ACHIEVEMENT

	by Grish Davtian


	We no longer wear out our shoes;
	We somehow outwear them.
	Fashion, style... you know!

	We now wear out the highways,
	The tires,
	The airports,
	And even the seas,
	Face and belly and all.

	We have no nostrils
	For the scents of flowers;
	But we inhale
	Through nose and mouth
	All the fumes
	Vomited by cars and machines,
	Jets and rockets, etc....

	We have come a long way
	Indeed.

--
Grish Davtian was born in Nor Jugha, Esfahan, Iran. His work includes
poetry and literary criticism written in Armenian, and, more recently,
poetry written in English. He has worked as the founding editor for
the Aregak monthly journal, in 1964-5 in London, and editor of the
literary pages of Alik Daily newspaper, in 1980-1985 in Tehran. As a
member of the Armenian Writer's Society in Iran, he has served as
the vice president and president of this organization for several
years. He has three books of poems published in Armenian. Now living
in Glendale, CA, USA, Davtian has been in charge of the literary pages
of the Asparez Daily newspaper in 1997-2001. He has initiated the
Literary Asparez monthly meetings, sponsored by the Glendale Public
Library. He runs a one hour weekly literary program, called Literary
Ether, on Horizon Armenian TV. The book of his English poems "The
Ameriacan Pulse" has recently been published by Publish America LLLP,
USA. He is also the editor of The Literary Groong (TLG) webpage on the
Groong Armenian News Network website.