"The poor poet (after Carl Spitzweg)", DV, stereo, 3:03, 2010.

Eu gostaria muito de escrever sobre a gênese deste vídeopoema, usando-o para discutir certas escolhas, sem cair em uma tentativa de autoexegese, o que é sempre um desafio. Por ora, eu creio que seria melhor, em primeiro lugar, mostrar o vídeopoema, sem discursos exteriores. Gostaria de acreditar, porém, que ele já carrega em si as respostas a estes questionamentos.



Ricardo Domeneck, The poor poet (after Carl Spitzweg), DV, stereo, 3:03, 2010.


Vídeopoema, ou texto-vídeo. Reencenação da pintura "Der arme Dichter" (1839), de Carl Spitzweg (1808 - 1885), um dos maiores representantes do período da arte alemã conhecido como Biedermeier. Texto composto por linhas originais, mescladas a apropriações e deformações intertextuais de linhas de Vladimir Maiakóvski, Ludwig Wittgenstein, George Oppen, John Keats, Gertrude Stein e Konstantinus Kavafis. Vídeo, texto e voz: Ricardo Domeneck. Edição de som: Uli Buder.

Texto:

The poor poet (after Spitzweg)

Like a Conversation with the Visa Inspector at the Department of Immigration about Poetry, long term investment towards glorious dust. May you flourish with bread and water, a Renaissance of minimalist proportions, based on the poverty of your organism. All you know of stock exchange has been taught to you by the relationship between your lungs and your blood. Let me recite what geography teaches. A bit of money is a joy forever. Poets? Metics in their own lands. Aliens of all times know what price that is. Well, brothers and sisters, borders can have various effects on writers as lovers. Mental note: consider the difference between Medea and Scarlett O´Hara right before The End. A thing of beauty is a toy for never. You write, darling, as someone who plays with public property. There is nobody here but us kitchens. Whisper secrets to yourself in a language your mother would fail to understand but, for migration purposes, you must tighten your belt, fasten your tongue. As if the spider exiled itself from its own web, through the web, one must eventually eject from his or her own body what others will then call his or her habitat. Dear guest, adopt the language of the host. Adapt the language of the host. Addict it, adduce it, adjourn it, adjust it. But you will never succeed in admonishing the Empire through its own language. There is nobody here but us chicanos. A beauty of thing is a boy forever. To say, finally free of heritage: Welcome, citizen of nowhere. Once upon a place, we thought you might find a home in a grammar, as one lies under the sun, on the grass. Addressed, you could legislate your own babbling, as one who seduces legions. Should poets finally be granted suffrage, you ask awestruck. Tired of being demonized as nonresidents of the Republic. Everyone knows that poets temporarily staying in the territory of Neverland must register with the migration authorities within five calendar days from the solstice. Show the fly the way out of the spider´s digestion. Now retired, you might want to sit at the gate with the king and wait for the barbarians, even forgetting you were one of the first of them. Invaders tend to mingle among the natives. Was there a new Troy, a new Jericho, or a new Canudos for which to yearn? You will register the long chronicle of the siege, not knowing sometimes on which side of the wall you first stood. Cities that fall have a way of being stubborn till the last standing brick. The History of the Past Sieges cannot help you, for you no longer know what you are supposed to record, what to erase. I cannot remember if I invaded, if I resisted. There is nobody here but us Chechens.


Ricardo Domeneck, 2010.

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