Adobo Criollo Sergio Antonio Ortiz Rivera

anatomy of an abduction your eyes are * nothing but a one-man cult Frank Ocean, It’s a Bad Religion

ruminations at a fast-food store yes, I share my hunger with the ocean's wave don't say things I don't want to say regret, appalling regret swallows me in pieces... why do I say nothing? perhaps it is their grief tugging at my shirt…waiting to be free of situations

on the road to Gaza charred intestines a memo to the families of the world …genocide Gaza beasts are just beasts insects making slaves out of the small, and thirsty Gaza eyeless, earless to all other nations deaf and dumb we stand-by as the bombs drop Gaza living in the underworld neighboring   mythological creatures that creep and crawl with tanks and shells

mistakes… wincing in the mirror is not an option I choose life and failure as my stepping stones

similarities a miracle of words or a plagiarist’s dream— running amuck through the pyre of your accusations 

steam in my head all for having taken care of too many pigs— sadness adds weight to the places of strength 

the dead  gather missing limbs and tear  at the human heart they know its fragrance, and love it I know  the smoke of my own breath and who I am  my pulse, the kisses, the feeling of health

Provoked her message accuses me of stealing the key to the world's voice... I pluck a flower her words burning my chest like a brand . . . at the center of the drama the foolish belief of wrong doing she grins, a coyote with old eyes, as I tell my story with the grace of a deadly weapon

she sent an email accusing me of stealing  the key  which hides the world… I reach and plucked a flower

she grins  like a coyote with old eyes as I tell my story  with the grace  of a deadly weapon

their bodies  crust the earth like salt— the dead  remind the living  of the coming storms

the heat of their words a wet brand on my chest...  crushing me like a bug

swallowed up I get quite angry and scream: go hang yourself from a tree, people of dying memories my wounds you shall not witness treachery abounds in a vulnerable tyranny beauty and truth lay in cinders death is now their nest tomorrow I will rise like an icon caught in the breast of the beast

running through the geography of my work... a stream of action along paths of remembrance   

I walked  away from myself and found  the magic garden... a vision  with the scent of wildflowers

we kissed under a canopy of raspberry   leaves and a syrup of sun and birdsong… have you forgotten me

dwindling  in my thinning skin  the tide  of my loves and hates blunted  on the sands of rejection

when I stop to consider my calling, I unfold, in the form of your body, these summer midnights

over-involved  caught in a cobweb  waiting for rain  will I end up sundered  like the shifting clouds 

I am an archaeologist of stones  hunting for stars in the river where passion's a crime against nature

The Age of Colorblindness A caste system in the USA? I hear stories about young black males incarcerated for smoking marijuana—some get life sentences. Don’t we all commit crimes? I know I’ve made mistakes—sitting behind a car wheel without a license—the only difference is I haven’t been caught. When a young man born in the ghetto and knowing little of life beyond the walls of his invisible cage turns to us in bewilderment and rage, we should look him in the eye and tell him the truth. orange is the new black— your face, the brown of declining autumn,          dodges the threat of erasure

Submission Guidelines to Undertow Tanka Review Kindly submit up to 10 previously unpublished  tanka &/or  1 sequence. “Undertow Tanka Submission” to: undertowtanka @ gmail.com Or use Contact Form to the right by August 15, 2014 / first Issue to be online August 29 At the end of your submission, please include your full name and country of residence.  All rights revert to authors upon publication. Your tanka must not be under consideration elsewhere or submitted to any contest.  Hopefully this will become a print Review in the near future. Best wishes, Sergio Ortiz,   Editor

lost among acres of scuffed limestone my people were known to speak in surreal, mechanical hyperbole

An I for an I: Palestinian and Israeli Children  be as sand in the places of bloodshed and kidnaping— don't sleep while the arrangers of the world are busy be suspicious of the thirsty machinery   in the world— the current is already live in the wire kraal be the shadow that struggles with shadows in the land of the sleepless streets where men draw guns on children

there were days when I wore the wings of a bird      to soar into daybreak like a nightingale's song

hardly anybody  knows me now— I sing hallelujah like a victory march out in the jungle

things fall apart planets move and crumble  but the cobblestones we laid together will remain *for my sister