THE SUNDAY POET: Krikor Der Hohannesian

Krikor Der Hohannesian

Krikor Der Hohannesian lives in Medford, MA. His poems have been thrice-nominated for a Pushcart prize and have appeared in many literary journals including The Evansville Review, The South Carolina Review, Atlanta Review, Louisiana Literature, Connecticut Review, Natural Bridge and Comstock Review. He is the author of two chapbooks,“Ghosts and Whispers” (Finishing Line Press, 2010) and “Refuge in the Shadows” (Cervena Barva Press, 2013). “Ghosts and Whispers” was a finalist for the Mass Book awards poetry category in 2011.

                                                               

THE FLOWER AND THE CANDLE

Sometimes in dreams, sometimes

in hazy reverie, in those feeling

adrift spaces they appear side by side

like offerings to appease the dark gods

of despair, as buffers against the siren call

of isolation, sentinels against the flight

of the spirit, the dread of mortality. The vase

of runnunculus, tight-lapped petals

pigmented yellow-orange, a medley of

all the sunrises and sunsets since earth-time

began. And the candle, pomegranate

red, its tenuous flame dancing in rhythms

at the whimsy of each puff of air, waxen

blood the melt of its own heat, the ebb

of its own life dripping, pausing, yet

inexorable. The flower always,

always bending toward the light,

the warmth, the promise of life. 

Sometimes, the candle flickers out,

a mean incubus haunts the air,

ghouls of the dark side fill the void.

      I reach out to relight it, the flame dances again.

Or the flower wilts, petals drop one

by one, a shedding of yellow tears,

a stalk sucked dry of life’s juices.

      I give it water and its thirst is quenched.

When the day comes that I move on,

it will pass to others. The candle will

be kept aflame, the flower will have water

until the day all our suns finally flare out,

a circle completed, perfectly round.