Author: Edilson Afonso Ferreira

My Hurry

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

They do not know that I am in a hurry.

A hurry to love this world even more,

with all people destiny has given to me,

fellow travelers in the common journey.

A hurry to instill and teach my children

the art of goodwill and mutual respect,

pillars that bring us closer to the Creator.

A hurry to fight the good fight, wielding

my sword, my mind and my will

against hopeless and unfaithful brothers,

acolytes of those fallen angels who envy,

hate and despise happiness, love and

the common good.

A hurry that before the end of my days,

may I help us to be closer to the promised land,

where milk and honey flow and evil ever hides,

defeated, disoriented, humiliated.

 

Published in Poetry Poetics Pleasure, September 2019

http://www.poetrypoeticspleasureezine.wordpress.com

 

This poem and all others at this blog, authored by Edilson Afonso Ferreira ©

My Tears and my Cries

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I cry for the estrangement among whites and blacks,

yellows and browns, Christians and Muslims;

for the rich who reach water from golden faucets

and the poor who carry it in the buckets;

for the wine and salmon tables of the mansions

and the yesterday’s bread passing from hand to hand;

for the security of the politicians on the comings years

and the fear of the common people for tomorrow;

for the dreams of the righteous, that have not come true

and the audacity of the insolents, who have no feelings

and are not intimidated.

But I hope to have strength until my last day,

to pierce the veil that seeks to cover evil,

lifting up my sword in the Lord’s army,

always angry against injustice and oppression.

It is my faith that this will be

sacred and ultimate my soul’s redemption.

 

Published in The Phoenix, printed issue Abril 2020

http://www.pfeiffer.phoenix.com

Nothing than Praise

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I have not paid to the world as much as I owe.

I was born naked; I have clothes, house, and car.

I was born unknown; I have friends, admirers,

have even had  people who loved me.

My body has withstood sun, rain, wind and snow,

has been spared the onslaught of viruses and microbes,

unwanted messengers of diseases and afflictions,

but, towering, persists defiant.

Evil spirits, the fallen ones, sown in wait,

have hit my carcass, my sacred helmet,

but, defeated, lie by the wayside.

I can only pay praising and worshiping, firm and strong,

body and spirit, in hope of the re-encounter with our creator,

sacred, ultimate and legitimate human’s redemption.

Our Tour on Earth

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I do not want to wait one minute more to say

to this world some words stuck in my throat:

I love all of you!

Whites, yellows, browns, blacks,

elderly, young, children,

even the evil ones, because they must have

some strange and shady missions,

often (or always) hidden just to themselves.

It is true that daily we catch ourselves watching

a lively musical from Broadway, and then,

horrible some Greek tragedy.

As mentor and director of our tour on earth,

God uses the talents of His creatures,

like a painter mixing colors in a masterpiece.

We must accept the tones we have been given,

for it is the redemption of a destiny and a duty

allocated to us, it would be good to believe,

even before the beginning of our own time.

Days of Yore

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I am a friend of the past.

I have good relations with it.

I do not frighten myself when I hear the gong ringing

and it says, hello, I am here, I am reminded of you today.

There is no time or day set for its appearance.

Today it reminded me the ways in the paternal farm,

where, solitary but not sad or haunted,

I walked in my childhood and youth.

We said of the blue-back grassquits,

which landed on the wire fences, sang,

and gave three leaps, up and down.

We said of when I was walking alone on the tracks,

wanting to sneeze, had to wait to cross someone,

and so sneeze, for it was needed to hear from him:

God help you!

We reminded the stone mill, operated by the water wheel,

that grinded the kernels producing corn meals,

used for the baked cakes in the wood-burning ovens,

ones brick-made at the open air in the yard.

Also remembered the school of D. Maria Dias,

who lectured in the cellar, where we studied

until the third year, for the fourth had to be

at the town school.

There were some comrades, who came annually

from extinct mines where gold was exhausted,

to work on our crops: coffee, corn, rice and beans.

We prayed the rosary every night, and, on Sundays,

our family went to mass in the town church, smoothing,

for years and years, the bank with our name inscribed,

friends we were of God and of the parish priest.

Times of old, when we were happy,

but did not know.

So happy that we lived in Paradise,

which was the name of that hinterland.

Really, some of us came to believe

the bible had borrowed it for the land

of one of its best known stories.

Published in Mocking Heart Review, fall 2019 issue, Nov. 01, 2019

http://www.mockingheartreview.com

This poem and all others at this blog, authored by Edilson Afonso Ferreira ©

Encounter on the Road Curves

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It was not on the straight, wide and sunny road,

that I saw you.

It was on the road’s bend, so switched a curve that

almost returned to the point from which I had come.

It was in a dark and gloomy day,

where wind did not dare to appear

and people sought to hide within themselves.

Now I know that fate had given that afternoon

as precious gift to me, when set us face to face.

Then, your beauty shone, flashed like a torch,

or a beacon in dark nights driving the sailors.

You enchanted me, like a serpent with her prey,

but not devoured, only arrested and gave me love.

In the days following our meeting,

they say the sun had shone again.

It does not concern me,

for I have won you.

 

Published in Red Wolf Journal, October 06, 2019.

http://www.redwolfjournal.wordpress.com

Love Reminiscences

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

I have neither the time nor the talent to sing praises

to all that have enchanted me in my life on earth.

Someday, I will miss these happy and satiated eyes,

my ears, even my heart.

We, who now share this land and these airs,

will be no more than sparing remembrance

for those who will remain.

In the short time given to me, I want to suck in fury

all the honey I can get by on my lips, living the life

just like that poet of sweet memory, burning my candle

on both sides, my light frightening and pushing away

all scarecrows on duty.

Maybe in another life, unknown to me,

they give me other days,

who knows, even Eternity.

But they never will give me, however,

those scarlet red sunsets preceding soft nights,

where I have met lovely and unforgettable women,

sisters our race has refined in such a beauty

never seen anywhere or anytime else.

Published in Free Lit Magazine, volume 5, Issue 3, The Beauty Issue, May, 29th 2019.

http://www.freelitmagazine.com

Published in Tree House Arts, July 24, 2019

http://www.treehousearts.me

Origins

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

I walk in the streets, alleys and squares,

I see and hear all kind of people.

I still feel even a bit of their souls.

Whites, blacks and yellows,

adults, children and the elderly,

they are my fellow ones, comrades

on the biggest walk, in route

to the admirable new world,

the land once promised, so long ago.

Instead, perhaps should I go

back to that sixth day of one holy week,

to ask our Creator if this is the way

He had thought for His people.

Also, if is not yet arrived the time for forgiveness,

disarming some cherubim’s flaming swords,

still on guard at the Paradise Gate.

Treasured a Past

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / 2 Comments

No one, other than myself, needs or should know about my past.

It is sacred a shrine, not open to public visitation in any way.

I am sure some guardian angels have been in duty,

around me, since my birth, even since I was conceived.

I believe, more so, they had approached and induced

a couple of young lovers, to the holy mission to add

to our world a new soul, a new being.

All this with the complicity and blessings of God,

lord and mentor of all destinations.

Every time I fell and got up,

was wrong, then corrected and forgiven,

my tears wiped and the hope renewed,

has strengthened and put me on the right track

to the land once promised to our ancestors.

That where milk and honey flow, and evil

never finds shelter, which, I surely believe

and hope, is waiting for us not far beyhond

the horizon of upcoming so happy a day.

 

This poem and all others at this blog, authored by Edilson Afonso Ferreira ©

 

Cherished Belief

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

Someday, somewhere,

I will get you only for me,

just for me, apart, separate,

from the entire world.

Then, I will kiss your red lips

with all holiness, born through

sacred, chaste and sinless a love.

Witnessed and blessed  by the creator,

so, there will exist no time or clock,

day or night, reason or laws.

It will be the fulfillment of a story,

kept secret and secluded, although,

we both know,

written and settled since always,

by solemn and unique a destiny.

 

Published in The Basil O’Flaherty, spring 2019 issue.

http://www.thebasiloflaherty.weebly.com