ROMANIAN LIBRARY

OLD POSTCARDS

Almost empty, the drawer was waiting;

Months, years passed and

I did not Look inside to see what was left in there:

a pair of laced white gloves,

a pair of playing cards, still good to play

a very used quill and

some spare feathers

a small bottle of dry purple ink

a bunch of dusty postcards – dusted,

covered with handwriting; ink – still can be read…

I took them with me in the sitting room

I sat under the high window and for a moment

I thought about throwing them in the chimney fire

For a moment…no! how could I?

I tore the red ribbon and

one by one I read them all

I read them one by one…

I knew and I didn’t know them; cards sent by us,

My mother and my father, my brother and I,

To my grandmother in her village far from Bucharest..

as Granny couldn’t write

my summer friend Tudora,

my aunty Vanghelita or her godson Ticu -

sometimes wrote to us in her place.

I read and read the fifty year-old postcards, yellowed and brittle… kept by Granny,

sacred relics of our love, her love taken back by mother when Granny died.

I looked the postcards in my hands filled with father’s careful little writing, and my mother Julieta’s big and beautiful lettering addressing Granny as “little mother”; some still had my proudly rounded letters and my brother’s as well, on the lightly penciled lines traced to guide his hand. They read:

“Mother, winter’s here; we regret we can’t come” “We’ll see you next summer, after school’s over”, “Julieta was sick; she couldn’t come for Christmas, sorry mother” “We send a lot of love and kisses, Granny”…

Forgotten memories – no one laid eyes on them Forgotten cards, planty of thoughts, Regrets and love in them.

Now only I can understand Granny,

Sitting in front of her house or under the lilac tree,

gazing into the horizon;

alone and sad, so sad She couldn’t realize herself how sad her life was! But she never complained,

a woman by herself, alone in her old age

knowing her children are at work or in schools

they’ll come by to visit twice a year

that’s just the best they could do

She hoped they would think about her As her thoughts were with them all the time. In the long, cold nights of early winter What was Granny thinking about? Maybe she wrapped her heart into a ball Of thoughts from the time when

she also was young.

______________

IVY ON THE WALL

I push the vacuum cleaner

Up and down, Stairs, bedrooms, stairs, basement Laundry room, stairs and sitting room. On the attic wall, green, contorted - an ivy Is struggling to get to the roof. It is not alive - is painted on the wall; The old soul of the house wanted Its signature there, a mark on the house Over the wood ceiling of the kitchen.

Is it a curse

Ivy is not for good luck

everyone knows that.

I have seen, This house was not a lucky place Should I paint over it a four-leaf clover When I leave the house? No way to leave the ivy there!

Noise, songs in the back yard

cardinals, squirrels, doves

the entire garden is under the spell of a big blue jay; having

no fear of anything and no one

a small woodpecker makes

itself busy on the lilac.

No, I wont leave the curse with this house I’d better take a brush and

paint a green,

luxurious four-leaf clover

over the ivy in the attic The four-leaf clover is for good luck Everyone knows that.

______________

CHAMP DE BLE

I followed the grassy way near the river bed Slopping up, slopping down

The way was widening into the sky

One side lined with pastures,

The other side, to my left,

With a forest of young dark-greenish pines.

Houses, barns, decrepit stores followed

And amazed cattle witnessed my wanderings.

Suddenly in front of me The large horizon emerged Projected in the open space.

Stunned I hung there between the sky

And the bright-golden wheat

I was dust, lit by the sun in the brutal midday light,

Blinded, I sought the horizontal line

Where the blue-marine sky dissipated

Into the deep yellow of Van Gogh’s champ de ble.

Dizzy, at the mercy of the burning sky I slowly melted into golden wheat.

Who said Van Gogh was insane?

______________

AIR FRANCE FLIGHT 312

All furies of the world reunited in the sky

Went against the man and his machine!

Tremendous rain, infuriated winds,

Fierce lightning and fulgurant thunder…

The disheveled Nature fulminates

Against Flight 312, its three hundred passengers -

Crew included, coming from Paris…

What can anyone do? Just watch and hope that

Someone if not everyone will be saved…

The will of man is crushed in face of dazzling disarray…

The plane was sliding down the short runway

The runway - a mirror-ice surface

The helpless pilot couldn’t stop the plane

The wind made things worse.

A fire broke out somewhere in the fuselage But no one could do anything about it. The pilot did not think about himself; Responsible for lives of three hundred Passengers and crew, he had to put them safe On the ground like fragile eggs. He must! He did! The pilot managed to bring the plane to a halt.

Miracles still do happen in our times.

In less then two minutes everybody went outside

On their knees, their feet, without a scratch;

They slid down on emergency chutes. Seconds after,

The flames lashed, embraced the plane

And through the curtain of rain one could see disaster.

The fiery plane’s carcass, dismembered toy, Washed by jets of water, laid on its side Prepared to drink the poison of the fuels.

Flames! Flames! Flames

Were eating away at the machine;

The same fire Prometheus had once stolen

From Gods to bring to man on Earth.

______________

DATA

Choosing an idea to write about Is difficult to most of the people. Some others, having too many ideas Find difficult to give them a shape And present them to the reader.

They, who possess both these skills are called Poets. If they make an inferno of their lives we call them Geniuses.

The same goes for people in the field of science: Some can use the knowledge received; They innovate, discover and Contribute to science’s development.

When work is in question they put off sleep, eat and family. These professionals are Geniuses. But when it comes to the computer world A genius is called Nerd.

The gentle, cool, polite and emotionless guy Is called Data. He can paint, play the violin, Converse politely, even drive a spacecraft. Data is the Star Trek product By a creative genius named Gene Roddenberry.

______________

FOLLOWING THE PLANE ACCIDENT

I look up at the sky and Notice the beauty lasting of the clear day But any noise in the sky makes me nervous After the plane‘s accident at Pearson Airport

I can’t remember how long it’s been since

I had not observed a plane.

A flashing light up there in the sky.

Reminds me of my childhood when, one day

Little silver flickering lights were raining down from sky In our backyard; I took one flier to my mom “Never talk about them again”, my mother said. She threw it in the fire, what a waste!

When sitting in my yard, I look up to the sky and Try to imagine the kind of people sitting In that plane, what life they have and What made them to travel by that plane

Sometimes, when a small plane flies low Over my yard I can see the pilot and I Know he also caught a glimpse of me Does he ever think about my quiet moment Spoiled by his noisy machine? if so I wonder if he cares…

am glad that my maple trees quickly hide the plane

From my view; though the noise will only later dissipate.

The sparkling azure sky, intact again,

Unspoiled fabric of exquisite silk, no silver scar visible

And I forget the last plane accident; soon

I’ll make plans for the next trip to Europe.

______________

MARCOVALDO’S SUMMER

White August’ sky, deserted streets Deserted parking lots, dry bushes

and yellow willow trees, A sordid town this town of Marcovaldo.

Alone in his empty city,

Marcovaldo had nowhere to go, nothing to do

But Marcovaldo is not unhappy;

This way the town is his

The coin has yet two faces:

To him, deserted town is friendly again

No cars, no horns, no noises…

No traffic jam in intersections

No people pushing at the entrance

of shopping malls; No crowd to wait in stations for the train. Marcovaldo chews his sandwich from his lunch box; gulps his coca-cola and

walks the middle of the streets.

As long as it has but only him

The town makes friends with Marcovaldo.

Empty of cars, the streets open wide before him

Inviting him to stroll around.

Austere some other times, the buildings -

Still sealed in theirs ramparts -

Look friendly to Marcovaldo

As a bird he whistles.

Then Marcovaldo realizes the truth:

The unconscious life of things took over town;

water main bust out;

trees roots’ invade the asphalt and push it up;

moths jam under the fabric shop’ sign;

Chinese bugs proliferate under the bark of

trees;

ants follow the track known only by them

which goes under the scarab beetle hard

shell;

caterpillars go up in every tree busy

themselves turning the leaves in laces

A car in middle of his street!

Oh! what a nuisance! lost in thought

Marcovaldo is almost run down by it.

A bunch of youngsters take him for a target; put

Lights on him and ask him questions;

Marcovaldo thinks he is interviewed…

and almost faints When a beauty of a girl descends from a red car… She’s to be filmed while bathing in main town’s

fountain

Does Marcovaldo dream? He rubs his eyes “Here I am in midd’ August, Pushing the heavy movie lights-track

around and around the fountain” People are splashing in the fountain, laughing And Marcovaldo doesn’t know a thing.

The town, this traitor, offered the place of honor to strangers, forgetting Marcovaldo;

But Marcovaldo understands:

the beautiful woman is the reason

Marcovaldo knows in crude September the town will be his and only his;

He will remember and treasure this moment…

Seating in town’s welcoming lap, eating his sandwich

He’ll dream about this summer;

He’ll keep the summer secret to himself.

______________

HUNTING AT MCNEIL SANCTUARY

“Bears are individuals, just like humans are. Just

look at McDougal, no other bears dared confront

him.

The bears have something that I wish humans

had, and that’s learning when it’s important

to fight and not to fight. I respect that.” Barnes

The big Grizzly waits for the salmon; The big brown bear is waiting To hear the music of jumping salmon.

What is this smell? Humans. The bear is lured by the smell of humans; This summer, from June to August, Two hundred fifty six people are allowed To watch the bears fishing in McNeil Sanctuary.

As long as bears stay near the water

They are protected; it is part of their sanctuary.

Often bears go out of the park’s boundaries; Waiting patiently for this to happen, hunters get them. Out of the McNeil Sanctuary bears are killed.

The big brown bears, heavy and proud bears, Are killed by man; man reversed the history! Several millennia before, man was hunted.

Man gained the right, or took it himself,

To hunt, to kill, to let the wounded animals to die.

Man does whatever he pleases.

“Bears are individuals, just like humans are,” But between man and animals it is a slight difference: Man hunts and kills for pleasure, animals - to eat.

______________

NATIONAL WWII MEMORIAL

Dedicated on 25 May 2004

“E PLURIBUS UNUM”

President Bush is speaking

About democracy, freedom and human rights

Brought by Americans to the world. The occasion is the dedication of The Second World War Memorial in Washington.

Meanwhile the war is going on in Iraq.

Captain X watched his friend die;

He went up the hill and killed twelve enemies.

Captain Y wounded two in retaliation For his brother’s death. “We aren’t warriors by nature

We want to finish this job and return home”.

It’s what soldiers are taught to say.

“We thought it was a patriotic war”

A blond soldier said to his captain who replied: “You are free to get out of this place, for a short leave of absence”;

His plane went down under enemy fire an hour later.

They are just boys, like angels they fight but

They have all the limits and fears of flesh and blood.

100000 Americans left home for this war, Leaving wives, children and mothers behind; 4000 died – leaving orphans, widows, and

Heart-broken mothers and fathers.

They are strong, they did the job, they deserve to return home.

Sixteen million soldiers went to fight in WWII

400000 lost their lives; they were left

To decompose in European graves. Do men ever learn from experience? Today graves are more and more numerous.

Bush is talking …but what about?

Democracy, freedom and human rights Brought by Americans to the world.

President Clinton is there; he thinks about the lives Wars claimed; his white hair says a lot His head is lowered; he knows America

Should give up the war in Iraq this moment,

Allow the young soldiers to go home

And people of Iraq to mind their own lives.

The Memorial is huge but not enough to give proper thanks to 16 million Americans who fought in WWII. People around are moving like a wave

“We are not a nation of warriors,” the present folks think.

Some, who experienced WWII,

Can see with their mind’s eye the handsome face of their sweetheart waving handkerchiefs at the train’s

windows

“They saved the country and thereby saved

The freedom of mankind”

Thousands died in our times

But here is not the place to acknowledge that.

The price paid for new Algiers I ask now if you acknowledge the lives lost In the war in Yugoslavia, in Afghanistan and the Gaza strip?