Prehistory

Ukrainian researchers announce the unearthing
of a six-thousand-year-old temple the same year
a woman I know looks for a calm site to rise.

197 by 66 feet in size and built mostly of wood and clay,
the building, my friend's body, were destroyed and abandoned
after years of regular occupation, for ambiguous reasons.

Found intact inside the temple, there were numerous animal bones
and pottery fragments received with enthusiasm by the archeological
community. My friend, two ribs spared in sacrifice, has only this poem.

(Photo: Nataliya Burdo and Mykhailo Videiko/Institute of Archaeology NAS of Ukraine, Kyiv)

N.B.:

- Trypillia temple gained the news last October after the publication of this paper. 

- Experts theorize Trypillian society was matriarchal.

- According to statistics, every two minutes, five women are victim of aggression in Brazil

Monsieur Fat Pig

Monsieur Fat Pig,
renowned artist to whom I have
been canvas several times,
apparently likes my frame.

He would have me hanging
on his office wall, but he's got a wife
and kids - "these things consume
a lot of money", he explains.

These are days of cheap copies
and easy pleasures,
because I am costly,
he bargains.

I have run into many men
like Monsieur Fat Pig lately.
My disgust for their sexist,
insulting behavior, sustained.

Unfashionable

I woke up feeling petty and
helpless this morning
put on a faded smile and my old
laconism no one appreciates.

I couldn't care less about
being fashionable.

Shoelaces

I learned you without my hands,
in the dark, by listening to your breathing,
by making friends with your ghosts.

Unaware of the
terrible complications of being tough,
you surround yourself with silence and walls.

But you held my hand once,
you tied my shoelaces once.
I know you have a heart.

I've seen it once, for thirty seconds.

Thou shall not look down

I must admit I am fascinated by his ability 

to only speak when he has something to say. 

Words, like seeds, carefully selected and 

patiently placed in sentences that, under the 

right will and dream conditions, may grow into 

exquisite thoughts overnight. I am privileged

he allows me close enough to watch them
gain the clouds and incites me to follow him
to the top, despite my fear of heights. 

Sunday afternoons

I am very careful about
writing on Sunday afternoons,
especially in the summer,
when I sink in bed alone with my thoughts
under temperatures as high as 35°C
and I can find no use for blue skies,
I haven't worked hard enough on my metaphors.
I can't be anything but ordinary on hot days.

Never too much, just enough

There is a word left unsaid
for every three I tell you.
Girls learn to speak prior to
and more quickly than boys,
therefore they gain knowledge
of words to be omitted from
their speech a lot earlier.
It's only natural you sense them,
you know them well enough.
They are hiding, not hidden.

The woman who mistook a man for wings

I had a guardian angel once -
the thorough thing, halo and wings,
- who would show up at my window
at the faintest mention of his name,
I thought. He did. He can't be seen
in many of my photographs, but he
is the reason I fear to forget
we grow up fast, feet and legs,
when you look further, men are just men.

(This is the story of the first man who left. Written for Play it Again #12 over at the Imaginary Garden. I went with Fireblossom's call for angel poems, the title is a reference to this great book written by neurologist Oliver Sacks: The man who mistook his wife for a hat. There's all kinds of crazy I guess.) 

Something about strong women

They weave personal experiences
into tapestry.
Pain and joy,
two sets of interlaced threads.

The first, running parallel to
the woman's length;
the second, running parallel
to her width.

They choose tapestry
because it is weft-faced weaving.
All the warp threads
are hidden in the completed work,

for the sake of stability.

(A found poem sort of for my soul sister Kerry, because she always knows what I mean.)

Python

The reason why I very seldom
see you in dreams is simple:
I have little of you to build on.
We beat the odds walking side
by side on that beach in Kent,
I wish I could go back. But
it seems the mind makes the whole
dream-making thing random.
It's been a long time I learned
algorithm. Languages have
changed significantly since then.

The listener

He sat across from me

wearing peaceful eyes

and listened,

like someone 

counting the seconds 

between lightning and thunder

to tell how far the flash is.

I am never close.

Suggested listening: When there were no connections - Tides from Nebula

Christmas morning

I wake up from dreaming
We still go to the same places.

We are now friends with different people
who will avoid confrontation
who won't stand for a challenge.

Your eyes search my stillness for discomfort
- there was never an answer
you couldn't draw out from my body -

my shoulders scream
I'm mad at you for parting
I'm mad at myself for waiting.

My knees confess
I wish you walked toward me
And occupied all the empty spaces.

Strangers VI

Dear Stranger,

You searched my window
four times today
for traces of me,
would you have called
if you had my number?

I've been watching you too.
You seem to worry I might
die all by myself in  my bedroom.

Who would find the body?
How long would it take?

Don't worry.
I'd have someone inform you.

Friends tell me to leave you alone,
you won't shout words from your window,
you're probably afraid to sound crazy.
You are not the only one.

Lesser and lesser

The first man who left
is in town for a month
and he brings color
back to sunflowers.

It's summer again,
last time we saw each other
there were so many
lights,
butterflies,
strangers,
I couldn't speak,
he must have noticed.
I've been speaking lesser and lesser.

I like saying things in poems
which some believe to be about nobody
but happen to be about people
who come and go because
life is like this
and just a few close observers
can tell.

The first man who left is in town,
we have changed considerably
over the course of the past five years.

I've been speaking lesser and lesser.

Thoughts on nights spent on living

a house of mirrors, my Lord,
and empty orbits:
this world, these people

who are born from similar explosions
who respond to the same clock

who can't tell reflections from bodies.

Let them not find it, my Lord, 

hidden in the secret compartment

under the library, too broken a heart.

I love selflessly,

I pray for my enemies,

I walk my path slowly.

why can't I be spared?

Handwork

Pins, needle and thread
to embroider a heart to this chest.

Measure the height and the width
calculate the number of stitches

to guarantee you will cover
the entire motif.

make them tight enough
it won't fall off,

but not so stiff
it can't beat.

(image by Visceral)

Shared with Marian's challenge over at The Imaginary Garden

Oware

I beat my sister at Oware today
in two hours of nearly untroubled silence.

As children,
we didn't see eye to eye often.

She insisted our dolls should have
perfectly brushed straight hair.
I learned to use scissors.

She wanted to sleep on the top bed.
I claimed it first!

I learned how to use a lighter.
She got burned.

We were both afraid of the dark.
I came up with a monster under the bed.
[we called it 'Mrs. Wig']

As children,
we were regularly warned by the father

we wouldn't be let into the world
if we didn't make peace with each other.

We were grounded for years,
I remember.

I complain about her sluggishness,
she still makes fun of my math.

(From left to right: Daniela, me and Kelle)

N.B.: 

• There's a one-year age difference between Kelle and me, this poem is for/about her.
• Oware is an abstract strategy game among the bigger Mancala family of board games. They say you can't be selfish if you play Oware. I was incredibly selfish as child. Thank God I also had sisters growing up.
• Oware works with two sacred principles: you must sow if you want to reap and you must learn to give if you want to receive.

Strangers IV

Dear Stranger,

I would tell you
the stories behind the neon letters
if you couldn't guess.
Something tells me you do.

Have you ever visited
the space between two words
in a poem? Try me here,
there is enough room

for the thoughts on your mind
and the questions you don't ask
because they would get lost on
the way from your window to mine.

I talked to someone last night
who couldn't sleep either.
He had a cigarette and watched
the empty loneliness of the streets.

I was the one who waved.
Would you have waved back?
Will you,
ever?

Political science

350 B.C.E Aristotle writes Politics
2014 I regret having slept through
college philosophy lectures on
Rousseau and Locke.

Because there's you
reading a science fiction novel
I recommended
against a barricade when it's calm. 

You speak the language of
snipers and bombs
which I cannot understand
or learn from books.

We have tea for breakfast
you don't talk about the blood.
But at 4 a.m. Ms. Revolution sleeps
and you are still awake.

(Posted to Kerry's challenge over at the Imaginary Garden)

Mind over mind

In a dream
I forget your face.

I've been seeing it so often
in people who are not you

I leave parts of you
in these strangers now,

shards of a broken past
I have walked across

and didn't hurt my feet
or heart.

I am no longer shaken
by the hearing of your name.

Stuff about me you should know

Circus classes,
social awkwardness,
insomnia;

Scar on the forehead from falling at school
at the age of five.

Love for dogs,

elephants,

sunflowers.

Fear of heights,

darkness,

forgetting

people's faces
and laughters.

Aversion to gooey creatures
[like slugs],

fondness of
fireflies,
junebugs
and the teeny-tiny pill bugs
[I really miss seeing them in the big cities].

Never a broken limb.

More than often a broken heart.

Pirates

It's all been written, Tom
if not by God,
at least by Mark Twain:

two souls with but a single thought -
you and I were meant to meet
down our very own Meadow Lane.

I would lead a life of crimes
with no one else.

No immutable observation is true

That I change my heart
with the weather,
you would say of me.

Because it rains
I'm in love with a man
who can read clouds.

The sun comes out
I lock myself in the bedroom
To learn my flesh and shadow.

Though there isn't light enough,
I try and stay the closest to the truth
this is how I'd like you to remember.

In a world of copies
I could have been
whoever I wanted to

and I chose myself.

This you must remember. 

The space you gave me to breathe

I used it to cry

because I am a woman

I can't breathe.

You drew your conclusions

from afar

afraid I was another copy

afraid if you got close enough

to touch me

you'd find me real.

What is real, T?

A head flooded with theories

on an empty bed.

But if you had stayed 

for one more minute,

if you had had a second look.

Give me release. I'm tired of this world of appearances. Pigs that only look fat. Families that look happy. Give me deliverance. From what only looks like generosity. What only looks like love.

― Chuck Palahniuk, Invisible Monsters

What to do in case of silence

It's different when
you're sitting
three steps away
and if we're silent

I can hear
the clock
the streets
your breathing.

I know exactly
what to do then.

Your eyes can meet mine in Betelgeuse

Spring showers
dissolve the city streets -

this Saturday morning
I can't find my boots.

Lipstick, coat,
glasses, and keys. Check.

Late for work
I miss breakfast.

But your hue is in town and I
realize beyond recall

how you got to learn
the names of the clouds:

You were born and raised
in Greyish Brown!

Now please, let me
tell you about my stars.

Scattered Cumulus Under Deck

I apologize for being unsteady,
but these lines, like scud clouds,
part as fast as they come to my mind.

They know my eyes chase the storm
behind them and they hush
to remind you a few things:

that we are transitional,

that if you observe a
three-headed monster long enough
you might see it turn into a whale,

that we are all going places,

that it takes not only courage
but also a great deal of faith
to look a tornado in the eye,

that our time on Earth is sensitive,

that my treasure has never been
at the end of any rainbow,
I carry it inside -

a heart that will shelter your dreams

throughout the downpour
and would very much like you to
stay after the monsoon ends.

For the sake of being

I can't say
I'm proud of
myself for

doing
the right thing
all the time.

I make mistakes.
Lots of them.
Thank God.

For#222

Strangers III

Dear stranger,

How much do you get from my silence?
Do you see me waving from my window?
Because I do.

There isn't enough for a poem sometimes.

Sometimes there's too much work.
Sometimes I don't want to go home.
Sometimes I just lie in bed looking at the ceiling,

Wishing for a good dream.

Can you tell it just by looking over my shoulder
and peering into my frame?
When you can read these silences,

We'll be no longer strangers.

This is where I leave you

This is where I pick you up:
braces, glasses, zits - day one:
you barely look at each other
but would still tell a tale of being
closely studied -

someone must have noticed
your lazy eye,
or protruding ears,
you being too thin,
you being too fat.

How on Earth can anyone fit this seat?
How does one manage not to make a fool of oneself?
What if the teacher asks me a question I cannot answer? 
Who in this class will want to be friends with me?
What if I I don't understand while everyone else does?

This is where I pick you up:
spelling, verb to be, classroom language - day one:
you speak in, you are afraid to make mistakes
that can get you laughed at
because people laugh.

They laugh when you mispronounce 'pocket'
when you invent words like 'father saint' or 'Daddy Noel'
when you can't get a sentence straight
when you don't know what to say about vegetarianism
because you do like meat.

This is where I pick you up:
reading, listening, speaking - day one:
Do we really need grammar?
Can I exceed the 45-word limit?
I haven't done my homework.

Will they learn it? I ask myself.
Will they like it? I ask myself.
They will hate mostly everything,
because they are teenagers,
that's what teenagers do.

Music, drama, movies.
Dancing, drawing, collaging.
Grammar. (Yes, you need it. Because you do.)
Good morning, this is an English-only environment.
You are required to use English here.

News. Discuss it. Global warming. Teenage behavior. War.
News.  I won't take 'I don't know as an answer, young man'.
News. Because I want to hear your opinion about it.

I have lost track of the days
(you're acquainted with my bad memory).
You're so grown up,
This is when you leave me.
This is where I leave you.

(a poem for the 12 teenagers who sat in my classroom for the past 6 years, and leave today. I'll add a photo later on.)

A song to follow Hope - RTQN

Strangers II

Dear stranger,

if you don't mind me asking,
what are you doing home
on a Saturday night?

Mother believes I've got
Chikungunya fever,
I've been forced to

lemon tea and blankets.
I don't tell her my heart aches.
She can't keep secrets.

If we lived across from each other,
if I had a flashlight,
if you could read Morse code,

would you find a way
to take me out
for beer and jokes?

(For the stranger out there, peeking into my soul lots of times throughout the day.)

(PS.: I don't drink.)

Finding Mr. Paperman

I'm searching for

notorious Mr. Paperman.

I'm in possession of a message

to be delivered forthwith.

Mr. Paperman 

who traveled places in the wind, 

who lived in drawers, pockets and jewelry boxes,

whose best friends are named 2H and 6B.

Mr. Paperman

who is beautiful beyond the surface, 

who does not fear getting old and yellow,

whose pet peeve is people who do not finish sentences.

Mr. Paperman

who is a one-of-a-kind sheet,

who can't sleep because of a coffee stain addiction,

whose heart lies between his lines.

Mr. Paperman

who is scared of giant erasers,

who is fond of getting tickled by paintbrushes, 

whose most honest passion is the sea.

Mr. Paperman 

who fought a war against an army of mechanical pencils,

who has got folding marks,

whose childhood dream was to be a paper plane.

Mr. Paperman! My dear sir,

what a difficult man to find!

I bring you a heartfelt message

from My Lady Kensington:

T, I am goofy and emotional

I have the silliest of eyes.

I am random and oftentimes confusing,

will you help me read you right?

Burn the message

You leave my life much before 

I can learn your smell.

You borrow 

someone else's metaphor

to buy me an excuse

instead of a smile

to buy me distance

instead of  coffee.

You leave before we can
make memories.

I stand alone.

(Read part 1: Kill the Messenger)

Arguing the uniqueness of man by regarding the treachery of images

He dreams of a poet in the crowd
whose face resembles mine

a vast, heartening smile that
matches big pensive eyes

he scans her for words
determined to find out for how long

they linger on her lips.

he doesn't know

I find it difficult
to be around people

to speak my words point-blank
to refrain my eyes from the violent blue.

I am not the poet.

If I had no fear

A series of jumps
into the unknown.

Have a one-night stand.
Morir in a mojito glass.

Get a peek into my own mind.
A conversation with my ghosts.

Learn to fly
as well as to fall.

Tell my love to your face
and allow the passing of days

to erase you from my path.

Strangers

I could be one of the lit windows
in your neighborhood.

Late night, when you
listened to the noisy city streets

tentatively searching
for a familiar soul,

I would watch your silhouette
framed on the side of a building

long enough to invent a story
which explained your presence

and hope we could meet again
in sleeplessness.

(To the stranger who's been watching my exercise on existing closely for long hours this week)

Doubting Thomas

You stretch my exactitude
by trying me under a hundred names.
I wonder which is your favorite.

Because the things you can touch
are the only things you can believe,
You question my nudity.

You doubt me with your heart
for you can't trust me with your skin,
too far apart for your hand in mine.

Lock

The nights I replace street lights
with your face,
there are too many clouds
for stars.

Yet, I carry my wishes and keys
in the same pocket.

There is a door to you
I cannot open.

Flawless

You unearth my flaws
like one digs the shore
for sea shells.

They take so much space
I lose my place inside you
for 6 months every year.

You do your stuff,
you walk your path,
you work out your issues
never letting them become ours.

This is how you've been
taught to believe yourself flawless.

Semantic satiation

They say if you repeat a word
up to three times a second
for 15 seconds

that's enough for
the word to
lose its meaning.

You thought
it was too soon for me to feel anything,
you never truly believed it.

I add my love
to one hopeless sentence,

make it my last.

I find it hard these days
 to place it
in context.

September

September keeps stealing
the people I love away from me.

There has been too much heat
and too little shade these days.

You find neighbors in their porches
talking politics and having lemonade.

We now plant people like trees.
They grow arms as long as branches

which still fail to touch the clouds
but make great hangers for hopes.

Bring the canary back into the house by nightfall.

- says your last note

forgiving the creature for it cannot sing.
This is the lesson you leave us.

Close to heart

My grandmother had a strategy
to remember anything -
she stashed things in her bra:

her ID card,
money,
shopping lists,

general notes,
bus tickets,
handkerchiefs,

a black and white photo of grandpa
in his wedding suit,
'what a rare man he was'. 

As I look for a safe place
to keep my favorite thought of you,
she comes back to my mind

gathering blackberries in the yard,
lost in conversations with the memory
of the man she loved always close to heart.

This will destroy you (but will also set your soul free)

I discover a fearless heart
when I repeat my love
for a man who denied me
three times.

The hours you spent
accounting my masks,
observing my stumbles

to prove me imperfect -

have you assumed 

they would make me weak?

I'm the weakest a human being can be,

I love. You don't know what it is.

Or maybe you do.
You block the bridge I've built to you
knowing I always cross it alone.
Maybe, you've already gotten yourself

a weakness.
This will destroy you,
my dear one.
(But will also set your soul free.)

Underworld

Dear G,

you go unspeakable
and I cannot guess
what runs in your chest,

if it is the city sewage
or a river of hot lava.
Will you take me on a tour?

Have I not said it
a thousand times
that I am not afraid of

your underworld?

Fishing

Last night
I was mistakenly happy
for two hours.

The thrill reminded me
of the first summer
I went fishing with my father,

when I caught
a P. Lineatus which was
under the minimum length limit,

and I had to
return it to the river
and watch it go away.

How to embrace a man who is too far from your touch

You wake up and say good morning
to the favorite photo of his you keep nearby

when it's too early to disturb his sleep
and you are acquainted with his grumpy version.

You get mad at him whenever he gets stung
because he can't stop playing with bees

or when he falls sick and refuses to believe
the effectiveness of your home remedies.

You be there for him in silence when
his heart caves in and he doesn't feel like talking.

You be there for him at two in the morning
when he has an idea or can't sleep,

for he could have called any person in the world
but he picked you.

You end your conversations with a kiss
you can't deliver yourself to his forehead

and because sometimes he might doubt it,
you tell him you love him, before he closes his eyes.

A night of firsts

Mid August:

we walk the empty neighborhood streets
against the cold, sharp wind -
none of us wants to get home.

I listen heedfully, he talks routine -
a frequent camouflage for his displeasure.
I should probably have written it down.

He would have liked it better,
to read an account of my anger and dismay
so he did not have to deal with my eyes.

It is a night of firsts:
First time I speak out -
I have a list, still manage to get lost.

First time he hugs me
like one is supposed to
hug a girl.

He lowers the guard
for the first time
and lets slip he fears I go away.

The bee charmer

Because they know of the mythical sweetness you hide,
they cross distances to dance around you,
tiny fearful hearts muted by the flap of their wings.

For the love of you, they cobbled
your lips and eyes together -
so they could tell your face apart from any other.

A blend of comfort and relief that they will
meet a destiny on the touch of your fingertips
for they can rest their tiredness upon familiar palms.

To tell me away

Dear G,

Even now you have started
studying ways to not let people close
I wanted to tell it to your skin
avoiding my fingertips
that I am also afraid.

I wanted to tell it to your eyes
on the rare occasions they find mine
that I am not going anywhere
that the only way to lose me
is to tell me away.

Ceci n'est pas un homme

Ladies and gentlemen,
I give you the prodigious man in the top hat
prepare to be diverted, for tonight he will perform
his most infamous trick.

Now even if you look closely,
you will see no rabbit -
Rest assured  it's not there.
I myself have been inside it once,

took the hat for the magician's heart,
ended up in a room in the devil's mind.
Do not be foolished by the many pictures
I have painted of him before, out of love and devotion.

Ladies and gentlemen,
I give you the spectacular man in the top hat
behold his elegantly fabricated smile,
before he vanishes through the hole in the hat.

(Share with The Real Toads)

The incog silences of green

I trusted the incog silences of green
to tell the story of how our lives
were interwoven
much before this encounter.

There was nothing about it in the sky,
this which draws us close,
they weren't our names
written on the tree trunks.

Still I find you where the sky begins,
you find me where the chaos ends.
You see, there is a line of ants
that collects our pieces together

with the fallen leaves.
Whoever crosses a forest
carrying someone else's heart to a secure place
has the right to the sun in the clearing.

(The incog silences of green is the title of one of my photo projects that can be seen here)

(Shared with The Real Toads)

Safe distance

History teaches me that
before we get too close
you will beat the retreat.

Before your dagger
touches my neck
and you're forced to

either look me in the eyes
or slit my throat
you will choose to

keep a safe distance.

Continuum

I wait within your silence
and replicate the emptiness
you left around.

I'm no longer afraid
of walking on my own shoes
through the darkness

or not knowing if
you'll ever be there for me
near or far or one day.

We are lucky to have been
a laughter,
a word,
a risk

to each other
for a day,
a year,

or the persistence
of what we called
continuum.



Eu espero no teu silêncio
e replico o imenso vazio
já não tenho medo

nem de caminhar com os meus
próprios pés no escuro
nem de não sabê-lo

longe ou perto ou nunca.
O que houve foi a sorte
de ter sido

por um dia, 
um ano
ou a duração de um infinito

uma risada,
uma palavra,
um risco.

To finally learn you

I have now gotten rid of mostly
every word I thought for you last year.
now they burn in my head among
blurred, naive memories

now they are ashes sprinkled
so far into the woods
the wind won't find them,
we won't see them again.

You come to me in a dream tentatively
because you know, being tired,
I'm likely to scream. Because you know,
being angry, I'm likely to forget.

Your smile touches the skin on my chest
I have been waiting outside in the cold for so long,
I want to use the time I have left
to finally learn you.

Lines

When the things you love
go all and each to a finger
in your right hand

and I'm left
walking in circles
on the other palm.

I skip the twists
but lose balance
on your fate line

I fall off
while tying the minor broken filaments
together

and fail to figure out
how exactly
our lives connect.

(Shared with the Real Toads)

A separation

I chase impressions of emptiness
with my eyes closed

and almost forget you're always saying
our uncertain feet

belong to roads
which only cross this time.

Yours and my shadow were close
throughout a slippery year

now I lose sight of you
before I can embrace your shoulders

you forget me
before the dust covers my footsteps.


De olhos fechados
persigo impressões no vazio

e quase esqueço como dizes
que os nossos pés incertos

pertencem a estradas
que só se cruzam nessa época.

Esteve a tua sombra ao lado da minha
por um ano escorregadio

agora afasta-se dos meus olhos
antes que lhe possa abraçar os ombros

paga-me antes que a poeira
me cubra os passos.

Wolffish-like

There is a deep sea creature
living the darkest
inside me.

It's regularly seen
playing
with my crocodile in the moat.

Sometimes I can't sleep.
I search the blackness
for the face of the monster

afraid to discover
it has
my eyes

afraid it
devours me
in a single bite.

In a dream the other night
it got so close
I nearly surrendered.

My arms and legs
so tired from the swimming.
My heart so dreadfully weak.

The birth of secrets

I watch you move
gradually farther
from my eyes.

Nothing prepares me for the winter of
words

or the silence of
empty days.

Nothing prepares me for the heartlessness

of closing words

or the roughness in your voice

the last time.

I watch you walk away.

In my throat, 

a collection of stories I trust no one else with.

The things lost

One.
I lose a grandma three months
after coming into the world.
She has me in her arms once.
I'm not taught her name.

Five.
I miss a school day in the hospital
to get a reminder stitched on my forehead:
children do not understand their legs well enough
to try and run as fast as leopards.

Six.
I lose my first milk tooth.
I throw it on the roof and
make a wish that
never comes true.

Twenty-one.
I lose a boyfriend to an earthquake in Turkey.
Rescue teams terminate the search.
My heart is never recovered
from under the debris.

Twenty-five.
I lose control over my mind.
I'm sad too often to know.
I'm prescribed
happiness pills.

Thirty-four.
I lose my voice for three days
after an argument.
I remain silent for six months.
Speech is compromised for life.

Thirty-six.
I understand
the things lost
never belonged to me.
I myself do not.

Time lapse

By sunset

he draws a line 

that crosses my chest

it goes from palm to palm - 

this is where we connect: 

below this line

we are alone.

By sunrise

the love I gave him

is not a solid enough home.

he yells,
I cry,
we speak in an alien tone,
we forget each other's skin.

House of stairs

I had a dream
you lived in Escher's house
and like two kids
playing hide-and-seek,

I searched you
behind doors,
between sky and water,
inside mirrors.

I couldn't find you.
In Escher's living room,
you were another illusion,
my personal impossible.

Not a word

Watching you
bewitch the guests with tricks
learned from forest beasts.

Waiting for your smile to meet mine
between an encounter with a wolf
and the sun among your trees.

Trying to determine
the ways in which a year changed you,
the ways in which a year changed me.

I find a place right below
my fifth rib to stash the thrill of
having you this close,

because I know you flee
at the sense of a maudlin word
and this time, I'd like you to stay.

(Shared with The Real Toads)

Five in ten thousand

Rigil Kentuarus 

Five years of distance,

five years of post office mistakes,

five years of undelivered affection.

Come the final hours

to the end of the world,

I'll wish we could sit outside and read

the universe on each other's palms

as we used to when we were young.

Tsih

I followed the spark in your eyes

and spiral danced around you like a beetle

before losing them for the dark night.

We learned each other's pitch

by watching words

come to light in the blackness

and used our hands to protect them

as if they were fireflies.

El Nath

A list of ways in which love is concrete:

in paper folded  boats,

in balloon elephants,

in black tea when I'm sick,

in a tangible invented world,

in the books we read,

in the waiting for Godot,

in Magritte.

Girtab

No one else finds me awake

after the 2 a.m. train,

I am not there for anyone else.

 I'm carried into my dreams

 by a whistle,

gradually fading in the separation,

sure to be soon lost in the distance
when you don't come.

Mirfak

You trigger me to

stare at my own spirit.

You wrap me 

in different strengths.

I show you the roof of my mouth

and am posed with your vast rib cage -

who would have thought 

of  a better hiding place?

(Shared with the Imaginary Garden)

The touch of dust

Dear M, I was there
when you left your coop
for the first time

a latent desire to
raise higher flights

you flailed your wings clumsily
and only sustained yourself in the air
 for a few seconds if that.

What I meant to tell you then
is that a body is a traveling cage
bound to the ground by the law of gravity

there is no freedom
in the tangible physicality

it's the touch of dust which
teaches we are made
of the same thing.

Like a bull in a china shop

For every tear I ever dropped there is now a crystal in my left kidney,

making it harder for light to travel through my body,
making it more difficult for me to choose radiance.

I had the choice to never let anyone else close to my heart.
But then there was you and I wanted you to see it so bad
I laid down my sword and shield and let you in.

You made your way inside me
like a bull in a china shop.

Touch

A list of ways in which we
haven't touched each other yet:

Your chest, my head.
Your lips, my breasts.
your hands, my thighs.

Your legs, my hips.
Your feet, my feet.
Your tongue, my sighs.

My back, your nose.
My teeth, your ears.
My arms, your fears.

My fingers, your days.
My scar, your weight.
My truth, your eyes.

To go into the world

To find your soul
a safe place on someone
else's cupped hands

and balance 

and words

and again a way.

Damaged as we have been,
broken as we are,
pieces of our bare selves -

It's for you,

the clean smile I wear
when I leave my body and

go into the world.

The boy who lived on the second floor

He would pull my hair,
run after me around the block
holding a caterpillar on a stick,
and call me stupid.

I would bite his arm,
spit on his head whenever he
walked under my window
and call him stupid.

We would throw spiny seed capsules

of the castor oil plants around
at each other all the time.

Until one Sunday morning
getting back from church,
he left a note under my door

which read (in horrible handwriting):
Will you be my girlfriend?
and I crossed the box under yes.


(Written for Susan's Midweek Motif over at The Poets United and Robert Lee Brewer's Wednesday prompt over at WD)

Eta Aquarids

On the peak of Eta Aquarids,

the entire universe skipping bed

in exchange for a shooting star

(except for me),

he wakes me up at two,

because he can't see East

from any of his windows

and maybe I could lend him

one of my wishes.

At two in the morning

on the peak of Eta Aquarids

we haven't seen each other in ages.

I tell him about my encounter

with Comet Halley in 1986

and how I finally understand
some things are not meant to stay. 

He continues not loving me,

but that's no longer on my list.

Pauli exclusion principle

I know for a fact, much before
Physics class in Junior High,
our neighbor's oldest son Marcus's tongue
uncomfortably chasing mine,
that two bodies cannot occupy
 the same space in time.

But there's nearness,
there's warmth.
There's this vacant spot
the closest from my chest,
right around my arms -
I am saving it for you.


(Started for Susan's Mid-week Motif on Science over at The Poets United. Completed for Fireblossom's Flash Fiction 55 mini-challenge over at the Imaginary Garden)

On the top of the tallest trees

And now I wish to admit
I ignored the clouds.

Last night there weren't
dreams or stars for me.

Still I went outside
for a walk with the cold wind,

the eyes of the universe resting
on the top of the tallest trees,

the night so quiet anyone would
become more pensive.

To the oracle at Delphi

How many times
have I said I love you?

How many times
was it true?

(you don't have the answer.)

Hurt

It's basic survival instinct.
When they are hurt
beasts will still attempt a final attack

before bleeding to death.
But how would you know that
not being yourself a beast?

Twenty-two

For the next few weeks
there is going to be
a trace of you
in everything I write.

you, who once owned my
uses of 'heart',
who once belonged on my
repetitions of 'love',

you will be found sitting
on top of the word 'blank'
or playing catch
around the letters in 'sad'

balancing on
'sleeplessness',
exploring the depths of
'void'.

The naive juggler

A fire torch, an apple, my heart.
one after the other
the juggler tosses them up.

They revolve around him
at the same interval of my pulse.
A club, a serpent, a book.

He throws them behind his back,
he twines them around his neck,
one after the other

I watch them as they fall.
The things heaved into the air
sometimes are missed on their way down.

Sunday morning

A dragonfly crosses my window
while I brew coffee only half awake.

The dogs wait for the first sunrays,
my mother attends Mass.

All things are in their best places -
my name on two or three blacklists,

your hand on someone else's chest.

April 19

Gathered in the yard
the women of my family
told the wind their sorrows.

How little my angst sounded
compared to theirs,
how little we all looked

lying among the stars.
We washed our feet
in one another's tears

a promise upon our lips -
to dance around sadness
wearing brave hearts.

Twenty-four

Because I can't sing you to sleep
I lull you with twenty something questions
and learn you in five hundred words.

There is a name for your first child
and an unknown favorite smell,
there is a lexeme I might never say.

There is an irrational fear of death
and a wish to live in a poem,
I write your soul a temporary shelter

I know you cannot stay.

Twenty-five

The night before your birthday,
when the last quarter moon lights up in the sky,
I'll be standing outside in the dark on my tiptoes trying to
glue all of my wishes for you onto Thatcher's shooting stars.

That there are as many ways as there are hours,
that you're dear to my heart even lacking superpowers,
that you won't ever have to hide your tears,
that I will love you for many years.

That I'd let you win in musical chairs,

that I will still be there when no else cares,

that you are beautiful with all the scars,

that I will always hold you fondly in my arms -

I am forever wishing you the very best.

(Lyrids meteor shower peaks on Earth Day this year. The morning after, one of my favorite people on Earth celebrates his twenty-fifth birthday. This is just a silly something from my heart to his. I will love you for many years, you annoying little thing.)

Silver lining

I had a dream
I had your arms
around my waist
and I forgot who I was
for the four minutes
we danced to each other
simple, sweet chat
in quiet little steps
swaying around
our living room.

There was a song
none of us knew
the words for
and we laughed
and twirled
and there was love
one could read
on the other's touch,
the other's smiling eyes.
I didn't want to wake up.

At random

They claimed we were a pest,
therefore we had to be eradicated.

They came in the middle of the night
and stole us from our lives like thieves,

burning down the windows we had flagged,
a path of lights showing the way home.

They brought us close to the flames
We had our wings and eyes scorched.

One hundred fearful blind moths,
we fluttered away at random.

(One hundred schoolgirls have been abducted in Nigeria today. I pray they are returned to their families safely and soon.)

As if this was an argument I could not lose

This is the space between our arms
: nine hundred kilometers.
I write you poems made of the words
I wanted you to read like Braille
directly on my lips.

This is the house I live in
with walls painted yellow-absence.
Contrary to what many might think,
it is not easy to find
furniture to go with the dye.

This is my collection of screams.
There are as many as the days
I had to learn without your imaginings
and laughter and words
I would hear from no other soul.

This is a fold in time.
You tell me repeatedly
you cannot be mine.
I bravely hold my position in space
as if this was an argument
I could not lose.

We've changed

You meditate.
I have tattoos.
We've changed.

You travel the world.
I write poetry.
We've changed.

You mail letters.
I don't answer.
We've changed.

You learned English.
I go out alone.
We've changed.

Unscathed,
the memory of the last time
our hands touched -

this stays the same.

Walls

The walls of this house
don't talk about the tears
the women of the house
have cried.

moldy smiles,
broken hearts,
and chinked souls

are secrets
safely kept
under four layers
of flowered wallpaper.

(Written for All about abodes prompt over at the Imaginary Garden)

Buried lakes

Water is discovered in Enceladus
at the same time my eyes run dry.

Dramatic plumes force their way out
through cracks in an icy crust

sitting over a sea of liquid water
at the moon's South pole

while tears are washed
down the open fractures of my orbits.

(Written for the SwampScribes prompt for NaPoWriMo Day 6)

(Saturn's Enceladus moon hides 'great lake' of water)

The amusement park when I was five

She let go of my hand
for a moment
to pay for toffee apples

and I drifted away,
my eyes chasing heights
in the Ferris Wheel.

For half an hour
I was an island
surrounded by

unfamiliar faces,
cotton candy,
vague noises

and colorful lights.

(Written for Cuyahoga County Library prompt for NaPoWrimo Day 6 and my own challenge over at the Imaginary Garden)

Grandmas

(image from my personal work archive)

After drawing a smiling woman

dressed in brown 

standing on long slim legs

she turns to me

with a question

because she's six

and apparently this

is something she

wasn't supposed to seek

but I'm a teacher

and I must know

everything there is

She raises an eyebrow and asks:

How long

does a grandma last?

To which I reply:

mine lasted up to eighty-eight

but that number will fluctuate

Mine lasted up to forty 

- she says, I guess.

No! Wait! Yes... yes.

The looking glass

One among seven billion people
when you're not trying to be
like everyone else.

Said the mirror.

(For Mirror, mirror over at the Imaginary Garden)

They lack the reason to make wise choices

We were what we were
and it was somewhat wise
when wise was a way.

Will wisdom still work
in a weaponized world?

(A Tautogram written for Found Poetry Review Oulipost 5)

(Source article: Deconstructing the Philosophies of RoboCop, by Alva Nöe for NPR)

To Mr. Vatn in Trondheim

(image from my personal archive)

Dear Mr. Vatn
it's been seven years
you filled a bottle with
loneliness and assigned it
to the sea.

It's been 2,556 days
I, who live 265 miles
away from the coast,
am the keeper of
your abandon.

Dear Mr. Vatn
there are 2,375,444
inhabitants in my city
but I couldn't feel
more left out myself.

From my kitchen
after dinner,
before doing the dishes,
I send you my best wishes
and hope your life is good.

Dear Mr. Vatn
it's the year 2014 and
you are not on Facebook.
I hope you still
write letters.

(Written for Fireblossom Friday over at the Imaginary Garden.)

(This is an original letter from a bottle found on the Northeastern coast of Brazil during summer vacation in 2007.)

The biggest lie

"She developed the most effective method of lying. She stayed close enough to the truth so that one could never be sure. She knew two other methods also -- either to interlard her lies with truth or to tell a truth as though it were a lie. If one is accused of a lie and it turns out to be the truth, there is a backlog that will last a long time and protect a number of untruths.” 

― John Steinbeck, East of Eden

I wasn't thinking it.
you are right.
I will love you for life.
I'm grateful you crossed my way.

I understand your motives.
It's fine.
I'll tell you why.
I won't miss you when you go away.

I forgive you.
You're a good guy.
I'm not going to cry.
I'll think about you every day.


(Cuyahoga County Public Library has been sending writing prompts to my e-mail for the month of April, and this is my response to today's: write a 12-line poem in which each line is a lie. Other than the John Steinbeck's words about lying at the top, Hitler's ones also came immediately to my mind: "they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods." Adolph Hitler,  Mein Kampf)

No answer

He

said

a prayer

asking for 

the waiting not to 

be long, but he had no return.

(Found Poetry Review Oulipost 4 asked of us to write a Fib with a variation that was so hard to write I failed it, so I'm sticking to the regular Fib, couting syllables in honor of the math in the challenge.)

(Source article: The boy who jumped beyond, in The Hindu) 

I wasn't allowed

I required as proper
a thing of some kind
to manage to live
or to be real
without any person
other than implied,

but I didn't possess
a characteristic state
of living
to engage in it
existing in possibility.

(Definitional Lit for the Found Poetry Review Oulipost 3)

(Source article: When I met Jane Goodall, she hugged me like a chimp, by Henry Nicholls for The Guardian, on 3 April 2014.) 
(Source line: “I wanted to be alone, but I wasn’t allowed.”)

A murder of crows

To come across
a murder of crows
and sit among them
to watch a soul
gain wings
and leave this world
in a storm of cries.

If you care to
account them,
they are twenty-five
indistinct voices
mourning for
a piece of life that
can't be recovered.

To walk among them
having nothing more solid
than silence
to offer in sympathy
for the painful darkness
hanging in the gaping space
left behind.

(Written for the Imaginary Garden prompt Avant-Edge and the Swamp Scribes NaPoWriMo Day 3 prompt)

(The Cardiff & Miller Gallery in Inhotim is home for the installation 'The Murder of Crows', one of the most remarkable sound experiences I've ever had. There are ninety-eight audio speakers mounted around the space on stands, chairs and the wall designed to create a wonderful work of physical sound to recreate the experience of being inside someone's head during a nightmare. It's hauntingly beautiful and a work that inspires me deeply. I've recently come across the entire thing on Sound Cloud, here is a link for the audio, but I do hope you have the opportunity to visit the installation if it comes to your area)

Exchanges

Your face
carved in a piece of wood.

My name
alone on a tree trunk.

This is what you exchange me for:
a final ride on the merry-go-round
before the amusement park leaves town.

Your head
on a hole on the ground.

My eyes
on a dying star.

This is what you exchange me for:
a definition of love the size
and endurance of a sugar cube.

Your ears
awake in the darkest nights.

My lips
in conversations with your absence.

Behind your resting eyes

I escape the poem while you sleep
and watch you from such small distance
that my chest nearly touches yours.

Who are you, bearer of my meanings?
Who am I when you move above the lines
on my palms and alters my destiny?

The world I know
vanishes, little by little,
behind your resting eyes.

(Written for Taking it to the streets, over at the Imaginary Garden)

Only if

If I were sure
he would  listen,

I'd tell him of how
when someone is open to love

the entire world
becomes responsive.

(A lipogram for Found Poetry Review Oulipost 2)

(Source newspaper title for letter exclusion: Bay Weekly) 

Commuters

This man on the bus

wears a faded brown shirt,

a window seat

and a ponytail, 

but never a smile.

He checks 

my shoes,

my hands 

and tattoos,

but never my eyes.

This man on the bus

carries a doubt,

a subway ticket 

and a fault,

but never a cry.

He owns 

a picture frame,

a yard and

a name,

but never a heart.

(Written for the State College of Florida Swampscribes prompt for NaPoWriMo day 1)

Brains and beauty

It might appear,
The Game and Play of the Chess
is not fitting nor seemly thing for a woman.

We built it slowly over the years,
a cautionary tale for the future:
what's true for men lasts longer.

A Quote Cento for Found Poetry Review Oulipost 1. 

Source article: The women of Westeros

Separate things

(Magritte, Infinite Gratitude - 1963)

As for who I was

leave it in the past

together with 

the settled dust

and the leftovers.

As for who I am

take it out for dinner

and journeys to places

my feet have never been to

not even in dreams.

(Ekphrastic poem for NaPoWriMo's early birds)

I learned this

I've searched the night
five weeks in a row
for traces of you.

There is a sleepless man
for every dog
barking in the neighborhood.

Each howl connects
to a soul's cry somewhere
in muted desolation.

To the first man who left

There are things
we kept secret after
growing up and apart.

Because they were
so dear to our hearts
they became treasures.

My most painful cry still
dwells on the very corner where
you announced you were leaving.

I never watched the stars
or the city lights with anyone else
from our spot.

I visit it occasionally and
you might be glad to hear that
birds live in our place now.

Someone planted a tree there
and its undisturbed shade
reminds me of your arms.

(Written for the Imaginary Garden Sunday Mini Challenge)

On Walmer Beach

My first encounter
with the sea happened
in southeastern Kent.

Had there been other people
on the beach, I would have
felt foolish for crying.

The water and the sky,
a gray-blue mix
of quiet and solitude.

The spots of poppies
among the pebbles,
the smell of licorice.

On my first encounter
with the sea we sat speechless
across from each other.

There was calm,
timid love in the waves
for me.

(Last night I dreamed of the sea, which I don't know, for the first time.)

Meant for the fire

Gli adulti (the adults) were always having 

conversazioni di adulti (adult conversation) while 

we sat around them and played 

with the flames of the old oil lamps,

i bambini della mia famiglia (the children in my family): 

lost in long conversations

with the salamanders.

Se ti bruci, ti spacco la faccia (if you burn yourself, I'll break your face)! 

- a loving promise.

Lascia soli i capretti (leave the kids alone)!  

- a protective cry. 

Le donne della mia famiglia (the women in family)

were all too busy 

for the fire spirits.

But we danced together and
learned some beauty from them:

that we can bear any inferno (hell), 

that skin cannot be our only belief, 

that a great deal of self-awareness is contained in pain,

that we are born from a quite unique spark

e siamo fatti per il fuoco (and we are meant for the fire).
    

(Written for Susan's Midweek Motiff: In two or more languages, I'm having a bad moment with my mother tongue, that's why I chose to go my third language, Italian. This poem is also shared with The Imaginary Garden)

To the naked eye

Was he the original Tom
to be blinded by Lady Godiva,

the last thing he saw
was freedom in nakedness

which he immediately embraced,
his eyes painted with dazzling whitish awe.

The liar paradox

Maybe that's because

you still visit my mind
when I am alone.

I think of how often
I would pass up my plans
to rest a song in your arms.

No one, no stranger 
would take notice of my 
absolute sense of emptiness.

“I'm very scared, Buster. Yes, at last. Because it could go on forever. Not knowing what's yours until you've thrown it away.” 

Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany's

-----

(Written for Margaret Bednar's Play it again challenge on The Imaginary Garden. My pick was #2 Kerry's challenge to write a poem inspired by a quote from Truman Capote's Breakfast at Tiffany's. The title is a reference to the line 'this sentence is false' in Gödel's first incompleteness theorem.)

Little Miss Red Hair

(image from my personal archive)

I follow Little Miss Red Hair 

around the yard and am visited

by Rousseau's ghost:

if she wants to take off her shoes,

if she wants to eat a a flower or two,

if she wants to chase the dog

among the garden plants,

if she wants to lie on the stairs,

if she wants to play with bugs,

if she finds the charcoal bag,

if she wants to climb the guava tree,

watch for traces of a younger you.

(Written for Herotomost's challenge over at The Imaginary Garden. Corey, I haven't been around much, but I've watched the children in my family play on the same yard I grew up in, I've watched them explore the corners of my little world and touch the magic in it. Your mention of Lewis and Clark reminded me my world got a lot bigger, but it's this yard my heart and mind will always come back to. For the record: the little girl on the photo is my second cousin.)

Obituary

When I die,
make sure
my obituary
reads:

she laughed,
breathed,
loved
and wrote.

(shared with The Imaginary Garden)

Aries and Gemini

The airless days of March
produce the clearest nights.

I know a girl who traced a map
going from Hamal to Pollux,

so her favorite boy on Earth could
always find his way back to her heart.

Tonight
somewhere,

a star is missing
no one will notice.

It's impossible to tell
when it was last spotted.

All this light in the city,
a man can easily lose the sky.

Ready to grow up

We have more than
the words we've imprinted
on each other's bodies.

There is a story of us
which told often
would help me dream.

Two or three times
I hesitated,
two or three times,

to climb that tree
up to the highest branches
to see the world eye to eye with you.

Had I not known
how far from the ground  I was
I might have gotten hurt.

Home

There was silence
above and below
there was silence

around and within:
Today the sky was
quieter than usual.

That is where
the eyes saw the truth.
Send me back.

Because I am weak.
When you can't love me
I wander off.

Send me back.
This heart won't change
while you sleep

and soon no road
will take me
home.

Happy place

Get home
cook for one
and eat alone
in the kitchen

longing for
the nights I'll rest
inside the stories
I'll tell my children.

We are always searching for home

In the end
this is what I was.

I was someone
you could always come to

with a question or silence
at three in the morning -

you'd find me there.
watching your sleep,

being protective of you.
Like a loyal dog.

Completeness

Since a very early age,

they told me that I was meant to serve,

that I would grow among people to heights

much beyond theirs but I should never forget 

where I came from - 

Use your strength in favor of the weak.

Learn to heal scratches.

Never get too attached.

I have taken names for the sake of true love,

I have cried reading over people's shoulders,

I have witnessed deaths and births,

I have been embraced.

I once fell in love with a man

who sat on the bench nearby and 

observed me for hours in silence.

His breathing around me felt like completeness.

(Written for a writing game with Matthew Temple)
(Note: the persona in this poem is a tree)

A space to disappear

Go for a swim in the deep waters
of your blue eyes to make friends with

the creatures living in your darkness
I know roughly nothing about you

but I have learned your waves
I have met your calm

when in a dream you came close
and gently touched my feet

leaving me on the sand
a space to disappear.

(To Matt)
(Shared with the Imaginary Garden)

Instead of sheep

cutouts from the day,
tomorrow's to-do list,
my choice of outfit,

unlikely romances,
happy endings under
unusual circumstances,

random fears,
the darkness of years,
monsters under my bed,

lines that will never make it to poems,
names for the children I won't have
reasons not to be sad:

A collection of things
on my mind late at night
instead of sheep.

(Shared with The Imaginary Garden)
(Edited four or five times - too much in my head...)

De-evolution

it all starts with me
learning new improved ways
of making the same mistakes

and then being unable to fix things
with the people I deliberately hurt
to avoid getting hurt myself.

(Posted to dVerse Poetics)