Category: Poetry

Categories
Poetry

Amnesty of Form by Asad Latif

The Dance of Muses by Louis Candide Boulanger(1806-1867) Courtesy: Creative Commons
AMNESTY OF FORM

(For Siddhartha)

The departed fare well in art.
Karan's  broken heart 
fell with him in Kurukshetra
on the wrong side of history.
We still live in mourning,
seeking refuge in mysteries
of the Mahabharata
to redeem him in our longing.

Hasan's brother Hussein perished
in Karbala. I don't like the way
the city's so beautiful today
after Iraqis were reduced to dust.
But that's the point. The Marsiya of Anis
rises from these passing storms
to find two boys whom the Prophet
once held in his arms. They never rust.

Antigone's gone the way of her
brothers and Creon. All equally dead.
But look! There waits mad Sophocles.
He's breathing. He's writing. He's read.

And Stratford's always around.
Ophelia's in Hamlet drowned
and Desdemona died chaste.
Their unrequited lines 
won't let an honest English word
ever go to waste.
With Cordelia they sit adorned
to shape redemption into a tear.
Most art's a footnote to Lear.
 
But not all poems have been written.
"This one's for Lenin," she said
of her grenade to the Nazi tank ahead.
Who were you, my one-girl Soviet?
Herein I name you Land of the New
to honour Comrade Death.   

Oh Muses of uneasy morn,
people pass. Poets are reborn.
Grant to this play of transience
your final asylum of form.

Asad Latif is a Singapore-based journalist. He can be contacted at badiarghat@borderlesssg1

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Categories
Poetry

Poems by John Grey

Courtesy: Creative Commons

THE FOREST COMES BACK AFTER THE FIRE

I'm not the maple yet.
More of that tall pine from Norway.
or a fruit tree you wouldn't recognise
from your brief lessons in biology.
Already, in my branches,
fifty crows caw,
a thousand squirrels’ nest.
I face west where one dark lake
is my left hand;
and then east,
where a rocky escarpment
fills in for the fingers on my right.
My torso is, as yet,
a dark burnt patch
interrupted by a few green seedlings.
But soon enough
I'll boast a chest


A BOY THROWS ROCKS INTO THE LAKE

He'll never run out of rocks
and that lake is going nowhere.
And the splash is seductive, I expect.
It's not a loud noise but it's of his own making.
But, eventually, cold gray rock
won't be enough to satisfy his sense of touch.
And the lake will be such a lazy target.
Maybe he'll toss a leaf on the waters,
watch it float.
Or fish at its edge.
Or paddle a canoe into its center.
Or when he's old enough, he'll bring a girl here,
wrap his fingers around hers,
stare out at the glittering water together.
He'll hug her slim waist,
kiss her trembling lips.
The rocks won't move.
The surface won't ripple.
But the earth is a different story.


DARK OF THE DAY

When I learn to see,
the day will not be dark.
Maybe blue and green.

Like the blue and green of childhood.

When I had a voice.
And now I cannot speak any colour.
I can only write it down.

And when I learn to see,
the page will not be blank.
I will know what I have written. 

Like when I had a mind
and I could understand it as well.

I can only feel the words
and there is no blue or green in them.

They are colourless.

When I learn to see,
there’ll be payback
of a florid kind.

John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in Sheepshead Review, Stand, Poetry Salzburg Review and Hollins Critic. His latest books are Leaves On Pages, Memory Outside The Head and Guest Of Myself, available on Amazon. 

PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

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Categories
Poetry

Lunch Time

Written in Korean and translated by Ihlwha Choi 

Courtesy: Creative Commons
LUNCH TIME

Magpies eat the cat's lunch after the feline finishes.
Sparrows eat the leftovers after the magpies finish.
Since a monk gave the cat something to eat,
The cat ate lunch with relish.
The magpies and sparrows also were satiated. 
After all finished their lunch,
The monk entered his sunbang* to take a nap.
The cat climbed to the hill to rest in the shade.
The magpie and sparrows scattered in the field to play with friends.

*sunbang(禪房):A room for Zen meditation at a Buddhist temple

Ihlwha Choi is a South Korean poet. He has published multiple poetry collections, such as Until the Time When Our Love will Flourish, The Colour of Time, His Song and The Last Rehearsal.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Categories
Poetry

Performance Poetry by Dee Allen

Dee Allen
IMMENSE RIVER

On and off 
Erratic activity
Storm cloud convergence
Climate's hostility

This year's winter rain
Shown up full force
Descending upon us
Impaling pitchforks

Landslides, mudslides,
Service roads gone concave
Car sinks into gaping sinkhole
Stormwater comes in a wave

Flooded main streets
Arrive with merciless wind
Staccato rhythm of raindrops
The house roof might cave in

Leave town for higher ground
California's battered—disturbed climate's powers
Hot months—Cold months
Season of fires—Vicious showers

Outflow intense from the immense
River from the sky—
Continued use of coal and oil
Brought this on—some still deny.


LEAST LIKELY

Canyons have splendid broad-gauge views.
Beaches offered the same treasures, too,
As had forests where pine trees grew,
But see me in the desert? Not likely.

Sunny plains are pleasant—Not!
Treeless, unbearable, exceedingly hot.
Lack of lakes—what that terrain's got.
Will I visit the desert again? Not likely.

From longest road to highest bluff,
Every mile's similar—dry and rough.
Death Valley in Nevada—that was enough.
My chances of waltzing through desert again? Least likely.


BATDAWN

What makes this
New Mexico sunrise
So different
From others?

The bats
Are returning
En masse, animated
Cloud of leathery wings drift

To Carlsbad Caverns'
Caves from a long
Night's flight
Of freedom.

Dee Allen is an African-Italian performance poet based in Oakland, California USA, with 7 books and 67 anthology appearances, currently seeking a new publisher.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

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Categories
Poetry

It Happened Again

By Alex Z. Salinas

IT HAPPENED AGAIN
(for D.B.)

Today at the bookstore 

A poet introduced himself to me

We tossed up the same scribes

The same publisher (surprise)

Conversation flowed 

More than I wanted it to

But big bro had to’ve been on Decade 5 

The case of the slow chase

And he knew I too was on his same side

Come to my next gathering, he invited 

(Writers and painters and coffee breath, oh my)

Your book is here in the store, he inquired  

Moments later he remarked on a mad tale  

With New Yorker’s flair:

“Polished stuff, you can tell”

Then out into Van Gogh’s evening I sailed

Because I was dog sick drowning and had to 

Because the moment I’ve died for 

Arrived— 

The end flashing again like a cult film:

Them returning my cold raw heart on their own time.

Alex Z. Salinas is the author of poetry collections WARBLES and DREAMT, or The Lingering Phantoms of Equinox. He is also the author of a book of stories, City Lights From the Upside Down.

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Categories
Poetry

Cold Black Coffee

By Anjali V Raj

Courtesy: Creative Commons
It’s drizzling outside
I make a quick cup of steaming black coffee
Having the liberty to enjoy the warmth over the cold
The strong aroma is hanging around me
Just as I begin to take a sip from my coffee
My little nephew mewls from his cradle
I reluctantly run to prevent his deafening screams
I come back; my coffee mimics the weather
I gulp it down along with my unsettled resentments 
The bitterness overrides the sweetness on two spoons of sugar
Neither did he have the patience nor did I

Anjali V Raj is a natural science researcher from Kerala, India. She has recently published a few of her works on online platforms like Down to Earth, Café Dissensus Everyday, Borderless Journal and Times of India Reader’s Blog. Most of her poems are published on her WordPress blog (Outburst of Thoughts).

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles

Categories
Poetry

Air Traffic Control Has Never Heard of John Denver

By Ryan Quinn Flanagan

Courtesy: Creative Commons
The busiest airport on the continent –
air traffic control has never heard of John Denver,
I can hardly blame them, the job takes extreme focus;
did he lose his luggage? some caffeine-wired Pixie cut 
tries to be helpful.  He lost a lot more than that, I say.
YOU AGAIN? the shift supervisor walks in with his 
three cream, four sugar Tasmanian Devil mug
and I tell him he would make a great sumo wrestler 
with such a low center of gravity, but the Flat Earthers 
aren’t having it so the muscle is called in, in a sudden fit of protein 
to push me down those metal exterior stairs 
that lead back to baggage claim and all those husky four-legged 
drug sniffers that work their way up your leg while 
the 10:45 out of Dulles disembarks.

Ryan Quinn Flanagan is a Canadian-born author residing in Elliot Lake, Ontario, Canada with his wife and many bears that rifle through his garbage.  His work can be found both in print and online in such places as: Evergreen Review, The New York Quarterly, Borderless Journal, GloMag, Red Fez, and Lothlorien Poetry Journal.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

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Categories
Poetry

The Language of Dreams

By Sister Lou Ella Hickman, I.W.B.S.

Courtesy: Creative Commons
dreams were our first language
handed down for the many millennia
to what we have become
they still speak their secret language
that was once voiced
in the cave drawings of vanished beasts:
mammoths, lions, horses, and deer
of hands stencilled red or black
and the men
who danced in the light of the primal fire
before their hunt
so, when dreams come
this ancient language
speaks our secret truths
like stories on walls reflected in the fire light . . .
one question remains
when dreams come
will we dare
to dance in the darkness of our own sacred fire

Sister Lou Ella Hickman, I.W.B.S. is a widely published poet. She published her first book of poetry in 2015 entitled she: robed and wordless.

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Categories
Poetry

The Moon Rises…

Poetry by George Freek

A POEM OF MOURNING 
(After Su Tung Po)

The moon rises without pity.
It rises indifferently. 
When I’m no longer here,
it will rise again,
for billions of years
oblivious to human fears.
A dead leaf,
that shivers violently,
then falls so quietly, 
means nothing to me.
You are dead. Your ashes
are in the ground,
and I’m now alone.
Nothing more can be said.


IN MEMORIAM 
(After Mei Yao Chen)

As the night begins,
a dismal line of people crawls
in slow procession
along the darkening street.
Stars throb like blue guitars
playing somber hymns
in other worldly rhythms.
I draw my shades.
I turn off my light.
As darkness approaches,
I have only this to write.
It is getting very late.
A distant moon,
barely shining
is a silent reminder of our fate.

George Freek’s poetry has recently appeared in The Ottawa Arts Review, Acumen, The Lake, The Whimsical Poet, Triggerfish and Torrid Literature.

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Categories
Poetry

When the Road is Wet

By Saranyan BV

Courtesy: Creative Commons
There are times in life you want
Grandkids crowding around your legs,
And you want to be patient with them.
And times when you don’t want all this.
Want to quietly read books,
To punch the pedals on your bicycle.
There are times when neighbour’s kids
Come to play, they are old enough
To know this is not their home,
But they can come and go.
Fill your life with borrowed joy,
And fill it with space.
It’s time to feel like grandpa
When the road is wet 
And without potholes.

Saranyan BV is poet and short-story writer, now based out of Bangalore. He came into the realm of literature by mistake, but he loves being there. His works have been published in many Indian and Asian journals. He loves the works of Raymond Carver.

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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL

Click here to access the Borderless anthology, Monalisa No Longer Smiles