Jan Skácel - The teacher of the second death

Jan Skácel - The teacher of the second death
(Učitel druhé smrti)

On a long bench along four whitewashed walls
were sitting the children who had died
only recently
Now they were waiting
for their second death.

They were sitting in well-mannered way and with their little hands in their laps
Totally motionless and so quiet
that behind the open window the chains
of autumn merry-go-rounds were heard

With their little necks they were touching the wall
and were waiting until the teacher came
and were waiting patiently
like never before in their lives

Then steps on the corridor were heard
the teacher entered he came in with no face
as if there was no threshold
and the children greeted him without a word
And because all of them were already after death

no one of them was trembling with fear
They all knew
that once was not enough

Then when he started to call them out by alphabet
they stood up one after another
and after a slight bow
of their hardly fluffed head
with little steps left the classroom

Tiny they were All from the first grade

Miroslav Válek - The wings

Miroslav Válek - The wings
(Krídla)

So it is summer. The blind men in Bahon
are lifting their heads above the wall,
above the barbed wire,
they are watching the trains, long and slim like whistling,
they are ripping the weeds, coughing.
Near Cifer a girl is sunbathing
with her hands above her head,
the heavy derricks of oil industry
are crawling to the railway, all are waving
thinking the same.
According to calendar it is August 15th, Mary,
4 o'clock in the afternoon,
The sun is in beer, the thunderstorm is in the air,
the park is full of lush green, and you are nowhere.
I have been saying you all the time :
Come in the right time,
come when the drums are rumbling,
at high noon,
when the swallows in the air give away their autographs
and the things are silent,
come full of anger,
when you are sad as well as when you would rather laugh.
The heads will be again in the windows, the things in order,
everything will be in its proper place again,
we will make an evening party in your family garden,
I will snap my fingers, the apricots will ignite,
their yellow fires will bend over us :
Then as well the grass was bluish and cold like a well,
the rain, punctuated like a tie, hang obliquely from the clouds,
the lightning started in the sky
and extended as far as our kiss.
When the thunderstorm lasted for too long
and too loudly the metal of thunder was beaten,
you said that they would look for you ...
I saw you fly above the yard in darkness.
During that night the earth moved in its bearings,
all stars were created,
the universe trembled like a lamb
and looked for its centre.
The second day after the world's creation the radio played,
they were walking in the rooms,
they were walking, they were talking,
they were breaking bread,
they were ringing with spoons,
ringing,
but nobody noticed your wings, transparent and light.
We caught you, the blindness of mature age,
we were fine,
and what has happened :
On Saturday after fifteen years
an Abel with whom I used to buy the football tickets
said me that we had lost it all long ago,
we had no wings
and it was a sad thing.
So I am at home,
grasping the land,
the land goes with me everywhere,
my land,
the plain of small people,
workers at Kovosmalt and at the atomic power station,
who represent the god six days a week
on the world's construction so sinfully behind the schedule,
beacause all the saints,
responsible for order, took bribes,
and the god's mills worked only for the rich.
I am at home. Eyes full of land and hands full of hands,
I rise inward myself.
Summer in the air. Summer everywhere.
Summer yellow as a wasp chasing us.
Behind the blood-coloured line of the horizon,
in the god's gardens,
where according to theologians should be the paradise,
where the devil's anger hisses, pomegranates explode
and the angels in gas masks,
burning swords in their hands, close their blind circle,
the destiny of man is written.
But we, since we learned that matter is
only a form of energy,
spread our wings easier,
move as well in space as we do in time
and know that this particular place is here with us,
on the ground.
We have a message for you,
you sweet, supposed, coming from our blood :
Think of us,
we were your destiny,
exactly as you are the destiny of those,
who will come after you to cross
the border line line of life.

And who think the same.

Jan Skácel - The last thirst

Jan Skácel - The last thirst
(Poslední žízeň)

So long ago did we pass away
and so much of thirst
so much of lovely thirst
we did leave at home
It is so long ago
and so many years elapsed since then
It is unbelievable
and all the same after quartzite does taste
and after sulphur
that thirst forever that thirst for the last time

Miroslav Válek - The sensitive

Miroslav Válek - The sensitive
(Citliví)

The mirror should be behind your back,
your hand in a glove,
your leg under the table.
Do not look.
They are hunchbacks,
with one leg shorter,
with one arm ending at the wrist.
They sit, they listen.
From the conversations that do not concern them,
from the words that do not belong to them,
each of them choses a thing for himself,
for instance :
... one should rather have his eyes back ...
... he lives on a high leg ...
... count it on your fingers ...
Oh, why does all the world touch the things that molest us ?
Why must we carry our visible marks,
while the same or even worse deformation of soul
is hidden from everyone ?
After death all of us will have a lovely hunch.

Jan Skácel - Daughters of song

Jan Skácel - Daughters of song
(Dcery písně)

My night is the darkest
where morning begins
and the little birds' horror beneath the windows
starts in full wolume.

Then I get up
And deprived of the previous day
I go to the bathroom.
Going there I am ashamed among my furniture.

Once again I am only myself
robbed to such extent
that to eternity I hang on a thread.
Everything embarrassingly reminds me
that yesterday I was verbatim perpendicular.

Water sets me free for a moment
From the white porcelain with my nail
I scratch out a hair
Too much yours.
It is again bad, even worse.

But then I remember again
and drinking my coffee I recite the verses,
slowly, hardly, to make them sustain :

"On bird-twitter he gets up
and all doughters of song cry."

Miroslav Válek - The touches

Miroslav Válek - The touches
(Dotyky)

Since the morning the telegrams keep coming to your home,
the sea of letters floods the house,
telephones began to ring all at once.
It is nothing to worry about, it is nothing to worry about,
it is only that I am calling you incessantly,
re-establishing the broken connection.
I am so lucky they have believed me
at the post office and at the phone switchboard,
that I had a million greetings for you,
that I had a million requests on you :
Do not be angry and,
it is horribly important,
I am almost crazy because of that,
I am horribly in love with you,
leave everything as it it is,
let the water burn in the bathroom,
let the gas flow in the kitchen,
let the foolish mirrors in your room turning,
and come to me by the first train,
come here to the vast plain !
Seven black horses will wait for you at the station,
all of them with a star on its forehead,
the jasmine will blossom,
the pollen will fall from the apricots
softer than your powder Soir de Paris.
Hurry up, on the corner
the evening is already hooting,
blue painted like a vintage car,
the town sun, a screechy worn out vinyl record
shifts down bellow the horizon,
but the one of ours,
the shiny casserole of copper,
sets down delightfully,
and when it touches the earth, it is all heard.
The black bull in the coopertative-farm stable
in a velvet voice finished its lyrical intermezzo,
the plain falls on its knees and prepares to sleep.
The time of shaking off the boots has come,
stamp like some festive parade,
because here in every house the men are like iron
and the sound has space enough for start,
thus everyone's dreams are heard ...
Dreams about :
glass,
stones,
metals,
caresses of hands,
bent index finger knocking on a window,
the fleeting smile you were waiting for
Dreamt are things unspeakable,
things wonderful and simple like a snowdrop
and my eyes on the bottom of your eyes,
we dream dreams
and everything is like a content of the magician's hat.
The night, the black hat with a wide brim,
overturns inside out into the morning.
Only now you can see how palpable the dreams are
The nervous fingers of TV antennas puncture the darkness,
double rows of new houses trot to the villages,
the morning is stuffy like an after-ball ballroom,
the single sad rook in the sky revolves like a fan,
the fat wheat-ears faint with astonishment,
when the local village radio calls in harsh voice :
Come to harvest, come to harvest !
In a moment the village is empty like a blown out egg
Only the grandma sits at the door and silently sings for herself :
"She was sieving the flour
Straight to the wooden floor ... "
Grandma, the poor blind thing !
She used to milk the cows in Herz's farmstead.
She used to pray for long life and lucky death.
Her life has elapsed like the stroke of a whip - it was exactly so painful.
And now she does not know this world at all.
She does not remember the names of her grandchildren, she starts with fear when there is a laugh in the house,
the evening brings her a strange smell of the burnt diesel,
but the earth she takes to her fingers is still good.
It is the same soil as then ...
The dress of silk, sixteen years of age and the long braid
are already gone,
but the plain is still here to stay, the plain is eternal
it only breathes faster and louder.
At the time of feast roast geese fly here,
a sparrowhawk starts to the sky vertically like a rocket,
in autumn the violet rains rain to the gardens,
heavy drops of plums knock on the tired soil.
The plain has given away its frut, it has no more to say and it is silent.
Sleepy, blinded by syrup and sugar, it puts on a quilted coat.
On St.Martin's day comes the first snow.

Jan Skácel - The night travellers

Jan Skácel - The night travellers
(Cestující v noci)

The thefts of gods' property woke us around midnight
We blindly touch around us
and sleepy request the news
how much cool is the night
The dream persists
like an unbroken egg on a rock
And it is the moment when we dream about ourselves
And the centaur has the turtledove's head
With what autumns will we share
the meals of deer
we
who travel at night
and ask in such sleepy voices