Alexander Schmitz 

Übersetzer:in

without care without seed pearl without stitching closed the
eye of the falcon without seemly rectitude without the platitude
of o thou muddled media pundit without questionable doubt or
metabolism without a geographic category of speech that will travail
without a hint or glint of "secular" mastery, without ritual framing
without a theatrical sense of illusion and bandying about or on or inside
a thermosphere without it working against you and when it does being
able to go on without it without gavottes without gazelles that you
study in neighboring Persian poetries without spallation and
without a diving bell how will you survive? without rapacious wildcats
without the sense of security you have always expected without your
familiar stage fright without the caves without the bombing of caves
without the mystery of caves without the caves in your memory of that
mystery that lives in caves without caves that long to exist in the
hand print in the cave of that memory without the rivets that hold
 the wing together that hold the whole throbbing machine together that
assert the rivet dominion without which you do not have a plan of
fastening together of wings of arms for the automaton that holds
the capital together without its own mind of wheels and cogs and mudras
that run the show without all the pixels and efforts of more dominion
without borders to cross without needing to carry things over borders
the invasion of your homeland (coming? coming soon?) without it, what
call in the night what call is answered what nuance what tantrum in the night
what martyrdom of dreaming your own birth your own end of history
or end of speculation what call what alarm is sounding deep in the home?

She continues at warp speed, mounting her poetry dance for the stage
and podium. She could be riding a seven-headed howling dragon, as harlot
who has rejected the patriarchal robber baron juta, riding a dragon with tail
so long that it sweeps down a third of the stars of heaven. She’ll carry a cup,
a skull-cup of blood perhaps, a transmografied grail with its abominations and
impurities of fornication, drunk with blood of martyrs. O Babylon, perdition and
idolatrous paganism, all rebel angels stand with me now. Against the Powell
Doctrine, the Bush fatwas, the euphemisms of apocalypse. Thirty silver coins
Ha! You warmongers sell the country cheap. Down with the tyrants.
Saint Michael dance with me. Have you heard about the mirror neurons that
show sentient beings wired for empathy? Sometimes referred to as the
„Dalai Lama neurons“? Invoke them now, so that I feel what you feel deep in the
desert trenches. Ida Lupino has a unique career, a thinking actress, who back
then could mouth her interesting syllables, have some studio clout as director,
take a stand outside the distraction culture.

This is the writing dance
Or a plumed helmet which itself
Resembles a heart in the shape of Africa
Continents! Continents!
The challenge is to question the „warrior“
Get inside his/her armor
Get inside the land which has no boundary
We could talk about China now
Its economics, its technocrats,
The backdoor deals
We could happily be Canadian
But could we really?
We could talk about Liberia,
Suffering everywhere
& Congo and our own backyard
safe... starlit
Stomp on it right now
Out on that turf

This is the obsequious politician
Flattering you
You never believe him
Never. The eminence of philosophy
So crenellated, so terraced pronouncing
The name of your dance: Down with the tyrant!
That is the gesture and the name: Down with the tyrant
Down with his exaggerated thunder
You wanna talk psychosis?
Down with the tyrant
Daggers...hysterical puritans...starved animals
You wanna? You wanna? You want to talk?
You want to write?
This is the writing dance, written
for all to see
the whole picture of the decimated site, the picture
of charnel ground.. .the jackals came... .& the jackals came
sift, sift through the body parts
sift... sift...

See the back of his head?
Would a gesture
Knock him off? Or is he too steely-eyed?
Eyes look through the head—inside there the
Little screen -the trick is to dance upon it
The dance I was doing is the written dance
To be a barker, be a noise maker, be a saint—
Tools, linen, weapons, wires, women creating
Sainthood, place hands together and bow

This was the written dance…eyes looking back on
Themselves before growing cold, check out the moon
Check out all the characters
The philosopher for example – her window of the room
The guy ready to blast his M16
The naturalist with steely gaze
Dark streets out there below the moon?
Is that what I see?
Is it written? No this is the smitten dance
Flying over the Occupied territories
Don’t talk to me about transgression any more
This is the trespass dance
This is the way I get down for it
It’s my power structure to strangle Rumsfeld!
STRANGLE Rumsfeld!!!!!!!!
Avuant thee thou Rumsfeld euphemisms!

If I were a scientist I would scream in my
Scientist
Neurons! Neurons!
I would say it again & again the way
The neurons like to be commended &
Commented upon: Dear Neurons
You can be kind
I would say elephants move like this
Neuralinguistically
Snakes move like that
Hyenas are shrieking at the body politic
If I were a Sufi I might spin outta control

This is not the terra firma dance
This is not the map of the capital materialist Junta dance
This is the writing dance
Ida Lupino liked id
She wanted the script to go on
Many of the women stars of another era
Were never confused about priorities
They had their stage directions. Their “moves”
Their maps
They had their “songs” their “gestures” their “postures”
They wrote for a silver screen
They had their “desires”
Their sky was covered with a thin layer of clouds
Everything was
quiet and still when they came on the "set"
It was like a scene of tranquil poetry
It was a scene you had to have been there for
As it got written
And the one who emerged, who lingered
Was the one you pointed to-was-was0-"she"
She who had been stalling, feet like the feet of many
Different animals
& with eyes in all the pores of their pelts
& voices
sounding as only she could as them,
and mapping
and changing the way the writing would go
if it were a dance
You might wonder

the manatee is found in shallow slow moving rivers
the manatee moves in estuaries moves in saltwater bays
the manatee in moving moves gently
the manatee is to be found in canals and coastal areas
the manatee is a migratory animal
the manatee is gentle and slow-moving
the manatee moves in slow moving rivers slowly
the manatee is completely herbivorous
the West Indian manatee has no natural enemies
the manatee has no natural enemies but unnatural man
the manatee is constantly threatened by man unnaturally
man with his boats and plastic and attitude
the manatee often drowns in canal locks of man
man who makes no concession to manatee
the manatee often dies in flood control structures
man who makes no concession to manatee nor cares of manatee
     life manatee fortune
the manatee dies in collision with water craft
man who does not protect the manatee
what steward of the earth is this unnatural man?
man who makes no concession to manatee
the manatee dies with the ingestion of fish hooks
man who unnaturally, makes no concession
the manatee dies from litter and monofilament lines
man who is rank in attitude has no use for manatee
the manatee dies entrapped in crab trap lines
the manatee dies from loss of habitat claimed by man
maimed by man, the manatee could be aided by man
man o aid the manatee man come to the manatee heart
a manatee calf is born every 2-5 years
a manatee gestates for a year in the manatee womb
8,400 miles of tidal waters could be for the manatee
11, 000 miles of rivers & stream could be for the manatee
10,000 miles of canals would they all be for the manatee
the manatee has more grey matter in the brain than man
the manatee is perhaps thinking archivally deeper than man
ancient days of manatee so many thousands of years
manatee mind, what is the mind of manatee?
the manatee has no natural enemies
the manatee is completely herbivorous
the metabolism of the manatee is slow, moves slowly
the manatee moves in estuaries, moves in saltwater bays
the manatee moves in slow moving rivers slowly the manatee is gentle
the manatee offspring nurses for up to 2 years
the manatee learns everything from the manatee mother
the manatee mothers and offspring sing to one another
the manatee have large ear-bones
chirps    whistles     squeaks of the manatee
the manatee in moving slowly moves gently
oscillations of the manatee moving between manatee ears
ears of the manatee mother and manatee offspring
manatee are our Sirenians, and live in the house of the sirens
where are the human sanctuaries for the manatee?
manatees     mermaids     sirens singing move slowly
the manatee mother and calf so bonded
female manatee bonded with her just one manatee offspring
the manatee is found in shallow slow moving rivers
the manatee moves in estuaries moves in saltwater bays
the manatee is moving most gently

what is it to be corset maker binding the bone and cotton in
a daily sweat of labor and purpose what is it to know the
sweat of all you my sister workers of daily living surviving
an economic purse-string purpose what is it to be declared
the most dangerous of purpose when J. Edgar Hoover has
your number and what is it here now in St Petersburg
hungry and anxious and soul-stirring for surviving my
purpose what is the cause of insomniac passion my further
disillusionment in your systems in your many systems in all
the systems that bind the bone in this labor to you who will
always profit off the labor of Emma's hands sewing
binding aching toiling bone and cotton in the class struggle
a dangerous purpose you want to call it that why you can
call it that and it's so much more but do call it that and you
will I'm sure call it that and most dangerous of violence
and terror too. you want to call it that why you can call it
that and it's so much more but do call it that and you will
I'm sure call it that and most dangerous of violence and
terror too and what of a Spanish Civil War I'll call wake up
all minions! I'll call: arise! and would cast in a daily sweat
of labor a struggle a sweet edge that way for it's an energy
of daily sweat and toil to be free of the fascisms of how
and when and why and why o never free of J. Edgar
Hoover but my imagination ever free of the imagination of
J. Edgar Hoover who will certainly most certainly have
your number in his fractious labor and psychopathic toil
even now when he the ghost of fractious J. Edgar Hoover is
stalking haunting the work places the meeting places the
"commune" of all my sweat and purpose. What is it to be a
large woman be-speckled and intent in my libertarian
socialist moment you want to call it that why you can call it
that and it's so much more but do call it that and you will
I'm sure call it that and most dangerous of violence and
terror to incite a riot. What is it to be thus called trouble and
to be forever "unpopular with authorities" to be watched
and goaded and arrested and in lock-down what kind of
terror moment is this and will it survive and assassinate a
president this kind of moment will it will it survive
McKinley will it survive psychopathic fractious J. Edgar
Hoover and will the ghosts of Haymarket stalk the Union
Hall still in that old purpose and will that will now sisters
break the corset that binds the moment?