La SirenaCollage and poems by Surrealists in Wales featuring in the sixth issue of Surrealerpool’s magazine, ’Patastrophe! (7 November 2022).
https://surrealerpool.home.blog/patastrophe-no-6/
https://surrealerpoolhome.files.wordpress.com/2022/11/patastrophe-6-online.pdf
Many thanks to our good friend, Dominic Tetrault, who recently came across these wonderful sirens, drawn by Robert Desnos – and has kindly shared them with us, at La Sirena.
Source for both images: Jacques Doucet literary library – https://bljd.sorbonne.fr/search?preset=19&view=medias&fbclid=IwAR2tfzUJ6p1tLXNhT2ECPf308qPdqDMTZCmCuDd7-9aqV9lShwkxm7sxCtg
The siren is an important figure in Desnos’s work and life. Here is one of several poems featuring sirens.
His partner and second great love, the artist, Youki (Lucie Badoud) was also associated with the siren, which she had tattooed on her thigh.
Taya and I recently met up with several of the surrealists of Wales, including Steve Handsaker, John Richardson, Tracy Thursfield and John Welson, in the beautiful mountainous setting of Clyro, on my birthday. John Richardson kindly hosted the meeting at his house.
We created a collective collage and some collective poems featuring in the sixth issue of Surrealerpool’s magazine, ’Patastrophe! (7 November 2022). Although, Jean Bonnin was not able to attend, he was certainly there in spirit and provided materials and ideas, which we incorporated into the collective work.
I Am Still Here
Fridge Eyes and bakerlite eyebrows
Underwater music filters through the night
There where we murdered the mirrors
Vulnerable lips choking on mirrors
Invoking the mystery of days to come
Announcing the moon balloon of memory
The lost child embraced chance encounters
Coins tossed, dice shaken, and light bulbs smashed
Light filtered in the shrine of a stolen memory singing
I am a man, I am a woman, I am a fighter – I am still here
Over A Number
Over a number
Blue stolen shadows creep
Light refracts on the breaking of dawn
The asparagus train pulls into the station
We play games with their faces nightly
The dragon dresses in the latest fashion
And ice falls from the eyes of the woman in black
As the dice swallow the odd numbers only
The egg is buried in the graveyard, never to be seen again
As golden tears fall on the luminous ground
Jean Bonnin
Taya King
John Richardson
Darren Thomas
26 July 2022
I also received a number of birthday gifts. Here are two that Tracy Thursfield and John Welson created:
Poem and collages by La Sirena featuring in the fifth issue of Surrealerpool’s magazine, ’Patastrophe! (27 May 2022).
https://surrealerpool.home.blog/patastrophe-no-5/
https://surrealerpoolhome.files.wordpress.com/2022/08/patastrophe5-online.pdf
‘How Much Longer?’
The torn map reveals the ghosts of the city
Dreams of protesting with the Russian pacifists
Pleased with war’s dreadful and tumultuous roar
The locomotive has taken them nowhere
Roll the dice and take your turn
The sunflower smiles through the blood of the rubble to greet the new day
He who cannot play chess only uses brutality
Butterfly children slaughtered by noblemen in the city
Sugar the petrol, sell your guns and hide
The children roar in wild tears until they cry themselves to sleep
Ghosts should rise up to drag the warmonger to hell!
The desert queen serves the mad king
The mad king is distended
Avenging strife embitters human life
What is invisible will light up the sky in incandescent colours
The doll child hides in East Budleigh
Ivan Bilibin and Pushkin should curse the mad king to hell
A chorus of war cries from behind keyboards far from harm
The alchemy of dreaming heals the broken hearts
Screams and curses across myriad media apps
Karkhiv can never sleep, can only dream of peace, can only endure in the hearts and minds of those who will carry hope to the highest mountains for all to see
A half-hearted re-enactment of old mistakes, but with real deaths
Extra points for the grim reaper for taking the mad king
Workers and refugees captured and tortured in a celluloid prison
The young woman took her revolver to bed and was prepared to use it
Inferno awaits the mad king
The boys in the field are bored, or afraid or just excited by the game
My son is missing an eye and my mother’s wing has been ripped
Dante should pull him down there
Inevitable as a pub brawl at closing time, last orders called
The imaginary letter, Z, doesn’t exist in Russian. Neither should the mad king
The inferno takes them all to his heart until they march to the beat of the war drums, the death drums, the holocaust drums
No one is leaving until we find out who really started it
Every embrace is a sign of hope, of defiance
Where are the angels now?
The wind blows the shards of the silent mirrors across their broken faces and captures their death throes for all to see
A world left blind and toothless by the law of revenge
We suffocated on steam that turned into locks of human hair
The mad king of antiquity belongs in the past, not now
We run and burn and fall and run over and over again
And midnight trembled to see such terrors
The fighting leaves old men deformed in the streets
May Baba Yaga escort the mad king to hell
A stain upon another generation, damned to repeat the whims of their rabid masters
All of this just to reset the board for the next time
Blood stained the monochrome city of ashes
We, the invisible demand to be heard even if we cannot be seen
May the liar choke on his lies
She hung up the remnants of shame like a ventriloquist’s flag for all to see
Criminals jostle to steal the clothes and words of the famous dead
The mad king is fragile, just like a chess king. And like a chess king, I want to throw him to the ground
The war is fought by actors and actresses, not by women and children
Who pays the price?
We bleed
Spent
How much longer?
Collective poem by Doug Campbell, Taya King, Daina Kopp and Darren Thomas
Taya King: La Sirena Surrealist Group participated in the International Exhibition of Surrealism by submitting collective poetry texts, artworks, and films, which was followed by their physical representation as a group at the exhibition in Cairo (February 2022). This historically significant event also marked the first time that all members of La Sirena have met each other since the group’s virtual inception the previous year, during lockdown. I was particularly proud to present my two films, La Femme Automatique and La Femme (Re)trouvée (2021), at the exhibition.
Darren Thomas: Being part of this great exhibition, in Cairo has been a truly special experience. As well as showing several of my collages and photographs, I screened the third film in my trilogy The Dream Key (eclipse) and performed my poetry. But my abiding memory is the collective and international nature of this meeting of hearts and minds from the surrealist community, offering a wonderful opportunity to meet old and new comrades alike from so many countries and different cultures and take part in a collective dialogue and group activities – the poetry made by all!
Doug Campbell: I had been excited to see the rebirth of Egyptian surrealism over the last few years, and was thrilled to be invited to Cairo to participate in the exhibition. Despite the many challenges faced by the organisers, the event more than lived up to expectations. A meeting of minds in a magical space, and as such, perhaps necessarily challenging. For me, those challenges were a reason to get out there and get involved, not a reason to stay at home. I’m so glad I did, and I’m sure the contacts made and the energy generated will lead to many further adventures.
Daina Kopp: I was over the moon to come to Cairo for such a monumental surrealist exhibit. As a polyglot, I was in my element to be surrounded by artists and creators of all kinds from 28 countries and 4 continents who flew in. It was an honor and a pleasure to submit artwork and perform with my surrealist dream-inspired band, Hypnagogic Telegram. It was enchanting to meet with my fellow sirens from La Sirena and I look forward to further collaborations with the artists who contributed to this amazing historical exhibit. An ancient country hosting the next chapter of surrealism. Bravo!
The knife of the sky tortures the wise
Broken day burning the birdless sky
The clouds form the ghosts of sleepers
Whose eyes distil the world’s reflection
And your face is a pyramid of kisses that I
Use for writing words and butterflies
Who can sing in cages just as the laughter settles
On lovers’ lips whose smiles are framed
The tears of last year’s summer now rests
In yellow roses where candles melt flat
The game ensues tearing open the Snow
Queen’s broken heart inside the gas lantern
The sirens whisper the name of the Sunflower King
Who dreams of men on the land
The sound of moon against sun shattered the summer
Where do the sirens meet?
At the turning into evening
They meet in the eardrum of a grandfather clock
They meet in the glint of sunlit underground vistas
They meet in dry patches under the sea
The sirens meet in the inner ear of Odysseus
In the library of Alexandra – or of Babylon on public holidays
They meet where the dream of midnight kisses the sun
At the confluence of the lost rivers of London
They meet in the ocean’s hot springs
They meet hand in hand garlanded in petals and tears
In the bride’s train
Where the three hemispheres meet
They meet on the giant chessboard
At the hour of the wolf
In the rose made of seashells
They meet through the mirrors
When the stars are right
In the place of whispers
In equality
They meet in waking dreams
They meet in the clocks without time
Under my lover’s curse
They meet in the smiles of lovers
In the ghost stations of the underground
Coffins brimming with yeast
They meet in the shadows of living ghosts
In echoes
In hopes
They meet in the miracle of becoming
They meet in the hazy daydreams of tomorrow
In the folds of time
They meet in period novels
They meet without limits
Under the moons of forgotten worlds
They meet in black and white
After the ball is over
They meet in the womb of the mountain
They meet on giant clams to play with phantom limbs
They meet inside her silver castle
In the mouth of madness
They meet on the dissecting table
At the Tannhäuser Gate
Where my first childhood grew glass antlers
They meet in the androgynous islands
Down a dirt track road
In the swollen ant hills of Arabia
They meet on Pangaea
Within the old house filled with swallows and love letters
They meet on purpose
They meet on the tail of an upset cat
They meet beyond the border
In a feline landscape composed from the glassy stares of the first sirens
They meet in each other’s gaze
In Plato’s prism
In haunted houses
In a message, glimpsed in a mirror, from a borrowed dream
They meet in de Sade’s chateau
In my silent laughter
They meet on the screens of abandoned movie theatres
They meet without prejudice
At the lighthouse
On someone else’s sacred ground
Who is the automatic woman? (1)
She is the domestic goddess of my dreams
She is the wave and I am the ocean
She is carved from Venus
She is not my equal
She emotes like a frightened nightingale
She is tabula rasa
She is made from the milk of human kindness
She is the doll woman with her doll dreams
She is a constellation of fetishes
She is the white queen
She is a mere mask, an ornament, a particle of sand, cast adrift in a great storm
She is a pawn
She is barely a shadow of man
She is a text to be read as you please
She is in perpetual checkmate
She cries her witch tears that flatter no one
Her reflection does not exist
She is a signified without a signifier
She doubts everything
She does not dare to dream anything but second-hand dreams
She is a mistress to patriarchy
She is a stain on the face of this earth
She is a cheap paperback novel to be discarded
She is a gift from the gods
She is the epitome of evil – a femme fatale, a siren, a new Eve – a plague to be extinguished
She is not to be trusted
She has the dry tears of all women that vampirise men’s laughter
Her mask is made out of the finest silk
She murders midnight with feminine ease
She is a masochist
She is hysterical
She is duplicitous
Her cruel games with mankind are genocidal
She is a succubus
She aspires to be a princess, but she is always only an actress
Who is the automatic woman? (2)
She is an equal
She is a hunter
She does not care for Oedipus
She inhabits my thoughts, my dreams, my waking life,
She is revolutionary
She is crossing over, becoming who I am, who I wish to be
She is the mirror I fall asleep in
She is beyond good and evil
She is not mythical
She rejects time
Her smile is the colour of my dreams
She walks in fields of fire
She knows what she wants
She knows who she is
She is beyond signified and signifier
She inhabits the space between yes and no
She is the key
She is closer to the sun than the moon
She cannot listen to the vile cacophony of hate-speech
She rises above it like a great surfer
She has a form that defies form
Her x ray eyes see through you
She is a raging maenad
Her gaze turns men to stone
Her tears water the gardens where we will plant the new children
She is a forest made from the leaves of love
She is always the bridge that carries us to where we need to be
She is limitless in her vision of the future
Her arms are big enough to embrace a world that does not even care about itself
She is fork lightning caught in a velvet glove
She is real
Her cauterised sleep is the essence of magic and produces the brightest pearls
She speaks in tongues
She is the whisper I hear when I want to hear nothing
Her confidence is only sleeping
She knows the secrets of all the hidden rooms
She gives birth to herself
She is part sunrise, part teardrop, part seashell
Her wedding to the winds of old Arabia is legendary and, in this tale, she casts the greatest shadow
She is not in chronological order
The alphabet reorganises around her
Her sunshine is infectious
She does not seek the end, only the beginning of the end, and this is where she begins again, to find her new beginning
She is the last word
She is metamorphosis
Found woman
In the breath of dreams
In my glass heart
Always there
In spring
She is my fluid rose
Growing from the seabed
Beneath my dreams
In spring
I can see you Sirena…
I can smell you on my tongue
She exists within my blinks
But never in my dreams
The lilac smile
Her path beyond the fist of thorns
Leading me
Beyond myself
To the chandeliers
Hanging like the gleam of childhood
From my shadow
I can taste you…
Between each rapid eye movement
And then in deeper sleep
She took the arm of a passer-by
The movement caught the beast’s eye
The door to the banqueting hall
Burst violently open
Returned to the shadowy world
Divided the sea and sky
Sending great waves
Instead of beauty
The box contained sleep
Serpents seem so precious to the gods
Hanging like the gleam of childhood
From my shadow
Part flesh
Part mirror
Her body sparkles with midnight seashells
I dreamt she spoke to statues
An arm of the sea stretched inland
And they became friends
The egg of the sea felt numb
She dances in collaged whispers
She swallows the sun
She kidnaps the last rays of hope
And emerges in kisses
Large as a pigeon’s egg
In the underwater world
The pearl shone like the moon
Cracking her whip above their heads
Climbing through the open window in her heart
And near the back of her reflection
She steals the night
Only to reclaim the box of delights she buried there in a dream
I found a ladder and thought it would it help me find her but…
She made her way back up the gloomy passage
She was already caught in the echo of her gleaming
Somewhere near the bridge of lost daydreams
Who is the found woman?
She is the sunset without limits
She is smiling in my dreams
She is the water goddess
She is dancing on a dime
She is at the back of midnight
She is in my shadow, always
She is the queen of black cats
She is the queen of wrong numbers
She is teaching the children of the revolution
She told me she existed, but I don’t believe her
She gave birth to her own dreams
She wants to take me to the top of the Empire state to read me her poems
She does not care for Paris
She whispers in white ash and red seashells
She is entirely capable of anything
She is a tramp, but that’s ok
She is not afraid to be an androgyne
She smells like red wine once a month
She’s a haunted house and all her windows are broken
She can only breathe underwater
She counts the hours in kisses
She whispers to the sea
She lives, breathes and sighs in the spaces between yes, no and always
She didn’t do that, but she might
She isn’t a mistress, but her reflection is
She makes the fishes sing in echoes
She is all the hope that we secretly need but do not dare to speak
She is a type of elemental fire, a smokeless, smouldering flame
She is a tightrope that I cling to when I go to sleep
She is an experiment in femininity
She eats fire that dances on the ceiling
She bleeds when her purity is misunderstood or maligned
She is the dancer that I aspire to be
She cannot tempt the tempters but she can heal the healers
Her eyes are on my dream mask
She is the dolphin who played the clown for the cloud-king
She is the mask that I can never remove
La Sirena 