November 30, 2004

• "Depression I"
  Poetry by Michael F. Nyiri  © 1971 (17 years old)

  
  

  Turn on the lights
  I want you to make it bright
  No more do I wish
  To live in the darkness
  Of our feelings.

  No more do I want
  To see you grope your way
  Along
  And I, the mountain
  Never moving toward you,
  Grasp the string of hope,
  Waiting.

  There the mist grows
  Thicker between us
  And the birds die
  In their song
  Can a love survive
  With nothing 
  On the other side?

  We do not know
  Nor do we care
  But yes we do
  And we do not
  At the same time.

  Void is seeping 
  Through our conversation
  Covering 
  The veils that already
  Hide our minds.

  Dare I ask the question
  Is it true you never
  Take the step
  That I should have
  Taken so long
  Ago
  And yet I will not.

  The wall is steep
  We will not climb
  Nor will we tunnel
  In the light of
  Everlasting love.

  We cannot open
  Up our minds
  At least I fail
  To open mine to yours
  And so the
  River between us
  Grows wider.

  "Photogenic Fallacies and Mixed Up Minds" 
  Poetry by Michael F. Nyiri  © October 17, 1974
   
   
  My theories always disappear
  
  I can't remember how to act sometimes
  
  Right now I remember many things
  
  Which people say to me.
  
  In and out of phantasmagoria
  
  Float little green philosophies
  
  And embodiments of sedate people
  
  Lying on the grass.
  I can sense their presences,
  
  Rich and full, complaining.
  
  Telling me my life needs their fulfillment.
  Then I search for answers
  
  As I've done since my inception,
  
  And I find unopened doors
  
  But they are always tightly locked
  As I reach out to people -
  
  Almost always I reach out and then
  
  Extended hands melt quietly
  
  Into unsolvable repressions.
  How am I, an insignificant
  
  Cinder in the universe,
  
  To fathom each unquenchable thought
  
  As it slithers through the coffin of my mind.
  For though I say I'm open,
  
  And let's face it, don't we all,
  
  I find I'm not as easy to
  
  Release even to myself
  
  As I thought I was to others.
  I can find my spectre staring
  
  As I know she always does and
  
  Yet I can't remember now how
  
  To cross the street and be with her.
  Days are but inventions
  
  And pictures in brown wallets
  
  Serve to conjure up a vison
  
  Of a lovely life worth living
  Then the windows shut on giving
  
  And reality is here -
  
  Harsh and mental anquish turn my
  
  Soul towards God and heaven
  
  And, as upward bend my eyes
  
  My mind is even boggled still - 
  Inspiration and bad poems
  
  Tell me nothing, nor do people
  
  All they say is what themselves
  
  They want to hear.
  My coalition with the forces of reality
  
  It shudders as I comb the
  
  Sunken prisons of the world for
  
  One to care
  Yes, It seems to me that as I
  
  Fight the love that boils within
  
  Me, I can feel the heat turn
  
  Off when others back away in fear.
  Many times I've thought of Kathy -
  
  Many times of Emma -
  
  But, oh, how many times do I
  
  Tell all, including myself,
  
  That that wasn't love at all.
  Only through lost emotions
  
  And those people dying
  
  Do I remember my right to be here
  
  And my experience these last months -
  But, oh, is hell on earth
  
  When yet again I wonder
  
  What the truth of life is
  
  And my intentions are turned down
  
  By life itself.
  My sweet mother understood
  
  But no one else ever did
  
  And as I sit in front of walls
  
  Throwing poems to the dust at my feet
  
  I'll think of my new feelings
  
  And still say
  
  "They aren't real yet"
  
  And still though friends will chide me,.
  
  I will cry - "I'm not in love."
  
  This is not happening -
  
  Because I know
  
  And I proclaim it so -
  
  That if I try to turn her handle
  
  Her door will be locked also.
  And I'm not ready for the
  
  next act yet.
   
  
  "The Apartment"
  Poetry by Michael F. Nyiri
  © Thursday, May 28, 1981 11:05 a.m. poetry for fools 
   
  
  The building stands, pipes leaking brown stained blood.
  A dowdy mother in housecoat trudges to the washroom
  Three-year-olders cavort on the stairs, in the
  courtyard, out by the trashbins- satisfying needs
  for friendship with pasty faced elves.
  The same little games are played even as the
  three-year-olders grow up and move away.
  The building breathes. doors open and the fortunate
  sons tread off to work-the others
  toil in their predictability moving around
  the courtyard visiting manufactured
  neighbors-telling stories-how's the weather.
  The afternoon advances-sun hangs bright
  over pretty divorced women sunning themselves
  while the elves get dirty behind the philodendrons.
  2:30 As the World Turns All My Restless
  Children into a monotonous hum on the 13"
  black and white television sets standing on
  top of 12 year old 25" consoles that will
  never work again.
  4&5&6o'clock the drones return from work
  and the stereo wars begin. In the
  summer its as if life is back from the 
  dead...in the winter the lives resume
  from behind closed doors
  Over the years the gunshots and yelling
  and fights and policemen and questions
  about whos sleeping with who subside
  into a crazy quilt of boring samenesses.
  People move from apartment to apartment
  like litte backgammon markers trying to find
  the home quadrant.
  There's a school behind the building and a
  market across the street. These people
  never have to leave if they don't want to.
  Some of us find we lost the inclination long ago.
  Life goes on. New landlords come and go.
  Old parties become legends. When you least
  expect it an apartment becomes vacated
  and then someone "moves in" who might
  have bearings on your own existence.
  The elves play on.
  The televisions continue spouting their
  advertisements and I sit here watching
  the brown stained water seep from
  under the toilet's broken gasket.
  Exactly like blood.

  • 8:23 pm
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