Frank Carellini, New York-Georgia, USA
Yaguara
The eyes of a jaguar
are a two-way mirror
and I, its eternal subject.
It poses riddles of my
past like a sphinx, and
sips my soul for passage.
Its gaze is an everlasting
confession, and my
penance, perpetual.
Myriad vision from
the slits of monstera
monitors my vitals.
It can smell my jugular.
And I see its prints
in infinite dimensions.
Its assistants:
strangler figs and birds
of paradise
observe my stochastic
wander through
its lush lab.
The owl moths are
eyes on the wall
and gush commentary.
The desperate salt of my
skin, on its tongue.
And my whimper, in its ear.
It will eat me over and
over, until I get it right
and it, never full.
And when I need rest from
rebirth, it breaks to eat
the neighbor’s chickens.
Lavender Waltz
The bees are drunk on lavender
and dizzily waltz
to lilac symphony and
orange blossom orchestra.
They gush at the ultraviolet
pop art of poppies
that we believe to be
for us
and discuss art movements
from baroque
peonies to
cubist rhododendron.
An entire stomach to consume
Van Gogh’s irises,
bathes the queen with kisses
of sticky currency.
The hive, a salon, to trade
volatility for volatility
tupelo Rosseau for
mesquite Thoreau.
At bedtime, they nestle
and sleep on lady lupine—
dreaming of yesterday’s nectar
and tomorrow’s flower.
Saline
The wine glass to my ear
like a conch
tells its story
of the hot Tyrrhenian sea
that fed swollen grapes
with saline silt.
And the unrelenting Sicilian
Sun no match
for drunken gods,
giving communion
from molten veins
that seep fertility
from destruction.
Hints of blood
and Odyssey—
My salt mouth
tipsy on its
history.
Frank Carellini’s life has been spent studying biology from molecule to organ to organism. An intimate investigation of life’s underpinnings has left him with the enormity, yet evanescence, of the infinite world; with poetry, a means to grasp and investigate it. The goal of his work is to pose hypotheses about deep ecology, cosmology, and consumption. Carellini’s influences include time spent in the Belizean Rainforests, SCUBA diving, birds of prey and cuisine.
