"The heavenly stars are on fire,"
you wrote—so I traced their embers in your lines,
but where’s the smoke?
Perhaps it lingers between syllables,
between a stick figure future and a melting past,
between the chaos you ransom
and the whispers you inflame.

"Some locks need two keys,"
you mused—so tell me, Anaïs,
does poetry need two voices to unlock a moment?
Because your words unfasten thought,
weave mischief into meaning,
turn science into sentiment—
each stanza a blade, a bloom, a rebellion.

You run from hackneyed halls,
freewheeling with Johnny Cash,
eluding rulers and repressive lies—
and somehow, still, you pause
to drop a pizza emoji, a signature,
a hunger that ink alone won’t satisfy.

So tell me, Yale’s ink-stained philosopher,
do you write in crust and cheese too?
Does every stanza deserve a side of marinara?
Because if poetry is fuel,
then surely, you are proof
that pizza and prose
can both be divine addictions.

A tapestry of words I seek to weave,
In the echoes of each poet's breath I believe.
Each verse a spark, each line a flame,
In every soul’s poetry, a world to claim.

From inked hearts, where thoughts unfold,
I find my voice, both young and old.
In every whisper, a rhythm, a sound,
I shall write from their verses, where beauty is found.

Share your thoughts, let me hear your rhyme,
For in your words, I’ll seek my time.
Comment, and in return, I will write—
A verse from you, a reflection of light.

In the sea of voices, together we’ll float,
Each verse a ripple, each word a note.
So share your song, let our poems entwine,
For in every poet’s voice, I too shall shine.

I am still searching, lost in the silent hum,
For one who sees the world as more than just what—
Who wanders, unhurried, through the creatures' breath,
Who feels the pulse of the earth and its depth.

I seek the one who wonders at the moon’s silent gaze,
At the stars that flicker with ancient, untold ways.
A soul who listens to rivers, whose stories unfold,
In the whispers of waters, in the stories they hold.

Not just the grand, but the minute and small—
The flutter of wings, the rise and the fall.
Who sees the beauty in the dust of the earth,
And finds meaning in silence, in sorrow, in birth.

I search for the one who stands still in the crowd,
Who sees the truth in the noise, the faces unbowed.
Who feels the weight of the dark in the light,
And finds peace in the silence, in the stillness of night.

I long for a heart that knows both pain and grace,
That has touched the stars and been lost in the space.
For one who will ponder, who will never be still—
Who questions the world with a mind that can feel.

For I am not seeking a lover or friend,
But a kindred soul, whose thoughts never end.
Someone who embraces both the quiet and loud,
Who lives in the wonder, in the space between crowds.

I am still searching, with my heart in the air—
For the one who will feel, the one who will care.
The one who will wonder, who sees the divine,
In the folds of the cosmos, in the soul’s endless climb.

The sea hums ancient songs,  
pulling me into its salt-laced poem.  
Barefoot, reckless, wild and free,  
I chase the whispers where mermaids flee.  

Your words are waves, restless and true,  
stirring tides in silent blue.  
Each line a shore where echoes meet,  
where longing and freedom softly greet.  

Does trust return on gentle wing,  
like birds that find their way to spring?  
Or once it’s lost, does it remain,  
a shadow cast, a lingering stain?  

Yet even shadows shift with time,  
stitched by light, unstitched by rhyme.  
Where trust has frayed, it learns to mend,  
worn, but never at its end.  

I am the wind, the desert breeze,  
the ocean spray and rustling leaves.  
I am the hush of dawn before the rise,  
the twilight’s breath as shadows creep.  

You are the sigh between each tide,  
a fleeting spark the stars confide.  
Unbound, untamed, you touch and go,  
carrying whispers only the wild will know.  

I am, and I am not,  
in the space between breaths.  
A shadow of light, a whisper of death,  
where time and breath are never what they seem.  

Between dream and wake, you weave a place,  
where fleeting moments leave no trace.  
Yet even as they slip and fade,  
the wind still knows the path you made.  

—For Nancy Maine, whose words wander like the sea and sing like the wind.  

And I—  
I listen close, where silence sways,  
where echoes breathe between the waves.  
For voices like yours never fade—  
they simply find new skies to claim.

In shadows of 2020, your words still linger,
Soft whispers that dance on time's gentle finger.
Like the mystical sky that weeps with grace,
Your verses drip softly, leaving no trace.

Your tears, they seeped through the lines we read,
Like radiance that persists, a light we need.
Where have the unraveled scars gone to hide,
Those marks of growth, where truths collide?

Your mysterious mists still haunt the air,
With empty promises and unspoken care.
Where is the dream that once flew so free,
Like jellyfish effloresce, drifting to be?

The curves of heaven, the grain of truth—
Your words once captured both youth and proof.
Now silence remains where the cursed night drifts,
Where your wobbled strokes once found their shifts.

Where are the glorious jams of your art?
What stilled your pen, what made it depart?
For in your absence, your poetry stays,
Like a mark left behind, lingering always.

We wait for your voice to rise once more,
To hear your spirits and the world you explore.
So tell me, dear poet, where have you been?
Will your ink ever rise, to dance again?

"Flesh—latticed in hush,
pinions bloom along their span—
pearled ache, ascending."
— (Dove in Bloom)

Vianne, you write of ache with wings,
of pain that rises, quiet and silver-lit,
as if sorrow itself could take flight.
Your words breathe in the hush of night,
leaving echoes in the marrow of silence.

"Moon spills in silver—
a fish arcs through drowning light,
the tide gulps its ghost."
— (Eclipsed Tide)

You catch the moment where light drowns,
where loss glows before vanishing.
A fleeting wisp, a spectral inhale—
a beauty held just long enough to ache.

"Willow bows, exhaled—
a hundred arms swaying slow,
braiding hush with time."
— (The Willow’s Breath)

Time does not pass in your verses—
it exhales, it braids itself into the wind,
swaying between presence and absence,
where every whisper lingers.

"Chevy lilts down arteries
stitched in coral marrow,
leather still inked with your laughter."
— (A Note Held Past Silence)

You write memory like it breathes,
like laughter can be sewn into the bones,
like voices don’t fade but dissolve
into the space between heartbeats.

"She dances where gravity forgets,
laughter drips slow as melting wax—
feral, fleeting, free."
— (Tiny Dancer)

There is something wild in your words,
something untamed, yet delicate—
a fleeting step beyond the known,
where even gravity dares not follow.  

Vianne, your poetry lingers—
like dusk humming against the tide,
like the hush before the willow exhales,
like a note held just past silence.

You don’t just write—
you let words breathe,
you let them ache,
you let them be.

And in that—
they are enough.

"In the end of days, elderly women will see visions,
young men will prophecy."
— You foresaw the storm, the whispers in the wind,
writing warnings in fire, in ink, in truth.

"Man should not fear death,
Fear ability to live."
— And so, you lived, not as a shadow passing through,
but as a flame, burning bright in defiance.

"They ask for truth, yet love the lie,
So I ask you—why?"
— You dared to expose the quiet part,
to say aloud what the world tried to hush,
to hold a mirror to the blind.

"Man flaunts eye candy,
lavish garnish, trophy wife."
— Yet you saw beyond the glitter,
beyond the painted masks of power,
choosing substance over shine.

"All that glitters is not gold."
— You walked away from illusion,
from being someone’s prize,
choosing freedom over chains,
knowing your worth beyond the price of a ring.

"Separate church, state,
People’s civil liberties—
Love, love, freed from tyranny."
— Your words rise against silence,
a voice against the tide,
a poet with conviction,
unwilling to let history be rewritten in dust.

And so, I thank you,
for your fire, your truth,
your defiance, your ink.
Your words are not just written—
they are etched into time,
screamed into existence,
refused to be erased.

The road to the middle is paved with good intentions—
but you never walked to the middle,
you walked beyond.