[x]

Dead Bird HeartI never noticed the way ash looks like feathers.

I become aware of the shores where my body
folds to meet itself, doubles over so that my hair
seems to grow like roots into the ground

keeping me from ever lifting my head again.

Of all the things she told me, she missed this one:
what to do with the ashes.

Hers is a dead bird heart—
grey-haired and grey-feathered.
She is paler than she has any right to be,
ashen—

But her eyes are open, and she can see the sky
where a roof once was.

Half-Past a Different Kind of BrokenTrauma looks like my kitchen clock.
The hours,
minutes,
they are dead
and the second hand stutters,
heartbroken.
I imagine every inconsequential twitch
is a plea for the freedom
it will never see again.
When its futile heart finally gives out,
I won't try to fix the timepiece
because after all its wasted sufferings,
allowing again such a disjointed tic
would be a deeper level of cruelty.

The Watchmaker's Lover - RevisionYour clockwork appendages
were cold to the touch.
The industrial complex of your mind
was grating gear against gear
where the unoiled works
kept clacking away; your atrium
was a tick-tocking machine
that counted the hours while the rust settled in.

The mainspring spiraled round
your mechanical heart tensed
so tightly it showed in your face,
in your quivering hands,
your troubled eyes.
The unlubricated escapement never
released, oxidized into place
from ages of neglect.

Your lonely footsteps echoed
under orange gaslamps submitting
to the glare of red lanterns.
Used parts are yours for the taking;
here, a hairspring; there, slender
legs unde

Serendipity and SnowfallI am la vie en rose,
a newborn with as many mini bones in my body as possibilities.
Lovelily,
I am potential waiting to be tapped into.
I am a spectrum of light,
serenity in the symmetry of a snowflake.

I come veiled in lace from everlasting love's womb with my budding,
fresh,
goose-flesh tucked tenderly underneath.
I spread my spirit wide,
outstretching my feather-tips &,
supplicated by twizzles,
I catch my ballerina's foot & fly.
In these fleeting,
finite moments of ubermensch suspension in multiple salchows comes clairvoyance,
a kindness beyond the absolution of mundane minds.

With the key to perfection being repetition,
I pray you

Va'eiraThis was a lesson in just how quiet it can be
when you don't make enough noise.

Me, holding a toy gun to a stranger's head
"Remember when things stopped being ridiculous?"

You, eating dandelions in a midnight field
"About the same time things stopped making sense."

A boy in church camp carved a small crucifix
for his arts and crafts project. He won the blue
ribbon and a brand new Bible. The next morning
I found it hanging over our cabin door.
A toad was nailed to the cross.
Still breathing.
Still breathing.

Sometimes we wake up early enough to hide the evil from our world.
Still breathing.

Harvest MoonThree a.m. moonlight
across lazy dust motes; a
tree scrapes the window.
Your arm weighs on my hip like
whispered promises of love.

and I still keep running into parked carsMama,
your baby girl's swimming
in dead of the night
hair, scarred knees,
overgrown weeds, and
countless pairs
of shoes-
with those
orange and yellow wheels
that hug my toes
and heels

I'm running into
parked cars
trying to get
my kite to fly
and hiding under
dashboards
listening to you
fight

I'm rummaging through
boxes of secrets
that Daddy tried
to hide-
solving puzzles with pieces
I'll never uncover
in these thoughts
of you

to a womanYou see it coming from the men.
You see the ways their eyes linger on you
When they're looking around the room
The way their bodies brush yours when you're walking through the hallways to class
The way they stutter and look away when apologizing for the accidental contact of skin to skin
You see it coming from the men.
You never see it coming from me.

God, was the world not complicated enough already
Without causing me to notice the interplay of textures in her hands
The calluses like mahogany mountains carving ridges of stone
Into her palms softer than Impressionistic sunlight?
I'm not supposed to feel this way about another woman

gullsbone white gulls skirling
low over the purling waves
calling down the stars

OrnithologyI sometimes imagine us,
Years down the road, sitting
On the patio of a London bistro
Much more sophisticated than we are.

We'll waste the afternoon drinking tea
As impolitely as we can.
We'll chat too loudly about absolutely nothing,
But with such authority the woman one table over—
The one with the ugly scarf,
Because it's always the one with the ugly scarf—
Will mistake you for someone famous.

We'll spend the next hour reminiscing
Youthful conquests, like Cleopatra might,
Or Anne Boleyn.
Then we'll make-believe
Like nothing's wrong with us.

We'll call it a day—
Find a good pub and drink a bottle of gin,
Each—
After watchi

Mermaid ThirstPortrait of the lost:
broken sails hang, curtaining
moody horizons.

The sea spray breathes promises you know can't be kept; in your thirst, fantasy thrives. From
ashore, the crash of the waves and the call of the gulls is a melancholic lullaby. The
night slips, black-out curtain thick, across the horizon and you shiver, just once. For
ghosts, memory-trapped and water-logged, the dark abyss is a seashell, a clam
locked tight and waiting to be broken apart. A subtle dystopia
exists here, the sea a starving monster, the sky a ticking time bomb. You'll forget Miami,
despite the family you left there, and dive deep, hoping to find her. Your

InfernoSeptember is a sultry tangle
of curly hair and corduroy jackets stretched
over broad shoulders that I've been leaning on,
metaphorically.

He won't press for answers
and I won't trouble him with my problems.
So he complains about the weather –
he's never gotten used to these sticky, southern delta summers –
while I hold the door
and press the call button.

The half-lit elevator drops us off above Dante's first layer.
I feel sorry for anyone beneath,
but I've indulgences to buy
and my own hell to return to.

But there's a light in my pocket –
abandon not all hope,
and

smile.

DandelionsI remember,
When I was just a little kid
In spring,
I would pick dandelions.
My mom told me not to pick them
Because they were weeds.

"But mom," I would argue,
"Dandelions are flowers,
Not weeds!"

I remember
Not being able to comprehend
How something so pretty
Could be a bad thing.
Besides,
They weren't hurting anyone.

Now, I wonder-
Who is more at fault?
Me,
For judging by looks
Or my mom,
For judging by labels.

But one thing I am sure of;
Neither of us
Gave dandelions
A fair chance.

AffannatoIf my ribs were weighted keys,
I'd play you an ocean song that tips you
right off the edge of the earth,
and clinging to my last phrase, you'd say
'what a tragedy, what a helpless dreamer,
such a beautiful pair of lungs gone to the dust'.

And night would hold us in that distant desperation,
playing our heartstrings so we couldn't keep up,
no, not with that soulful, off-tempo portrait
of who we could have let each other become.

I'll crawl back to bed on my bare boned knees
and when I wake to the black holes you've burned
into the sheets you and I were 'us' on,
I'll write you a desert song
about how I jumped off the edge of the earth
and yo

tick...tick...tick...i've seen four seasons pass this window,
and now this bookmark finds its place;
it signals not a rash crescendo,
just a steady, metronomic pace.

and now this bookmark finds its place
in the concordance of my life;
just a steady, metronomic pace
somehow beyond both joy and strife.

in the concordance of my life,
it signals not a rash crescendo;
somehow beyond both joy and strife,
i've seen four seasons pass this window.

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Collisions and Invisible LinesOur molecules collide
Within creases smoothed by the promise of rain,
Clouds beyond the reach of this steel bird's wings.
All the frozen lakes look flawless from far away
And I see
No boundaries
but the roads that guide us from one life to another.

Rosy pollution cheeks
And golden glow sunshine streaks
Pour forth streamers into blue islands between the seas,
Proudly displaying scraps from when
Life was easy
And innocence
was freedom.

Our molecules collide.

The Stone .6

"Well, gents," said the elf who seemed to be captain. He smiled at the extravagant houses around him. "Enjoy yourselves." H stood and watched his crew charge. Within moments there were shrieks from inside the homes. "Remember the rules!" the elf bellowed. "No one is to be harmed. That means you, Varja!" The elf turned his kind brown eyes on the humans who watched him. "What, never seen an elf before?"
"No." Aislinn replied. Despite her mounting anger at what the ship's crew was doing, she couldn't help but sense that she could trust the captain. "Why are you robbing these people? Why steal what they have rightfully earned?"
You should have

Untitled IVangels and the smell of
destiny
locked between hearts
and pentagrams
sickly sweet candle smoke
i am weary and
you are home

Beautiful Words: BiographyToday
A ribcage made of cloud drifted
Across the path of the sun
And I wondered if the heart of the universe
Was up there,
If it was as ethereal as the shape around it.
Where is ours?
It is buried somewhere at the heart of a labrynth,
At the soul of time's greatest enigma.
There are empires we cannot see
Suspended between water molecules,
Between the synapses connecting thoughts of here and destiny.

There is such glory in the imperfections,
The differences.
Winding stone stairs climb
To cliffs and the sea,
And there is nothing left but a leap of faith.
Faith in ourselves.
Faith in all of us.
There are such beautiful words

Beautiful Words: FantasiesDesperate hopes.
Why won't these tears fall?
Remembering the fauns and a time before
The world was old.
When love was new
And faeries in the sky
Traced diamonds on the moon.
I once knew how to fly.
And now I long for dragon flights
And glorious battles against wicked foes
And the destruction of demons immortal.
Wishing that the elvish songs would carry the world away
But knowing
That all the waiting in the world won't make me able to fly.
I must make my own path out of the woods.
Only I can find the open sky.

Beautiful Words: AnthologyDifferences in Photographs
Many brilliant faces.
Lovely chaos and confusion.
Have you ever watched the patterns
In the shades of pink,
Of amber brown?
There is no imperfection in the glory
Of the smiles.

Glimmer
Candles
And the beauty of the stars.
How varied the goodness.
Even the palest heart knows the truth.
Pearls in hymns and silent providence.
Divinity nestled in the curves of vaulted ceilings.
Where is the sin in deviation?

Choiceless
Desperate hearts
Cannot be abandoned
To the gutter's concrete hiding places
Beyond the salvation of streetlamps.
There is only impulse.
Dream on, lovers.

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Santa Fe de Bogota

by =AzizrianDaoXrak, Nov 27, 2012, 7:42:55 AM
Literature / Poetry / Emotional / Free Verse

Simón Bolívar found you como una Flor de Mayo.

I know that in your swelling city heart
you long por el mar, por la sal del mar,

but instead you straddle the roads,
hunker down over your landscape and breathe
your car fumes, inspiras las fumas como sombras,
espiras tranquilidad inquieta.

Colombia, madre, you have become
bloated in your old age, have grown your
ankles, pálidos e inflamados;

you should have been a sea lion,
morena y rapida y a la cresta como la espuma.

Mi alma, I will bring you the sea salt to run through your hair,
diamonds with which to crown your mane.

Santa Fe de Bogotaby =AzizrianDaoXrak

Literature / Poetry / Emotional / Free Verse

If you're interested, I've recorded a version being read aloud

You can download here: [link]

Edit 2: Featured as a DLD on 12/31/2012. Thanks so much to ~shebledgreenink for featuring! Check out the others here: [link]

Edit: Thanks to *Scarlettletters for the wonderful feature! [link]

The title is supposed to have accents in it: Santa Fé de Bogotá [which should be pronounced SAHnta Fey dey BohgohtAH]
Inspiration and soundtrack: [link]
Translated version:

Simón Bolívar found you like an orchid.

I know that in your swelling city heart
you long for the sea, for the salt of the sea,

but instead you straddle the roads,
hunker down over your landscape and breathe
your car fumes, you breathe the smoke like shadows,
breathe unquiet calm.

Colombia, mother, you have become
bloated in your old age, have grown your
ankles, pale and swollen;

you should have been a sea lion,
brown and quick and cresting like the sea foam.

My soul, I will bring you the sea salt to run through your hair,
diamonds with which to crown your sea-mane.

Written for the theme "Bogota" for my 100 Poem Project. Also written for the #theWrittenRevolution monthly prompt using the word
monachopsis
n. the subtle but persistent feeling of being out of place, as maladapted to your society as a seal on a beach—lumbering, clumsy, easily distracted, huddled in the company of other misfits, unable to recognize the ambient roar of your intended habitat, in which you’d be fluidly, brilliantly, effortlessly at home.
(For similar words, see here: [link])

As you notice, I took some inspiration from the definition

I'm planning on recording myself reading this, because when I write in Spanish, I write for the sound. The other problem with writing in Spanish, is I'm really trying to write for native Spanish speakers, so I'm trying to make use of all the possible meanings of the words I've chosen, if that makes sense.

Perhaps a better way to say it is: translations are never perfect, and I write my Spanish poetry specifically to create spaces where meaning can grow between the original and the English translation. I therefore suggest that those of you who don't understand Spanish look at the original and the translated version together and try to figure out all the meanings the Spanish might have. (You can now download and listen to a reading of it on my sta.sh: [link])

Questions for critique:
Spanish speakers - did I do it right???
Do you think the Spanish contributes to the piece? Are there places where it feels unnecessary?
What do you think of the repetition?
Do you like the sea lion imagery? Does it feel strong enough to you?
How well do you feel I've used the definition of the word?

Thanks for reading!

Critique for

[link]

Critique by ~randomphilosopher Nov 27, 2012, 11:56:33 AM

I am a Spanish major, and am not qualified to say much yet, as my Spanish is still fledgling, but I did understand a fair bit of it.

I am a novice poet, but perhaps I can critique anyway? The word "inspiras" confuses me... I may be missing a meaning of it, but perhaps it should be "aspiras"? Also, I am not sure about the word "sombres." Other than that, I believe that yes, the Spanish does add a great deal to it. It brings forth the spirit of the country, which makes me happy. I know just the tiniest bit of Colombia, but I believe you have captured it beautifully.

As for the repetition, I believe you have just the right amount. In no way is it overdone, but as it is, it gives the piece a feeling of longing and grows the image of her disquiet, as in por el mar, por la sal del mar and bloated to inflamados.

As for your definition, I love how you've applied it to Colombia! I can easily see how Colombia would be a sea lion ever clumsy in her awkward cities, but longs to release herself in the quiet or vicious beauty of the sea. I wish I could say something more intelligent, but alas!

The only part I am on the fence about is the ending. I know my first few reads I found it weak, but the more I read it, the more I came to understand it and loved it. I only use that to explain why I mark off on impact - though that may be just my little foible.

What do you think?

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~falcorn0squirrel Jan 19, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

I love that one line "you should have been a sea lion" its thought provoking

=AzizrianDaoXrak Jan 19, 2013 Hobbyist Writer

Thanks very much ^^

=tonepainter Dec 31, 2012 Hobbyist General Artist

Congrats on the DLD; this is beautiful!

=AzizrianDaoXrak Dec 31, 2012 Hobbyist Writer

Thanks so much!

*lombregrise Dec 31, 2012 Professional Writer

great piece, very original! bravo!

=AzizrianDaoXrak Dec 31, 2012 Hobbyist Writer

Thank you! ^^

*soldierofnightmares Dec 30, 2012 Hobbyist Writer

A very beautiful piece!

=AzizrianDaoXrak Dec 31, 2012 Hobbyist Writer

Thank you!

=DailyLitDeviations Dec 30, 2012

Your wonderful literary work has been chosen to be featured by DLD (Daily Literature Deviations) in a news article that can be found here [link]
Be sure to check out the other artists featured and show your support by

ing the News Article.

Keep writing and keep creating.

=AzizrianDaoXrak Dec 31, 2012 Hobbyist Writer

MEEP That's so awesome!

Thank you!

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