On Carnations

*Image found HERE

*Will update with translation

On Carnations

All around me
men are walking,
your guillotined head
sticking from their pockets.
Mother’s rubies,
snuck from the jewel box in spring,
young girls offering their hearts
on palms to Proserpine,
their innocence tucked
like a pink heartbeat
between your cymes.

I salvage the bodies of your dead sisters,
pick them up from the dust
of Stambol streets.
I lay them in the paper tombs, in ancient books,
I weep into their stems
and plead with love
to be.
The morning does not know
to dose your sap;
does not know the thorn meridian
between a wife and a mistress,
does not know the raw heart splattered
before an open mouth;
the Mediterranean queen,
clipped, bruised,
her genes tempered with
to mimic the sea.
Like me.

So you take breaths,
sway red cells,
incite embraces that can
go on and defy;
a decapitated host
singing in an empty room
from inside an ugly vase.
I wonder would you ever wish
for gentler meadows,
I wonder do you pine
on Portugal’s windows,
I wonder, yes at times, I wonder
how would we both look in cinders
or in patches ripped,
but torn to make the crinolines
for fairies.

Do you tire of your beauty,
of tempera red, prohibited for sunsets.
Of dinner or war. Of pockets.
Of fading with an open, empty chest,
your nest a grumble of dirt
under the weight of August’s love-making,
but who am I
to ask?
I steal your dead body
from the glass-house,
Belgrade, year after year,
and let you wither softly
in my arms,
let you fragrance my blood.
I walk with men
who only ever know the names
of other men,
but stir you,
stir your petals
that in sweet decay they lay
and make my soul not waste
but taste
like Moonshadow wine.

*Written for NaPoWriMon prompt day 8, which was about flowers. I often write about flowers, and mention them in, I think, every single one of my poems, so this was not a very interesting topic for me. This is why I decided to dedicate the whole poem to my favourite flower – the beautiful carnation. Whichever country I visit, I hear a different folk tale, a different meaning to be pinned into the encyclopedia of this gorgeous Earth-gem. Neighbouring countries with opposite legends, it is just fascinating. Oh, and I wrote Istanbul Stambol on purpose, this is how we used to call it in the Balkans 🙂 Hope you enjoy reading!