Gedichte.

TOMATO INTERRUPTED

A surrealistic poem by Christine Spauka Conner

I was back in Spain, when Spain was like Mexico. And smoke.

Smoke coming out of the walls, crawling between the tiles, through the grey grout, that crumbled under its force.

Smoke coming out of me, my ears, my eyes, my nose, my vagina. Smoke like sunshine, smoke like pain.

Smoking was allowed, smoking was wanted, smoking was needed. Smoking was what we wanted.

Walking through El Corte Ingles, feeble minded, absent, cigarette in hand.

Smoking in the shower, by the shower, through the shower, through the night, through sex, before sex, after sex, because of sex, without sex. Como quieres.

And tomatoes. Tomatoes were everywhere Like smoke.

They came from the fields on terraces like grapevines, organized neatly in rectangular fashion, along the coast on the winding road to Almeria.

Fields of toiling tomatoes, toiling through toilets, screaming Scheisse! Scheisse – instead of water.

But then after the rain, the tomatoes came rolling down the mountains, like avalanches, tumbling down the hills

like drunk pedestrians, plunging from the cliffs into the Mediterranean Sea. A Sea of red. A cliff hanger.

Only I didn’t jump. Come, come, come with us, lay down your head in the warm, shallow waters of solitude, tomatoes and salt.

Butterflies no more. You think I should? Forget it. I didn’t jump. Not now anyway. Instead – I got up.

Whenever the bell rang, I got up from the desk, walked slowly to the other side of the card board wall and attended the customers.

I hated being interrupted in my work of words. The customers noticed that. Eyeballing my eyeballs.

But once the paintings, the installations, the sculptures came in, I didn’t mind anymore.

It all started with the iconic painting, from the Russian artist who was so moved by the words.

He sent me a card of gratitude. I sent a card back to show my gratitude. Then he sent a painting. Because of his gratitude.

Absence of Field, I knew it right away, but didn’t have the words yet.

Three groups of three or four small figurines were attached to the canvas near the edges, figurines wrapped like mummies, hugging each other as if in a friendship circle.

Red, red, red, red, red…

Red like the tomatoes on grapevine. Red like the pain in my groin. Red like Spain.

Then the oil mixed media arrived – chicken feathers, sand, snow and chocolate.

A toilet filled with tomatoes and, and, and…

All because of the words. So I stayed. That was when Spain was like Mexico. Mexico without the tomatoes because tomatoes come from Spain.

Tequila comes from Mexico.

TO BE AN AZELEA OR NOT TO BE

by Christine Spauka Conner

You snip them at the knuckle – right at the junction Actually, right below it.

Before they part, before they go their separate way, before they say good bye.

DO IT!

Don’t be a sissy – a fiffy – a fuffu – a phoney-baloney, bologna or genoa salami sandwich.

Be a doer, a maker – a quaker – an oatmeal if you must.

See – it wasn’t that hard. Was it? Now, do you see green? A hint of it?

Like a hint of garlic in a salad dressing near the autobahn? That’s precisely what you want.

No more pruning of the sprigs, no snipping of the tips NOT to trigger the ticks.

From here you just leave them alone. They’ll recover. Don’t worry.

The rain will come. The leaves will sprout again. The flowers will bloom again.

They’ll spread their sweet scent again like a pretty poem, blanketing the earth with their colors once more.

HERE’S TO YOU!

TO ALL YOU AZELEAS OUT THERE – YOU AUTUMN CHIFFONS,

YOU PRINCESSES AND ANGELS, YOU LEMON AND MANDARIN LIGHTS,

YOU FASHION, FIREBALL AND HOT SHOTS, YOU NORTHERN HIGHLIGHTS AND SNOWBIRDS…

And here is to you: To all you constant gardeners not afraid of snipping them at their knuckles.

‘Cause it takes more than a village. It takes guts.

A FLACCID JESUS

By Christine Spauka Conner

Carlos dressed in white Lacoste Polo Shirts and baggy jeans, long before they were a thing. He wore his black curly hair unkempt. He always looked somewhat sloppy – persona held together by a green crocodile above his heart and a silver belt buckle above his groin.

He owned Bar Playa in Malaga. The only thing that could hint a smudge of self care or indicate a vanity of sorts, was the pitch-black eyeliner he used along his lower eye lids. Carlos looked like a mix out of the Spanish crooner Julio Iglesias and Freddie Mercury, the gay lead singer from Queen. Actually, at that time, every Spaniard between the age of 20 and 70 looked like a mix of Julio Iglesias with some other male – at least to me. My running joke-answer, when someone asked me why I came to Spain, was always: I’m here to meet Julio Iglesias. In fact, it wasn’t a joke. I knew all the lyrics to all of Julio’s songs. They were not as trivial as one might think, poetic ballads really, somewhere in between a Hallmark card and Rilke. I liked his exaggerated accent, his extreme “SH” sound instead of a true Castillian “J”, shega instead of jega. In Spain they made fun of him because of that. It sounded to the Spanish ear like a speech impediment – not to mine. To me it was poetry.

Carlos’ older brother Roberto looked like Julio Iglesias combined with George Clooney. He had somewhat of a statesman appearance, he owned a famous restaurant in Marbella, had a young wife, a beauty queen from Madrid, a new baby and drove a red Porsche 911. Carlos drove a green Volvo, was forced by his father into a marriage with the first girl he got pregnant. She was from a pueblo in the mountains and looked more like ham and potatoes, especially when next to Roberto’s long legged Miss Spain. She had come for work to the Costa del Sol and ended up as a waitress in Carlos’ restaurant. By the time I met him she was in her third pregnancy and he on his hundreds something fuck affair with a blonde Dutch, German or English tourist. Even though the English were not so popular, not that they were not willing, they were, believe me, but the Dutch and German were prettier and mostly blonde. Trophy fucks, we called them, paraded by their machos along the beach promenade as if at a car show. Shiny and new. Hi, this is Bettina! Did you meet Mareike? The relationships were mutual. The girls weren’t victims. A Julio look a like on your side for a couple of weeks provided a full Spanish emersion program.

Carlos probably had contracted Aids by that time but didn’t know it yet. The Aids epidemic was at full swing in the beginning of the nineties. But nobody cared. I didn’t either. With each passing year and after each OBGYN check up. I high- fived myself. Made it! I never was a trophy fuck. Not that I didn’t have my share of “Costa-Fun” but I chose wisely. I liked Chino, yes, chino like Chinese, a friend of Carlos and Roberto. He looked like the perfect combo of my crooner Julio and Benicio del Torro. He was from Valladolid, in the middle of the country. They sometimes look like that there, Carlos told me.

We were all out that night. On Cocktails of JB – Jota B – Cocaine and Chocolate – the dry weed from the gipsies, that looks like beef jerky. I kind of was with Chino, but flirted with anyone who looked like Julio, as if it was my private manifest destiny. My own westward journey. Chino was a mild mannered son of a wealthy builder overseeing a new hotel project on the coast. He drove me home that night. We kissed lightly good bye in front of my house.

Later in my bed I could hear the waves crashing against the beach. My lullaby. I never lived that close to the beach again.

Bang! Bang! Bang! I heard a loud pounding against the door of my bungalow. I wasn’t afraid as usual, because I was drunk and stoned. I actually made sure that I was one or the other every night in order not to be scared alone in my little house. The nights I wasn’t intoxicated enough I slept with a butcher knife underneath my pillow. I made my way down the creaking stairs. When I heard: Christina, Christina, abre, abre! I thought I recognized Carlos’ voice. Also the silhouette I saw through my milk glass door indicated my friend. I opened the door. Then everything was very quick, a blur of black unkempt hair, te amos, baggy jeans, clinking belt buckle – waves crashing hard. I can’t remember if I screamed. I probably did, but it was like in those dreams where you scream and scream but you don’t have a voice. And nobody hears you. Nobody comes to save you. Nobody wants you. Nobody needs you. Nobody likes you. Nobody cares. Nobody. Nobody. Nobody.

I just know I kicked and kicked and kicked. Then everything was still. He was gone. And in my hand I held a golden necklace with a cross and a tiny Jesus hanging – flaccid. The Mediterranean Sea drowned my crying with her lullaby.

The next morning I went to Bar Playa. Carlos, held together by the green crocodile and the silver belt buckle, was in a conversation behind the bar with his father, who did not look like a Julio Iglesias clone. Carlos didn’t anymore either. I slammed the flaccid Jesus on the counter and said: Never again.

BACK IN TEN

By Christine Spauka Conner

Diego was a friendly crook from the Costa del Sol – with a big nose and a whiff of Armani. He operated in the shadows of the bigger crooks from England, Germany, Holland – or wherever the hell they all came from.

It was in the early eighties, a few years after Franco. Spain was a crook haven back then. The government was corrupt, the Spaniards naïve – a magnet for crooks of all kinds: tax fraught crooks, bank robbery crooks, polygamy crooks even killer crooks. “Crooked Lobster faces” the locals called them, because they all had fair skin that sunburned easily and everyone knew why they were here.

Diego laundered money from drugs those bigger crooks dealt with – in his little travel agency, two blocks off the beach.

In those times northern European females basking their bare tits in the sun were still a novelty and a stark contrast to the grandmothers dressed in black with babushka head scarfs – the ones you tie underneath the chin. They walked the beach promenade with their grandchildren – on Sundays.

Diego spoke besides Spanish, German and English, why the hell he could do that – I have no idea.

From Café Cielo across the street we would watch him through the double glass doors of his agency. Most of the time he was sitting behind his high desk on a barstool, talking on the phone. We were sitting outside on the sidewalk, on little round tables, wearing dark Ray Ban sunglasses, small espresso cups of Café Solos with tiny spoons for steering – in front of us. It was like music, the clinging of the tiny spoons dissolving the sugar in the espresso cups. I don’t remember music blasting like today, I told you, it was right after Franco, and a somewhat dull and hushed atmosphere dominated Spain. People were whispering on the streets, they closed the front doors of their houses more often than leaving them open. No resemblance to the vibrant, gesticulating Spaniards of today.

Café Cielo was one of those sidewalk cafes where you could sit for hours and would run into someone from the gang at any given time of the day. Kiss left and right, sit down, drink, smoke and – watch Diego.

He was there every day from 10am to 8pm. Several times a day he ran across the street, kissed all of us, I told you he was a friendly crook, spreading his Armani scent like a protective vail over us, sat down and threw a round. We accepted, we were kind of his “hanger-oners”.

A line of cocaine for breakfast with his aguardiente, two for lunch with his Rioja, three or four with the Café Solo after lunch. By the time late afternoon rolled around Diego was stuffed like a cream puff – ready to fuck every foreigner under 25 (he called them U25) who walked through the double glass doors of his agency. Every, I’m telling you, men, women and all in between. When a U 25 entered his agency, we all knew what would happen, we leaned in and starred. The double glass doors would shut and a sign reading “Back in ten” would appear. That’s all the time it took for Diego to have a good fuck.

Exactly after ten minutes he would remove the sign, open the double glass doors again and accompany the U 25 out, shake his or her hand, he even bowed, like a true gentleman – his big nose slightly tapping the sidewalk.

One morning, when I was sitting outside at Café Cielo steering my Café Solo, making music, waiting for the gang to assemble, the sign “Back in ten” was already hanging inside the double glass doors. Diego got an early start, I thought. But when after an hour the agency hadn’t opened yet, I got up, walked across the street and peaked through the double glass doors. The room was empty, no high desk, no barstool, no files. Farewell my friend.

TO BE AN AZELEA OR NOT TO BE

by Christine Spauka Conner

You snip them at the knuckle – right at the junction Actually, right below it.

Before they part, before they go their separate way, before they say good bye.

DO IT!

Don’t be a sissy – a fiffy – a fuffu – a phoney-baloney, bologna or genoa salami sandwich.

Be a doer, a maker – a quaker – an oatmeal if you must.

See – it wasn’t that hard.

Was it?

Now, do you see green?

A hint of it?

Like a hint of garlic in a salad dressing near the autobahn?

That’s precisely what you want.

No more pruning of the sprigs, no snipping of the tips

NOT to trigger the ticks.

From here you just leave them alone.

They’ll recover.

Don’t worry.

The rain will come.

The leaves will sprout again.

The flowers will bloom again.

They’ll spread their sweet scent again

like a pretty poem,

blanketing the earth with their colors once more.

HERE’S TO YOU!

TO ALL YOU AZELEAS OUT THERE – YOU AUTUMN CHIFFONS,

YOU PRINCESSES AND ANGELS, YOU LEMON AND MANDARIN LIGHTS,

YOU FASHION, FIREBALL AND HOT SHOTS, YOU NORTHERN HIGHLIGHTS AND SNOWBIRDS…

And here is to you:

To all you constant gardeners not afraid of snipping them at their knuckles.

‘Cause it takes more than a village.

It takes guts.

The Immigrant

It’s cheese he said.
Yes, cheese she said.
It’s not cheese she thought to herself.
Not the cheese I know.
The cheese I know comes from the beautiful cows, cows as beautiful as princesses that graciously graze on the deep grass, grass as salty as the sea, grass as green as the emerald lake of your dreams. The grass infuses the milk with a spice and the delightful dirt of the reed roofed huts where the loafs of cheese lay to rest like lazy cats in the sun, gifts it with mold – blue, thick and crumbly, bursting with umami – alarming the senses.
And your cheese? White as snow, slick as plastic, tasteless.

It’s a house he said.
Yes, a house she said.
It’s not a house she thought to herself.
Not a house as I know it.
A house with a heart and a soul like a family, where the floors creak like grandpa’s bones, where the sour aroma of pickling pickles is hanging in the air like an invisible vail – grandma’s shy hello from the distance, but so close. A house with a front door that never fully shuts, with oblique walls – protective – silent, not telling what they saw, and then mother whose high and happy song tirades along the winding staircase, wiggling at the last post in a liberating vibrato.
And your house? Perfect, pasty. Walking on thick creamy carpet, like on clouds but not feeling it.

It’s friends he said.
Yes, friends she said.
It’s not friends she thought to herself.
Not friends like mine.
Do friends say good bye as they just arrived? Denying themselves like a lover who leaves the night cold? The friends I know they stay, lay down their hats, their hearts and heat up the night as only lovers can do. Lovers hate, scream, cry – like a coyote howling all through the night. They laugh, sing and jump until the morning – until the healing sound of a gong echoes through the mist – as from a monastery high above.

And so she sat in her new house and wished it was her old house, next to the new friends and wished they were her old friends, eating the new cheese and wished it was the old cheese. Contended in a container of polite smiles that stung like bees, sterile air she couldn’t breathe and lies so thick she couldn’t see.
No – content she was not – contended she was – she wished for the old world, the lost world. She wished for home.