—

The leader—the Jackal, slow as an ox, came
Towards me—I gathered my feet, below, I
Leaped, struck, I sheared through his neck
Cords: blood flowed from him, like the Rio.
It was my last kill. I jumped over fires, swift
—I wasted no time, seized him by the knees,
Cast him over my head—how dead is dead, I
Thought. Next, I jumped back up, onto my feet:
Then bending low, like a sweeping condor, I,
I howled like the enemy, like a pack of hounds,
As the fires dwindled down: now the blood of
The foe was on my blade, but I was alive—
For the moment: like the wind that follows me.”

—Part Eight
Spring and Decay

There were no intimate things in her room, empty—; the entire house remained still— with a chill of desolation, spring had come, with a bright blue sky, she saw flowers lying on the ground, as if forgotten…

—She walked further into the wooded area, there—withered and dead laid her husband. Crumbled in his fingers, flowers, she touched his hand, they had left a stain she noticed; yet, disgustingly, he smelled: reeked with decay—!

Soberly, in the chill of the morning, she paused (leaning over his body), fretfully relieved, and alarmed, her fear and bewilderment had come true: then trying to remember what little they had done together, and her worrying now over, she sighed a long, long sigh.

The gist of it was plain enough, she had never understood him or war, but she did today, it meant—detachment. It all implied—one must put it behind them, to stay alive, to survive, yet shocked and curious—she didn’t appreciate it.

She asked herself— “What are the words to this?” there was nothing to do [perform, carry out] save, hope for a new husband, yet that brought back distaste, and dread; she had to trust to a stranger (she’d put this aside for the time being).

—Part Nine (conclusion) Interlude
The Ghost of Weeping

(Grieving) She stood sluggishly by her fireplace, her hands cold to the bones—she stood before it, then turned towards the window, there she could see the drooping trees, her heart leaped a little “You fool!” she exclaimed; his shadowy shape came leaping unto the open sill of the window—, “You idiot,” she exclaimed; the shadow seemed to stare at her, with a wild repose.

Her wet face, lighted up “Don’t,” she cried, and then she tasted her own tears—she clung to the window, the shadow showed saber intensity “Have I gone crazy?” she asked herself.

She had been hoping he would have come home, I mean, come home for good (long ago)) not like this)), she had waited—so she said aloud, “… longer than a thousand fires—in my stone oven…” and perhaps had she not found his body, she would have waited longer. “No,” she answered, “wishful thinking!” That is what it was. “What?” she said; a voice said, “…you’ll find someone soon…” she stared quietly (it was as if the voice was annoyed).

Her chin now in her palms, looking into the fire, “You don’t want to!” She said “Surely for what it’s got to be.” She added, “Whatever you think, it is because it is what you want to believe.”

She picked up a cup, drank its contents and sat back, her face rosy in the firelight. She closed the window, “People smell bad because of the things they do;” she said, “living corruption, flags the flesh, all soiled.” She felt clean to the bone—then the fire went out, as she fell to sleep.

She murmured “He gave half of himself to me, and the other half, perhaps the better half, he swapped for war—that part, I could never find, until now.”

Stone Oven

Beside the stone oven—she slept
One bronze woman, half-grieving
Her face shining with heat
And rolling dark eyes; by her
Feet one dog and four puppies,
Scratching and bumping—
As they ate—their meal…the
Fire reflected: flashes of teeth;
Curiosity had vanished—.

#1453 (9-8-2006)

Stone Window

Outside her stone window
In the sky no stars showed,
The earth was a deflated swell,
The sky was sagging its dark shape,
The trees beyond like chilled ghosts,
And the moon shown a cold
Corpse-like light—ascending; a gray
Chill seeped through the stones.

In her seeping lifeless mind,
She said, “How long must I grieve
For the dead?” As if pleading in
This gray like silence, for it
Quickly to dissolve, and end.

#1454 (9-8-2006)

Afterward (Epitaph):

The House on Unishcoto

Weep for the one so strong to die
Who war has taken at last!

Mourn for his wife that sings no more
And the ruins called Unishcoto—

This was he who had a flaming heart
And heroic breath,

Whose weapons are laid, and hung
In the House by Unishcoto;

It was he, who grew mighty in war,
But her war was otherwise:

Thus, weep for one so strong in war
Whose war is now, of the night!

#1451 9-7-2006 Note: Unishcoto is a ruin on top of one of the mountains in the Mantaro Valley of Peru.

#1450 “The Road to Unishcoto”, 9-6-2006 (First parts written the first and last week of August, and the last parts written the first week of September, 2006)) drawings also drawn during the same period.

Spanish Version

GWB

El Camino a Unishcoto
San Jerónimo de Tunán, Huancayo, Perú

Comentarios Iniciales

Una Mirada Breve al Guerrero Wanka del Valle del Mantaro:

La cultura Chavín es la más antigua de las grandes civilizaciones peruanas; esta floreció entre los años 1800 y 300 antes de Cristo, aproximadamente dos milenios antes del Imperio Incaico, siendo el jaguar un símbolo de la cultura. La cultura Inca quizás fue la más inteligente e imperialista de todas las culturas que aparecieron en Perú, pero los Wankas de Huancayo fueron quizás los guerreros más resistente de todos los que surgieron en la historia de Perú: localizado a 3,260 metros (de altitud) en el valle fértil del Río Mantaro.

La ciudad de Huancayo (en tono convencional, de hoy en día) es muy famosa por su feria dominical, y a dos kilómetros de Huancayo está lo que se llama Torre-Torre, coloreadas formaciones geológicas rojas debido a la erosión. En un nuevo parque de la ciudad, estatuas Wankas de piedra evocan la cultura de la antigua civilización Huanca.

El guerrero Wanka vivió entre los años 800 y 1400 después de Cristo (Huanca: o Wanka) Waaka Michiq (o: Huanca Quechua: original) He viajado por todas partes en el Valle del Mantaro, y éste es fuera de toda descripción, su belleza y sus vistas espectaculares desde la cima de las montañas cercanas. Hasta entonces, era natural (mientras que el tiempo progresaba) para los Wankas tratar sus diferencias hablando, no siempre peleando entre ellos, lo cual ellos lo hacían bastante; así, repito, lo que usualmente seguía era la conversación (ya que todos ellos eran vecinos de todos modos): conversación significaba: "Kawagley", o cantar, bailar, o tocar, como lo hacen hoy.

El Wanka amaba la tierra ((En el idioma Quechua, la palabra pacha es usada para describir a la tierra)(o allpa, que quiere decir suelo o tierra; y Urqu Pacha, se refiere al mundo de los muertos))

Los Wankas Continuaron

Hay que recordar que en el mundo de Los Wankas, o en particular, el mundo Andino, nada es finito. La vida y la muerte son como el agua, una necesidad, y parte de la creación. Pachayachachi (vivir en esta tierra, fue una parte de su filosofía), hay que aceptar el proceso normal de vida y muerte, no sea que él sea atormentado su vida entera con desconcierto.

GUERRA: No sé de ninguna palabra específica para Guerra, en Quechua, o en el diccionario Wanka: la palabra: awqatinkuy, significa luchar, que es bastante cercana. O wañuchina kushunchu, que quiere decir causar la muerte. Tomando esto a un más nivel personal: la palabra “guerrero” en Yupiaq; así, un guerrero es llamado: el nombre de un guerrero es decir, es anguyagta.

El Guerrero usó: arcos, flechas, arpones, lanzas, tiradores, kayaks, y vivía en pueblos. Ellos tenían una casa de la comunidad para hablar cosas abiertamente; y a menudo ellos luchaban entre ellos mismos, como lo dije antes. Ellos también jugaban juegos, juegos de habilidad, cosas así. Había quizás un período de tiempo en que los Wankas intentaron psicológicamente—así como espiritualmente—en un acercamiento, acordando formas para abolir la guerra entre ellos, o entre los de su propia clase. Hoy en día hay bailes en cambio, como vemos; así, sostienen juntos la cultura e idioma, sus esfuerzos de revitalización, podrías decir.

Hacer la guerra: El enfoque de esta historia no está tanto sobre cómo hacer guerra, o la capacidad para hacer guerra, sino más bien sobre la capacidad de mirar la guerra, para reflejar las acciones individuales y las acciones del pueblo (hay siempre un conglomerado de cierta clase involucrado; y muchas partes de los dolores que acompañan a la guerra)—en este caso, usando herramientas como armas para matarse el uno al otro; y veremos que es más que un grito de batalla oído a través de un río, sino un recorrido. Como vemos hoy día en el Valle del Mantaro de Perú, la Armonía ha reemplazado a la guerra.

Debería ser notado, que el Guerrero Wanka era un individuo destacado e impresionante, con una expresión feroz y dientes deslumbrantes cuando estaba en batalla.

Los Wankas Hoy: Los Wankas hoy se parecen mucho a cualquier otro grupo de gente en muchas formas, ellos tienen sus problemas como: el alcoholismo, la violencia doméstica y suicidios en el ámbito de la comunidad. Y auto-gobernación y derechos educativos—ellos continúan buscando, en los niveles institucionales y políticos. No hay ninguna palabra para alcoholismo en el lenguaje Quechua, tampoco ninguna palabra para suicidio, por lo tanto, estos tuvieron que ser inventados durante el siglo XX y XXI ((podemos llamarlos: hatun wasi o yatray wasi)(la casa de aprendizaje))

Avance para el Poema:

Sobre la cima de la Montaña San Cristóbal, conocida de otra manera como la Montaña Catalina Wanka, reside una vieja ruina, Unishcoto, está quizás a 15,000 pies sobre el nivel del mar, o talvez más alto. Las viejas ruinas tienen 19 puestos, o cuartos de almacenaje. La ubicación exacta sería, en el Valle del Mantaro de Perú, más allá de Los Andes; metido, y encima de la ciudad pequeña, llamada San Jerónimo de Tunán. El río Mantaro está cerca, y si uno quiere subir la montaña, esto toma de dos a cuatro horas (o más), dependiendo de la condición física. Pero la vista desde la cima es abrumadora; tú no sólo ves la ciudad pequeña, sino el valle entero y sus montañas.

Las arcas de almacenaje fueron usadas para almacenar papas y otras verduras. Y mientras subes la montaña puedes ver—aquí y allí— los restos del proceso de cultivación que usaron hace mil años. Una vez el valle fue salpicado con pequeñas ruinas pero la agricultura ha destruido la mayor parte de ellas, junto con las lluvias, etcétera, etcétera; pero Unishcoto permanece, y es un tesoro para contemplar.

—Una Aventura Poética
El Camino a Unishcoto

Halcones sobre el Valle
(Una Introducción al Guerrero Wanka)

Todos los hombres que viven por la guerra, presentan
Una especie de aspecto parecido a un halcón
(así como, una postura firme)
Él, cuyo cuerpo mostró fortaleza
Combinado con resistencia
Afeitado suave, rasgos siendo más
Del sol, que natural—
El fue el guerrero Wanka.

Sus ojos oscuros eran fríos;
Bajo sus pies, la tierra gimió.
Una vez le dijeron, “En las filas del
Guerrero Wanka, siempre hay un lugar”
(para un Guerrero de sable como él)

“¡Sí!” el Guerrero Wanka exclama
(con una voz elástica) “... pero ¿qué quieres decir?”
“Tú gritas en la tensión de la lucha
(batalla)—tú eliminas a tu enemigo”, dijo
el jefe, añadiendo, “tú eres rápido
Para enfadarte (hubo un instante de tensión sin aliento)”.

“Muy bien”, dijo el guerrero veterano,
“¡Busco un enemigo!”
“¿A quién?” Preguntó el jefe.
“¡A la plaga del Valle!”
“Tú sabes, este hombre es un general poderoso”
“Esto importa tan poco como si él fuera un
fabricante de ladrillos”, sostuvo el Guerrero Wanka.

((Pasaría otro año antes de que el Guerrero Wanka tomara el camino a casa desde su última gran batalla, El Camino a Unishcoto)

(Unishcoto, un modo familiar de deletrear las ruinas, puede y ha sido escrito de diferentes formas, por ejemplo: con dos palabras y una “k”: Unish koto, y/o con un "H" Unishcoto))

Primera Facción
[1 a 4]

El Guerrero

1
El Guerrero

Nací en el Valle del Mantaro
Vine de la antigua reserva Wanka—
Raza cuyas características
Fueron inclinadas hacia la violencia—guerra
¡Combatimos el uno contra el otro …!

En la región de montaña—viví
Un valle lo rodea, es dónde pasé
Mi niñez, ¡una competencia física era esto!
Aunque todo un aliento de vida para mí …;
Una vida agitada, así, me hice un guerrero.

Hay que entender los riesgos,
Las incertidumbres como guerrero;
Debes ser completamente intrépido, salvaje,
Primitivo, y eso me hice, yo fui:
¡Todo esto, frío, extraño, y más!

2
La Espada

Como guerrero, no podía esperar nada,
Sólo furor de mis músculos adoloridos:
Apretados, nudillos pelados abiertos, adoloridos;
Mirando fijamente hacia abajo a mis víctimas, fatalidad:
Mi asesina espada afilada en su punto.

Aprendí muerte en mil formas
Y debido a esto, estaba en parte muerto.
En mi vida, en este momento, sólo puedo responder:
Acción violenta constante: ¡impone!...
¡Simplificarlo demasiado, y ahora muero …!

3
Capturado

Fui capturado una vez y abandonado a morir
Mi esposa ((pero no lo era entonces) (no la nombraré))
Hurgó en vano a mis pies: ¡Había sido
Físicamente torturado, ella me sostuvo derecho
Ella gritó, y rezó y lloró …!

Inútil, pero ella tenía compasión de mí
Y ahora ella esperaba en vano, esperando …
Retorciendo sus manos, sabiendo que yo estaba bien
No más un escudo, así, yo era libre para:
Luchar otra vez; alguien vio a tal mujer [¿?]

Tú dirás quizás: … no es imposible
Para un hombre como yo, enamorarse—
Ella era de verdad una llama deslumbrante,
Un sonido ensordecedor en mi pecho—
Un sonido que nunca podría ponerlo a descansar.

Durante mucho tiempo estaba sin sentido, sin vida,
Deseando, pero curándome en mi sueño, amar,
Nunca realmente esperando encontrarlo, aunque:
Una vez encontrado, ella trastornó mi vida …
Pero, de algún modo, nos hicimos uno.

4
El Vencido

Siempre pensé que volvería a ella
Mi pequeña flor amarilla de la montaña
“¡Volveré!”, pronuncié … Liberada
Pero vencida matanza manchada de sangre...
Ellas no hacen favores a nadie.

En mi mente mientras vine a ella—
Pude visualizar, a través de mis ojos
Sus rasgos brillando, flotando;
Es pero ahora, una visión trascendental
Aunque extrañamente familiar mientras camino …

5—Interludio
Sombras de Muerte

Como en cualquier guerra, él encontró su imaginación encima de la muerte, sus ojos tratando de cerrarse (de la agonía, de la niebla, de los muertos que ahora yacían detrás de él, —apoyándose en (lo que podía), hacia adelante y silenciosamente él avanzó: ¡él intentó y trató de borrar de su memoria, la batalla, la sangre, la penumbra, aunque él recordó todas las formas, sombras y colores de las sombras de destino... su parte en la vida!)

Rígidos en sus formas de molde, valientes y fríos, caras inmortales encogiéndose: ¡él se alejó de ellos…sacudió su cabeza, mantuvo sus ojos hacia adelante!
Él llamó a esto rendición sin esperanza; él tendría que aprender a ser duro, ya que el mundo no podía permitir a un guerrero con afecto verdadero ((afligido estaría en la batalla)( pero él venía a casa))

En su viaje de vuelta, él perdió toda noción del tiempo, pies muertos caminando, lentamente, él cerró sus manos, un gruñido en su cara: de una u otra forma, él venía a casa hacia su esposa.

Sus facciones mostraron—dientes, caras blancas descoloridas: incapaz de más movimiento, él emitió sonidos raros ((moviendo su cabeza de arriba a abajo) (él estaba muriendo)). Su aliento silbó casi igual que el viento, mientras él recordó, todos los olores de muerte: mudo, él se hundió dentro, en un silencio de crudeza, aunque él siguió caminando, hablando, gimiendo.

Segunda Facción
[Parte 1 a 5]

La Gran Batalla Wanka

—Parte Uno
Por los Dientes de la Luna

Cuatro mil guerreros combatieron esta noche
Dos mil guerreros Wankas morirían
A lo largo del Río Mantaro, en el Valle
Y ellos tenían iguales armas y todo
Y muchos de los guerreros estaban ocultos.

En ambos lados del Río estaban los Wankas
Los huancaínos y yo (los antiguos)
Nosotros, mantuvimos nuestros fuegos y espíritus incesantes,
Pero con escasa ventaja, ya que todos sabíamos que
Lentamente el enemigo, el adversario se acerca sigilosamente más cerca...

Más cerca y más cerca ellos se acercaron sigilosamente por precisión
Al borde del Río—espiando ellos vinieron
Ocultos en las zanjas a lo largo del Río y árboles
Sosteniendo sus posiciones, esperando, sólo esperando:
En conclusión—, esperando borrarnos.

Terrible sufrimiento, en los vientos fríos
Habría sido una locura nadar
Cruzar el Río de noche, pero lo hicimos
¡Terrible sufrimiento de los vientos fríos
Despacio nos acercamos sigilosamente más cerca de ellos...!

Así, cruzamos el Río de noche con
Sólo los dientes de la luna por luz,
Arqueando abajo ahora en tierra
Espadas azules en nuestros lados—decididas
Formas extrañas, lanzas en nuestros muslos.

—Parte Dos
Batalla a lo Largo del Río

Una vez en tierra nos apresuramos al campo
En medio de fuegos, perros y gatos …
Oí voces vagamente familiares:
“Entonces acuchillé cabezas—ellas rodaron
Con muecas abajo de la colina hacia el fango—”;

¡Jadeando, manchados de sangre, caras enfurecidas
Guiados sólo—por los dientes de la luna—
Ojos ardientes, hurgando en nuestra prisa,
“¡Atrás!” Oí a alguien decir—
¡Al instante mis oídos oyeron un rugido distante!

Los golpes de porras rechinaron—
Flechas de Fuego, chamuscaron mi pelo,
Yo era el último guerrero Wanka en morir:
En esta guerra caótica; ciegamente luchamos
Algunos cuerpos humeando—calcinados …

Vi los restos de mis compañeros
No había escape; ¡ninguno! Ninguno en absoluto.
¡Caminamos dentro de un camino devorante—
Yo y sólo yo, escapé hacia el Río …
Por los dientes, y la cara de la luna!

Corrí a través de la oscuridad del agua—
Sospecho, que estaba confundido, musitando:
La luna errática, balanceándose arriba mío
Entonces alcancé el Río de mi lado—
¡Allí estaba el espía en el hueco del tronco...!

—Parte Tres
En Medio de la Batalla

En medio de la batalla Wanka
Densa congregación de cuerpos Wankas
Todos nosotros luchábamos como demonios
La batalla estaba un su punto muerto jadeante
Ellos no podían empujarnos atrás …

¡Acuchillamos, amontonamos alto sus cuerpos
Entonces cuando estábamos agotados, ellos
Vinieron con todas sus fuerzas—mano a mano
Los hombres tropezaban entre los muertos—
Carne y sangre, y rugidos ensordecedores!...

¡Guerreros Wankas—estábamos por todas partes
Cada uno enfurecido a un frenesí (oculto)
Ellos—nuestros hermanos enemigos Wankas,
Ellos estaban ocultos en árboles, troncos, zanjas
Tumulto desesperado, cedimos el paso!...

La batalla se desplegó, por todas partes
Del campamento, y abajo hacia el Río,
Pies pisando fuerte, gritos—con acero azul
Mano a mano, vino la venganza:
¡Todos los enemigos en el mismo Valle y Río ...!

—Parte Cuatro
Muerte (en Medio de la Agonía)

Continuamos muriendo como langostas,
Éramos muchos en la batalla
Tantos que no podíamos extender nuestros brazos,
Y cuando lo intentamos, nuestras: amplias, alas rotas
Continuaron luchando (con brazos y rodillas rotos, Continuamos luchando); por consiguiente, fuimos Pagados—morimos en dolor, en agonía.

Roja, sangre roja fue el pago—
No podía apiadarme de ellos, ni ellos de nosotros…:
La vista de la batalla nos aturdió a todos nosotros
Algunos agachados en terror, y yo, yo—
¡Estaba en medio de la dolorosa Agonía!...

¡Cortando y acuchillando—guerreros!
Evité golpes por casualidad—de algún modo;
Acuchillé y corté, en mi camino hacia el Río
Nadé rápidamente por las corrientes
Mis miembros de bronce contra los diques;

Ahora a través del Río, deslumbrante ante mí—
Encontré un camino, donde el viento sopla…
El domo de la luna—destrozado
En la media luz: ¡mis miembros de bronce
Aplastados, con dolor y ahora la lluvia …!

Oí en la distancia, pulmones de hierro de los Wankas,
Y pies golpeando como tambores triunfantes—
Ellos dijeron, “Conquistamos a los tontos”, aunque
Ellos, así como nosotros, son del Valle—también,
Y algún día ellos serán conquistados también.

—Parte Cinco
Paredes de Piedra

¡De este pasado frenesí catastrófico
Que ocurrió un día atrás—
La muerte de gente gritando,
Trajo a mi memoria paredes aplastantes
Un rugido horroroso a través de todo esto …!

Tú piensas antes de una batalla, y durante:
Tu cuerpo puede explotar por todo ello;
Cuántos cayeron ayer, no lo sé
Pero yo fui el único que escapó—
A través del río, por el flujo del río.

Lo que esperé encontrar o ganar con la guerra
Es diferente que lo que encontré—
Como monstruos ciegos y tontos
Luchamos—una cegadora llama blanca
Envuelta en un olvido frenético.

Tú dirás, quizás todo esto fue en vano,
Mi única respuesta es que yo fui parte de ello;
Insensato como es, era, y será—:
¡Otra vez, después, uno se vuelve investido
En delirio, paralizado con ello …!

Después de la Batalla
(Partes seis y siete)

Interludio
(A: Después de la Batalla)

Ascensión

El camino (desde el Río) iba relativamente directo hacia la montaña, el guerrero Wanka se identificaba con ello, este doblaba hacia arriba y hacia la derecha ascendiendo bruscamente hacia la cima; parte del camino, sería fácil— él sabía , aunque doloroso, ya que él tenía sus heridas, como consecuencia, cuando él escalaba, él zigzagueaba su camino hacia la cima; asentado en la cima estaban las ruinas de sus antepasados, las antiguas arcas para almacenar las cosechas, y más allá de estas una pequeña casa de piedra, su casa.

Mientras él subía la montaña, aproximadamente 5000 pies hacia arriba, él no pensó en morir o en batallar (no aún de todas formas) ni en el transporte hacia arriba, sino en la pequeña casa de piedra, Unishcoto mismo, y él no quería olvidarla, este era su impulso.

Él alzó la vista (el campo detrás de él ahora), no podía verse la cima, todo ello parecía empinado, aunque él había subido esta cientos de veces antes, esta parecía como una cascada, lista para caer a torrentes encima de él, con rocas rotas y todo, como un océano de tierra.

Cada aliento que él tomó, era como el último resto de oxígeno respirable; las nubes de la noche eran lúgubres, éstas se movieron a través de la luna como olas arrastradas por el viento, parecían ceremoniales, ellas tenían formas de cadáveres estirados, con cuellos torcidos como personal de madera, manteniéndose juntos. (¿Por quién esperaba la muerte?)

—Parte Seis
Por el Farol de la Luna

Me esforcé ahora subiendo el lado de la sierra
El fondo del viejo riachuelo, detrás de mí ahora
Mi mente en un olvido fino—
Por fin yo vi, a lo lejos …
¡Una sombra parada en la oscuridad …!

Mientras caminaba hacia mi casa—, árboles
Y ramas cercanas surgieron delante de mí
De la oscuridad, calló el cielo borroso—;
Un perro comenzó a ladrar delante:
¡ Guiado sólo por el farol del cielo …!

Sentí un triste, sombrío, débil escalofrío
Mis heridas—le dijeron a mi cuerpo que este estaba muriendo
Desvaneciéndose entre los árboles vivos de la sierra;
El perro me oyó, ladró otra vez,
¡¡Su sombra tratando de escuchar, ¿quién es?!!

Mi esposa, miró fijamente en la oscuridad—
Yo la vi, oi su voz acortando mi camino
Ven por este camino, quise decir
Pero inmóvil me recosté, como una rama rota
De un árbol vivo yo era sólo un eco silencioso.

—Parte Siete
Yo Muero

¡Morí, y entré en un silencio condenado
Morí, y el silencio rápidamente murmulló
No era noche—ni día—todavía
Quise seguir el camino delante,
Tú sabes, el que conduce a mi casa!

Pero yo estaba muerto—entre los árboles vivos
La casa pareció saltar delante de mí
(una dimensión diferente quizás);
Entonces me encontré yo mismo al lado de ella—
Susurré su nombre—¡conmovedoramente!

Sus labios estaban fríos, o ¿eran los míos?
Ella probó fatalidad, destino terrible—no sabía
Su cabeza inclinada entre sus pechos;
Yo estaba ahora encima de ella: ella era tan valiente.
(Y yo morí, y ella se acostó)

Y pensé entonces, en los tiempos
En que ella y yo, nos mantuvimos el uno al otro—
Y nos tiraríamos en los prados,
Y silenciosamente en la oscuridad—ella
Me calentaría, y ella era suave.

( Pero de este destino fatal, no podía escaparme)

Interludio
(Última Matanza (o Batalla del Chacal))

(Últimos Pensamientos):

“Me recuerdo ahora—‘El Perro’ como lo llamábamos,
Estuvo allí en la neblina, cuando me topé con el:
Mis ojos en llamas en lucha con un viejo odio;
‘Él es el Chacal’, pensé, ahora en batalla—

El líder—el Chacal, lento como un buey, vino
Hacia mí—junté mis pies, debajo,
Salté, golpeé, esquilé por su cuello
Cuerdas: sangre fluyó de él, como Río.
Esta era mi última matanza. Salté sobre fuegos, rápido
—No perdí ningún tiempo, lo agarré por las rodillas,
Lo arrojé sobre mi cabeza—cómo la muerte es muerte,
Pensé. Después, salté apoyado, en mis pies:
Luego doblando bajo, como un cóndor grande, yo,
Yo aullé como el enemigo, como una manada de sabuesos,
Mientras los fuegos disminuyeron abajo.
Ahora la sangre del enemigo estaba en mi espada, pero yo estaba vivo—
Por el momento: como el viento que me sigue”.

—Parte Ocho
Primavera y Decaimiento

No había cosas íntimas en su cuarto, vacío—en el cuarto entero permanecía todavía—con un frío de desolación, la primavera había venido, con un cielo azul brillante, ella vio flores tiradas en la tierra, como si olvidadas …

—Ella caminó más adelante hasta el área boscosa, allí—atrofiado y muerto yacía su esposo. Aplastadas en sus dedos, flores, ella tocó su mano, ellas habían dejado una mancha ella notó; aunque asquerosamente, él olía: ¡apestaba con decaimiento—!

Seriamente, en el frío de la mañana, ella hizo una pausa (inclinándose sobre su cuerpo), irritablemente aliviada, y alarmada, su miedo y desconcierto se habían hecho realidad: luego tratando de recordar lo poco que ellos había hecho juntos, y su preocupación ahora terminada, ella suspiró un largo, muy largo suspiro.

Lo esencial de esto era bastante simple, ella nunca lo había entendido a él ni a la guerra, pero lo hizo hoy, esto significó—objetividad. Todo esto implicó—hay que ponerlo detrás de ellos, para mantenerse vivo, sobrevivir, aunque sobresaltada y curiosa—ella no entendió esto.

Ella se preguntó— “¿Qué son las palabras a esto?” no había nada que hacer [realizar, cumplir] salvo, la esperanza de un nuevo esposo, aunque esto le dio repugnancia, y pavor; ella tendría que confiar en un extraño (ella dejaría esto de lado por el momento)

—Parte Nueve (conclusión) Interludio
El Fantasma del Llanto

(Afligida) Ella estuvo inactiva por su chimenea, sus manos frías hasta los huesos—ella estuvo delante de esta, después giró hacia la ventana, allí ella pudo ver los árboles que se inclinaban, su corazón saltó un poco “Tú bromeas”, ella exclamó; una misteriosa configuración vino saltando a la ventana abierta del alféizar—, “idiota”, ella exclamó; la sombra pareció mirarla fijamente, con una paz bárbara.

Su cara mojada, se iluminó. “No lo hagas”, ella gritó, y entonces probó sus propias lágrimas—ella se aferró a la ventana, la sombra mostró la intensidad de sable “¿Me he vuelto loca?” ella se preguntó.

Ella había estado esperando que él viniera a casa, digo, que viniera a casa para siempre ((mucho tiempo atrás)( no de esta forma)), ella había esperado tanto—eso dijo ella en voz alta, “ … más largo que mil fuegos—en mi horno de piedra...” y quizás si ella no hubiera encontrado su cuerpo, ella habría esperado más tiempo. “¡No!”, ella contestó, “¡eso es hacerse ilusiones!” Esto es lo que es. “¿Qué?” ella dijo; una voz dijo, “...tú encontrarás a alguien muy pronto…” ella miró fija y silenciosamente (era como si la voz fuera molestosa)

Su barbilla ahora en sus palmas, mirando al fuego, “¡Tú no quieres!” Ella dijo “Seguramente por lo que tiene que ser”. Ella añadió, “Cualquier cosa que pienses, es porque eso es lo que quieres creer”.

Ella cogió una taza, bebió su contenido y se sentó atrás, su cara atractiva en la luz de la lumbre. Ella cerró la ventana, “La gente huele mal debido a las cosas que hacen”; ella dijo, “la corrupción viva, marca la carne, toda manchada”. Ella se sintió limpia hasta el hueso—entonces el fuego se apagó, mientras ella se durmió.

Ella murmuró “Él me dio su mitad, y la otra mitad, quizás la mejor mitad, él la cambió por la guerra—esa parte, que nunca la pude encontrar, hasta ahora.

Horno de Piedra

Al lado del horno de piedra—ella durmió
Una mujer bronceada, medio apenada
Su cara brillando con el calor
Y ojos oscuros corredizos; a sus
Pies un perro y cuatro cachorros,
Rasguñando y chocando—
Mientras ellos comían—su comida …
El fuego reflejaba: destellos de dientes;
La curiosidad había desaparecido—.

# 1453 (8-Sep-2006)

Ventana de Piedra

Afuera de su ventana de piedra
En el cielo ninguna estrella aparecía;
La tierra era una elevación desinflada;
El cielo estaba encorvado en su forma oscura;
Los árboles más allá, como fantasmas fríos;
Y la luna mostraba una luz fría
Como una luz cadavérica—ascendiendo; un frío
gris se filtró por las piedras.

En su escurridiza mente sin vida,
Ella dijo, “¿Cuánto tiempo debo llorar
a los muertos?” Como si suplicando en
Este silencio gris, porque este
Se disuelva rápidamente, y termine.

# 1454 (8-Sep-2006)

Después (Epitafio):

La Casa en Unishcoto

¡Llorar por el que fue tan fuerte para morir
A quien la guerra lo ha tomado al final!

Aflicción por su esposa que no canta más
Y por las ruinas llamadas Unishcoto—

Este fue él, que tenía un corazón ardiente
Y aliento heroico,

Cuyas armas están puestas, y colgadas
En la Casa por Unishcoto;

Este fue él, quien se hizo poderoso en guerra,
Pero la guerra de ella era de otra manera:

¡Así, llorar por el que fue tan fuerte en guerra
Cuya guerra es ahora, de la noche!

# 1451 7-Sep-2006: Nota: Unishcoto es una ruina sobre la cima de una de las montañas en el Valle del Mantaro de Perú.

# 1450 “El Camino a Unishcoto”, 6-Sep-2006 (Las primeras partes fueron escritas la primera y última semana de agosto, y las últimas partes fueron escritas la primera semana de septiembre del 2006) los dibujos también fueron hechos durante el mismo período.

▼

End Poem

Part Three: The Hidden Diary of Bin Laden and God (The Passerby)

2007-01-21T14:10:00.000-08:00

Part Three: The Hidden Diary of Bin Laden and God (The Passerby)

Bin thinking: ‘Oh, Lord look at this mess, Bagdad is worse than I thought, I should have told Allah, I’d prefer Afghanistan, you know, my home away from home, here they are shooting up the place.’

(He looks up and sees rockets coming in every which way, like cats and dogs raining from the sky).

‘This is not my cup of tea (he adds), got to find some shields, some good Egyptians or those folks from Jordon will do.’

A Passerby: “Hay mister you look somewhat like that Laden guy, you know… (he hesitates to think of his first name, continues and says:), Laden, laden…!”

Bin Laden comments: “His first name idiot is Bin, Bin you got it?”

The Passerby: “Man, don’t get so uptight, he’s dead and gone, we’ve forgotten his brow long ago…brother!”

Bin: “What do you mean, forgot!”

The Passerby: “Dead is dead man, in Bagdad you get a lot of it, where you’ve been man, I mean, homey?”

Bin: “I’ve only been gone a few hours, or is it days, whatever, I mean whatever!”

The Passerby: “That’s not allowed if you’re a true infidel fighter like us here.”

Bin: “What is not allowed?”

The Passerby: “Saying ‘whatever,’ like those young punks in America…you got it— Laden look alike?”

Bin: “I’m not a look alike, I am the real thing, Bin Laden in the flesh.”

The Passerby: “I don’t think soooo…but if, then you should know better; plus playing Bin Laden is worse than playing Elvis, I suppose you’ll be playing him next?”

Bin: “I’m for real man, not like those Elvis imitators, I’m the real thing.”

The Passerby: “You’re the only thing naked around here; you should find some cloths (thinking he might have been hit by a flying piece of debris), you that poor brother? I mean, just go down to the Army surplus store, USA, style, and tell them you’re on there side, get the goodies, and run back here like hell, and I’ll find you a gun or two and we can kill some infidel for the almighty Allah, and if we get killed we can go to heaven have vino and girls all over the place, I’m kind of looking forward to that.”

Bin: “Homey, the last part of your scenario, is full of it, there is no such glory in heaven as in having vino and girls.”

The Passerby: “How do you know? Now I know you’re a spy, only spies say such things, they want to take all the goodies, like those damn Americans, they got enough over yonder, and I got to suffer here in Bagdad, and you tell me there is no such thing…what’s a man to do for a freebee?”

All of a sudden rocks hit a few feet away from the passerby, Bin looks this way and that way, every-which- way, and quickly moves to a safer area, under a nearby bridge. The Passerby is hit with scraps of metal, one deep in his side, and is begging for Bin to come back and help him.

The Passerby: “Come back please, please Bin and help me.”

Bin: “Sure, sure,” he hollers, “now you believe me call me Bin when you want something, sure, sure, like Saddam, you guys are all alike, when it come down to life and limb, you’ll say anything.”

The Passerby: “But Bin, I’m a brother Arab, come save me, we can kill more infidels for Allah.”

Bin thinks about this for a moment thinking: Allah might be watching, this is a good moment perhaps to put on a good show, if I save the coward, maybe he’ll send be back to heaven, and get me out of this mess… thus, Bin starts to move to save him…

God: “I see you Bin, you’ve got better things to do, don’t worry about him, I got his number up here, he’s was about do anyhow, a few days here or there doesn’t matter, he killed enough for his pass to the whore house, that really isn’t a whore house as you’ve learned…hee, hee!”

Bin: “Shoots…I mean crap…I mean, it’s a bad day, can’t fool the almighty, what was I thinking about. Sorry fellow, that voice you just heard was the Almighty, he said your number is up, so I can’t do a thing for you. Incidentally, you’ll find out in a moment that little extra goodie package we all thought was waiting for us in yonder is not waiting.”

I can’t describe what he is saying to Bin, but he is giving him the finger in four differed geometrical designs.

1/21/2007 Humor

Part Two: The Hidden Diary of Bin Laden and God (Bagdad)

2007-01-21T14:08:00.000-08:00

Part Two: The Hidden Diary of Bin Laden and God (Bagdad)

Bin: “Not sure if I like it down here, it’s getting a little hairy…especially Bagdad.”

Muhammad: “Harry is a Midwestern term, an infidels way of saying, ‘bad’, and we don’t use that word, ok Bin, I mean, I thought we saw eye to eye, I’m wondering?”

Bin: “Sorry, old fellow, too much of that cave TV carp, you know, Americanism, it’s everywhere.”

God listening: “You can say that again.”

Muhammad: “Yup, the big guy is watching, wants to make sure you do it right this time.”

Bin: “That’s kind of an insult, I mean, he’s had forever to do his thing, and I did more in one day to the Americans than he has in 200-years, what’s his beef?”

Muhammad: “Be careful he’s listening.”

God talking: “What’d you say, he says?”

Bin: “Is he pretending, I thought he could hear everything?”

Muhammad: “Move out of the sun, he gets a better echo from your voice in the shade.”

Bin: “Echo?”

Muhammad: “You’ve got a lot to learn, things are not exactly as you figured they’d be. In any case, God is waiting for your plans, what are they?

Bin: “What are they, I’ve only been here a few minutes, I’m not God, give me a few days to figure this out. I mean by all purposes, I should be in that damn tent with all the girls he promised for my good works, and some vino…you know, but here I am, in this mud trap going to do my duty again, for God and you, I mean, this is a hardship tour. I got to show these folks Allah raised me from the dead, like he did Christ, and perhaps they will follow me like before to their graves; I just need time to brainwash a few, and the rest will come. It is easy to fool the masses, I have a hard time with fooling the few though, and that is where I’ve got to start.”

God looking down: “So be it.”

Bin to Muhammad: “Is that all he’s got so say, ‘So be it.’ No question mark, not even a statement.”

Muhammad: “Who is to know God in his never-ending glory, he speaks, and we lesser beings try like the dickens to figure out his every motive and move, but we are but grasshoppers to him.”
Bin: “I’m getting the feeling I’m being used by him a bit, I think I want to be in that damn tent, it beats running around these tunnels and caves. I mean it is my turn.”

Muhammad: “Stop belly aching, and get down to business, we got a schedule to meet, I think. God has a lot of hope for you. And to be honest about the matter, vino in heaven is forbidden, we are you know, in no need of such things.”

Bin: “But here I’ve heard, and told everyone, and I think somewhere along the line, read, we’d have vino; I’m kind of hooked on it now, how about telling God to modify that rule?”

Muhammad: “If you drink it in heaven, you’d get no effect from it; just being in heaven is enough of an effect to satisfy you.”

Bin: “Then why did he promise girls and booze?”

Muhammad: “You got to read between the lines; he meant you will get drunk and high off his heavenly environment.”

Bin: “Well now you tell me, perhaps I better get some down here before I go back up there.”

Muhammad: “Remember you are killing for God, not suppose to be whoring around with girls and vino for yourself. What kind of hero do you want people to think you are?”

Bin went to say something else, and in the clap of an eye he was gone, I think a little agitated at Bin, thus, here he was in the Middle of Bagdad, naked as a horse, trying to figure out which way was which…!

1/20/2007

The HIdden Diary of Bin Laden and God

2007-01-20T15:48:00.001-08:00

The Hidden Diary of Bin Laden and God

Bin Laden died, and God stood in front of him, he said,
“Allah, the most High,” and Bin said, “Sir, it is I who has wished to serve you,” and Allah said, “Oh, I thought you thought it was the other way around, sorry for the mistake, how the heck you been, from what I’ve seen you’ve been quite busy?”
A little bashful, Bin said, “Doing your work God isn’t easy you know,” and God, “But it helps, I mean, I can’t do it all myself, now can I?” Bin thought about that for a moment, figured he’d leave that alone, it was a hard question (a loaded one perhaps), then commented in passing, “Is Muhammad around?”

“I can have him at your command, what is your wish?”
Said Bin in a sheepish way, “I wanted him to comment on the good job I’ve been doing down yonder way…”
Then all of a sudden, in the clap of an eye, Muhammad showed up, he was smiling, and Bin and He met eye to eye (I think they thought alike, and liked each other, you know, clicked), said Muhammad in a random echoing voice,
“I see you are carrying out my good works, I mean, killing as many infidels as possible: hee, hee,” he said adding, “I killed more folks than you, perhaps we can talk to the big guy, and see if you can go back down yonder, and catch up to me, I mean, you did well, but blood is blood, and Allah, likes all he can have, you know: in the name of God, we can do it, do it together, me from up here, and you down there.”
“Do you think another 9/11 will do the trick?” Mohammed looked at Bin, smiled, and behind him was God, who was looking up in the sky as if he didn’t hear a thing, but he was smiling nonetheless, said Muhammad,
“Yes, that might satisfy the big guy, but how about a bigger bang for the buck, you know, we’ll supply the oil revenue through Iran or Syria, God has a few friends left there (the PLO and Hama’s gorillas can assist), and we can get a few more jets to line up, and a few more Arabs to give up their lives for the holy honor of sticking it to America and perhaps Europe, and why not add a few of our enemies in the Middle East that have been a bit cheap lately with their revenues.”
And so it was, Bin was given a second chance to make good, and I think he is almost ready….

1/20/2007 Humor

The Lair (Part II))3-9: Poems, Humor & "On Poetry's Form"

2007-01-19T09:37:00.000-08:00

3) Lies and Love

Life and good life and then
From the first element, to the end
I few like a Vampires heated blood
And fire reeked from my eyes
And all my deeds and words,
Died as I was judged—
On Lies and love…!

#1512 (1/16/2007)

4) Bereaved

We take death reduce it in size
Call it a penniless spinster
(then look for the prize):
No, that’s only somewhat it,
It is more like Fried Chicken,
Tightly kept in a shoe box,
Checking out, or trying to—
Where the devilled eggs were left.
Oh yes, the black Veil is lifted,
Thrown into a fire of resistance:
Then we eat a piece of chocolate,
And go to bed, senseless.

#1613 (1/15-16/2007)

5) Youthful Ignorance

The only crime for a boy at ten (claiming innocence) is he acquired the appetite, but not the means to devour it. Some call it ignorance; I call it the lack of desire for the fruits he will pluck later.

#1612 (1/15/2007)

6) Song of the Beast

“Satan! Satan is forth! Hark to his rippling-voice!
The blood that drips to Hell makes crimson his hands.
Satan is forth upon the light! Brother, think twice!
A demon has loosed the beast whose sword is sharp on the
land!”

#1624 1/19/2007

7) Held Breath

God said one day, he whisper it, to be exact, in fear His voice would echo, and cause too many earthly disruptions, He said plainly and clearly,
“There will be no more Free will.”
And the world held their breath, I remember the day quite well, a little after five, sundown had yet to come. But the day was finished—; nonetheless, the world held an empty silence. It was too late now, He had already chosen, elected, pushed (you could say) pottage on us, we the world, so someone said.
I thought: hadn’t someone seen this coming? (Foreseen, that is). Oh well, it is case of the blind leading the blind I suppose. Anyhow, this weakness of humanity I felt had gave God too much evil, corruption for God to stop it—so abruptly now (or even give it forgiveness): I mean: why not let us destroy ourselves, we’re doing a good enough job of it, it shan’t take all that much longer. So I told myself anyhow.
In any case, it was a fair gamble, He’d keep his word, He said:
“You had failed Me.”
He whispered that also, thank goodness. His whispers, I’ll let you know, are not all that calming, they vibrate the spine to a point you become paralyze, can you imagine if He yelled—God forbid. He used the word ‘had,’ I would have preferred ‘have,’ in that the latter is less fermenting, sounding.
I heard someone say, and it wasn’t me, I dare say,
“What did you expect?”
I thought it was a good question though.
He said (and I must now paraphrase it, because I was kind of ducking if not down right hiding behind a large, very large tree: it will be like a dream , and you will all suddenly wake up tomorrow, and be saved (and safe).
I thought that was a pretty good deal, then I heard a horde of voices screaming, yelling, and all that kind of stuff, “Let’s vote on this!”

1/18/2007, Lima, Peru (Humor)

8) Non-Virtue
(A sketch—From the summer of 1960))
Dedicated to Mike Siluk))

“Hurry up, come here!” He said.
My brother, Mike, was smoking in the backyard underneath some bushes afraid mother would see him, thus hiding somewhat, and he spotted me, or I him, I can’t remember fully who got the first glance, but we were seeing eye to eye now, so I leaned down and got closer to those bushes, and sure enough it was Mike, smoking a cigarette, if I had any doubts before, I had none now.
He was shifting that cigarette like car gears, between his mouth and hand, and back again. Perhaps that is where he got his name later, “Gunner,”
I couldn’t say for sure, but I think he used to gun his cars, you know, accelerate it like puffing on a cigarette to get more juice out of it, before the big bang, before the car took off. I suppose it made it all that much more pleasurable.
The pantry was part of the kitchen, connecting anyhow, to one another, and mother would walk back and forth, she could see through the pantry window, the whole backyard, and that is why Mike singled with his hands, motioned that is (to me), to join him in his little crime scene. Ah, I was not wise back then, as you will see in a moment.
“All right,” he said, “take it quick,” as if that those were my initial intentions. I was not there to start a smoking habit, that would last twenty-years, but he slid the cigarette into my right hand, as if it belonged there. Teenager to teenager, a mutual crime was now born. At this point I was already saying to myself, ‘What am I doing,’ but I kept it in my hand, and slowly brought it to my mouth.
“All right,” he said smiling. He really didn’t need to say another word, I got the picture but he said something on this order: we are equally involved. And so I perhaps learned my first lesson in self-survival, or was it self-interest. If he was evil, it was I now, because my innocence was really simply waiting to be tested under fire, so it would have happened down the road of life I suppose, somewhere, had he not triggered my so called evil side. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t blame him, under the circumstances, as Mark Twain once said, and I learned that phrase of his, way to late in life, “A virtue is not a virtue until tested under fire.” I didn’t do very well, did I?

So what did I learn, and what is the premise of this little sketch? Perhaps, we can call it a virtue, or a good quality one has is really a non-virtue, until tested under fire, and usually we don’t even know it.

(Humor) 1/16/2007

8) Before Dawn In Bagdad

Fast the hours outside the noonday sun fall.
Afar on the sandy soil a vehicle goes by.
I know there is little hope, sun rains from the sky,
Yet that obscure heat is over most all,
Similar for hell, and men a momentous pall.
More distant now, an icy, mechanic cry
A signal and soldiers swirl and die,
And lines wait useless, for the trumpet’s call.

Now breaks the night on America and Bagdad
Over the torso of the world, they know
What now gleams from the recording snows!
(That page of Hell’s book that lays so clean!)
As, motive to the race’s huge mischance,
Yes, men die, for Liberty? That thou cry.

#1626 1/19/2007

Note: it doesn’t seem anyone knows were we are going with the war in Iraq. So much is involved, it is hard to sort out the future, not only of the Middle East, but America and the world, we are all stuck here together you know. Saddam is no longer part of the equation, nor has been for awhile. Like in Vietnam, my war (kind of), we see chaos not only in socio-political circles over this divider of souls, but on the streets of Bagdad, with our Commanders and theirs, long-term, short-term. Perhaps there are too many scavengers trapped into this horrific explosion, risky affair, perhaps I should call it, to come up our out with a proper solution to the problem (whatever the problem is and I’m no longer aware of what the problem is, we won the war, who says we got to stay?). Whatever, like in Vietnam, night and day, the solider, the one doing the fighting, and the one we pay to do our fighting, waits and perhaps evaluates: for liberty, who says that?

9) On Poetry’s Form

People get obsessed with structure, trying to choose the correct form you want to use in poetry; that others expect you to use; you must let go and blend one idea or event into the next, lest you lose the soul of it trying to fit it into something that never should have been.

When God created man, he began in the beginning and went to the end, He knew the whole in-between of that matter, he watched, and learned perhaps, man was all vanity, as he had perhaps learned from Lucifer prior to this (if indeed God can learn, and I think he can. He once said: “That never occurred to me…” He was referring to man’s demise, or depths he could fall in sin (a particular sin).

However, I use the above to support my idea here of folks being obsessed with structure to the point of loosing everything in-between. We are not God’s so we cannot go back and find what we threw away—what might have been. I think one of the secrets is, is to listen to your voice, the one speaking inside of you, you find the silence with no pretense inside that voice, this silence may provide you with—between the silence: the syllables, letters, words, rhyme, and other elements of poetry you may want to use, and it may not, but nonetheless, you got to record it as it comes, and don’t force it in to satisfy the neighbor.

"The Lair" (new poems by D.L. Siluk) : Night Song & The Barrier

2007-01-15T18:21:00.000-08:00

The Lair

Poetry of Dennis L. Siluk

Here are Mr. Siluk’s new, and most vivid if into disturbing poems in a longtime; readers of “The Lair,” will see the unique and simple, if not genuine representation of life, and emotional tone in life, bittersweet, seep out: in it’s harsh but brilliance in these new poems. “Poetry,” as Dennis has said in the past (or one element of it) “…must hold no pretense within it, raw or not.” In a way, these poems read as if, he was a ghost.

Rosa Penaloza de Siluk

1) Night Song

Anger set in her going, like an over would watch
As the hospital tried to hide me
From my unwed mothers arms (in 1947)
And then I took my place among
The corrupt world.

There were no bands or relatives
Upon my arrive, I
Was just simple, and naked
Looking blindly at the walls;
Now in my mothers arms
Held tightly as the nurses frowned.

Note: #1610 (1-15-2007). One child had died that night in the hospital, on October 7, 1947, at St. Josephs Hospital, in St. Paul, Minnesota; hence, I was almost fed to a new family, had my mother fallen to sleep up a few minutes more.

2) Time Barrier

The word of a camel in heat,
is not mine, don’t believe it.
The word of a stranger might be
better than a friend, be on guard.

A mans self-interest, comes in like weather
sunny one moment, gray the next
(but usually stronger than friendship.)

People walk on cracked streets
no better than water falling off a leave.

On top of the mountain I found pretense
going down it I found self-interest
In the valley—I found the poor and dying…
Those that lived by self-righteousness

What barrier do you prefer? I asked myself,
(thinking: we all need friends).

#1611 91/15/2007)

Note: This will be up dated…