No Man’s Land


The Queen of the Lowlands

Is sleepless tonight

She’s walking on marble floors

In the pale moonlight


The oil-man from Texas

Is still pulling the strings

In this palace of puppets

Of my paper King


No one will sleep

In the fields of Verdun

No one can finish/end

What they once had begun


I’m in a man-hole

I’m looking for light

I wonder why the German Philosophers

And the English Poets always fight


No man’s land   No man’s land


Did you see Elvis in his kitchen tonight

He’s got the Memphis blues and a real strong  appetite

He’s walking through Graceland in his black leather suit

He is smelling home-cooking.......it’s only the river


Elena Ceausescu is still wide awake

She’s counting her shoes

And she knows that she made a mistake

So let’s start again-the night is still young

The voices outside are singing a folk-song


No Man’s Land

Tic toc tic toc   mustard gas   grenades

No Man’s Land


Louis Quatorze he can not sleep

He’s walking through the corridors of his funky antique

He’s got 300 pillows and 400 chairs

He is counting his clocks

Can you hear them ticking

Tic toc tic toc tic toc


Toe in the water


You hear the birds in my italic forest

I smell the roses in your cement garden

You snow around-around my head tomorrow

I rain upon-upon your feet in sorrow


Toe in the water 


You walk on mud along a thirsty river

I see the trees - I hear the leaves that shiver

The snowy owl will fly around your silence

Today is light-tomorrow will be darkness


Toe in the water


You whisper something in my ear

The words I cannot hear

There’s a hole in a tree

Somebody is watching me

The Big Black Woodpecker


The lake with circles-circles like a necklace

I see your face I see a million/thousand frecles

My Red-spotted Flycatcher

You drink the lake -I eat a Lesser Whitethroat


Toe in the water

River of dreams




The Great Caruso


1906 The morning after Carmen

The earth was shaking

The sky was almost burning


San Francisco

I am The Great Caruso

My bloodred suite and lits-jumeaux are turning


When I look at my life

My life is a dream

Let me sleep


Then I woke up and I am in the middle of the ocean on an island

With a vulcano-smoking my last cigarette


There are not many trees and a windy beach

Big black rocks and a lot of mean dogs around me


The sun comes up-the sun goes down

The sun comes up-the sun goes down

Somewhere


A man comes up to me

He says’where are you going?’

I say ’I am going

Nowhere’


When my life is a dream

Don’t wake me up

Let me sleep



In Dutch Fields


In Dutch fields the poppies grow

Between the crosses-row by row

We are the dead

Short days ago

We lived- felt dawn- saw sunset glow

Loved- and were loved- and now we lie

In Dutch fields

We shal not sleep- though poppies grow

In Dutch fields



After the poem ‘In Flanders Fields’   (december 1915)

John McCrae – Canadian military doctor

november 30 187 2- januari 28  1918


The Flowers


She is walking through the snowflakes

On the churchyard

With a small bunch of flowers in her hand

She's putting it on a gravestone

Of a young soldier

Who died on the desert sand


And it hurts

And it hurts

The song in her head

Where the flowers are gone

And the young men are dead

And the girls are alone

With the hours


Life is floating away in a small red river

On the desert sand

A river of pictures

A movie of 20 years is flowing

Through his head


The flowers

Where are the flowers

She was picking alone in a meadow

A summer a long time ago

Life was endless

A desert

An ocean


The host of a talk show is laughing

And laughing

And people talk about the interior of their houses

And how they want to change it

And it hurts

And it hurts

The song in her head

Where the flowers are gone

And the young men are dead

And the girls are alone

With the hours


The Apache wandered lonely as a cloud

O'r vales and hills

When all at once he saw a crowd

A host of red poppies in a field


And the flowers

Where are the flowers

She was picking alone in a meadow

A summer a long time ago

Life was endless

A desert

An ocean


The flowers

Where are the flowers

The hours

The years

Where are the flowers


Sometimes you dream

The desert is an ocean

You dive deeper and deeper

You cannot find him






Five and Dime


I am waiting in the hospital

With my mother’s eyes

There is a song on the radio

That I dont wanna hear


No I don’t wanna hear


I am turning pages of a magazine

With my father’s hand

There are pictures in the magazine

That I don’t understand

That I don’t understand


Come back to the Five and  Dime,Jimmy Dean,Jimmy Dean

I am looking with my mother’s eyes

I’m seeing things I’ve never seen

Things that I have never seen


No-I don’t wanna listen

And I don’t wanna try

I am waiting in the hospital

With my mother’s eyes


Lenin and the Wounded Angel


I’m is walking on the thin ice of the lake

It is almost spring-it will melt and break

The holes are getting bigger


Is this a déja-vu - a prophesy- a joke

The skyline with the factories

The black sky with the smoke


My brains inside a cap of fur

My thoughts are burning like a fire


It’s important to bring electricity

To all the corners of this country/ the world

To fight disease and poverty  


There is a hand on my shoulder -a hand on my head

How do you do      His face is red and  blue

My name is Jozef  -   just  for you


I can hear your whispering voice again

I cannot speak your name


Tampere-Tampere

Home of the Holy Smoke

The bricks and stones

My prison - my homesick home        


I can hear your whispering voice again

I cannot speak your name


In the distance on a snowy road

Two boys are carrying a precious load

An Angel with a wounded wing


The younger boy is wearing a hat

The other a small brown jacket

He’s turning his head - he’s looking at me


I can see his worried eyes again

I can feel her hidden pain


Tampere   - Home of the Holy Smoke

The bricks and stones-my prison- my homesick home    


Drops of blood are falling on the snow

Like cherries on a table cloth  

In her hand she’s holding a small bunch of flowers


They bring her to the Blind Girl’s School

Where the wooden rooms are always dark

In corridors with rippled tiles                   

Small shoes are whispering



Cowboys & Indians


I thought that I saw you in the last train

With a plastic white fork in your hand

Your teeth-your elbows-your shoulders-

Your mouth and your eyes


You saw me standing on a platform

One second with 24 frames

I was gone with the last letter of your name


We were looking-only-looking at the sky

When we were cowboys and indians

Waving goodbye


My dream fell into pieces

It was difficult to paint a horse

And your sister said

‘There’s no Wild West’


That’s when I needed-I needed more time

When we were cowboys and indians

Waiting in line


We were looking-only-looking at the sky

When we were cowboys and indians

Waving goodbye


Hope is a strange invention

Emily said

The words fell like rain

On our head



I am a Fly


I’m a fly in your eye

I’m a bee on your knee

I’m a moth in your mouth

I’m a fly


I’m a worm in your shoe

I’m a brick in your wall

I’m a cloud in your sky

I’m a fly


I’m a car on your road

I’m a ship on your hip

I’m a bird on your head

I’m a tree on your knee

I’m a fly


I’m a spider inside her

A nit in your hair

I’m a flea you can’t see

I’m a thing   a ding  ding

I’m a fly


I’m a door in your heart

I’m a floor in your house

I’m a fish in your lake

I’m a fly


I’m a hat on your head

I’m a tree on your knee

I’m a lock in your door

I’m a cloud in your sky

I’m a fly


I’m a girl with a pearl

I’m a boy with a toy

I’m a man with a can

I’m a fly


I’m a fly in your eye

I’m a bee on your knee

I’m a moth in your mouth

I’m a fly



Mrs. Sunlight


Mrs. Sunlight is walking on the bright side

She’s dreaming of the moonlight in her eyes


I wish I had fever

I wish I had smallpox

Or worse

Then I needed love and care

Of My Sweet Nurse


Mrs. Sunlight dances

Under the circumstances

She likes ‘Rome was not built in one day’

Romances


Mrs. Sunlight      Soap

Is giving me a little    Hope

I’m climbing up the ladder of rope  

Kissing the moon

Jumping the broom


Sundays in winter

Mondays of darkness

She’s got a fire inside her house

We look at the snowflakes

Outside  the window

She turns and turns and turns

The pages of a  cookbook


Mister Moonlight is living on the dark side

Driving through the red light - looking for a some money


I wish I had a shoulder to cry on

I wish I had raindrops in my eyes

I wish I had windows   in my heart


Da dum da dum da dum

They do they do they do the dishes


Jumping the broom     

Kissing the moon

Jumping the moon



Moon Dog


Moon dog

Give me fire

Give me water

From your wishing well


Moon dog

Give me a rock

Give me a stone

From your home sweet home


Moon dog

Julie and John

What have you done

When the moon struck one


It’s a dirty old road

In a dirty old town


Moon dog

Give me rain

Give me shine

From your old coal  mine


Moon dog

Sweet heart

Ferry man

When the moon struck one


It’s a dirty old road

In a dirty old town


It’s a dirty old game

And I am feeling ashamed


Moon dog

Give me money

Give me honey

From your hollow  tree


Moon dog

Give me a hand

Give me love

From your broken heart


HEART     


Sometimes life is so simple

Sometimes it seems so hard

While in the end it doesn’t matter - simple or hard

Bring it down to the heart of the matter

Bring it down to a matter of – heart                


I walk up to my piano

Lay my hand on the keys

Got no idea what is pending here

Turn off my brain, new ideas

Always come from the heart of the matter

Let them come as a matter of – heart 


Sometimes it’s dark in the daytime

Sometimes it’s light at night

It’s not always pure logic

What makes this world go round

What makes this world go spinning around

Why are we tossing and turning around    


It’s a law of nature

Every rose comes with a sting

With one to six on my dice I don’t know

What the next minute brings

What will the next minute bring next

What will the next, next minute bring


Sometimes I talk with the angels

Sometimes I speak with the birds

You can change this world if you want to

They say, just like you did with the weather

Bring it down to the heart of the matter

All together - with a change of heart    


Make it matter

Make it better

With a change of  - heart



Yesterday


Yesterday- I was robbing a bank downtown

I was shooting the halogen ceiling lights

The laminate parquet on the ground


It was funny -there was no money

Crime doesn't pay -I am happy

So rich -So rich


Yesterday- I was robbing a gas station

I was shooting the tin cans and the coffee-machine

It was a sensation


I was happy -there was no money

Crime doesn't pay-but it is funny

I am so rich -so rich



Yesterday-I was robbing a butchers’ shop

I was shooting two medium steaks and a big lamb-chop

They were allready dead  so I took the money


Crime pays and it’s not funny

I am so sad -so sad



Grrr ... to you


Take me to great lake Ontario

Walk me to the lighthouse through the falling snow

I was loving you - loving you


Take me to the river where the sirens sing

Listen to the raindrops on their paper skin

I was loving you - loving you


Walk me through the snowflakes of a burning town

Talk to me talk to me when I’m falling down

I was loving you - loving you


I was walking to you

I was loving you


Take me to the zebra of Abbey Road

Hide me in the pockets of your blue raincoat

I was loving you - loving you


Je te grrr

Grrr ... to you



The Twins


Someone was playing a Walker Brothers song

When a ricochetting bullet hit the juke-box

The sun ain't gonna shine was stuck in it's track

Anymore - anymore ... and back


Mother 'Violet" - Jack 'The Hat' - 'Cannonball' Lee

They're all dead - but I'm still living

Brother 'Ronnie' - George Cornell - Richard Hart

They all fell - but I'm still standing


The sun goes down in the park

Soon it will be cold and dark around me

Those were the best years of our lives

We were rulling the town

Let's go down to 'El Marocco'

Reggie Kray - Will fade away


In our Sunday's best - East End - Wild West

The gang wars and the drinks at the 'Blind Beggar'

Under the scrutiny of 'Nipper'

A Peer of the Realm unlocks his zipper

Reggie Kray - Will die today