Hearing ‘Indus’

[DieterM]

A half-mile from the beach,
my shadow sheets give off
the faint whiff of my own sweat.
I’m thinking of the sky outside,
insanely blue, the street a viscid ribbon
flowing inch by inch in strange
marengo waves towards the sea.
I breathe in sizzling air and sand
while the sirocco breezes up
from the Sahara plains,
wheezing soft boredom through
my half-closed shutters.
I imagine everyone has died,
the island full of dried-up bodies
lying here and there, in every corner,
red and shrivelled, human chili pods.
A Dead Can Dance-song blares out
from the neighbours’ house,
Oonnaah cootitaeh janna ennech nay…,
the ethereal female voice,
the made-up language and the
slow, syncopic drums coating
this afternoon’s reality
with dusty, immaterial desires.
Even the dog that seems to bark
in the faint distance sounds
as unreal as a ghost hound.
Yullah-ouny-eezy-wahna…
Yullah-ouny-eezy-wahna…
I am too hot to move, to think,
to feel or to remember…
I guess that’s how I should remain,
A sweating body in a rented house,
on this forgotten isle of Lotus-Eaters.
And I am sure that I for one
would not regret…

[YesNo]

The title with "Indus" in it puzzled me.

[DieterM]

… as well it should ;-) It's a song title of a piece performed by Dead Can Dance. Very… other-lordly, especially when heard on a sizzling hot summer's day somewhere on an island, let me tell you. But I liked the sound of the title. Say it out loud… Hearing "Indus"… heeringinduss… almost like an onomatopoeia.

[mahmod qabaga]

I imagine everyone has died,
the island full of dried-up bodies
lying here and there, in every corner,


thanks for your imagine that help us to characterize all the wold



thats nice poem

[DieterM]

Thanks mahmod, glad you liked it :-)

[caddy_caddy]

What are the Lotus -Eaters?

[DieterM]

Dear caddy_caddy, here's a quote from wikipedia:

In the Odyssey IX, Odysseus tells how adverse north winds blew him and his men off course as they were rounding Cape Malea, the southernmost tip of the Peloponnesus, headed westwards for Ithaca:

"I was driven thence by foul winds for a space of 9 days upon the sea, but on the tenth day we reached the land of the Lotus-eaters, who live on a food that comes from a kind of flower. Here we landed to take in fresh water, and our crews got their mid-day meal on the shore near the ships. When they had eaten and drunk I sent two of my company to see what manner of men the people of the place might be, and they had a third man under them. They started at once, and went about among the Lotus-eaters, who did them no hurt, but gave them to eat of the lotus, which was so delicious that those who ate of it left off caring about home, and did not even want to go back and say what had happened to them, but were for staying and munching lotus with the Lotus-eaters without thinking further of their return; nevertheless, though they wept bitterly I forced them back to the ships and made them fast under the benches. Then I told the rest to go on board at once, lest any of them should taste of the lotus and leave off wanting to get home, so they took their places and smote the grey sea with their oars." -- END OF QUOTE

It is said that this island of the Lotus-Eaters is the isle of Djerba, situated in the Gulf of Gabes, off the coast of Tunisia. I hope this helps :-)

[caddy_caddy]

wow that's very interesting . Thx for the information which I can use in Arabic.