dreams,
let them float
to you.

don't try
to make them
into something
you wish
to dream about.

just let
the universe
decide.

we got married in october.
on the twenty-ninth.
exactly three years after
we both got drunk
to face our feelings
and say the truth out loud.

that was the day
we became us.
messy, imperfect,
a little bit shy.

i still don’t know
how it happened.
as if i wasn’t even there.
it’s like watching us
on hallmark
with a bag of popcorn in hand.

you were exactly
what i needed.
what i longed for.
after so many doubts,
so many wasted breaths —
thank god i kept
rooting for myself.

I once read in the language of flowers
That blue rose means overcoming the impossible
In nature, there's no such thing as blue color
According to the various scientific facts I once read

Yet despite the fact that blue roses never existed in nature,
I keep my hopes that someday it will happen
It is also my deepest desire to someday overcome the things
That I deemed impossible for me

As I am an avid dreamer sharing a sentiment,
One of the things that I once deemed impossible
Is a fated encounter of a man who'll bring me a boquet of blue roses
As they say, women has soft spot for flowers

For I am a woman who keeps dreaming
Like the symbol conveyed by the blue roses
I keep praying and hoping that someday, the blue roses blooms to existence.

Staring holes into the universe
Gazing far beyond our galaxy
Watching acid rain on Venus
Leaving half of my thoughts on distant planets

I've been walking on Triton
I've been circling black holes
And yet, the most beautiful words
Come to my mind when it's empty

Looking for home among distant stars
While Earth's own beauty left its mark
So I'll take my journal and tent
And write down the whispers of this planet
While still embracing its cosmic neighborhood

Somewhere beside a rocky shore,
A sea so deeply blue,
Sparkling like sapphires and diamonds in the light.

Somewhere in another world,
A little piece of my soul
Paints an olive tree.

Somewhere beyond the inland confines,
The wind is free,
The rocky cliffs wild and imposing,
As heavy oil paints the canvas,
Dappled green and yellow.

Somewhere in Greece,
My heart is free,
Where worlds build underneath my steady strokes,
And the brush an extension of my being.

the things i could tell you—
they’re almost criminal.
but i only find your lips,
soft with ache for me,
in the quiet dark of dreams.
i carry you
like a wound that scabs
but never bleeds.

and if you were here,
really here,
i think i’d take the risk.
let my life fold in half,
see if you’d catch me
as i come apart
under your touch.

but i know you wouldn’t.
so i’ll hold onto
this fantasy for now,
praying that your flickers
eventually burn out.

Before they begin their tapping
dreams nestle in shadows, napping;
growing, groping and grooming
in the blood the day is drawing
from the wicked wounds of walking—

     In all meter and measure
     beyond meaning and pleasure;
     with each tick wounds are dripping,
     with each tock midnight is waiting!

Though lagging and lacking
the speed seconds requiring,
the Minute Hand must outstand
all the heartbreak till the day’s end
and tally each looping sally
of seconds’ light-footed rally
around all measured rant,
rushing like a foraging ant
ticking and towing crusty crumbs
from Time’s forbidden lumps.

Until the iron-booted Sentinel
watching each hour’s terminal
sounds the late day’s knell
and salutes the midnight spell
with spear prodding straight up,
tapping napping dreams to wake up.

Now, they flood the heavens’ starlit strait,
milking the dreamer’s cataclysmic cosmic plate.

Hence the eaves of the heavens droop
and sag in a sleepy silent stoop,
scooping minutes’ heart-ached soup
on the brink of a dream laden swoop.

Here the heavens sigh in shallow heaves,
whispering dreams
from where Shadow lives—
far below the sun-bathed eye;
yet, far above the sighing sky.

Now is the time to drop all drooping drapes
and steep in a nether land’s old golden grapes
that Philemon aged within scented staves,
mulling archaic aches in shadowy shapes.

From his kingfisher blue and the nightly hue,
shadows leap through to ***** and find you.
Not to destroy, but to explore you;
not to wage war, but to restore you.

Dark as Poe’s black winged Raven;
thus, not good for the cringing craven.
How you didn’t know you bore them laden,
hidden yonder in you, native and graven!

They toss you in a gale you’re scared to sail:
          “When they hail, you think they wail.”
They restage a rending rendezvous:
          “When they woo, you think they boo.”
They pretend the pain of piercing spears:
          “When they kiss, you think they hiss.”
They dance in your drastic defeats:
          “They chant in cheers; you think it's jeers.”

You blanch Fear comes to hunt you;
you didn't see it's for you to pursue.
     You fear Wrath comes to burn you;
     you didn't see fire will forge you.
You panic Pain comes to ******* you;
you didn't see it also will push you.
     You fear Darkness comes to consume you;
     you didn't see it is what's cradled you.
You fear new wounds come to find you;
you didn't see they’re windows about You.

     A grieving Poe was sure;
     We ‘stand amid the roar of a surf tormented shore’,
     while we ‘dream within a dream...'

...and that which keeps carrying us
               ~like a stream~
may also be a dream…
                                  …within a dream.

‘a doorway to the past opening—'
an empowering offering keeping us going...
So, Philemon is no demon—

that which you deem as sweet
may sometimes sap in dreams' sourest seed.

© Hirondelle, August 04, 2025
    Arif Hifzioglu