{"id":5156,"date":"2014-12-14T02:06:50","date_gmt":"2014-12-14T02:06:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sporkpress.com\/?p=5156"},"modified":"2014-12-14T02:06:50","modified_gmt":"2014-12-14T02:06:50","slug":"5-poems-oscar-schwartz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/2014\/12\/14\/5-poems-oscar-schwartz\/","title":{"rendered":"5 Poems || Oscar Schwartz"},"content":{"rendered":"

please skip to the last line of this poem and read from<\/strong><\/p>\n

the bottom up<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

never to speak again<\/p>\n

and so by this line the lovers have already left each other<\/p>\n

feels that the other is a blind conformist<\/p>\n

yet the person who read from the top down<\/p>\n

feels that the other is by nature inconsiderate<\/p>\n

because the person who read from the bottom up<\/p>\n

but then there is an insurmountable tension between them<\/p>\n

they will meet here in this line and fall in love<\/p>\n

the other from the top down<\/p>\n

one from the bottom up<\/p>\n

there are two people reading this poem<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

god will send you nudes<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

if you\u2019ve been feeling guilty<\/p>\n

about all the sinful things<\/p>\n

you\u2019ve been enjoying on the internet<\/p>\n

and you try to seek consolation<\/p>\n

in the presence of your grandma<\/p>\n

she will say fuck\u2019s sake just go to<\/p>\n

confession you devil child<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

but what she couldn\u2019t know<\/p>\n

is that if you leave your room<\/p>\n

there is that fear that the internet<\/p>\n

will die of loneliness without you<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

at night alone you wonder whether<\/p>\n

if you looked hard enough<\/p>\n

you might find god on your facebook feed<\/p>\n

constantly posting status updates<\/p>\n

like a distant relative who is the only person<\/p>\n

more active than you who is rumored<\/p>\n

to send nudes to the boys in your school<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

quietly you feel that<\/p>\n

in this way that you might find faith<\/p>\n

and befriend the lord, and maybe<\/p>\n

in time, god will send you nudes<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

the world\u2019s youngest desert<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

in a young desert<\/p>\n

one of the youngest on the planet<\/p>\n

where the sand is still clean and the dunes<\/p>\n

mountainous the camels infantile and adorable<\/p>\n

there is an inbox and in this inbox<\/p>\n

there is spam<\/p>\n

the spam tells of anti-ageing medication<\/p>\n

of botox and silicone and it is<\/p>\n

written by hand in the cursive script<\/p>\n

of your mother, bold and legible<\/p>\n

just like the permission slips<\/p>\n

she would sign and leave<\/p>\n

by the door for your sisters<\/p>\n

so they wouldn\u2019t have to swim<\/p>\n

in the ancient desert of school sport<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

you were only six at the time<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

after six years of life<\/p>\n

you went to a michael jackson concert with your dad<\/p>\n

who was wearing a silver leather jacket<\/p>\n

(or at least it was shiny)<\/p>\n

you were wearing a skirt with butterflies<\/p>\n

he told you to stand on his shoulders to see better<\/p>\n

when michael jackson moonwalked<\/p>\n

you felt all the butterflies on your skirt<\/p>\n

turn into razor blades<\/p>\n

(or at least it felt different)<\/p>\n

michael jackson threw his towel into the crowd<\/p>\n

a woman caught it and put it to her face<\/p>\n

remember<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

language giving birth to itself in our mouths<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

your name is xyz<\/p>\n

you have been accused of a terrible crime<\/p>\n

you have to go into hiding and take on a pseudonym<\/p>\n

from now on i will refer to you as sarah<\/p>\n

sarah, you are not alone in this<\/p>\n

because in the future most of us will be forced to use pseudonyms<\/p>\n

in the second future no one will know their real name<\/p>\n

children will be born and given a pseudonym<\/p>\n

pets will be given pseudonyms<\/p>\n

abstract nouns will be given pseudonyms<\/p>\n

it is possible that by the third future we will call \u2018happiness\u2019 \u2018rebecca\u2019<\/p>\n

and we will call \u2018rebecca\u2019 \u2019seaweed\u2019<\/p>\n

in the fourth future the giving of pseudonyms will be non uniform<\/p>\n

meaning that in the fifth future we will be endlessly confused<\/p>\n

and in the sixth future we will talk aimlessly<\/p>\n

hoping to be understood by coincidence<\/p>\n

so that by the seventh future we will talk with no meaning<\/p>\n

like parrots and we will be living in caves too<\/p>\n

but then for some unknown reason the eighth future will happen<\/p>\n

and everyone will be free<\/p>\n

and we will come out into the sunlight<\/p>\n

and start swapping our names back<\/p>\n

i can imagine it now<\/p>\n

you will walk up to a beautiful man and you will know straight away<\/p>\n

you will say to him you look like someone called sarah<\/p>\n

and he will say to you, you look like someone called xyz<\/p>\n

and you will embrace for a minute then shake hands<\/p>\n

and in the ninth future you will swap your names back<\/p>\n

everyone will start swapping their names back<\/p>\n

and this action will be repeated over and over<\/p>\n

and we will authenticate each other<\/p>\n

so that by the tenth future<\/p>\n

we will once again feel language giving birth to itself in our mouths<\/p>\n

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