Two Poems by Krikor N. Der Hohannesian

Unkind soul
early joined at the hip,

leech on the soft flesh
of longed for love,

plaque on the arteries
sustaining the spirit,

cancer eating at the cells
of the gentle soul,

plague infecting the house
of the once unhardened heart.

We have reached the fork
on our torturous course

and no longer can I hold
your withered hand.

 The Birth of a Poet

A single moment, branded
upon the young psyche-
not the mark of Cain,
but a blessing – a lover’s heart
etched deeply on furrowed tree bark.

Callow child, peering in the doorway,
hairig, grandfather, hunched
over his writing table.  Trespass
upon hallowed ground, I feared.

		and then the moment

a beckoning nod, the quickening smile
puckered at the corners of his mouth and,
oh my, that seductive twinkle in his eyes.

A wave of him well-gnawed fountain pen
bade me sit, a tousling of my hair
and back to work – a river of discourse
flowing in strange, squiggly-looking characters
of Armenian script.  I was awash

in his serenity, basked in his aura,
smelled the sweetness of his presence,
wishing to spend the rest of my life
in that room.

Krikor Nazar Der Hohannesian