Gentrification, they scream at me
from behind sunglasses and infinite
torque. They blame my skin! My cock!
The number of years I have danced!
Proclaiming me unfit to walk these
streets once baptized in worker
sweat, now a haven for the middle-class,
sorrow. I will not bend my knee to these
opinionated oppressors, denied!

There’s a little place down
on Simrishamnsstreet, just a
couple of blocks from here,
by Möllevångssquare.
That’s where they roost,
angel-headed with pants from
the city of Manchester, brown.

Buttoned up shirts stained with
as much coffee as self-doubt mixed
with text-book narcissism, truly!
Sipping black life and chewing down
those bits of eco-friendly dairy-based
concepts, not so much jazz but retro.

Alive, puzzled together by hamstrings
and forgotten verses. Where are those
ancient people now, I wonder?
With their thick black glasses and
their loathing for all things
streamed mainly. Now replaced by
mechanical monstrosities billowing
books of faces via a web of subterfuge.
Letting fruit symbolize what it means
to be young and free care in this adopted
city of mine. I go there sometimes,
to mix with other nuts, feminazis and
liberals disguising themselves as
manarchists, jokingly. One can hope!

I order my coffee with milk and
my company sans sanity.
I like their touch to be intense
and their eyes shallow, shoals.
I hope to one day be allowed
to project my words and thoughts
upon these hallowed caffeine walls, poems!
For now I find myself content simply
frequenting my siblings in arms,
observing with equal parts fear
and loathing and kinship, connected.

My ivory tower creaks and moans

Sitting in a chair given to me freely

All I wish is for a taste of Cuban freedom

I have been told I am a sexist, like Fritzl

Like him I have a first name

Unlike him my moustache is a peacock

It flutters relentlessly

I ponder cats and dogs, the creaking escalates

I am twenty-five, soon twenty-six

And considered good at what I do, by some

In reality I am a fucked up poet

Who will never come to terms with my shortcomings

Despite how good my adjectives

Despite how many girls I sleep with

Spite, deified

The sad truth of existence, this life of never-ending work

Truth always out of grasp, just

Alone with words, meaningless except for what some breathe into them

All I wish for is honesty

Real people with genuine genius

Flowing through me, invigorating

Images dancing with what some would call life

I would call cultural harassment

Months spent in this newly adopted city of mine

Carrying words on buses

Carrying bruises up stairs

Three lost lovers and one pair of shoes, puked upon

Searching for that perfect muse

Madly, like witchcraft

Some would call me charming

Reality just has a way of making my lies look true

I am the sly fox wannabe

The young amateur chasing, crazily

I've never known when to quit

It won't end 'til it ends

It's all crazy

Random cobblers living on spare change

Wishing for grass that is never greener

Always the same faces on the same buses, worn

I still get random erections at inappropriate times

I play them off like rain

Maybe I should have become a politician

Let the middleclass decide, paupers and poets be damned!

Musicians make more money and they still complain

What chance, then, do I have?

Hipsters, children of an un-revolution

The wonder of mediocrity combined with a fathers paycheck

The miracle of unrequited boredom

Let us dismiss all that bourgeoisie nonsense

Dismiss the lies of a lesser life

Embrace the fallacies, the hypocrisy

The truth that we are grander than our shortcomings

Despite the ludicrous amount of said failures

Instead, sing

Sing of sex, of liquor

On the road, Howl

You see what I did there?

Zing!

Bukowski would puke with pride and joy!

Shake your peacock! Ruffle leather!

It is all alive within us tonight, comrades

Andy Kaufman is yelling my name from the borders of limbo

Faking death is never the solution

But neither is faking life!

Malmö är en ung kvinna
hon har packat sina tunga andetag
i en resväska av fuskläder
det gör lite ont i hennes bröstkorg när hon andas
omringar midnattssommardimma
får oss att släppa taget om våra fördomar
men inte om våra pretentioner
Hon läker oss
Hon rör sig som en hebreisk haiku
Såhär nära
Viskar vackra virvlande visor i mina öron
Nu blir det kanske annorlunda
Nu blir detta kanske den enda
Dessa tider är kanske skapta för att utsöndra dessa ballader
Jag behöver en öl
Jag behöver en ung kvinna
som gör lite ont i min bröstkorg
när jag andas
Jag tänker på allt sex jag aldrig haft
Jag är nästan pank
Hotellrum har schampooflaskor lika stora som patroner
och jag vet att det finns mycket smartare män
som aldrig kommit såhär långt

Vackrare också.


Översatte den tidigare dikten till svenska. Funkar den bättre så?

Hey, buddy
have you ever just danced?
Like a popette to Belle & Sebastian
have you ever just vibrated for no particular reason?
Like a puppy who recently discovered his first patch of grass.
Give me a pair of tight jeans
and I will bounce until I expire.

Give me a pair of tight black jeans
and I will dance until they come for me
Because if you do not dance
If you do not move yourself free
Then you will never ever have lived at all, buddy.

“Fair enough” is my defense
as I ache for release from the mediocre.

My city is a young woman.

Her chest hurts when she breathes.

Surrounding midnight summer fog.

Makes us let go of our prejudice but not our pretension.

She heals us.

She moves like a Hebrew Haiku.

This close.

Whispering sweet collective dreams into our ears.

Maybe this time will be different.

Maybe this time will be the one.

Maybe these times are born to howl these ballads.

I need a beer.

I need a young woman
who makes my chest hurt
when she breathes.

I think of all the sex I never had.

I am almost out of money.

Hotel rooms have shampoo bottles the size of shotgun shells
and there are smarter men who never got this far.

Prettier too.