Return to Belgrade 2000
In this grey town, Popa’s
‘white bone among the clouds’
the buildings stand still
like shocked witnesses.
Pigeons coo in the ruins of a high rise.
Amidst dandelions and debris
a security guard dozes in the sun
in his hand a cigarette smokes itself . . .
pigeons overhead, ash in his lap.
Refugees sell Lucky Strike
and Marlboro smuggled in from Kosovo
they can smell a cop a mile off
can disappear in a blink.
They are the invisible people
they are the dirty laundry
in Milosevic’s basket piled underground
far from the hole in the wall
where he drops his bundle.
Meanwhile, in full light of public eye
Slobo’s making links
crossing bridges he’s rebuilt
bragging of progress
to visitors from the East.
Everybody’s working on an exit scheme.
In an internet café a guy with dreads
extrapolates the physics of tofu
to a blonde bombshell
who’s sipping Nescafe – the latest thing
to hit Belgrade since the air raid.
On a street corner a woman, barefoot
sings old socialist songs –
Druze Tito mi ti se kunemo
da sa tvoga puta ne skrenemo...
Nostalgia tugs at the heart of a man passing by
the heart which lies behind ‘I Love USA’
rebellious on his t-shirt,
and he drops a Deutschmark
at the altar of her feet. She kisses him
not for the Deutschmark but for paying his respects.
A red smudge brands his forehead
like once a star.
--------------------------
Belgrade, or Beograd: beo white grad city
‘white bone among the clouds’ from ‘Return to Belgrade’, Vasko Popa
Snow Dance
Remember this
photo of us
slow-dancing on
New Year’s eve -
Your arms slope down
to rest on my
shoulders my head
is level with
your breasts the edge
of my skirt whirls
at my ankles
and is fringed with
the same silver
and red of your
dress (breathless yet?)
though the black and
white doesn’t show
the thread we share
doesn’t show my
hair striving from
my shoulders to
be like yours at
the lower back.
You are looking
down towards me like
you’d said something
teasingly or
tenderly but
my head is turned
away to face
the camera.
Are they snow flakes
at the window
ferries in the
distance witches
shooting stars or
dust on the lens.
Let’s say it was
snow piling up
high to my waist
in the old year
reaching up to
yours by the new
to meet your black
hair at the edge
of that bare-back
dress snow closing
us in snow snow
closing us in.
My arms enfold
your waist rest in
the nest at the
small of your back
as you sway in
dance your hair laps
against me no
gap between us
except for my gaze
turned away
the shock of flash
open shutter
twelfth strike too late
snow and midnight
seize our embrace.
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