MP – Meet Neeli Cherkovski a great poet from San Francisco ,California .Neeli enjoys writing mindboggling verse creamed with heart rending satire . Young poets from around the world should also take a leaf from Neeli Cherkovski’s writings and poetry. Neeli is one among great poets to come out of the California .We are greatly humbled by his will to exchange with other poets and writers across the globe. Readers Contact us through our email address, miombopublishing@gmail.com-Mbizo Chirasha
And let us all enjoy poems by Neeli Cherkovski
ODD WORLD
Ownership belongs
to a spider
Strangled in the grass
Nobody doubts it’s ability
To think back in time
To the lava flow
We engage meditation
In order to sort
The insanity
That crosses us
And brings envious thought
To dawn’ light as
The sun breaks through a cloud
And settles on our kitchen table
Odd world
Of wealthy spiders
Sailing on yachts
Through the straits
Odd world of wounded pelicans
In the harbor
Old planet
Of orangoutangs
Devouring clumps
Of grass
Odd plain of
Inter-tribal fear
The fear of death
By hanging or
A slow process
In hospital wards
Odd signs
Of life percolating
From the drum sound
Of man in his infancy
Nov 2017
UNLOVELY BEAUTY
unlovely beauty
of the dead star
hanging around
before the division
called old world
new world
unlucky light
of the star, odd distribution
of blame, white moth
dead moth, unspooled
mantle frail conquest
of the old word
by a new one
unscrew the bulb
lock the door and
put up a no trespassing
sign at the garden gate
to keep the strangers
from abusing the plants
and destroying
the green benches
what is beauty? does
it exist? is a mortal thing
beautiful, ever? are you
ever beautiful? if you are
devoured by clover
where is your beauty?
Nov 2017
BACK IN THE GARDEN
Sing for my buttercups
And forget me nots
For marigolds and roses
Clover and freedom
Sing for the garden
On an overcast day
May branches of the trees
Collide, may rhododendron
Stay in place, forge an
Alliance with roots
And groundwater, allow
The flowers to gliter
In spite of winter’s
Insistence, lean over the fence
And talk to the neighbor
Of politics and poetry, and
Tell me how does your Music
Grow? Have you written an ode
For a future made out of glass?
Will you come tend
These daffodils when I am off
To a distant land of machine guns
And drug cartels? My neighbor
Grins, he asks about assault
Rifles, we have bigger worries
I tell him, stilettos and lynch mobs,
Nuclear bombs and poison
In the drinking water
Then I turn the conversation
To gardening, what is the best soil
For the tree fern? It seems
About to die as if it’s chemistry
Has gone wrong, sing for
My plants, praise simple stems
And stamens, plead for
An awakening and a bloom
OUR BLOCK
Read a political tract and
Turn onto my block
Where the blood of the poet
Flows like liquid gold
Imagine the blessings
Of a poet undisguised
When our block sleeps
On the metal of a new car
And
Pick a poet’s mind
On my funny block of
Vintage houses and shout
For the human face
The bloom in knowing
When to praise thin wires
In the dramatic clouds
Hanging over our block
We need an insane code
For conduct, brother, we
Need your lipstick, lady,
I strut in a black gown
Kiss my street corner,
Sister, bust my balls,
Father Sleep, comb your
beard, old poet, rip your
Shirt in protest of the
Angels, cruise your catacomb
Brain and slam the dumb
Stars twinkling over my block
The postman wears shorts
And carries a trumpet
He flings a death notice
On top of an eviction
Or block is the United
States of America and
Ask for approval
From the nasty trees
These trees send sap
Onto our windshields
Exhausting our sense
Of national pride
Tell me about the politics
Of grass growing in cracks
If asphalt, green and
Yellow tufts of life
Raise a filthy flag on
My block, play folk tunes
From the mythic past
When little birds chirped
In honor of the melodies
That rise from discord
And shut down our peace
And practice the art of wa
ON THE STREETS
if you care to talk about these streets
follow shadows from pale facades
shrouded by decades of rental
and cold sea breezes reaching
hallways and closets, flow as if
your life was on the line, listen
to wheezing fire from renters trapped
in narrow passageways on the road
to Byzantine solitude, water the plants
and sort your garbage, consider all
notions of beauty dissolved, leave
camellias to ponder mortality
on glass-topped table, and go
onto the streets, go to work, go
find release, untangle the lies,
grab a seat on the express bus
and watch the eyes of hopeful
old women with crates of pottery
waiting for their stop, look down
on the sidewalks, turn the city
into a floating palace, join one
of the tour groups, look out for
the intersection, a shaft of sunlight
trembles against the burnt-out shell
of a hardware store, racism is
afoot, it leads us to damp corners
of the neighborhood, God bless
untamed blood, God love street
life, love women with strollers
streaming on the walkway, come
into the circle, every door on
the block holds out hope and
ambition, the streets are a web
of opportunity in this trial
where opportunity demands
patient hands and fortitude
awaken everyone, may their
language be comfortable on
cold November mornings
when Autumn reigns, may light
hit the flowers and make their
magic bloom, on one of the streets
the grackles burn, they amuse
my eyes and animate a dream
of lyrical fingers made out of
the grid, or is it a prism? shadow
birds, tree birds, municipal transit
grackles at the bus stop, life
on a short leash, gardens of
forget-me-nots and thoughts
that please a citizen, the street
talk, they propose endurance
though Autumn will give way
to frigid dawn down around
the depressions, the diminutive
policeman and his oversized
partner partake, they have
grackles on their arms, I
quietly salute them and borrow
success from the scene
Nov. 7, 2017
Neeli Cherkovski –
is in internationally known poet living in San Francisco California. He is the author of many books of poetry and prose. His latest collection, Elegy for My Beat Generation,” it’s published by lithic press.
