LITHUANIAN QUARTERLY JOURNAL OF ARTS AND SCIENCES	ISSN 0024-5089 Copyright © 2007 LITUANUS Foundation, Inc. www.lituanus.org
Volume 53, No 3 - Fall 2007 Editor of this issue: M.G Slavėnas

Poetry

Lidija Šimkutė

Lidija Šimkutė was born in Lithuania in 1942, spent her early childhood as a refugee in displaced persons camps in Germany, and arrived in Australia in 1949, where she resides, writing in Lithuanian and English. She has three book publications in Lithuanian and four bilingual poetry books. She has also translated Australian poetry/ prose and other works into Lithuanian and received poetry grants from Australia Council and SA Department for the Arts.

MY FATHER
emerged from the coffin

and told me it could be mine
in the year to come

I’m bored

he said

below all is water
and above hungry dust

he tilted his head and by the
light of his match

I saw neither myself
    nor another

THE BLUE WOOL
hung entagled
in her hands

she followed the thread
to its end

she buried her hands
in the sand

her eyes entered clouds
her hair spread dune grass

with lips of coral
she touched blue sand

and lost her fingers
to the sky

A GRAIN OF WIND
returns from
the ink stained sky

bones read before time

the circular breath
of the living

the body speech
of the dead

PINES
dressed
in salt-green

sway on the
edge of a cliff

each needle
threads into song

THE EMPTY WALL
clowns with linear time
in the cyclic chamber
of my brain

thinking is a walk
on ground
    less
        ness

SKIN FLOWERS RED
beyond the cactus bloom
beneath the pyramid bed
of the shrouded citadel
where angels walked
    the zocalo

my eyes scale the plaza
in the abandoned axis
of the final sleep

RUINS OF THE GODS
breathe pigeons

the piazza’s umbrellas
    stir
the gaping crowd

as they unsky
the dead and
we speak with
the nameless

THIS HOUSE
has no walls

I will grow
a wine old tree

words
cannot erase
the voice

    hibiscus torn

WINTER SUN WALKS
across town

its uncertain warmth
envelopes the landscape

no birds sing

steps fade
into melancholy haze

someone walked past
and left a warmth behind

NEON SCREAMS
    pierce
the river of exhaust

the human factory
lines the fast way

Find me a job
build me an air house

make more sky for the birds

SUNFALL
on your shoulder

thoughts almost

transparent

THE FISHERMEN HUM
    home
in early morning fog
to wooden houses
sunk in fallen apples

cut wood
    breathes
        smoke and milk

fish scale sheen blows
onto potato and onion sacks

salted nets creak in the wind

AT DUSK
the streets of Vilnius
    empty

shadows of run down
buildings cover
cobble-stone streets
in sadness

the windows watch
swaying drunks
and cats eating
from rubbish dumps

the gloomy cathedral square
veils the emptiness
                                1992

THE UŽUPIS*
walls of Vilnius whisper

around corners
spider webs
wait in suspense

roof drains flower

a dream born from hunger

[* Ex-slums of the Lithuanian capital.]