10 minutes of life?
someone tagged them with a price
given for a flight, a stop or just an in-between pause
and then your mind runs to catch up for the loss
while your heart stops to feel the preciousness of seconds
in a gentle smile holding your hand
right there at the gate –
between the flight and stop
where you remain as well, price paid, heart out,
holding on tight
to the remaining smile weighing inside
with years of treasures upon your memories
while 10 minutes ironically
display
before a gate
a meaningless tag, with nothing to lose
or gain
for you keep the beauty of such breathings
in the safe clock of your existence
pacing one smile to embrace at any gate of life
while flying above the skies or staying on the grounded path of
Reality —
purposely giving the most beautiful feeling
of a one-of-a-kind meaning.

(Reflections of life in 10 minutes, Soar, January 2012. www.soaring-words.com. No liability over the picture. Picture credits: www.thisnext.com/tag/distorted/)

Rewind

Somewhere where space regains its trace
Where realities and fantasies intertwine
And where whys would turn into wows
There reigns an orchid in full bloom
At the windowsill of life

She?s white and begets scented sprouts
Balming the weather?s sunset and sunrise
Like a loyal soldier in armour of trust
Keeping a love safe from the outer harm
With the only seed of care germinated inside

Her utmost view is a wooden bed of silence
Which her perfume wraps in reverberating hues
His shape ensconcing warmth to emanate
Whenever feelings would be embraced
By meanings immersed in their plain eloquence

And when the day falls in love with the night stars
The scented white turns into blush
For there a girl would kiss a boy in tears
To purify with love reality?s charred marks
To dew his eyes with her soul?s values

Above a fading scenery where time loses its track
Life constantly rewinds its antiquated wheel
To a forwarded point of the same crystalline feelings
Where an orchid rests her dreams upon a silken bed
Giving her blossom?s breath to scent the universe.

(Soar, December, 2011. All rights reserved. Picture credits: Samantha Lockwood, http://samanthalockwood.artistwebsites.com/)

Loving one?s country ? inner pride or outer attire?

(ARTICLE)

The inside out perspective

I came across an interesting article by a Rumanian journalist the other day (Lucian Mandruta, Romeo, Punkt.md) tackling this subject with an open-minded, ironically driven attitude from an inside out perspective: ??Loving Romania is like the ?Romeo and Juliet story?, he states, ??a little risky?for you never know which of the two families will come at you?.

The Romanians seem to have this oxymoronic tendency to love and hate their country at the same time, with a fatalistic vision about their own future, flavoured by an ambitious quest to find redemption under the roofs of others rather than under their own.

Whenever I visit my country from abroad, my co-nationals complain about the same things with the same monotone diatribe I?ve been hearing for the past 10 years: ?nothing works in our country, it must be better where you live?.
Of course, the grass is always greener on the other side. I would name it curiosity, while in their minds it?s already an assertion. Yet, ?dancing with wolves? doesn?t necessarily imply Kevin Costner in the ritual. It?s more a matter of Hollywood and its encapsulating dreams.

What happened to the idyllic ?Latin island in a Slavic ocean?? What has become of the ?little Paris?, once cluster of culture and art in the 30s, nowadays famous for the holes in the streets, or often mistaken for the neighbouring capital, Budapest? Has loving our own country really become an optional convenience? Patriotism no longer seems to be an inner pride, but rather an optional attire to put on now and then. To suffer less from the eventual loss, they found an excuse: globalization.

The outside in perspective

A while ago, I was flying on the Berlin-Munich route and, while on the flight, I was skimming through the informative magazine, distributed in thousands of copies on the national and international flights. An interesting article, written by famous intercultural analysts absorbed my attention. It was about ?Do?s and don?ts in the international business world?. Romania was referred to as well.

?Wow, it must have become an important country for trade? I was thinking, with my doubt out loud. As much as I expected the well-known stigmatic stereotypes about my country, I was bewildered to read: ?Don?t: when in a business conversation with a Romanian, don?t get offended if your partner constantly answers his/her mobile phone.? Hmm, the Romanians have become the impolite business partners of the 21st century. I?d rather they had stated: ?When in Romania, bring your garlic along.?

In my 10 years? travels through Italy, France and Germany, I have been confronted with the same biased images or innuendoes about my country: gipsies, Dracula, homeless children, homeless dogs and the ?Securitate? tales, some of which really whopping, ready for a new Universal Pictures script.

Yet nobody seems to know about the uniqueness of a Voronet, of an Infinite Column, of a Happy Graveyard, of a Porumbescu?s Ballad, of the rich folk dances, and of a traditional upbringing and kindness of a warm and welcoming people.

I never had much time to actually present my country for I?ve had to deal more with presenting a plea for my country in front of an ever changing jury, rather than sharing cultural diversities, on a one-on-one level.

It took me a lot of time to reassure my foreign ex parents-in-law that my childhood had not been ?endangered?, that the best winter holidays were actually spent in the countryside at our grandparents? house, where the goodies were already ?bio? at no extra cost, and where, in the lack of ready-made dolls with multiple accessories and 3D video games, we invented our own playground and toys, the way we wanted to. That we read more than we watched TV and that we had the spacious views to shape our dreams and not to have our fantasies already preconfigured by computer games and simulations. Yet this would be another interpolated topic about traditions vs. globalization, even though traditions are a part of a people?s essence, therefore a beauty to love.

And the final apparel?

A bold and picturesque campaign on positive thinking about Romania, intended for national and international display, initiated by deceiubescromania.com has printed a few names promoting the values of our country: Coanda, Nastase, Comaneci, Paulescu and Odobleja (aeronautics, sports, medicine and computer technology excellence). Very nice initiative and at least one bold step forward, yet hardly envisaging the uniqueness of the Romanian culture and enrooted traditions. While looking at one of them, a big green poster with a huge tennis ball on the side, I was puzzled: how will I ever be able to describe, from abroad, my country and its values?through the symbol of a tennis ball? I am pretty bad at tennis myself.

Despite any advertising beauty cream, promising miracles from the surface to the depths of the skin, a true beauty starts from within and bursts to the outer finish with distinguished attire.

The Romanians seem to be confused about the attire they?d put on to please their visiting guests, or to display while they are abroad. They long for love, while they?ve forgotten to love themselves. How about trusting what we are and what are we made of, before even expecting other countries to appreciate such apparel? How about keeping our roots alive as a base for exploring our inner resources to unravel an explosive unique identity in the present modern world? How about not expecting the extraordinary but just being it? And then, when we are asked who we are and we simply reply: ?I am Romanian?, it would be the biggest contribution we can give to our land.

The best attire entails the fastening sewing within. We have the surface through our virgin landscapes and we have the ingredients ? the intelligence. Let?s hold on to our hearts: the essence of what we are about. And the love will emerge.

(Soar, December 1st, 2011. Written on the occasion of the National Romanian Day, commemorating the ?Great Union? Day: the unification of Transylvania to the country. Photo Credits: www.econnect-usa.com)

A poem is the moulding of a hand with the sparkles of the eyes, through the silent speech of the ears, but essentially, it is how a soul smells like. A poem in truth is a flower in bloom with all the human senses in unison: feelings.

(Soar, October 2011, www.soaring-wrods.com. Photo: private source)

Reflections of Bodensee

There is a place where water kisses the earth
Cushioning with faith white streams upon earthly sheets
It?s where space hails from no form
While time stands still in awe holding on to the universe

It?s a body whose limbs embrace three ancient meanings
Coming to life from ice, on a silken bed of giant alps
Unbinding the borders of unified complexity
Through a flamboyant communication means

Antiquity named it by its deeds
Stemming from castra, chivalry and masculinity
Audacious bod, brandishing eagles and dragons? coats-of-arms
While lying bashfully subdued to nature?s depicting attributes

From its heart of an island in bloom
To its surface mirroring stilt houses or flying balloons
Sweet apples and wine remind sojourners of its taste
While it feels like sun, beyond its canvass of Mediterranean hues

And when it represents traditions and cutting edge feelings
Amid three kisses, a hand-shake or a smiling servus
It?s the culturally attired melting pot, flavoured in European style
To explore so that one can learn, to adopt so that one can love

And so its shores beholding hopes and dreams
At the threshold where reality sets sails to explore fantasies
Are the immutable purveyor of waves humanly entwined
Carrying upon their crystalline beliefs the sequel of life.

[Author’s note: Bod = antique German word meaning “messenger”.]
(Soar, August 2011. All rights reserved. Picture Credits: Klaus M?ller, Bodensee at Dawn. Republished by the Decanto Poetry Magazine, London, UK, June 2012 Issue)

On the occasion of a literature project contest, the Poem ?Smiles? was published in the Literature Section of the BD? Federal Association Magazine (1st July, 2011 issue). Thank you BD? Germany!

SMILES

You see smiles pass by, sojourners of your life
Some stop to dazzle your train, fogging the station of your feelings
Others join your path, brightening the pavement to your stars
Yet just a few per lifetime will reflect the meaning of your heart

And despite human reasoning to expect so that you can give
You keep your soul na?ve and share without prerequisites
One smile of solace, then two for care, three ? for the deepest feeling
You lose too much, yet you will win, heading towards the dawn of dreams

But here it comes, as if from an outdated track, the smile that changes your life
Replete with d?j?-vu and tempting mysteries alike
You stop your life, eyes closed on an open soul, feeling it to the core
You strum and drum with all you hold within the purpose of its melodies

Yet, was it him reflecting you, or rather you reflecting him?
When your heart speaks its sways to him, is that a weakness or a virtue?
On the new track, you blithely steer an ad-hominem reasoning
You live one smile alone, amid the same collage of love ? weaving destinies.

(Smiles, Soar, April 2011. All rights reserved. Republished by the Enigma Magazine, London, UK)

Silent love crying out loud its essence letters from echoing inner strings in a deaf scenery. Rupture…of time in heart, encaged in feelings, while too extended to the outer world, with its display of futile multi-hand framings. Uselessness…of space, afar or nearby, losing its shape for leaving its sparks on the path where love was kissed last time.
And there, unseen, unheard, unknown — the regent destiny with its twisted ever-changing whims
testing feelings upon its grinding wheels.

(Soar, July 2011. www.soaring-words.com. No liability over the picture. Picture credits: Salvador Dali, The Persistence of Memory, www.wikipedia.org)

Poetry is beautiful
It graciously veils feelings
While mirroring them boldly
Silent words coming to life, always differently
At the end of their meaning
Grasped by stranger eyes
Who label them with own experiences

Poetry is like a melody
Putting emotions in notes, articulated soulfully
While the stave is forgotten in its theory
It’s like fashion in trend with heartbeats
Displaying a hot attire with elegance
Seen as a piece unique for its tailored creativity
With no need for further accessories

Yet, I am no poet and claim no right to be
Nor do I fashion words for pastiche melodies
I purely search inside of me to find your meaning
And feel your image in the rhythms of a symphony
Words begetting passion inside of me
Music voicing the pace of my breathing —
You are poetry. You are beautiful.

(Soar, July, 2011. www.soaring-words.com. No liability over the picture. Picture credits: inkandquillconsulting.com; fashion.wikia.com/wiki/; hndfzk.co.tv/)

Writing poetry is like painting feelings freely upon a white canvass longing for your array of colours to caress and mould its bare surface with your own form.
Translating poetry is like sweating with skills upon the shapes of a sculpture you would want to render in tune with the original muse.
I paint my soul on the canvass of poetry – I am a scarce sculptor of foreign meanings.

(Soar, May 2011. No liability over the picture. Picture credits: Heron Dance, http://www.herondance.org/)

When our stories become ?tales? and when we give our feelings the appropriate ?magic?, then we can make ?fairy-tales? of our lives

Once upon a spring
There was a young boy who met a girl
On a prairie, just below a Roman milestone
Left by the ancient history to remind of world?s boundaries

Why have you come this way for me?
The boy asked with genuine curiosity
Isn?t it far from your world?s beauties?
There?s nothing around here, except for soothing silences.

And the girl was small, but high in hopes
With rounded eyes and a melodic heart
She took his hand and kissed his sweat
Murmuring faith to him, as if she knew him for eternity

I?ve come to show you two big eyes
So that you won?t forget the depths of the blue sea
When deserts try to choke your water yields
And leave you thirsty of life?s prerogatives

I?ve come to have you feel my soul
It?s what a mother, sister or true lover would bestow
On you so that you grow strong in hopes and marvel at love
Treasuring you with warmth when the world grows cold.

The boy listened to her quietly
Trying to catch her answers in the swirl of his wishes
And then he approached his heart a little closer:
Will you hang around? Why do you have to leave?

I can not stay when the sun subsides, she said
I love the earth, but it keeps cold at night
I shelter my body?s heart in the warmth of the sun
It?s there where true feelings never die

But I?ll be back again
As soon as the sun defeats the moon
And your heart would miss the colours of the sea
Or just one spring amid the earthy sceneries

And so, she had to leave
But gave him a pearl from the deepness of the sea
Taking with her the roots of his precious memory
And hoping for the sun to win within

There is a quiet place at the world?s boundaries
A place where miracles and realities intertwine
A place where whys would turn into wows
A place to always return for a boy?s heart shaped by a girl?s eyes.

(23rd April, 2011. Occasion: World Book Day, 2011. All rights reserved. ? Soar, www.soaring-words.com. Republished by the Enigma Magazine, London, UK)

“I am the mountain springs that run in energetic flows towards destiny’s aim, I follow the stars of hope and give them my mirror to reflect their glow, I fight against hard rocks and gather precious shells with pearls, I stop in crystalline streams where the sun rests its beams and further pursue my course towards the deep blue sea of my eternity. ”

(Excerpt from “Into Earth, Wind and Fire”, ? Soar, January 2011. Image copyright protected. www.soaring-words.com)

“I look at you with deep desire and wonder what you are made of: scent or fire? If you are scent, my soul is a flower, if you are fire, my soul will burn for being poked, if you are both, let me flee to save my soul, or breathe upon my love… give me the phoenix life of sun-drenched rainbows.”

(Excerpt from “Into Earth, Wind and Fire”, ? Soar, January 2011. Image copyright protected. www.soaring-words.com)

“You’re undefined, a life companion of my heart: without colour or shape, you’re the translucent air following my passion’s flows, trying to change my course, yet hoping to gain my form. You feed me with your energy and spoil yourself inside the beauty of my yields, while rushing along with me towards an unknown symphony.”

(Excerpt from “Into Earth, Wind and Fire”, ? Soar, January 2011. Image copyright protected. www.soaring-words.com)

“The universe has placed you right beside me from the start of time: you magnetize my pole, shaping my rivers with your earthen casts, you are the garden of my falls, the earth prince claiming my springs upon his lands to fertilize his own seeds with all my passion’s scents.”

(Excerpt from “Into Earth, Wind and Fire”, ? Soar, January 2011. Image copyright protected. www.soaring-words.com)