I Allow You to Penetrate My Cold Heart with Your Golden Horn, Istanbul

By Dora Šustić

Either you make love or you make love through art

When love is palpable

Poetry lives in the gaze of two lovers

When love is far

The distant songs make pleasant comfort and lovers use abstractions

To satisfy their lonesome hearts

Istanbul makes my groins wet and skin soft from excess oxygen

Istanbul flushes my waters down

Istanbul does not spare me from risks or doubts

Istanbul is my mirror – when I look at my reflections in the city's windows

I see all my faults

Istanbul is mean sometimes, vulgar and coarse

Istanbul touches me directly, but only when he wants

There are little things I can do to captivate his attention

Istanbul leads me

And I follow into wells of flamboyance

Unleashed invading persuasive force

Istanbul treats me like I'm made of steel

Not knowing that my heart is made of the tiniest seeds of pomegranates

And pomegranates are Istanbul’s very essential pieces

He is as invasive as the Galata tower into the Bosphorus sky

Istanbul has always been a part of me, I visited him in my dreams

Istanbul is patient with me, and he smells like home

Istanbul is the fire of my loins

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Born in Rijeka, Croatia, Dora Šustić (1991) obtained her BA in political studies at the Faculty of Social Sciences in Ljubljana, Slovenia. In 2012, she moved to Prague, where she currently studies screenwriting for a MA degree at the Film and TV School of the Academy of Performing Arts (FAMU). Her poems, fiction and non-fiction have been published in several international journals (GUTS Magazine, Hourglass Literary Magazine, Modna, Magazine for Art and Feminism etc.). She wrote and directed several short films and is currently writing her first feature screenplay, Virgins of Pomegranates.

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