Dopo mezzanotte!

by Marina Kazakova

Dopo mezzanotte!

Dopo, dopo!

The door pops open,

out of the dust

the ocean

unfolds

under the ropewalker’s

high gloss

black shoes.

He floats

among the buoyant atoms-

the iron nerves of muscled Brussels,

silenzio

fulfils The Place Royal -

no traffic,

only the cinema of

sinking smiles

of women,

oh, excuse me,

of “things”

behind the glass windows,

brought to the citadelle

of cultures,

oh sorry,

to the “Grand Market”

to sell the bodies -

the live sculptures

of Gare du Nord.

The Captives,

in search of lost hopes,

observed by some,

ignored by all,

the poultry

living decades of years

under

the artificial lights,

in high temperatures

of pre-Renaissance

“battery cages”,

not far from new headquarters

of Europa -

a gorgeous

post-modern

Space Egg,

built up of

thousands of windows,

recycled

and brought from every member state -

a cleaner's nightmare,

a symbol

of new life,

the victory of light -

Buon Giorno!

The door gets closed,

the ropewalker

becomes a cock

sitting among

the poultry,

eating his business lunch...

Vivo,

vivo mezzogiorno!

* * * * *

Marina Kazakova (b. Gorky, 1983) is a writer, poet and audio-visual artist in Belgium. Published internationally in magazines and journals (Three Rooms Press' Maintenant, AntiNarrative Journal, Crannog), Marina is a frequent performer. She has been shortlisted at different poetry/film-poetry competitions and was awarded various prizes. She is author of verse novel Tishe...Piano, the film adaptation of which was shortlisted for International Short Film Festival Leuven 2013, Miami Indie Wise Festival 2018, XpoNorth Festival 2018, and got ‘The Best Narrative Short’ Award at the International Film Festival behalf Savva Morozov in Moscow in 2015. Her literature works deal to a large degree with confrontation with the past and explore the challenges posed both by memory and grief. In addition to poetry, Marina has written essays and articles for such publications as The Word Magazine (Brussels), Culturetrip. com, Seanema.eu. Marina holds a Master in Public Relations and in Transmedia. Currently, she is Communications Officer at ‘Victim Support Europe’(Brussels) and working on her practice-based PhD in Arts “Lyric Film-Poem. A research on how the unique characteristics of lyric poetry can be expressed in film” at Luca School of Arts (KULeuven).