Adobo Criollo Sergio Antonio Ortiz Rivera

clouds move in a space beyond grief or understanding... memory, my scandelous mirror alwasy telling a lie

tumbling  through winter she knew she didn't fit... a doll's life trapped in a young man's body

I won't lose you I will follow your body as far as the street where best regards forms a corner with the breeze I will follow your body up to where our two bodies fight to enter your dark tunnel... the deluge of your cloisters

filled with longing I came looking  for ghosts and found  whispers— divergent

strange creatures on moonlit nights ugly sloth faces when I'm alone

you bend like a secret about to be revealed erotic logo

Voto for my logo: Undertow Tanka Review

We met as soul mates on Parris Island there were holes in the Persian rug we sat on that Christmas I could smell the fear and uncertainty of happiness no war crimes would ever be punished our shadows, a candle burning at both ends, kept singing  Goodnight Saigon 

this cold night a silver birch reaches for the sky the life I shared with him ...a scent of lilacs

cold night, a silver birch reaches for the sky— life dissolves into circles when visualizing loss

tiene sangre en las manos y vidrio soplado en los pulmones el corredor del narcotráfico donde mi isla muere tiene sangre en la cara y vidrio molido en sus fosas nasales el corredor de la justicia donde mi isla muere tiene sangre en su pene y vidrio cortado en su colon el corredor de partidos políticos corruptos donde mi isla muere y sangra, sangra, sangra por la cabeza sangra por los pezones sangra por los pies y es capaz de salir absuelto 

Juan Ramón Zalduondo, Puerto Rico's true owner, was arrested today! He is a criminal in all the sense of the word, political corruption, drug trafficking, banking corruption, you name it he has been alleged to have done it.  It is a real triumph for Puerto Rican justice.

I've had this blog since 2009.  I want to thank you all for the support you've shown through the years. Have an incredible Holiday Season! Sergio

fairy-tale illusions: I want to make love but my neck smells of another lover's touch… sleeping on Sunset Boulevard

another soul  blown like glass...  I'm sleeping  on Milagro Boulevard waiting for my train to Machu Picchu

winter solstice a cold that travels from my heart to the moon to the other side of silence

I stare at my hands look for visions  I haven't braved— a haven without sea surf or undertow

watching a ginkgo tree through a hospital window... should I say I'm sixty-three, or that I’m a devotee of Eros?

I am orbiting around your face my heart is like a fire-stone… sparks ignite my bones

you were my fallen flower a 1000 gifts of heavenly abundance my banquet of endings

Everything eventually comes to an end I've learned to disappear inside the cracks of the path along my shuttered house this is as far as I venture into empty space… I bond with the quartzes of a moaning night

we are ripe with gifts, the moon, the first rays of morning from the East, a coffer for a faithful heart

winter I have walked through your storms dreaming within the folds of frizzled viola petals

The Pianist We buried him yesterday. Night finds little, if any consolation in the embellished stars, and although I’ve stopped crying, I still sigh. I'm listening to music when there's nothing but the luscious scent of emptiness…my haunted past stares at the future

Torture Song I saw my face in a cell at Guantanamo electrocuting his genitals, my government waterboarding I saw my face in Ferguson right after being shot… a commanding surge blasted through the streets I saw my face in a man selling cigarettes on a NYC street corner screaming I can’t breathe , and I can’t breathe

wondering what it will feel like after he's gone pulled by a rope I walk through the dark

I'm going back to a time when I was  a woman … my kimono brushing  the arid ground

unmoored launched cloudward he dreams  with heavenly music— carnations tinged with love Spanish translation by Pedro Perez Osorio sin amarras lanzado hacia las nubes  sueña música celestial claveles teñidos de amor

let it rain may it all be suppressed your footsteps in the melting snow... climb through my window after dusk

Undertow Tanka Review Issue # 3 is now live! Submission are open for Issue # 4 Copies can be purchased at createspace and amazon!

he planted palms along my driveway so dates could ripen before my sorrows... shadows in the stream