Poetry

Our bodies tangled
Become a tapestry,
A delicate weaving
of flesh and feeling.
With each movement
The art is drawn anew.
Me beside you,
You around me,
Us together in a Rorschach splotch
That codes an idea,
Speaks in motion,
What it doesn't say in words.

Our bodies,
Tangled together,
Are far too comfortable
And sweet.
I cannot let go of you,
So we repeat
The turning over,
The realignment,
The fresh new weaving
Of arms and legs and bodies and heads,
Until we settle back again.

Bubbles rise up beside me, 
and the lips of a clownfish pucker between my eyes.
He mocks me,
And then runs back to his anemone.

Oh, sure, he's used to this.
The deep water is his home.
His gills pull oxygen from fluid,
but I am drowning alone.

The sharks circle a short distance away.
When I give up, they'll feast on my bones.
They know I have no life boat,
They know no rescue comes.

The bubbles shiver and float to the surface.
I shiver and despair.
A storm may rage above us,
but it will not mat my hair

for I am sinking,
in the deep blue green

Long ago I wrote a series of poems in a little black book while taking buses and trains to and from work at Amazon.co.uk in Slough, Berkshire England. I wrote a title on the front cover in shiny silver pen, "The Commuter Poems". A few years after that, I went to a workshop on micro-publishing with my son Noé at the Bumbershoot arts festival in Seattle, Washington. When we left the workshop, we each knew we had projects that we could produce that same weekend.

I want to absorb this city
   through my pores.
I want to stretch out my arms
   to embrace her fully.
I want to drown my sorrows
   in the lakes and sound.
I want to love the soil
   with my flesh.
I want to plant seeds in her
   and watch them grow.
I want to spend every minute here,
    to fall asleep,
       and wake up,
         in the arms of this town.

She thrills me.
She fascinates me.
She brings me great joy.

My heart is in the East
but I am in the farthest West.
How can I feel at home in this distant place?
How can my feet know the soil where I have no face?
Not Spain, though Spanish be spoken,
So far away, my heart is broken.

Oh, Jerusalem, I will not forget you!
Though my heart turn black,
Though my hand whither upon me,
Though age take my mind and my will.

My heart walks on the mountain tops of Carmel and Tzfat,
My soul soars in Metula and high above Eilat.
My feet walk on the land of rushing waters,
But my love is in the land of my fathers.

My heart is sore.
  Your words slap at me.
My heart is weak.
  Your words batter me.
My heart breaks.
  Your words tear at me.

I wish that love were unbroken and unthinking.
I wish that thought only built without me breaking.
I wish your arms were 'round me ever.
I wish our sex were made of fire and endeavor.
I wish you would not turn away,
I wish you would not next time say
   you hate me,
   you loathe me,
   we have no place together.

My heart weeps
    for it loves you better.

by: Anastasia Zamkinos

Sleep slicks off of my waking mind like water off of oiled feathers. I ignore the soreness until after I remember the dream in which 

    A pomegranate nesting in my palm cracked

    open and spilled out seeds.

    The gel around each hard grey heart melted

    into the lines of my palm

    and the black dots overwhelmed my hands

    like endless ellipses

    covering a page................................................................. 

    They spilled to the floor where

    a rattlesnake sang and

    slithered amongst them

    and the waves of tiny seeds

    tempted him to slip

    out of his own skin and

    wrap around my ankle and

    he squeezed and

    I did not

    could not

    move. 


    When it died, finally died,

    I was finally animated

    and I palmed a plastic bag

    and gathered the raw limp body of the snake up

    and threw the two out

    and the bag drifted, and I followed,

    to the toes of some distant body

    where the one baby sea turtle, the one

    that made it from the beach to the water

    without being snatched up by a gull,

    suffocated on the clear plastic 

    And I watched the body fall

    and land in obscurity; 

I brush my teeth with my elbows close to my bruised sides and think that somewhere there is comfort, there is a hand that can hold my hip and wake me from my nightmarewithout a piece of me coming off in its palm.

Editor's note:

Anastasia is editor-in-chief of Quarterlife the literary journal at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington. She is also one of the regulars at the Coffee Perk Wednesday evening poetry readings, which is where I met her. I'm thrilled that she agreed to share a bit of her poetry with us here at AlwaysSababa. I hope you enjoy her work as much as I do!

My home smells
   like sandalwood and burning candles,
   prayer and meditation,
   study and devotion.

My home feels
   like will with blended love,
   joy mixed with compassion,
   light and dark refashioned.

My home tastes
   like bread baked in the oven,
   cinnamon and spices,
   lentils stewed with rices.

My home
   seems far away.

This one dream
Seemed clear
But lost its definition.

This one heart
Seemed good
Until it broke in two.

This one path
Seemed fine
Before the flooding came.

In blue --
because the ink flows thus --
My blood pours out to you
And we shall wonder now
What it infects you with.
Ideas and dreams might grow.
Discontent may also stick
Between your ribs or in your gums
Until it makes you sick.