The Key to the Cage

Collected Poems 2012 to 2014

Armando Hazaveh presents a collection of poems inspired by art, daily life activities, nature, humor, and the hope for peace.

Do You See the Roses?

Do you see the roses?
Inhale their sickly sweet perfumes.
Grasp their lush, silky petals and their piercing thorns.
Do you watch them hour by hour, in silence, as they wait for an unsuspecting victim to puncture?
Tick tock, tick.
Tick tock, tick.
Their time is growing scarce.
Do you spy the midnight sparrows?
Catch their fierce battle cries.
Sniff the rotting decay of their aching souls.
Do you watch them wither slowly before death reaches out and snatches them in its cold, dark fingers?
Tick tock,
Tick.
Their time is running out.
Do you behold the trees?
Evade their colorless leaves?
Take in their sacred whispers swept away by the never-ending breeze.
Watch them sway at the strike of an axe, before tumbling down with a deadly finality.
Tick tock.
Their time is trickling by.
Do you perceive the apples?
Taste the deadly poison within.
Ignore the rotten portion in a crumpled heap beneath your feet.
Do you watch them wither, turning black within until their once fresh, juicy core has gone dry?
Tick.
Their time has almost gone.
Do you see the humans?
Taste the blood lingering in the frosty silence.
Hear the rustle of fabric as they turn against each other?
Do you watch them drive their companions to death with their cruelties strung up like a banner of pride?
Silence.
Their time has passed.