To be Armenian
Ah, to be Armenian
Promises, past glory
Lamentations, future fury
To be Armenian
Timeless and free
Singing mocking songs
Of birds and fruit tree
Singing lullabies to
Dead children
Sleeping namelessly
Wear your little crosses
Foreheads bleeding
Begging for water
A page sans footnotes
A cage of accusations
Mighty Muslim mendacity
Treasured clinging obsession
To mount one Ararat
To count two peaks as
One nation unRussified
UnTurkified, undissolved
Into Iranian touristry
To be Armenian, dark, pileous
Pampered, mommy Virgin
Dad kebab savvy, oghi, tavli
Weary, witty, dead early, dead often
Never born where you are born
Always hero, always torn
To be Armenian in so many tongues
Is artistry, talent outsized
Intimidating skeletal envy hords
Moon slivered, uncultured
Toads of groaning swords
Mounting horse hooves marking
Tracked sliced, hung, cut, claimed
Creamed, burned cities in sunless agony
A musical chord shoved into a throat open
To destiny exposed, overbite to oblivion
Remedy diasporan, dangling loyalty
Suspicion, melancholy, never free to be free
To be Armenian is an apricot dream
A pommagranate scheme, an eggplant dome
A stuffed zuccini melodrama with tomato, rice
Meat snd herbal trauma, for grape leaves to resolve
For violins to absolve the motherless child
On rescue ships and island barges exiled
Banned, brave, declared a prodigy
An Armenian in another Armenian’s eyes
Sees flowers, steeples, sheep grazing
Grapes ripening in peace
On another Armenian’s lips luscious promise
Crane songs, hinted, brushed love songs
Patriotic bed downs
Making love, no words
Tears or moans unheard
Church and book
Reason as recourse
Trade monetary acrobatics,
As spirits past guide gamble
For an Armenian one day
Not in Argentina or Athens
New York or New Zealand
But basking in the shadow
Of Ararat writ large fonts Mesrobian
Borrowed from heaven, served, sentenced
Due date uncertain, future fury, a given.
Bedros Afeyan
Los Angeles, CA
6-12-12
