rubatosis

rubatosis (df): the unsettling awareness of your own heartbeat

street lamps flicker

and I tell myself

that this is a broadcast

especially for me

(even if I can't decode it)

so there is that

and there is noise

I think we must be

standing exactly where

the City has its heart

if I am right

and that's the heart

I am the needle

moving through

its arteries

and about to kill

I focus on

my own heartbeat

and synchronise it

with this other

bigger heart

- so we can die

together

I want to tell you

that this is the time

to say all of the

goodbyes

but the only sound

that I can make

is this loud rumble

coming from

my heart

- already

counting down

...

opia

opia (df): the ambiguous intensity of looking someone in the eye, which can feel simultaneously invasive and vulnerable.

I sit under the angle

so the shadow can

hide me

at least this part

that resembles

a trapped animal

you move slowly

the way you would

approach

something wild

something scared

something blue

I shake my head

and blink too much

but none of these

can stop you

you look me

in the eye

I surrender

I invade you

rain

I am sitting in an ugly and depressing bar. It’s raining outside and it creates a constant hum that swallows all of the other sounds. I start to watch raindrops that hesitantly make a downfall from the edge of the canopy. Unwillingly or maybe even against my own will I start to count them. I know for a fact that it will be very hard to stop. And when I finally succeed my relief will be strained and polluted. Uneasy. “Fuck”, I think to myself to avoid thinking it when you will be next to me. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Forty-seven.

So – it may be that you will walk into this bar just when I will move on to the number fifty-seven. You will have this nervous smile on your face: a bit apologetic, a bit absent. You will also make this weird wave with your hand that could be sort of “hello” but could also mean nothing. I will be still counting – probably won’t stop before sixty-one.

You might come a little bit later, when I’ll be in the low hundreds. If that’s the case I might not even look at you and simply keep on staring ahead. And it’s not because I would be already pissed off with you for all that waiting – it would happen simply because once I get to the three digit plane – it is so fucking hard to stop (it takes at least twenty numbers). But you know it. You would sit down at the table and wait. You could even make a remark that this way our waiting debt is evening a bit.

 You may also not come at all. Then I may stay till it stops raining or maybe even a bit longer - until all of the raindrops from the canopy fall to the ground. At that point I may forget I was waiting for you.

Sixty-one.

mauerbauertraurigkeit

mauerbauertraurigkeit (df): the inexplicable urge to push people away, even close friends who you really like.

if I still could make
a step back
I would
there is a harsh
wall behind me
and it's already biting
into my shoulders
I can feel the heat
radiating from
your body
and your heartbeat
is so loud
I can't hear
anything else

you look at me
and there is
a soft shadow
around your eyes
I think you are
saying something
- your lips
are moving
but all I can hear
is just the drumming
of your heart

I cover my ears
and it's like
taking a step
back.

oxygen (fuck. I can't breathe)

it looks a bit

like an asthma attack

as they show it on TV

at 2 am I said 'no'

to my mum

when she mentioned

something about

the ambulance

it seemed to me

at a time

that's a very

long and difficult

word
at 4 am I told
my dad
to call the ambulance
(imagine how many
'nos' you could fit
in that sentence?)

world transformed
into a beautiful chaos
of blue lights and
the constant hiss
of the oxygen tank

(fuck. I can't breathe)

birth

I was born in the month

of falling stars

maybe my parents

should have thought of it

as a sign

an omen

of yet not determined

nature

instead they looked up

only to name

the constellations

- and once

there was nothing left

to name -

they talked about

the Theory of Everything

I was born in the year

of the rat

or

(that's what
my parents said)

 in the year

2⁶ x 31¹

- it was
a good year
(they added)

I was born.

crossing

We are standing on the verge of the pavement: less than a few inches from the street, with the ugly cubic building behind our backs. Its shadow covers us and nearly erases from the landscape. Somehow, in this fading light, in this silence of ours – everything looks like a stage set up for the judgement day. Your cough synchronises with the hum of passing cars. It’s eons before one of us decides to move. Metaphysical veil is lifted. Now it’s just a night, the city, headlights of the passing cars and us. Finally we can cross the street.