Reading: Dark Eyes Touching Clear Sky by Kattya Janssen

Kattya Janssen (b. ?) is a Dutch poet and artist. I read a poem from the section ‘Lust’ on her website:

Dark bodies touching clear sky
Underneath crisp pearly grass

Feverish shadows
Oakwood touching hands
Capricious patterns of roughness
The sliding of a foot
Fanciful flowers crushing
Aurora shows up
The cold whim of the sun
the chill of shrubs

Never beat the tricky lady
with the tinkling bracelets
The good-luck charm

Innocence fades when
clear water floods the outspoken

Concrete weapons of defence
Feel the glades
Inhale the excruciating frost

Fluttering eyelashes on cheeks
Dark eyes touching clear sky

We see two lovers sunken deeply in the pearl-white grass (that’s how I read ‘underneath’) at dawn. It is still cold and the environment is capricious, whimsical. A foot is sliding and flowers are crushed under the weight of the feverish lovers.

I wonder who the tricky lady is here. We should do her no harm as she’s our good-luck charm. The mention of fading innocence seems to refer to losing virginity (can we lose our virginity without losing our innocence as long as we respect the tricky lady?) Clear water, a lucidity takes hold of the outspoken and enlightened even the darkest recesses of the mind where our guilty thoughts would have hidden.

The lovers defend themselves in the cold (I’m not sure about this). The dark eyes confront the clear sky: As enlightened beings we are nog ‘innocent’ but on the contrary, aware of a deeper truth which precedes the distinction of innocence and guilt.