claudiapena.com

The count, the break, the muscle
the minimalistic memory
that breath takes in language

Inside one syllable, a note explodes
stacking alpha blocks into organized mirrors
systematically painting the world:
this private conversation between God and I,
a fluke of memory triggered by sweet bread,
the color of love in a child’s caress,
this identity between us and them.

If I wanted to just live,
I’d keep my head down and continue walking,
Instead, sounds visit me like angry dogs barking,
fighting leash and nozzle, biting tongue and harness,
to make sentences, songs, and poems
In this new language of mine,
that holds maps mountains and people
thousands of miles wide
and hundreds of antemundane years long
when borders didn’t exist.

More than what’s being said,
I want to know what’s being felt,
So I read street signs smiling.

If language is a translation of grace, then
Knowledge is the continuation of awe.

contact
no where
have I found
so much sincere beauty
like in a child’s face

shot
frozen
beautiful
fearless warrior
eye to eye we meet

As submitted to InCinq.blogspot.com. First poem done on a word count second one is syllabic.

shot
fearless warrior
eye to eye
we meet
contact

I think I played with this poem for a good three days and a couple of pages in my journal. Above is the published version in InCinq.blogspot.

no freckles, no blemishes, no marks
no hair, no fat, no odd remarks
or flat heeled shoes in public

no wrinkles, no sun, no light
no skin, no smiles, no eye-to-eye
no face, no hands, no personal space in public

tattooed brows are always black
highlights used in tasteful golds
hair is thick and bold
you’re a baby doll, baby doll, always in public

the things that look like me
are minced and used as spice
integration, well defined
I frame the scar on my legs
Baby doll, baby doll, you’re just a smile away in public

The road to peace and freedom is closed.
Adorned with lily pads and frogs
jumping from lotus through dead bouquets
and ink stained poems that fall
from heartfelt tears on a bridge…
only when the day is clear

Looking to the north
they pray in wooden crosses to Christ
and shark fat to Buddha,
on the altar of sheets that the elders built.

Somewhere on the lowest point,
of a river under a closed bridge,
to a land they can’t cross,
they’re watching.
Praying that the bank would lengthen
that the river go dry
to make the road to freedom
longer than the bridge above

Nothing is lost,
Even emotions get canned in preservatives
Even the eight million dollars it took
to build the wooden plank
up on river
up on its way to freedom

But life is a chess game of compromises
and freedom towns were built
under strict military supervision.
No one can go in, only a few come out
but quickly they return through a closed bridge
back where freedom gets displayed
back on the road to freedom

If you get past the twenty thousand mines
If you can get a freedom pass
for thirty minutes or two hours
there’s an amusement park on the edge of the world
waiting for a shilling and a months rent
welcoming you to freedom

The irony doesn’t escape me…
The men in guns keep watch
with specialty patches black belt 2 inches wide
What can you do when you’ve reached that joyous ferris wheel,
the merry go round with hundreds of soft yellow bulbs
And that pretty hot pink pony with a golden saddle,
Whose mane seems to be eternally gliding in the wind
and it’s perfect white teeth smiling at you…
or laughing with you,
along the road to freedom…