Author: Edilson Afonso Ferreira

Sad Surprise

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

I did not know,

neither did my wife,

that our marriage had become a rarity.

We meet every five years with former colleagues,

celebrating the anniversary of our graduation,

party that has become traditional.

By the latter, celebrating twenty years, we were troubled,

even frightened, being greeted with such comments:

It is true that you are still married!

Have you not yet separated yourselves?

Something wrong must be happening!

They gave us weird looks,

some of them even suggested a psychologist.

Undesirable and unimaginable a reality,

which we are not prepared for.

My spouse and I agree never more attend these events.

O tempora! O mores! –  said Cicero.

What time, what customs! –  do we say!

Dreams, Dramas, Desires

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

Again alive, from

ambushes assembled by enemies in unsuspected corners,

by inoffensive and ordinary days;

unexpected malicious comments and dirty looks

of people always counted as faithful friends;

unknown and treacherous diseases,

out of reason or occasion to appear;

sleepless nights, frightened by horrible nightmares,

or sunny days, suddenly turned to cold and sullen ones;

recurrent sweet dreams appearing without warning,

in pensive and lonely nights,

remembrance of the woman you still love.

Again alive and unlearned from harsh past lessons,

so is the destiny of amorous, stubborn and delinquent one heart.

Published in Tree House Arts, Feb 20, 2019

http://www.treehousearts.me

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

Friends, Land and Flowers

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

I am guilty of not having many loves

and few people have being my friends.

I am a man of old-fashioned customs,

the one who hopes to be duly introduced

and then exchange a full conversation.

Forgotten refinement of the times of yore,

etiquette learned in the old social rites.

My friends are few, faithful and heartfelt,

not subject to the usual taps on the back,

easy laughs and feigned cuddling.

They are always austere, even stern,

but never fail when you need them.

Never accustomed to false praise

and empty words,

but prompt, effective and friendly deeds.

Like the land where I was born and raised,

dry plateaus and arid hills, narrow creeks

and honest meagre sheaves by the harvest.

Stubborn trees that, unlike the others,

wait for the driest season to bloom,

naked even of leaves, find strength

to bring forth delicate yellow flowers,

resembling pure and true gold.

Published in Young Ravens, issue 9, December 2018.

http://www.youngravensliteraryreview.org/

Published in Better Than Starbucks, September 2019

http://www.betterthanstarbucks.org

Published in The Lake, June 2020

http://www.thelakepoetry.co.uk

Published in Masks Anthology, July 2020, by Culture Cult Magazine

Published in West Ward Quarterly, Fall 2021 issue 

http://www.wwquarterly.com 

Passage to Paradise

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

The emotion that lies at the heart,

not shown in gestures and words,

cannot be measured or felt,

but by myself.

Disillusionment, sadness and despair,

even rejoicing and pleasure,

have created tears, salty and hot ones,

which have leavened the soil where I live,

bringing forth flowers, fruits, children.

Have nourished and ennobled my spirit,

paying the toll I owe to the lord of the fief.

I am sure they are leading me to Canaan,

the promised land where evil finds no shelter

and milk and honey flow abundantly.

Where the woman I desire is waiting for me,

at the door of my house, longing and needy,

wife and lover.

Published in PPP Ezine, April 2019

http://www.poetrypoeticspleasureezine.wordpress.com

Published in Lothlorien Poetry Journal, October 9, 2023

http://www.lothlorienpoetryjournal.blogspot.com

Life, Seasons and Desires

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

Let me tell you a secret.

Secrets are made to, at the right and appropriate time,

be revealed and exposed.

They twist and squirm, get tired of the imposed imprisonment

and ask, if not demand, their freedom.

I am a conservative man, averse to change.

I would live my entire life in the same house, same friends,

same loves;

would have my children and their children would be equally ours,

growing, assembling and sharing rooms and lives,

indifferent to strange customs of those

who do not love or even like each other.

We would be like a pack of wolves that are always together

and know no other world but their own.

I like the sun that does not change

and it is the same every day,

heating and never forgetting of us.

I cannot understand the moon, its four phases and four faces,

that makes us fall in love with its brightness and then,

plays hide-and-seek, feminine and elusive wants and appearances.

I would like to have an extended spring without summer,

a fall without winter, succulent fruits the whole year,

packed with gentle rains and tender winds.

My hair could be white, but full and thick,

not meager and thin; my desire active and predatory,

voracious and powerful, facing my last season

with that child’s own haughtiness, still shaped

as a certain book says, in the image and likeness

of noble our Creator.

Published in Free Lit Magazine, November 2018 issue.

http://www.freelitmagazine.com

Published in Tree House Arts, Feb 20, 2019

http://www.treehousearts.me

Published in West Ward Quarterly, print issue, Winter 2021 (Jan 2021)

http://www.wwquarterly.com

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

Encounter of Faith

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

Once, on my thirties, in a very little used road,

by the side of ancient and dark a forest,

I was acquainted with weird a creature,

very unlike anyone I had ever met.

He taught me we have been tagged with a signal,

that of being answerable for any of our equals.

He said that to as blessed man as I was,

it was not allowed to share with fellow ones,

as little as I had been accustomed to.

It seemed to me an alma mater of humanity,

came from ancient paths of our origins,

incarnate by some of our loving ancestors,

if not by all.

Since then, I have found strength, and my friends,

family and even this world as far as I reach,

I imagine, yet believe,

have improved, if just by a little,

every day of my life.

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

Pride

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

“So God created mankind in his own image,

in the image of God he created them;

male and female he created them” – Genesis 1-27.

 

This is how our history has been told in your book,

in the words of your saints and prophets,

a matter we must never doubt of.

Forgive us for questioning, but where

the power and mastery we should display,

which we have been looking for so long?

Where the wisdom and clearness,

where an eternal life or, at least, someone like

that of Methuselah, who lived for nine hundred

and sixty-nine years?

We lived by your side so little, and quickly

you banished us, locking the Paradise Gate,

there placing those cherubims brandishing

their deathly flaming swords.

Perhaps, in lieu of immortality, we developed

greatest and warmest a love, for and from

each one of us, what you could ever dream of.

Also, may you believe,

having forgotten your primeval purpose,

boldly, unconsciously, perhaps,

so we should prefer to continue living.

Published in Culture Cult Magazine, issue 13 – Monsoon 2019.

http://www.culturecult.co.in

Published in Fevers of the Mind, Sep 18 2023

http://www.feversofthemind.com

Published in Lothlorien Poetry Journal, March 10, 2024

http://www.lothlorienpoetryjournal.blogspot.com

Published in Feed the Holy, April 18, 2025

http://www.feedthehol.blogspot.com

Published in Voices 2025, May 2025

http://www.coldriverpress.com

Published in The Galway Review, Aug 13, 2025

http://www.thegalwayreview.com

Published in 7th circle Pyrite, Feb 21, 2026

Who will read?

/ Edilson Afonso Ferreira / Leave a comment

Plowing the fields and producing wheat, oats and beans;

rising sheep, cows and pigs;

raising and spreading children and instilling in them

those dreams we were not able to turn into reality.

Throwing rails, roads, bridges and ports,

cities, skyscrapers, churches and cathedrals,

always leaving fences and borders;

creating worlds only ours,

incapable and fearful to co-habit the one

that has been given to us in full.

Boasting and toasting in life’s daily feast,

trying to write our history which has begun

in that sixth day of the divine journey of creation.

They who will read our history will know it was lived

with such a love and endearment, though absent from

the power and glory of its creator.

 

Published in the March 2018 issue of Snapdragon A Journal of Art and Healing. .

http://www.snapdragonjournal.com