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 Dec 2024 LL
jules
I woke up again today.
the way a dog might wake up
to a kick.
not because I wanted to,
but because the hours don’t wait
and neither does the rent,
and no one cares
if you spend the morning drowning
in yesterday’s whiskey
and last year’s regrets.

the sun drips through the blinds,
thin and pale,
like it knows it’s wasting its light on me.
I light a cigarette,
watch the smoke twist,
and I wonder
how something so fragile
can disappear so easily—
then realize,
I’m not that different.

there’s a woman I loved once.
she had hair like wildfire
and eyes like a question I didn’t know how to answer.
she told me I was a storm
she wanted to walk into,
but she didn’t know
the rain never ends.
she packed her things on a Tuesday.
I tried to stop her,
but my hands were too heavy with all the things
I should’ve said when it mattered.

the world keeps moving forward,
dragging me behind it
like some forgotten wreckage.
I smile at strangers,
say I’m fine when they ask,
but every mirror I pass
whispers the truth:
you’re breaking
and no one even notices the sound.

some nights, I sit in the dark,
just to feel it wrap around me
like the arms I lost.
I drink until I forget,
and I drink until I remember.
it’s a cruel, stupid game,
but it’s the only one I’ve got left.

the thing no one tells you
about being alive
is that sometimes you’re not.
sometimes you’re just walking,
talking, breathing proof
of everything that’s gone wrong.

and when they ask me what I want,
what I need,
what I’m looking for,
I don’t have the words.
because what I want
is to go back,
and what I need
is for the pain to mean something.

but what I’m looking for—
God, what I’m looking for—
is the door out of this room.

and maybe,
just maybe,
someone who notices
I was even there
to close it.
 Dec 2024 LL
Unpolished Ink
Simple
 Dec 2024 LL
Unpolished Ink
To be a poet
is not to burn the paper with your words
but to be heard,
when ink and page and pen are embers
it is the beauty one remembers
 Dec 2024 LL
Larry Berger
Untitled
 Dec 2024 LL
Larry Berger
I went looking
for my mother's grave;
it took me two weeks to find it,
and when I did, I was standing
on it; I actually looked around
to see if anyone else saw
what I had just done
 Dec 2024 LL
Unpolished Ink
5am
 Dec 2024 LL
Unpolished Ink
5am
5am,
snuffed between the fingers of the day
slumming stars and a night not fully broken,
the waking world, its petals still to open
is filled with silent promises unspoken
 Dec 2024 LL
Zywa
As if everything

revolves around me I see --


people flashing by.
Collection "Local traffic"
 Dec 2024 LL
Zywa
We sing and that's how

we make a very good time --


out of the waiting.
Collection "Local interest"
 Dec 2024 LL
Frances Raeburn
Here’s the thing
the missing
never leaves
we just learn
that love
is just as real
from afar.
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