Years of Pilgrimage

a long poem by Tim Cloudsley

with border art by Mary Johnston

part 2

Chopp

High in the sky I see a light

The clouds fall like sinking ships

A book of myriad colours, dreams

Its electronics into the ear

Of our invented God, who sings mad

But beautiful songs into the air

Which is blue like the sky over Asunción,

As blue as a middle-of-the-night

Fantasy of love or happiness,

Thronging music in ecstatic chords


Paraguayan Dawn

In the Paraguayan dawn

The love-lust rises

Streaked pink cloud-wisps

Wet air dreaming its tropical rain

A girl moves wrapped in a towel

Figure like a jewel, black hair,

Her soft juicy lips ready for kissing

Because it is a Paraguayan dawn


Spirit World

Your own soul, with the force of the divine

Universe, is how you drive the demons from your

Life. Imagination illuminated

By the Paraguayan sun,

And the spirit flows like the great

River Paraguay. You mould life

As an Indian artisan makes his sculpture

In ceramic mud.

And if all flies into unreal sky

And drives into the most glorious sea,

The ship swimming and swaying between

Might be made of bliss, I don’t know;

But I feel beauty as if I were,

And luck surrounds me, sometimes with love,

Which is happiness of the living light,

Joy breaking its waves on me.

To get lost in Paraguay is the ideal,

All alone, noone knowing you are here:

Bliss, in night-dreams, days of heat,

Nothing happening, but in your mind:

Bliss, for throwing useless blocks

Heavily from the mind;

What is it for an immature child,

To live in Eternity’s sunrise?

Sweet into the deep night, madrugada,

Peace enveloping all in dream,

Silent music of a million smiles,

Here I am, still alive,

Rolling like clouds before the sun,

Healing the wound that noone knows,

Feeling soft warm love like a thirsty

Boy, panting under rain.

Those dreams are removed from moving time,

Therein I lie, so excellently,

The moon has kissed me yesternight,

Today I feel ripples from every star.

I escape into my brain

Because you touch me as the moon,

The sun moves my inner soul,

And I await you, beautiful soul.


Muero Con La Patria

A foul battle was fought at Piribebuy,

"López organizó un nuevo ejército,

Casi por milagro, con niños, ancianos, mutilados, heridos y mujeres.

Los vencedores incendiaron el hospital,

Repleto de heridos y degollaron al comandante de

La plaza mayor. Fueron con tenidos de niños

Disfrazados con largas barbas

Y que se dejaron ma tar uno por uno." *

Hitler had little to learn from this guy,

Who said, expiring, "Muero con Ia patria." **

All about territory, no thought of human

Improvement. Just frontiers and power -

A small anticipation of the First World War

In Europe. But how peaceful is

Piribebuy today, as if left alone

For at least a century.

That was another day, another year,

Here I study that, a little laboratory

Of insanity, that can however be explained;

At least, the circumstances that made such actions

Possible or likely, but not inevitable,

Can be interpreted, if not determined.

Remember Kant’s argument about Free Will.

There are choices, alternatives;

You can even face against a fence,

Or a wall of flame, a tidal wave

Of apparent inevitability.

You can be one voice shouting through a hell,

To reach ears in another epoch,

That hear, and agree a little.

To whistle through the napalm, as it were,

Or cry foul, at each massacre of Palestinians

In their own land. You can say:

"Principles of Justice should be universally applied,"

Even though you will be immediately drowned

In rotten tomatoes and accusations

Of Communism and Subversion.

Not much fun it is, and little glory

Accrues to you, but at least you do not die

In your deepest soul, and can feel

A friendship with something warm.

And so, in flabby freedom, I

Persist in insisting something still,

For what else can I do?

"I will die with my dreams."



*Lopez organized a new army

As if by miracle: children, old men, the crippled and wounded, and women.

The victors set fire to a hospital

Full of wounded soldiers, and beheaded the commander

In the main plaza. They murdered

Boys disguised as men with beards,

Putting them to death one by one.

**I die together with my country!


Flames

I cry as if the moon were happy

And laugh as if the sun were sad,

Waves of warm air drench my spirit

As I hope to all eternity

Rain poured today, all day

And happiness erupted in my heart

Her smile was so gorgeous then

The planets turned around, on fire

How lovely is her soft skin

Her raven-hair, black as dusk

Her dark dark eyes, flickering

Like fire deep within the sun

O she turns, in her sleep sometimes,

Dreams are coming, changing as she breathes,

Her eyelids must be screens of paradise,

Overwhelming her sweet soul

O how lovely is her invitation

Sleeping gently like a heart-beat

The portals of her heaven smiling

Like tempting supernatural doves

As wings of coloured miracle fly

The sky bursts into translucent dream

Appears a sound of beatific fire

Flaming round all the universe

Her sweet voice sings like Victory

And all the rivers burst their hopes

Roses catch into spiralling stars

Music floods the fields


La Guerra

During La Guerra Del Chaco,

Campesinos sometimes hid some gold

In their houses, or in the ground,

Then went away, and died.

Others sometimes turn it up

When they plough their fields

Or, when they meet ghosts at night,

They hear where the vessels are

That contain the golden sun

O daughters of the land,

Lovely flowers in our rainbows,

The loveliest women amid the burning land,

Where were we dancing in the Great House,

Until they came and turned us to servitude?

Mothers, protect your children from the wolves;

They will snatch and bite them,

And turn them unto War.


Armadillo

I feel like a stone

Sinking in a transparent pool,

Lost, under little self-control

But clear at least, in free fall.

The United States

Puts bloodthirsty megalomaniacs into power,

Then when they no longer obey Him

He decides it is time to kill them.

O your warm kind love is sweet

And supports my brain into good dreams,

And sleep is full of gentle strangenesses,

Inventions of magical creation.


Iguaçu

In anger, M’Boy, the Serpent-God

Transformed Naipi and Tarobá

Into a rock and a yearning tree

At the huge Falls of lguaçu

As punishment, for running away

From their destiny; as Francesca da Rimini

And her lover, forever in Dante’s Hell,

Were condemned for following their own commands.

Or was it a Serpent-Goddess

Who desired Tarobá for herself?

And if he would not be with her

The earth would be buckled into absolute chaos

And turned into cataracts to kill them both,

With Naipi turned into a rock

Upon which Tarobá grows as grass,

While the jealous goddess hides in her cave.

O to get lost in Paraguay,

Get lost, get lost, like an Indian,

Escaping from wrath of some tormenting god,

But without that god ever finding you!

O! to be with the Indians,

Hiding in the Chaco, dispersing away

From Civilization! O what a dream

With the psyche melting into everynothing.

O to forget all hassles and quarrels

Of the civilized world, the guilt and insuperable

Pain, just to feel love and death

And hunger and misery in a dark thorn.

With the crashing Falls and the Guaraní myths,

And the easy girls and the simple steps,

Survival is all that it ever was,

Why must our brains be so filled with hell?

Why must one always be full of concern,

Always worrying about sticks or bones;

Our ancestors fought for caves or fields,

But did not prick their consciences

As we all do. We have lost a boon!

But think we advance in our degeneracy;

0 give me sun, and a lovely girl,

And let me forget, for a minute, all.


Wandering

Such is the weirdness of wandering,

The wonder in the stars of the galaxy,

And all the galaxies of the universe,

And all the universes of the Cosmos entire;

Such is the strangeness of every dot on the map,

Every village or city in the entire world,

Every piano, and every inn;

Every flavour of meat or wine.

Touch the glories and pain in the sky,

The dog-bites, and the insects,

Women with vast secrets beyond

The narrow fields of the Hearth.

In his carriage, a great Traveller went

Among gypsies, pilgrim to ultimate depths,

Offering the world his wondrous sounds,

As High Priest of Romanticism.

I love him, proud and humble

At the same time, friend of the Soul,

Adventurer of the heart, brave and true,

Genius of a distant star

Sunshine shoots through all darkness

Colours of a woman’s blouse

Pierce like the rainbow into mystery

Her character singing its distinctive song

Her lips so soft, dripping in beauty,

Her eyes so round and brown in beauty,

Her breasts breathing a million kisses,

Her nipples dreaming a million dreams.

The sunset of her pink dreams,

Her soft skin touching miraculously,

Warm, sweet, soft, loving woman,

All that is real of paradise.

Dark deep frightening romantic blue

Sky, fixed, after dusk

In intense mood like a mad thought,

Racking the dark deep parts of the brain

O swivel us to the nether regions!

Escape altogether the dreary track

Of wandering: fly, into other realms

Like dancing midges in a sunset sky!

Adventure beyond fear, forget all

Clustering anxieties and dripping fears,

Fly, flow, pour away

Make love to strangers, who love thee best

Do not end up with the hurdy-gurdy man

On the freezing ice, like Franz Schubert;

I was once there: he is forever my brother

But never again would I wander there.

No more of that: when you die you die,

Until then enjoy the sun

And wine and delicious women and music

From whenever it comes, be it paradise

Or hell, a tune can always bring

Experience, hope, love, or death,

All are equal ultimately;

When one shuts off, so do all the rest


Alejo García

Alejo García

mmmmmmmgold

mmmmmmmcmcsilver

Guaraní battles

mmmmmmmmcinfuriating the Incas

Dreams of Silver Mountains

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmdream of a White King

Crossing the hostile Chaco

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmstrange bold adventurers

Pedro De Mendoza

O persistence, in spite of syphilis

Had Pedro de Mendoza, founding Buenos Aires,

Where Indians attacked night and day,

And his men died of hunger and illness.

A bad commander was he, according to accounts,

But 0 what misery he must have endured;

Rich, from the Sack of Rome, highly favoured

By the King of Spain, sent

To conquer La Plata, and bring back gold -

He found nothing, other than agony

And disillusionment. Utterly greedy,

Nasty man; but what fortitude!

He sent Ayolas to find the gold

Who ventured into the Chaco,

But on his return, he was killed

By a sharp, Payaguan arrow.

The soft beauty seduced them all

Into mad adventure in serious soul,

Coping with difficulty, pain, exhaustion,

Because of European lust, but also mythical hope

Absorbed from the Guaraní,

Who always yearned for the Mbaé Verá Guazú,

The Land Without Evil, mystical paradise

With a Silver Mountain;

These things merged,

And Paraguay was born,

Crazy and young


Wisp

Rain

mmcstars

mmmmmmany flames

Night

mmmover river

mmmmmmmmflames

Of love

mmmmdiving

Catch it

mmmmon the edge

mmmmmmmmmmcof a star

Flash

mmmbetween the pain -

Who bites

mmmmmmthe mosquito?

The Divine Cosmos

Opens Itself up tonight

For the return of part of It

In what men call Death

The body rots, the spirit disperses,

All re-enters the Earth and Universe,

All is well and normal

In the Eternal Recurrence

Of the moth and the fly on the hand

Of the kiss and the blowing flower

Of the wind over the sad river

Of the Mind that thinks Itself


Wind

A dying moth

Lights a flame

Then enters it to burn

Like the conquistadores

Who would not forget

Hallucinations of gold

Entering again and again

The hopeless passage across the Chaco

Where malaria, arrows, heat, hunger

Accosted their dreams, and left their tongues

Blacker than hell, and their souls more bitter

Than poisonous xerophytes

Ah, but what is better to do?

Sit and live a torpid life,

Like a frog on a stone, never jumping,

Pig in a box, drearily moping?

Spasms of hope, vague restlessness,

Need to justify something within,

Knowing your wickedness, your deep lies,

Banging rocks because you left your mothers.

Now you dream, of what, unclear

But life rolls on, families love,

And die; sometimes you grow palmito, at others

You work in banks, like everyone else,

Or you pursue carnal delights

With little guilt, and less restraint.

Some of your streets are very cobbled,

Others dusty, and bars seldom close,

Your ancient buses spew pollution,

And rack the buildings with giant noises;

Some houses, with their white porticos

Are beautiful, especially at night.

Las Paraguayas reign supreme

In beauty, and shapeliness:

Wonderfully kind, friendly angels,

They have been my sisters here,

I swear. Because of them

I beat off loneliness, which settles down

Like a dark blanket on anyone

Eventually. I am not good,

I know; but I try to fly

In the best winds with my wings.

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a raunchland publication 2002

text © Tim Cloudsley 2002

images © Mary Johnstone 2002