Mist dancing

White Noise

2011-07-13T21:13:00.000+03:00

What can you say
to the cat
that's walking on clouds

Mantric distortion
radiowaves pulsing like haunted frequencies
above the intermediate clouds
of your levitating stasis

In the spectrum
of omniscient metaphors
"white noises"
turning the sun
into a door knob

Sand polished paws
stampeding the clouds
demonstrating
opposition to direct sunlight

Crows as white
as tear gas
tuning their call,
a radio broadcast
white noise
bronze cello strings
idealized firecrackers

the sun
punches holes
in shinny notions
in un-handled parachutes,
bodies
free
of white noise

© Costis Demos

Scaffolding

2011-06-20T18:08:00.003+03:00

Branches unfolding their resignation
beneath prepackaged wind
in stock for tomorrow.

Leaves bow like beggars
pleading for nightmares
where they burn like the Wickerman
before Autumn crumbles them.

That scaffolding
a solid construction.
Iron bars embrace concrete walls
and fluid nap dreams.

Tonight the scent of overcooked cliches
bubbling in frothy cauldrons.

That scaffolding
rattling iron pipes
rusty joints jealous of oaks
filled with squirrel piss
and remnants of dead moths
newborn three days ago.

Tonight the scent
of bent incense in reversed burning
from ash to stick.

A scaffolding dismantled
deconstructed metal rods
scattered like non-invented telescopes
rolling downhill towards the midnight
of tomorrows scent.

© Costis Demos

Lawn chairs

2011-06-09T04:12:00.007+03:00

The poem below is a collaboration done by myself and the rare poetic weaver of earth toned words, Angie. Read her at myearthgirl

Angie: two sunlit chairs

four empty arms

the space between

Costis: fashioning wind woven poems

tossed in close proximity

Angie: outer spaces

inner pieces

Costis: constellation's garden

piece by peace

cosmic

Angie: porch-framed stars

lovers still

life

Costis: stellar frame

Andromeda the pin

Venus the hammer

Angie: love

hanging

on a sky full of nails

Costis: stars

past pins

comet loves

connect the dots

for the true picture

Angie: beneath the stars

blades of grass

stir the milky way

Costis: the fox's tail

northern lights

white brush

a kiss

above two lawn chairs

Mist of aeons

2011-05-25T04:32:00.003+03:00

led by the Raven
soil born skeletons
mountain wraiths
atop the hill
rituals of smoke

nine flickering torches
spermatozoa launched to the sky
became astral dots

the cerebral mist
unraveling mysteries of carnal ghosts -
manifestations of urban abductions

witches and owls
tucked below the schism
of a leather covered diary

self exorcized teenagers
self ostracized synapses
self exiled entry codes

eyes tracing
the otherworldly roots
of human footprints on wind pipes

Seven naked parents
each holding
the golden plated genitals
of three million aeons
thread softly on copper leafs
as the ritual of smoke
falls thick
like the white curtain -

like the mist-woven
synthesis
of an infants soul

© Costis Demos

Posted for One Shot Wednesday

Gathering

2011-05-20T04:16:00.002+03:00

Gathering
existing
under the delusion of tolerance.

Opinions and judgements-
a rampage.
The pretenders of the high road
slain first
or converted to the elevated position
of 'secret executor'.

"Only god can judge you"
Yells the funny Cormo-rant
fluttering upwards to a self made cloud.

Identity and self
scratching their head in confusion
outside grouping.
Non attachment looks at the mirror
and sees itself perceived
in the prison of its peers.

Drink your ink-
Drink your opinion.

Tomorrows sunset
consists of puked-out beliefs.
Circular dawns fry your neglected reconsideration
and your bloated resilience to change.

A gathering of mocking sparrows
carry away your crumpling consciousness
to the lap of the Tibetan monk
who holds the answer to mans riddle.

He might post it
on his Facebook status

© Costis Demos

Get yours today

2011-05-09T03:58:00.001+03:00

Lifestyle ordered
the spring catalog
a wide selection

Festering wardrobes
leopard skin
a bowl of condoms next to a lava lamp

pheromone injection
inside a careful dosage
of Paolo Coelho, Carrie Bradshaw and a sprinkle of orientalism

Your high heels stabbing
daddy's pelvis
in a trail from your kitchen tiles
to Alice in wonderland

Testosterone levels skyrocketing
shaking a cocktail
of monogamous polygamy and self molded bachelorhood

You count your biceps
play-backing mamas praise
as you recite ancient philosophy
applied to corporate culture
"things to do before 30"
tick

It's a lovely night on planet earth
The pop culture supermarket
is open 24/7
and your shrink
is working the register

© Costis Demos

Djinni

2011-05-01T22:18:00.003+03:00

Sideward gaze
"King Solomon demands teal tears"

The nomads tea
drugged

Ancient prayers
adrift in sand
He guides you
in Khamsin paths
as the fifth wind
swims in his turban.

The Djinn's scimitar looms above
your inspiration
passing words from captors
expecting down-payment

Rock and dune
appease the caravan of imprisoned nouns
as the desert
is nothing but a tilted hourglass

Sun rays wake you up
Bronze coins
Bronze tea

The markets of Casablanca
produce
frequent illusions.

offered for One Shoot Sunday picture prompt
picture by the Moroccan-based photographer Rosa Frei. Check out her interview over at One Stop Poetry.

© Costis Demos

Norwegian Fjords (στοιχειωμένες διαστάσεις)

2011-04-13T21:02:00.001+03:00

Septic windows banging
smudging and bending
the amber reflections
of scalded blinds

That murder of crows
sarcastic caretakers
of that exhumed wind-
an exhaling of stale breeze

Born there in bleached sepia
void four dimensional
exponential wildfire
imagination haunted

Mornings were
convoluted holograms
unspent moments
deprived of possibility-
schismatic childhood

That murder of crows
a black tie event
memorial service
to your paroxysm
and your unhatched metaphors

Only unkempt achievements
saw the light
as it twirled around the winding wood
of that invisible patio

next drive by,
I promise to toss
my packaged obsolescent esoterica

(...)

I kept this morbid postcard
and made a talisman
of a hibernating Buddha
levitating above Norwegian fjords

© Costis Demos

part of One Stop Poetry & One shot Wednesday

Photograph {Harpers Ferry, WV at night} by Jennifer Thompson
-used under kind permission-

puissant daybreak

2011-04-07T07:47:00.006+03:00

Parenthetic accusations
Lintels of mosh covered hints
as the yawning poet walks away
from stalking colloquialisms

"Tread lightly among your peers"

Discarded tobacco flakes
turning into lotus petals
as the wet sidewalk puddle
phases in and out of a serene pond

One will-o-wisp
shoots up the nose of a taxi driver
during rush hour

Stellar nights
dancing behind the cremated highway
and yet you hear
wolfs howling from a hundred years ago,
a moon song stolen from grey mane coyotes

Longing for her blastoff proximity
the cabby turns warp speed on
charging wormhole tariff
for every unbound cliche

Yellow and black
like a wheeled tiger
making way
for the Dolby doctrinaire
of the pastor

The tabernacle taboo
that dripped from
his eBay purchased portable halo,
unfurled into the immaculate dogma
which got him shot by a sperm bullet

The perpetrator
told me that 'Genesis'
is alabaster dimensions
colliding in a puissant daybreak

we had breakfast

© Costis Demos

Shards of moist silver

2011-03-28T00:45:00.008+03:00

He bathed the blade in snow
His death poem streaming
in red ink
verse upon metaphor
transparent like the frost

The samurai
performs hara - kiri
but it is the snow that bleeds

Winter cleansing
epoch blood
branches of crimson veins
on the frozen lake

Tracing the wave length of the katana
a curved life walk,
blacksmithed soul
inside folded powdered iron

Still his death poem flows,
a red avenue amidst flowery sprouts
branches of crimson veins
upon the melting lake
the circle bended by death and life
a haiku for oval seasons

Shards of moist silver
raindrops tracing the hamon
purified spring sword

picture prompt by @chasingtao at today’s one shoot sunday

© Costis Demos

Fusion

2011-03-16T05:21:00.003+02:00

Words slip and hide
inside the tape-recorder of my ears.

Wine soaked smell
distilled dreamscape and lucid fire.
I gravitate towards a den of smoke
towards a cellar unbound.

That tattoo between your breasts
molds the passing of time
into tiny drops of blood
synchronized with your innermost pulse.

We are attuned
with the frequencies of the primal orgasm.
With the clay goblet of the earthmother.

We are reborn together
and the semen of the sun
fountains from our lovemaking.

I curve my walk
to trace
the carving of the serrated sunset
the dawn of your epiphany.

A silhouette
manifests like a string of smoke in my lungs.

My bowels longing for your vowels.
The ones you utter
on the flip side of your pillow.

Moist flowerbeds
and nymphs with golden ovarian follicles
emerge from your barefoot step.

I know it tonight.
You are a funnel
of weather beaten clouds
stolen from the womb of the first daybreak.

I dream of molecular structures
as my voice is warped in the sanctity of your skin
embarking
in pilgrimage
in salvation
in fusion.

© Costis Demos

This poem also is also submitted as a response to this weeks One Shot Wednesday at One Stop Poetry.

Two crows

2011-03-09T06:58:00.005+02:00

A man was born, down by the sea
they named him Joshua
his faith in life, humbled all tree
Buddha, Yahweh, Allah

They call him Judgewhiskey
and sleeps inside a fridge
a mind like the water
a heart like the bridge

His character uncharted
he hides what he knows
a soul that's closely guarded
by eagles and by crows

A typewriter once awoke
deep within his eyes
with each robust and steady stroke
girls loosen their thighs

He holds a pen that's dipped in coal
and one that drips with silver
on sunlit dunes his verse does stroll
his rhyme flows like a river

Two crows now I send to him
or should I call them Ravens
to lend him wings when times look grim
and beaks to pierce the cravens

These birds devised a rhyme
that I am now reciting
echoing in Mist time
bond from afar igniting

Greywing and Ash
were all out of cash
and all out of booze
nothing to lose...
and said : "oh my gosh"
"lets go visit Josh"

To Joshua

© Costis Demos

Ink

2011-03-07T19:56:00.004+02:00

Poems carved by kisses
Streaming canyons of desire
voyaging through your pores.

A cohesion of skin, of moist ink.
That is our mantra.

I long for you to know the coarseness of my beard
across your inner lips.

Under the clandestine acoustic of our nights,
let me ghostwrite your tattoo
let me dip my tongue in ink
and trace the dripping of your sweat
as it fumes into lavender and cardamon.

I look for your delight under Chinese lanterns
while my inked mouth
shades mahjong patterns
on your aromatic wetness.

I am choreographed by your moans.
A ghostwriter.
A shade.
Manifesting in six senses.
Working overtime
inside your Volumes.

I am the ink on your skin
denying armistice between your thighs.
Absorbed and permanent,
branding lust and adoration
while my heart
circulates in your veins.

© Costis Demos

The last son

2011-03-03T02:43:00.008+02:00

The last son,
of the last son
born by a mother
who father had none,
walked in Pangaea
to capture the sun.

He weaved crude contraptions
and carved cave walls
and hid inside caverns
when he heard thunder rolls.

The last son,
of the last son
worshiped the rain
and fell down prone
learning of pain
bedazzled and lone.

He built stone towns
and tamed wild beasts
longing for crowns,
for power and feasts.

The last son,
of the last son
drank from the stars
and ate from the dawn.
Encased in his eye,
the ancient eon.

He waged holy wars
and conquest crusades
and raised iron doors
'round religious charades.

The last son,
of the last son
battled with science
and claims he has won
saying in defiance:
"it was me all along."

The last son,
of the last son
unorthodox lines he has crossed,
he has drawn.

he gazed at the sun
and then he was gone.

© Costis Demos

R&J

2011-02-23T20:33:00.012+02:00

Collaboration between the beautifully talented Angie and myself , the result of two evenings of fluid poetic dialogue.

Visit and read her heartfelt poetry at : earthgirl

Let us have a go
without proper etiquette
on the story of Romeo
and that of Juliet.

Angie: supine in the cathedral
the poison of lost care

Costis: love must be dihedral
poison's just a dare

Angie: such apothic love
smug beneath stained glass

Costis: lurking like a dove
daydreaming in Sunday mass

Angie: a buttress
a crow
a good way to go

Costis: ebony
wings
in the midnight sings

Angie: nevermore
is such a bore

Costis: bedroom haven
said...the Raven

Angie: then, through the bedchamber door
a flicker
a roar

the molten bedsheets only heard
the passion of their whispered words

Romeo: your Cabernet lips
the color of pressed grapes

soaked in juices sublime and archetypal
drenched on hues delightful in taste, smell, and vision
spread on our bodies aroused

drinking from the cleft of your collar bone
rivulets down your spine...

Juliet: spine explored by your lips of plumed desire
the stain of vineyards pagan and of nectar Dionysian
a rumble of sweat unearthed...
ambrosia pooled in the small of my back...
the gods look on and grin

at your poised masculinity
at the onslaught of your posture

Romeo: and then your shin
an arched avenue beginning
rasp is the taste of our union
molten sunsets and smelted dusk
linger in your pores

teal shores and shivering foam
streams of your earthiness
jewels coming from holy soil

Juliet: my starlit, sky-chiseled thigh
melts into your watercolor horizon

ecstatic in verticality and vagabond grace
a palette of voracious release
a brush of thin, firm, crimson strokes

Romeo: I lower...

chained breath
rapture unrestrained

Costis: on balconies and shacks
then comes the morning mist
and so it was the poison
they managed to resist

Angie: poison's overrated
says Romeo
Juliet has a smoke

no rhyme
this time

The above poem , is also a part of One-Shot Wednesday at One-Stop Poetry.

© Angie LaPaglia McNeill , Costis Demos

Black Label

2011-02-23T04:18:00.007+02:00

Copper drops
Barricated gulps.

A toast
to years of celebrated maturity.

Her molten thickness
straight and overflowing
revels in bewitching density
staggering around
copper drops
and puissant refills.

I saw a Tambourine man
lurking outside my window.
Sly mannerisms
like those clumsy rainclouds
threatening the park
with imminent evacuation.

Your street has the stupid name
of some bone rattling general.

You love the concrete.
That inner fondness
for greyscale incarceration.

More copper drops
Red label
Green label
Black.

You inexplicably wonder
if the Tambourine man
is named Johnny.

To Monty. Bless ya old timer. And to Joshua. Cheers to you and to your fridge which cannot freeze the warmth of your heart.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

Shangri-la

2011-02-19T05:36:00.000+02:00

Hear it read by the Aerie voice of Catherine

Who dreams
of silver leaves in Shangri-la?

Fossils of fragrance
once orange hexagons
once shapes of green.

Who keeps
their hands enervated for Xanadu?

Awaiting the kiss of the Oshidori ducks
swimming in the stream
of the Peach Blossom Valley.

Who will be drinking tea
in the tent of the great Khan
the midnight before tomorrow?

It boils in that golden Samovar
like the heart of the mongol falcon
called Yanibeck Altai
in the tongue of gods.

Who links El Dorado
with the first morning breath?
with Daybreak?

Is the fate of Atlantis
suspected in a train ride?
Who ponders the architecture or her chambers
intrigued by those mandarin lockboxes
so much alike human minds?

Who dreams
of silver leaves in Shangri-la?

Falling like miniature string-less parachutes
like shimmering platforms
like minute moments of Déjà vu
imprinted
on excess ink
on leaking sighs
on misplaced to-do lists.

who.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

Dustman

2011-02-16T06:14:00.006+02:00

Hear it read by the gorgeous and mellow voice of Catherine

Every last hair
turned downwards
in a vertical plea
a tribute to wooden floors
an execution paused.

One life fitting in a box.
Or rather
a jack-o-lantern.
Stacked trinkets
and mechanical brakes
cast into the fire
but he kept the boots.

On them
Dust.
Wood.
Grounded soles fashioned for wild walking.

Go now baptized heathen.
Go out and inhale
clogged permanency.

Maybe
you will see your mother
selling herself
and your father preaching
with a loud speaker.

or

you can raise you head
and see millions of others
bowing
kneeling
on that Galileic floorboard.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

Μεσημέρι

2011-02-15T06:15:00.002+02:00

Μιά τελευταία φωνή
πέρασε από το καμπαναριό
και οι ακτίνες του ήλιου
μία-μία
απέρριψαν τον ήχο.

Αγγαρεία φάνηκε
σε ήλιο και πέτρα
η θυσία της σιωπής.

Κι έτσι
Μάλλον απο τότε
έμεινες γυρμένος
με δυό παλάμες στις τσέπες
πιέζοντας τον ώμο στον αέρα.

Αγγαρεία φάνηκε
σε ήλιο και πέτρα
να σε αποδεσμεύσει
απο την μνήμη
ενός και μόνο μεσημεριού.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

Unhinged

2011-02-13T19:50:00.002+02:00

The poem below (delivered for onestoppoetry Photography Sunday Poetry challenge)is the inspirational offspring of the above picture, work of Canadian photographer Sean McCormick.
His interview , part 2 , can be found at One Shot Photography Sunday.

The view is to the open air
and not to floors confined.
To open the secret window
three eyes must be combined.

Aligned.

Aligned we were , obscured by mist
in pathways stretching wide,
as we procured the earthly gist
in trenches by the side.

Hide.

Hide in trees with outstretched hands
attached to clear vision.
Inhale the fog in empty glands
and breathe a true decision.

Incision.

Incision split the road in stripes
and thoughts in deep plantation.
Do not divide the mist in types,
its just an alteration.

Illumination.

Illumination nearby,
in fog and verses lost?
He took the road less traveled by,
his name was Mr Frost.

Crossed.

Crossed are the paths under the mist,
where ghosts are dancing still.
Inside that mist my psychic cyst
Foretells the lifelong wheel.

Peel.

Peel your soul and as you dance
the mist will slowly fade.
Let loose your feet under the trance,
farewell is not yet bade.

Shade.

Shade of clouds in prairies green
one shut-down window less.
Perceiving now, lands unseen
Horizon in excess.

Formless.

Formless the view, viewless the frame
when souls remain blind,
unhindered vision, clear sight
comes from an unhinged mind.

Rewind.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

Photo by Sean McCormick. Used under kind permission.

Yellow Galoshes

2011-02-11T05:50:00.007+02:00

Care for a reading by the lovely voice of Catherine?

He spraypainted
his yellow galoshes.
Graffiti on rubber.

Mud on the trail
and spiked lizards
on the artwork.

Long trench coat
heirloom of rainclouds
stolen from Humphrey's closet.

Tilted was his Panama hat
Collecting slim sun rays,
rays indulging in escapism
between gerontocratic branches.
Rays , gasping for reflection.

He longed for some punkish woodpeckers
penetrating the acoustic ambiance
like that made by the god awful ambulance
carrying away his heart.

The shack is a refuge
and named him Dustman
as he entered
again barefoot.

Galoshes at hand.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

Crippled Moon

2011-02-09T02:08:00.013+02:00

That argent night had come too soon
Two bodies lying on the floor
Arose the old and crippled moon
Brought the mystique, the heathen lore.

The smoke from sticks Oriental
Lit by the candle on the skull
Soothes the coming of the beast
But this story, has a twist.

Her skin was white as Alabaster
And he was so with lust absorbed
That no willpower he could muster
Would save her lacy lingerie.

He poured a glass of Cabernet...

And showered her neck,her breast,her thighs
No one would hear her yelps and cries
She moaned sedated on the rug.

The haunted painting stared and shrug.

Beside the alchemy apparatus
There sat a white Felis Catus
Sniffing the change in the atmosphere
A wolfish hour s' drawing near.

He licked and mouthed her reddish skin
(Was from the wine, not from within).
She twitched and turned, would not stay put
To be taken by the brute.

The argent night came too soon
Arose the old and crippled moon
She wouldn't have no real hope
But she was... The lycanthrope.

Wanna hear it while reading?

Delivered and Shared for One Shot Wednesday

Dedicated to those who are in touch with their animal instincts.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

photo by Lenna

The Hut

2011-02-06T14:46:00.004+02:00

Slow Solar winds
Funneled
into the ecstatic void.

The hut
Harbored that inner fire
From bodies ignited,
Fluorescent,
Paleolithic.

Outside, as the Cosmos
Re-arranges his umbilical cord
The vortex of the Ion storm
Unleashes its operative battery
Around our humble abode.

I call it Genesis

And so does your cousin
'The Aurora Borealis'
As it unfolds
The static discharge
Of some raw poetics
Atop another
Lonely
Hut.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

(delivered for onestoppoetry Photography Sunday Poetry challenge)

Photo by Sean McCormick. Used under kind permission.

The Last Picture Show

2011-02-04T04:01:00.006+02:00

Who places people
in perceivable urban settings?
32 years
and those bricks
implode like cinnamon sticks.

Some house windows
are like prairie postcards
or like frameless portraits
halting words.

Uncut facial hints
re-emerge since the grim feast
of nursery rhymes,
packaging the same mannerisms
in the treadmill of fooloshophizing.

It's the last picture show.
Sit above - look below.

How are photographs
any different
from crude sketches,
from a soul tofu,
dipped in the perception
of an angled click?

The camera
does not capture
the psyche
as the Shaman fears.
It ensnares
the acrostic dimensions
of a facade,
or a face.
Of a practiced pretense,
or an archived spontaneity.

It's the last picture show.
Filmed and cut years ago.

But pictures are alive.
Sequential.
Perma-linked
above urns and tombstones,
maternity rooms
and spent pencils.

It's the last picture show.
Final column.
First row.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

Photo by Alicia - http://kaleidoscope1712.blogspot.com/

Kenji saw two birds

2011-02-03T06:34:00.008+02:00

One tired tune
lured
an array of notes
as Vinyl skies
revolve unscratched
by downward needles.

Kenji saw two birds
lured
by an array of notes.
Sitting on the lamp post
their black eyes
submit
to the grayform
motif.

Their beaks like downward needles,
tweet
one tired tune.

My smoke
is a column of marriage
Betrothed to the motif.
Its a thin white Duke
unable to slip
towards the lamp post.

Lawrence and David
are their quick and fleeting names.

Re-named tomorrow
I hope,
in a poem.

© Κωστής Ντέμος

Kenji saw two birds
And I am one
ever since.

Dedicated to gray motif appreciators