Cornflowers
By: Philip Avilov
Your face is halberd silver,
your gestures airy.
The smell of gaudy motel curtains lingers
in cornflowers pressed in a jerry.
Darling, that's what you really like.
These make you feel fragile and loud -
agrestal paint tubes, restless and spiked,
the blue devilishly squeezed out.
An orphaned flower of the burdock breed
knows no rival in blue among weeds.
Chagall's riddle, Chagall's mark,
rubles to Narva's triumphal arch!
They grew when Solomon the Wise
gingerly sucked on life's marrow bone.
In a field of bread is a bit of sky.
We are united by sky alone.
Like blue stained glass, so gothically jagged,
they stretch their heads out through chant and stone.
The field is loved, but the sky is beloved.
We are united by sky alone.
Undines and cows soar by the sun.
Keep an umbrella when you're on the throne.
Motherlands differ, the sky is one.
We are united by sky alone.
How did the cornflower seed even spread
to Champs-Élysées (pronounced properly)?
How do you braid a wreath on the head
of Grand Opera, Grand Opera!
The globalized age filled the sky with smoke.
Confused on who's you and who is the clone?
Don't stuff our faces with lead till we choke -
we are united by sky alone.
These canvas have fled the fascist troops
and dug their delirium into the loam.
The forbidden sky is rolled up in a tube,
but we are alive by sky alone.
Not that the echo of "why'd you allow this"
weakened the cries of Tituba -
the stolen paintings, tubed up and well-practiced,
howl like an archangel's tuba!
Get off the train, hear the call, keep your eyes peeled.
The grasses heave.
The cornflowers spurred the field -
running away, but you can't ever leave...
Go out at night and nearly get rich,
the field's pupils like Coketown towers.
Ah, Mark Zaharovich, Mark Zaharovich,
all is cornflowers, all is cornflowers...
Not a Bonaparte, not a Clementi,
ah, Mark Zaharovich, paint me
a testament in lapis tones -
WE ARE UNITED BY SKY ALONE.
your gestures airy.
The smell of gaudy motel curtains lingers
in cornflowers pressed in a jerry.
Darling, that's what you really like.
These make you feel fragile and loud -
agrestal paint tubes, restless and spiked,
the blue devilishly squeezed out.
An orphaned flower of the burdock breed
knows no rival in blue among weeds.
Chagall's riddle, Chagall's mark,
rubles to Narva's triumphal arch!
They grew when Solomon the Wise
gingerly sucked on life's marrow bone.
In a field of bread is a bit of sky.
We are united by sky alone.
Like blue stained glass, so gothically jagged,
they stretch their heads out through chant and stone.
The field is loved, but the sky is beloved.
We are united by sky alone.
Undines and cows soar by the sun.
Keep an umbrella when you're on the throne.
Motherlands differ, the sky is one.
We are united by sky alone.
How did the cornflower seed even spread
to Champs-Élysées (pronounced properly)?
How do you braid a wreath on the head
of Grand Opera, Grand Opera!
The globalized age filled the sky with smoke.
Confused on who's you and who is the clone?
Don't stuff our faces with lead till we choke -
we are united by sky alone.
These canvas have fled the fascist troops
and dug their delirium into the loam.
The forbidden sky is rolled up in a tube,
but we are alive by sky alone.
Not that the echo of "why'd you allow this"
weakened the cries of Tituba -
the stolen paintings, tubed up and well-practiced,
howl like an archangel's tuba!
Get off the train, hear the call, keep your eyes peeled.
The grasses heave.
The cornflowers spurred the field -
running away, but you can't ever leave...
Go out at night and nearly get rich,
the field's pupils like Coketown towers.
Ah, Mark Zaharovich, Mark Zaharovich,
all is cornflowers, all is cornflowers...
Not a Bonaparte, not a Clementi,
ah, Mark Zaharovich, paint me
a testament in lapis tones -
WE ARE UNITED BY SKY ALONE.
Writer's Statement: I took inspiration from Mark Chagall's dream-like paintings. I hope the reader sees beyond the subject - the cornflower - in favor of the stories behind it.