LeTaon

Me dog keeps barking like it knows what it hates. 

It has a way of confirming its argument. 

I write my lines in full sentences. 

Because it feels like a dormant indictment. 

My dog hates cats, apparently. 

It doesn’t know a cat’s stipulations.

But it doesn’t care, errantly.

 It has no political sentiments. 

Fighting dragons is easy,

 Just run around the ancient roofless halls 

And look for the moment to 

Slay it. 

The ‘moment’ here means ‘opportunity’. 

Eat this fruitless cake. 

But, 

And we know that everything that comes after but is, 

Well, is nothing. 

Killing dragons is easy. 

The real ones, I mean. 

But there are other dragons that take a little 

Space 

Once 

At 

A 

Time. 

                                                Sijo I

The spring ravaged the restfulness 

                                of a common abode, spilling its peace. 

Tomorrow battles the morn of calm 

                               like a poet scuffles his rhymes. 

Forgiveness is a prize for those 

                               who are guilty and for us.

                                               Sijo II

Mountains stand like ridges of 

                              proud giants, breaking dreams. 

The dimness of a morrow 

                              wakes up the hopes of a day, but 

the serpent of the road 

Pale windows tolerate the knocking of naked branches, 

overgrown with transient waters, 

waters that have neither dreams nor deaths. 

A handful of warmth left after a lingering winter 

is what’s left to deliver to us. 

The sea of our guilt leaks through the fissures in time. 

Next to us aging memory sits close, 

holding ellipses of candle light in its palms  — 

light like gulls painted in black over dirty walls 

and ringed by lunar gleams — light left to deliver to us. 

Reanimated mouths empty glasses full of a robust sorrow 

Hope lives in the past. But not in the distant 

one, playing in Eden and forging traditions. No. 

Hope lives in the past seized by family photographs, 

where Grandpa’s alive, so is Dad; 

where they are younger that I am now. There, 

in the gloss of those white and black images 

the hope is captured like Browning’s Porphyria, 

The campfire is cheering, flickering, 

unrestricted by big city lights. 

   The river’s skin whitens its shimmering 

obfuscating the rustic paysage. 

     The trees imply prospects of frailty 

from abaft, emphasized by the light 

    in façade. Like the hair on the back has its own 

sensory follicle, hinting glances 

    of menacing beasts. Sparks from woods 

gorged by rapid loss of electrons 

    disappear among stars, reaching nebulas 

and return back as mosquitos and flies. 

    I am sitting on the top of a celestial body. 

Here, under my hands, from the surface of the planet, 

A child points at things and demands signs This is sky This is a rock This is a dragonfly This is a tree Wha … What? Why what? Why

the clouds are white? the rock falls down? the dragonfly flies? the tree . . .

A child sees a tree a child learns that this tree is not like others a child learns the tree’s name

this tree gives the child its first sword this tree is the child’s first castle or a first battleship or a spaceship he breaks his arm falling off this tree and tears his holiday shirt the one he wasn't supposed to wear climbing that tree knowing that  the tear is bigger than the fracture

he burns the brunches of this tree to see magic and stories of fear and valor and life and death and giants and dragons and wizards and queens and soldiers and aliens and sultans and djinns and Vikings and harlequins and archers and knights and witches and dancers and fathers and mothers and daughters and sons and Gauls and Saxons and Slavs and Goths and Khans and Indians and Aztecs and Mayas and voyagers and explorers and villains and merchants and mashujaa and gods and lions and elephants and spiders and witchers and yogs and alchemists and basilisks and mavkas and tsars and viziers and serpents and towers and crows and galaxies all are dancing shadows on his face and

When I was six, 

my mom used to say that 

I am like a laden donkey, 

accepting all the cargo endured. 

She said it after she saw me with 

my backpack on my shoulders, 

a bag full of music scores in my left hand, 

a violin case in my right one, 

and a clarinet case, hanging on my left shoulder,

facing the world. 

Oh, and I had a cellophane bag 

with my notebook 

handing on strings around my neck, 

like an umbilical cord. 

Now I carry different things, 

formless things that are shapeless, non-tactile but… 

galore like a memory of 

an umbilical cord 

that prevents oxygen to 

turn into carbon dioxide, 

painting skin in blue, 

Did you know that the Puss in the Boots was not orange? 

He was not orange 

he was not nice 

he lied to the people 

he took their land 

he took someone’s castle 

(yes, that someone was bad, but…) 

he forced a king to force his daughter 

to marry someone fake. 

At the time, they called this behavior ‘clever.’ 

Andersen’s ugly duckling 

was not the other, 

but an aristocrat lost among poor. 

Two hundred of Grimm’s tales 

had three good fathers and 

sixteen awful step-mothers; 

two good wizards and 

twenty-three wicked witches; 

ones always concerned with 

‘Who’s the Fairest of Them All,’ and 

ones actually saving the day. 

Aladdin was Chinese and 

Humpty-Dumpty was Colchester’s cannon, 

defending the king against 

Cromwell’s men. 

all the king's horses and all the king's men 

cannot put Humpty-Dumpty together again 

She has nice hands. 

I like them. 

When she moves them, 

the muscles create little shadows because 

she has strong hands. 

Her arms look good too, 

but the hands look better. 

I saw hands like hers in the past. 

Those hands were older, 

those hands worked longer, 

those hands are no more 

Her hands remind me of a rye field: 

the shadows are short but colorful; 

the wrinkles are blossoming; 

and the mirror of nails looks like a dew. 

Her hands will change. 

I am afraid not to be subtle enough to pierce the thinnest fabric,

as my anapests, dactyls, and spondees stress proper issues.

I am afraid not to be loud enough to elevate the decibels to 

the intolerable spectrum, harmonizing frequencies of mixed wavelength   .  .  .

You sound too smart

I know that because I know

the sound of my voice.

Your made-up appearance

is noticeable by most

but I don’t see it.

Your smile is wasted

on so many people I don’t like, but

I like it.

Your words are spilled

not in the sense I think they

are spilled.

Your hair is thin&

light, just like mine

but better.

Sometimes I think I don’t know you and

you don’t know me

but here we are

I woke up in the middle of the night 

coughing                            because 

I fell asleep suddenly 

without last glass 

of water 

without saying goodnight 

to 

anyone 

without letting my lungs to expel 

the air of the last day 

with a sudden 

sharp 

The scream interrupted poetic thoughts

turning into a melody of unaccepted desires.

Dark-blue of the greasy sky turns

darker

as the time embraces its potential.

Tama-tama-tama-tum.

Ironclad argument slices the piece of a family reunion.

Yet,

the blue of the sky

enjoys its forced change of color

because it is common knowledge:

people

shall

not

find

themselves

marvelously