Tigris Poems

Waves from the Tigris

Green woods 

Barefoot I walk 

Chalk half broken 

Unspoken yearnings 

Earrings from the caves 

Waves from the Tigris 

Enslaving existence 

Distances chopped 

Pearl drops

  ________

July 2, 2025

Effect of Redness

As the blush of a lovely breast spreads
Harpy eagle's desire hovers over the Tigris River
Taurus rides the high tide of excitement.

The Cliff gets inundated by huge floods
Turbulent is the danger time boat-
Turning the inkpot upside down-
Principia Mathematica gets blurred
Young sailor is disoriented without a lighthouse
Falling are the rudder and mast on the waves.

Piece of Me

I can still feel the weight of the heat colliding with my face as I first stepped off the plane, 
And how beads of sweat would tickle my neck the same as when it rained,
How the harsh odor of the atmosphere would nauseate my nose,
And the courage of a people despite our impose,

I hear the splashing of the Tigris as I kneel to rinse my hands,
And how it felt to think that nothing’s promised, even on promised lands,
From wailing sirens and the buzz of the Phalanx at night,
To the popping of shots and the whooshing of helos in flight,

From the honking of horns and roads without lanes,
To swishing through traffic and the jingling of chains,
I hear the whispers of prayer being broadcast through the air,
And the murmurs of locals and their unwelcomed stares,

To the thuds of percussions from bombs in my chest,
Detonated afar but still rattled my vest,
But of all that I remember, I’m fully aware,
That I've left a piece of me there.

Dewdrops

As the early morning sun rises 
in private I am yours  
I can see your purple iris 
cast a marrow of essenced bliss 
my way, and as my senses roar  
you stir me to the core

She's a dainty eyelet adage 
my Queen of irisis
Centered in my antique carriage 
a pearl of wisdom for marriage 
she is, flowing like the Tigris 
I flourish with each kiss 

Each dewdrop in the sun sparkles 
telling me I am loved 
brighter than fine golden bangles 
this jewel of vibrant jangles 
was scented from heaven above  
I never, feel unloved. 


June 16, 2022 
Sponsor	Angel L Villanueva
Contest Name	Dewdrops

Panthera Tigris

To them most stealthy, most noble, most fierce,
  chased and trophied by a mightier foe;
striped jungle beast with eyes and claws that pierce -
  O white coated emperor in the snow.
Now it’s the hunter turned hunted - great cat
  whose wild prowl is driven to higher ground,
but this I shame to hear, and more than that,
  no man should follow where tigers are found.
The captive cub, the zoo, the circus cage
  will not the untamed roar save to cherish -
in irony of our extinction age
  that which makes you mighty makes you perish.
A world without all is a world less grand
when less roamed is the forest and marshland.


             Written: February 1991

River Tigris

Tigris, Idigna, Idiqual, 
watering parched desert lands
of Mesopotamia.
Swift it flows on the East
toward the sea, from
the once fertile Garden of Eden. 
Arterial blood of arid lands, 
of transportation,
of trade and commerce.
In spring, mountain snowmelt
tumbles and rushes downward,
flooding alluvial plains for farming,
sharing its life-giving waters
from time immemorial to villages,
towns, and great cities.

Mount Ararat

The famous mountain where Noah came to rest,
ending the ecliptic flood, building an altar for time as test. 
Flourished kingdoms at the upper Tigris grew,
Babylonia and Urardhu created powers to sew.
Persian legends refers the holy Vulcan as the cradle of human race,
Armenians built a monastery in honor to St. Jacob’s pace.
Mount Ararat as omnipresent and utterly elusive,
snow capped peaks imaginative conclusive.
Magical countenance almost not of this earth,
crisp air in endless blue white mountain infinite birth.
Center of legends, myth and story,
the fire God Vahagn stumbles upon Ararat with all gory.
Giving life to Tigris and Euphrates River,
pagans visited ghost of royal ancestor in shiver.
Armenians and their homeland of Kurdistan under fire,
centuries in war for nationhood and holy place entire.
Good spirits in distillation known as Ararat Brandy,
Sir Winston Churchill called his favorite tipple, ‘handy’.
No Arc ever found beside many tries on Mount Ararat still today,
keeping mysteries in holy books still at bay.

The Goddess of Kindness

Your eyebrows are rainbows, your voice smells like rain
Your lips mightier than the red army,they relieve my pain
I didn't tell you, you are my breath, because of my shyness
If I'm not worthy forgive me you are the goddess of kindness
Your arms are the holy land,your hug is my Eutopia
Your eyes Tigris and Euphrates, your nose Mesopotamia
Your mouth full of shiny pearls, just if I could feel you near

India's National Treasure

You are the pride of a nation
revealing the beauty of it's people
you reflect a nation's heart, mind, and soul
more brilliantly than pavo cristatus...

With grace and agility
you embody the power of your people
youthful energy unyielding strength
rivaled only by panthera tigris...

You are the nelumbo nucifera gaertn
the sacred flower of your people
keeper of art, music, mythology
guardian of it culture...

Your thoughts branch out into words
like the branches of the ficus bengalensis
which re-root themselves into fertile soil
those words take root in the hearts of your people
and become immortal...

You are more than the pride of a nation
Mundaka Upanishad scripture said
satyameva jayate
you are proof that truth alone triumphs...

Bedouin

Beyond a sandstorm’s gritty veil,                       
A solitary Bedouin,
Like a ghost in a sea of dunes,
Rides slowly along in the dusk.

The singing of rababah strings
Mimic the cooling evening winds;
Tambourines and flutes sound sadly
From the oasis where he’s bound.

His caravans once wound their ways
From the Atlas to the Tigris,
Trudging across the somber sands
Of a boundless and barren realm.

O Bedouin, where are thy tracks?
No hooves clatter in the wadis;
No trail of rotting camel dung.
O Bedouin, where are thy ways?

O Bedouin does your dirah
Yet teem with goat and camel flocks,
Since you have settled in the towns,
Which you once heaped with scorn and mocked?

O noble herdsman once so proud,                                        
Tightly wrapped up in culture’s shroud,
Are you bottled up like the Djinn;
Forced to serve those who hemmed you in?                                      

The rosy mirage of freedom
Is like a scarlet evening light
That paints the clouds with fiery hopes
Which fade in thralldom to the night.

God Planted a Garden

Before any known thing was evident
God existed for all time never began
He rested on the seventh day made it holy
the Lord had created Adam the first man

But God created a garden in Eden
in a moment He planted it in the east
Adam came there to work on it
this God's plan for Adam at very least

At first, there was nothing at all there
until God displayed His creative hand
then there were trees of every kind 
oak and fir and ash all to stand

Then water appeared to water all there
it divided into four rivers no less
which flowed into its tributaries indeed
God watered Eden sharing its real dress

Rivers aplenty began with Pishon
flowing around Havilah full of gold
next came Gihon covered all of Cush
then was Tigris and Euphrates this is told

Now disaster struck this godly garden
God had made woman from Adam and grown
these two did what God said no to and sinned
so Jesus later took this sin to sure atone

Her Garden

When God made thee

He planted Eden in thy arms

that I should rest

this head He planted 

the noisy streets of ancient Rome.




...and when're I come with rejoicing

and find a forbidden hedge of thorns,

I weep like the damned 

in hades.

.

I survey thy borders on Sundays,

Walk miles around on Mondays,

Trounce impatience on Tuesdays,

and weep at thy two-leaved gate on Wednesdays.

I think on thy refreshing Tigris on Thursdays

and fancy sighs of thy vegetation on Fridays

blowing softly into a lute bitterest dirges on Saturdays.




Seasons going in circles

and yet am I no where

nigh the tree of life

which I long to pluck from

to live forever in thy arms.




Fair woman

unfair thou art

to this man who would spread not

his tentacles where the blooms

of other gardens call.




Here before your fenced garden

I plant my being given to a holy lust 

of thy fragrance the north-wind

steals to my desperate soul

till you let me in.

Rivers

The Tigris and Euphrates,
they flow like time, 
murmuring and sighing
and running their individual courses,
cradling Mesopotamia,
their land, 
in life, 
and flooding the plain in alluvial soil,
for cities to put down deep roots,
the wonder of humanity.

Besiege and Conquer

The long line of your followers that you detest, 
Walking single file with vehement interest,
In their wake blood overflowed into Tigris,
The dead integrated Euphrates causing infest,
This man made Styx was never left to rest,
Lay in your sepulcher with a lustrous diamond crest,
Lock horns for the ecclesiastic never confess,
Never giving thought to children bludgeon to death,
Beloved mothers crying holding dead to their breast, Fathers saying last love at the end of their final breath,
You made us live in hell to make certain you look best.


(2017)

Sonnets of Freedom

From now on the waters of Tigris, 
Will not show blood stains and floating corpse. 
Thereby bringing an end to the isis regime over cliffs, 
Because 'Baghdadi' is no longer Mosul's boss. 
The three long years of wait is now over, 
Joy and tears of families reunited,
It's time for the Carrol's to be sung over and over, 
It's that desired freedom for which Iraq forces fighter. 
A question arises," Did they ever sighted?"
"Why not" comes an answer."The cruel militants had to be curbed."
Today, Mosul's independent mosques will ring the freedom bells,
And preach that 'Quran' teaches 'secularism',
Not 'Jihad',Mosul's people will feel the freedom in air. 
'Progress Mosul's will be mentioned in their every prayer.
      
                         -ON THE EVE OF INDEPENDENCE

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