L'amore crocifisso


Painting by Stanley Meltzoff






She planted you,
expecting to see a small plant
like maidenhair or a potted ivy.
……………….You were not prepared
to be a rosebud or maybe she wasn’t prepared
to see something outgrowing uncontrollably
behind the fragile surface of the words.

You could never appreciate
a rainbow tattooed under her skin
for you yourself don’t know your own true colors
and ignored dimensions.
She glued stars on the ceiling,
wrote messages with her favorite red lipstick
on the mirror, spoke the language of the flowers.
She had thirty hours, thirty days, thirty minutes,
thirty silent seconds to tell you about Tarot Cards,
Astrology and the immutability of fate.
Did you listen to her hoarse voice?
She was l’amore crocifisso.

Your blue eyes creep as you smoke away
your life and last possibility of happiness.
You said you had asked your God for guidance
but life is an eternal dance and you can’t
understand her steps as she moves her hands
in a tender choreography:
she is a zingara.
People clap their hands
and sing: “Mira la gitana, mira…”
But she is a zíngara, her blood speaks Italian
when L’amore weaves stelle and lune
in solitudine.

She cursed you.
“Strega” the crowd shouted at her.
She cursed love.
“Strega” you said.
What is love but a knife in the chest?
Every day you thrust it deep and deep
till nothing hurts anymore.

She doesn’t need what she can’t have.
For me she will always be a zingara
dancing, with a shawl and a red rose
in her black hair.
She shall be the magic lost, The Empress,
The Priestess, The Star, The Divine Feminine
drawn on my cards.


Karla Bardanza

For J.G

L’amore crocifisso – crucified love
Zingara - gypsy in Italian
Gitana – gypsy is Spanish
Mira – Look at
Stelle – stars in Italian
Lune – moons in Italian
In solitudine – alone in Italian
Strega – witch in Italian


Photobucket
Copyright©Karla Bardanza 2012

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