I woke up to the sound of Trumpets

and my way of killing myself 
is by dropping both arms
                                Ruy Belo


I woke up with a numb arm today, the right one. The other arm was used to raise a mug of coffee and try to wake up into this new nightmare. I need to be careful today not to overwork my left arm, the only arm that is left.  

Balada da Bicicleta Roubada

Tinha ido numa manhã, despreocupado,
de Tejo em deslumbre de ensolarado,
em cima de ti até ao trabalho,
e, no meio do caminho, não uma pedra
mas um pilão ficou chocado connosco,
e abraçados caímos contudo.

As nuvens continuaram a maquilhar o céu.

Na queda, a mão direita suportou todo o peso
do chão no osso, qual coluna dum Hércules fraco.
Dei-te a mão, levantámo-nos do asfalto,
e chiando queixosos, de pedal cabisbaixo,
metal e músculo chegámos ao Cais do Sodré.
Tranquei-te com corrente e chave,
deixei-te para trás e fui para a labuta.
A mão dorida não podendo cerrar-se na tua,
dia e noite, dia e noite, dia e noite,
e uma semana mais, deixei-te ao acaso,
naquele ponto de passagem desde a ralé
até ao ambientalmente preocupado. Deixei-te.

Quem eras tu, minha velha? 
Quase dada por um vizinho que te viu
como um excedente de rodas no armário,
apaixonei-me rapidamente pelo teu estilo,
de corpo cromado e esguio, de garfo amarelo
que tanta trepidação amorteceu.
Tinhas sido usada e bem usada,
e agora mudavas de companhia, o início
de mais um princípio, um sacudir a poeira,
um olear a corrente com que se puxa
os nossos corpos conjuntamente.  
O teu parco valor a olho moderno
era uma mais-valia à tua companhia.
Sim, quem te roubaria? 
Sem valor comercial, qual o motivo? 
Pensei-te eternamente minha.

Depois pensei melhor: O que possuo
não é da minha posse nem do meu posso.
Todos estes átomos colados, em macro
compondo células, costelas, e cerebelo,
não fui eu que os criei, que os escolhi,
e que depois às estrelas devolverei.
E assim, minha companheira de cu dorido,
tal como essa dor passageira, 
somente fui passageiro de ti.

E o roubo? Terá sido roubo? 
Deixei-te, perdi-te. Ninguém me obrigou
a deixar-te perto daquele porto
de maré dos que marcam o ponto.
Não houve um alguém que exigisse
que eu te oferecesse sem troca. 
Criei a oportunidade, e o oportuno levou-te.  
Só espero que lhe proporciones felicidade,
daquela de ir por caminhos de monte e mato
que a pé não apeteceriam. Nem de carro.
Espero que toda a tua peça sustente
o menor peso de ver o desconhecido
de mente sanguineamente bem bombeada.
A tua voz cansada de asfalto,
que o embale, que o embale.
Que o oportuno te aproveite,
te aprove e te aceite, contente, 
como tento aceitar a tua ausência.

E é ainda de mão da queda dorida
que te aceno.  

Trial and error

Side by side, a couple of young lovers placed the L and R eartips in each's appropriate ear canal.
The earphones wires became one necklace when their free ears touched.
The plan was to form a full circle of shared simultaneous experience, thought exchange, and equal enjoyment.
Their indexes pressed the single play button.
The music kicked in.
It didn't fully work.
But they tried.

Rádio-oral

Ela usava a boca
como quem liga o rádio
em pano de fundo, em surdina,
para fazer ruído,
para não se sentir só,
para não ter que pensar.

E eu entendi tudo isso com interferência:
Ela usava a boca para manter o cérebro no ar.

A Dancing Line

Dancing apsaras carved in a wall of the Bayon temple, Angkor Wat complex, Cambodia

I know, I sometimes forget to dance;
to shuffle my feet, my memories;
to workout and prevent that disease
of sitting too much and forgetting
to dance. 

"I have to thank you: you taught me
not to be embarrassed of dancing."
Thank you for having told me that
as my soul danced when it heard it.
A propos, "That's music to my ears."

"You didn't notice it? She was eating
you up with her eyes." No, I didn't.
I was dancing as one should dance,
with abandonment, just as we do
unwittingly when we walk enough.

Dancing is walking without leaving.

The More Real Shadows

It is still beautiful to hear the heart beat
but often the shadow seems more real than the body.
The samurai looks insignificant
beside his armour of black dragon scales.

                              in Tomas Transtörmer's poem After a Death

Rua da Betesga

Ele há um fado que pede 
"Lisboa, não sejas francesa." 

Nunca entendi essa letra
que pela negativa reclama
retorno a uma portugalidade.

Se bem que não há regra
que diga que o que se cante
tem que fazer sentido,
e o autor, na onda da rima,
é arrastado por uma corrente,
e pode embater numa rocha,
quebrando o crânio, criando
vacuidade no derrame.

Contudo, naquela madrugada,
metidos num esconso com vista
sobre os telhados do Rossio
e os da Praça da Figueira,
avistámos dessa betesga a pinta,
e ela disse, "Parece Paris."

E foi, nesse ver finalmente a face
dessa Lisboa afrancesada,
e por vírus a espirrar obrigado, 
e sem me poder assoar no momento, 
que pinguei. Também do nariz.    

Suspenso

Leda e o cisne, de Botero

Se a vida é manutenção,
manutenção, manutenção,
manutenção,
eis a pura razão para deixar um momento
quieto no tempo, não o repetindo,
não buscando a repetição.

Pela biblioteca horizontal

Toda a criança e todo o vizinho

proibido de ruído para além duma tosse

tímida, reclinados numa chaise longue,

de psicólogo na mão, por vezes psiquiatra,

feitos de frágil papel e tinta desvanecente,

de si próprios palrando em surdina,

berrando em surdina, em surdina rindo,

e assim sussurrando beatificamente,

bestas, belos, bobos, quase todos.

Estar sentado é posto de trabalho;

deitado deve ser o absorver do etéreo

enredo em cada livro contido.

Logo, nesse derramar de deleite divino,

a cadeira não tem postura para a literatura.

Lombo dorido, fora! Venha a chaise longue!  

From close to closure - a toast

"I'm emotionally crazy right now," saía da rádio que poluía a esplanada ribeirinha onde fui tomar o vodka com laranja natural -- três euros, é um preço que já quase não existe em local semelhante àquele e em Portugal. E, esse vodka, tomava-o no afogar dessas emoções sempre tontas, sempre tantas, de saber que a Jennifer se entretinha com um amigo novo. Ora não há assexuada amizade entre homens e mulheres heterossexuais: É uma questão de tempo e oportunidade; estado de todos nós antes de a outros nós nos entregarmos. 

Ao saber desse estado Jenniferiano, não mais consegui continuar a nossa conversa telefónica, devido às emoções queimando no peito e, como água na cafeteira ao lume, subindo e misturando-se com a cafeína, que se mistura com o sangue, e que nos levanta e força à cafeína reagir, no meu caso a tomar um duche, fazer a barba, passar no cabeleireiro a que tinha antes desistido de ir neste dia mesmo, mas que agora tarde demais era: A aparadora de cabelo tinha-se ausentado; a depiladora removia pêlo nas traseiras (não sei se do traseiro), e as minhas orelhas tiveram que ficar frondosamente protegidas de agressões externas mais uma dia, pêlo sim pelo não.

E fui, a passo firme, a passo irado, até à beira-rio, até à esplanada, de onde as emoções se podem lançar para desaguar e diluir no Atlântico de águas frias, as quais as emoções quentes, se experientes, buscam. 

E, na esplanada, ambicionava eu saudar pela primeira vez uma nova amiga, mas sobre a Jennifer nada lhe dizendo, contudo dando-lhe atenção tão intensa como se ela fosse a Jennifer. E se isto que te digo te soa a infantil é porque é verdade. Tivesse eu tomado as rédeas do discurso e estaríamos ambos agora lendo uma poesia, porque ler não é um acto solitário, a menos que estejas lendo o que antes escreveste... E mesmo assim!... 

Depois deste pôr-do-sol irei pôr-me-belo, e o que vier receberei de braços abertos, livres que estão da forma do corpo ausente da Jennifer. 

É com estranho prazer que me expresso aqui em português, uma língua que por muito que ela a estude jamais a sentirá porque não a viveu -- tal como eu não vivi em inglês, ou, melhor, se o vivi foi-o noutramente.

Não te iludas -- eu quero que ela viva essa outra vida que agora se lhe apresenta. Não odeio no amor. Apenas queimo os cabos e as amarras que nos atavam um ao outro. E para isso um cigarro basta, seja a sua ignição por fósforo ou por isqueiro (por pedra pederneira ou por espelho demoraria mais do que este texto delonga). E desse cigarro se faz mecha, e dessa mecha se faz a queima, e daí naturalmente fumo.

Vem beber um vodka laranja, essa bebida cor-de-chama, em brinde e hino ao pôr-do-sol, tudo bem rimado com álcool.  

António's box is open, never as destructive as Pandora's.

______

The Incompetent

"Violence … is the last refuge of the incompetent."
in Isaac Asimov's The Foundation


The first refuge: to refuse to act
Wake up, greet everyone, read the newspapers,
Break the fasting, go for a walk, greet everyone, 
Go to work, greet everyone,
Travel abroad, greet the world. 
Did my incompetence harm any one? 

2: to refuse incompetence
Read myself, read books, read people,
Read newspapers, read manuals, read myself
Again, read people, read the same book,
Read how it now read, read myself reading.
Did I get rid of my incompetence?

3: to embrace incompetence
Who cares about the world, about people,
About what they think of me, about consequences,
The future, the past, history and the rest,
This is my first and last show up in life.
Did my incompetence bother you much?

The last refuge: to resort to violence
Who cares if violence begets violence,
Forwards no cause, melts down the brain,
It saves me time, gets me through refuge 1 and 2,
Lands me on 3, and I'm free to see, you fools, 
My incompetence realized fully.


__________

Written in Times New Roman, written in Times New Roman... 

To Walk the Talk

"Walking Willow Man" a sculpture by Hester Pilz

Finally we stand by and consciously 
Measure the double sense of all our talk, 
And, every man his dramatist, anxiously 
Corrects his role, his gesture, and his walk. 
    
     in John Ciardi's poem, Port of Aerial Embarkation


Waiting at the arrivals hall, I could see her before I could recognize her face. She came through the gate with one of those gaits that others before her didn't exhibit. The flow of her movement stood out amidst the crowd of walking passengers weary of the time spent sitting. Amusingly, sitting is the new smoking in terms of health, and I tell you this while sitting down and just before going outside for another smoke. 

My dog died a year ago, and since then I'm not forced to walk around one hour daily to maintain its happiness levels. That lack of maintenance endowed me with a bigger belly, so new reasons to force me to walk are in the forge of my very belly. After all, our guts turned out to be our second brain. And, no, our brain is the boss of our sexual organs, and not the other way around: it's just that our brains are, wisely, very reproduction-oriented, and we've to thank nature for it to be so pleasurably so. With such two brains, the connection in between two separate pleasures, food and sex, has quite some new reason to be made. Perhaps I should forget about that cigarette and go out for some chocolate instead.

Tergiversation aside, I've been observing how we walk. This time of the year is appropriate for that as the city is brimming with tourists so the walk of more than one culture can be scrutinised, and as we are wearing less clothes much more of the mechanics of walking can be thus seen. And if you're thinking I'm just finding an excuse to my pervert ways, if you're measuring the double sense of my talk, let me inform you that I've been observing men too, and no children at all. 

"Walking Man" a sculpture by Mathew Harding

And it turns out to be that days pass without an elegant walker being spotted. Or rather, without a walker drawing my attention. The elegant walker is the agent after all, while I'm just a passive walker-by. 

In films, where most of the time we're watching actors from the belly up, I started to pay attention to the frames when their full person is shown walking. And attractive looking people don't seem to pass the test very often. As one example, George Clooney's elephantine displacement cuts his grace in half.

Could it be that as we inherited a face we inherited a motion as well? Or is it derived from culture? Or from our very emotional traumas? (physical traumas are too obvious a walking changer.) How much of how we walk is a result of our own body's mechanics? Has the time we spend sitting down increased our awkwardness as upright walking primates? Should we walk more and drive or be driven less? I can't answer these questions as I'm not a scientist or will ever study the subject at hand. Err, at foot. 

I don't even know if my own stride is graceful, and I apologise for drawing your attention to this subject when we have so many others, more or less important, to deal with constantly. But I invite you to join me for a walk whenever you feel like it. I'll, of course, be watching you from up close.  

Urban Arteries

There was a day when Lisbon became very ill.
First it shivered. Then it was drenched in waves of cold sweat.
Then the fever, as hot as many fires burning simultaneously.
Then the delirium: "Pray, for we are sinners! That's why God is punishing us!"
It was so shaken up on that 1st of November 1755 that it had to be injected blood from Brazil.
Brazil was so drained out that it started to feel a malaise towards Lisbon.
Lisbon convalesced for some years until it was discharged. A different Lisbon emerged.
So we emerge different persons after each illness. Our antibodies much wiser.
Our Lisbon looking differently. Our drained out Brazil filling up an Ocean in between us.   

St Anthony's Day Revelations

I tend to choose a humorous or saucy revelation when it comes to this day of the year which sees my namesake saint being worshipped in the Christian world. But the massacre in Orlando plus the political exploitation of it, in particularly by Trump's campaign, bled my intentions out. 

The world is not more violent than it was in the past but extremism is visibly on the rise. A few weeks ago we almost saw a far-right president take office in Austria, right in the heart of the well educated western world. In France, Marine Le Pen's party is still gathering momentum. The soon to be held Brexit referendum has deep notes of the rise of nationalism and the closing of borders that entails it, and could potentially lead to a disaggregation of the European Union---a union which was thought of, first and foremost, as a way to end the possibility of more events similar to the two world wars to erupt. And it's predictable that the continuous flow of migrants on to the eastern borders of Europe will take a toll in the the popularity of more moderate visions of the world.

To add to that, demented individuals killing in the name of Islam will only help to swell the ranks of extremism, to recruit paradoxically more enemies and thus self-defeating their purpose: if life in the western world was any tough for a Muslim before it will only get worse. Curiously, if there was a time when Islam was great it was when it was the most tolerant of cultures; when Jews, Christians, Hindus, Nogodians were non-persecuted subjects in the Muslim world. Medieval Europe, by then, was a cesspool of religious fanatics in comparison. 

So it's not the time to shun political correctness in every day language, specially if we're talking of public figures as Mr Trump got to become. It's by language first that we dehumanise our fellow human beings and thus make it mentally possible to proceed to wish for their death, or to kill them ourselves. And it's also by language that perpetrators such as the one in Orlando will be shunned or deemed as heroes. Therefore it's not the time to attach other labels to that murderer other than demented individual. That should be inscribed in his tomb. Whether he adhered to ISIS or to Lunar Defenders is just a way of finding a group to blame, and the murderer a channel for his insanity.

It's in times like these that cool brains are precious commodities, when the whipping up of emotion towards blame and hatred blinds. And if you're inclined to think of apparently strong leaders, as Mr Trump views himself, as the way to fight a perceived threat to the world you hold precious, it's funny but it's exactly the insecure who will fill out that role of strong leaders. The way Mr Trump reacts to comments on his small hands or sexual apparatus, the way he responds to personal criticism, are hints on how insecure he is. An assured person would most probably smile or laugh at similar comments. The strong, and tough, and aggressive stances are a cover under which the insecure person hides. And I invite you to look for those characteristics in historical figures. It's a fun exercise.    

Even more curious is that America was much greater when the likes of Mr Trump could never go past the intention of becoming a presidential candidate. The smallness of Mr Trump's world lies in the self-delusion that he can make a society greater out of subtracting those whom he deems that should not be a part of it.

This is a time to be politically aware and to keep all our democratic cards close at hand. Our every day stance and speech within our social circles counts; our vote is likely to have too much importance on our collective near future not to be cast.  

“Play it, Franz. For old times' sake.”

If we replace Franz with Sam, the resulting utterance is the most famous in the history of cinema but usually reproduced wrongly as “Play it again, Sam.” That would be a great way to start an article on how easily tricked our brains are, or on how we collectively pass down information of events that never were; myths as one example. But this one, Sam, is going to be about what you were there for—for music.

It seems I'm one of those who came equipped to this world lacking the starstruck gene, or whatever it is that makes us want to have children with a person we know almost no thing about except that his or her performance is messing with our entire beings. So you can easily imagine my dropping jaw when watching footage of a The Beatles' gig, and all that mass hysterical screaming, and all that fainting.

But...

The thing is that it would be implausible that all of a sudden in the early 1960's a part of humanity had suffered a mutation that made it swoon in the presence of music composers and performers. And that thought leads me back to Franz, Ferenc, Franciscus, all of them Liszt, out of a list of alternative names for the very same composer.

Liszt is reputed to have been one of the rare both composers and virtuoso performers of the 19th century, while his pieces were famous for being dubbed as unplayable, or for requiring four hands to be performed. This is easily perceived in his only piano sonata known as Piano Sonata in B. Minor. That's quite a stolid name for a piece that could have been known as I Am the Yellow Submarine and I Will Dive in You. The shift of emotions throughout the piece, and the intensity that playing it requires, surely drew many a sigh from the lady concert goers of that time. “Oh, Franz...”

And why? Because, most likely, Liszt's music would have sounded as a break from what the ears of that time were used to, in a pleasant way. He was the shit of his own time. And music and our very existence seem to the fatally tied to one another, from the heartbeat of our mother, from the resonance of her voice in our first concert hall: the womb, to the sound of our hands and feet first stamping the floor. No surprise then that music turned out to be therapeutic in some instances.

Musical score sheets, with their allegro energetico or con strepito entries, might be seen today as elitist or snob. I'm inclined to believe though that, if those kind of entries were renamed mentally to fuck all or bring the house down, the gold wash that they seem to wear would wear off. And thus we could see the bare nature of the geniuses behind them, regardless of the epoch each was born in.

My niece C and her colleagues and teachers did exactly that last night to an even older rock star, Claudio Monteverdi. By erecting a performance with humour and amour, and in spite of the gold wash the 17th concert hall in need of repairs exhibited, they were able to transport the sex-appeal that Monteverdi brought to the world in that same century and the one before to the 21st.

“Play it, Franz. For first times' sake.”

Puzzle

Slow Breakfast

for Jennifer


Fish and coffee in the morning,
fried the day before, the coffee fresh,
favourite day start of mine,
from mother's culture to son passed.

And stories and news in the morning
are not so hard to take in and absorb
as the day is yet to be unfold
against the ending of the world.

Her skin from dreams lightly salted,
her wild mane flowing perfectly,
hiding her face from me as she
heads to the bathroom to holy pee.

That white noise once extinguished 
tells of her return to warmth,
those air-cooled body ends all
touching and soft awakening me.

Bed linen a seascape of stormy seas
bettered by relation-ships: vessels
brimming with coffee and fantasy,
bound from her brain to our bed.

'Stay the course!' the captain
shouts to whomever's the first mate, 
soon to be promoted by sheer  
sharing of raw fish being fried.  

Gardening Day

for Jennifer

There was a French TV series
I watched in my pre-sexteen years
based loosely on Robinson Crusoe,
the protagonist sometimes abandoned
himself by laying face down
on a verdant, flowery field
with twin little boob-like hills
and a view to the ocean. 

Unlike him, or the series writer,
I've no dreams of fucking Mother Earth
unless we're talking of climate change,
earthly motherfucker each denier.

Changing the subject, today
she watered something in me
when she said,"It's a gardening day."
Or maybe it was, "Lure me in."

Arousal is confusing, we feel it while
its full source might not be traceable.

Yet it was a gardening day,
and the sun warmed my petals,
and my roots were unquenchable,
and there's no place for denial
as she's implanted in me.

From Ernest to Donald in a blink of an eye

Discussional Metaphorce
Let us polish our swords with our enemy's unseen blood!
Or let his buckler meet our thrust and the return blow
Silence the brilliance that spurted out of our throat...
Otherwise, let us summon the soured scapegoat!

My history as a reader of Hemingway is one tainted with physical violence.

The first time I was reading Fiesta: The Sun Also Rises when a fight broke out in the tram. This man in a suit got fed up with a blabbermouth who was noticeably mentally challenged. Twice I had to intervene in order to push them apart. Both of them exhibited a bull-like determination to keep on altercating.

Yesterday in the subway, while reading Hemingway's hunting feats in his Green Hills of Africa, an African woman almost punched a young couple after the girl called her stupid as she didn't want to change seats allowing the couple to sit side by side.

Curiously, the times I spent reading The Old Man and the Sea don't seem to have affected nearby fellow passengers. That major work on the struggle of mankind with natural elements didn't beget any physical violence, if we except the fish I helped killing with each Sashimi I was nearly forced to eat while reading that book.

But let's blame Hemingway for those two events. Or let's blame the electricity needed to run both those public transports.

Unfortunately the human trait of selective memory tells me otherwise: my brain, trying to find meaning and, in the process of finding meaning, a cause, collated those two episodes of violence and made me ignore all others that would challenge my selected scapegoats.

And that leads me to Donald Trump.

Trump has been a master at summoning scapegoats, and became himself a scapegoat. Muslims, Mexicans, Chinese, Blacks, all are now favourite selected victims for Trump or for his followers, while Trump is being blamed for inciting people to violence and racism when he's just a catalyst, not the creator.

I'm inclined to think that historical moments make the historical man and not vice-versa. That a similar character in different historical conditions wouldn't achieve the same results.

A true entrepeneur, Trump's drill and pipes have struck a deep and dark oil field. If there wasn't crude there ready to burst out into the surface, he would have died impoverished and alone in the desert sands of Narcissiland instead.

In the meantime, I'm going to read only books on Zen while travelling in electric powered public transports. Just in case I'm wrong all along.  



______________

Bibliography (besides Hemingway's):

- Charlie Campbell, Scapegoat - A History of Blaming Other People, Duckworth Overlook, 2011
- Robert T. Carroll, Becoming a Critical Thinker - A Guide for the New Millennium, Pearson Custom Publishing, 2000
- Dietrich Schwanitz, Cultura - Tudo o que é preciso saber, Publicações Dom Quixote, 1999

Nowhere Street

"Nowhere Street" in Portuguese

"It was true that I didn’t have much ambition, but there ought to be a place for people without ambition, I mean a better place than the one usually reserved. How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 6:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?"; "Baby," I said, "I'm a genius but nobody knows it but me."

in Factotum by Charles Bukowski

 

 

 



Um Português Famoso

Abu Muhadjir Al Andalousi, é o nome de guerra de Steve Duarte, de 27 anitos, um lusodescendente que cresceu no Luxemburgo e converteu-se ao Islão em 2010. Casou com uma argelina, mas a mesma conseguiu legitimar o divórcio em finais de 2015, não tendo aderido à causa do ex-marido. Mas provavelmente o que levou este menino a ir combater e matar pelo ISIS deve ter sido a carreira como cantor de hip hop. 

O nome artístico do menino era Pollo. Editou um álbum mas faltou-lhe o próximo passo para o estrelato: o videoclipe. Agora, no norte do Iraque, tem os seus minutos de fama, premindo o gatilho, e com divulgação mundial da cena de execução. Problema resolvido.

Diz ele que oxalá (do árabe wa xallah, no caso da língua portuguesa e espanhola, significando queira deus, se deus quiser) consigam reconquistar a península Ibérica. 

E, nessa eventualidade, creio que Al Andalousi executará pessoalmente Cristiano Ronaldo, com sete disparos na nuca, como convém fazer a um CR7. A estrela peninsular escolhida a dedo passará a ser Islam Slimani, a quem será dado um harém de pitas adeptas do Sporting, que por sua vez será guardado por um contingente de eunucos. Porque é um trabalho de confiança, os eunucos serão escolhidos de entre adeptos daquele clube também, os quais nunca gritarão "golo" do mesmo modo após a necessária orquiectomia. 

Contudo a perda das bolas é um ganho na bola, visto que o clube será campeão todos os anos; os adversários evitarão marcar golos com medo das consequências.

É um sonho húmido de Bruno de Carvalho.

Caminha

A tua vida é melhor ca'minha.

Não raras vezes se gera vida na caminha.

Caminhar aconchega a mente na caminha.
Caminhar é distraidamente focar a mente.
Deixar o corpo presente.

One Set for the Future

Fifteen-love 
In Australia, the living animals played today.

Thirty-love
For many years, I had a wrong idea about Djokovic:  that he was a robot. But no, the robot has always been Federer, made by a Swiss precision watch-maker. Only that Federer’s tennis is filled with poetry, which until today didn’t allow me to see his true nature in the animal world.

Fourty-love
While the power of Nadal, his stubbornness, and ability to withstand pain, remind me of a mule that carries the weight of the world in his saddlebags, Murray is the human child who tries to trick the adults and sometimes succeeds, while trying to deal with his Tourette problem.

Set
But Djokovic, in the deep woods of Serbia, was given eyes that can focus like an eagle, the will to never let go of his prey, a cooling system that will allow him to play for longer than any other at high intensity levels. And now we must wait to see how high this new beast will set the bar for all tennis players alive or to come. And which other kind of cyborg will have to be developed in order to overcome Djokovic’s achievements.

Fogueiras

Deste castelo de Palmela, com vista para o Vale dos Barris, vê-se fumo. Não é tão vistoso quanto o lumaréu que Nuno Álvares Pereira acendeu para enviar uma SMS a D. João I dizendo: "Xtamos aki," enquanto este último estava sitiado em Lisboa pelas tropas castelhanas, mas não deixa de ser uma coincidência com sorriso.

Those Freckled Skies

Freckles are my punctuation of choice for a female skin. They make men look girlish yet girls look divine.

They've a frailty akin to wearing one’s soul out: For each sin, the blemish is eternally cast.

Divine as a constellation of impossibly far suns which rays are too strong for too fair a skin.

Freckles are a mapped universe, a maze on a milky celestial body.

... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ...

Presidenciais 2016

Marisa Matias

Quanto a não lançar o voto, desculpas poucas houve, incluindo a proposta de nem sequer comparecer às urnas, que é a de Saramago no Ensaio Sobre a Lucidez. O autor é mais do que admirado por aqui, mas aquela obra de alguns defeitos se enfeita, mormente o de que isto é uma democracia, ou a ela tende. Perfeição só nos olhares de Blimunda. E onde a podemos mirar? Na ficção puramente. 

Eu cá não sei. Marcelo tem a maioria dos votos antes de os ter, mas, perdoa-me, eu queria uma Marisa Matias por presidente. É que o argumento mínimo para tal é que teríamos uma presidente sexy. O argumento mínimo, disse. E se a Marcelo louvo a inteligência, a cultura, e a flexibilidade na coluna vertebral, não há como suportar a flexibilidade dessa mesma coluna vertebral. É como falar com um louco: 
─ Como te chamas?
─ Mário.
─ E precisas de ajuda para encontrar um local para dormir esta noite?
─ Eu não!... Mas o Soares pode precisar. 
─ Quem é o Soares?
E o louco aponta, sorrindo, para o seu peito, tocando nele três vezes com o indicador.
─ Bom... Nesse caso, até domingo, Mário! Até domingo, Soares!
─ Ora vai chamar nomes a outro! Eu cá chamo-me Rebelo. Não é, de Sousa?

No caso de Sampaio da Nóvoa, há algo de sebastiânico no personagem, e não se sabe bem se é da proximidade linguística a névoa, se o é a nódoa. E a frase "Maria de Belém em Belém" não soa bem também. Tino de Rans, apesar das deficiências, apresenta um profissional e seguramente pensado populismo que parece revelá-lo apto para nos "encanar a perna à rã." Quanto aos restantes, abstenho-me de falar, não por falta de respeito mas por falta de votos com que cada irá contar; o avozinho do meu pessimismo primário, Henrique Neto, que me perdoe. E Edgar Silva, que Deus o tenha...

Vota M.M., e vamos lá viver um pouco num Portugal menos saudoso e bastante mais sexífero. *
________

* Tal é bónus para destaque na imprensa internacional e, sequentemente, no turismo bónus.

God’s Dream, according to Pope Francis

There can be no confusion between the family God wants

 and any other type of union.

The family, founded on indissoluble matrimony that unites

 and allows procreation, is part of God’s dream and that 

of his Church for the salvation of humanity.

Pope Francis, addressing Vatican judges on a bill that

 would legalise civil partnership for gay people as well as for 

unmarried heterosexual couples and which is being debated

 in the Italian senate.

Italy is the only major western European state not to

 recognise civil partnerships or same-sex marriage.

Despite the European Court of Human Rights condemnation

 of Italy last year for failing to introduce a law on civil

 partnerships, its passage has been held up by objections

 from politicians of all stripes.

The Guardian

God’s Dream

It was revealed that Thou dreamst, dear God,
and that Thy dreams are only known by some,
like Francis.

Why then hast Thou made us dream other dreams?
Thou hast been making us plural, yet some,
like Francis,
were made to tell us that our dreams are wrong?

Pray, tell Francis, in his dreams, that our own
are of all the godly dreams the sum,
and that his dream is just one
of all the dreams Thou hast forced us to dream.

After that we might begin to, as we want to,
like Francis.