The Smell of Possibilities

THE SMELL OF
POSSIBILITIES

TWENTY-TWO POEMS BY

PABLO OMAR

HAPPY DAYS

When you're a poet you're alone
when you're a poet you've chosen to be alone
When you're a poet you're alone

TEORIA Y PRACTICA

For the continued inactivity of the silent informed minority
of which i am of course a member
i think about raising my fist then whisper:

keep buying broadsheets and shrugging shoulders
and on and on we´ll stagger and mutter.

THE BRUTE ENGINE

And it´ll continue like this?
Best equip

seat
desk
cheque
yes yes yes

roof
garden
car
girl met in local bar

sufficient tv time
create the next in line

SOMETHING THE SAD-EYED LADY SAID

Her eyes two broken hearts she looks at me says

"life is one long nightmare interspersed with brief dreams
mere moments amidst it all
you for me were but a moment"

DOG ON A BUS

Buildings built to store future boredom
the city as a construction site and moments missed
come let us talk of the madness we live amongst
i like the sound of my voice even more while being kissed

Your skin gets darker by the day as do my thoughts
kiss me while we listen to their sound
kiss my neck while i spit at the absurdities

come along my dear
come along

THESE CONSUMER DAYS

Memory disfigured by harsh words
you´re forgotten in the potential of strangers
Though it bores me you creep back in thoughts

thoughts of touch
thoughts of taste
of anticipation
and of waste

mostly waste

PEPE

Nobility is disobedience.
Stand tall
face the shit
spit and bawl

Obedience is not a noble thing at all

UTOPIAN TALK

Solitary walks
and the extraction of thoughts

the extracted thoughts will go as words on paper

the walks till i´m no longer lost.

GLOVE OR THE SUBURBAN CURSE

A writer finishes pens and pads
i finish both
i leave words of ink on paper
of the words i leave i like many

a drinker finishes cans, bottles and glasses
i´m a drinker and finish many

MALATESTA AND ME

The world is absurd
don't be so absurd

lay the book on the floor
lie down and think of me
think of me without censor
thoughts free
dogma exposed
legs open

- ? -

With the smell of possibilities
and my empty stomach i walk
walk in order to read
read so as not to talk

the smell of possibilities
is the odor of these days
an odor that both kills and creates
an odor i can't ignore.

SOME CHANGE THEN MORE OF THE SAME

Maybe i´m simple and things complicate me
dictated by things far beyond me
your face made me forget the futures monotony
a little smile can be revolutionary

Do you know those grey days nearly sealed my faith?
In those days we´ve lost so many
but i thought clear thoughts and made my escape
ay ay ay
Maude Gonnes are so many.

ANSWERED IN WORDS

In some lugar
under the sun
backpack on
loaded soul
in hand

Outstretched hands
my friend
open air
open land

one day i´ll join you

when i stop swimming in
streams
rivers
seas
and even oceans of agreement
warm and easy

one day i´ll join you my friend
please believe me

BLACK SKIN AND JANE AUSTEN

Let us lie together
and tell each other
our thoughts
my thoughts right now
are only of you
i know little of the inside
but the outside i like
empty me and let me
know who you are

IT COMES BACK STRONG

The nervous energy fills me up
and brings me back
to a child with too much reality in his eyes
to the sunday night smell of ironed cloths
and that country music sound

A child lying in bed alone with his fear
of a world so full of chains

TEACHERS

For those who disrupt
the gradual learning process
i give them nothing
they deserve nothing

A man in the park
just opened a beer
i give him my all
he has my all

HAPPY COUPLE AND WARM BEER

Shadows of trees reach out
to touch the suns street presence
my beer once cold turns warm

unaware of the warmth around me
i think of destroying what's before me

BEEN BACK IN DUBLIN A DAY

Grey streets
grey sky
grey river
grey eye

friends becoming something less
a darker shade of grey ?
Free market economy
hip hip hurray

THE LITTLE DEATHS A-COMING

You appear before me
as newly arrived freckle
on a pretty strangers face
as a green strap on a
brown back
as a white face slowly
turning red
a hesitant smile
glancing eyes so unaware
reading a book or tapping a foot
in a hurry or changing line
as a conversation never had
words without exit muffled inside
as the other the unknown
beating heart beating hard

You appear before me as a moment missed
in this city of moments missed

You´ll appear before me and i´ll be gone a while.

HISTORY AND RASTA REGGAE IN THE SUBWAY

There's a man in the metro
who understands repetition
repeats himself slowly
while i walk and listen

keep the rhythm
keep the rhythm
brotherman
keep the rhythm

put pen to the paper
and we´ll see what i´ve written:

History like reggae
repeats itself
reggae its rhythms
history its crimes

keep the rhythm
keep the rhythm

SILENT NOISE
EL RUIDO SORDO

we've found slowness
in the rush
in the madness

in the water's sound
we've found silence

in sunlight
in shade
on damp grass
under dry trees

the thump thump
of the unspoken

the thump thump
of what could be

PURPOSE

I spent the day
looking for
and walking slowly across
zebra crossings

CRYSTAL EYE

I a normally dutiful disciple
of the theoretical school of thought
that is inaction
stand up from my floor of scattered words
and spontaneously
put thought into action

A son of defeated potential
I close my blinds on a defeated sun

SKIN AND HONESTY

A piece of skin I just saw
a glimpse
little bit of back
soft skin
fading brown
below the tee-shirt
above the belt
reminded me of a piece of time
that I describe as a waste of time
although at the time

that's not quite how I felt

MY FRIEND NATALIA LIVES IN LAS TABLAS

Lady on a road
empty road
an empty road
in a neighbourhood
waiting to begin
she pours water
on plants
plants alive
living plants
an attentive lady
looking after life

in a neighbourhood
waiting for conformity.

Conformity ?
Ah sure that's life.

I'M SORRY, BUT COULD YOU REPEAT THAT ?

How can i listen
when the words make the mouth run
and the finish line is such a smile ?

MOVING AND SHAKING

Sweetie, sit here and listen up.
Any number of awful things could
happen to anyone of us.

What I usually do is choose just
one.
Play it out in my head for days
like episodes of a TV series which only
I see.

I write the script.
When it comes to worry, baby,
I'm ambitious.
All I need is a symptom of some
sort and the rest writes itself;
tests, results, tears, hugs...

All I need is a symptom of some
sort,
an hour unaccounted-for or
misinterpreted words.
Then the ideas start to flow.

I'm ambitious.
I've got the prime-time shows.
There I'll be, not visibly
Trembling, but inside shaking
from side to fearful side.

I'll be captivated by it.
Consumed.
I'll have no choice but to keep
tuning in.

Any number of awful things
could happen to anyone of us.
And there are many doing
something similar.
Playing out their worries
and fears in their heads.

Knowledge of it doesn't help.
But I wonder, do they put as
much effort into it as I do ?

Like I said, I'm ambitious,
I'm going for the big money.

BREADCRUMBS ON THE STUMP
OF A TREE

When the call came
I was in the park
looking at the pond.
The ducks had gone
to some other part
so it was just water
with yellowed leaves.
There were breadcrumbs
on the stump of a tree.
It had been days since
I'd spoken to anyone.
Longer still
since I'd spoken to him.

I'd get up around noon.
Drink a couple
of glasses of white wine
then head to the park.
I'd walk a bit,
but for the most part I'd
just sit by the pond.
Sometimes
the ducks were there.
Other times they weren't.

I'd write poems.
I was trying to make sense
of what was happening to him
and had happened to her.
All the while something
similar
was happening to me.
I've still got them.
When they took me
they kept reading them
over and over taking notes.
Irrespective of all that's
come to pass
the poems are good.

When the call came I was
by the pond.
On the rail, between the
bench and the water,
someone had incised
What is a life if full of care ?
We have no time to stop and
stare.
I was looking through
the gap in the rail,
into the pond,
trying to make sense of it all.