Editor’s Choice
Dimitris P. Kraniotis
(Greece)
Minus one
I pulled the earth
To cover us
Just in case we might wear tonight
Disarming and bloodless
The words we spat out yesterday
Like seeds
But don’t answer me hasty
Wait your turn
In line
I’m waiting for answers
From you and from me
Again and again
Up until yesterday
Until reaching the certain and unexpected
-1 of the elevator
Basement indefinitely
And inexorably with anger
(Which logic was rented
From my imagination tonight?)
But I don’t want the mud
To ferment our bodies
Filling with minus one tomorrow
Roots of lotus and myths
Janus
Our neighborhood
Is an apartment building now
The elevator stuck
Between penthouse
And sky
And we in it
Squashed in comfortably
Breathless
(And without reception
On our cell phone)
On the verge of an escape
From the “savoir vivre”
Ready for a long time now
For escapades
(When did we actually
Fall in love?)
At the peak
Of suspended steps
In the basement
Of Janus semi-dilemmas
Tie of public decency
I began to strip off
My clothing
Till I remained naked
In the middle of nowhere
Shouting
In a unknown tongue
(One way or another,
Who would have understood me?)
Yet they didn’t arrest me
For violation of public decency
To stop the shouts
They treated me to absinthe
And dressed me to the hilt
But my shoe-laces
Didn’t coordinate
With their tie
I didn’t leave any change
For a gratuity
I didn’t fall diagonally
Wrinkles in the coffee
I wake up
Hearing the same sound
Every morning
Full of broken questions
With so many wrinkles in the coffee
With the same poem nailed down
In my mind again
I search for a word
I mourn
Even though I forgot to cry
So many nights
Away from you
I complain as always
Without a reason
When you’re close to me
The poet
The direction of events
He seals
The unseen of the lights
He symbolizes
With brushes of the guilty
Of false Presents
Naked bodies
He paints
Wings of winds
Birds of waters
He shapes
Stone cages
Prison cells of the innocent
He tears down
Fields’ ears of wheat
Of empty seasons
He reaps
With ancient wise men’s
Woven ideas
The poet
Always in the end
Builds a new beginning
Dimitris P. Kraniotis
(Greece)
Minus one
I pulled the earth
To cover us
Just in case we might wear tonight
Disarming and bloodless
The words we spat out yesterday
Like seeds
But don’t answer me hasty
Wait your turn
In line
I’m waiting for answers
From you and from me
Again and again
Up until yesterday
Until reaching the certain and unexpected
-1 of the elevator
Basement indefinitely
And inexorably with anger
(Which logic was rented
From my imagination tonight?)
But I don’t want the mud
To ferment our bodies
Filling with minus one tomorrow
Roots of lotus and myths
Janus
Our neighborhood
Is an apartment building now
The elevator stuck
Between penthouse
And sky
And we in it
Squashed in comfortably
Breathless
(And without reception
On our cell phone)
On the verge of an escape
From the “savoir vivre”
Ready for a long time now
For escapades
(When did we actually
Fall in love?)
At the peak
Of suspended steps
In the basement
Of Janus semi-dilemmas
Tie of public decency
I began to strip off
My clothing
Till I remained naked
In the middle of nowhere
Shouting
In a unknown tongue
(One way or another,
Who would have understood me?)
Yet they didn’t arrest me
For violation of public decency
To stop the shouts
They treated me to absinthe
And dressed me to the hilt
But my shoe-laces
Didn’t coordinate
With their tie
I didn’t leave any change
For a gratuity
I didn’t fall diagonally
Wrinkles in the coffee
I wake up
Hearing the same sound
Every morning
Full of broken questions
With so many wrinkles in the coffee
With the same poem nailed down
In my mind again
I search for a word
I mourn
Even though I forgot to cry
So many nights
Away from you
I complain as always
Without a reason
When you’re close to me
The poet
The direction of events
He seals
The unseen of the lights
He symbolizes
With brushes of the guilty
Of false Presents
Naked bodies
He paints
Wings of winds
Birds of waters
He shapes
Stone cages
Prison cells of the innocent
He tears down
Fields’ ears of wheat
Of empty seasons
He reaps
With ancient wise men’s
Woven ideas
The poet
Always in the end
Builds a new beginning
Dimitris P. Kraniotis
Dimitris P. Kraniotis 
was born in 1966 in Larissa Prefecture in Greece and grew up in Stomio (Larissa). He studied medicine at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and obtained a Master of Science (MSc) in Medicine at the University of Thessaly. He lives in Larissa (Greece) and works as a medical doctor (internal medicine specialist physician). He is author of 12 poetry books in 7 languages and Editor-in-chief of an international anthology in English. He has won international awards for his poetry which has been translated into more than 40 languages. He has been invited and participated in many International Poetry Festivals. He is Doctor of Literature and Academician abroad, President Emeritus of the World Congress of Poets (UPLI), President of the 22nd World Congress of Poets (Greece 2011), President of the World Poets Society (WPS), Founder & Editor of the World Poets Magazine, Founder & Director of the Mediterranean Poetry Festival (Larissa, Greece), President of the International Scientific Committee of the International Poetry Festival of Naoussa (Greece), Chairman of the Writers for Peace Committee of PEN Greece, Laureate Man of Letters by the United Poets Laureate International (USA) and member of the World Poetry Movement (WPM), Poets of the Planet (POP), World Organization of the Writers (WOW), Hellenic Literary Society and National Society of Greek Literary Writers. His official website: https://dimitriskraniotis.com/