To walk
to walk
forget what’s wrong
enjoy what can
beach and sea
and walk on again
dunes, forest
to walk
through your memories
past your expectations
arm in arm with your thoughts
foot by foot
be there for a while
and walk on again
Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Dag van het Woord 2022 Harelbeke – poëziewedstrijd
Op 5 februari was de bekendmaking van de prijswinnaars van de gedichtenwedstrijd, ik was erg verheugd dat ik de tweede prijs heb gewonnen in de categorie ouder dan 26 jaar 🙂 met het gedicht ‘euthanasie’ .
Second place in poetry competition “Dag van het Woord” in Harelbeke-Belgium. Lees meer via onderstaande link:
The old gull
The old gull sees us but doesn’t think:
‘What is going through people’s minds
down below me in the dunes,
along the beach and in the woods?’
The old gull flies his flight alone
His screaming cuts through morning mist
His calling sounds over the roofs
His wings are skimming
past our graves, through skies
but the old gull doesn’t think of us
He sees us though
and knows that we are passing in the time
and that he will remain a while
He does his flying on his own
always going towards freedom
De ôde kôb
De ôde kôb sjogt ûs wol mar tinket net:
‘Wat gaat er door de mensen heen
Beneden mij in duinen,
Langs het strand en in het bos?’
De ôde kôb flygt syn eigen flucht
Zijn schreeuw doorklieft de ochtendmist
Zijn roepen klinkt over de rode daken
Zijn vleugels scheren
Langs de graven, door de lucht
Mar de ôde kôb tinket net om ús
Hij ziet ons evengoed
Hij weet dat wij voorbijgaan in de tijd
En dat hij nog wel blijven zal
Hij vliegt zijn eigen vlucht
Altijd zijn vrijheid tegemoet
This poem was written in Westers (one of the three dialects of the island of Terschelling) mixed with Dutch 🙂 Published in De Terschellinger 0f 31 march 2021.
Dit gedicht is gedeeltelijk geschreven in het Westers (Terschellings dialect) en gedeeltelijk in het Nederlands. Terschelling met nog geen vijfduizend bewoners heeft drie dialecten, plus het Nederlands dat wel het meest wordt gesproken, en ook nog het Fries. Misschien een beetje veel 🙂 maar toch ook wel leuk om af en toe bij stil te staan.
RIXT : Frisian Poets
Last year I joined the Frisian poets group RIXT https://eng.rixt.frl/
WHAT DO WE STAND FOR?
Poetry collective RIXT is a broad platform of Frisian poets. We write and publish poems about current issues in and outside Fryslân. We show the vitality and relevance of Frisian poetry to a wide audience.
Check out the site! 🙂
My first poem with them was written during a workshop on Terschelling last year:
The ‘driig’ *
a procession of pale people
I saw: your understanding – a ‘driig’
to the cemetery of Saint John
You’re now digging deep into my petrified words
like looking for the morning
before the tears fell,
like you know where the coffin is,
where the coffin is immovably buried
where it chafes, the silicon grinds
on the granite of my soul
I saw a ‘driig’
and they were all acquaintances
The ground smelled vaguely like a day in spring
You dig through the granite
hit the coffin – almost
You want to say you are not lying here
But it is September, I say, it is too early
The crows laugh at the mistake
- * A driig is a vision, for example in a dream, of a funeral procession, with participants known to the dreamer. The order they walk in, tells the dreamer who it is in the coffin.
(Dutch) De driig
Ik zag: jouw begrip – een driig
een stoet van bleke mensen
naar het kerkhof van Sint Jan
Jij graaft nu diep in mijn versteende woorden
alsof je de ochtend zoekt
voor de tranen vielen,
alsof je weet waar de kist ligt
waar onbeweeglijk de kist ligt begraven
waar het schrijnt, het silicium knarst
op het graniet van mijn ziel
Ik zag een driig
en het waren allemaal bekenden
Vaag rook de grond naar een dag in het voorjaar
Jij graaft door het graniet
raakt de kist – bijna
Zie maar, je ligt hier niet, wil je zeggen
Maar het is september, zeg ik, het is nog te vroeg
De kraaien lachen om de vergissing
(Frisian) De driig
Ik seach: dyn begryp, in driig
in omgong fan bleke minsken
nei it tsjerkhou fan Sint-Jan
Do dolst no djip yn myn ferstienne wurden
lykas sikesto de moarntiid
foar’t de triennen foelen
lykas witsto wêr’t de kist leit
wêr’t ûnferwrikke de kist leit yn ’e grûn
dêr’t it skrynt, it silisium knarst
op it granyt fan myn siele
Ik seach in driig
en it wie allegear kunde
Faach rûkte de grûn nei in dei yn it foarjier
Do dolst troch it granyt
rekkest de kist – hast
Sjoch mar, do leist hjir net, wolst sizze
Mar it is septimber, sis ik, it is noch te betiid
De krieën gnize om it fersin
Oersetting: André Looijenga
Major Anthology Released by Four Windows Press — fourwindowspress
(I am a bit late in posting this but here it is: a lovely anthology and proud to be in it 🙂 )
Lockdown estivation post card
(The blackbird keeps me up all hours, and doesn’t want my sleep to come, as days are with no end and night is now a memory.
I won’t go out, but wait in my cool room till all this madness of a lockdown goes away. Till presidents of the US have brains again. So see you hopefully in Fall.
I stay and bathe my soul in sunshine from my home. The blackbird sings of better days with plenty water. )
It is really Summer and the weather here is great. Wish you were here. More news will follow in my letter.
Home alone
Cat is there to ignore me,
chair is there to relax.
Sun is shining its comfort,
blackbirds sing, moving on.
Everything seems the same, now
yet all is different and wrong.
Freedom looks far away,
as we know we must stay
where we are, for our good.
Fear and sadness so close. It’s
the same everywhere.
Yet I do like the sun
when I take my face out 🙂
and the cat and the singing,
yes we all will move on.
We are all in this mess,
so no one is alone.
Once we’ll see loved ones back,
and this nightmare is over,
once the birds have their young.
Until then: world, keep strong.
from a sunny Terschelling, greetings! And stay healthy!
The mistress (awkward verses #1)
Lie me some more love again
as it doesn’t matter now –
no harm was done
(but no good either)
in these dead hours of the night.
Lie me some more love again.
Your words will stay with meaning
till it’s dawn.
Don’t break us up but lie to me,
return to her, and then be gone.
The mourning
There is a woman on the island who mourns for her husband
and cannot stop mourning in the time we have set for her.
She needs a psychologist so we say
but she cannot go to the mainland for help,
she cannot cross the sea as she is too depressed
and we all think this is crazy, she is crazy
for not getting her act together by now and crying
all the time. And we tell her all we know about grieving.
And we feel so much better
about our own heroic distances from the death
and how we move on in spite of our losses
and keeping up the spirit
although the real spirits better be absent.
We are still here
as no one has gone to the mainland as well;
for whatever reason we can think off we are reluctant
and we mourn in our ways without knowing we do.
We mourn as we water
the already dead plants in the garden,
as we go about our lives in a slower pace
as we hear ferry whistles and the sound
of geese flying over, without us longing
to go away too.
We are too dead to mourn well.
The portrait painter
When word was out
that he, the village artist,
was making another portrait
no one dared to see it
as they expected to drop dead at first glance
as they knew others had died in admiration
just by watching his art,
which they burnt.
So they shut his cabin
locked the windows and doors
with him inside
and it became quiet,
all was good
and grass overgrew the dwelling.
The cabin rotted,
the village slowly vanished.
Years after the last villager had died
a little girl found her way in the cabin,
stepped over the skeleton
drawn as she was to the painting
and she took it outside
where no one ever expected
such beauty to be found
in such a derilict place.
The colours that never saw daylight
started to live,
the immortal face they saw
was that of a young man,
the artist himself, as he had been,
while he was being buried alive
by the people
who were for ever faceless.
Ina 
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