Poetry

Circumstances

/ Andrada Costoiu / 14 Comments

by Andrada Costoiu

Peasant,
Walking next to a king,
One has nothing,
The other has everything. 
Birthright.
Was it really fair,
When it gave one the right to rule
While the other one has to be its mule?

Syrian,
Walking next to an American,
One has been displaced and cannot go back,
The other has a home, a car, and no lack.
Birthplace,
Was it really fair,
When it gave one the opportunity for a good life and success,
While the other had to fight, lost everything and has been oppressed? 

Actaeon, a Greek hero,
He was a hunter who accidentally saw Artemis, the goddess of wild animals and childbirth, bathing,
For him that sighting was unfortunate,
Artemis got upset and her attack on him was scathing.
She turned him from a hunter into a stag,
His own dogs chased him, then ate him,
And all this happened quickly, without a tiny lag.

Time and place,
When you’re assigned the seat in the great story of life,
Sometimes you are lucky and sometimes you have to brace.

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Two worlds

/ Andrada Costoiu / 11 Comments

by Andrada Costoiu

Swimming, she used all her might to get to the surface,
Fighting the currents of reason that sought to keep her in her world.
Sure and unsure walked hand in hand on the beach where she surfaced,
She stared them in the face,
Took her first breath, and then the first step,
And followed the voice that had long cuddled in her heart.

“Ariel,” the sand carried his whispers,
From the place where he stud locked up in the man made prison.
She whooshed through the sand and she found him,
Trying to bend the bars that ruled his world.

“You are not allowed to love a mermaid,” said the chorus of ethnocentric voices,
Singing decades old rules.  
He saw her, she saw him,
And oblivious they reached for each other,
Bending the bars under the heavy weight of their love.

Unafraid, they walked hand in hand by the wall of “virtue” where others were bowing, relenting their feelings to the man made rules.
He picked a piece of charcoal and wrote “Love!”
Not as a rule, but as guidance…..

They left, walking side by side.
It wasn’t easy for her,
She was just learning to walk into his world,
But she had him…..
And he had her…..

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© Andrada Costoiu and a-passion4life.com, 2020- . Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Andrada Costoiu and a-passion4life.com, 2019 with appropriate and specific direction to the original content

I will not and I am not

/ Andrada Costoiu / 15 Comments

by Andrada Costoiu

I will not ask for attention, love, 
I will not be taken for granted,
And play your games.

I will not think less of myself,
Because I deserve the best,
And I will not be your second choice.
I will value myself and I will not keep short-changing myself,
I will not live in a space that puts me in this position. 
I will not….I will not….

Note: “I will not“ and “I am not” are two very different things.  Many people are struggling in a relationship, and they tell themselves “ I will not” until it becomes a constant familiar voice. Chances are, that if you play with “I will not” too much, you are already accepting these things for yourself….and will be, until you actually do something about it.

Now read this:

I am not asking for attention, and love,
Because you never take me for granted,
You don’t play games and you love me as I am.

I am not thinking less of myself,
Because you always make me feel as I deserve the best.
I am not your second choice,
Because you always make me feel valued,
And I always want to be with you.

Note: This is where you should be, or at least what you should be looking for. There is a distance between “I will not” and “ I am not”. It is not easy to walk this distance but unless you will walk it, you will keep struggling and you will keep hurting.  I wrote this for people who are hurt, who struggle. Know that you are not alone and know where you are, know where you should be…

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© Andrada Costoiu and a-passion4life.com, 2020- . Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Andrada Costoiu and a-passion4life.com, 2019 with appropriate and specific direction to the original content

Forbidden love

/ Andrada Costoiu / 12 Comments

by Andrada Costoiu

Summer, 
Clouds rolling down the hill,
Tumbling down like a waterfall,
The dusk is part of it too, carrying its colors,
Of orange and red over the village.

Two glasses of red wine,
Two chairs, a table, you and me, and
The light of the candle that flickers,
And every moment, a new bit of wax is melting and turning into flame…..

Your eyes meet mine,
Speaking the untold that my heart has already heard.
How can we feel so many things at once?
Love, truth, sadness?

Forbidden love, that’s what we are,
Because the heart doesn’t always listen to what is socially justifiable. 
You look at me and I feel,
How your heartbeat riots mine in violent rebellion.

Against all odds, 
Forever and impermanence dwell together in our world.
The impermanence of the stolen moments, 
Glued together by the forever in our longing.

Star-crossed lovers,
Why does the jukebox of life play such tricks?
Because it can, because it does!
Love is rarely a choice,
An it is impossible to un-love when you love,
Even when it’s forbidden.

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Wishing On Dandelions

/ Andrada Costoiu / 16 Comments

by Andrada Costoiu

Dark! Dark!
Do you feel that?
It’s my hand pulling you forward,
Through the dark tunnel of a lost cause,
Where time of your life was already spent.
“Come on! You can do it!”
Do you hear that?
It’s the voice of faith,
Your voice that merges with others,
Me, you, walking the tunnel.
You’re dragging your feet…..
Does it ever end?

Tough! Isn’t it?
Life is tough.
You feel in the holes, you jumped into some,
You crawled through mud chasing your dreams.

Are you tired?
Has your mind and body gave in,
In your organized preparation,
To become who you really want to be?

“Where are we going?” you ask the others,
Walking, crawling through the tunnel,
Next to you.
“We are walking out, keep going!”


And one by one, people come out,
Returning to sunshine and a sky with no clouds,
Returning to the innocence of roaming through the fields, 
To the dandelions,
Waiting to make all dreams and desires come true.
And so they pick another dandelion, 
Wishing in their hearts, and believing that their wish will come true.

Note: Life is a journey, and there are many dark tunnels. It is tough, but I believe that the beauty of the human spirit lies in our hopes and dreams. Keep listening to the whispers of your hopes, keep chasing your dreams, no darkness lasts forever. 

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Good for you

/ Andrada Costoiu / 10 Comments

by Andrada Costoiu

Good for you,
All of you that have lived beautiful love stories,
Have broken your heart and then got up,
Wiped your tears and carried on, 
Towards another day, and another story.

Good for you,
All that face sickness,
As we all think that disease is never part of us,
Until it is,
Good for you for conquering the fears that are whirling in your head,
Good for you for choosing and fighting to be a survivor,
You are our teachers,
Because you have an extraordinary capacity to rebound and survive,
And you can show us how to stand up when life puts us down.

Good for you,
All of you that have dreams, and have broken your wings chasing them,
Only to get up,
And fly higher than before.

Good for you,
All of you that have lost yourselves, 
Had fallen, cried, and then got up,
And walked with your head up high, not hiding your permanent scars.
None of us has an innate toughness, but you have built your own,
Re-framed your life after a deep upset, 
And now you teach us resilience and strength. 

Good for you, all young and old,
Damaged and hopeful,
That have been through the hoops of life.

There is no grand script for life,
And each has his own,
We are all worthy and free,
To spin our versions of our stories.

Good for us,
Humanity has lasting worth and meaning,
Make your story count,
And don’t forget that after a tear, and a hurt,
You will always be stronger.

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© Andrada Costoiu and a-passion4life.com, 2020- . Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Andrada Costoiu and a-passion4life.com, 2019 with appropriate and specific direction to the original content

You just know

/ Andrada Costoiu / 2 Comments

by Andrada Costoiu

My bedroom window always sheds light into life.
Primitive emotion, up there on a branch,
“Jaaay” ,””Jaayyy”,
Two beautiful blue jays, nesting.

“They mate for life,” you say, yawning,
I lay my head against your chest and breathe.
There are some things in life that cannot be explained, just felt,
And this is one of them,
You and me.

Desire and its horse-powered engine started loud,
I was drunk, but you were a sober driver,
Or maybe you too, blindly, steered us here,
Where love simply exists.

We each carry multiple us inside,
But curtains have fallen, 
And I love the multiple you that you nest within.
You’re spark and calm somewhere in my soul,
You’re the endless opportunities,
And …..you’re home.

The noise of the world is gone,
I can only hear you: “they’re mating for life”,
And I smile,
Blue jays, albatrosses, barn owls, sea horses, 
And so many other creatures…..they too, 
Seem to know the deepest truth,
Love is not mind-driven,
It happens,
And when it does,
You just know.

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Catharsis

/ Andrada Costoiu / 6 Comments

by Andrada Costoiu

By the ocean everything seems quiet,
Except the waves that break free, in an out,
Carving the sand.

Thinking of you.
We once opened a box, called it ours and put it all in,
Our dreams, future, desires, thoughts,
We shook the box and mix it,
Yours and mine,
And said, “ love conquers all.”
It does, doesn’t it? Almost all…..
In love, we fly with the wind
We drown in the rain
We take turns taming the elephants in the room.

Love is a cathartic journey of discovering togetherness,
And feeling it deep inside you.

Love is….
Love was….
Life sucked us in and then spit us out on different paths,
How did this happen?
It is often that we stand in the beautiful certainty of knowing what’s inside us,
Only to find ourselves, that we cannot understand our untold thoughts.

Alone now, listening to the symphony of my emotions
Playing a confusing song,
Hope, anger, despair, freedom, 
All trampling and playing one over another.

What do I do now?
I don’t have to pretend….
I don’t know.
But I do know something,
That is: I don’t want to be a villain and I don’t want to be a hero,
I just want to be me.

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Born blind

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by Andrada Costoiu

Ink has dried on papers,
Where pen has pressed hearts, of black and white,
Of yellow and all other human colors….
So many books have been written,
To highlight the difference of no difference……

“Billy, can we sit here,” asked a boy his play buddy.
“Yes Andrew, lets’!”
“Do you hear the birds singing?” he asked his friend,
“Yes, they sound nice,” answered Andrew.
“They have pretty feathers too, white and brown, just like the two of you,”
Said a man sitting on the bench next to theirs,
The boys smiled, and sword fought with their white canes.

The man watched their joyful child play for a while,
“I hope that other eyes would never break your play,”
The old man said to himself.
He left, sad, dragging with him the burden of seeing colors,
And all the meanings attached to them.

You cannot feel something,
Until someone teaches you to feel something.
And sometimes, you cannot think something,
Until someone teaches you to think something.

Colors….

Red symbolizes excitement, passion and love in Western cultures
It also symbolized communism and revolution in countries like Russia.
Yellow, In Germany it represents envy,
In Egypt it means happiness and fortune.
Purple means wealth around the world. 
But in Brazil and Thailand purple is the color of mourning.


Billy and Andrew have not learned about black and white,
Born blind, 
They would have others to teach them……
And the others must never break their play.

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She was a ballerina

/ Andrada Costoiu / 11 Comments

by Andrada Costoiu

Nobody walked her path,
She carried her sorrows with grace.
Everybody starts somewhere different,
But she had many judges, all of them wrong.

She put away rejection slips,
Into a drawer full of pain.
“ I’m not like the others,” she cried,
Hoping that people will understand that passions
Choose whom to embody and then never leave.

Her eyes danced,
In this small moment in time she was becoming.
“Your hair looks lovely,
It must have taken many years to grow it so long,” said one
“It did,” she thought,
But it took much longer to be here
And step into the stage lights.

With strong legs and a heart full of love,
She took her limitations and her vulnerabilities
And bought them to the limelight.
The music started,
And she did what she was born to do: she danced,
She was a one-arm ballerina,
Imperfect in a perfect world,
And perfect in an imperfect world.

Note: this is a poem about the struggle of being accepted for what we are. Our society is not very kind as people are being judged against existent stereotypes that are hard to break. We forget that behind any skin color, any missing limbs….there is a soul with hopes and dreams. That soul did not chose how it would be embodied. Whatever you might be, fight for your dreams. Whatever they might tell you, keep going forward. You are worth it, everybody is.

COPYRIGHT NOTICE

© Andrada Costoiu and a-passion4life.com, 2020- . Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Andrada Costoiu and a-passion4life.com, 2019 with appropriate and specific direction to the original content