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Tuesday 19 June 2007

La Petite Mort -- by Mimitig

-

At 17 I lost them both
My virginity and my friend

There was nothing for us
To make us think
We were not immortal.

We had fine times
We ruled our times
Bikes, cars, everywhere we went
We were the crew

We had summers of love
And heat
And swimming late at night
In the river

We took the boat out
Again and again in those hot nights
We lit bonfires and raged in passion
Nothing, ever would spoil our future

Until death

The phone rang
I heard, he's dead

In an instant
My world crashed

My life and love smashed like the Honda
Broken and crushed in the hedge

Every year
I remember

He's gone
I'm here

-

22 comments:

DoctorShoot said...

Mimi
Right from the soul.

I know a painter well and her defining characteristic is that her paintings are so close that it is not easy to look,
unless you can handle looking deep inside...

like moody merry-go-round music through a mist, tinkling softly above the sound of the water,
persistant
and
tasting the sad taste of salt on the skin...
and always searching for the missing footprints in the sand...
and the music never goes away...

"There was nothing for us
To make us think
We were not immortal"

taking us to the brink and then

"Broken and crushed in the hedge"

If you can find Missy Higgins '10 days' on youtube pour a scotch and have a listen.
Lyrics are at:
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/missyhiggins/tendays.html

pretend we are all in the room with you...

Anonymous said...

Thanks doc - both for the kind comment and the link. I found the youtube clip and listened to Missy Higgins. Gentle and lovely. I will try some other songs too.

Anonymous said...

I just had a wwe (weird web experience). As a virtual bunch of wild flowers for Mimi, I wanted to post a few verses by Rimbaud - "On n'est pas sérieux quand on a 17 ans" - and couldn't remember precisely so I tried to google the poem. On the first site I found, the inevitable popup ad that greeted me was for... Honda motorcyles. Not one of my silly jokes, Mimi, I still know when to and when not too, I think. It really happened and was quite spooky. Just like life sometimes, irrational, twisted, unfair.

Some emotional scars are like tatoos, you carry them to the end. Unlike tatoos, you don't choose them and they seep deeper. But maybe they don't fade and go wrinkly with time but instead acquire a strange beauty. Maybe. I really don't know.

file said...

o mimi,

I was an immortal motorcycle god at 17 too, when 2 of our crew flew into heaven on an X7, could easily have been me many times

it seems painfully clear that what you had you still have, nothing will change that, a future was lost but nobody gets guarantees for the future

you know the story of the little wave don't you?

there's a little wave out at sea and he's having a whale of a time, 'Weee' he says and 'Woooosh', he see's a bigger wave and he says 'Cor this is fun innit?' 'Oh, yes,' says the big wave 'It's a lot of fun" and they both sing 'SHWeeeoooosh' together and laugh.

Then the little wave sees an black island and he's like 'Wow, look at that, it's a black island' and the big wave says 'Oh yeh' and as they get closer the little wave sees the other waves getting bashed and crashed on the jagged black rocks

he starts to get a bit concerned and then, frankly, scared. He's says to the big wave 'So, we're gonna go crashing into those craggy rocks then?' 'Oh yes' says the big wave 'So I'll all break up and dissapear then, like all the others and you?' and the little wave starts to shed a tear 'Come now, come now' says the big wave 'You think you're a wave don't you? When you touch that land you'll realize you're just part of the sea'

I don't know mimi, really, but to me life is the important bit and that goes on

Anonymous said...

I think this is a courageous poem, Mimi, and deceptively simple, like a simple stone dropped into a pool and letting the ripples spread out...and out...

Anonymous said...

Everyone: thank you a lot. A few weeks ago I told Zeph I couldn't write a poem for her Salon. I'm in the process of some soul-searching and clearing out just now, and this came from that. We had some shocking times when I was younger - we lost 3 chaps in a period of 6 months to bikes and cars, and then one more went and fell off a mountain. It's a long time ago now and it's not so much a wound as something that happened. But nothing cuts as deep as your first love, and that's where this came from.

DoctorShoot said...

a literary historian wrote:

"In the last fifty years, few influences on literary creativity and development have had greater effect than the rise of an electronic world community through the agency of COUPLIER (formally known as 'the world wide web').

The astonishing success and rise of writing collectives, such as the originally and perhaps almost casually title 'Pseud's Other Stuff' for example, has been amazing.
World President Marcela DeArayo entertained the current members at her lavish litterati convention in Nairobi this week, and rewarded all thirty two members with handsome life stipends and gold travel passes on intergalactic shuttles.

The Floating Taproom, currently stationed close to the booming Martian capital of Bransonville, will host the next perfomance of their...."

keep writing Mimi

DoctorShoot said...

...and your poem is hauntingly beautiful and tightly delivered as befits a painting from the soul

Anonymous said...

You should be made Chevalier de l'Ordre Intergalactique. I'll put in a word for you next time I meet La Presidente.

file said...

Hi, El Loco Presidente, Mon Enorme

any chance of an advance on that stipend?

DoctorShoot said...

file

Mme Zeph Grand Chevalier must first present the formal tattooed t-shirt and declare that the flood gates are officially opened for us all to swim through.

I think 'Other Stuff On Tour' might be the first gig, and the survivors graduate to:

"A Night in the Corner Taproom"

whereupon those voted to be allowed to remain alive by Pseuds Corner attendees get awarded the 'Other Stuff apron and kitchen knife' properly inscribed with the immortal words:...

"WE RULED OUR TIMES... AND SURVIVED"...

stipend advances can then be applied for....

file said...

bloody red tape

not sure about the kitchen knives, one of us might end up in the Ceasar Salad

alright, no stipend yet then, grant?

Anonymous said...

Loyal Subjects, Fawns, Denizens,

lend me your seers..

Zephirine said...

Fawns? I like that. But I thought I issued an edict that denizens were not allowed to carry knives.

I am attempting to secure funding for this venture by doing the lottery every week.

Zephirine said...

But I keep not winning, why is that?

Anonymous said...

Wrong numbers. Gotta know how to pick the buggers.

file said...

if you look hard enough you'll find the numbers encoded in the midnight shipping forecast of the day before the draw

Anonymous said...

file! shhhhhh...

file said...

I thought everyone knew, it was in that book 'Holy Finistere Holy Lottery' By Donegal Brown

Anonymous said...

Hmmmm, celestial lotery... I think we've come full circle.

guitougoal said...

mimi,
on behalf of your friend offy, from Rimbaud:
on est pas serieus quand on a 17 ans.
"We aren't serious when we're seventeen.
-One fine evening, the hell with beer,lemonade
Noisy cafes with their shining lamps!
We walk under the green linden trees of the park.

The lindens smell good in the good june evenings!
All times the air is so scented that we close our eyes
The wind laden with sounds-the town isn't far-Has the smell of grapevines and beer...

That evening...you return to the bright cafes,
You ask for beer or lemonade...
We're not serious when we are seventeen
And when we have green linden trees in the park.

Anonymous said...

guitou: thank you for this translation. It's not a poem I know, but it's lovely and so captures the mood of being 17 then. Not I think for current teenagers, but their loss.