Stateless – Oz Hardwick
after Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Hymnen
Fast laughter: insects repeat, repeat: time
passes, glides, cuts, repeats, repeats: metal
breathes deep and sings:
the world speaks in accidental phonetics
drawn from static wires in empty beds,
charges of cars on mountain roads, cracks
of branches in virgin forests, all drawn
from blind sky.
A star falls like fruit: repeat, repeat: stone
falls like money: hair falls like spiders:
air grows thin:
insect screams: choir sings: village pond
ripples as fowl paddle, fish kiss bugs,
a child drops a rounded stone that flashes,
darkens, disappears, sinks into the mouth
of dreaming Mímir.
Orchestra of geese, grass and steam: flags
burn like nettles: repeat, repeat: settling
into sea/light waves:
compasses spin: air freezes and falls,
perfect geometric sculptures, each bearing
unique fingerprints, blind compound eyes,
a portrait of a dead king or queen: drowning
orchestras play on.
There: there’s the monster/dragon/tree,
shifting with the flick of a synapse: repeat,
repeat: breath held:
airport/motorway/lighthouse: darkness
brushes the bellies of clouds, reclines
on foam/field/tarmac, fills all space between
closing eyelids: red erupts open wide see
white lights multiply.
Passport stamped with pressed insects: ice
bright traces like silver music: another
border: repeat, repeat:
end.
Oz Hardwick is a writer, photographer, music journalist, and occasional musician,
based in York (UK), whose work has been published and performed internationally in
diverse media. His latest poetry collection is The House of Ghosts and Mirrors
(Valley Press, 2017). Oz is also Professor of English at Leeds Trinity University.