A ship's cook
The sea is dark, clunky, and calm today
slowly undulate
turns white where the ship's bow has plowed a furrow
that stretches for miles.
Gulls still follow us, shrieking and waiting for the cook to
throw overboard waste food, tomorrow gone back to the coast waiting, for another ship
I fiddle with the radio in the galley, find a good station
it saddens me also as it was it was my brother's favorite song
We left Antwerp 24 hundred hours ago,
it had been
hectic, long night, blaring music, whores and beer
In the drunken haze, a nucleus of sobriety reminded
a longing for something better, knowing this was
a temporary and shallow
as for now, I have a long day ahead of me, food to cook
bread to make and the cleaning of pots and pans
that is why cooks are temperamental
I feel safe in my little domain, a place the captain fear
to enters. Yes, I'm sailing across the sea, and it is good
to be alive on a day like this
Categories:
antwerp, absence, anti bullying, books,
Form: Blank verse
The collectors' job is to get the drugs out of the container
and away from the docks,from where they will be transported
to Amsterdam, Germany, Poland, Holand, Lithuania, Latvia,
Estonia, Finland and other parts of Europe.Over 150 tons of
illegal drugs were seized by French authorities in 2022 and
with it comes unprecedented drug violence in Belgium and
the Netherlands,whose ports of Antwerp and Rotterdam,
respectively,have become the main gateways for Latin American
cocaine cartels into the continent.In Belgium,the justice minister
is forced to live in a safehouse,out of reach of drug gangs.
Note.Drug Lords are powerful, strong, and dangerous.
Categories:
antwerp, abuse, addiction, drink, drug,
Form: Free verse
In an old briefcase
capsuled for years in a corner
of the shed, I found a rolled up wad
of poems, stalled, still looking
for something to say, frozen
in a futile gasp for air.
I should have thrown
them away.
There was also an old plane ticket,
a beer coaster from an Antwerp cafe,
and a few photographs taken
from a bridge across a canal
in Bruges with three nuns wearing
starched white cornettes
stretched out like enormous
butterfly wings perched atop
of their heads.
And tucked in a side pocket,
were letters from my mother
written more than thirty years ago.
Long dead, I could almost hear
her voice read each word.
In one, she told me how
she scored an A for English
in the HSC exam she sat
when well into her sixties.
She could recite Frost's "Birches"
off the top of her head. Stevens,
for her, made no sense. Mum liked
plain language pared down
to bone.
I am not sure why I am writing
these words about such
middling matters, much less trying
to shape them into poetry.
No matter.
Sometimes just ordinary things,
like those found in an old briefcase,
seem to find a moment
to have something to say,
at least for me.
Categories:
antwerp, poetry, words, write,
Form: Free verse
Patrasche loved being a rescue dog in his youth
husky with one blue eye, one brown eye and a curled tail
his reputation was solid; he could track an owl’s beak
older now, he felt the frost and ice in his bones tonight
His master had asked him to track Nello, a young boy
It would have been truly easy most nights, but this was not most nights
Antwerp was covered with frost and ice
Patrasche’s paws kept flailing out, he was skating on this stuff
It was past midnight now. The town was dark, even with the snow
Tavern signs were creaking with age, Patrasche could relate
Come on, boy, I know we are close. This was Paul, his owner.
Patrasche’s knees were arthritic, he was older and tired.
He thought this might be his last rescue.
If we find Nello, all will be well, he told himself.
His knees did not believe him.
Freezing to death might be easier tonight.
Patrasche had heard that freezing was a sweet death.
Categories:
antwerp, fantasy,
Form: Prose
Ironsmith Quentin Metrys
became a noted flemish
He painted both religious&sacrificial
funding the Antwerp school so special
Categories:
antwerp, art, people,
Form: Clerihew
Hendrick van Wueluwe
a master of Frankfurt was he
He developed a new artistic style
lived around Antwerp for a while
Categories:
antwerp, art, people,
Form: Clerihew
Vincent Willhelm van Gogh
a difficult talent to truly know
unwise love choices-Eugenie Kee&Sien
made him stick to brush not pen
Finance support from brother Theo
loosed his giftings to flow
in dark landscapes&still life
too bad, without a wife
From Ecole de Beau Arts a matric
In Antwerp he creates his pics
Then to Paris to mix with the best
lived an artist life with great zest
Upon the death of Pa Theodorus
Vincent does portraits&busts
as his love life to Margot ails
so also his pointillism fails
He then met Agostina Segatori
& a brief affair the world did see
An interest in all things Japanaise
then to Arles were the sun does blaze
The artists colony was not a success
Vincent cut off an -ear-but I digress
progressively VG became deluded
'a mad redhead,'the locals said
Genius & delusion marries as one
but a recognisable usp is done
with broad brush& wavy line
a reputation to outlast his time
In Arles he is hospitalised
&unique art realised-
then with a gun suicides
on canvas though his genius resides
Categories:
antwerp, art,
Form: Clerihew
An oil port
He is looking on to shore and sees an oil terminal
waiting for the pilot, he may arrive today or tomorrow.
Well he is not going ashore at this Arab port it is
usually boring full of men smoking water pipes talking
excitedly about the next revolution and he knows
as a white man, he viewed with suspicion.
He never understood a culture where women are cattle
sit indoors and wait to be pregnant again.
This is a society of men, and as such, they make a mess
of daily life.
It takes 12 hours to load the ship with crude oil, bound
for Antwerp, which is more like the home he understands
the people there can have a beer in a bar and not starred
at with hatred.
Mind, he knows well the white people have done much
harm in this part of the world, nevertheless he dislikes
their culture, but he doesn´t care to understand them.
Categories:
antwerp, 5th grade, boy, child,
Form: Blank verse
The Voyage
The big seagull sat on the bow of my rowing boat
on my way to Argentina and Rosita,
which I never met she had married guitar player-
had unfriendly eyes ready to peck my eyes out.
I regretted my heroism.
I wanted to go to Argentina because of its pampas
Beautiful horses and also to be famous for the voyage
I was picked up by a merchant ship
it was actually going the wrong way docked in Antwerp
Free beer for the, would be the hero.
I got a job on an old steamer bound for Argentina.
Buenos Aires,
A City with so many beautiful women it took a long
before I got my stead looking for the tree of wisdom.
I found it burning in the night
the Gauchos were feeling cold and set fire to the tree.
What matters is the journey
which is a fine sentence to cover for absolute failure.
Categories:
antwerp, absence, anti bullying,
Form: Sonnet
In an attempt to establish an uncertain linkage between 2 parables,
Ivo Torena resorted to impress his colleagues all night long; hence,
awkward as a cow on a crutch, he was cowed into pilfering bananas,
and when he was caught red-handed by the deputy, his eyes showed
no response even though his arteries were friendly. Thus, a series of
tribulations took place inside his troubled mind for outlandish
reasons, and his whereabouts were commended by one of the top
enemies of the state: The twerp from Antwerp. On a serious note,
a cabal of notorious hotshots devised an agenda to unnerve Ivo
until the cow comes home. Still and all, Torena has a truly unique
composure, unlike the belligerent Belgian, and his mannerisms
can't be reciprocated with ease. Furthermore, the notoriety with
which he prattled and sprattled was momentous! His uneventful
birth can't hold a candle to any cinematographic invention although
his water bottle company is a candle in the wind and the pieces
begin to assemble duly without second thoughts whatsoever.
Categories:
antwerp, assonance, aubade, beauty, confidence,
Form: Verse