A Never-Ending Story
- Feb 25
- 7 min read
(1) Ana Isabel Albuquerque
(1) LabCom – UBI, Covilhã, Portugal - ana.isabel.albuquerque@gmail.com (CiênciaVitae - ORCID - Scopus)
If you hear that crystal sound,
it’s not me — it’s the ground
trembling for all our sins
we haven’t dared to name.
If you hear that crystal sound,
it’s not me — it’s the earth, unbound,
longing for paths
we never chose to walk.
If you hear that crystal sound,
it’s not me — it’s the mirror turned around,
the version of me
that survived the storm,
the one who sees the truth unveiled.
If you hear that crystal sound,
it’s not me — it’s the sky torn down,
calling back its stolen crown,
pleading for rain
to wash away the trial of the soul.
If you hear that crystal sound,
it’s not me — it’s that violent crowd in the town,
striking the hour,
dragging the weight
of all we’ve ever felt.
It watches.
It fractures.
If you see that colourful skylark,
it’s not me — I’m just sinking into my roots,
where my feet whisper to the earth
and ancient wind runs through my hair.
If you see that colourful skylark,
it’s not me — I’m flying within my mind,
searching for my secret branch,
where I can sing my sorrows
with the hush of one who’s wept with opened eyes.
If you see that colourful skylark,
it’s not me — it’s the painting I never began,
so vivid, so clear, so minimal, so dark…
what a journey it has already been,
though it hasn’t yet begun.
If you see that colourful skylark,
it’s not me — I only left the window open,
to let the world drift in, light as a feather,
into this strange place
where everything weighs so much.
If you see that colourful skylark,
it’s not me — I don’t have wings strong enough,
nor a heart swift enough
to break through walls
and carry to the sky a peaceful blue,
or to earth,
seeds that already know how to bloom.
If you taste the sweetest blackberry,
it won’t be me,
though I linger in the shadow of its skin,
bruised, ripe, almost ready.
If your fingers sink into that flesh,
dark juice bleeding down the wrist,
it won’t be mine,
but I’ve dreamed of being that stain,
the kind that clings even after the washing.
If you taste the sweetest blackberry,
it won’t be me,
but I would speak in the language of its pulp,
each syllable bursting on your tongue,
a little sour, a little wild.
Not meant to be swallowed easily.
If you taste the sweetest blackberry,
it won’t be me,
but in that stillness,
in the moment before the bite,
before sweetness turns bitter,
I wait like breath between two lines of poetry.
If you taste the sweetest blackberry,
it won’t be me,
it will be the brush that coloured it black-blue,
the clay that held its form,
the silence after a song.
But somewhere,
beneath the juice, behind the pigment,
past the seed,
maybe you’ll taste what I couldn’t say.
If you touch that lone, dazzling gardenia,
you won’t find me there,
not in the bloom so pale it forgets the sun,
nor in the petals folded like silence.
I am the space between the half-shadow and half-light,
the hush before the flower opens.
If you touch that lone, dazzling gardenia,
you won’t find me there,
but you might feel my breath in its bold exclamation,
a single white cry against the green.
It is not fragility,
it is a story of surviving storms
without once asking to be named.
If you touch that lone, dazzling gardenia,
you won’t find me there,
but you’ll catch the scent I never learned to carry,
sweet, yes, but edged with fire.
I’ve burned through softness
to hold this shape.
I’ve lived where petals fall, and roots endure.
If you touch that lone, dazzling gardenia,
you won’t find me there,
but the soil beneath knows my voice.
It speaks in pulses,
in unscripted prayers of growth.
I called her Florbela
because she bloomed with her scars still showing,
because her scent never asked permission.
If you touch that lone, dazzling gardenia,
you might not find me there,
but something wild will meet you and show you how much I care.
A whisper that does not plead to be remembered.
It will not obey the sky
nor any law written in man’s ink.
It is free.
And so, perhaps, am I.
I lie when I write, because I’m thinking about what I’m feeling.
And thinking keeps me from truly feeling.
I keep believing that real poetry lives
in the cluttered, untidy room of my imagination,
a space that screams silently, only for me.
In the end, I’m just this contradictory theatre.
But still, I want to tell my side of the street.
Comment 1
1. Clarity of expression
Is the work accessible to someone outside its specific discipline or medium?
Yes! I am not particularly well-versed in poetry but I found this accessible.
Does it communicate its intent, feeling, or idea in a way that resonates beyond technical detail?
I find it difficult to discern the intent or idea behind a poem – I think the point of poetry may be that these things (intent, ideas) remain nebulous. It does keep them nebulous, and it does communicate some feeling or affect.
2. Originality & Insight
Does the contribution bring a fresh perspective, question, or experience?
I do not feel fully equipped to assess this, as I am not very familiar with poetry in general. Many of the references to nature seem like fairly established poetic vocabulary. In that sense, I would not necessarily describe this text as ‘fresh’. On the other hand, all poetry is unique and therefore ‘fresh’ in a way.
Does it challenge or unsettle established ways of thinking or creating?
I think destabilizing the unity of the presumed individual human subject is an interesting endeavor for any text, and to a certain extent this does unsettle established humanistic ways of thinking. On the other hand, I have often seen this mode of decentering before, and arguably decentering individualism has by now become an established way of thinking in its own right.
3. Connection Across Fields
Does the work build bridges between artistic and academic ways of knowing?
I would describe this text as decidedly more artistic than academic, so not really.
Does it open space for dialogue between different languages, ontologies, or cultural frames?
Perhaps it does, in the sense that it brings together the human perspective of the poetic ‘I’ with the more-than-human. But at the same time, a poem written by a human struggles to escape its human cultural frame.
4. Engagement & Resonance
Does the piece invite reflection, dialogue, or further exploration?
The piece invites some reflection on the nature of the poetic ‘I’.
How did it affect you as a reader/viewer/listener (emotionally, intellectually, or otherwise)?
I find it difficult to combine analytical and more emotional epistemologies in my reading. It confronted me with that difficulty.
5. Contribution to Radical Creativities’ Ethos
Does the work embody or align with the journal’s aim to de-confine traditional knowledge production?
In the sense that a poem is a non-traditional mode of knowledge production within an academic context, yes. In the sense that I think this text is decidely more poetic than knowledge-producing in the strict academic/scholarly sense, no.
Does it expand what counts as legitimate knowledge, expression, or critique?
I think the text itself does not do this, but publishing it in an academic journal could do this.
6. Constructive Suggestions
What could make this contribution more impactful, accessible, or resonant?
I think the poem might be a bit too long for my taste, and it could potentially be more impactful if it was a little shorter.
I also found the use of em-dashes distracting in some places. I feel like the end of a line in a poem already fulfills a function that is very similar to an em-dash in prose, so I don’t really understand what the em-dash adds to the form of the poem.
How might the author/artist refine or clarify their piece without losing its integrity?
I found the title to be somewhat distracting from the piece. It reminded me of the movie of the same name, but I do not know this movie well enough to see how the poem resonates with the movie. I would personally have enjoyed a footnote explaining if the poem was named after the movie, and if so, why.
Answer to reviewer's comments
First of all, thank you very much for the review. I’m aware that the field of poetry can often be very particular, personal, and even abstract. It also depends a great deal on each person’s individual taste. And yes, I acknowledge that it has a much more artistic than academic nature, but I also intended to do a more practice-based piece of work in order to approach the human being.
I would just like to leave a note to explain and justify two decisions. First, the original intention behind the em-dash was to create a longer pause, but I will remove some of them. The reviewer’s suggestion makes sense, and I agree that, in this poem, they may cause some orthographic and even semantics confusion. The second one is related to the title. This title has no relation with the title of the film with the same name. At the time I wrote it, I didn’t even remember that a film with the same name existed. I’m now surprised by this coincidence, but that inadvertent crossover is interesting (maybe for future work). The title was chosen precisely in line with the behavioural cycle of the human being and the intrinsic, continuous relationship between humans and Nature - also emphasized by the repetition of ‘If you’. For these reasons, I would prefer to keep the title because, in my view, it is the endless story of the self which, through cycles and detours, continues to write itself indefinitely, also in relation to others and even from generation to generation.
Once again, I’m deeply grateful!
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