The following poems are
taken from MAGDALENA, a collaborative work in progress by Phil Shoenfelt and Kateřina
Pinosová, a member of the Group of Czech and Slovak Surrealists. The book is a
poetic-erotic meditation on the dark, obsessive side of sexuality, and on the
magical-erotic nature of Prague itself. It takes the form of a series of poems, letters,
short stories and incantations passed back and forth between two imaginary lovers.
1.
How much I need you
I succeeded in making your face visual
today – here on this wall
Sir,
I’m choking on thick, grey clouds
The tricky sun crawls into my holes slowly
My body needs your devices to be pushed inside
I put a collar of sharp metal petals around my neck
The pain it causes saves my guts
From the desparate need for your hairy limbs
Naked in the morning chill
I threw myself on a thorny bush
I’m covered with drops of dried blood
There are fresh scars on my breasts
And my arse aches
I’ve seen the palace of the Great Cohabitation
Even though I am not Sunday’s Child
I’ve seen my cloak disappear
Behind the corner of Golden Street
Last time I saw you
Your skin was almost translucent
Or was it my own skin?
That familiarity frightens me somehow
4.
My Dear,
Again I consumed so much
All those words Magdalena produces...
Don’t feed her on beer – choose some different poison
Oh, our coffin – I saw The Black Mare walking around when we fucked
She was looking at me and stole some glances which I wanted to
dedicate to you
Don’t kill her, she is my sister, but punish her – she is bigger than me…
Don’t look into her eyes – they are so beautiful and will make you cry
Her fur is so smooth that it will make you come
Beware of her she will steal your semen
Once you let her fuck you she will suck the lymph out of you
And leave you dry
My crown rises for you
Like a watery throne
My mares are so black
And the way my brother fucks me isn’t possible to describe
I can pour my tears into his eyes
And he weeps his into mine…
Oh the fucking world!
There hasn´t been anything like this before
5.
THE FIRST POEM OF MAGDALENA
Clasped between the horned stars
Magdalena strokes her thighs
To bring herself off
In gushes of spermy tears
These crevices and undulations
Spasming the aether
Make her shuddering belly
Drip with milk
Owl feathers garnish her cheeks
And her toady fetish
Is the moon submerged in a cup
The ocean calls Magdalena
Her lips blow shining blades
To kill all the drowned men
To suck their puffy eyes
To cut their cocks
To swallow them at one go
Her creamy palpitations
Are like nectar on my tongue
From hallowed ground
She flies on silent leathery wings
See how she flickers and flames
Between the tendrils and fronds
Of this ancient noble limb
She trails her nectar
Like scented raiments
Across the scarred brow of youth
Such a cool essence she doth possess
And yet and yet and yet…
A secret fire consumes her from within
O that she-wolf and her convulsions!
See the glove she trails
Amongst the slimy boughs
Of a debauchery too liquid
To embrace
Her essence lies in the skull
Of the white tortoise
Her arse is girldled
With tiny bones and feathers
Plucked from a vulture’s neck
The carrion on which she feeds
Hangs rotting from a broken linden tree
Enough…
Divest her now
I insist absolutely
I’ll gather hollyhocks
To whip her thighs
On dripping benches
Of toads meat and ebony
But first this haunted bitch
Must reveal the clefted hollow
And offer a fleshy cup
From which the company
Will partake –
A feast of sorts
For young and not so innocent flesh
33.
A LETTER (1)
Dear,
I offer you my ribs on a shining fist
I offer you my eyes on stalks of running mucus
I saw you in the yard yesterday
You were fucking one of my friends in a doorway
Is this the means you choose to get closer to me?
To run your intestines
through my fingers is my ultimate desire –
those butterflies
we pinned to the sky
are only a prelude
to more intimate caresses
I sometimes feel so high when I watch
your head from the roof of the house where
the snake-tailed witch flies on leathery wings through
the moon which is a window…
Come – my fingers are stars
They’ll warm and strangle your heart
So you’ll never go away again
Come now – I’m ready to receive you
Why did you only stare at me
behind the gate
behind my window
behind the bars
stained with sweat?
I offer you the way, how to...
Ah, but these instructions decimate me –
Am I just a newt’s tail
beating like a heart
on the end of a pin
or does my excrement truly excite you?
Yours, in torture, truly…
34.
A LETTER (2)
Dear,
My scrunchy apples
taste so good this empty season.
Behind the slimy bars
my fingers enter funnels
and dance upon the milky entrails
that bind me to your shrivelled heart.
Only dead love excites me...
How can I explain
these subterranean devices
to one who lives above ground?
The machines here make a lot of noise.
I think I’ll use them when I visit you tonight.
The points of light their needles produce
is the mirror I can use to reveal you.
So good to hear you are active...
My legs go buttery to the core
when I receive your fond insults.
And the rat-tat-tat of these machines
screws me to the metal plate
on which my favourite indiscretions
were committed...
Last night I saw the ANGEL.
He was dancing and came to my window
clothed in ribbons of light.
I’ve broken three branches
I’ve broken your neck
Now I’ve come to heal you.
I’m never more the one to touch.
I’m far away, sliding, but
be aware I’ll be within you!
Work slowly, don’t push yourself,
or you’ll break the fucking mirror!
I’ll saddle my leathery arse
for this journey into oblivion
My tunnels have been opened
by the labour of insects
My fingers regulate the pulse
of once forbidden pleasures.
While the world is full of glimmers
my stricken heart is engorged with slime
Oh, and my teeth ache and stutter
to suck your leper’s breath…
Keep your ear to the eye,
the needle pierced through
your lines of fortune,
the arch to break your skull against,
the thorny rose growing on your eyelid.
Aim for the core and crush it!
Yours, in kind, forever…
40.
When the dusk comes
I unfold my wings
And unpack my trunk of whispers
I jump between chimneys
And fly from roof to roof
With my tail of stars strung out behind me
At midnight I trail my fingers
Through the sleepy rows of swans
On the rivershore
It’s easy for me to change my shape
And flow like smoke
Through keyholes and cracked bedroom windows
Can’t you hear me whispering
In your dreams, sir?
So it will continue
Until the dawn’s
Spreading cheeks of crimson
Check the cat’s progress under the eaves
But my alcoholic self
Is a mirror of chains
Run through with pewling brats
That cluster in shadows
And ruin the ectoplasmic curtain
At such times I have to be careful
I chant on cement stairs
Calling out for the wrecks
Of shivering revolutionaries
I follow a circuitous route
Down soot-blackened chimneys
Into the calm asylum wards
Of the suburbs
There I’m safe –
Just another harmless lunatic –
A broken wing
A foot to climb the winding stairs
When your diamonds fall in flakes
I lay these jewels on
A pig’s snout
And go beachcombing
To find my theory
But your calm demeanour
Betrays you, sir –
Under certain conditions
The atmosphere congeals
And all your attempts to embellish
Will be thwarted at the turn
One, two, three barrels of silver
I have in my possession now
A fitting dowry
For a bride like me…
So let’s go fishing again
My dear sister swans
The night is dark
But the moon is in the right position...
|