Once the fields were of that yellow
And the morning wind made waves to shake
The sleepy stalks
Where lonesome hare
Had shut an eye
The night before
Once the cities of steel
Cleaned their streets of brown bags
That shaped bottles of the green fairy
And made unshaved men dream
Of names they once knew
Before they slept alone
In a cardboard box
With their dog
Once I walked these fields
And got lost following concrete streets
To become who I always was
May 18, 2026
©Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2026
When I learned to drink spring water in my palm, I gave my cup to a thirsty soul
When I searched for
words to paint a poem, I found all the shades my passage had already left upon
my path
And under the summer
rain, I heard the whisper that became a song, upon a warm pillow where dreams
had once slept
In welcome shy, and in
hope for the tender embrace of unkept promises
And I heard nightingales
sing, at noon
May 3, 2026
© Vahé A. Kazandjian,
2026
My shoes are worn
But the travel
Taught me to look
Not to see
But to find
Perspective
Secret meadows
Invite to rest
The unrest
Yet they only lead
To cities of steel
Where my shoes dreamt
Of mountain
Sides
Where the nightingales
Sing at sunrise
Uninvited and shy
To forget
The night
Before
My shoes are worn
But I still keep
Them on
To keep going
Through uninviting
Fields
For the harvest
Without season
Without reason
For what is broken
Is protected
From new
Breaks
And
From
Itself
April 22, 2026
© Vahé A. Kazandjian
Like a drop of water
That becomes ice
In the desert
Like the first cry
Of an unborn
Name
My hands hold on
To the promised
Dance
My Eternity
My forever
Is
Now
April 19, 2026
© Vahé A. Kazandjian
PS/ I was reading "La piel" (The skin) poem by Uruguayan poet Idea Vilariño. Then I wrote the few above lines inspired by her.
It made my Sunday morning more introspective.
My studio has a corner where infrequently used, but
still dear to my memories, items are kept. Among these is an old Panasonic
portable radio/cassette player, a 9 inch screen car plug-in TV with a built-in DVD
player, and letters from old friends who have passed.
Next to that area are the wall shelves where I keep
most of my vintage mechanical cameras that I still use for my B&W
photography. So, I call that corner of my studio “the place where time has
taken a respite.”
Last night I decided to do some spring cleaning to
free up space in “the place.” Instead, I took out the Panasonic radio and
inserted a cassette tape from the 1970s that was labeled “Aznavour.”
… Charles Aznavour was a famous French singer, and
his songs were poetry delivered with the thoughtfulness of a person who had
lived his songs. He was one of three such singers who sang in French and touched
my teenage years – Jacques Brel, Charles Aznavour and Georges Brassens.
On that moment, I did not need technology – just the
sound waves to take me back decades.
One of the songs is “Il faut savoir” (one must know) and its lyrics meant little to me
when I was a budding young man. But yesterday, the message of the song seemed
to touch on many of the life experiences I have had since. Here are the famous
lines where Aznavour gives a life lesson he had learned the hard way:
“
Il faut savoir quitter la table, lorsque l'amour est desservi" (One must know how to leave
the table, when love is no longer served).
"Sans
s'accrocher, l'air pitoyable, mais partir sans faire de bruit" (Without holding on, looking
pitiful, but leaving without making noise).
I listened to the song twice, hanging on to the
words of those two lines. And I realized that the imagery of being on the table
where love is served (or no longer served) had stayed in my view of life
experiences through my photography and past writings. Indeed, one of my books’
cover (circa 2000) showed a woman sitting alone at a table next to mine in a
dimly lit Fado restaurant, in Lisboa. I had a Nikon F2 with me, rested it on my
table, set the shutter speed to 1/15th seconds and zone focused. It
remains one of my favorite shots. The title of my book is “Table for One”….
Over time, Aznavour’s lesson has also applied to
instances when dignity, empathy and kindness were no longer served. When the
table served no food for the soul. When holding on was ignorance.
The photo atop the page includes a woman, seemingly
thoughtful, perhaps disappointed, at the lonesome table listening to Portuguese
Fado which always is melancholic and full of longing. But was I reflecting on
my own feelings? Perhaps she just came alone to the Fado restaurant. But why
were there two wine glasses, yet empty, on the table?
Here is another photo that I took in Bellagio, Italy
that follows Aznavour’s philosophy:
In the country of love and romanticism, an empty street
and lonesome trattoria tables seem out of place.
Finally, below a poem I had published in 2022 (https://vahezen.blogspot.com/2022/02/i-did-wait.html)
that perhaps shows how the lyrics of a 1961 song can stay in us and resurface:
April 10, 2026
© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2026
Then
I held
each worry bead
for the space
of a name
Now
a bottle of Cava
and a window
without
a frame
Often
I let
one bead slide
as I held
the next one
a while
longer
next to
a round table
where the space
of a name
was lovingly
left
lonely
February 19, 2022
©Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2022
The sun was almost disappearing behind the mountain range after a glorious day in the high desert of Arizona.
I heard a loud thump in the kitchen. As I looked around, the last rays of sunshine fell on the window above the sink and there was an amazing imprint of a bird that had just hit the glass.
We do get a few such events, but this one was breathtakingly detailed, complete and a work of art. Every feather, given the desert dust it carried, had left a print on the window glass.
I had a few seconds to take a picture before the blue sunset turned red, yellow and dark blue.
The one atop this entry is a rendition in B&W that I like. Here is the original view:
… And all disappeared within the blink of the eye. And I recalled a 2016 book by Eliot Weinberger titled “The Ghost of Birds”.
It is an eclectic book touching upon Chinese poetry, Aztec rituals and Buddhism among other things. I recalled a 10-page poem about birds and searched for it. Here are a few lines that seem to fit with the “visit” of that bird to my kitchen window:
Red: the color of bravery. Red: the sacred
color of the gods. Red feathers on the cloaks, mats, axes, kites,
headdresses,
digging sticks, the gables of houses, the ceremonial aprons.
Red feather tied to the middle finger of the corpse of a chief.
There were ninety shades of red. Red feathers were
said to shine
in darkness.
Red shift: it shifts to red as it retreats in distance and
time…
It was a Good Friday to remember.
April 4, 2026
© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2026
And it happens without fanfare.
“I did not want to change, but one cannot remain a
caterpillar. Time teaches us resilience with continuation.”
He was our teacher of arts in middle school. A
painter famous for using ink pens to meticulously sketch the setting of his
water colour creations. He was in his sixties then, an old man for the times, teaching
painting in a small room, in the basement of the school building. And we were
eager to play with colours.
He called us his caterpillars, which we never knew
why. Until we were thrown to the world without the warmth of our cocoon. By
then he was gone – his wings were broken.
… It will be spring soon and my butterfly trees will
attract those who once were caterpillars. Those with colourful wings and
gracious posture to discover a new world under the desert sun. The tree will
open flowers for nectar and ambrosia for their flight.
Then, a nesting robin will fly over the butterfly
trees and change the metamorphosis of the once caterpillar to become food for
hungry chicks calling from the nest.
Resilience and continuation.
… And every year, I find myself watching these trees
and the butterflies wondering how we all metamorphose, sometimes without
fanfare, to find our identity. Who we were perhaps destined to be. Even when we
did not want to change, like our arts teacher once told us.
And sometimes we metamorphose to protect, cover or
perhaps forget our identity. Because we do not trust the new “wings” we
acquired to carry us high and away. Because our colourful wings attracts robins
eager to feed themselves or the chicks in the nest.
… My thoughts always end in understanding identity.
Not the process to change. Not the discovery of the world through the wings
metamorphosis gives us.
And, I always find my comfort in realizing that
there is no “I” in identity. That multiple caterpillars do not mature in the
same cocoon. And that the nectar offered by butterfly trees is worth having
colourful wings to discover the world.
Even if red-chested robins have to feed their chicks. For
continuing the promise.
March 25, 2026
© Vahé A. Kazandjian, 2026
