LONG LISTED FOR THE 2023 GRIFFIN POETRY AWARDS

2023 Longlist Announcement

HORSE EYED WOMEN

A city among thousands of other cities on earth

with houses, roads, monuments

the passing musicians, cemeteries, the crazies

the ones who run after bread and others who run

          after their dreams

with those who keep silent, those who postpone,

          those who betray,

with their imposing temples and the small, remote

          taverns

like forgotten, foggy corners of a humble paradise

with the naked people, the traitors, the egoists,

             the notary public

with the tears and the serious decisions taken

             during the night

with the smiles and the little daily compromises

a city swallowed by dust and commotion and

             lights and dreams.

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I SAW

I saw a far-off country in my peaceful dream,

a land whose beauty no soul can describe,

that seized my mind and made me leave my meager village

and promised myself I there alone would settle.

A foolish youth I started, spellbound by the beauty

of my dream, and passed through lands hemmed in by water

and others clothed with shining plains and hillsides,

but still the land I longed for receded, always further off.

The passersby I met urged me to settle.

This is a beauteous land, stay here, they said.

Yes, I replied, your land is good, my friends,

but not the one I dream of, which is far away.

Leave me to travel slowly,

alone to pass the plains and mountains.

Perhaps one day I’ll reach it but even if I don’t,

don’t ever ask me, brothers, anywhere to settle.

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New World

Here I enter the world

of an immortal as the trees

on the other side of the river

meditate their good fortune

slight shiver through my spine

as your wonders smile and

the chair you once sat laments

as the ruffle of the air

sings of your Death to the

lonely hawks and to the pious

peasants. You put your hand

on the anvil once again and

a sweet babble overtakes

my heart water in the river

sighs as the realm of

spirit opens like a rose and

rudimentary sound of order

hovers in a young, blue

universe which you create

with your ambitious brush.

In the realm of nascent pathos

where does the line mark

my flesh or your flesh Great Father?

Your celestial new world appears as

a humble resonance echoing

to the ends of space and

in the tympanums of my dreams

the night weeps in fairy tales

of the laughing children and

it all makes sense now, yes,

in the eyes of your Cretan sun

there is no ephemeral light

just immortality and your hand

as in a miracle guides your

brush to unfold reality like

the joyous heart of a child

it all makes sense now

deathlessness, chromatism

splendorous fusion of ethereal

with the invincible earthly

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