The Barking Poets

(written in the 6th international poetry festival in Jerusalem, 2003)

1.

A dog barking
seems to be very poetic
in any language
a dog barks
un perro ladra
keleb noveahh
it's poetic
There were seven of them
barking into the hall
from mouths of poets
but I didn't see one dog that day.

2.

I have nothing against barking dogs
I just don't like the sound
I prefer when they do it in poems
as if they were in the closet.
Too many barking dogs
that's another story.

3.

The day you read
you are entitled to a free dinner
it's like donating blood.
they used to give you a voucher
for a hot dog and glass of juice.
Now, that dog
he didn't bark.

4.
Jerusalem
crowded restaurant
twelve poets in three tables
barking
wouldn't it be poetic
Oh, so poetic
if we all blew up
in a terrorist attack
we'd be famous in a day
known all over the CNN
read by the masses
make our own statement
change the word
all the dogs from the universities
would bark around our graves
and we'd be anthologized
as the dead poets from Jerusalem
one from Serbia, one from Russia, one From
Spain, Portugal, India, Arabs Jews Christians Buddhists, Hindsights
Now wouldn't that be poetic,

But I
don't want to be poetic
I want to bark.



5.

The old poets they don't bark anymore
they fall asleep while the young ones read
they've heard it all read it all.
when I am very old
a five thousand years old poet
I will be honored by Ph. D.'s
and too many festival
and I will fall asleep in my seat
telling them poets
I know what you've written
my friends
I've read it all
But I also know every poem you will write
or anyone will write
I have seen the one letter
I am not a barking poet anymore
I am not a man
I am not a poet
I am poetry

and then fall asleep
Oh! deep sleep
forever,
an bury my letter
with me
my barking secret
into the night.


6.

Old Buk didn't like the festivals
Old Buk doesn't bark anymore
only his poems bark