KNOT Magazine
Fall Issue 2022
Silva Zanoyan Merjanian
Under My Skin
My pen thrust under gordian ribs
you bled in pigments of melancholy
on Egyptian cotton
thread count in verses of lament
you lay in piles of edit
silence under my skin
rain was merciless that year
digging you from every landfill
you, in jazz of ebrious nights
you, on lips sipid leftover wine
absence rising to crescendo
your name slavers on repining spring
silence prises terete sighs
I wake a poem slipping through cracks
in quiver of fingers I once kissed
In Veno Veritas
In debauchery one nostril flared
fulcrum tip at the sparrow's head
mirada ignored
alight on a solo dance
a dare, a missed step, a blushing fall sans grace
come morning
dry tongue smoldered to a name
murmured past midnight
on salted lies
sediments of magnum wine
a buzz in a draft
maudlin solitas on one side of a four poster bed
milonga of words used to suffice
but for the duende of a night
soaked in jasmine and French lyrics
rising with a tremor between strings of a guitar
Happiness
Are you happy he'd ask
pulling me to him
how can I not be I'd say
this is heaven
here
with you
watching the Jet d'Eau from our terrace
shoot up 140 feet in the air
and rain down in thousands
of shimmering diamonds on Lake Leman
some forever caught in clasped eyelashes
what would a beautiful lake know
of what I left behind in hell
walked out with a suitcase
his ring on my finger led
Rive Gauche lights, colorful fishnets glistened on the bank
caught in guilt, fresh writhing wet
yet the lake remained stolid
are you happy he’d ask
I would kiss him, yes, yes
carefully circling the edge
Silva Zanoyan Merjanian is an internationally published poet residing in Southern California. She released the first volume her poems, Uncoil a Night in 2013 with all proceeds donated to Syrian Armenian Relief Fund. Some of the publications she’s been featured in are ; Streetcake Magazine, Miracle-ezine , The Literary Groong, Mad Swirl, The Galway Review, The Artistic Muse, Poet’s Basement at Counterpunch.org, an international political newsletter, The Oddity, Red Fez, Young Men’s Perspective volume 3, Munyori Literary journal, Ygdrasil, a Journal of the Poetic Arts, and The Orignial Van Goghs Ear. She is proud to be part of the Anthologies ‘The Art of Being Human- An Anthology of International Poetry’, volume 3 and 6. Sagittarius, The Inspired Heart, Editions 1 & 2, a collection of International Poetry by publisher Melinda Cochrane, the Blue Max Review, and Songs For Julia :An Anthology by Julia Priest. Silva was shortlisted for the Fermoy International Poetry Competition 2012, and was invited to Ireland in August 2013 to introduce her book Uncoil a Night. She is invited again to read summer 2014.