Monday, December 29, 2008

afterthought at the end of a year; goodbye 2008

Walter Benjamin writes in The storyteller:
'memory creates the chain of tradition which passes a happening on from generation to generation. It is the Muse-derived element of the epic art in a broader sense and encompasses its varieties. In the first place among these is the one practised by the storyteller. It starts the web which all stories together form in the end...'

can it be that every year is nothing else but one more story that adds to the final web which is the story of a person's life?
can it be that we, the subjects of our individual, personal stories- micronarratives and to a lesser extent subjects of the grand narrative of history, we experience our stories according to the inspiration that the muse gives us to experience and live our lives?
can it be that we just live better if we have been given the gift of being able to share our lives and tell our stories out loud in ways that will add to other people's stories?
can it be that our individual stories make sense only when they become part of the greater tradition of stories of humankind?
can it be that life is yet another form of the plenty forms and varieties of the epic art?


Happy 2009 (in approximately 70 hours)...
may the stories go on
may we have the passion to endure and experience
and the virtue to narrate and share

more to remember

..and what about what has not been captured in cameras and films, how can these be recorded in the micro-narratives of my story?

for example,

there are the recent Radiohead and REM albums that played non-stop in the cd
or
the evenings that I spent listening to other musics thanks to my friends
or
the song 'it's the first day of the rest of your life' playing non-stop on the 29th of July
or
the feeling of joy and triumph when the phone rang at 9.30 am on that morning
or
the tear that I could not control at the end of Complicite's A Disappearing Number
or
the scream of joy at the end of Schaubuehne's Hamlet
or
the pain I felt that February morning when I could not move from the bed
or
the disgust that I felt when I realised (yet again) how petty people can be
or
the evenings that I spent on the leather couch in Dublin drinking gin and tonic and talking or thinking about nonsense
or
the words that were not sent via email and the emails that were received late
or
the beauty of the words of Murakami and Mishima and Yoshimoto and all the Japanese writers that invaded my life this year
or
the taste of that strawberry sweet we used to have together in Leon
or
the moment when you told me 'read this, I will get you a coffee--what do you want?', but we were in Starbucks that day and it was a day during rehearsals
or
the tiredness of carrying my baggage to and from
or
your
smile that I am carrying with me everyday and makes me smile--but you cannot see me because you are far away or because you don't know how much you can make me smile
or
the feeling of missing precious moments because you have chosen to be present and experience other moments
or
whatever is forgotten, considered unworthy and deleted from the long lists of memories at the end of a year..

something else to remember (grand narratives?)


I am not entirely sure that this will make it to the grand narrative of Greek History
but the recent (and ongoing) protests of the youth in Athens following the brutal murder of the 15-year-old boy on December 6th are definitely a moment to be remembered in the new year...

if Obama's victory is about the audacity of hope
the young Greek rebels are crying against the audacity of corruption and demanding the audacity of a better future...if any is left for 2009

something else to remember (grand narratives)


this moment has already entered the grand narrative of History
the anonymous individuals
and the one man that millions of people are expecting from
not as a static picture or a mirror image
but as a true tide of hope

Barack Obama elected American president (November 08)

something to remember (snapshots)


black and white
and a bit unclear
like some memories that you are not entirely sure
whether they are yours or
you have borrowed them from a film
or stole them from someone else..

and sunflowers in the vase
on the way out
on the 31st of August

in memoria of
life in Dublin

something to remember (snapshots)




the making of Halt!Manufactured; the ten days in the Newman Building (May 2008) and what can/might/will come next from these new friends

something to remember (snapshots)




the streets of Berlin, January 2008 (definitely one of the most attractive places I have ever been)

Tuesday, December 09, 2008

στην μνήμη του Αλέξη


μπορούμε αυτή την φορά να μην ξεχάσουμε;
να μην ξεχάσουμε το παιδί που έφυγε άδικα χωρίς να προλάβει να κάνει λίγα από αυτά που εμείς παίρνουμε ως δεδομένα και κάποιοι μες στην πόρωση τους και την μαλακία τους και την θρασυδειλία τους τα φτήνουν και από πάνω.
τα σπάνε και τα καίνε

η κρίση είναι τεράστια και μας κοιτα βαθειά στα μάτια -- ας την κοιτάξουμε και εμείς να δούμε τι μπορούμε να κάνουμε ο καθενας ξεχωριστά και όλοι μαζί. καιρός για ανάληψη ευθυνών--τώρα.επείγον.

θα προσπαθήσω να θυμάμαι τα μάτια σου Αλέξη
να φανταστώ όσα δεν πρόλαβαν να δουν και δυστυχώς όσα είδαν λίγο πριν το τέλος

Sunday, December 07, 2008

in praise of... (1)

1. South West trains; especially on sundays for giving us free tours (well..relatively) in Surrey and Hampshire..London Waterloo to Winchester (via Staines, Egham etc!!!) today= 1 and a half hours...but if you take it easy and relax, there is something about the slowness of the trains and the realisation that nothing is THAT urgent that cannot be delayed for a while (not even a bunch of essays due on Monday morning), that makes you see the world outside the window in a different way;
2. Ella...just because she has been keeping me the best company in cold afternoons and evenings in the past month;
3. avocado..and the beautiful friend who initiated me to it;
4. little notes saying 'i love you' and 'i think of you' especially when they come from the other side of the world;
5. dolls especially when your mother rediscovers them and clean them up and dress them the way you used to do together;
6. keeping it up without expectations, without desires, without pressure;
7. japanese literature, for the surprises and the beauty in the pain;
8.blogging for offering again another space to breathe and be;
9. complicite's a disappearing number that is still so vivid in my mind and giving me so many good ideas;
10. winter, yes, winter for always filling me with hope

Friday, December 05, 2008

new look

i like the new look of Drifting Planets...dark and playful at the same time
corresponds to my need to feel that I am moving on and some things are changing
including the arrangement and the style of my planets
who still, 2 years and more later, carry on roaming, drifting and meeting again
perhaps less frequently than before but still truthfully (or at least trying to)

like people that I meet and then (either them or me) disappear
but the challenge always comes with those who don't disappear
who are somewhere around, closer or far away
it doesn't matter whether I see them or not
or even whether I speak with them on a day-to-day basis
i know that they are around and this is the challenge--always
how we meet and then carry on with our individual journeys
only to meet again at another moment

weird...

okay
first, I wake up this morning from an incomprehensible rhythmic sound which reminds me of an alarm clock or a fire alarm but it is neither -- nor; it might have been someone buzzing the bell, probably the milkman since I saw a small bottle at the outside door later on

then, I sleep again and I am transferred into this weird story where my flat is full with smoke, the carpet is dirty or covered with another carpet,I am cooking fish that I will eat reluctantly and semi-burnt three hours later when I realise (while being on the train) that I have left the oven on and I rush back home (through Woking or Basingstoke or something) to find out that a friend of mine has saved the day by turning off the oven. but then, i have a visit of this person that I love very much (both in the dream and in reality) and he looks so ill and horrible and he says that he is not hopeful..and i start crying because it cannot be--no..and i wake up because a sob is shaking me...

and now, for the past two hours the phone has been ringing and whenever I pick up, I can only hear another rhythmic sound (like a fax or the sound of an internet modem) and I just say hello hello hello and nobody answers --and i feel weird

is this day turning into a David Lynch film? a part of me wants to switch off all electric devices and lock all the doors to keep these ominous sounds and images outside..

Sunday, November 30, 2008

something dystopian..something interesting

the other day i found myself wondering in a familiar place that I have always considered as one of my favourite buildings in London
the Tate modern--well, I went there mainly to see the exhibition of Mark Rothko and test the ways in which his work would speak to me... (would I be one of the people who sit on the benches in the rooms of the gallery, staring endlessly and desperately the works expecting from them to reveal their secret?)...and I did go, and the works did speak to me somehow in an incomplete way and it was painful but it was not bad altogether and I am glad I went.

but what was the memorable experience of that afternoon in Tate Modern was Dominique's Gonzalez-Foerster dystopian vision of London in TH.2058 in the turbine hall as part of the unilever series..not only for the concept, not only due to innumerable quotations-references to dystopian novels and films, not only due to the real interactive theatrical platform that she constructed...not only for bridging the past and the future of the building that I love in such a creative and imaginative way..
but also because I want to go back and it feels that the concept itself is left in-media res; this is not the last day of London, these are not the only survivors but just passer-bys who want to spend a rainy night..perhaps because even this dystopian vision is not entirely dystopian and has a glimpse of hope in it..perhaps because of that and for many other reasons that I will discover when I return there again, TH.2058 is one of the most interesting and sudden experiences of contemporary art I've had in recent years.

check it out until April 13th 2009:

http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/dominiquegonzalezfoerster/default.shtm

Thursday, November 27, 2008

no harm done..really


i'd rather think about petty behaviours
and small dramas
as slimer gum from ghostbusters..a bit disgusting but ultimately ridiculous and harmless...

laughing at what annoys you
might be the best way out

Sunday, November 23, 2008

to make a note of... (3 months later)


the right to love the way that you feel is appropriate
the feeling of weakness that cannot be articulated
the need for future adventures and conquests
the importance of privacy and silence
the anger against anyone who attempts to violate private spaces
the arrogance of knowledge
the failure to convince
the fragility of information
the fluidity of circumstances
the lack of interest to convince
the possibility of change and
the utopia of all-encompassing emotions of hope
the realisation that replacement is part of the game
the uselessness of certain ideas and actions
the vanity of power
the break with the past -- at last
the ephemeral of promises
the inevitability of the end
the surprise that certain relations bring
the all-enduring love lacking any sense of pressure
the urgency of certain notes
the absurdity of relations
and the beauty that sometimes is impossible to take in

life as it happens
everyday
(painting by Mark Rothko)

Saturday, August 30, 2008

yet again... (for the year in Dublin)


places are safer when you see them on a map
when you just arrive and you cannot feel
the distinctive smell
the peculiarity of the city
cannot really tell what's special about the accents
and north and south divisions seem irrelevant to you...
places are safer when you see them from a plane
or arrive at 8am, late June
and you stand by a bridge thinking
'oh what a strange deja-vu; i have lived here before'
but then perhaps you haven't..you are just about to
places are safer when you just bring in your baggage
your memories, your longing of a different place
and when your everyday walk is a bit of a surprise
looking for a flat, looking for a job, looking for a friend
places are safer when you don't understand the local jokes
or the references to names that you can't even pronounce
when you stay in the safe twilight zone of the outsider who
does not really want to learn about the inside--
but pretends that she does
and you walk by houses without knowing or caring about whose house they were
or pass by statues and read the information but they remain as irrelevant to you as before
places are safer when they just have a name
and numbers of people that are irrelevant to you and your world..
but
places become dangerous when a little cafe has become your favourite niche
and a number of buses take you to your everyday journey
and the face of the guards are getting more and more familiar
just because you walk past them everyday
and the concrete built building becomes familiar
even at 9pm on january nights
when you leave it and the lights are off
and it's cold, you shake in your coat
places become dangerous when they are filled in
by sounds and stories and memories
and corridors and rooms and pubs and drinks and flats
and names of people
first names
then faces
then bodies
then beings
then presences
yes, a place becomes dangerous when it's full with presences
here now, not from the world of before..
and soon, just as the safety net,
just at a glimpse of the second
it takes you to close and open your eyes again
the presences have become absences again
and your suitcase is full with cards and gifts to remember
and the place is gone
just like a dream, it's gone and vanished
and you cannot see its face...
you see it from above again
like before but
you cannot go back to the moment that it was just a name
and not a year of your life
and you wish you could go to that moment
when the place was a name
when the place was safe
when the place had not taken part in your story---
but yet again/you don't

Saturday, August 16, 2008

when you are not around..

..i normally prefer to stay at home
or at most get a cup of hot chocolate in the best place in dublin..
and read japanese literature and admit that
am so far away from achieving any understanding about the meaning of life..

funny how voices overlap
in nights like this
and the well-known deja-vu is almost becoming past
perhaps it never actually happened
all a story, a tale to be said the nights you are cold
and so very little make sense

..and the walks that i never did
seem to come back to me now and the city offers itself to me
but i know that it is gonna be for so very little..
no, i won't take the offer..what do you think?

and i come back home,
and i turn on the lights
and i make hot noodles
and i think it's boring, cut the crap,
and i know that this is not home, home is what we make of it
and i find myself again in-between states
and i've been here before
and it's like a joke because i know that it's millions of lightyears away since you find yourself in my steps
and i take it comically and lightly
because there is no other way that you would have wanted me to take it
and i pack books and stationery and the little purple anti-stress ball that came with me a year ago
and i stop to stare at the rain fall and contemplate that everything is a mindgame
and to wonder what you might be doing now
and to decide that it doesnot really matter

and to talk to the man in the off-licence on dame str.
who is wondering how long i've been living around here
but forgets to answer the basic question: for how long still am i going to?
and autumn is almost here in a known-unknown land that used to be my home--if it ever was
and the street up to Christchurch does not seem as exotic as it did
and i am packing my bags and my shoes and my clothes and my notes from the orientation lecture, a year ago, and what is left from this process of travelling and drinking guiness and talking about theatre and human contact and
i am wondering whether this would have ever made sense otherwise
but it doesnt really matter--it's mid August and the drama, thank God is over
it's just that i see boxes around me
and i am afraid of what can happen next
and i know that you are not around
and i am not sure that you have been around before
even the night i felt that you were not some mindgame
but really there..next to me..for so little, i did..i think

'this is not theatre--this is drama, and it's different'
how funny! a stupid phrase when looked back, changes completely
it's been a year--almost
by the time it is, you will be back
around here
at home?

one of these days, I want to lose myself in the streets of Dublin--before i go, it's the only thing i can possibly do

Saturday, July 05, 2008

Looking for gold



was never really easy. For example, this famous duck spent years trying to get it -- and everything started with that one little penny that he found --then he only had to find the ways to multiply this one penny. And it took a lot of patience..

now, we are all looking for gold too, i thin-not necessarily the shiny yellow gold or the black gold that Scrooze was after--especially these days with all the discussions about recession, looking for gold sounds a bit awkward and taboo as a subject. But when we are looking for other forms of 'gold', how do we look for it? How can we make the right steps that will take us all the way to finding and getting the 'gold'? And how much patience do we need to have to find gold?

what is scary about gold-hunting is that perhaps over the years we become obsessed with a particular kind of gold, and perhaps we might miss other valuable elements that we come across, just because they don't look shiny enough.

Thursday, June 26, 2008

this time..

...they will have to meet
or actually they already have but nobody was there to witness the meeting
it needs to happen again
this time.properly

Monday, May 19, 2008

mess is..

..to start one thing, go on with another and never manage to finish a third..
..throwing clothes and papers all over the place
and not minding the cigarette-butts in the ashtray...
not managing to read a whole chapter of that stupid book
and leave sentences unfinished
and constantly checking your email, your facebook page, your mobile
and setting your alarm at least eight hours before you start thinking of going to bed..
and keep on saying the same things over and over again in front of the mirror
or maybe not..
not remembering the telephone number of your family
and forgetting the birthday of the dear friend..

mess is when your routine is broken
only for very little
and then restored as if it was never broken but you know that it was..
and even though you can go back to it, you simply cannot find the strength to do it
and you find yourself in a mess..
what's problematic though is that the mess at the first place
was not yours..it was someone else's..
but at the end of the day that's what mess is..
contagious..if you go close to people who are in a mess, most probably you will end up carrying one of your own

Sunday, May 18, 2008

Summer Festivals 1: 7+1 Reasons to visit Greece during the summer

1. Dimitris' Papaioannou Medea 2; the renowed Greek choreographer/director reworked his seminal production based on Euripides' tragedy and opens the Athens festival (1-5 June)
2. The Wooster Group's Hamlet; Shakespeare's text in a post-modern reading--looking forward to that even though sadly I will not be able to be there when it's on (13-16 June)
3.Pina Bausch in Epidaurus' Theatre with Gluck's Orpheus and Euridice (19-20 July)
4. The two Oedipus (Rex and in Colonus) by the National Theatre of Greece; if not for any other reason, just for the interesting cast (8-9 August)
5. The Bacchae in a garage; my most favourite Greek theatre ensemble in their first performance after the closing down of the space (post-Amore) present the most challenging Greek tragedy in a most interesting space (7-9 July)
6. Heiner Mueller's Philoctetes in the small theatre of Ancient Epidaurus; if not for any other reason but for the excitement that any play by the German playwright brings (27-28 June)
7. Damage, the world premiere/adaptation of the famous Josephine Hart book as an opera; if not for any other reason, just because we did not have enough of The Beggars' Operas work with their recent Il Trovattore (21-22 July)

and..

my most favourite reason to take an airplane to go to Athens to see the world premiere of Hamlet directed by Thomas Ostermeier of the Schaubuhne Theatre. (7-9 July)

this summer, the Greek festival's programme is amazing and the festival should be considered a destination festival..
chapeau to the artistic director and the team..and I will be there..
For more, check the official website:
http://www.greekfestival.gr/home_page?lang=gr

the ship song (just for you)

night in Dublin
03.18, groups of people in their early twenties
running to catch the last night bus south..
i am walking and i feel my blue shawl getting more and more wet..
thank God I am wearing boots..
cross the traffic lights in trinity, walking on Dame street
how long have I been living here?
when am I gonna get my own way ticket?
when is this gonna be over?
why didnt this ever work out?
you are lying to me..

such a lucky bastard

03.21
a girl with black hair among other girls with blond hair
is trying to find her balance on her silvery high heels
trembling wet hair
and her silvery short skirt soak
and the sounds of people screaming
running towards me and my shawl being soak wet
and i feel the coldness of the may rain pearcing me
my skin, inside..
sirens hurling in the night
and girls and boys gathered outside the cheap chinese take-away..
ugly..
i dont fucking belong here

please show me home
'-only when i am gone, only then
-i appreciate that'

03.28
i am running back home
and feel the rain on my cheeks
and the tears
cheap as it sounds
yes i am crying
for going back home on that dublin night
and for being wet
and for screaming that i feel zero pain
while i should have
and for being May again

03.31
back home
hair dryer and the rain growing stronger
'if i dont catch you when you are over
i guess i will see you whenever'
turn on the heating
wanna feel your 8 and the warmth on the skin
and us never managing to meet
and us never having the proper timing
and you asking--really why did you ask me?

03.53
'we talk about it all night long
we define our moral grounds
but when i crawl into your arms
well everything comes tumbling down..
-your face has grown sad now..
when i must remove your wings
and you..you must try to fly..

come sail your ships around me
and burn your bridges down
you are a little mystery to me
everytime you call in round..'

03.56
everytime it rains in May
the ships lose the compass
lose the orientation...

but next morning they will sail again.anew..as if nothing ever happened
as if it never rained that night in Dublin

Sunday, May 11, 2008

my angels



Some things we plan, we sit and we invent and we plot and cook up;
others are works of inspiration, of poetry;
and it was this genius hand that pushed me up the hotel stairs to say my last goodbye
to a hair as white as snow and of pale blue eyes
closing my eyes and actually praying; not to God above but to you, saying:
I'll love you till the end of the world..
(images of favourite angels, words from Nick Cave, Till the end of the world
just for the unspoken prayers of these days)

Sunday, April 20, 2008

the ethics of (dis)embodiment

I cannot make up my mind about the abortion performance art project at Yale university and questions of ethics, ownership and closure of representation/reproduction/embodiment and disembodiment.

Who owns the body?
How much harm can a body take?
I am not questioning whether it was 'correct' to launch such a project-or even whether it is a hoax--even the idea is quite simply incomprehensible..but then again the materiality of the body is potentially the only thing that each one of us owns?
But ultimately I cannot help but asking a rather old-fashioned question: what's next? Have we reached our limits by now?

For more see:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,351730,00.html

Friday, April 11, 2008

u-topia

thinking of belonging these days
of belonging and home
and no man's lands
Gulliver is constantly in my mind...
probably because i am in Ireland
and the days are growing longer

να μας πάρεις μακριά
να μας πας στα πέρα μέρη..
με Λαιστρυγόνες και με κύκλωπες
όπως πριν όπως πάντα

Monday, March 31, 2008

10+1 things that i learnt on my birthday

1. that the beautiful gardens in the Museum of Modern Art are not supposed to be playgrounds
2. that it comes in handy to wear a hat on a day that starts with sun especially in case you take the Dublin Bus
3. how to pronounce correctly Aran and Leenane
4. how (not) to (dis)appear
5. that certain restaurants are closed on Sundays for dinner
6.how to eat snails in a great French restaurant in the heart of Dublin
7. that it would have come in handy to have an umbrella rather than a hat when it is raining like crazy by the end of the day
8. that it's good to be back home and smell roses, vanilla and drink aromatic tea while rethinking and rewriting about belonging and imagination
9. that some friends never forget you even if they are in the far end of the world (Australia/New Zealand)
10. that I will be able to get Far Away So Close, at least in the German version
and..
11. that life is weird..but still wonderful/wundervoll...

Sunday, March 30, 2008

28 ή πάμε για άλλα

03.35 says the watch--yes, of course, this is the time of the year that we go an hour ahead--and this is the time of the year that coincides with my birthday
28 now..
they just stole an hour from the 29th year of my life

but it doesn't really matter
i will go to bed and tomorrow morning i will feel the smell of white roses, planted the same day that i was born
and hear the sounds of water
and dream of an ideal sunset somewhere in my hometown
and know deep down that everything will go fine
and i will be happy in the end
against all odds
and against all methods

been there
done that
had the T-shirt
dont want to do it anymore..
turn the page
take a deep breath
and go on..
this is my birthday present to myself this year and more will come...

Monday, March 24, 2008

what's this thing with honesty?

-I want to know everything about you. Because I am insane.
-I just want the truth.
-I'm telling you the truth.
-You and the truth are known strangers.
When I get back please tell me the truth.
-Why?
-Because I'm addicted to it. Because without it we're animals. Trust me, I love you.
What?
-I don't love you anymore.

(Patrick Marber. Closer)
ps. really..sometimes why are we so obsessed with truth and honesty? for truth's sake? for our sake? or actually when we are saying we are being honest, perhaps, those are the moments that we are being the least honest to ourselves and the world?
Next time someone says they are honest, think twice? honest to whom? and for which reason?
I love Alice--'I dont love you anymore...'
and thank you for your honesty...

Saturday, March 22, 2008

angels wings


and something else..

to escape from mortality and loss, can I please have a pair of angels' wings?

time to fly away..
I blame the body
not for existing
but for not being able to block the ways it remembers
what was it this book that said that the body is an elephant?
everything prescribed, ascribed there
just there..
the moments of sadness and joy and fear all put on the map of the body
and a tiny prick can make everything burst out again
revived for a moment in the sadness of silence

tonight I drink for the body
I blame the body
I worship the memory that remains unspoken, unfound, uncompromised
and yet to be remembered...

Friday, March 21, 2008

Heaven and Hell







'but the truth was that I did not believe in heaven then, and never would. And when I thought about hell, it was just very quiet.'
Anne Enright. The Gathering

on the first night of spring, what is interruption..really?

margo writes about interruption..one thing: is time ever interrupted?
the more I think about it, the more I realise that you cannot interrupt the circular pace of time..and even if you think that you did, look back and perhaps you will find out that time was interrupted in that exact same place before..
time is a bastard, a whore, a witch, elusive and concrete..cannot be owned, cannot be interrupted
it just flows and takes you with them

on the first night of spring

the wind is blowing like crazy outside
and the candle smells like melon and mistletoe and wine-what a strange combination of Xmas and summer..but this is the first night of spring...
and on the first night of spring
I dream of a weird place with red lights and transparent light pulps
listening to Ella, drinking gin n'tonic
when was the last time that you played musical statues? well, last winter..cause it was winter after all..
the first night of spring
the equinox and all that

on the first night of spring
eat ice cream and hold the tear that is inappropriate to be shed
because it was shed a year ago
and open your purple notebook and rediscover the blue beast
and the man who travels without a story, looking for stories

look at yourself in the mirror
and try to understand who you are but accept it anyway
open the blind and look at the full moon playing hide-n-seek with the clouds..
and write a loosy, gloomy post in your blog after all this time.

...someone asked me how nights smell in Dublin
I can't really tell..
tonight I climbed the window and went off to the secret balcony
and I inhaled the night
but nothing was distinctive about it..just like in Athens
places from a point onwards lose their distinctive smell
like lovers that you've had for years and their smell blended into yours

the first night of spring smells like something you've always known
but cannot really tell..
it smells like fragments of what used to be called 'human contact'..

Friday, February 29, 2008

calendar days

tick, tack, another second
23.59, february the 29th so close..
tick tack the rain still falling
another cigarette perhaps..i thought i quit well..perhaps next time
00.00 midnight
march the first
does it matter? i guess not anymore
March..happy birth-month to me
at the end of this month, i will be 28..thirty days from now
365 days before..whatever happened..

tick tack another drop on the window
this shouldnt be a miserable post
blame the tequilas
and the blue beast attacking me for i have forgotten him for so long
nights going by..nothing new, nothing strange
αν καμια φορά είναι τόσο δύσκολο είναι γιατί
κάποιες φωνές δεν σωπαίνουν όταν τους κλείνεις το στόμα
απλά βρίσκουν άλλους τρόπους να σε κλωτσάνε..

last night i dreamt that i was dreaming
drinking champagne on a cliff
and only a room with big windows was floating in the air
on the top of the cliff
and i woke up this morning and outside there was only rain...
march finally..for another year..no matter what..

Sunday, February 10, 2008

hurt (like Samantha)


independence and self-sufficiency are myths..no matter how much I respect and have worked towards them, this morning I realised how awful it is to wake up, be in pain and be alone..and the archetype of the hero does not work in such cases..because the pain is strong and even the voice of a stranger offers a lot more consolation than the voice inside you..

actually i think, i cannot really write it, but yes I must, actually I do hate being alone..especially when I know that there are certain people in this world who could be by my side, but I (chose to be) am away from them..

now that I feel better, the pain went away, it's reconstruction time again...reconsideration...think back; what is really important? what matters the most and what can you do for that?can I find a way?

ps. the title of the post is trying to distort its seriosity; did anyone understand what I am referring to?

Saturday, February 09, 2008

passing by

drinking red wine in a pub when saw him passing by
he stared at her for a minute or two
in an ideal world he would approach the window wanting to take a picture of her
while later on some drunk men actually did that and she thought that it would be cool to merge the memories
but he did not
he just stared at her..for a moment remembering the moments of true naked human contact, days before...months..did this ever happen? really? did we ever have coffee at 3am?
did i ever wake up at 8.07 and you were already awake starring at me?
and why are you starring again at me tonight? from a distance?

and then still staring at her, he moved on
and disappeared from the frame
the character-passer by in the movie
no,he was not supposed to become the central character
too busy, too complicated, too complex and preoccupied for such a role
she smiled and realised one thing:this place was finally home..suffocating, familiar but home

and she wanted to fly to the island next door
and feel young again..close to..
love the simplicity of a tiny phrase...'miss you'

Sunday, February 03, 2008

Copy-Cut-Paste

write about examples, singularities,pluralities, what exactly we choose to love when we fall in love, the loved one per se, and feeling that only if we stop being examples we can find our uniqueness..
a tissue of quotations, the voice inside, back to deconstruction and the death of the author...going over and over, the diaries, copying their words, mad at himself..another night, cannot get to sleep..
his voice is lost, hidden behind numbers of others who try to reach them in the darkness, whisper words in their ears, he can no longer see her, somewhere lost, holding her beautiful shoes, lingering for a moment in the tube, piccadilly line last train to caledonian road, want to get off, have to get off--kings cross--damn lost you now..
just pure gold, never heard the voice..have to make it up..

a pastiche of voices and stories and sounds inside..
for example..which one to choose?
never before so cryptic, yet so clear in his mind..

let go/ you might lose yourself (otherwise)

Saturday, February 02, 2008

fading out...


some photographs might turn yellow when time goes by
and some memories when narrated for a hundred times
sound a lot more trivial than the first time
and some times it takes a lot less effort than you expected
and things just are a tiny bit easier than before

and you feel better--admit it!


it's February
and according to a particular calendar
of a place that I just get to know
this is the very first month of spring
bizarre though it might sound
I think that this time I would rather 'classify' February
into my spring months
rather than the icy heart of winter
that always left a distant memory covered in snow

fading out..again and again..


Monday, January 21, 2008

ausgang..


huge,vast parks and 'platz'

and brown leaves, no leaves

and vast skies, all the world could fit in this place

beautiful, painfully sometimes

the night close to the wall and the topography of the branches nearby

and a dim light coming from the moon? no, rather the purplish roof of the complex building


a golden aura

and a smirk in her eyes while

the bus to the zoo centre passed her by

and then, the umbrella broke

but her wings protected me--

victory at last came down the pedestal and introduced herself to me..


something is changing

don't know whether it's love

but it's gotta to be what the germans call 'ausgang'

i.e. exit

i.e. way out---free at last

Sunday, January 13, 2008

writings on the sand


as if in a dream
a blindfolded woman in a red dress
writing letters and making shapes
on dust or sand
whispering or singing
something like:
'dont take your hand away.it's not that i am feeling anything for you.It's my skin that remembers. Or perhaps it doesn't matter to it,does it?
when i close my eyes you are beautiful. Or hunchbacked if I want it. The privilege of the blind.they drew the better lot in love. they are spared the comedy of circumstances: they see what they want to see. the ideal would be blind and deafmute.the love of stones.'

then opens her eyes, wipes off everything
leaves..next day she will be back as if..

(photo: Duchamp & Man Ray, L'elevage de poussière,
text with extracts from Heiner Muller's Quartet)

Thursday, January 10, 2008

'at my back the ruins of Europe'


..i am dreaming of sand and heavy ladders
and plenty of neon lights like those in the tunnel of Frankfurt airport
and the sound of the iron, metal hammer
breaking down the ruins of Europe...


i dream of beautiful laces being burnt
like those that Penelope was making while waiting for Odysseus to return (did he?)
'something is rotten/in this age of hope/
let's delve in earth and blow her at the moon'


and i see the sun setting in the West
over a sea of clouds..while the beautiful couple and their baby are smiling to me


the search begins--'my drama is cancelled'..(H.M)
can the character turn into machine? and how?

Tuesday, January 01, 2008

2007,this one goes to my blueberry year

‘a blueberry pie is left whole every night;
Why? What’s wrong with the blueberry pie?
Nothing is wrong with the blueberry pie;
it’s just that nobody wants it.’

And so, here we go again..last year I was writing on the very last year of 2006, now I am writing in the first hours of 2008—last year I was writing about fragments and people and places and memories and moments
This year I want to write about my blueberry year, this bitter-sweet taste of a year that lasted two hours less since it started in a home that no longer exists to finish somewhere that is yet to become home and most probably will never become.
wanted to press a button and be home;
my reflection on the windows of south west trains,
sometime before midnight
tasting Guinness;
the 22nd of March, counting stops
knowing that I had to get off-the biggest mistake of the year,
but why regrets now?
Walking in the forest..why didn’t I stay there forever?
And tell you about the tree angel enchanted forest boy who flew across the ocean because he loved you; and I know it’s all over but hang on in for just ten more minutes before you throw me out of your life and forget who I am because it’s beautiful learning to know you and well worth the effort..

The reflection of myself in your eyes
Made me understand who I am—and what I wanna be
And what I will try to become..
And this reflection is not that bad..
Not for what I thought
Bless the universe for a blueberry year
That I was never planning to have
But when I tasted, I found my way to what might this year reveal itself as home…
[a small personal note:
always friends..and I love you
last and only open letter to you-if you ever find your way back to my drifting planets, read this just to find out that what I’ve told you so many times during the year was actually true. something that belonges to the blueberry year that is now over.
(pause..sigh..change the rhythm..)]

remember (you who read this,me who write this)
be generous and grateful for the gift of life..
and make the choice to be there..
here and now
always.
..and so the story continues..
Happy New Year 2008; a year that might not taste like blueberry anymore
and who knows? this might make a difference