Author: poetryfest

wilting, if there must be one stem,
greenhouse cultivated,
one root of truth,
will the universe be lonely without us? Sappy, will it yearn
for we great apes
like a flower desires petals, colors ablaze
with new life?
Withering hope is soon plucked
from people’s pots,
no more symbolic buds, sly fragrance, or green thorns.
Astonishing, these stamens
and pistils! Doom
now pollinates our apologies. Soon, no more
crimson roses to say
“Forgive me”
to paramours wronged. The fated,
hellacious sun
is a dying blossom, too.
You and me,
jilted from all memories, unromantically forgotten
by wild loves—
foxglove, oleander, hemlock,
mountain laurel,
and all our poison enemies gone—all
oblivion. My one word,
like a dandelion against my lips to sum up the human bloom,
is not “love,”
for “disappointment” echoes,
then it doesn’t.

Ninety months since my mother’s last breath
but she returns in dreams about death
to tell of that shadow heart that drums
only for itself, that hollow home
of memory my flesh passes through,
that discard skin of forgotten folks
before my time who lived there and charmed
bright chrysanthemums, that living dream
that she wakes me into when I breathe
in and out to the skirr of crickets
as questions rummage my ransacked brain
for lame retorts. A last flower flames
as the light over the hillside fails
till the lifting moon recurs blood pale.

My uncle lives some hours away.
The family asked me to give him a call.
I have not spoken to my uncle in years.
The weight of my words will be magnified
By each year that has gone by.

There is no one reason why we stopped talking.
Nothing dramatic occurred or transpired.
I am sure that given the chance,
He would have continued to impart on me
Self-righteous opinions and right-wing theories.

He was part of my life when I was little.
I was drawn to narcissists even then.
They can be irresistible and charming.
So intolerable with their sense of entitlement.
But you don’t figure this out when you are little.

The question of what to say to my uncle is manyfold.
What does one care to say to someone
Who is a self-important misogynist,
Ladles disinformation and intolerance,
And does not think kindly of queer people.

What could one say to someone
Who is always toxic to his wife and daughter,
Brainwashing them so they think it is normal,
Poisoning the air in the household
With disquiet and distress as background.

What should one say to a person
Who is so ill, they lost the ability to speak,
And who happens to be dying.

Your left-wing dips.
You drift over sea stacks to circle back;

kite on a string attached to a spring.
Always the same game.

Your sleek beak, M’-shaped body
passes back and forth

my sea salt clouded windows;
hypnotic relief from the silly

rise and fall of stocks and bonds.
You soothe my sky-high vexation,

my groans over the pesky, hovering,
buzzing neighbor’s drone.

You put a smile on my face,
give me cause to mute my phone

and officially decree that it’s teatime,
popping a bottle of Cabernet.

I sip, time suspended
for when your Batman-like mask

comes back around, knowing you
are determined to feed your babies.

I bet the bank, your brown irises
will plunge into the drink, snatch a fish

I’ll see squiggling in your black talons’ spicules,
eventually disappearing

into slipping, sinking, pink sun.
You’ll figure it out.

You and I — remarkably similar.
No matter the predicament,

we always deliver for our families.
And you never flap your wings

or cheep cheep for attention.
Never spread mine while I ran

a company, and I never squawked
when fear crept in. Would I ever

be hired again or have to reassemble
pieces of my life for my sons and wife?

Never was fired, never laid off—
like Pavlov’s bell, we answer duty’s call.

Even when we lived freely,
floating between places and things,

we still demanded a punch list;
tendencies towards consistency.

We always figure it out.
Next week, I’ll pour wine

into a yellow bowl at cliff’s edge,
overlooking the drink,

where wild, orange daisies grow.
I’ll watch from my windows,

ignoring my neighbor’s drone
figure-eights, with a smile on my face,

glass in hand, waiting for you to grab
and clutch the surprise catch;

a black cod flopping about.
A slight twist to the same endless game.

A thunderous night
A bolt of light
And for a blink
The sky was white

The spectacle
I watch in awe
But from inside
Under the straw

Another flash
Another crash
The raindrops wild
While out they lash

A force so sheer
It sounded near
And slowly up me
Creeps the fear

I’m feeling chilled
But still I’m thrilled
Now fully covered
By my quilt

When nature throws
Her fateful blows
I hide
But still enjoy the show

Like the tides, life rises and falls.
At times, you’re soaring—
High,
Reaching toward the endless sky,
Your crest catching golden light,
Dancing in the sun.

And then—
You’re pulled low,
Crashing down,
Breaking hard,
A surge of force,
Scouring shores,
Leaving driftwood behind—
Fragments of dreams
That once were ships.

We, the sailors,
Adrift,
Charting unknown paths,
Searching for home,
Holding on
Just to make it
One more day.

And then comes the stillness—
A hush.
Waters calm,
Sky mirrored in a sea of blue.
No wind. No fear.
Just peace.
Just breath.

So when the skies darken,
And storms begin to howl,
When waves rise tall
And clouds press down—
Hold on.

Be strong.
The ocean cannot break you.
The storm cannot drown you.
Because you know:
Beyond every wave,
Stillness waits.
Peace returns.

Time had been canceled,
my forever was death
As eternity dawned
I inhaled one last breath
Then matter of factly
she announced like I knew . . .
“It’s a quarter till heaven,
And 15 minutes from you”

Surrounded by warmth
I did not understand
In the brilliance of light
she extended her hand
And lifting me upward
she said, “Lord what a view . . .
It’s a quarter till heaven,
And 15 minutes from you”

I thought to myself,
these are magical things
A halo casts sunshine
upon glorious wings
She softly confided,
“We touch only a few . . .
It’s a quarter till heaven,
And 15 minutes from you”

Beyond what she called
The Communion of Peace
She explained she had come
to delay my release
And she echoed the words,
“What is written is true . . .
It’s a quarter till heaven,
And 15 minutes from you”

Her message was clear
as she bid me farewell
From within we create
either heaven or hell
Now each moment on Earth
is her work that I do . . .
“It’s a quarter till heaven,
And 15 minutes from you”

women in my family whispered
of wealth long after it had left their hands
as if calling its name would recall it

your daughter once told me over tea that our family used to be rich,
that we used to own a one hundred room mansion
in that Western style that was good
for the time
she told me that jade ashtrays lined the hallways and smoke —
the men in our family have always smoked —
wavered through the air

she never told me if you lived in the mansion too,
or if that too slipped from your hands before you could hold it

grandmother, did you know that your daughter is scared of water?
or that the women in our family have never known how to swim until me?

your daughter tells me that once, your house flooded
in the countryside where earthquakes were so frequent you had
seven pots for each little head to protect their crowns
she tells me that when the water had broken your windows and
risen to your chest, you told everyone
to cover their head with a pot hoping
it would help
your daughter tells me now over the stove
that you never learned to swim either, but that you still can’t stand
the smell of singed water because grandpa was smoking
during the waters rise

grandmother, did you know that the government took the house away
from us in 1974
and will never give it back?
or that the day you died your daughter sat in JFK and called the American Embassy,
shouting “return” until she was thrown from the lounge?
either way, your daughter told me yesterday over LINE that you died at home in your jade bracelets
and your most comfortable slippers
and a pot over your head

grandmother, your daughter tells me that you still don’t know my American names because
it never translated
over
but that you asked always for me, murmuring for the stars over Fur Elise
I wonder if you know that I never knew your name either, but that I called you ah-ma
and never pronounced it right, always dividing the words a syllable too early
and an ocean too far
to make it sound
like “a mom”
instead

grandmother, did you know that my father hasn’t smoked since I was seven and choked on a panic
attack on the freeway?
or that your daughter hasn’t dreamt of waves crashing over her since we walked the shore of Jones
Beach?

grandmother, did you know that earthquakes hardly happen in New York City, or that I take
mandarin in school?
or that i do not whisper of wealth, but I write it —
which somehow makes it realer?

grandmother,
when the time came, did you remember, beneath
that pot over your head

did you remember that your granddaughter
knows
how to swim
now?

One week clean, addiction free, feeling utmost light at liberty.
I jitter through the halls, my tongue still tingles to my thoughts.
Two weeks clean, the road looks bright, untethered from my urges.
I turn back to view the drawer there, where I know it all began.
Three weeks clean, spiders web, along the handles of the box.
I can’t help but clean and dust upon the nooks, to tidy up here once again.
Four weeks clean, deja vu, I feel it’s here once more.
I peer again to the opened cupboard and clench my hands, just looking.
Five weeks clean, I bite my tongue, defeated once again.
Rapidly I drive my hand and reach for another cookie.

Fixated on a shallow enchanted pool,
he said: I’m looking
great, so fit, so heroic! Confident
in his sexual prowess, he soon pursued figure
modeling in Athens,
posing for statues, urns and such.
Something striking

about his looks, and being quite tall,
were among his
unearned
advantages to be showcased—especially, he
could be the perfect
“boy next door,” a real Spartan
if clean shaven.

He dated supermodel He
len of Troy,
met her on the red cobble
escorted by Paris.
Fashionista Aphrodite was there with Hercules,
and bad boy
Narcissus reflected upon …
a new seduction.

Persephone was hot, too, spending
her winters in Hades.
Hubris, you say? Narcissus
soon dumped looker Helen flat—too proud
to yield to any lover
(for long). Although many desired
him, he felt none

were worthy. A nonchalant bachelor,
he rejected marriage.
To wither and die, he reflected, lay on a path
to vows. He could see
the enchanted
pool glisten in the eyes of new lovers,
shallow as ever.