Murat Nemet-Nejat: from The Spiritual Life of Replicants

[From Nemet-Nejat’s major new work, The Spiritual Life of Replicants, schedued for April publication by Talisman Books. The afterword to the book appeared in Poems and Poetics on December 2, 2010, and another essay on April 28, 2009.]

.............The Wold Shadow
....................“My laboriously painted vision of the god of the forest. ...
....................It had to do with the history of painting rather than any
....................wood creature.” Stan Brakhage [1]

you'll ascend the stairs slowly
on your skirts a golden pile of leaves
always you'll be looking at the East crying

............Always looking at the East crying to be revived

waters are yellowing ... your face paling in shadows
bending roses bleed bleeding to the ground
wait flame like on branches nightingale
has water burnt why is the marble bronze

...........From yellow to bronze to crimson to night is the fiery movement of the soul in its ascent.

...........Fire is reflected light in the evening twilight, soon to be replaced by the reflected light of the moon.

...........The nightingale and the branch on which it stands become one, waiting together.

wait flame like on branches nightingale

look at the crimson sky turning evening ..(Ahmet Hasim)

*

When One has given up One’s life
The parting with the rest
Feels easy, as when Day lets go
Entirely the West

The Peaks, that lingered last
Remain in Her regret
As scarcely as the Iodine ..............................(the color of tea)
Upon the Cataract. .....(Emily Dickinson)

*

Windows, windows are better;
you see the birds passing by at least
instead of four walls. ....(Orhan Veli)

*
............
............The Eyes of Absence

Pursuing phantom pains.


............Love of Words

A part of,
apart from my lover.

As words separate, I draw close
as words draw near, I fall apart.


The all sufficiency of language is a concept which, which can only be conceived by the all powerful.


So the creator Tyrell punished the glorious Nexus-6 models with mortality so that they do not learn too much and become like gods.

Without realizing that all the replicants arrived at was the weave wall of human emotions.

[1] The quote is from Stan Brakhage’s commentary in the DVD edition of his film The Wold Shadow.” “Wold” is a Middle English word denoting a clearing in a forest – the space within which the shifts of light as the evening approaches might reveal the arrival of the gods of the forest. “Wold” also is a yellow derived from the roots of the plant “weld.” The quote points to the linguistic roots of Brakhage’s cinematic art, that whatever one’s struggle against the materiality of things --of language-- one is inevitably snared by it.