a cynical view seen from a balcony in paris

7/28/2019 A Cynical View Seen From a Balcony in Paris

1/37

GRIZLI777

A Cynical View from a

Balcony in ParisTanka, Senryu, poems and stories.Oscar Hansen

[Pick the date]


2/37

Monuments

Is the Eifel tower female? Yes, she is a timeless Miss Paris.

Leaves are getting auburn and there is no denying fall is here.

Im the great survivor standing on a plateau of nothingness.

Many wasted years, ok, but it was those years in the wilderness

that brought me here. I shall not climb the tower from the outside

to honour the army of workers, who built this magnificent tower.

They are all but forgotten now. The name Eifel lives on, but the man

himself lost his crown when trying to build the Panama Canal.

I walk in a long corridor with many doors, but I will look inside,

my curiosity is gone I need not know. My goal is to reach the end of

the hall where I see shadows, perhaps the great man Eifel is there,

and if not, I hope it is the army of the forgotten I will meet.


3/37

Fear of Flying

Having spent a week in Israel and seen the inequity and arrogance

of the way the Palestinians were treated, I had a breakdown and

sent to a psychiatric hospital. When feeling better a male nurse

was flying with me to London. The nurse had a great fear of flying

I persuaded him to take valium he was to give me. He got quite

giddy, I ordered whisky for both of us. He insisted on singing Yiddish

songs and fell asleep. I told the stewardess not to disturb him as he

had mental problems .For safety he was hand cuffed and I moved

to another seat. When we landed he had to be wheeled into

the terminal and it took me some time to tell them that it was no

longer my duty to look after him anymore. The nurse was carried

Into a cell while I caught a plane to Liverpool.


4/37

Visitors

Worlds oldest man

Hundred and twenty today

Resides in a zoo

Visitors gasp as he smokes

The ape enclosure is shut.

Gorillas are envious

No one throws them bananas

Neglected and hurt

Want to go back to Gabon

Where Jane Goodall visits them


5/37

Senryu

A pretty butterfly

Flitters across a highway

Splash.

Senryu

The admiral is dead

Sail ships congregate in the bay

Sunset

Senryu

Red admiral pale

Shivers on my window ledge

September.


6/37

What Happened to Laughter?

What I miss the most not being a child, is its exuberance.

The easy tears and laughter, to jump up in the air for no

reason at all other that it gave a dizzying sensation.

I loved to go to circus, laughed uproar sly at the clown

and admired the lion tamer with his whip.

These days a clowns mask is an unfolding tragedy and

animals should be free to survive or die in the wild.

But I still hanker for the days of innocence which is so

utterly lacking in morality. Now I seek refuge behind

irony a place where to hide my tears and hilarity.


7/37

The Leaf.

On my walks I picked up a perfectly formed elm leaf,

the colour of dry tobacco. In Norway, during the Nazi

occupation, people had tobacco plants in back yards.

Perhaps carrots and cabbage had been healthier.

Put the leaf on top of a white wall and took a picture.

The wind came and blew it away. I brief meeting of

equals and a memory


8/37

Christmas in Lisbon (1974)

The day before Christmas the Atlantic was in a frenzy

it was with relief when we turned starboard and met

the softer water of Tagus.

We birthed far from town, on a double Decker Bus

I had bumpy drive into town. I good meal and wine,

just sting sitting there reading newspapers.

Rang my wife to hear a friendly voice, she asked if I

was drunk since I sounded chirpy. Put down the phone

Drank some more wine and aimlessly walked about.

Picked up an cushy prostitute, needed a warm body

next to mine, In the morning I took a taxi back and

a new long, laborious shipboard day began.


9/37

Music

It is Saturday, the lady in the flat next to mine,

Is playing Mozart on her stereo

I have stopped reading, sit back and let

the wonderful music sooth my mind.

Im also immensely grateful that It is not someone

learning to play the drums that lives next door.


10/37

The Excursion (Edith Piaf)

A man with blue rinsed hair was our leader.

We stopped outside the house where she was born,

the house is still a dwelling and the stone steps to the door

looked well trod. Our leader held up pictures of the lady,

photos I had seen before on YouTube, and told us a fairy tale

about her goodness. For a moment I thought he was

talking about a saint. We retired to a cafe where he sang

La vie en rose and forever destroyed the most beautiful

of songs..


11/37

Second Excursion (Edit Piaf)

Fighting my way through the Metro and jostling

with rude French commuters I found my way back

to where Edith was born. The street was now entirely

Taken over by the Chinese, and best of all several

weddings were going on. The Chinese really can

throw a party, noise, laughter and lovely brides.

While I sat on the steps outside Ediths house, her

voice came back to me the offensive blue rinsed

man had not succeeded after all.

It was a beautiful autumnal day and together Edith

and I walked to a park overlooking Paris and saw,

at safe distance, the Fabled Eifel tower looking old,

yet elegant in glorious sunlight.


12/37

A Cynical View from a Balcony in Paris

Fine rain, open umbrella, sitting on the balcony of a hotel

overlooking Haussmann Saint Lazare. A throng of people

and cars, but something as changed, people drinks Starbuck

coffee and eat burgers on the hoof. Old restaurants are

closing or converted to fast-food joints. I sigh and drink from

a bottle of Bordeaux to avoid getting rainwater in my wine.

This place together with rue dAmsterdam used to be where

the posh people lived and now, safe for the ruddy scrap yard

tower, this could have been downtown New York.


13/37

Tanka (air travel)

Air travel

Like number nine to Garston

Lost its lustre

You will get nothing to eat

But you can buy high mileage food.

Busy Sex.

Our Alger taxi driver

Had two wives and five sons

Worked 18 hours day

How come he had time for sex?

O, it only takes five minutes.


14/37

My Landscape

Today, now as the weather is cooling, I went on my walk.

Hadnt been here since June; simply because it gets to

hot to walk here in summers. The stony part of the track

was firm like walking on a cobblestoned street. The soft

part was like walking barefoot on a newly mowed lawn.

At the part where thorny bushes had made archway,

a tunnel of mystery, I hesitated. Neednt have worried

the branches embraced me like a mother whos young

son is coming home from the sea. When I stopped for

a rest under the tree where also sheep rest in the heat,

leaves, in perfectly still air, fell as confetti welcoming

the returning hero. How I love this odd landscape, once it

was tilled but now humanity have gone leaving the land

to its own devise and strange beauty.


15/37

Tanka (Neo fascism)

The exterminators

Unrelenting nightmares -are

The superiors

The best must be beheaded

To ease the minors burden


16/37

The God Problem

Religions root

Is mans guest to live forever

Not only of flesh

But superior to other life forms

Spiritual and advanced

He seeks a deity

In his own vain image

Insist hes right

Ready to kill for his icon

And askew timelessness

Will not accept

Hes no more than a weed

Or a dandelion

Forever seeking assurance

That life offers more than death


17/37

The Experience

Twenty years ago

What I thought of as correct

I now see as wrong

I could have been right back then

If my views are now habitual

Due to lack of perceptions

But twenty years ago

I lacked lives true experience

Habituated by norm

Following the mainstream

I may see thing clearer now


18/37

On the Highest Crest

Beautiful October

God has gone main-stream

Ignores the seasons

Wants to be loved by us all

Before the big deluge

Lovely October

God disregard the cycles

My river is dry

While I sunbathe by its shore

And think of buying camels.

Godly October

Vacations our new deity

Tomorrow is today

Frost and snow are banished

But Himalaya is an island


19/37

Pretty October

We fight for a place to sit

The strongest win

Design a new national flag

And build a golden temple

Scenic October

The Sea is heavens mirror

God was a dream

No echo of man lingers

The long stillness has begun


20/37

The horses

Three horses graze on my land, one is a foal.

In the twilight and with gentle rain falling

they remind me of work horses of by gone

days when I steered the plough that made

furrows in dark, clean soil.

When I stroke their flanks the good aroma

of warm horse arises; dreams are endless.

In daylight they pretend to be boulders, but

even then they make the land serene.


21/37

Birthday Poem

Happy birthday

The festive occasion

Wishing me well

This gaping greedy hole

Too deep for an almond tree

Wonderful birthday

Im the oldest in my family

The rest have died

Seventy two years old

Am I immortal?

Blissful birthday

Carefree October month

A drifting ice floe

Breaking up in the ocean

Who will rescue me now?


22/37

Tanka

Jubilation of life

Trumpet revel of a new day

Instead of stillness

Memories are silent

They fade and lose the truth

Tomorrow has nothing to offer


23/37

A Soldiers Wife

I dont want to be a superman but I do love, love madly.

It is strange to think hadnt you come a long I would have

loved someone else- unthinkable today. When I finish

too early, you smile and say it doesnt matter but I know

I cant let you down and must make love to you again.

Lucky you cant read my thoughts, I used to be soldier

and dream the way we spoke about women in the dugout.

When I see a smile of heavenly satisfaction glide around

your face my work is done. Two body entwined, one think

of love the other about comrades in arms.


24/37

The Sad Escape.

I sat by the table, near the window, reading. A woman and her man sat

on a filthy sofa, eating smoked sardines off an old newspaper.

This room stank of unwashed bodies and lack of hygiene. Dry washing

that should have been ironed weeks ago occupied a chair.

The pair rolled their own cigarettes and had nicotine stained fingers.

It was raining heavily I could not go out and felt a violent despair, like

a trapped animal that attacks its rescuers.Use fork and knife I snapped.

They both giggled. Rain had stopped I walked out, light shone out of

miserable curtainsand I knew. I must leave now. Get out! It was too easy

sink into apathy, and ignorance. Yet, I loved them, they were my flesh

and blood, good people who had never been encouraged to seek anything

better. But I must leave and I left never to return.


25/37

Unplanted Land

Things made by man never impressed me, but the fallow land,

where I live, which is going back to natures way does impress.

On my walks I see how each plant strive towards the light, one

may say, as man seeks god, but here it is not about being better

or more powerful, its just nature. Thats way I see Eifel tower

as a symbol of power, pride and vanity. But in the back of my

mind an unpleasant thought arises: could it be that wars are

a natural cause? Natures way of insuring that only the strong

survives ? That peace is like fallow land, beautiful but useless?


26/37

The Grump

This is really too much!

I have painted her chair golden,

The one she is taking to her flat in

Cascais.

Stabled the winter wood and

covered it with a black plastic sheet.

Still she goes on, wants us to go

to bed at eleven when Im watching

Charles Rose.

Im fed up, better off living alone.

She has gone out shopping and

why is she so late coming back?


27/37

The Love Story

We live far apart

The distance is getting hazy

My dearest love

I can still hear your heartbeat

In the stillness of the night

Youre my love

Green eyes clear as the ocean

Tears like pearls

My soul was transient back then

My quest was worldly success

Give me sign

Help me to see, I was blind

Open my eyes

So you can come into sight

Before cruel time erases us


28/37


29/37

The Night Fall

My evening walk was interrupted by night. Keeping close the verge

of the road I fell down a ditch, and saw stars as never before.

A kaleidoscope of colours swiveling around and around in my head

Life, we never see in daylight, was all around me, spirit shadows in

a haste to find food and safety before man intruded. Knew I had

caused chaos in their life, I got out of there and heard silent relief.

Starry, starry night, as the song goes, trees moved and whispered

scary stories about the man with the chainsaw, whether it is true

there is a Paradise for trees. Wished I could tell them a tall story

with a happy ending- no turning into winter woods and ashes for

them, but a malevolent mule kept kicking me home as it wanted

the night to itself.


30/37

Non Je Ne Regrette (Edith Piaf)

Wish it was true

Regrets have made me what Im

Scars on my mind

I remember my mistakes

The done cannot be untied

There is no healing

Pain caused when briefly blinded

Yet, to be woeful

Is a pointless act of lament

Leads to joyless self pity.


31/37

Tanka

Trumpeting outside

An elephant on the terrace

Its raining too

The poor thing needs an umbrella

Go back to sleep youre dreaming

Senryu

Dawn creeps in

Got to buy bigger curtains

Im not a worm


32/37

Soldiers Pride

Soldiers train hard

They want to go into action

Show off their skills

In the art of killing enemies

And civilians in their fields

A dead soldier

Hard training came to nothing

Funereal at five

A skill the army knows well.

A medal on the mantelpiece


33/37

The Tenth Month

Dead leaves

Blows useless in the street

Once so green

No one hear their despair

Every garden a cemetery

Fallen leaves

Dance no more to springs tune

Blow where the wind will

October moon, the mortals waltz

To the dirge of the vanished.

Saying

Marriage Is

Great expectations

Unfulfilled


34/37

The Festivity

The party has ended they have all gone home, the house sighs,

I open windows cooling air clears away the smell of perfume

and full ashtrays. Wine glasses everywhere on tables, shelves

on the floor. Empties have to be thrown in the bin, and glasses

have to be cleaned and put back in the cupboard. Got to do it

now, I dont want to be faced with this task tomorrow morning.

Im glad they came to my day; glad to be alone also; sad too.

Im one year older and time seems so short, the ocean of life is

not endless and the horizon ends just beyond where the sun

goes down.


35/37

October Sunday.

Along the promenade at the marina, where the rich

have their boats on display, the tourists have gone;

mostly Portuguese people walking about this sunny

October day. I have brought a camera with me, but

will not take pictures of boats which look like plastic

toys, shiny and had never sailed on the open sea. Yet,

they lend a pretty picture to the maritime ambience.

On the promenade elderly people, pretty girls and

boys, in their teens, walk up and down, for a moment

wished I was sixteen, but remember how painful it was

to be that young, a face full of acne and timid. A lovely

day, not a time for thoughts of mortality. While my

wife eats an ice cream I smoke a sly cigarette and think:

this is good Sunday to be alive.


36/37

The Date.

It is midnight I was to meet her at nine under railways stations clock.

I waited to eleven, something might have happened, the train delayed

(his was before mobile phones were invented,) I didnt have her home

number. I walked along the docks where harbour light is forever throwing

itself into dark water. I threw the flowers I had bought her into the sea

and saw them sink slowly into the sea only the wrapping paper floats on

the surface of despair. I was seventeen it took great courage to invite her

out, this humiliation and she had such a sincere smile. Why couldnt she

had said no in the first place? It was what I had expected her to do.

A fog horn blare in the distance, the world knows I have been stood up.

no escape if anyone asks I will have to play the clown, make a funny story

to hide my sorrow for not dating a girl I thought I loved.


37/37

The Poet

Is a quarreler

Doesnt accept status quo

No wonder

Plato

Didnt like them

Alas

Poets are also vain

Hungry for fame

Which rarely come their

Way

If they do meet success

And get a medal

They soon destroy

Their official status

By being

Quarrelsome

a cynical view seen from a balcony in paris

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