We lovingly dedicate Issue 40 to our dearly departed (Perpetual) Poet-in-Residence, Felino Soriano. We hereby offer a mini-tribute to him among many other amazing writings and artworks. Stay tuned to an entire tribute issue to Felino, coming up in early Spring, 2019.
Desire Is Not Dead
By David Matthews
Afternoon light plays the leaves like Vivaldi
Until evening segues softly into a melancholy Chet Baker tune
The sun crawls sidewise across the indescribable sky
And meets the moon in the middle of a turquoise sea of delirium
A beauty waiting to be born burns in the eye of the green violin
And desire is not dead in this heart
The lovers linger on a bridge somewhere between here and there
She whispers vowels of wind and rain
His lips sound the words that make up the book of the abyss
Neon smears the surface of the river silent and dark beneath them
Poised between yesterday’s waste and tomorrow’s treachery
Proud in beauty—and despair
And no, desire is not dead in this heart
Author bio: David Matthews is a native of the South Carolina Midlands, resident of
Portland, Oregon, poet, runner, and unaffiliated intellectual. His poems have appeared
in Adelaide Literary Magazine, The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature, Quill &
Parchment, the anthologies Fault Lines, Ghost Town Poetry Vol. Two, Raising Our
Voices: an anthology of Oregon poets against the war, and elsewhere. Essays on film,
books, current affairs, running, and other topics can be found on the blog at his
website Portable Bohemia (www.portablebohemia.com).