Long Havre Poems

Mirror
by Kajal Ahmad, a Kurdish poet
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

My era's obscuring mirror
shattered
because it magnified the small
and made the great seem insignificant.
Dictators and monsters filled its contours.
Now when I breathe
its jagged shards pierce my...

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I balance my illicitly obtained bottle of absinthe from a man who knows a man, for an exorbitant amount of Euros, on the worn wooden windowsill of my topmost room at the rundown pension overlooking...

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The Great Northern Road Trip is meant to follow Highway 2 from Washington to Maine.
That’s how it was drawn up…that is how it is known
but along the way (Seattle, Olympic, Glacier, Banff) we’ve tried to...

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When I look at a recent photo of myself…I admit to sometimes feeling dread…because the photo that I’m seeing doesn’t match the picture in my head.

In my head I am much younger…on this my heart...

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The scent of oceans, a certain coolness
of wind over water wanders these city streets
where oleander blooms wickedly 
in the ruby assignation of the heart.
An occosional grayed gull, bonded to the Seine,

grown fat with pigeons and...

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The Initiation 

It is not easy to be young at 16 I was a galley boy
on a tankship that even then 60 years ago was ancient
crewed by old mariners who spent their free time
playing cards...

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The Initiation 

It is not easy to be young at 16 I was a galley boy
on a tankship that even then 60 years ago was ancient
crewed by old mariners who spent their free time
playing cards...

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Penniless in Le Havre 

At the time of my nadir penniless in Le Havre in the drizzle 
Saw a blue neon light of a bar I meet sailors there from my own country 
They gave...

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Penniless in le Havre.

In the time of my nadir penniless in Le Havre
in the drizzle, I saw the blue neon light of a bar
I met sailors from my country
they gave me cigarettes and wine
also money...

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tangerine sunrise~
oscillating reflections glow
like a sketch of your smile
at a glimpse of a new morn

a medley of indigo and carrot
as the sun floats in hazy sky
like the sparkle of your eyes
remembering first love

nebulous  harbour...

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The Loss of Innocence

At a school sports day I was running 60 metres,
 I wanted so very much to win, could taste blood
didn´t quite make it but got a bronze medal,
 which I wore on...

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sun rays
     soft glaze

               tawny
            ...

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