secret agent
nearing endgame
chessboard of patience
unraveling sapience
burning the haystack
the needle will come up
delivered in charred black
the countdown is on track

Are you aware,
did you know,
have you been told
you've got killer voice,
leaving me no choice
but preemptive action...
Let's ensure mutual destruction
of clothes;
my thoughts
made those illegal
in a secret meeting;
that security council
in my head...
while the heart was busy beating,
doing its own thing...
Captives in my cells
twisted and bled out
their escape plans...
Excuse me, got sidetracked,
what's your name again?
I'm twenty-three
but only if you switch the digits.
For a high-functioning whatever,
I must say I'm admirably sane
but you pull the wrong lever,
and the lyrics spill with the melody
breaking the levee.
So what do you do for a living?
That's adorable.
How are we still sitting
and talking here?
You thought I'd be taller;
I was expecting you'd run off screaming.
Let's drink to that, the small victories!
Time will tell what's next
if only we listen,
instead of reading more text,
unless we're OK with missing out.
God, my thoughts do talk loud!
When did your face get so near?
Lips go "clink", and eyes go "Cheers!"

You and I,
The last of our kind,
Let us join
To meet the sunset
And tread together
Into twilight

And if new dawn awakes,
After the darkest of nights,
If morning still awaits,
We could be reborn as rays
Of sunlight

In my left hand a joker,
In my right a Jack of Hearts:
A wild card that will break this game
And I know in these crimes nobody can claim-
Their hearts back.

The dealer, the eyes of Judgement
Offers me a King of Spades,
Which I could use to dig up my grave
After you withdraw your red knave.

I dig my nails into my palms
The game is on
the stakes are way too high
my queen of hearts is
reflected in your eyes

Thumb is rubbing on that
ace of spades
the hard way always taught
me
I should know my place
but I cannot resist your call

flying now erratic circles
I'm the moth who didn't flee
glutinous tongue of careless wind
caught me in a single lick
pulling inexorably into the opening
through the lid ajar I went
above the window sill
and straight into the eyes
of a room clad in light

it's turning warm to hot as I orbit closer
and closer still to the ceiling deity
I came in from the wide open void
I came in from the purposeless
the great free emptiness
where skies were grey and cold
I came in to embrace the bright frail sun transparently imbued
with the gift of gods

I pledge my wings to you
though charred into disfigured trails like brush strokes on some
impressionist painting

No longer are you transparent
no longer am I winged
and for a split-second in suspended animation
it was worth it ten times over

Smiles, tram cars, stinging eyelids
Transparent brittle shards,
Ashes finding water surface
All of this onto a palm
Locked into a fist

I’m the coin that’s landing on its rim
The odds were slim and yet
I am standing on a grin
The third side says that
Karma always wins

And when I turn to stone someday
You will become Medusa
The very moment that you lay your gaze
On my skin of cold-hard gray

she said she was broken
needed fixing
came for the fix
I said “look honey,
I don’t do clockwork”

Invisible lines and curves
Extend from skin to skin,
In waves, from eyes to eyes
Closing the distance faster than light
Is this gravity,
Catching the eyes,
Binding the minds,
Bending the thoughts,
Charging the skin,
Pulling us in?

Ash outside
Sparks - encased
Just deny
If the world peeks
Through the keyhole

For it was meant for
It was meant for One

Whose eyes unlock the door
...barefoot 'cross the threshold

My broken lightbulb,
I have conserved your light
Unto my pages
Stop raining shards
You are weeping now
Inconsolably
Your crumbling body
Wasting further away
Unnecessarily
Beyond return
But you will find no solace
In my eyes
In my skin
Where you cut and you burn
For you’ve been but a shining
On my ceiling
That I’ve let too long replace the sun

Heart is singing loud so loud I can't hear other sounds but the rushing bloodstreams
Head is yelling uncontrollably
"oh my god the brakes are severed; Reason's gonna die in a horrendous high-speed crash"
they're pulling Common Sense out of the wreckage mangled on the seat beside the driver
something happens to the flow of time and there's a comatose thought still left alive
voices fading in calling names some crying some sifting words through teeth
you look what you did you killer, liar, thief, deceiver, cheater, coward, selfish hypocrite
Guilt will lead the trial but the tried is firm with silence
See you, Heart, don't forget to write and the conjugal visits, after all I'll do Your time

The curse of eternal life
Would be, watching
Every one you love, die

...and she felt like
Her bones were buried
In her body
Unapologetically
Apathetic

She had eaten eons,
Watched the ends
Of millions of clocks’ lifetimes
Snorted the rust of their
Idle hands, dead still
In the blank stare
Of their concentric silence

She wanted to cease
This void existence,
For boredom was
Her ultimate torture

Entwined,
heavy with fruit,
she is suspended in time
Caught in a move
endlessly smooth,
her body winds up,
hugging the cold
pillars and walls,
stretching about,
reaching around
and out to the sky.

She can curve it
in every way
on a whim,
however she pleases
... and droplets will shine
on her body like lotion,
or jewelry, playfully teasing,
although frozen, the motion,
warm is her dance
in the hands of the sun
and the tickling breeze

In our sleep
There are sparks
Unblinking
And when the flags of nations
In the hands of tyrants
Strive to suffocate the fires
Of our conscience
There are those
Whose lives are palms around the flame of truth
And she, the truth, a moon at night
Will never fail to summon
Her champion, the wolf
The lone survivor
Whose howling can’t be silenced
Taking flight
And overwhelming every obstacle there is
So that we know
That freedom’s not for free
When men are driven
To become the wolves they never thought they’d be
Only to remind us
Of the value in humanity

* * *

В съня ни
има искри
които не мигват дори
И щом на нациите знамената
във ръцете на тирани
устремени са, пожарите да задушат
на съвестта ни,
Има ги онези
със животи като длани във заслон на пламъка от истина.
А тя, истината, на нощта луната,
не ще пропусне да повика
рицарят ѝ вълк,
последен оцелял
със несломимия си вой,
издигнал се във полет,
препятствията всички превъзмогнал,
за да узнаем ние,
че не е безплатна свободата
щом хора са принудени да станат вълците каквито те самите не биха предполагали...
да ни напомнят
стойността в човечното!

...thoughts and feelings are soulless soldiers
bleeding my blackness like ink
leading the cracks to the brim
And do they dip deep, indeed...
they come out the other side thinning
and thinning still
and thinning
and seething my fabric
as my quietness parallels the tempo of serration
the wanting of you:
to flow and embrace
my every erasure
with the renewal
the slow violent blossoming
flowing and growing
into our fragrance
Our one world

404

your words are razor blades
and I have seen you
shaving others
enough to know
I'd never let you be my barber

for if your mind,
the hand that guides them,
were as sharp,
you'd see that Occam's razor
is not a proper tool of art

Distress calls are a Venus flytrap
Don’t come flying to the rescue
Or your wings will be
Its 4 o’clock snack
Can’t seem to shut its flap
Ever hungry for more
Always empty at the core
Traveler beware;
Heed not that mayday;
Move on and pay no care!

Why do your weaknesses elude me;
my black magnets
keep you at a distance
because
you're facing their
repelling poles

your hair strands are currents,
thoughts;
mind of their own,
tentacles
gesturing hypnosis...
who are they;
what are we,
but extensions,
body parts,
extremities,
intentions,
of a hive mind
unidentified

but I’ll walk these narrow bridges,
shifting as they are,
these catwalks,
hanging ledges,
and breach I will
the curtains of your
ink-spilled masquerade
to taste the sweet and salty
that you’ve saved for me

and you will know
in the contours that hold me,
the right substance
beneath telltale textures
of requited sensation

and we won't fathom the bonds
but touch what they bind us into
smearing the need for questions

My look perched on its medicine,
Twin hazel pills approaching slowly
Going down even slower,
My look took the dose that I tried to convince the doctor, is insufficient
I was told I couldn’t get another prescription
I’d have to adjust and make do, and cope, and adapt…
My doctor says it’s for my own good
And in time I’d feel more appreciative, less trapped
But I don’t really have time… it’s the other way around
And time has Me instead… And I refuse to be a resource to be had
I just want those caramel pills
I just want to feel the sun spill into my heart…
With an unending kiss that bears your name...

if ever there was a decent descent,
then I was thus sent to collect the scent
of the passing sand… not to make amends -
alas, too late for that, but hand
the Feeling…

marriage is
just two letters
longer than
mirage
(penned by different feathers)
but is Mr. Age
what matters
as he does
for cars in a garage?

are you embracing mountains within me, each swallowed three suns upon sunset
a flock of longing birds up high, leaves a grain of spring to eyes
seeing again, that white painting, our hands in tenderness, sketch out a swan
and in the shadow of the beak, a broken off scream of solitude, lies hidden

* *

It is with great honor and excitement that I introduce to you, this gem of an author from Bulgaria, my native country… Without further ado, I present you * tearfly * and her wonderful work, translated to you with care reserved for my highest standards...

Thought you got me in your grasp
Fallen in your hands,
Money in the bank
But
I'm a human hand grenade
you’ve pulled the safety pin away
division now awaits
the careless

I am a snowman in spring
Hoping you’d keep
The lumps of coal,
The carrot nose,
The broom at least...

An angel fell because… (skip gender-”biased pronouns” here or anonymize with asterisk lunacy) wings were in conflict… the left one anxiously ***** equality, not knowing that would mean a lack of lift and loss of aerodynamic quality… the right one, weaponized, stiffly resolved, glides over the notion that all feathers should be attached talons, even though it doesn’t make sense to fight gravity with sharpness…
And so the angel split with Grace and tumbled… eventually lost the race to inertia… another force to add up to internal struggle and its intensifying pressures...

parallax movement of the clouds
beneath the dome of now departing summer
my eyes kept anchor till it tore
and so my wish was written
into the cloud, the vessel of my message
before I bid it farewell and let it go
a bottle in the sea whose lips
caress your shores

*

Фоново движение на облаците
Под купола на отпътуващото лято
Очите ми държаха котва, но се скъса
И тъй желанието мое бе написано
По облака, съда на моето послание
Преди се сбогувам и да го пусна
Бутилка във морето чиито устни
Милват твойте брегове

Falling, not fallen
She was no man’s
But a nomad
She was the comet
Finally caught
In His gravity

Her celestial body
Lured beneath
Her stellar sails
By a solar flare
Lowering anchor

To war!
The queen commands,
Battalions defend at once!
The battleship is pounding on her shores;
and past defensive lines extends
the front of the invading force,
retreats, regroups,
rallying the troops,
the enemy is pouring through the doors.
Her thoughts are soldiers finally expired.
Her generals now under heavy fire.
Yet she's the one who, after all,
this battle, skillfully,  provoked.
It seems that she forgot
that cold wars can turn hot.
She managed for awhile to slow down the assault.
Now the end draws nigh when final hill embattled falls.

And all the wars
those eyes of yours
have started,
and all the gore
blown open in the hearts
like grotesque gardens,
by beauty, battle-hardened,
yes, all of this is lost to words;
none ever cross
the lips of worlds
exhaling in the fallout
following the meltdown.

… our bodies in our clothes like holstered guns…
love is when you draw... and shed the holster
… that sweet crunchy click blowing your pupils
the arching trajectory of the safety-off smile

And some might say
I've lost my way
But who are they
To judge
When numbers rule
Our nights and days
A life of Midas' touch

And all of those
Who quantify
All the good and woe
Will be too vain to realize
They are their own foe

And some might say
I've lost my way
A sentence I'd forgive
But it's the dreamer, not society
Who, the way forward, shall cleave

Drunk on liquor metaphors
High and falling fast
No direction in the clouds
Why does winning feel like losing
Why does your image burn
So extraordinarily
On the inside of a skull box
I am tossed away from answers
I’m a coin in the fingers of the sun
The last hundred flips were
Unsatisfactory
The white puffy scarves
Only swirl into themselves
Sympathetic, yet,
Not bothering to reach out
Because
They know they aren’t strong enough
To catch me
Or break the fall
But my lips are wings
Stretching into flight

She is loved. She is stubborn
Mad at that part of the world
That loves her
For loving her
Without asking first

She never asked for this
Though the space between her lines
Already did

Those words
Those traitors
How dare I
Understand with
my heart

She needs to need
She wants the thirst
The hunger, the craving
The needing, the yearning,
The lack at its worst

She wants
none of the learning;
Only the burning
That gives her the thrill
The stinging,
The near-numb
Throbbing
In every flutter
Between every pulse
Through every string

Giving her is
Taking from her
Would it work in reverse?



She is loved.
Stubbornly denying it.
Fearing her happiness.
Banishing the ones who care.

Because her happiness
Potentially could mean
Not having things
to write about
It equals change
And breaking out the zone
Of torturous comfort



I’m afraid of what she seeks
And how she sees those burning curls
And what she does with sparks
And why she fosters embers

I’m scared the most
Of her using flames divine
To burn herself inside
A dark obsession
That swallows every light

*

I’m afraid she seeks love
So she could hurt herself with it
She uses it
As a means to an end
The end being the feeling
Of being hurt
So the ashes of that
Would be her ink
Fuelling her pyre
Of
“behold the beauty of suffering”

“I’m your key, Pandora;
I’m just as guilty
as you are”

She wants every poem
To be about her
She wants the foam
Of every wave
As the skintight
Dress of dusk;
Divine forces be her tailor
And every Olympian as
The servant-king
To every whim of hers

In my head her lips white-hot are melting
Burning red are thoughts my blood is pelting
This is not a dream
This is no fantasy
This is not a whim
The lover and the enemy are wed
And she's the sum of everything
That words have never said

My summer smells like deadlines,
for lifelines **** themselves
sometime near spring,
with the serrated rust
of misconstrued martyrdom,
they wither fall
into a ghost who lingers
flaking slow
among the fallen ribbons,
former clothes
torn and thrown away
for the sheets of winter

I’ve seen shooting stars,
Their, bodies, burning undesired
Thrown away
Like banished tears
From the dark pupil of the sky
I’ve been holding the hand of
A decade worth of dreams undone forever
So they could achieve dreams of their own
Before my gaze
I’ve held their ghosts in my arms
I’ve been standing at a full “I mustn’t” worth of distance
From their lips
I’ve been filling in vain, the bottomless glasses
Of the most beautiful words,
That spring from the electric spark
Beneath the ribs
I’ve been leading the guerilla squads
Of my beliefs
Against the empire of Impossibility,
And its most decorated generals: Doubt,
Insufficiency, Wrong…
I’ve lied face-down, hands tied behind my back
For that traitor, Restraint…
But now… I forgive him now…
And now, Empires fall on their own
Now those dreams unachieved,
Meticulously paint their eyes
Wrinkled from the salty trickles,
That realization has drawn towards me
For I’ve always known that…
Loving is now or never
You cannot wrap it in tinfoil
And freeze it for later
Yet, they, those morally unattained, chastely righteous dreams,
They do arrive at Knowledge station
Aboard the Intuit train,
Atop the tracks of true common sense,
Alas, too late.
My loving is given now
To Fulfillment,
For it chose now to never
And caressed my scars of restraint
With warm fingertips
And kissed my see-through “I mustn’t” from the other side of the wall
To melt away the distance to my bloodless lips

...I’m falling
You’re open
   {I) Dive in
Openness
   Like a stone
Like a river
   Ripples and sinking
Banks and flowing
   Like a stone in the river
Falling into you
   I dive deeper
To caress the bottom
   With every move
Of the current
   Forever…

The moon is a question mark,
A door of the night
And I am none of its answers
But I enjoy the conversation

We are living memory
Our words are our saviors
For they will remember
Us

Thoughts take off
From dandelion head
I lost them
but found one
In the palm
of your hand

They say that scale can break the laws of science
A crime so high in magnitude
Yet they cannot police
This bully that reality turns out to be

We met by means of tunneling improbabilities
The kiss of a miracle
Punishing the God complex
Of the self-righteous
Because the real laws, unknowable,
Dwell in realms higher than dogmatic notion
Whose knowledge is the surface of an ocean

Hence judgement cannot be
Wrought by the swimmers
And their fear of mortality
That guides them through the waves
And so their laws are the transgression

And We
Are the justice of the storm

Солта е (гора) иглолистна

Целогодишната истина

Чиито очи цветовете Ти не сменят

..*,

Salt is… (a forest) coniferous

Truth perennial

Whose eyes don’t ever shed your colors

а може би през зимата дърветата цъфтят, но наобратно
ей така, невидимо
под почвата
дълбоко стиснала клепачите
улегнала във сънища за топлото

и там съвсем наяве
измежду стените на дома им
скрити за очите на света и чуждото
под завивки и завеси
цветовете им се сбъдват

* * *

And maybe trees in winter blossom backwards
Just like that, invisibly
Beneath the soil
That deeply clenches eyelids
Set in dreams of warmth

And there awoken truly
Between their walls of home
Hidden from the world’s foreign eyes
Within the sheets and curtains
Their colors come embodied