Adobo Criollo Sergio Antonio Ortiz Rivera

Two poems up at Fourth &Sycamore

The End of Night I exist to be conquered. I, set against all other I’s, am a stillborn poem taken out of my mother’s womb. Once I was immortal, condemned to endless mornings, empty of the knowledge of manmade rituals. Until out of my mouth that knows, came the shape I was seeking. Now I want to be a waterfall of hummingbirds covering our bodies. Sometimes I read you under another twilight. In that half-light your voice is different. When you open your wings you do not look like yourself but I know that it’s you.

The Alembic Soft humid hair trickles from his torso to his belly button. I moisten my lips. When the fruit ripens, he places it in containers fashioned in scented Spanish Oak and moss. But to me Jerez is not what gives him the fragrance of Montilla. It only forces me to savor the memory of his abdomen.

Dolphins and Moons The sword of perfection is unworthy of mention in my lovers presence unless it be drawn with regret. Bones wear out with age, fire can be extinguished, but simplicity is better chained to hearts, like dolphins swimming around the aura of a lunar eclipse a centered pendant. When my lover touches my hair I shatter into dancing moons.

ISSUE 10 OF UNDERTOW TANKA REVIEW IS UP!

Invitation to Dust Am I poet or sheet of paper, my soul asks in the cruel infinite /night of the sea that is never serene… Manuel Ramos Otero , Invitación al Polvo You, Manuel, the seductive arch of a bay, a drop descending on the half-light, feet circling my suicide hour. We were tangueros* of the same tile, tropical byway, creek mist, and love's insomnia. Dancers with the white silent breeze of despair. *Boleristas take their stilettos for a stroll while you burn your tongue, nail it to your pride. I spit on you, all you neutered men and women frightening children playing in schoolyards. You’re nothing but a simple invitation to dust.  

The key you lost                            lives like a fugitive on your skin. It is the prelude to our memoirs, a poem fused to nectarines, an exploration through Copper Canyon, visions of Haiti’s angels licking my ears, a hypnotic belly dance on the sand matching the colors that mesh on your hip scarf, an experiment we refuse to put down, an invitation to cross the doorway of the home I no longer occupy. The key you lost is not the manual of a digital camera, or calendar entries for next month’s readings. It is not a Popular Mechanics article you wrote to put food on our table, or a classified add on craigslist. It wants to be the bungee jump into the pangs of a deer in heat, the obituary of bolted doors, a list of all the vacant walls on which we'll scribble our erotic graffiti. ...

Cheater I gather lilies, set them on the bed where you are absent. Gone. Going up, going down, inside a hotel elevator with a stranger brushing his groin against your hand.  Yes, stuck with another man pushing his arm against your elbow.  You slip away with him into a corridor until you reach a door that he opens.  You enter, let him take off your clothes, while I wander about the house, looking for you in the geometry of our bed, with the fear of one who just arrived to his first unrehearsed death. 

Deadly Mirror Inconclusive thoughts, what I hear inside my head. My imagination flutters like a swallow, and cries like a hungry baby. I sit and play the saxophone in self-contemplation.  The mirror tells the truth, but not enough to merit constant thought. I am folding inward over and over. Six inches of words and I am betrayed, hypnotized into believing I achieved all there is to achieve in this art form. So, I start a new contemplation of the swallow, and I listen to fragmented phrases, read life studies, and notebooks, of his memoirs, the flowers that sustain all of earth.

A Litany for Survival An elephant walked into my bedroom reciting a litany for survival.  She spoke about her mother and sister having died too many deaths that were not their own. About winter people taking off their blood masks and monuments for the children of war. About hunger and blind feet trying to find their way to the sun. About a greedy black unicorn captive in Australia. About having two faces and a simmering frying pan ready to cook up her daughters. She spoke about men with stone eyes fucking in the hallway, Said the hall was covered with beggars she couldn’t step over. Perhaps, she wasn't meant to survive after all.

Ghost Looking like a jungle is where I am never myself. I don't want to trip over the sounds of the wilderness’s bewitching hour. Life apart from the pain I conceal from myself is impossible. Come play in the rain. This is not that same winter downpour where December was you. Where the loss of my dead became custom. I counted the dead roses in the garden. I forgot to write my name on the mailbox. You couldn't listen to my dreams. I couldn't question yours. The scars are still there. I don’t know how many years I spent trying to forget, or how many years I’ll spend trying to remember.

On my Bed Thinking about You You are voiceless, buried in a long-forgotten childhood hideaway, a dark jungle where every tree looks like every other tree. I long for your scent, your knees pushing against my thighs, but what is asked for is often destroyed by the very words that seek it. It is time for me to crack open my skull, invent a new way of looking at you. I know I am dying but why should that make a difference? I will build you a fortress that will stand forever, with a smile folding at the corner of my mouth, and a star sitting on the tip of my tongue, a lit stone around which your body can blossom. My bed will no longer be the fossilized prison where I learned to make love to you forever.

For those days when the lights switch on and off by themselves and I hear voice messages from longstanding enemies. For the good old days when I rely on verses I already wrote to keep from slashing my wrists. For the fear of failing that haunts me every December. Will this be the year my planet refuses to forgive me with a blush of green long enough to soothe my heartaches? For the assumptions of next winter’s chill and the quiet days in between. Your face among the poinsettias after every prayer and rainfall. The only image I long for.

Sorry, but I've been sick and in some pain.  Today I feel a little better.  Anyway,   s ome poems up at Thesongis  

fragile you are                    a foul day                              in my lonely life on appeal                the faint green                                   to the south of my border

  Me acaban de otorgar una mención honorifica en el CERTAMEN LITERARIO INTERNACIONAL HACIA ÍTACA 2017 de Argentina por el poema Carmela

Constrained Your crystal-clear body in the sunlight still in its dream stage. I stop to pick up your breath and hear other songs. You stand by a window and sulk.            I reassure you there is nothing to worry about. Your eyes sink to the ground as I walk away. A tear descends on daybreak. For your benefit forgetfulness and passion remain tattered. I leave you in the middle of your moment and come back to mine. I set aside this fool’s paradise and revert to being a name.

Torn Late winter day, your whining doesn’t sound like you, sounds like a voice living inside other voices. I try to mold you, but you choose your own dream and shatter. I am torn between your body and your eyes. A monologue: Does one divided by nothing equal infinity? Your young face my point of departure, the line I follow to the point of regret.

Cuando ya no quiera contestar tus llamadas Al final del día el cuerpo se deshace de la memoria. De una mente que no existe no hay nada que confiscar.

Cuerpos trazados en la arena Tu y yo dispersos sobre el agua y la arena. Te miro en silencio y recuerdo esa playa, tus ojos color cielo tu piel blanca derramada en mi boca.