Mwandishi
Posted by Melissa Pavri | Filed under Poetry, Print
he looks like a sun kissed wanderer
with aquatic eyes and tumbleweed fingers
sweating somewhere outside of time
he is the spitting skeleton of
a perfect first word
the kind that makes any man
wanna break loose from his bones
and rename himself a writer
he is the humble sum of everything
between charcoal and ivory
eight octaves of what
the most common existence is made of
slow bass moans and
high pitched hysterics
intersecting at a cryptic coordinate
they say it’s the birthplace of humanity
i wonder if his
maiden voyage is
matchless
a cognac map to Atlantis
fingering the ten corners of the earth
a tangerine rose
blooming into cactus
an impossible fantasy
sailing under a purple moon
in a sea of daydreams
or is it just
where his hands
take him in the afternoon
corduroy pockets and
the small of a back
feels like the cracking of a
cool watermelon smile
and the universal belief that
souls are like galaxies
cupped in the fists of children
waiting to be born
little stars shining placental promise
but he is still just a fleck in his own iris
a crippled conversationalist
a mute symphony of impassioned phrases
that can only exit his being
through his fingers
he would gladly trade his lips
for canteloupe island eyes
and bipolar hands
one quarter note for every unspoken truth
he wishes he had the eloquence
to express
wishes it was
effortless
like melody
like harmony at sunrise
waking between his fingers
a crimson assurance that
everything will be okay
a nocturne euphemism for
a declaration of love
that slipped out from
between his brandy hands
a technicolored vista of afterthoughts
that never scrolled past his tongue
he spills his darkest secrets
on this chromatic canvas
excessive
uninhibited
belief leaking from every cleft
after he empties his chest
he’ll leave his legacy squarely
on the piano bench
look over the
shoulders of his grandchildren
with the full moon glow of
a man who beamed
a cosmos from his fingertips
and he’ll smile
a cool watermelon smile
that looks like dolphins dancing
and he’ll know that
this is what being human
should feel like
Stained Glass
Posted by Melissa Pavri | Filed under Poetry, Print
love’s
a stained
glass window
it doesn’t see
faults the same way we
do, dull godforsaken
oracles of demise but
rather reminds us that the most
divine things have cracks on the outside
we can’t help but shatter beneath its light
Dreamcatcher
Posted by Melissa Pavri | Filed under Poetry, Print
Dream
Catcher,
Be my smile,
Deflect my fate.
I know you won’t last
Forever but promise
You will age majestically.
Do not fear the cracking of teeth,
It is the simple proof that you have
Let a thousand good things pass through your breach.
Excel
Posted by Melissa Pavri | Filed under Poetry, Print
crestfallen
sitting in a sea of coffee and tedium
hands
frowning quills
hungering for something worth writing about
i am old world weariness
zipped into high waisted slacks
sunday morning bubbles
burst in my pockets
whatever was left of
saturday champagne fantasy
it’s monday
the week ahead
crushes the small of my back
an all too familiar load that
leaves its depression on my spine
a hypnotic qwerty humdrum
colonizes my fingers
and i begin typing
manic
shackled to the keys
hands ticking
like a bewitched clock
pupils tightrope walking
two invisible axes
through some magnetic field
to a blur of recycled words
and reversed equations
i gawk at the tiny font
on my screen
like a dumb beast
trying to make sense of the world around me
astonishing
how every character pops
in and out of existence
as if it were
just
that
simple
funny mindless little creatures
happy to live in rectangles
i blink twice to make sure i am
still human
still made of flesh
and skin
and soul
i know
this view is skewed
mechanics beyond my control
myopic to the bone
something like
one way tunnel vision
on a yellow desert road
two by two
numbers and nonsense
wake from sleepy trenches
like possessed men and
march across the screen
into an alternate universe
where ideas go to die
this matrix of monotony
and vapid spreadsheets
where the secrets of the cosmos
take on numeric disguise
where everything looks freakishly similar
slipping into cracks
deathly afraid of being greater than something
scared of being significant
until i whisper
fly to the moon
outliers
and take your souls with you
when you get there
free the comet in your chest
so i can follow it to the sky
i will fasten my days
to the backs of fireflies
and wish them
magic migration
to yesteryear
i used to be
wondrous and technicolored
i want to fix this broken mirror
