Adobo Criollo Sergio Antonio Ortiz Rivera

December 31st night's broken residue-- the slow freedom of a city in darkness ~ Dedicated to San Juan , Puerto Rico New Year’s Eve 2017

I’m Somewhat Certain I do not know for sure, but I suppose that two men can one day love each other, if they’re left alone little by little, something in their heart tells them that they are alone, alone on earth they penetrate each other, they kill each other. Everything is done in silence. As light amasses inside their eye. Love unites bodies. In silence they fill each other. They wake up in each other’s arms; Then they know everything. They're naked and they know everything. (I do not know for sure, but I suppose.)

An Illustration of My World The same as your non-existent window. Like a shadow of a hand on a ghost instrument. The same as veins and the intense manner by which blood travels through them. Always with the same equity, offering me its precious continuity it ideally ensures your existence. From a distance. At a distance. Despite the distance. With your forehead and your face, all your presence, not closing your eyes, and the landscape that leaps from your presence when the city was not, could not be but the useless reflection of your hecatomb presence. To wet the feathers of birds even better this rain falls from on high. It locks me inside you. Inside yet far from you like a lost path on another continent.

poem up at The Writing Disorder http://writingdisorder.com/ sergio-ortiz-poetry/ Poem accepted at Barking Sycamores Poem accepted at Narrow Road Poem Accepted at Unlikely Stories V Poem Accepted at Survision I'm thrilled

On the Run Little by little I lose my star. I am the orphan of something that dies. I open the capsule to the most virginal silence, evidence the light and word that impede me. I am the perfume of the disinherited rose. The orphanhood of beauty freezes me! The full moon man and the human oblivion dump are extinguished inside me. My voice sinks and collapses like the language building where God’s seamless epicenter resides. There is no doubt, I am leaving for balsam and sleep. The alive desire of the sonatina with which I call “my man” to the party has been ambushed. It's without earth wind or the diphthong of my lyrical moan.

Muted Things When I was of age, older than letting go of the drool and shake of my little arms, I learned three dirty things inside me: My father said, there's nothing for lunch.        (I’m poor) I felt myself blush upon discovering the throbbing, huge sex of one of my uncles under his pajamas.      (I’m a homosexual) I saw a very fat cousin convulsively clutching a glass, singing the toast from “Traviata.”          (and I love Art) Events seething inside me.

Cold Fronts There are days that decompose moans, and there are dizziness’s and cold front sentences, pasts stars that can sense every emotion. They remember everything. It is the inescapable shock of memory; the beginning of a day that has no choice but to begin, that just offers itself. Who knows what it feels.  It never gives up.

Third Absence  You hid the light somewhere and deny me a return. I know this darkness is fictitious because before you left fireflies landed on my hands. You were you  and we were intertwined bodies  on the same bed. Neither of us  saw the eclipse. We became cold,  nothing more than acquaintances and night turn out to be inaccessible. We couldn't dismount it together. You hid the light somewhere, planted it in someone else’s eyes. Now that you no longer exist nothing dawns side me.

¿Cómo pinto la felicidad? - imitando a Lisel Mueller Como un regalo de mi amante hondureño una lluvia de arco irises Sí, un árbol de Magnolia China florecido rociando su flor y su fragancia mientras estamos debajo. De repente robados de nuestros capullos, reencarnados como extraños demasiados divinos para ser trastocados.

Desconfía de la tristeza  cuando viene  vestida  con disfraz  de consuelo  a última hora  de la tarde con los brazos  abiertos.  Créeme,  no te dejara  tranquilo  hasta el  amanecer.

The Insomniac I go to bed early.   Toss and turn in the bed. Get entangled in sheets. I read a little. Turn off the light but no shut eye. At three I get up. I wake up my friend. He advises I walk to tire the body, then drink lime blossom tea and turn off the light. I do everything he says but I can't shut my eyes.   I call my doctor. As always, he talks, talks, and talks but the man does not asleep. At six o'clock, I load the assault rifle, walk to a train station and      fire!

What Is Spoken Because something remains, I feel it, but do not talk about it —a memory so visible of a lover so absent, So, I think of the silence. I am surrounded  by smoke that hurts, the good way of suffering, the glory of touch, my diaries of fire. If the compass and the games have been unspeakable: they frighten everything with their  diction of fear.

Once We Buried You Dawn falls into its slit of light and even though it's a miracle the chorus of words withers  in the windows as old as  prayer book pages. It’s the second day of mourning  and people lie in uncertainty while lightning strikes choirs  who laugh at everyone. I come to look at you rest  in silence next to the procession of permanent tidal waves in the flower buds of your eyes. I sprinkle water on your portrait the third day of your posthumous party. The food is not enough for everyone  that devours your memory. Plastic flowers hang on nothingness and vague allusions accustom us to focusing on the prayer book when lightning strikes  and strikes until it arrives at the place  of resignation. To talk about memories  that do not curse inside photos  and goodbyes hidden between  the lips of a veiled word to calm the dawn. Five days passed ...

Your games start and end like a diversion, I guess it made you laugh to find my drawing next to yours, you attributed it to a whim the first time, the next time you knew it was intentional so you looked at it slowly, came back later to look at it again, taking the usual precautions: the street at its loneliest hour, no car parked at the corners. You made sure to gaze at the graffiti in front with indifference, feigning interest through the window next door, then you hurried away as if nothing.

the clash between opposite proximities adrift impalpable-untouchable weight of things that fade

A la deriva duelo de proximidades opuestas, la inconsistencia de la dicha: para explicar su partida, su materialidad el peso intocado-intocable de cosas que se desvanecen y permanecen furiosamente, tesoros derretidos, posibilidades abandonadas las sílabas se preguntan en qué tono convocaran el coraje para rendirse   y obedecer las leyes luego de la pérdida luego de hablar de la tensión al momento de obedecer los ojos enmarcarán el consuelo del perdón?

From where does this attempt, this triumph, this excessive impulse, this unneeded salt frame, cruel & lukewarm at times, uncontrollable, perennial, hateful, feeling of sadness arrive?

when the sun begins to hide, a black-whiskered vireo slurs the question I'm asking ... are you going to miss me?

"Palace" My head is filled with ruins Most of them are built with you Now the dust no longer moves Don't disturb the ghost of you Mmm They are empty, they are worn Tell me what we built this for On my way to something more You're that one I can't ignore Mmm I'm gonna miss you I still care Sometimes I wish we never built this palace But real love is never a waste of time Mmm Yeah I know just what you're saying And I regret ever complaining About this heart and all its breaking It was beauty we were making Mmm And I know we'll both move on You'll forgive what I did wrong They will love the better you But I still own the ghost of you Mmm I'm gonna miss you I'm still there Sometimes I wish we never built this palace But real love is never a waste of time I'm gonna miss you I'm still there Sometimes I wish we never built this palace But real love is never a waste of time But real love is n...

"Happier" Walking down 29th and park I saw you in another's arms Only a month we've been apart You look happier Saw you walk inside a bar He said something to make you laugh I saw that both your smiles were twice as wide as ours Yeah you look happier, you do Ain't nobody hurt you like I hurt you But ain't nobody love you like I do Promise that I will not take it personal baby If you're moving on with someone new Cause baby you look happier, you do My friends told me one day I'll feel it too And until then I'll smile to hide the truth But I know I was happier with you Sat in the corner of the room Everything's reminding me of you Nursing an empty bottle and telling myself you're happier Aren't you? Ain't nobody hurt you like I hurt you But ain't nobody need you like I do I know that there's others that deserve you But my darling I am still in love with you But I guess you look happier, you do My friends told me one day ...

"Perfect" I found a love for me Darling, just dive right in and follow my lead Well, I found a girl, beautiful and sweet Oh, I never knew you were the someone waiting for me 'Cause we were just kids when we fell in love Not knowing what it was I will not give you up this time But darling, just kiss me slow Your heart is all I own And in your eyes you're holding mine Baby, I'm dancing in the dark With you between my arms Barefoot on the grass Listening to our favourite song When you said you looked a mess I whispered underneath my breath But you heard it, Darling, you look perfect tonight Well, I found a woman, stronger than anyone I know She shares my dreams, I hope that someday I'll share her home I found a love to carry more than just my secrets To carry love, to carry children of our own We are still kids but we're so in love Fighting against all odds I know we'll be alright this time Darling, just hold my hand Be my girl, I'll be your man ...

In the window Naked as the sun skull, I blow murmurs to the clouds, impregnate the pale neck of light with my groping hands, and swallow the agony of the tired images  in the puddles. The rain stops. Immersed in the howl and the gratitude of eyes I discover my Aunt's favorite collection of poems. A cigarette walks across  the moon's dark ear.  An Old-World sparrow pecks  a hole in the metaphors  while I write for the afternoon  make-believe wages.

I am a Bird When the sun starts to hide when it sinks parsimoniously like a burned-out fire at the bottom of the immense chalice of sleeping water I start singing and become a black-whiskered vireo on the trembling branch of a mangrove moved by the breeze shaking bathed leaves by the last glimmer of twilight water I sing to the jumping fish They rise to the surface sweetened by my trills of slow sunsets hidden in the thicket of the agonizing horizon

Preterits of Another Light These are the signs of the old flags pierced by the gales of discord The wide-eyed stares of the hordes passed through here Deranged, thirsty for relentless revenge In these dilated savannahs impaled those who dared defy the secular domains of dogma On the margins of these confines waved Presidential flags and the strangled voices of his ragged constituents remain screaming in agony while day comes to light They remain the postponed promises of legions of preterits mocked and reviled We are the heirs of the sad vilification of cloistered convents, peaceful tombs and withered gardens This earth has dried and from its bowels sprout thorns in whose bosom bud the horizontally crucified rising to the edges of the world

My soaring boy who levitates on December afternoons: I take care of you, cover your light slumber  on cold early mornings A faint twilight thread draws your river god  body paddling over my calm waters  on weightless Mondays I celebrate your untamed, unheeded,  festive beauty while you row back  and forth from my stubborn warnings to your delightful torso which you attempt to keep secret  during evening escapades on my waters

Three Poems Up at Rat's Ass Review

all those voices lurking in the urns of my death— my shortcomings break your window shutters

Poem Up at Califragile , "Two Months After Maria."